#I’ll get better someday when I figure out the tweaks

[layna-lane]

Diana & Matthew + Diana Kisses

#adow #a discovery of witches #diana bishop #matthew clairmont #my gifs #my first gif set #teresa palmer #matthew goode #can’t believe I finally did this shit #jfc it took forever #I’ll get better someday when I figure out the tweaks

[pantpisser9000]

Combined Together, Chapter 4: Finally assembled

After work, Peso trudged back through the snowy terrain, and walked inside his house. He’d be enjoying all of this before he left. “Ma, I have a huge announcement for dinner.” Peso said, and she looked happy, though was that a hint of sadness in her eyes? Peso didn’t quite know. Physcology wasn’t his field of expertise. Pinto pestered him about it, and Peso just kept on telling him to “wait until dinner” which didn’t stop his insistence. 

Once they had sat down for dinner, they were all expecting Peso. “So, um.. I- you know that job, last night I mentioned?” he asked, and they all nodded. “I’m.. well, I- okay, I accepted it. I’m guaranteed to work there, now.” he said, and Pinto cheered. “Now you’re an adventurer! You better take me on your awesome adventure someday!” his mother looked at Pinto, “Maybe when you’re a little older, sweetie.” she softly said, which Pinto promptly ignored. 

“W-well I’m.. I’m still a medic. Just on a submarine.” Pinto didn’t care, his brother was on a submarine! His tail was wagging like a dog, (Peso honestly didn’t know Penguins did that, but the more you know, right?) and feathers were where ears would usually be.

“Good job,” Pogo commented, clapping a little. Pinata looked impressed too. “I think you’ve outdone yourself, Peso.” she said, agreeing with her twin. His mother looked to be tearing up a little. “I’m.. I’m so happy for you, Peso. Will you be able to call?” she asked, and Peso nodded. “There’s internet on the submarine” he said, which made Pinata’s attention perk up again. “..do you know if they have any open positions?” she asked. Peso guessed by how they were launching soon, they didn’t. “I don’t think so,” he said, laughing a little. 

She sulked a tad at that, and the table burst out in laughter, (she joined in, too) and Peso pushed the thought that said, You’ll miss them so much, is this really the best decision? 

But Peso knew it was, they’d all be fine without him. And he was ecstatic to be helping many many creatures. That night, he went to his room and packed. Pinto helped him, saying that he should bring over one of his comics so he “wouldn’t forget him”, and Peso laughed as he put it in his suitcase, saying, “I don’t think I’ll ever forget you.”

Though, there was one nagging thought he was trying to get rid of. 

What if the crew hates me?

If they did, he’d return. Though, then everyone would be disappointed, right? He’d just.. Not be a yes-man, he had a little more dignity than that, but just.. Stay out of any trouble. There were bound to be fights, of course, though Peso wanted no part in any of them. He wasn’t one to yell, and certainly not anyone to hurt anyone. He didn’t think he could even throw a punch without crying. 

—

The Captain was excited. The team was assembled. Dashi had managed to get to Florida for her last flight, so she was there. Tweak was obviously there, and Kwazii was as well. They’d be cruising over to Scotland, to pick up their marine biologist, Dr.Shellington and the Professor. Then, they’d be going to the arctic to pick up their medic, Dr. Peso. 

“Everyone,” the Captain boomed. Dashi and Tweak, who were talking, looked over, and Kwazii, who had been busy trying to figure out how many flips he could do in a row, steadied himself and looked over as well. “We have our marine biologist and our medic secured. We’ll be heading to Scotland to pick up the biologist and the Professor. Then, to the arctic, to pick up our medic.” 

“That is, if everything’s ready, Tweak?” the Captain asked, and Tweak pulled a carrot out of her pocket, taking a bite. “Everythin’ should be, Cap. Looks good. Dashi?” she asked, and Dashi looked at the screen. “Looks good to me as well.” she said, nodding. “Well, I think it’s time to board, then.” the Captain commanded, motioning for them to get on the Octopod.  

Barnacles watched as they all boarded. First, Tweak. She walked up the ramp into the ‘mouth’ of the Octopod confidently, with Dashi trailing behind her. Kwazii sauntered in after them, tail swishing excitedly behind him and ears perked. Barnacles boarded last, stepping up and pressing the button to lower the ramp. Once they were all in the hq, they were in their places. Kwazii was just kinda hanging out in hq, Tweak in the launch bay, and Dashi at her station. 

The Captain turned on the loudspeaker for all of the workers outside of the ship to hear. “LOWER US!” he commanded, and slowly, but surely, the Octopod was lowered. All of them were standing confidently, or at least sitting. Kwazii and Barnacles both had built up sea-legs, and working as a flight attendant helped Dashi get used to a somewhat similar situation. They didn’t have Tweak on the screen at the moment, she was checking on the gups. 

Soon, it entered the water. Tweak came in through the screens in the hq. “Launch bay filled and Octo-hatch closed.” she told him, motioning backwards. Captain Barnacles came back in through the loudspeakers, “Continue lowering!” he said, and his demands were met immediately. 

And soon, they were consumed by water. Kwazii had his hands pressed to the glass, looking outside. “I’ve never been on a sub before..” he muttered, in awe. Right, Kwazii had never actually been in anything like this before. Neither had Dashi or Tweak, actually, though Dashi didn’t seem as amazed by it. 

“Dashi, activate steering,” he commanded, “On it, Captain.” Dashi replied shortly, pressing the button and the Captain felt the ground under him heighten. “Shiver me whiskers..” was the last thing he heard as he was greeted by the wheel. He placed his hands confidently on it, and began steering. He’d be just getting them out of the port, and then automatic steering (with the assistance of Dashi) would take over. 

Weaving through, they got through without a problem. The Captain lowered himself, before commanding, “Put on the automatic steering, Dashi.” he requested, and Dashi once again said, “On it.”, and almost autonomously doing it. Suppose Tweak’s preparation programs worked well. Barnacles thought, hands behind his back. Kwazii walked up to him, standing beside him. He didn’t address him, for some reason. “Scotland, right?” he asked. 

“Yes, Kwazii.” Barnacles replied, which he nodded at. “I never have gone.” he commented, and Barnacle was slightly expecting that. “Where have you been, exactly?” he questioned, and Kwazii thought for a moment. “Well I’m from.. Uh.. well, wherever I’m from, all the oceans and seas, and now Florida. And soon Scotland.” he said. “You don’t remember where you’re from?” Barnacles asked. 

Sure, he knew Kwazii had a few.. Issues with remembering anything from before his pirate days, (that he refused to talk about more than just the stories he shared about sea monsters) the guy literally hadn’t remembered what a bathtub was. Of course, Kwazii never admitted that, though Barnacles could tell just by his reaction and the delay of turning it on and the clear confused shuffling around in the bathroom. 

Though Kwazii also couldn’t really read too well, (and while Barnacles had no interest in sharing that–Kwazii’d probably be incredibly embarrassed if he did, and also hold a grudge for a while) and couldn’t really do math either, at the very least the Captain had expected him to know where he came from. “Naw,” Kwazii said. He seemed unbothered, though it was a tad hard to read the guy. “Hm. Interesting.” Was all the Captain said, and to him, Kwazii looked like he was itching to say more, though he certainly didn't want to pry. Plus, this was his co-worker, and he didn’t think they were close enough for him to ask more. So they just stood there awkwardly for a moment, until Kwazii walked away, over to the Octochute. “Kwazii? Do you.. Know how to use it?” the Captain enquired, and Kwazii whipped his head back. “Uhh- aye.” 

Barnacles, an eyebrow raised, wasn’t quite impressed. “Mhm. How about I show you, just in case?” he said, and Kwazii, pursing his lips, reluctantly agreed. “Aye, alright.” The Captain jumped, and the chute opened as he was going down, making him pummel down the metal-slide-like thing. He arrived in the small room in between–it was about the space of a small elevator, or an American bathroom stall. 

Kwazii jumped out right after him, his stance wide. To be fair, he’d never done it before. “Me rooms.. Wait, Cap, that ain’t– me name is spelled k, w, a, z, i, i.. Not k, w, a, z, z, i..” he noted, and Captain looked at the sign on his door. “Oh. Apologies, Kwazii. I’ll get that updated soon. Just a bit surprisedj you.. Noticed..” he said, coughing to hide the comment. 

“Hey! Just cus I be unable to.. Read.. all that well.. Doesn’t mean I can’t recognize me own name!” he said, a little mad. “Sorry, sorry.” the Captain apologized, which Kwazii shrugged at. “It be alright.” 

Why was Kwazii so difficult to understand? The Captain thought briefly, but then he remembered Kwazii wasn’t raised regularly. He didn’t seem to remember much if anything before he got picked up by those pirates, (Barnacles was still unsure when and how that had happened-surely his parents had been worried, right?) and lived on a boat for clearly a very very long time. 

The Captain was unsure how long, of course, Kwazii didn’t even know his own age (which was a whole other can of worms) and while Kwazii had shared more personal things.. He really didn’t know much about the guy. He trusted him enough to be on the ship, (while Kwazii was less of an actual lieutenant/second in command at the moment, he was more so just a helper/assistant at the moment) and he knew he had a good heart but his pirate past was truly mysterious as hell. 

Kwazii stepped in his room, glancing around. Barnacles looked in behind him briefly. There.. Wasn’t much. Only one box. To be fair, Kwazii had bought a thing or two in Florida, so there was a tad more than what he had before. 

Barnacles decided to leave Kwazii to it though, instead opting to go to his own room, which had a lot more boxes. While he didn’t have too much control over it, as his polar-bear side came out just whenever he needed more strength or he assumed likely under intense stress as well, he could sometimes control it a little more. Grunting, he managed to get hands almost fully polar-bear like–at least enough so that his claws were out. (and his more Polar-bear like ears) Slicing his claw through the tape on all the boxes, he balled up his fist and the fur and ears went away. 

Opening up box by box, he put his other pajamas in his closet first, set up his small cubby-shelf thingy, putting his few books away in it. Hanging up his pictures near his bed, and decorating his room with the other things he had brought with him–he was just a tad surprised he had been able to finish so quickly. It was nice Tweak had the idea of asking everyone what type of wallpaper they wanted–for almost all the rooms, too. There were still a few unfinished things decor wise, though. Mainly just painting the GUPS and working on the helmets, which Tweak would likely start with once she was 100% sure everything was working. 

Stepping out of his room, the Captain launched himself down the chute, landing standing up, hands on his hips in the hq. “Dashi, is everything looking good?” he asked, and she swiveled back to look at him. “Yes, Captain. No storms or anything in sight, either.” the Captain nodded. “Wonderful.” he was very stern-sounding, or at least he hoped he did. As the Captain, he needed to be the most professional out of all them, by far. Besides maybe Inkling, but the guy was just professional by nature– no need to try hard.

The Captain decided to look at the Garden–they unfortunately, didn’t have anyone to do the cooking and gardening for them specifically, so the Octonauts themselves would have to do it. He.. didn’t know too much about Gardening, though he knew Tweak did. Luckily, at the very least, they wouldn’t have to worry about their clothes getting dirty quite yet. They hadn’t actually gotten their uniforms–he knew Inkling was actually working on them getting them made, while in Scotland. Tweak was making some sort of special collar (like a fancy shirt’s collar, not one for a pet) that would basically give them a bubble/helmet so that they could breathe underwater in an instant, as well as a radio. He knew that was her priority over painting the GUPS–he was a little worried if she could get it done before they got their last member. 

He then remembered he had to come up with a few things so that everyone could get to know each other–he and Inkling had both discussed a sort of name game, and Barnacles decided he wanted to narrow it down just a little more. There was one he’d done in Polar scouts when it had first started, Professor Natquik had taught it to them. 

Basically, everyone got in a circle, and the first person would say their name and then have a little motion, for example a clap. Then the next person would say their name and a new motion, then everyone would say the new person’s name and motion, then the previous person’s name and motion, and so on until everyone in the circle’s name had been said. He honestly liked that one–maybe it was because it was one he had familiarized himself with, though. 

He considered asking one of the other members, though part of him also wanted it to be a bit of a surprise, so he decided not to. 

Launching himself to the garden chute, he looked at all of it. He knew they had an automatic sprinkling system, so they didn’t need to water it manually, though they still needed to check to 1; make sure said system was working, 2; check to see if any of the crops were ready. Tweak had planted them herself, (Her father had actually came over to help her, he knew more about farming anywho) and Barnacles trusted that it’d work well. 

…It was a tad boring at the moment… 

Though Kwazii was bored at the moment, sitting in his new, nice, non-hammock bed, tossing his yarn ball in the air, he knew it’d up in action after their missions actually started, and they got the rest of the crew. He had only crashed a few times in that training simulator, but to be fair, he thought the fake-subs could maneuver quicker! He hoped that the real submarines, the ‘GUPS’ as they were called, could move faster! How were they supposed to do awesome tricks–er, save creatures, if the GUPS were slow! 

Kwazii knew they had to wait till everything was done and they had the rest of the crew, but that didn’t mean he didn’t wanna zoom around in a fast GUP everywhere, weaving through.. Coral, or something. As long as Kwazii had spent sailing, he honestly didn’t really know much about anything under the water. Besides the sea monsters, of course! That was one of the few things he had remembered from his childhood, (and one of the few things he would likely share from his pirate life) were the tales Calico Jack had told him about the fearsome beasts that laid just under the surface! 

Kwazii was excited to slay those foul beasties! He was certain he’d find at least one, even if that might mean sneaking out to find one. He had a feeling that the other members wouldn’t quite believe him, especially those more serious ones. Namely that dog girl and he was certain that the scientist guy wouldn’t… He might hold off on speaking about them until either they were actively relevant or he just knew the rest of the crew better.

Obviously, Kwazii knew he likely couldn’t ever trust the rest of his crew, after what had happened with Wo-.. him, Kwazii knew that he had to go by his gut. His own morals. Not let anyone tell him what to do, unless they had the same plan or ideas. He had a few goals while he was staying with the Octonauts, too. (it was entirely possible that while the Captain had accepted him, and the Professor, (who seemed a tad apprehensive during the interview, even though Kwazii was OBVIOUSLY a good pirate) had let him join, and those two girls he was with now at the very least didn’t mind him, that the others..? They might HATE him. So, therefore, they could get him kicked off, since it was likely that the others would believe them over a pirate like himself.) 

The main goals (some were more so just rules, not goals, but Kwazii didn’t care enough to distinguish those) were;

1: Encounter/slay/fight at least one monster

2: Not let anyone know about his lack in actual subjects like reading, math, and science and history too. 

3: Don't trust anyone. As nice as they might seem, Kwazii knew better than to actually trust people. He liked the Captain, sure, but he would never actually trust him. 

4: Do not let anyone know about the majority of his pirate life. He wasn’t sure if the Blackclaw pirates were infamous or not, so it was better just not to mention that he was a part of that crew, or him at all. He’d probably lie and say he wasn’t with a crew for most of his life. 

Now, he was still bored. Jumping back down the chute, he wobbly landed out in the hq. He took a glance out the window–unsurprisingly, it was just water. Disappointed there were no sea monsters, he pouted a little. Though, he supposed it was a good idea to get to know the ship, explore a bit if you will. So, he hopped in the chute, and popped out in a hallway. 

He looked, and there were three doors. One for the library, one for the infirmary, and one for the laboratory. He was glad there were pictures, not words, in all honesty. While he wasn’t.. Super interested in the library, he was a little curious on how big it was. 

“Shiver me whiskers..” he muttered as he wandered in, it was huge–larger then he was expecting, at least. He had no interest in reading any of the books, obviously, though that was partially because he couldn’t (or at least not well) and partially because he’d likely find all of those books boring. He walked out as quickly as he had walked in. He took a glance in the laboratory and infirmary, but they seemed a little… barren. Sure, there was stuff in them, but no decor, and certainly not as much stuff as he had expected. And, he didn’t want to touch anything in either room in fear of accidentally breaking anything. Walking back to a chute, he jumped down, landing in a large, spacious area with a pool of water. And he heard some tinkering sounds, so he followed where his ears took him, and they led him to an area with some pipes and that Tweak girl working on some stuff. “Aye, matey.” he said. He wasn’t really worried about bothering her–it wasn’t like if she was startled she would drop something that could hurt her or anything of the nature. She whipped her head back, blinking. “Heya,” she said, confusion littered across her face. “What’re you doin’ here?” she asked, and Kwazii shrugged. “I be bored.” he said, and she stuck out her tongue, thinking. “Y’know, y’ could help me paint the gups. I needed some help with that, anyways.” she said, putting down her tool and walking over to Kwazii. “I’ve already done the GUP A, so you can start with the GUP B.” she said, pointing at an almost sharkish-torpedo like metal structure. It looked fast. Kwazii smirked “Issit fast?” he asked, and Tweak grinned. “Fastest I’ve got. Proud of er. I have some paint cans ‘n brushes over by where I was workin, if ya wanna take em.” she said, and Kwazii nodded. He took a can of orangish paint, (and was very grateful the cans had their colors colored on them) and some white and black, and a few brushes. Tweak seemed relieved she’d be getting help with it. He sat down, in that one pose that adults told you not to sit in when you were a kid cus it was ‘bad for you’ (basically on your knees but with your legs spread out instead of next to each other) and dipped the paintbrush in the orange, beginning to paint the GUP. He was just happy to have a distraction. Tweak wasn’t one he expected to be for small talk, but he was open to it once she started. “So, how’d ya get selected?” she asked, still tinkering away. Kwazii snickered a little, “Well, ya see, I be on a.. Raft, of sorts. An’, when gettin’ parts or somethin’, he found me out on th’ open ocean.” he explained. “Why were ya on a raft?” she asked, and Kwazii was silent for a moment. He wasn’t a (extreme) liar, though he also wasn’t going to explain the real situation. “...just was.” he responded. He was grateful when Tweak seemed to get the hint and didn’t pry. 

“Howabout you? How’d y’ be selected?” Kwazii asked, and Tweak replied quickly. “I was workin’ for this repair company, an’ the Professor came in, wanting a engineer, and while my manager declined completely, I overheard and reached out. We discussed plans and ideas, and I ended up being the main engineer.” 

Kwazii, dipping the paintbrush back in the paint and making another stroke on the GUP, “That be pretty great. Wait,” Kwazii blinked, looking away from his work. “Did ya make ALL of this?” he asked, and Tweak chuckled. “Yup. The Octopod herself, the GUPS, everythin’.” Even to Kwazii, that was a massive feat. He wasn’t one to compliment most of the time, though that was certainly, “Impressive,” he said. He tried not to show too much awe. Didn’t want to give her the wrong impression.

“Thanks.” she simply said, before asking another question. Kwazii would obviously never trust her, but her talking to him was nice. “What color are ya paintin’ her?” she asked, and Kwazii replied “Orange. It’s the best color, after all.” he said, grinning. “Pft, right. Clearly green’s the best!” she said, and they both laughed. “Naw, naw, orange. I mean, it’s the color of me fur!” he said, and Tweak chuckled. 

“Well green’s the color of my fur–or, hair, I guess.” she bantered back, to which Kwazii playfully responded, “Well, I be better though, so,” and for a moment Tweak was silent, and Kwazii wondered if she was a tad less blunt and.. Able to handle that kinda thing then he thought, though that thought was proven wrong immediately. “Oh, right? May I remind ya who designed the very ship yer paintin?” she asked, jokingly. 

“That may be true, but I could beat y’ in a fight, I’m sure!” Kwazii bragged, and at first he thought maybe Tweak’d leave it at that point. Until, “Prove it.” she challenged. “Does that be a challenge?” he asked, and he heard the sound of a tool being put on the table, and Tweak walked out of the pipe room, readying her fists. “Yes it does.” she said, grinning. Kwazii placed the paintbrush back in the can, and stood up. “Let’s go.” he said, readying his own fists. “No claws, no serious harm,” Tweak said, which Kwazii agreed on. Especially since they didn’t have a medic yet. “Just fun.” she finished, and Kwazii nodded, and “3, 2, 1!” 

Kwazii pounced, hands on her shoulders, pinning her down (in a non-sexual way, just to be clear. These bitches are FIGHTING, and not in the ‘fighting with their tongues way’) and before he could declare himself the winner, Tweak butted him in the stomach with her knee, making him fall back a bit. “Yow!” was all he exclaimed, as Tweak stood on him 

“Hah! I won. Faster than ya could say buncha munchy crunchy carrots!” she said, triumphantly. Kwazii grinned, though a little embarrassed he lost. “I’ll beatcha once we get that medic,” he said, sharp teeth gleaming. “Sureee.” Tweak responded, hands still confidently on her hips and head tilted to the side. Kwazii actually looked at her now–he hadn’t really thought about what anybody looked like, but now he realized that line earlier implied her hair was naturally green. He certainly couldn’t judge her outfit though, (black tanktop and jeans) because one, he definitely didn’t have ANY sense of fashion, he was wearing some of the Captain’s old clothes, after all. Grey t-shirt that was way too large on his skinny frame, and jeans that would be quite tight on the captain that weren’t at all on Kwazii. 

“Wait, yer hair naturally be green?” he asked, genuinely, and she just nodded confidently. “Yup! Pretty great, yeah?” Kwazii nodded. “That be true. What, y’ part plant or somethin?” he questioned, and Tweak laughed. “Naw, rabbit.” she said, and confusion washed over Kwazii’s face. “Rabbits be green?” he asked, now even more clueless. “I don’t think any other rabbits besides me an’ me Pa are.” Tweak replied, shrugging. 

“Well, shiver me whiskers..” Kwazii muttered, and Tweak held out her hand, which Kwazii took, dusting himself off. “I.. I should be gettin’ back t’ painting.” he said, grinning. “And I’ll get back t’ makin’ our helmet-radio-neckcoverings.” she said, and before Kwazii could express his confusion she said, “You’ll see later.”

Kwazii pursed his lips–he wanted to know what the hell she meant by that, (and badly ) though even if his patience was practically non-existent, he had a feeling she wouldn’t let up. She seemed a lot more.. Well, patient. And very persistent. So, he walked back over to the GUP B, picking up his paintbrush and sloshing it in the orange paint, as he heard the twisting in of parts.

Tweak had her tongue stuck out–that wire just wasn’t getting in place properly, it was almost creating a little mountain of sorts of itself, so she gave it a little hit on the side and it was in well. That little fight she had just had with Kwazii was entertaining–she found it a little funny how full of himself he was. And the gall he had to say he’d win the next time! 

Though she appreciated him painting the GUP B, it would save her a little time later. She had the sneaking suspicion he wouldn’t help paint any other of the GUPS, though, since he already seemed infatuated with the GUP B. It made sense, he clearly wanted something to go fast (he had said that was why he had crashed in the simulation–he thought the simu-GUPS would go faster) and like she had said, the GUP B was by far her fastest. 

She was proud of it–it would be good for missions where someone needed to dive down and scoop something up, or evade someone dangerous, or just distract someone or something. It was good. She had a feeling it’d be wrecked by Kwazii often enough, so she was glad she had so much extra material. 

Eventually, Kwazii had announced he was done, and promptly (just like Tweak was expecting) he left, off to do his own thing. It was too bad, Tweak would’ve enjoyed some company. Tweak knew that Dashi girl was busy, doing checks and everything, though she wondered how the hell she’d be able to sit in that chair all day! Tweak always had to be tinkering, personally, or at least moving or something!Genuinely, she had no idea how that girl was able to keep that together. Though, she did appreciate the help with the wifi stuff and the ideas that Dashi had brought forward–again, mainly about the wifi, but still. It was a good idea, after all. Would make it easier to contact most of their families, (besides Tweak’s own Pa, old guy refused to use any ‘gadgets’ or ‘gizmos’ like Tweak did) and even improved stuff like the storm and creature tracking, plus some radio things. 

After popping one more thing into place, the helmet was complete! Well, not completely, it would obviously need to look a lot better, since currently it was metal, so she’d need fabric, but, other than that, it was done! She clipped it onto her neck, and decided it was time for a test run. Grabbing oxygen tanks and hooking them up seamlessly, she turned on the helmet. It covered her entire head, just as planned. Jumping into the water, it worked perfectly, no water got in. 

She swam around a little bit, (ignoring the annoying texture of wet fabric on her skin–she forgot she hadn’t gotten the water-proof outfit quite yet) and it was still working wonderfully, and when she resurfaced, she clicked the button and it went away in an instant. Perfect. She thought to herself, and then she decided to look over at the GUP B–it was actually surprisingly well painted. 

Yes, it was painted that orange color, but it was done well. She should’ve expected the eyes and teeth, too. She decided to go over it and make the teeth a little rounder at the ends–not enough that Kwazii would notice, obviously, just so hopefully nobody would be scared of it. She doubted they would be–it was clearly a submarine, not an actual animal, though she knew how stupid some people could be, so she didn’t want to take the chance.  

The rest of the week kinda dragged–The Captain, obviously, in his good heart came to visit her a few times, making sure she was alright, bringing her food, (he told her that once the whole team was together that they’d all be eating in the dining area for all the meals, just to make sure everyone was eating. Tweak wondered why anyone wouldn’t eat, though she also realized she was kinda a hypocrite for that thought. There were too many times where she skipped a proper meal in favor of engineering and instead snacking on carrots.) and just generally checking on everything. Asked if the development on everything was going well. 

Well, there was one time when Dashi came down. 

“Dashi?” Tweak asked, confused, paintbrush mid-air. (A drop ending up dripping on the floor, making a tiny tiny puddle) “Hello, Tweak. We’re very close to a hard-to-steer through area, and it’ll be dark soon, and the Captain doesn’t favor driving through that kind of thing in darkness, so we’ve stopped a little early.” she said, smiling.

“I appreciate ya comin’ down, but couldn’t you of told me over the speakers?” Tweak questioned, cocking her head to the side. “Oh, well, I was thinking I could help with the painting.” she offered, and Tweak grinned. “Lemme getcha a paintbrush.” she said, walking over to the astutely named ‘pipe room’ to grab another paintbrush, and some paint. “I’m finishin’ up with the GUP C right now, so if you wanna help with D, that’d be wonderful.” she said, and Dashi glanced at the color. “Yellow?” she asked, a little confused. 

“Yup. Figured, as it’s by far the most.. ‘Different’, of the GUPS, should have th’ most stand-out color.” she said, and Dashi sat down next to her, picking up the paintbrush, dipping it in the yellow paint and beginning to lather the GUP D in it. “How is it the most different? I will say, yellow is a wonderful colour, though.” 

Tweak, now focused again on painting the GUP C, responded, “Well, you see, it’s th’ only GUP that can really maneuver on land, fer starters. It has,” and she put the word in air quotes, paintbrush back in the can, “‘legs’, that can extend out when needed. It’s modeled after a crab, so it’s also the only GUP–besides the GUP C’s towline–that can really grab onto anythin’”, she said, accentuating the ‘grab’ both in her tone of voice and making a little grabby hand motion.  

Dashi nodded, making another elegant stroke across the gup. “Speakin’ of colors, though, what’s yer favorite, Dashi?” Tweak asked, tilting her head. “My favorite colour? Hm.. It might be a little basic–but pink.” she said, and Tweak thought that made sense. Dashi seemed like a classic girl’s girl in all honesty–Tweak had never been interested in any of that, in all honesty. Maybe it was because she never grew up with it–living a little more isolated made her.. While not antisocial, she thought she could hold up a good conversation in her opinion, she didn’t have much exposure to most girly things. 

Her Pa was–expectantly–never was interested in again, more feminine things. So Tweak was never exposed to things like makeup or more fem clothes (like skirts and dresses) or just really any of that. So, she was never interested in it, ever. But she assumed Dashi likely was–maybe Dashi’s mother liked all of that stuff or maybe Dashi just ended up actually being exposed to that through ads and stuff. It wasn’t really Tweak’s business to pry, any who.

“Oh, fair. I think it’s a fine color–it is the color of my headband, after all,” Tweak responded, which was true. It was the one thing that could even remotely be considered girly, at all, that her Pa had gotten her. Dashi laughed. “Looks good on you!” she said, and Tweak felt herself blush a little. It was nice to be complimented, after all. 

Their conversation was a good one–Tweak was glad she was bonding with someone, it really was nice. Eventually, after finishing painting those two and the GUP E, Dashi went off to bed and Tweak played games before tucking herself under the covers of her own bed as well.

The day after that, Captain Barnacles had everyone come up to the hq. “Everyone, the area we will be steering through next is.. Rocky, to say the least. I recommend putting anything that could more easily fall over in a more secure area. Along with that, by the time we get to the medic’s, we need you to fill out this form. It’s.. basically medical history, since he needs to know all of that incase if–and hopefully this doesn’t happen of course,--anything happens to anyone and either he needs to put you on anything or just in general.” 

Kwazii let out a groan, (and he did not care to hide his annoyance) to which Captain Barnacles said, “Kwazii, remember to include all intense injuries.” he said, and Kwazii pursed his lips. “...does surgery count?” he asked, and confusion washed over the Captain’s face. “...Well, I’d presume you should mention it, just not under injuries.” he said, and Kwazii nodded. “..Right.” was all he said. “Now, everyone, to their stations. It could get very difficult to steer through here, so we need to make sure everything’s secure. Tweak, head to the launch bay, and if she needs any help, Kwazii join her. Otherwise, you stay here with Dashi in hq.”

Everyone agreed, Tweak launched herself down the chute, and made sure all the GUPS were secured. They were, fortunately. She secured her games away, actually made her bed for once so her blanket wouldn’t fall off as easily, and did that dusting hands off motion. 

She felt the ship lurch to the side, and she grabbed onto the control panel to steady herself, knees bent to help with her balance. It lurched to the other side, and her cheek squished against the metal of the ship’s wall, and she decided to make a run for it to get a better grip on one of the pipes in that one room, and fortunately it didn’t end in her being chucked into the launch bay’s pool of water, and she managed to get over there, grabbing onto one of the pipes for support. It was one of the thicker ones–she knew it would have better support. 

Tweak was gripping onto that pipe for much too long–knuckles white from the intense holding. It lasted for about 10 minutes too long, and Tweak was sweating egregiously after the whole ordeal. Breathing in and out, she decided to go to hq, hopping in the chute and hopping out in the hq. “Howdy,” she said. 

Dashi was still gripping on her chair, pink nails digging in, but her face was calm and collected. Kwazii radiated confidence, though Tweak had a feeling it was a facade. When the Captain came down, he was.. Very calm. Not a hint of scaredness behind those dark eyes. “Everyone, did anything go wrong?” he asked, and Tweak shook her head no. “Nothin’. I had to grip onto some pipes–but no tools or GUPs got harmed.” she said, and Dashi nodded. “The chairs were.. Kinda sliding all over, but no one got hurt. Kwazii seemed to enjoy sitting up on the table.” 

Kwazii’s face went red. “Hey!” “Wonderful. I’m glad no one got hurt, especially without a medic. Speaking of, there’s some form everyone needs to fill out.” he said, looking at Dashi. “They should be on the computer, if you could print them out, Dashi?” he asked, and Dashi nodded sharply. “On it, Captain.” she swiveled back over to look back on the screen, tapped a few things, and it was printed out quickly. “It’d be better for everyone to do it now, but does anything they need to do first?” he asked, and Tweak thought before shaking her head. “I’ve got nothing.” Kwazii said, and Dashi similarly said, “I don’t have any pressing duties.” 

So, the Captain grabbed all but one from Dahsi and handed them to Tweak and Kwazii, and Tweak sat down at the table in the hq, pulling out a pen from the sealed pencil holder. Kwazii grabbed one too. Tweak.. Didn’t want to judge, or be mean, but Kwazii was definitely not holding the pencil the right way. 

He had his hand in a fist with the pencil stuck through, and he was very clearly writing with individual lines instead of each letter conjoined properly or using any sort of curves. Tweak decided to ignore Kwazii’s chicken-scratch writing, though, and decided to focus on filling out her own form. 

Her name and species were, obviously, incredibly easy questions. (Tweak Rabbitson and, obviously, rabbit)  She had no past major injuries, no surgeries, the only medication she was on was birth control (for period pains), she had no mental illnesses or physical ones (to her knowledge, at least) and she didn’t think there was anything else that would be relevant in a medical sense. 

She was a little curious on exactly how the new marine biologist, and medic, would act. The names never were mentioned, and she knew nothing about them. She just hoped they’d be good at driving the GUPS.

Shellington had all of his stuff packed up–he was actually staying in a hotel, as he wanted to get out of his dorm quickly. Inkling was actually still in Scotland–apparently they had decided on picking up him and the Professor in Scotland, then going to the Antarctic to pick up their medic. Shellington, obviously, didn’t mind though. He had said bye to Pearl already, as he wasn’t entirely sure exactly when they’d be arriving and just wanted to get it in just in case. Pearl was happy for him, clearly, and had only demanded he visit her(which really didn’t need to be said–he was obviously going to visit her at some point, and he was definitely going to talk to her over the phone at some point). Sure, he had to fill out this little medical sheet, but it was easy. He basically just had to put in his name, species, and then answered some variation of “no” or “none” to almost all of the questions. 

Well, he did say that he slightly suspected he wasn’t neurotypical. But other than that he didn’t really need to write any other letters other than “N” “O” “E”, again not including his name/species. He was curious about the crew, though Inkling insisted on everyone meeting each other being a surprise of sorts. Shellington didn’t see the point, though he supposed he could deal. All of his stuff was packed up, and even though Inkling said that he’d be provided with supplies and everything he needed, Shellington still wanted to bring his own stuff. For two reasons–one, he wasn’t completely sure exactly what Inkling thought he ‘needed’, and two, he didn’t really have anywhere to put his stuff. He’d prefer not to bury it or force it on his sister, so it was better to take it with him. 

Shellington was also ecstatic when he found out his room was also part of the lab–wasn’t that wonderful? If he wanted to research something or test something in the middle of the night, he could without worrying about people hearing him creep through the halls of the ship. It was wonderful. Something he wasn’t as excited about the fact that he’d likely have to help with gardening, and god forbid cooking. All Shellington knew how to make was pasta, (and that was barely!) and he had somehow managed to burn that. 

To say the least, he wasn’t exactly the best cook or baker. He was glad when he found out Inkling would be doing a lot of the cooking, or at least helping with it, since he didn’t really have a secure role. Unlike Shellington, who had a role as a marine biologist, he mainly just chilled in the library. He had obviously wanted to go on the expedition, he just.. Wasn’t interested in doing everything. 

While Shellington had to admit he wasn’t super interested in the ‘protect’ and ‘rescue’ aspects, those seemed a little too high action for him, the ‘explore’ bit was right up his alley. And he was sure he’d be able to do so much research! Living underwater in a submarine that’s constantly traveling around the ocean meant he could research so much! And, Inkling even mentioned how they could head into the deep cavernous trenches of the ocean, which would let up so many research opportunities. 

Basically, TL;DR, he was excited for this. And the rest of the crew, (the rest of the Octonauts , he realized) was likely going to be there either tomorrow or the day after. 

—

The Professor had called him at 4pm that next day. “Shellington, the ship’s here. Come to the port,” he had said, and Shellington scrambled, grabbing everything. He had already checked everything about 7 times over, and he glanced around his hotel room to make sure he had everything–fortunately, he did. Walking out of his hotel, walking to the port, and he saw Inkling. And he saw it. As he approached Inkling, he asked, “Is that.. It?” And Inkling nodded. “Quite wonderful, don’t you think?” he asked, and Shellington was speechless. 

It was beautiful. It was clearly modeled off of an octopus, before the whole hybridization thing. The ‘head’, which its mouth doubled as a sort of opening hatch, (that currently had a ramp attached) and four arms all with large rooms attached. He could see a garden, a sort of play room with a ping-pong table, and two that seemed to have bedrooms. Inkling smiled, looking at Shellington, before motioning with his head to go up. Shellington walked up, bag rolling behind him, and as he walked in, there was a ladder. 

A woman with mint green hair and a pinkish headband waved to him from the top. “Sorry, this is usually filled with water–ain’t right now, though, obviously. Just leave yer suitcase–we’ll get it, and just climb up the latter.” she instructed, and Shellington nodded, still in awe. He clamored up the latter, and looked around. “Mind waitin fer a moment?” she asked, and Shellington gave a thumbs-up. “I don’t mind.” 

“Great.” she said, looking back down the empty bay. “Prof, can you climb up the ladder?” she asked, and he probably nodded or something because she said, “Great” again, and soon Inkling had climbed up the latter too, and Tweak pushed over a box. “There’s a much better chair in hq. You’ll see.” she said, grinning. “But, while I grab yer guy’s bags, do you mind showin’ Dr…” she looked to Shellington. He didn’t say anything for a moment, before realizing she was asking him his name, discreetly. “Just Shellington.” he said, and she nodded. “Do ya mind showin’ Dr. Just Shellington how to use the chute?” she asked. Shellington almost corrected her, but decided there was time for that later. 

“I can do that,” the Professor said, and pointed towards the chute. “As you can see, this is a chute–it’s attached to tubes, that deliver us where we need to go. I’ll demonstrate, and you just follow right after.” he said, and Shellington blinked, a little surprised, before saying, “Fascinating.” 

Just then, the Professor catapulted himself down the tube, and once he couldn’t hear the Professor, he shrugged, and launched himself down it as well. He landed flat on his face in the hq–where the other crew members were. He looked up, and the Professor seemed to have a sort of hovering chair, that must’ve been what she was talking about, he thought, and he looked at the others. A clearly cat-hybrid, with long-medium gingerish hair, cat ears (one with a little nip in it) and tail displayed, an eyepatch, and his face littered in freckles. A man with dark skin, white buzzcut, and a squarish mustache who he assumed was the Captain, and oh my goodness was that- “ DASHI?” he exclaimed, who immediately swiveled around, a look of confusion on her face. “Shellington?” 

“You two know each other?” the white haired man asked, to which Shellington got off the floor, dusting himself off, and nodded. “Yes, we met at a cafe a little while back. I didn’t expect this to be the job you mentioned,” he said, looking around now. It was circular, like he was expecting from how it looked on the outside. There were some screens and a LOT of controls, some chairs, a table or two as well. 

“I was wondering if you two would meet.” Inkling said, and Dashi and Shellington both looked at him. “I should elaborate, yes?” Both nodded, and everyone else was still at least a little confused. “Well, I was in Scotland because I know there was a school that taught marine biology there, and also because Dashi was heading there on account of being a flight attendant and was able to get me a slight discount. So, I knew you two were both there. Therefore, you could hypothetically meet.” he concluded, and now that Shellington was thinking it over, it made sense. 

“Well, either way, everyone meet Dr. Shellington–who hasn’t already, I mean.” the Captain said, and Shellington clarified quickly, just as the woman from earlier was coming up through the chute, “Oh, you can just call me Shellington,” he said. She looked a little embarrassed, (probably because she accidentally called him the wrong thing) though didn’t say anything. 

“Though, everyone should introduce themselves. I’m Captain Barnacles,” the Captain told him, and Shellington was glad he assumed right on that aspect. “I be Kwazii,” the Cat said, grinning. He thought silently, He must be a pirate or something. I doubt Inkling would hire one with a criminal record, though, so he’s probably a former one or one who didn’t actually do anything bad. He concluded. The woman spoke up, one hand on her hip as she took out a carrot. “I’m Tweak–the engineer.” she said, and Shellington nodded. That made sense. He was a bit curious about her affinity for carrots, though didn’t want to pry. 

“Tweak, can you start filling the launch bay again so we can set for the Antarctic?” Barnacles asked, and she nodded. “Faster than you can say buncha munchy crunchy carrots–er, actually, it might be a little longer than that..” she seemed to contemplate silently as she jumped back down the chute. Shellington was just impressed she was able to land upright–he certainly couldn’t. 

The Captain turned to Kwazii. “Kwazii, since you’re not doing anything, can you show Shellington around?” he asked, and while Shellington was a little silently disappointed that it wasn’t Dashi, he knew she was busy. “Aye!” he turned towards Shellington, a grin plastered on his freckled face. 

“C’mon, where do you wanna see first?” he asked, and Shellington thought for a moment. “The Laboratory, of course.” he decided, and Kwazii shrugged. “Aye, then. Follow me,” he said, walking to a chute and motioning for Shellington to follow. He did a front flip before jumping in, exclaiming “Yeow!” and Shellington jumped in, bracing to get launched out. Kwazii landed on his two feet, and Shellington managed to at first, but then stumbled and fell onto the carpet. Confusion washed over his face. Carpet? Shouldn’t we be in the lab? He thought silently, looking up. Oh. A hallway. He quickly stood up brushing off his knees. 

“You’ll get it eventually, matey.” Kwazii reassured, which Shellington silently appreciated, and Kwazii walked over to a door, which automatically opened. “Well, this be the ner-” he coughed into his arm, stopping himself. “Lab. Enjoy yerself.” 

Ignoring the obvious accidental Kwazii calling him a nerd, (which, to be fair, he kinda was) he looked around. It was wonderful–the wallpaper was what he would’ve loved, and it was primarily green, his favorite color! He set his stuff down to his bed, glad that his suitcase had already been delivered there. He looked around the room–it had some things he hadn’t previously, like a microscope and once he looked in a few cabinets, an unholy amount of test tubes, which only added to his happiness. 

While he was tempted to start organizing everything, he figured he should see the rest of the ship. “I’ll… let’s look at some other stuff–I’ll come back and organize later,” Shellington said aloud. Kwazii grinned. “Good. No offense.” he said, and Shellington took no offense. (he kinda ignored the comment entirely, actually) Kwazii walked out, motioning to the infirmary. “That’s the medical place. I don’t think we be allowed in, yet.” Kwazii said. 

“That’s logical.” Shellington commented, and Kwazii nodded, motioning to the library. “It’s real big. Lotsa books. Personally, not interested.” Kwazii said, shrugging. “You don’t seem like the one for books,” he said, and Kwazii looked a little nervous. “Somethin’ like that.” which added to his suspicion, but he honestly didn’t care enough to really pry. He took a glance inside, and damn, Kwazii wasn’t lying. 

There were a ton of books–Shellington assumed the Professor had a lot, but not this many! He glanced around, seeing that there were books on marine biology–a decent amount of them seemed to be, actually. He walked over, skimming them, not noticing the annoyed Kwazii in the background. It was all topics he knew, of course, so he didn’t read any at the moment, though he decided if he felt he needed to freshen up, he would come there. He looked to Kwazii, who was tapping his foot impatiently and gazing off into space. “Kwazii, is there anything else in the hallway or…?” 

Kwazii, a bit surprised, looked back at Shellington. “Huh? Uh, naw, I don’t think that be. I’ll show you th’ kitchen, garden, and dining area next.” Kwazii said, motioning for Shellington to follow him, which he did. Kwazii launched himself down the chute, and Shellington followed after. He ended up crashing INTO Kwazii that time, (which he could argue wasn’t his fault, honestly) making them both fall over, Shellington on top of Kwazii’s back. “Shiver me whiskers..” was all Kwazii muttered, as Shellington spooned out apologies, before he shrugged, stretching, and then motioned to the room. “The dinin’ room and kitchen! Garden be upstairs.” he said, and Shellington nodded. “Makes sense.” 

The dining room was nice enough–it was a plasticy yellow table, and the kitchen was honestly larger than Shellington expected. Though, it was just kinda an average kitchen, nothing special. (besides the fact it was on a submarine) Kwazii didn’t honestly seem to know what the things were called, and as he was motioning to everything, he just didn’t say anything about the stove or anything. 

He decided not to really take note of it though, it was likely just him over-analyzing, after all. Kwazii showed him up to the garden, and Shellington looked over the array of fruits and vegetables. It was nice that he would certainly be eating a much better diet then his (now former) college years. Instead of instant noodles, (both of ramen and mac n cheese) he would be eating meals with actual nutritional value behind them! 

He was sure there was some type of artificial meat stored away as well, but that wasn’t really his taste anyways so he decided not to press on to where that was. Kwazii showed him to the ‘fun’ room, which was complete with a small tv with beanbags, and a ping-pong table. “Ey, Matey, wanna play me?” Kwazii asked, grinning. “No, I’d like to get the tour all done so I can organize,” he said. Kwazii was clearly disappointed, (he didn’t seem to be good at hiding his emotions, honestly) though didn’t protest like Shellington expected. Instead he grumbled, jumping down the chute. 

“The other bits are me, the Captain’s, uh, hers, and probably be the medics,” Kwazii said. “Oh. I don’t really need to see those then. Thank you, Kwazii.” he said, to which Kwazii responded, “Yer welcome, matey,”  and Shellington launched himself down the chute, stumbling and face-planting into the carpet. Walking into the lab, he grinned. He wanted to talk to Dashi later, but for now, it was organizing time, babee. 

Speaking of Dashi, she was currently manning the ship–they were on the way to the icy terrain known as the Antarctic. Apparently there had been some problems with the Octopod and the cold before, but Tweak had come up with something that could hopefully keep it warm for the most part. Especially since it was just a quick stop–unfortunately, they couldn’t really do what they had done at the port earlier though. 

Given the risk of the whole ship freezing and everything shutting down, they instead opted to just drive out the GUP C (Tweak said that it’d likely be best equipped if something did go wrong, plus while it wasn’t specifically designed to deal with the cold, it was the best suited for it) to grab Dr.Peso and head back to the Octopod. Plus, that way, they wouldn’t have to empty the launch bay, and instead could just let them in through the water. 

Dashi honestly wanted to talk to Shellington once more–she considered him a friend at this point, and genuinely wanted to talk to him more. But, at least for now while everything was being set up, she simply didn’t have the time to do so. Especially given that Shellington was probably busy setting up all of his scientist stuff. 

She was a bit curious about the medic, though. She had been told that Dr.Peso was part penguin, and that led her to think about something–wouldn’t he, (and the Captain, given how he was part Polar Bear according to his last name. Dashi might’ve done a little snooping around in the files of everything, though to be fair it was part of her job, wasn’t it?) overheat? Sure, being part human and primarily presenting as such probably helped.. Though she still wanted to know. 

At the very least, shouldn’t they experience heat stroke more often? That would likely put them, and everyone else, in danger, wouldn’t it? She seriously had to ask about that. She’d phrase it as less of her just being mildly curious and more of like, a genuine concern, though.

And almost as if Meomi themself was answering her prayers, the Captain approached from behind her. “How is everything looking, Dashi?” he asked, and Dashi astutely nodded. “Good, Captain. We’re perfectly on course–heading at a steady pace to the Antarctic.” she said, professionalism lacing through her voice. To be fair, she just kinda did naturally sound like that–her voice was a bit monotone, for lack of a better term, at times and she tended to say things factually. 

She’d been called blunt once before, though she could certainly hold a casual conversation, she just sounded a little less… ‘friendly’, again for a lack of a better word. “Wonderful, Dashi.” the Captain said, and before he walked away, Dashi decided it was now or never. “Captain, I have a question for you,” Dashi said, swiveling back. She knew there was nothing in their way for the next 15 minutes at the very least, and let’s say something came out of the blue, the ship’s auto steering could handle it. 

The Captain, now twisting his body back to face her, “Oh? What is it?” and Dashi cleared her throat. “You.. in all respect, you are part Polar Bear, correct?” she asked, and the Captain was a little confused, and for a moment Dashi worried she had gotten something wrong, until the Captain said, “Well, yes, but.. I don’t quite remember telling you that,” he said, confused. “Oh, I.. I saw it on the files.” she said. It wasn’t a lie. She just wasn’t saying that maybe she was being a tad nosey and was purposely trying to find information. (She will say, she was a bit weirded out how that pirate didn’t seem to have a last name. Kwazii, was it? All she knew is that he was hired and was very athletic, and was part cat. Though that was obvious just from looks) 

“Ah. I see. Well, you’re correct, about that. Is that all?” he asked, and Dashi shook her head. “No, just clarifying. What I wanted to ask was.. I’m a bit confused on how you aren’t overheating–and how our new member, him being a Penguin and all, won’t either. I’m just worried it could cause some sort of damage or problem.” she again, wasn’t lying. Just not displaying the full reason–she was more so curious if anything. 

“Ohh, yes, I suppose I should explain that. You see, I have a cooling suit–it’s.. Well, don’t tell, but it’s actually pajamas. Once we pick up the new uniforms though it’ll be incorporated into those. It basically just cools down my whole body, and Dr.Peso will get one too, on account of him also being used for frigid temperatures, “ he said. “I see. That’s all, Captain.” she said, and Barnacles nodded sharply before walking away. That’s right–they would be getting proper uniforms soon. They had sent in forms of any sort of preferences they wanted–Dashi only requested that a skirt be compatible. Inkling had (albeit a tad secretly) shown her the main colors, and she had a pink skirt that she thinks would be wonderful with it. Currently though, she was wearing a sweater. She hadn’t gotten the chance to wear it, even if it was cute, in Australia as.. Well, obvious reasons.

But now she had the perfect chance! They were heading somewhere frigid, after all. And again, it was adorable, plus once the uniforms got in she doubted she’d really have a chance to wear it again. Soon, they would be landing. As trusty as the auto steering was, it was better to just stop. Apparently they had considered shifts, but it was vetoed quickly. 

After another few hours, it was ‘night’ completely. It was a bit hard to find out given the timezones, though most of it was planned (partially by the system) and not something to worry about. Dashi scanned for creatures, and fortunately there wasn’t any in the area like she was hoping. Beginning the landing protocol, she stretched, and stood up. In all honesty, she didn’t mind sitting all day. She imagined other people would hate it, though she really didn;t mind. Especially with the wonderful views of the ocean… that she hadn’t been able to take any pictures of. With that, she sighed–she knew she couldn’t go out yet, especially without the suit and the oxygen and everything, but.. She still wanted to. 

Though, she decided in order to cure her utter boredom, she would visit Shellington. She knew where the lab was, or at the very least she was sure she could figure it out. Of course, she got it right on the first try, swiftly entering the hallway and peeking into the lab. There was Shellington, and hell that was a lot of stuff. “Shellington?” she asked, and his head turned back, not dissimilar to an owl. “Dashi?” and his confusion faded when he realized he was right. “Hi–what’re you doing here?” he asked. It was phrased a little rudely, but Dashi presumed that likely wasn’t the intent. “Wanted to see how you’re doing, since the Octopod’s landed for the night.” she said, and Shellington looked surprised. “Wait, it’s–nighttime?” he asked. “Almost, yes. Tomorrow we’re getting the medic in the GUP C.” 

“.. oh. I have so much more to organize–” he muttered, and Dashi decided to offer. “I could help?” “Oh, really, thank you- I appreciate that,” and just as she thought he was going to accept her proclamation, “though, no. I need everything exactly where I want it, and you clearly don’t know where all of it goes, so , uh, yeah.” he looked back to his stuff. “Make sure to sleep though. You’ll have time tomorrow, especially since you’re not going to pick up Dr.Peso.” she said, and Shellington nodded. “Oh, right, sleep. Yes, I’ll- yup. I’ll sleep. Later.” 

Dashi had a feeling he wasn’t quite in the mood to talk more, so she shrugged, deciding to retreat to her room despite her mild worry that the guy would get little to no sleep. She changed into her nightgown, (though she had a feeling she would just start sleeping in her uniform once she got it) brushed her teeth, took a quick bathroom break, and her nightly rituals were primarily done. Putting in her headphones, she laid down, curling up under the covers. She was glad she had her music with her–she and Koshi surprisingly had pretty similar tastes, so whenever she listened to said music it reminded her of her little sister. That next morning, she got up bright and early. She had a very fortunate ability to just think of a time that she wanted to wake up at, and she could do it as long as she wasn’t unendingly tired and wanted to wake up early. And that wasn’t usually a problem. Stretching out her arms, she put back on a sweater. She launched herself down the chute after brushing her teeth, landing upright. 

To little surprise, the Captain was already up. “Dashi, hello. Good morning.” he said, and Dashi nodded back, “Good morning, Captain,” she greeted. She sat down in her swivel chair. “Starting launch, sir,” she said, pressing some buttons and the Octopod was ready to launch. “Go ahead.” he said, giving a sharp nod of approval. She pressed the final button, and the Octopod shook for a moment, before it propelled itself off the seafloor and they were now floating. “Turning on auto-steer,” she prompted, tapping the button on the screen, and the Octopod went into action, sailing for the Antarctic. 

“When will we arrive, Dashi?” the Captain asked. “In about a hour at the most.” Dashi said, not turning to face the Captain and instead prompting to continue to look at the screen. “No large schools of people or storms, Captain.” she said. She was surprised they were so lucky–she’d honestly been expecting at least one storm or roadblock somewhere. Things were going.. Shockingly smooth. 

And the trip itself was also surprisingly smooth, they got there without any complications–Dashi just hoped the luck would keep up while they were picking up the medic. She landed the ship, after making sure there wasn't anything that could possibly be damaged there, and then a face came on screen. The captain in his buzzcut + squarish mustache glory. “Everyone, report to the Launch bay.” he said, and Dashi hopped out of her chair and into the chute, launched herself down and landing in the launch bay. 

The GUP C–a GUP complete with a tow line that was lightly based off a whale, (it was certainly the one with the least obvious resemblance) was the one chosen. It had also been decided that the Captain, obviously, along with Kwazii would go. Inkling approached with some fish biscuits–seriously, those things were SO good, Dashi wondered what the hell they were made of–as a snack for the ride. 

Barnacles, of course, accepted the gift. Kwazii was exhilarated, excited to finally be going OUT there. And then, Tweak granted him something. “I don’t have the fabric, so it’s not technically done, but.. These helmets work. Just put 'em ‘round yer neck and press the button, and y’all will be sealed away from the water.” she said, and again clarified, “Again, not technically done. They’ll be prettier when I get the fabric.” she said, and the Captain nodded. 

“Thank you, Tweak, Professor.” he thanked, and turned to Kwazii. “Ready?” he asked, and Kwazii, wide stanced and fisted balled up in utter excitement nodded. “Aye, matey!” he exclaimed, sharp teeth barred in a grin, tail swishing back and forth rapidly behind him. Barnacles got in the GUP, Kwazii front-flipped into it after him, and they set off after clipping on the helmets Tweak had given them, along with putting air tanks in the gup. Maybe a few too many, it was really just a precaution if anything. 

“It’s going to be a long ride, Kwazii,” the Captain said, glancing slightly worriedly. “No worries! I be able to… deal!” Kwazii said, clearly someone forgot to think through the sentence before saying it, Barnacles thought, chuckling a little to himself. “What be so funny?” Kwazii questioned, pursing his lips. “Nothing, Kwazii,” Barnacles reassured. 

Kwazii, tapping his still somewhat long nails, had his tongue stuck out and Barnacles just knew he was bored out of his mind, and suddenly Barnacles noticed as he stopped, shrinking away a little and he would be lying if he said he wasn’t a tad worried. “Kwazii? Are you alright?” he asked, and Kwazii looked back up at Barnacles. “Uh, aye.” he said, and Barnacles knew he was a liar at that moment. “Mhm,” he mumbled, unconvinced. “I just….was thinkin’ about.. Me old crew.” Kwazii said. 

Oh. was all Barnacles thought. “I see. Would you.. Like to talk about it? It’s quite a long ride, anyways.” Barnacles said. It was his job as Captain to help his crew members–and even if he wasn’t super close with Kwazii yet.. He wanted to offer something. He hoped to be the first one his crew came to when they had any struggles.

“Aye.” Kwazii said, nodding a little. “Y’ see, I… the old–well, I’m sure he still be the Captain of the old crew, but he.. Helped me out when I was younger. Offered me t’ join his crew–and I didn’t know most pirates be bad.” he told him, and it almost looked like he was struggling a bit. Though Barnacles figured it was probably good to let it out now, not later. “They helped me with a lot–cut those lumps off,” I wonder if he got an infection or something? Not sure quite else he’d mean by lumps, the Captain thought, “Get the things, trained me t’ be a good pirate–thoughI didn’t know.. How terrible they could be. Cus, one day, I was told it was my first time on a proper pirate mission.” 

Ah. That must’ve been where everything went wrong. The Captain thought. “I thought it be to celebrate. But, alas, no. I assumed we were killin’ vile beaties. We weren’t.” That was all Kwazii had to say about that–clearly, he didn’t want to elaborate. But Barnacles didn’t pry. He was pretty sure he knew what happened. 

“Twas a party afterwards–o’ course, I didn’t have any fun. Snatched some essentials–rum, catnip, food, drinkin’ water, me things.” he said, leaning back against the wall of the GUP C. It was concerning to Barnacles how alcohol and cat-weed were listed above drinking water and actual food, (or honestly that those were even listed at all) though he figured it wasn’t best to try to psychologically examine Kwazii. He wasn’t qualified.

“Then I met ya.” Kwazii said. “Can I be honest?” Kwazii asked, and Barnacles would be lying if he said he wasn’t a tad worried about what Kwazii was going to say next. “I don’t think I would’ve lived if ya hadn’t showed up.” he said, and Barnacles figured that made sense. When he found Kwazii, he had been battered and bruised, clothes practically falling apart and little to no food and water left. “I’m glad I did, then.” Barnacles said, and Kwazii smiled.

“I be more so just happy y’ didn’t find me while super drunk” Kwazii said, shrugging. “You don’t have a drinking problem, correct?” Barnacles asked. A little invasive, but it was info that he needed to know. “No, nothin’ like that. Just… wasn’t doing good. ‘Gain, kinda thought I be damned to death.” Barnacles nodded. Sure, maybe not the best thing that he had turned to alcohol and weed, but to be fair he was stranded in the middle of nowhere. There wasn’t much else he could do. 

And, now he had.. Some sort of support. He wasn’t alone. Barnacles had a sinking suspicion he’d have trust issues for a while. “I suppose that does make sense.” Barnacles said, still front facing to the windshield of the GUP. Kwazii, sitting at the back of the GUP, put his hands behind his head. “What ‘bout you?” he asked, suddenly. Confusion overtook Barnacle’s face. “What exactly do you mean?” he questioned. “Well, I mean, I know nothin’ bout you. Besides.. Like, yer a Polar bear, yer the Captain, and I know yer personality n things…” 

Oh. That was true, he hadn’t really told anything about him. Sure, he shouldn’t be expected to spill his guts just because Kwazii did, though he figured it was good to at least talk a little about him before this whole Octonauts thing. “Well, I lived in the Arctic for years. Me and my twin sister, both. We were a part of this small organization, the Polar scouts. We basically just had little badges–for things like helping specific creatures, completing courses.. Everything like that.” he said, and he admitted it was a little nice to talk about it. He did miss his sister, after all. “Huh. Yeah that.. That be sensical.” Kwazii said. “Presumin’’ that was all fine ‘n dandy.” Kwazii assumed, and Barnacles internally debated telling him. “Well, not quite.” he said, and he practically heard Kwazii’s ears perk up. I decided to bring it up. It’s only fair to tell. He said, and sighed. “One time, me and the other Polar scouts decided to venture through a ice cavern–or cave, I suppose. We all often did it, so we thought it would all be fine.” he took in a deep breath. “It wasn’t. I fell into the ice, into a very cramped space down under. I was stuck in there for hours.” he shuddered. 

Kwazii didn’t say anything–clearly intently listening. “Fortunately, of course, the other scouts found a way to get me out. Ever since then, though, I’ve had claustrophobia.” he said, and he just knew Kwazii’s face was scrunched up in confusion. “... Don’t act like I know big words like that.” he said, crossing his arms. “It’s basically a.. A aversion to tight spaces.” he just hoped Kwazii knew what ‘aversion’ meant. 

“Oh, I see.” Barnacles would’ve said fear, but.. He had a hard time admitting he was scared of anything, he was a big, strong, leader–he shouldn’t be scared of anything. “Can’t blame ya. That must’ve been wretched.” Kwazii said, and Barnacles nodded lightly. “We are almost there.”

Barnacles knew Kwazii wouldn’t want what he had told him to get out to the crew, and he trusted that Kwazii wouldn’t tell anybody about his Claustrophobia. “Kwazii, maybe stay at the back of the GUP. I.. I think it would be better if I was the one who made the introduction.” he said, and Kwazii grumbled, but seemed to agree, sitting at the back of the gup. Barnacles honestly just hoped Dr.Peso was ready for them.

Peso had all of his things all packed up and ready to go, he had two suitcases. One was one of those ones that doubled as a backpack. He had been told that the whole submarine wasn’t coming–instead just one of the smaller ones, since they didn’t want to risk the bigger one freezing. There was another penguin who he didn’t have the name of who had all of the other crew member’s uniforms. Peso already has his own uniform on, as it had a cooling mechanism in it. 

His whole family was there.(besides all of his cousins and aunts and uncles who lived outside of this area of the antarctic) His mother, his brothers, his sister, his aunt, his uncle, his cousin that lived there, and his grandma. 

“ Mi hijo– I’m really going to miss you, okay? Call us sometimes, okay?” she requested, holding Peso’s face. “Don’t worry mama, I will,” and Pinto raced up to him, holding onto his leg. “Peso! You better call us, okay? Yeah?” Peso nodded, laughing a little bit. “Of course, Pinto.” he said, and his older brother and sister didn’t say much. “I’m happy for you, Peso,” Perita said, and her own twin, Pogo, nodded. And as if magic, a blue, ship looking thing arose from the water. It was round at the bottom, flat at the top, with a tow line attached. The windshield opened. “H-hello-” Peso greeted him. He, with his white haired-buzzcut, mustache, and dark skin seemed like the Captain. There looked to be someone else at the back, but in all honestly, he couldn’t tell. “Hello, are you Dr.Peso?” The presumed Captain asked, and Peso nodded. “Y-yes! I am.” 

The man hopped out of the submarine, and motioned for Peso and the clothing guy to hand him the things. Clothing guy handed it to him first, and then Peso handed him both suitcases, which he easily took. Peso was a little surprised at how strong he was. “Do you.. Need help getting in the GUP?” he asked, and Peso presumed the ‘GUP’ was the submarine. He looked at it, a little worried about getting in. “I um.. I think.. Maybe?” he said, and oh no i’m making a bad impression. 

The man held out his hand, and Peso grabbed on, and he was basically just put in the GUP. Peso might’ve been shaking a little. The Captain closed the windshield, and Peso waved, and the rest of his family waved back. And then the GUP dipped under the water, and Peso shook more. “Dr-” the Captain started, and Peso shook his head. “J-just Peso, please.” he said, and he nodded. “Well, Peso, I’m Captain Barnacles, and..” he motioned back, and a man with a eyepatch, ginger hair, cat features, and freckles thrown on his face revealed himself from the back of the GUP. “Ey, matey! I be Kwazii!” he said, grinning. 

Peso couldn’t really stop his reaction–he was a little if not completely terrified. Sharp teeth, pirate speak, plus the eyepatch, this guy–was he a criminal or something? “H-h-hello” and he cringed internally at his stupid stutter, it was so bad and he hated it. Kwazii, who seemed.. Not really hurt, just a little annoyed at most, didn’t seem harmful. Though Peso had certainly heard most pirates were liars, so he really didn’t know.

“We’ll be heading back to our ship –the Octopod, now. It’s basically our home base,” the Captain said, steering around glaciers and navigating the icy water. Peso nodded–he knew some of this already. He was nervous around Kwazii, though he had no reason to actually hate him. Hate and terror are very different feelings, after all. 

“How long will the ride there be?” he asked, and the Captain thought for a moment. “About thirty minutes.” he answered, and Peso didn’t know if he would be able to get through all of this. He was stuck in a small, in-escapable, submarine with a (potentially) dangerous pirate and a seemingly nice guy who he’s never as much as seen before. He’d be fine, surely.

A few minutes later, he wasn’t exactly fine. It had been primarily quiet, besides the pirate tapping his nails on the walls. “Oh, D- er, Peso, those forms you wanted everyone to fill out will be waiting in the infirmary.” Peso blinked–he’d honestly forgotten about that. He’d made those for some basic info. Incase if anyone got hurt, those were the things he needed to know. Especially if they were like, knocked unconscious or something. 

“O-oh- that’s wonderful, thank you,” Peso said, fidgeting with his hands and looking down. He just hoped this wouldn’t drag on much longer.  

Eventually, after that.. Utterly torturous ride, they arrived, and Peso’s mouth gaped open in shock. Octopus looking, and he couldn’t really make out the rooms, but they looked nice. Looked like there was a garden… and was that a ping-pong table in one of them? He wasn’t completely sure. 

As the ship maneuvered its way into the other, bigger, ship, Peso’s awe certainly didn’t lessen. The room that he would come to know as the launch bay later on was bigger than he thought it’d be, and even if he had a little trouble getting out of the GUP C. The three of them were greeted by a woman named Tweak, who was apparently the head engineer. 

“Howdy, you must be Dr.Peso,” she had said, grinning. “I’ll take y’alls bags to your room, and I’ll meet back up in the hq,” she said, grabbing Peso’s two suitcases and launching herself down some sort of tube. The Captain seemed to notice Peso’s utter and complete confusion though, so he clarified. “That’s the Octo-chute, it’s a system of tubes so that we can get around.” the Captain said, and Peso nodded. “H-how easy are they to use?” he asked. “Shellington–the uh, science guy–kept fallin. Everyone else be able to use ‘em just fine though,” Kwazii jumped in. Peso nodded, still somewhat-to-completely terrified of the guy, so he was shaking a little. At least if he failed horrendously, someone else was, too. “Kwazii, do you mind showing him?” Barnacles asked, and Kwazii nodded, grinning and launching himself down the chute. 

Barnacles then motioned towards it. “Your turn now,” he said, smiling. Peso didn’t think he could really refute that–this was the Captain, the leader, after all. Nodding, he hesitated before hopping in. But, after a few moments of waiting from the Captain, who looked a little concerned now, Peso (shockingly) sucked it up, and hopped in. Surprisingly, it was actually pretty easy–it was a lot like bodysurfing, which was one of the only things he was good at. He sucked at sliding down hills, but bodysurfing was genuinely easy for him. He landed upright, with a bit of a wobble, and all of his presumed Crew members were there, He walked away from the chute, and the Captain shot out from behind him, and he put his hands behind his back. “Crew, this Peso. Our medic. And, we have also got everyone’s uniforms, which we will hand out in a moment.” he said, holding up the bag with all of the clothes. “But, as we wait for Tweak, everybody introduce themselves.” 

He cleared his throat, putting down the bag and walking to what Peso assumed was the front. “I know you all know me, but I will introduce myself again. My name is Captain Barnacles PolarBear. You can refer to me just as Captain, or a abbreviation of such, if you prefer.” he said, then motioned over to a woman with looped cornrows and hair-clips. “Oh–um, yes, hello. My name is Dashi Daschund–though you can certainly just call me Dashi. I’m the I.T worker–I’ll be helping with steering and managing the ship and its systems.” she said, utterly and completely professionally. Peso just hoped the others wouldn’t speak like that, because then it’d be expected of him. 

The next person in the arbitrary ‘line’ had short, shoulder length hair and didn't seem to realize he was next. Dashi rolled her chair over to him, giving him a bump with her elbow. “Oh! Apologies. I’m Dr. Shellington Sea-otter. It’ll be wonderful to meet you all. And, just Shellington is quite alright, I should mention.” he said, smiling.

Next was that older fellow, the Professor. “I’m Professor Inkling. I’m sure you all know this, though I’m sure I ought to clarify. I’m the founder of this organization, and I’ll primarily just be helping out or reading in the library. I will be preparing or helping to prepare many meals.” he said, smiling and bowing his head a little. 

Do we not have a proper cook? Peso wondered, though didn’t say anything. 

Then, the pirate. “I be Kwazii!” he said, grinning. Peso blinked–did he not get the memo they were supposed to say their last name, and at seeing everyone looking at him a little confused he cleared his throat, continuing. “K-Kwazii, uh, Kitten!” he said, and in all honesty, it was obvious he made it up on the spot. Peso doubted it was on his medical form. 

Suddenly then, the woman who Peso had assumed was Tweak, jumping out of another Octochute. “Oh, we’re introducin’ ourselves, yeah? Well, I’m Tweak Rabbitson.” she said, smiling, and everyone looked at Peso. “Oh– I’m.. I’m Dr. Peso Penguin, though just Peso is fine,” he said, hands intertwined nervously. 

“Wonderful, then.” the Captain said, picking up the bag. “I’ll hand out all of your new uniforms, now. Peso, I’ll show you around in a minute.” the Captain said, and Peso nodded. 

Sure, this whole thing was certainly nerve-wracking and a little less than terrifying, but yet Peso was very excited about what was to come. He was going to help people, more than he had ever imagined before this. 

#octonauts #fanfic #captain barnacles #octonauts dashi #octonauts kwazii #octonauts peso #octonauts barnacles #octonauts tweak #octonauts inkling #octonauts shellington #2 more re-uploaded chapters and then these will be slowing down! #also btw i've said this before BUT i wanna say #there is no ships in this au/fic! #so any ship-art i make in the style of this au isn't canon! #(i do have my ships though so you might be able to tell LMAO)

[rollofleaf]

Inspired by a post from @silversiren1101

What would Hilde’s dream in Areelu’s lab be?

The original idea was for her to be at home telling stories to children from her tribe, but a good point about the demonic dream latching on to more surface-level desires made me reconsider. Ultimately, I think it still works well by framing her desire as seeking out fame and power, portraying her as a great, famous chieftain and poet with a woman hanging on her arm. It strikes close to the core of her desire and gets some important details like her retiring from fighting and being a storyteller, but ultimately misses the point. Hilde doesn’t care about fame, what she really wants is to pour her soul into something she created, to learn something from her endless traveling, and to love someone with all her heart. And of course the demonic misinterprets that as wanting power and fame and sex because it can’t fully understand the love for creation and beauty. The more I think about it, the better Hilde would fit as a Shelynite… So I made some tweaks without changing the essence, focusing on it portraying her as vain.

Hilde is sitting in a big comfy chair surrounded by children and a few adults. There’s a shadowy feminine figure at her side that leans over and kisses her shoulder. Her axe hangs over a fireplace as a trophy alongside a few stuffed heads. One of the children pipes up, “Chieftess, Chieftess! Can we hear the one about how you slayed a dragon alone!” Hilde chuckles and stands up to head over to a bookshelf. “Of course. Just let me find that volume…”

Hilde sighs as the illusion fades. “Is that what I want? Seems crowded… I’d rather have seen myself writing that tale.” She doesn’t fully understand how to process it, she clocks that something’s wrong with the scene and doesn’t find it as appealing as she thinks she should but doesn’t realize it’s missing what she really wants.

Arueshalae: She’s initially confused, but she quickly takes it as a beautiful expression of humility and desire for peace because she doesn’t yet know Hilde well enough to realize what’s wrong with it. “Is that your dream? It’s beautiful… I hope someday I’ll be able to wish for things like that.” She also can’t help but murmur, “I wonder who that woman at her side was…”

Camellia: Camellia is nothing but contemptuous. “All this power, and you want to go tell some snot-nosed brats stories?”

Daeran: Daeran understands Hilde’s desire for peace, since he kind of shares in it, so he’s much nicer than usual and focuses on something he feels comfortable making a barb of. “A woman on your arm? Well, I suppose that explains why my charms have failed on you.”

Ember: Ember, being Ember, gets a sense of what’s wrong with the scene. “You’re a big success with power and fame… But you seem even happier when you’re writing than here.”

Greybor: Greybor focuses on the wife and kids and is only able to mumble out “Mora…”

Lann: Lann is thrown for a loop and very conflicted. He’s frequently looking to Hilde for advice on being a leader since she understands his more tribal system. On one hand, it’s a very unconventional method of leadership that he doesn’t get, on the other hand she’s still taking care of her people.

Nenio: Nenio doesn’t really realize what’s going on.

Regill: Regill is a bit conflicted on what to think. He isn’t quite sure whether Hilde’s desire for a peaceful life is an asset keeping her grounded or a distraction from her duties. Ultimately he says nothing.

Seelah: Seelah is reassured by it, seeing it as confirmation that Hilde isn’t the demon she superficially appears and is still a good person under the demonic rage.

Sosiel: Sosiel seems to appreciate the dream, though he also gets the sense that something is off. “You really are an artist at heart… I hope soon you’ll be able to write freely instead of being trapped in war.”

Ulbrig: “Isn’t that what we all want? No more oglins, no more fighting, just family?” Hilde doesn’t have the heart to tell him that’s not what appeals to her.

Wenduag: Contempt similar to Camellia, but more disappointment. “I suppose you’re chief in your own way, but where is the power and bloodlust?”

Woljif: “Hey Chief, who’s the old lady? Looks sorta like you.” Hilde will sullenly respond with, “My mother. I t-think. I don’t remember what she looks like, but I think that’s her.” Woljif gets quiet, unsure how to try and comfort her.

[kyluxtrashpit]

2020 Fic Recap

I really like writing these and 2020 has been a HELL of a year, so here we go lmao. It’s been a wild ride for sure

Total wordcount: 88 109 words (note: I’m subtracting the ‘sorry I didn’t finish this, here’s a summary of the remaining plot’ that I published for a fic in a previous fandom from this since it’s not relevant here). Overall I wrote less than last year, but given all that happened in terms of the world and personally and fandom-wise and all of it, I don’t feel too bad about it lmao. I also have a lot of WIP words of half-finished things and some planning and such so I feel okay with this

Favours, 4906 words, posted Jan 4

This was a weird one cause this is a two chapter reader insert fic, the same story but told with both Phasma and Hux. I originally wrote this for Phasma, but later decided it would be easy to tweak into a Hux story (which it was lmao) and figured people might like that, so I did both. I had fun doing it, even if this is kind of a very small niche ship and trope wise

Know Your Shadow, 5022 words, posted Feb 16

Ah yes, here we are, the first foray into renben, a ship I had NO idea would grab me so hard but here we are lmao. I’m not done with them either yet, don’t you worry. There’s something about the corruption angle I really like, also Ren is HOT, and it’s also interesting to think about Kylo truly getting to find himself and be who he wants to be. Canon didn’t really satisfy on this, but the concept still interests me and it’s what had me writing this fic. Also, Ben losing his virginity to an older man like Ren is just *chef’s kiss*

Public Indecency, 3719 words, posted Mar 1

And my second renben! This was partially inspired by art and partially by just the idea of not giving one single fuck, and how thrilling that must be for someone like Ben to experience. Ren and the KOR truly do not give a shit and it’s really beautiful in a way. Plus some hinting at found family with the KOR. Ngl, Ben/Kylo finding his place and acceptance with the KOR makes me so Soft and there’s so many words I could write about it. Plus public sex is very hot lmao

Beautiful, 3254 words, posted Mar 8

Back to kylux, and this one was an old WIP I started back when the prompt was first posted on KHK in like 2019 or something. I got stuck on it and then left it for a while. I was digging through my old WIPs, looking for something that might catch my interest and boom, this one did, so I finished it and then posted it. I quite like the fic and it’s a bit more in the ~classic~ style. It’s also always a good feeling to get an old WIP done lmao

Choose Your Destiny, 5077 words, posted Mar 20

More renben and this was my fix it fic for ROKR vol 4. I talked about this more on twitter at the time and why I found the story as it was unsatisfying, but ultimately it’s really just a case of rushed writing and playing into established bad writing (e.g. showing a fall from grace by having someone kill someone eviler than themselves). I also really liked Ren and I felt like Kylo didn’t really get to have enough agency in like... any of it. His motivations were weirdly absent as well, despite this being ostensibly about him. So I wrote this, which I think handled how the story should have gone a lot better and, plus, it’s got smut!

(Okay and the rest are behind a cut for length)

Show of Devotion, 2479 words, posted Mar 28

Renben once again and this time, I mean, it’s all inappropriate use of lightsabers lmao. I was looking at the Ren and was like ‘wow that is SO phallic’ and then the horny brain turned on and, well, here we are. I also wanted a side of found family with the KOR and I think got that with this. It’s horny. It’s fun. What more could one want?

Aural, 2729 words, posted May 12

Okay this one... I have absolutely no excuses for lmao. I’m not even sure where the inspiration came from, I just remember I was in an online work meeting that was boring and the entire sequence of events played itself out in my head. It was all I could do to focus on work for the rest of the day and not immediately write this cursed creation lmao. The worst part was I’d been totally blocked on writing since March and this, THIS, was what eventually broke out of me. In case you haven’t read this one, it’s ear sex. Hux’s dick, Kylo’s ear. No, I don’t know the logistics either. But hey, I had a blast with it, both in terms of writing it and the reactions lmao. Someday I gotta write a follow up involving a nose too

Missed Chances, 10 749 words, posted Jun 7

Ah yes, this is the point where my renben met my kylux and created this absolutely enormous peanut butter cup of a fic lmao. It really was supposed to be like half the length it was, but alas, it was not. Also cockblocking kylux was SO hard, they wanted to fuck SO bad, but I had to stop them, the story demanded it lmao (and people in the comments were MAD, which is always excellent). It’s also when my renben series really started to have like, an overarching plot (aside from the modern au fics which I’ll talk about later). I even still have more instalments planned

Free Use, 6971 words, posted Jun 23

Another one that turned out far longer than initially planned, and also my most popular fic this year! I’m both surprised and not cause like. It’s a complete smut fest + my heavy headcanoning of the personalities of the KOR. People like smut, but I also feel it’s kinda niche considering how deep I’m in for the KOR lmao. So idk, I guess the smut won out. I did have a lot of fun with this one and there’s a lot of characterization thought put into each KOR, so it was really nice to see people loving that as much as I did. Canon gave us crumbs, but I just used them to make meatballs

Eat You Up, 1573 words, posted Jul 5

There’s not a lot to this one, it’s really just renben rimming cause the sexual dynamic with renben is so fun. Kylo/Ben is inexperienced yet eager and depraved enough to impress Ren, which is something considering I think of Ren as Very Experienced lmao. I really do love this ship; it’s a lot of fun to play with

In the Vents, 2002 words, posted Aug 3

Ah and this was my first piece for the stuck inside event on twitter, which I had a lot of fun with. Stuck fetish is one I’ve always wanted to explore, but never had any concrete ideas for. This event led to me finally getting to have Kylo stuck in a wall (plus more as well), which was fun. Also I spent far too long thinking about Hux’s vent contraption set up cause I knew he would never let Millie go anywhere that might hurt her, so I had to come up with a way to make the vent safe and here we are lmao. Hux being an engineer and also the most extra cat owner in existence worked out very well indeed. This was also the start of my creativity boom near the middle-end of the year that uh kinda burned out in a not so great way, but I’ll talk about that later lmao

Distraction, 3658 words, posted Aug 6

Another for the stuck inside event and another kylux/renben sandwich! Also featuring the KOR this time! Listen... it’s a gangbang, it’s got renben, it’s got kylux, it’s got Kylo getting stuffed from all ends... this is the kind of fic that, to me, is pure indulgence lmao. I had a tremendous amount of fun with it

Entrapped, 3484 words, posted Aug 8

So this was also for the stuck inside event (yes, I wrote 3 fics in about a week lmao - I don’t know how I did it either) and it’s darker than the sort of things I usually write. I enjoyed exploring something like this though, something outside my usual purview. It didn’t perform super well, but tbh the dark ones rarely do so lmao

Pit Stop, 1505 words, posted Aug 31

Welp, this is just an excuse for watersports lmao. I like piss, what can I say? And I’ve done it to kylux, so I had to do it to renben, and the modern au ‘need to pee on a road trip’ seemed like the perfect opportunity for it. Not much to say for it really

The Deal, 2431 words, posted Sep 3

Ah and this one here was the first for the throwback event I ran on twitter! The event itself ended up kind of being tainted by drama from one singular person who kind of ruined it by being a jerk for literally no good reason, but I’m not going to talk too much about that. Even with that, I still greatly enjoyed it and this piece might be my favourite from it as a whole. Kylo Amidala, political scandals, neither of them being nice... ahhhh yes, it definitely brought me back lmao

Devotion, 1929 words, posted Sep 10

Another for the throwback event, this time with Emperor and Hound dynamics which, unf, yes, I will literally never get tired of it. I really had fun with every fic from this event and this one was great because I so rarely get to write real action scenes, even if they’re in a flashback here. That and the dynamic itself really made it fun

To Be Wanted, 10 473 words, posted Sep 16

Ah yes, and here is my KBB for the year! I did a minibang this time, as, well, everything was going horribly wrong around the time of sign ups and I thought a mini would be more realistic. I think I was right on that and I’m glad I did it, even if I was torn at the time. The idea itself is one I’d been thinking about for a while. I can’t remember if I thought of it after seeing the leaks for tros or after watching the movie itself, but it’s been with me for a while and while I dithered over whether or not to sign up this year, the idea came back and was just perfect for a minibang. Plus I got an absolutely amazing and wonderful partner, which is really what makes the experience of doing bangs so great. I love this fic, I LOVE the art for it, and the whole experience was definitely a highlight to 2020 as a whole, both overall and in terms of my fandom/writing experience this year

Floss Me, 2033 words, posted Sep 21

My third for the throwback event and also the dental fetish fic I’ve wanted to write for a while now lmao but could never figure out a scenario for. As some of you may remember, 2018-2019, I went through some pretty horrific dental stuff and ultimately I think it kinda gave me a fetish lmao. Also I feel like there may or may not have been a kinky flossing prompt on one of the prompt sites at some point, but I looked everywhere and couldn’t find it so. But anyway, it was a fun fic for a kink I think is quite underrated tbh

The Cost of Certainty, 2541 words, posted Sep 25

My fourth and final piece for the throwback event, and this one is also a contender for my favourite piece from that event. I have always loved the idea of Hux being a serial killer and this was a perfect excuse to write it. I’d also recently finished a rewatch of Hannibal and, well, you can see where this came from lmao. I love writing tension and it was just very fun all around. I almost wish I’d done something like this as a long fic but tbh I don’t think I would’ve enjoyed writing it as much

Huxloween Drawings, 676 words, posted Nov 1

So this isn’t a fic but rather the drawings I did for huxloween, but people wanted them on ao3, so posted they are. Now, I mentioned above that I had this massive creative boom in Aug-Sep, but that it burned out rather badly. This is when that happened. I got into this place where I just... felt like everything I made wasn’t wanted or needed in the fandom. That everything I like is so unpopular at this point that I should just give up and leave. That I’ve spent all this time and energy over the years trying so desperately to get people engaged and so few ever cared and I just... ugh. It was bad. It was really bad and definitely partly fuelled by the bullshit that someone brought up regarding the throwback event (and I still believe that they are the sole cause of it’s poor reception). I, uh, am doing better now and still working through it all but it was a really rough time. But I found myself still wanting to be creative so I decided to draw. I am not good at drawing. I am not an artist. But that’s what made it fun: I went into each drawing knowing it wasn’t gonna look great. That wasn’t the point. So I never got upset about it. I think it helped me a lot tbh and I did really enjoy it and I’m glad I did it

Unconventional, 7243 words (in progress), updated Dec 20, first posted Nov 18

So the next part of me trying to fix the bullshit in my brain creativity-wise was to post the first chapter to this fic. This is a piece I’ve been working on since 2016-2017 (I don’t remember exactly when, but it was pre-TLJ, and I’ve gotten a new computer since so I don’t have the original creation date of the document) but I could just... never get a plot together for it and ever since I abandoned a fic in my old fandom (and this year I finally posted the ‘sorry this isn’t getting finished, here’s a closure summary’ chapter), I’ve been hesitant to post WIPs before being at least 80% done. So I said fuck it, I’m gonna post this and not be scared. Is this fic complete? Nope, but the plan is starting to come together. Do I know exactly where it’s going? Nope, but I don’t need to. Is it self-indulgent as all hell? Absolutely. I love this fic and I love this story and I love the concepts within it. So I posted it and tbh, it really helped. And I think this, combined with my writing break where I drew for 31 days straight lmao were really my saving graces here

Test Run, 3661 words, posted Dec 31

And now my final fic of the year! Which is a ship I honestly wasn’t super into (I don’t hate it, it just generally doesn’t do much for me) but then I did that thing where I thought ‘hmm but could it be written in a way that I am into?’ which, in my experience, always leads to me writing exactly that. Which is what I did here lmao. I’m pretty happy with it though and despite it being very strange to write, as I really had to work to get these two to get where they were going lmao, I had fun with it. I honestly doubt I’ll write more of them, but I’m glad I wrote this one, and I think it’s a good experiment to close out the year with

What have I learned?

Honestly, this year was a clusterfuck lmao. 2019 wasn’t great for me either, but we all lived through this and it was certainly An Experience. I think what this year really helped me focus on was what made me happy. I ended up in some dark places and I don’t want to go there again. It feels repetitive to say that, once again, I have learned that writing what I want is key when I say that every damn year, but tbh I think 2020 underscored it even more so. Spite as a motivator, when used to much, smothers the spark of creativity and the joy of creation. The most important lesson I learned this year by far is to not let that take the driver’s seat. A dash here and there? That’s fine. But as your main motivator? That’s just not healthy. And I need to work to keep it from consuming me like it has been for too long

Goals for 2021?

So last year I didn’t set any hard goals and boy, is it a good thing I didn’t, cause I achieved none of them lmao. I didn’t write more words (though I did write more individual fics, and the word count gap between this year and last is about the size of the difference between a big bang fic and a mini bang fic so really, I think I did okay), I didn’t even write a single fic for BTHB, and, to be really honest, I did not manage to keep my love for writing alive the whole time. I was in a really dark place a few times this year, but that drop in Sep-Oct was the worst from a creative standpoint. I feel like I’m mostly out of it now, even if I still have some work to do maintaining it. I’m hopeful for the future in that regard. The only thing I really did accomplish was that I feel positively towards all the fics I wrote; I’m happy and proud of all of them

So what is my goal? Honestly, I feel like every year I have to relearn the lesson of ‘write what you want, have fun, be self-indulgent, fuck expectations, etc.’ and my goal this year is to not have to relearn that again, but to keep that energy and carry it with me for the whole year. I realize I may have to put some effort in there, but I’m okay with that. I don’t know what 2021 has in store, but if I can just keep my passion alive and not fall into that pit again, I’m calling it a win

#kylux #renben #hey I'm not late this year lmao #it's been an interesting one that's for sure #anyway I'm happy with all my fics this year which is good #but I need to keep working at keeping my head in the right space #which will likely take some practice #but I'm off to a good start #and I have good feelings about the future in that regard #so here's to a 2020 full of writing about kylo getting railed to high heaven #and to a 2021 full of the same! #my fic #long post #shut up nerd

[be-ready-when-i-say-go]

I'm obsessed with the famous singer with Calum universe and imagine your about to realease your first album and you ask them to come into the studio and listen to it and they all just give there genuine opinion on it while your head is on Calum's shoulder and your just break all the songs down for them and what they mean to you. But what if it was like Clairo's album bc that shit just SLAPS ok gn

Thanks for the suggestion! I tweaked it just a little bit. I hope you enjoy. 

Here are parts one, two, three, four, five and six. This is the Distance series on my masterlist!

If you have any other suggestions for this series, please send them to me! I’ll use as many as I can while still progressing this story along!

_______________________________

The flight is no doubt long for Calum and he sleeps like a log on her couch, cuddled up with her dog. He’ll admit to missing Duke, but it’s nice to have another furry body around to curl up with. She manages to him wake up for food. Watching him sit at her tiny dining room table, with his eyes constantly blinking from sleep lingering, she can barely keep a grip on his plate. She wants to hate what Calum is doing to her. But for a fleeting moment she lets herself linger on the thought that maybe she can have this one day. As the plate settles with a soft thud, Calum smiles up at her. “Thanks,” he says, voice thick and deeper than normal. Her spine shivers, toes curling. It’s not like she hasn’t experienced this before while she stayed with him. But this--this just feels different between them now.  

“No problem. I still can’t believe you just hopped onto a plan for me? That’s so insane.”

“Of course. I just wanted to help. I’d do it again too if I had to.” 

“I have to go into the studio the rest of the week. I’m sorry about that.”

Calum takes her hand, across the coffee table, fingers gently grazing her skin. “You say that like I don’t understand.” They laugh, gently only cut across by the sound of her dog’s paw across her hardwood floors. “You gotta work. I’m just here to help out.”

The jetlag isn't as major as Calum thought it would be. It helps that he managed to sleep on the flight and his nap definitely aided. Her apartment is unmistakably small, but it’s cozy with the hanging plants and the sunlight that she lets come even once the sun has settled and night has fallen thickly over the city. “Only one bed, but if it makes you uncomfortable, we can figure something out. I can take the couch.”

Calum, throwing an arm over her shoulders and pressing a kiss to her temple, steps through the threshold of her bedroom door, keeping her in toe. “You are not sleeping on your own couch. If anything, I would. But I’m comfortable sharing a bed if you are.”

She nods. “I’m okay with that.” 

And she is, but she can’t help her heart from fluttering when Calum returns from his shower, no shirt and just sleeping shorts. She peels back her covers, patting the empty space next to her. When he settles, albeit with a lump in his throat, he turns onto his stomach, clutching the pillows into his arms. “This is the point where we tell each other ghost stories,” he teases. He’s hoping his laughter doesn’t shake. He hopes she can’t detect how his body is shivering as the scent of her detergent and the mixture of hair products and lotions climbs into his nostrils. 

She slips down under her covers, the lights in the room clicking off as she finds the switch for the bedside lamp. “I don’t have many of those. Generally, I try not to mess with ghosts.”

“Understandable.”

Turning onto her side, she goes to reach out and hesitates. She can’t believe it. He’s really here, across the globe for her. “I’m pretty sure you might be a ghost right now.”

Calum shakes his head. “Nope, I’m very much real.” He reaches out and takes her hand. He noticed it, how she retreated. Their fingers glide over, before she threads her fingers. He tugs her hand close and kisses over each of her knuckles. “I’m very much real,” he whispers into her skin. 

Her morning routine starts earlier than usual, but only by a half an hour, as a phone goes off at 5:55 in the morning. “Fuck, sorry,” Calum straightens up, reaching across her to turn off his phone alarm. “I’m sorry.”

She laughs, wiping at the corner of her eyes. “It’s alright.” She hums as she stretches. 

“I didn’t mean to interrupt.” He falls back into the sheets, welcoming the warmth it brings. “It’s just--it’s a thing I do.” He’s trying to remember for a moment where he put his wallet. 

One hand on his chest, she kisses his cheek. “Whatever you need, just let me know.” 

“My pants,” he grumbles, wiping at his face. 

She nods, and slips out of bed, finding his pants laying across his duffle bag. “Incoming.” Calum sits up and catches his pants, patting the pocket, and there in the back pocket is his wallet. He fishes out the wallet and photo, his mother’s grin making him smile in return. She spies something small that he pulls out and the warm smile. She wonders what it is, but she doesn’t push it before walking out into the hallway. 

Their morning is quiet, Calum joining her to make a quick breakfast after taking her dog for a walk. The morning’s a bit breezy, though not overly so. Calum watches from the passenger side of the car as she rolls down the streets. “Sorry again about my alarm.”

She waves it off. “I’m an early riser anyway, Calum. Really, it’s fine.”

“It’s just a thing I do. I have this picture of my Mum and I. Makes my whole day better starting it out like that.”

Paused at a traffic light, she looks over with a soft smile. “That’s really sweet.”

“So, uh, what’s on your agenda today.”

“Laying vocals for one last song. And god knows, I’ll be laying them for hours.”

Calum remembers her previous rants about needing to get things exactly the way she sees them in her head out on tape. He’s excited to hear more music from her. The two singles are amazing, a bit more bluesy alternative than what he was creating, but the way her vocals reminded him of melting chocolate and she managed to teleport the listener, like sitting in a dark room with an old record playing in the background. It’s awe inspiring and a thing he always went back to when he felt like he was missing a home that he had never really been to. 

The studio is cozy. It’s really just her, the producer and a couple other people. It’s close and intimate. As Calum settles onto the couch outside the recording booth, he keeps to himself but is polite as he’s introduced. “I didn’t expect a partner in crime for today, but uh, this is the famous Calum I probably don’t shut up about.”

She admits it so freely and Calum can’t help but gape. He’s not sure his ears are working. “She really don’t shut up about you, mate,” the guy introduced as Paul laughs. She steps away and lower, Paul adds on, “I’m not attempting to be big brother here. But that girl’s basically a sister to me. And she hasn’t smiled nearly as hard in about a year than she smiles about you.”

Calum watches the door, waiting for her to be just around the corner. When she’s not there, he turns back around. “I’m not going to lie to you. I’m a goner. But it’s, hard. The living situation right now.”

Paul nods, pulling his hair back into a bun. “I get it. I do. Shit’s not easy right now. But, I’m happy she’s happy. And I’m rooting for this. You seem decent. Literally flown across continents for her. That’s mad, but also, really genuine.”

Giggles signal of her arrival, that she’s just down the hallway but Calum chews over what Paul says, as he settles into the seat in front of the mixer and she slides into the booth. This thing went deeper that he realized. Through the speakers, everyone catches her vocal warmups, and Calum sneaks a cheeky video of her, making faces. “I see you, Calum!” She signals him out through the glass. They can only laugh before she returns to her work at hand. 

Halfway through the day, they take a break and as the group leaves to gather lunches, she waves for Calum to join her at the desk. He slips into the second rolling chair. “Hopefully it’s not too boring?”

“No, it’s really not. It’s amazing to see you work.” He can feel the emotion anytime she does a take and it’s always more and more each time she goes. He worried for a second she’d loose her voice but Paul’s always there to reel her in. 

“I wanna play you something.” He watches her click around and soon through the speakers, Calum hears the crooning guitar, wailing and setting the tone before her voice accompanies it. Her voice swells in his chest and he thinks for a second, he might be crying. But he can’t be. Not until she gently takes his chin, guiding him to look at her and her thumb comes up to wipe away gently at the corner of his eye. 

“God, I didn’t mean to make you cry.”

“Maybe if you stopped singing like an angel, I wouldn’t.”

She laughs, fingers dragging down his cheek, across his moles. “Don’t know what I can do about that.” And her voice is still singing around them, she’s still wailing along with her guitar. Calum just listens, part of him wishing he was listening through headphones to catch every tsk of the drums and listening to the creaks and breathes. 

As the break comes around, her guitar crying out more and slightly out of the melody established, Calum bops along. His head dipping and shaking with the frets. “God, that sounds so dirty, but somehow so emotional at the same time,” he compliments. And as the tracks play on, he listens to each one, fingers picking out the keys and notes over the wooden desk. The guitar sounds like it was laid all at once, not much fuss what layers around it. Just like it was a moment that was just her and her guitar. He compliments each track, gives small suggestions here and there for production, but overall, he’s blown away by her craftsmanship and the way she’s been able to communicate with her team with what she wanted for each song. 

“I want to write like you someday,” Calum teases over his plate. “What’s the secret?” The last twinkling of the bass and piano play out around them. And Calum’s not sure if he’ll ever be able to pick his jaw up off the floor. 

“Being insane,” she returns with a soft laugh. “And having a really great team of course.”

“You’re the mastermind behind it all,” Paul addresses. “We’re just the minions. The pawns in her games of chess.”

She scoffs, working down the last scoop of soup. “Let’s be honest. I’d be lost without you.”

“Nah, you really wouldn’t, babes. You know what you want. I just happen to be able to translate it for you.”

Picking up a napkin from the table, Calum cleans away a little bit of soup that’s dribbled down her chin for her. “And a messy eater, clearly that’s needed in the recipe for creative genius too.”

“Fuck off,” she huffs throwing the plastic her spoon came in at his chest. 

The session ends soon and as they all climb out, taking hallways back to civilization, Calum slips his hand into hers. He pulls them to the side, letting the crowd continue on. “You’re really talented, you know?”

“Nah, I’m not that--”

“No, you really are,” he interjects. His fingers come up to her chin, dancing across her skin. “You really, really are.”

Her cheeks are hot. She’s not sure how to hide the smile, if it’s okay to smile and for the moment all she can focus on his him, and the way his exhales are soft and his lips are such a  pretty pink. “Thank you,” she breathes. 

Calum dips his head, inching and inching closer. “Is-is it okay?” His lips are so close to her and instead of verbally answering, she meets him. They’re lips graze properly and briefly. She pulls away, body flooding with embarrassment and before the words can vomit over her lips, Calum pulls in for another kiss. This one longer, lips actually tasting the other. She thinks she could kiss him forever. 

There’s a soft echo as their lips part. Her eyes are still closed, inhaling deeply to still her rapidly beating heart. “Yeah,” she says, then clears her throat. “It’s okay.”

Calum smirks at her answer, laughing as he kisses her again. This time without fear, without hesitation. Her fingers clutch around his shirt, he can feel her pulling at him like she can’t get close enough. But there is nothing, no inches, no centimeters, no millimeters between them hardly besides the cotton of their clothes. 

There’s desperation, all the I miss you’s and I really could use a hug from you right now’s and all the almost spoken signs of affection pour themselves out into the kiss. They’re not handsy, not dying to cave into hedonism. Just unsure of how to use words to express the concern, the love, the care for each other. Calum cradles her face, pulling back just a little for air. “I’ve wanted to do that for like, so long. And it’s a shame how giddy I feel doing that.”

“No, never a shame. Because like my guts feel like they’ve been folded over like pastry dough right now.”

Laughing into each other, they linger for just a moment longer in the hallway. They share breaths, trying to find the steady established rhythm that they innately have, but getting so lost in each other’s gaze. She’s never really noticed just how deep the brown goes in Calum’s irises until now. “I have lyrics brewing in my head right now and like, it’s embarrassing,” she confesses.

“No, never embarrassing.”

“You cannot use my own sentiments against me.”

“I think I just have.”

-H

#calum hood #calum hood blurb #calum hood imagine #calum hood fluff #calum hood 5sos #calum 5sos #asks #asnwered #h writes #distance series #5sos #5sos imagine #5sos blurb #5sos fanfic #5sos fic #5 seconds of summer #5 seconds of summer fanfic #5 seconds of summer fic #5 seconds of summer blurb #5 seconds of summer imagine #ashton irwin #luke hemmings #michael clifford

[starwarned]

Day 26 - Break

Carry On Countdown Day 26 

@carryon-countdown​

What You Cannot Feel on AO3

“Pain serves a purpose. Without it you are in danger. What you cannot feel you cannot take care of.” - Rebecca Solnit 

What You Cannot Feel

It snapped. 

Now, this could be referring to a lot of things— the table underneath me, Penelope’s pencil in her hand, the butter dish. Alas, it was my fucking arm. 

I was attempting to show Penny that I do indeed know how to do the can-can (don’t ask) and in order to prove it, I had gotten up onto one of the dining hall tables. (We were alone in there — teatime in the dining hall is either packed full of students or Penelope, Agatha, and I are the only ones there. And, well, Agatha broke up with me last year and didn’t even come back to school for Eighth Year so she’s not around.) 

I was doing an incredible job of proving Penny wrong when my foot got caught in a butter dish (Betrayal of the highest degree) and I slipped, pitching forward and crashing down onto the table. I heard a loud snap and felt a current of pain shoot up my arm. 

So that’s why I’m here, in the infirmary, my arm wrapped up in a sling because even though a thousand healing spells have been cast on me in the last half hour, I’ve never taken well to magic that’s not mine. It’s not healed yet. It still tweaks when I twist my shoulder too far. 

“Well.” 

A familiar voice rings out and sends a shudder up my spine. I’m not facing the door so I have to turn over in the bed, effectively shooting searing pain up my arm. I grunt when I’ve finally turned enough to see the lanky and brooding figure leaning in the doorway. 

“Need something, Baz?” I spit. 

He shrugs and takes a half step into the room. He’s still dressed in his football kit like he didn’t bother to change after practice. His hair is all windswept (I’m surprised it’s not up in a top knot — he usually does that to keep it out of his face) and he looks more flushed than usual. Like he ran here. He’s likely just still exerted from practice. I don’t know why he would have run here. 

“Just figured I’d come gloat,” he says. 

I momentarily wonder if vampires’ bones can break. I indulge myself in a quick fantasy of standing up, walking over to Baz, shoving him up against a wall, and threatening to break one of his limbs. 

“Well, let’s get it over with,” I mutter, mostly to myself.

He’s still walking and by the time he’s gotten over to my bed, I’m on the defensive. There are professors wandering all over near the infirmary so he wouldn’t dare curse me or hurt me right now, but I almost miss the unstaggering protection of the Roommate’s Anathema. 

I expect him to immediately start jeering at me. I prepare myself to be scorned for being such an idiot, but it doesn’t come.

“Did they not cast a healing spell?” he demands. It’s not kind, the way he says it to me, but I’m also trying to figure out his angle. Why does he care? 

“They did,” I say. “But I’m not really perceptible to magic that’s not mine most of the time,” I say, which is true. Even Penny’s magic feels unusual to me, though hers is better I think because I know she has no intent to harm me. “They said I’ll have to stay here tonight. Which is stupid, but I guess you’ll have Mummer’s to yourself.” 

Baz frowns. His face is going to get stuck like that someday. Not that it’ll be a bad look on him. His face was practically designed for pouting. “You know,” he says, his frown morphing into a sneer. “There’s something to be said about you breaking your arm over something stupid like this instead of on one of the Mage’s preposterous missions.”

“Yeah, well, I’d appreciate it if you didn’t say it.”

And then Baz surprises me. “Why hasn’t it healed yet?” 

I squint my eyes and shake my head a bit. “Did you not hear what I said?” I ask. “I don’t like other people casting spells on me, you preening arse.” 

He doesn’t even respond to my (really good) insult. “Let me try,” he says, taking a step in so he’s right next to my bed. 

My legs still fucking work so I throw them over the opposite side of the bed and stand up, clutching my injured arm to my chest. “Abso-fucking-lutley not,” I say immediately. If my body can’t handle my professors and Penelope casting healing spells on me, there’s no way it’ll take Baz’s magic. 

He has the gall to look offended. “I’m a better Mage than you are,” he mutters. “Let me try.” 

“You think I don’t know what you’re doing?” I explode. “You think I don’t see right through your fucking act? You stroll in here, all sweaty and perfect in your football kit and you don’t insult me every other word and say shit like let me try to fix your broken arm, and you expect me to be cool with it? Well, I’m bloody well not. I know your games, Pitch.” 

And then, I think, maybe I don’t know his games because he’s sliding his wand out of his pocket and getting up close to me. He carefully places his free hand on my elbow to stabilize my arm and before I can stop him (shout, hit him over the head, call him a twat, anything), he’s whispering, “Kiss it better,” and leaning down to press a kiss to my wrist where the sling stops. I can feel his lips on my skin. 

I shiver despite myself. 

Baz’s magic feels funny. It almost burns. But I also think… it’s working. And Kiss it better is not a spell that you go around using on your mortal enemies. I know that’s a family spell. 

When Baz has taken a nervous few stumbling steps away from me, I twist my arm and find that it’s completely healed. I tug the sling off and experimentally move my arm. It’s fine. It’s like nothing happened in the first place. 

I look up.

Baz is standing a few paces in front of me and I have the overwhelming urge to shove him up against a wall and kiss him. Perhaps punch him a little first, but then definitely snog him.

I reckon I’ve got nothing to lose. Baz started this with the whole family spell business and now I’m fucking soft on him. 

I use my newly healed arm and grab him by the collar to drag him over to the nearest wall and shove him up against it. He looks at me curiously — like he thinks I’m about to maim him and he doesn’t care. His eyes are wide and (I’m realizing that I know exactly what shade they are when he’s taken aback like this — a more green-grey than usual) and his lips are slightly parted. 

I’m going to kiss it better, but for real, I suppose. 

I keep a tight hold of his collar and kiss him. I kiss him with every ounce of my being. I can’t say I’ve ever thought about kissing Baz before today, before right now, but I can say that it just feels good. 

He kisses me back and I slot into his arms like I’ve always belonged there. 

And perhaps I have. 

When he shoves at my shoulder to break the kiss, I let out an embarrassing whine. I blush when Baz raises an eyebrow at me. 

“What the hell, Snow?” he asks, but there’s no bite behind his words. 

I shrug. “You cast a family spell on me, Baz. I’m pretty sure that means you feel the way I do.” 

A raised eyebrow. “And how do you feel?” 

“Like I want to kiss you again.” 

“Oh?” 

“And also punch you a bit, but I always want to do that.” 

Baz rolls his eyes, but there’s a hint of a smile playing on his lips. I never get to see that. I swear to myself that I’ll memorize how it makes his face light up. “Right.” 

“Can I?” 

“Hmm?” 

“Kiss you again?” 

“Yes,” Baz says, and before I can make good on my word, he’s sliding his arms around my waist and kissing me first.

#coc #coc 2020 #carry on countdown #carry on countdown 2020 #carry on countdown day 26 #coc day 26 #carry on #simon snow series #simon snow #baz pitch #snowbaz #fic #my fic #writing #my writing #fanfic #fanfiction #lauren's coc works

[graveyarddirtseries]

Graveyard Dirt & Salt

Chapter 6

Not wanting to touch her without permission, knowing how his mother was with men and how big he was and how scary he could be, the Lieutenant sat beside her awkwardly for a moment, before settling his hand on his knee, palm open, facing the vaulted ceiling above their heads. It was an offering for her if she needed it and she took it after a moment, squeezing with a small, strong hand.

The backroom of the Catholic church was lit only by the flickering light of a couple small candles.

In the glow the Lieutenant watched as Benny preened in front of a full length mirror, he felt like his face was drawn in a grim, tight mask, but in the reflection seen over his shoulder, all he saw was a tired, middle aged marine who could use a good shower and a shave.

The shadows cast by the light hooded his eyes in darkness, making him appear like a spectre, some boogin from out of a Gothic novel.

The thing about mirrors he never cared for, was how honest they were. They held no dogs in the fight when it came to showing a man everything. You'd see time and life on your own face, wrinkles and worries and everything the sun kissed in a mirror. And from his own experience, after his mama died, the Lieutenant knew that the mirror also reflected emotion.

It was before a mirror that his Mamere had told him that his mama was gone. Thirteen years old, holding his toothbrush in his hand, staring at the old woman over his shoulder. He thought time would heal his mama, that everything bad that had happened to her would fade with time.

In his youth, being as foolish as all children were, Lafayette Vancoughnett IV, named after his Papere and not the man who had raped him into his mama's womb, thought that his mama would come back someday. That they would be together.

As he aged in the mirror, any reflection he looked into, the face he saw was of a man who came to realize that he didn't look much like his mama. The face that looked back at him, he theorized, must have been the same face that had taken his mama into those dark woods, held her down, and forced reality on her.

As time became lines etched on his face, Lafayette came understand that this face of his was why his mama could never really look at him. That if he had maybe stopped forcing his Papere to bring him to the hospital where his mama was, that maybe she wouldn't have to relive that night in the woods over and over and over again.

The mirrors and reflections of his face had always brought back into his mind how utterly he loathed himself, because he loathed the man who had driven his mama into a grave at the age of only twenty-nine.

His face wasn't his own, because his face belonged to a monster.

And maybe if he hadn't lived, if maybe sweet Louise, his mama, would still be alive. And she'd be married, with a whole bunch of children who didn't haunt her the way this only son of hers did.

If Lafayette had known then, what he knew now, he would have run off, left Louise to her happy home, to the parents who did their best to love her and the bastard offspring of the crime committed against her.

He would have done everything to make it right.

But he was a boy and he never knew entirely why his mama couldn't look at him, why she was in a hospital.

In those days girls like her, girls like his mama, they didn't stay home on medication to balance the serotonin in them. In those days the best you could do for a girl who tried three times to kill herself, to end the misery she was in, was to put her away. Surround her with padded rooms and locked doors and nurses.

He would have burned his face off, if only to spare Louise the terror he had unknowingly brought upon her every time he visited her. All he wanted in his greedy youth was a hug or a smile or for her to even notice him. He would bring her report cards and drawings and little things he found that he wanted to share with his mother, and the only thing he ever brought her that lingered with Louise were bad memories of a broken night, leaves in her hair, bruising and dried tears on her face.

No silly turkey's made of the cut out outline of his hand could ever smooth over what that man did to a fifteen year old girl.

So, no, he kept clear of mirrors when he could, because he didn't care for the reminder. The face of the monster he wore it haunted him as much as it haunted his mama.

“You still with me, Cajun?”

Snapped from his thoughts, the marine whipped his head up to meet Benny's gaze in the reflection. “Yeah.”

Benny narrowed his sharp eyes at him, but thankfully kept quiet, instead, turning around with his arms out.

“How do I look?”

“You look good,” he finally managed to say. Hoping the words might break the spell of the haunted figure in the mirror. “Like a real priest.”

“Think priests look good, Cajun?” Benny teased, pulling a little at the dog collar at his throat.

Opening his mouth to give the fancy man a smart assed response, the Lieutenant was distracted by Benny suddenly whipping his head to the right to peer at the open doorway where Mena stood like a pocket-sized ghost, her face haunted in the flickering of the candles.

She stood in her pink pyjamas with the pretty little white polka dots and her short, almost black hair ruffled from sleep, or rather perhaps, sleeplessness.

“What's the meaning of this?” She asked in a tremulous tone, bleating like a lost sheep on the open plains.

Benny spoke first, slowly and unsure, halfway between teasing and mocking, “fashion show?”

“Lieutenant?” She asked, turning to him.

“Paon thinks he's gonna try lighting out on his own.” He said helpfully. “Thinks it's best if he heads out alone to try to find these men. And I think he's right. You all need me here and that kid isn't ready to get into a fight.”

“Very well,” she said, holding up a hand, fingers spread, gesturing vaguely at Benny, “but why the blasphemy?” That tiny hand then went to touch her chest, just at the base of her throat.

“Devil worship,” Benny retorted quickly, grinning wickedly. “At an orgy.”

“Benny,” the Lieutenant said firmly, it was both to begin his sentence and a warning, “thinks it might make the men less inclined to just kill him if he hides behind the cloth.”

“And Annie?”

“I'll be back for her,” Benny said, suddenly serious.

“And here I thought you were beginning to like us, Mr. Malone,” Mena teased a little.

Reaching out, Benny tugged at the lapel on Mena's pyjama top, before his hand danced up and he tweaked her chin. “If you're going to miss me that much, at least be waiting with a kiss when I get back, huh?” He teased.

Mena slapped his hand away with a quick as a snake swat, before saying, “your flirtations have never and will never work on me, Mr. Malone. Now, if you're going to be parading around like a fool in a dog collar, at least do it right. You want to lose the vestments and wear something simple. A full length cassock might be best for a long distance recognition, but we can layer it and once you're in, you can take it off for better movement.” She said, moving towards the closet.

“What are you doing up so late, anyways?” The Lieutenant asked.

“I came to light a candle for Sister Mary Patrick, I couldn't sleep and thought I'd say another prayer for her.” Mena replied curtly. The subject of the nun off limits in just her tone. As she pulled out a few things from the closet, she said, “I really wish you two wouldn't leave me out of things like this.”

“Well, it's...not a sexist thing,” Benny said. “It’s a nun kind of ruins the party thing.”

“You make the fancy man uncomfortable,” the Lieutenant said with a smirk.

“Being in the presence of raw sexuality can do that to a man, I'm told,” Mena sighed.

There was a beat where the Lieutenant thought he hadn't really heard what he'd heard, where even Benny cast a furrowed, confused look at the Cajun.

Setting the black garments down on the table with a frustrated sigh, Mena said, “I...I haven't been sleeping and that was...a slip of the tongue.”

“No,” Benny argued lightly. “You said what you said and you can't unsay it. Abbess,” he exclaimed, “do you have a dirty sense of humour?”

“I'm exhausted and you boys drive me a little...batty.”

Gasping, Benny gripped his chest in much the same place Mena had clutched her own breast earlier. “Language, Abbess!”

Mena gave him a stern, displeased look and said, “here, put these on. They'll be cooler in the Georgian heat and better to blend in later.”

Sitting in the front pew of the church, waiting for Benny to dress, the Lieutenant watched as Mena finished up her prayer for Sister Mary Patrick, before moving to sit in the pew beside him. The light she had lit for the poor nun flickering in the dark like a lightning bug all a glow.

“La misère semble toujours vous suivre.” He murmured sadly.

“Beg your pardon?” Mena asked.

The Lieutenant shook his head a little. “Just something my mama used to say to me.”

“What does it mean?”

Almost hypnotized by the flickering candle, the Lieutenant was quiet for a moment, contemplating getting up and pacing. He didn't do well with just sitting, not when there was so much that needed doing.

“Lieutenant?” Mena asked.

“Misery seems to always follow you. La misère semble toujours vous suivre, Lafayette, she'd say.” He replied, still watching the flame.

“That's hardly a kind thing to say to a boy,” Mena argued gently.

“Mais, she wasn't wrong,” he returned, easing back in the pew to settle in more comfortably. Seems whichever way he wriggled his ass, the hard wood wasn't going to offer comfort. It seemed a perfect metaphor to how he felt about religion in general, he supposed.

Beside him Mena was quiet, prim and pretty as she always was, sitting like a queen on the pew, not a wriggle or a squirm to her posture on the hard wood under her derriere.

“The first person I saw torn apart by the uggies was from above. We were being sent in to a hospital towards the end, when things got out of hand and as the 'copter set down, I watched a young nurse run out towards us in the parking lot and they set upon her like a pack of wolves. They don't eat them, the dead, they just...have this abnormal anger to them, this hatred of the living. Or maybe they aren't dead and just hate those who aren't infected, aren't claimed by whatever it is that's got a hold on them.” He glanced over at the nun, her face stoic, eyes on the flickering light. “Lord, I never saw anything like that. I was startled, afraid, I don't feel fear like normal people, I never have. Things that should scare me only drive me to wonder, to curiosity. But I was scared then. I was helpless for the first time in my life, I felt like my own body wouldn't move, wouldn't act. You get to used to it. To them. You wander around outside these walls long enough and you see them as an annoyance, another bump in the road. But they were people, they are people, I suppose. Something preyed on them and they fell.”

“You said infection,” Mena asked.

He nodded.

“Do you...are they not dead then?”

“I don't know. Everyone who knows what this is is buried underground in their bunkers, holed up until this all blows over. I'm just a marine, Missy, I'm not a scientist or a politician. I'm muscle and metal.”

Glancing over, he spied a sort of furrow to her brow and knew immediately what it was.

“Don't worry,” he said, trying to soothe her, “you haven't been killing anyone who would object. If they aren't dead, they aren't ever going to come back to us the way they were. It's either you're killing abominations or mercy killing the dying.”

“Still not much of a consolation.”

“Hey,” he said firmly. “You saw how they took to Sister Mary Patrick. They would do that to any of us. Killing them is just like clearing your world of misery.”

“That could be said by either side of this fight, Lieutenant.”

“Sure,” he agreed. “But only one of these sides can talk and rationalize.”

Emerging from the sacristy, Benny stepped up to the pulpit. He looked like a priest and that was at least a little comforting to the Lieutenant. Maybe his plan wasn't so bad.

“Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” Benny said from behind the pulpit.

“Did you really study the bible this afternoon, Mr. Malone?” Mena asked. “I'm rather impressed.” Standing up, she approached him. “When I saw you with the bible in the shadows of the church, I thought maybe you were just being mocking.”

Benny grinned. “Maybe I was. Or maybe I was pulling shit out of my ass and flinging it to see what stuck. Hey, check this out,” he went on, running a hand through his hair, settling it back into less of a loose finger brushing and more into a tamped down, alter-boy style. “Huh? Priestly.”

“Are you sure about this, paon?” The Lieutenant asked one last time, feeling like he needed to ask it.

Benny nodded. “Yeah. Jesus, don't start crying or I'm going to start crying. Fuck.”

“Language in the church, please?” Mena asked, sounded like she was hanging by a string on patience with the man.

For a brief moment, in the dark of the night, lit only by the flickering candle of Sister Mary Patrick's memory, the three of them milled about, Benny rubbing the bottom of his expensive ankle boot over the red carpeting by the pulpit, Mena sitting perched like a pretty sparrow on the pew beside the Lieutenant who was gazing at the candle.

“Welp,” Benny finally said. “I'm going head off.”

Mena stood up suddenly, almost panicked. “I don't like this. No. You're not going. We can think of something else, something better.”

“It's really cute that you're already in love with me,” Benny said with a grin. “But, babe, I can take care of myself. I promise.”

“No offence, Mr. Malone, but by the looks of your suit and your shoes and that fifty dollar grin, I'd say you have-”

“JSOC,” Benny said suddenly. He said it so simply that for a moment the Lieutenant didn't register his words, before the marine was suddenly intrigued.

“What?” He asked asked.

Benny scowled. “Fuck it, society's fucked anyways. I was...tasked with doing things for the military.”

“What things?” Mena demanded.

“Intel,” the Lieutenant supplied for him. “He was with Delta Force, JSOC.”

“No,” Benny said. “It wasn't just intel you dumb fucking marine. It's...I can handle my fucking self, alright? Both of you need to just...calm your asses down. I promise you that I will be just fine.”

“You're a man of a many hats,” the Lieutenant said.

“I look good in them,” Benny replied. “Just keep that fucking kid alive, alright? I'll be back in contact with both of you. And don't pray for me,” he pointed firmly at Mena, “that's a defeatist fucking attitude.”

“I didn't say I was going to,” she returned archly.

“Rough, that's rough,” Benny returned. “Alright, I'm out of here. Don't get anymore nuns killed, marine.”

The Lieutenant winced like he'd been slapped. “Just don't get yourself killed. We need the intel you're getting us.”

“Aw, want a kiss goodbye, angel face?” Benny asked him.

The Lieutenant scoffed. “You get us some good fucking dirt on these men and I'll kiss you right on the mouth when you come back.”

“I'm holding you to that,” Benny returned, walking backwards down the aisle towards the font and the door. “Abbess? You and me,” he made a suggestive gesture as he continued to walk backwards in the near dark. “Huh? It's gonna happen. We'll have a threeway in the fucking bell tower. Think about it!”

“Don't think I haven't already,” Mena replied with a small, almost wicked gleam in her eyes.

Tripping a little by the font, Benny chuckled, catching himself, before turning and leaving.

In the silence of Benny's absence, the Lieutenant grinned a little at the nun beside him.

“What?” She demanded demurely as she turned back to face the front of the church.

“Nothing,”he replied.

“That man should get as good as he gives,” she said, shrugging her shoulders like a hen ruffling her feathers.

“You have a real dirty streak to you, Abbess,” he murmured, staring straight ahead.

It only took a moment, before a small, sad grin appeared on her face. “I used to,” she admitted. “I'm beginning to think the two of you bring out the worst in me.”

“Or maybe the best?” He suggested.

“Hmm.”

“Can I ask you something, Missy?” The Lieutenant asked.

“Hmm?”

“Can you really fight or do I need to force you to take lessons with the others tomorrow?” He asked. “I need to know everyone will be able to defend themselves the next time we get trouble.”

“I can handle myself,” Mena said. “I don't like the idea of fighting, but if it comes to it, I can handle myself just fine.”

“I don't mean to pry,” he went on. “But I'm going to need some credentials to back that claim up. I just...I don't want you to be the conscientious objector here and now.”

Mena was quiet for a minute, before gathering herself with a soft inhale. “When I was thirteen I ran away from home and lived on the streets of Atlanta for five years before the church took me in.”

Regretting asking, but a little more comforted by the information, the Lieutenant nodded. “Alright.”

“You're not going to ask any follow up questions?” Mena inquired with a small smirk.

“It's none of my business.”

“I'm not ashamed of it,” Mena replied. “We all do what we need to in order to survive.”

“I get it.”

“Anyways, I was freelance, if you could call it that. So if a man refused to pay, you'd better have a strong grip and get a good tip,” she went on. “Because there wasn't any pimp to come along and convince them to pay up.”

“Fair enough.” After a moment, he added. “I'm sorry you had to run away from home.”

“There are people out there worse off than me. I was lucky in that I used to go to the convent shelter in Atlanta, not this convent, it was another that would feed the homeless there and give them clothing and whatever they needed. I wasn't addicted to any drugs, I barely drank, though I did more than I should because...well, what else do you do when you're in that situation. But they recommended I join the church as a novitiate, it was Sister Mary Patrick who gave me my first instructions. She came here to this convent when I did and we have always been close.”

The Lieutenant didn't know what to say, so he remained silent. It wasn't his place to say anything.

“So, yes, Lieutenant, I can fight.”

He nodded.

“And no one will judge me, but God,” she added firmly.

“I won't judge you,” he said.

“If that day ever comes for us.” She added grimly.

“Go ahead, if you need,” he said. “I'm secular, so I won't judge.”

Mena opened her mouth as though to say something, but stopped suddenly, inhaling, almost as though she was stubbornly refusing to cry.

Not wanting to touch her without permission, knowing how his mother was with men and how big he was and how scary he could be, the Lieutenant sat beside her awkwardly for a moment, before settling his hand on his knee, palm open, facing the vaulted ceiling above their heads. It was an offering for her if she needed it and she took it after a moment, squeezing with a small, strong hand.

Wrapping his long fingers around her hand, he held it gently, warmly.

“I'm sorry,” she said again.

“You don't have to apologize,” he replied. “I imagine it would shake anyone to the core to have to be in this sort of situation. Civilians aren’t used to facing very real and dangerous threats, they aren’t prepared mentally for all the ugly parts that come with a disaster like this.”

She nodded. “It certainly makes you rethink a lot of things.”

“I'm not religious by any means, not really, but...well, how is your...you know? Your faith?” He winced as though faith was a dirty word.

“Honestly? I don’t know. I suppose I’m waiting for a sign.”

“A sign?” He asked.

“From God. What do we do now? I just don’t know.”

“Ooh,” he teased. “maybe his sign is the dead rising?”

Inhaling once more, Mena calmed herself, her hand still in his. “I am grateful for you, Lieutenant.” She said. “If you weren't here, if Mr. Malone wasn't here, I think it could have been worse for us last night. I have a hard time showing gratitude, and it's my weakness, I will work on it.”

“You don't have to be grateful,” the Lieutenant said. “You just trust me a little, yeah? I want this convent to flourish and be safe.”

“I think a lot of things need to change, don't they?” She asked.

He nodded.

“Maybe we'll turn completely secular,” she teased.

“You're joking, but...it'd make my job easier.”

“Your job?”

“Getting some nuns to kill some bad men.”

Mena laughed. “I don't know about that. But maybe we can make some room in the cloister for you and the others.”

“I don't know,” he teased, “that close to nuns, might make a man wish for the cold embrace of the Georgian backwoods.”

She clucked her tongue at him with a small grin.

In the dim church they sat for a good long while in silence, before the Lieutenant glanced at the woman beside him.

“You ever hear of 'telling the bees'?”

“Not that I'm aware of, what is it?”

“Used to be when someone in a house died, you'd go outside and down to the beehive and you'd tell the bees that they died. It was a sign of respect to the hardest workers on the farm.”

“What happened if you didn't tell the bees?”

The Lieutenant shrugged. “I dunno. They'd fly off, I guess? Or die? Or stop giving honey?”

“That sounds absolutely Pagan,” Mena replied finally.

He grinned. “Now I'm not proposing we dance around naked at the equinox or anything.”

“No reason to ruin a good time on my account,” Mena teased.

Chuckling, the Lieutenant squirmed again in the pew.

“Are you uncomfortable, Lieutenant?”

“No,” he lied.

She smiled. “They're not the friendliest seats, are they?”

“Ah, it's...churches make me a little nervous and I have to say this Catholic church is a little intimidating.”

“Is it the icons or the crucifix?”

“Well, Jesus dying on that cross doesn't give this place a...warm welcoming feel.”

“It's a stark reminder, but...I never cared much for him on the cross like that. I always thought we should remember Jesus as the man who fed the poor, healed the lepers, tolerated the downtrodden with grace and kindness. But then again, I'm just one nun with progressive ideas.”

“Is that why you're here? I recall you saying that this is where the diocese sent the troublemakers.”

Mena smiled. “I never thought of it like that, but perhaps. I know in my younger years I was very vocal about moving beyond the old ways of doing things in the church and mostly in the convent. I thought nuns were far, far removed from everything. I wanted us to get out into the world and be there for people who needed us. Homeless shelters, soup kitchens, they're wonderful, but we could be doing more. Building homes for the impoverished, protesting for civil liberties. Supporting a woman's body and woman's right to choose, it would prevent so much heartache and hardship, but...I'm not supposed to believe in things like abortion or birth control. The Catholic church doesn't believe in any of that, but...I mean a few years ago we didn't support homosexuality, but things were beginning to change and I thought we could push change. But...too many old men set in their ways in charge of too much, with too little desire to listen or even care.”

“I didn't know I was among Catholic rebels here,” the Lieutenant teased.

Mena smiled. “I suppose I was too worldly and I've seen too much to feel the way the church wanted me to. It was easier to shove me away, cloister me, cloister most of these nuns, here at a convent with little to no contact with the outside world, only going out to the farmer's market to sell goods to keep our lights on.”

“Mais,” the Lieutenant exhaled. “The world's gone to seed now, good time as any to forge a new one the way you want.”

“Do you want to know the most controversial idea I had before they sent me here?”

“What was it?”

“I thought priests and nuns should be allowed to marry.”

The Lieutenant faked a gasp. “Blasphemy!”

“As it was, I think – though they would never say it – I think priests and nuns believed that in order to be closer to God they had to rise above the people, but...isn't it logical to think that being closer to God is being among His creation? Experiencing it? All of it? Love and heartache and loss and birth?”

“I wouldn't know, I sort of gave up on God a while back. I think people should do what makes them happy as long as it doesn't hurt anyone else.”

“You're not what I'd imagine a military man would be. Especially a Lieutenant.”

He shrugged. “If you know what a military man looks like, I'd like to know. Wouldn't want to let people down at first sight.”

She laughed softly. “I guess...I was thinking the short, boxy haircut and maybe a ramrod straight spine.”

Reminded subtly to straighten his spine, the Lieutenant sat up in the pew and grinned. “Well, it's a start,” he replied at her look. “I suppose we're both bucking societal expectations of our roles. The progressive nun and the slouchy marine.”

“Hmm, I think I might say a quick prayer for Mr. Malone, then head to bed.”

“I thought he didn’t want you to,” the Lieutenant asked with a grin.

“I know,” she said firmly, the devil dancing in her eyes.

He nodded, releasing her hand. “I'll let you do that in peace then. I'm gonna hop on the wall before bed.”

“Do you think,” she stopped him at the aisle with her soft voice. “Do you think Mr. Malone will be okay out there alone?”

“The man survived this long in a fancy suit with a handgun and a small child, I think he knows what he's doing.”

She nodded. “That's good. I quite like him.”

The Lieutenant smirked. “Me too.”

“Goodnight, Lieutenant.”

“Goodnight, Missy.”

#novel #graveyard dirt & salt series #support a freelance small time author #go to my blog and donate if you can to my ko-fi #chapter 6

[chapter-61]

the reunion

CARRY ON COUNTDOWN DAY 14: Favorite Trope/Cliche

AO3, AU

“I can’t believe you talked me into this.”

I can, actually. Simon Snow can make me do anything just by asking. I’m weak.

“Don’t be dramatic,” the man in question tells me. “We’ll be fine.”

“You’re not the one who’s going to have to pretend to be dating you,” I say, because snark is my default state around Simon. This night is going to be horrible.

“It’s not too late to back out, I can always call Penny,” Simon says, as if he hadn’t asked her first. She said no, of course, so Simon had to come to me. That’s what I am, a last resort.

“We’re almost there, Snow. We might as well, now.” In fact, we’ve only got one intersection left, and then we’re at the location.

“Turn right here,” he points.

“I know.”

He rolls his eyes and I grin at the windshield. Annoying Simon is my specialty, after all. However, I might have to turn it down a notch for tonight.

“Try to be nice, alright? Or else this isn’t going to work.”

“I’m a fantastic actor,” I say as I parallel park the car perfectly. I’m not lying, I am a good actor. I’ve been friends with Simon for five years now, and he still hasn’t noticed my massive crush on him. We were roommates in college, and from the first moment I saw him, I was smitten. Then, he had to be the nicest guy possible, always helping me with projects and staying up late to spell-check my essays, and the rest is history.

Him not figuring it out might also have to do with his utter obliviousness, of course, because I’m quite sure that Penny has known for a while. He was probably distracted by Agatha, as well. But we don’t think about Agatha.

I turn off the car and wrestle myself out. I’m a bit too tall for my car, but I really like the model. Plus, driving around London with a big car is a nightmare, so I’ll keep my small one, thank you very much.

I shake my head to make my hair look elegantly messy and adjust my suit slightly while I move to the sidewalk, where Simon is waiting. He’s not looking too bad, his curls slightly more tamed than usual and wearing a gorgeous blue suit that matches his eyes. He’s a sight for sore eyes, alright. And I get to be his pretend boyfriend for the night. Terrific.

Simon exhales a laugh when I’ve reached him, and he’s looking at my suit. I feel slightly offended. It might be a bit overkill, but I know I look amazing in my flowered suit. I lift an eyebrow, daring him to say something, but he wisely stays quiet.

As we’re walking to the building he pointed out earlier, I say, “Remind me why I’m here again?”

“Baz, I’ve told you.”

“I want to laugh at you again,” I tell him. No other ulterior motives, of course.

He looks at me sideways and huffs. “We’re going to my school reunion. I wasn’t planning to go, but one of the bullies from back then baited me and now I can’t not show up.”

I nod along. “Of course. And?”

He sighs extensively, but continues. “I told him I’d bring my partner, but he didn’t believe me. Because who would want to date me, right?”

I tactfully keep my mouth shut.

“And then I asked Agatha and initially she said yes, but then, you know. We broke up. And now you’re here.”

“Because you asked me to be your pretend boyfriend.”

He groans and I laugh as if being his boyfriend is such a laughably idea.

“We’re here,” Simon says as we arrive at a wide building with glass doors. There’s a lot of people inside. Suddenly this seems like a bad idea.

“Wait,” I grab his arm (hello, biceps) and pull him back a little, so we don’t keep people from entering.

He looks at me questioningly, and then looks down at his arm where I’m still holding it. Oops. We’re not even inside yet and this night is already going great. I pull my hand back like I touched a stove (same thing, really) and clear my throat.

“What’s our story?”

“Huh?” He frowns. “Oh, right, we’re dating.”

I’d be lying if I said that didn’t make my heart flutter. Pathetic.

He says, “Can’t we use our story but with a few tweaks? Roommates in college, now we’re dating.”

“Romantic,” I remark, trying to extinguish my gay panic. Why did I agree to this?

Simon laughs. Oh yes, that’s why. “We’ll improvise, come on.”

He grabs my hand and pulls me to the doors. As we enter, I keep my eyes entirely on the people around me and the decorations, ignoring the burning feeling of Simon’s hand in mine.

We walk past a group of people, most of them our age. I can feel a lot of eyes on us, although I’m not sure if it’s because we’re two men holding hands or because I’m wearing this ridiculous suit. I flash them a nervous smile, finding myself incapable of anything else. The Baz from this morning would kick my arse for not looking intimidating, but he’s not in this situation.

Simon has finally stopped pulling me along. It appears we stopped at the food tables. Predictably.

“Are we going to hide here, forever?” Please say yes.

“Of course not,” he scoffs. “I just wanted to get a vantage point of the room.”

“And a snack,” I say, because I can see straight through his bullshit.

“And a snack,” he admits. He releases my hand in favour of a scone on the table. I glare at it.

Simon takes a bite and notices me looking. “What?” He says, mouth full. I shouldn’t find it so endearing.

Before I can reply, we’re joined by two women. “Oh my god,” one of them says. “Simon Snow?”

He manages to swallow his scone and smiles pleasantly at them. I can’t wait to see how this turns out. “Hi,” he says. “Uh...”

I snort. He clearly forgot who these women are. I decide to save him. “Good evening, girls. I’m Baz. Simon’s boyfriend,” I add, because I can. If only for one night.

Next to me, Simon chokes on his scone. For someone who loves food, he’s really bad at eating.

“Nice to meet you, Baz,” the first woman says to me. “I’m Anastasia, this is Nadine. We were in Simon’s class.”

“Right!” Simon has recovered. “Sorry, you just look really different.”

Anastasia laughs. “I’d hope so! You’ve changed a lot, too.”

Do I sense a hint of flirtation there? I will not stand for this. “I love your dress, Nadine. Did you make it yourself?”

“I did!” Nadine confirms. It was a fairly easy guess, considering how terrible it looks. It’s grey, boring, and hangs off her body without accentuating any shapes. I’m not saying I would be able to make a better dress, but I could.

“So, Simon,” Anastasia starts. I almost roll my eyes. This lady. “What do you do now? I always imagined you as a hero of some sort, like a fireman or a doctor.”

“I’m a kindergarten teacher, actually.” Simon says with pride. It makes me smile. He’s always crazy proud of those kids, constantly texting me about them and sending me pictures of drawings they made. He’ll be a great father someday.

I realise I’ve stopped listening to the conversation and I’ve been staring at Simon with a lovesick smile on my face for a few seconds and school my expression.

I’m pretty sure Nadine noticed but she doesn’t say anything, she just looks amused. Anastasia has come closer and is now within touching distance of Simon. Alarms are going off in my head but I keep still. I’m not his actual boyfriend, I shouldn’t care.

Then Anastasia laughs exaggeratedly and puts her hand on Simon’s chest, and I’m moving. I’ve grabbed his hand in a second and I tell the women, “We’re going to snog now,” while pulling Simon with me to an empty corner of the room.

Simon looks perplexed when I finally let go. I may have overreacted. “What are you doing?” He asks.

“What am I doing? What are you doing? That woman was clearly flirting with you!” I try not to sound too affected.

“Huh?” He says intelligently.

“I’m pretending to be your boyfriend,” I tell him, “you can’t go around letting people flirt with you while I’m standing right there!”

Simon frowns. “She wasn’t flirting with me.”

“God, Snow. You wouldn’t recognize someone having a crush on you if they were right in front of you.”

That hit a bit too close to home. I need alcohol. Thankfully, a waiter passes by us, and I grab a glass of champagne. I chug it in one go. It makes me feel slightly better about this evening.

Simon hasn’t said a word. He’s rubbing his neck and looking around.

“Seen him yet?” I ask.

“Hm? Who?”

“The bully. The reason we’re here.” I feel like I shouldn’t be reminding him of this, when he’s been so focused on this event the last few days.

“Oh. No, I haven’t seen him yet.”

I lean back against the wall and pull my leg up at an angle. “Next you’ll tell me you just wanted a reason to take me here.”

“Ha ha,” he says, still looking around. “Funny.”

“I try.”

It seems like most people have arrived. I take my phone out of my jacket and look at the time. Half past nine. Everyone should be here by now, unless they’re fashionably late.

Simon has settled on the wall next to me. I lean toward him. “Hey. How long are we staying?”

He shrugs. “I don’t know, we’ll see.”

I accept another glass of champagne. Simon hasn’t touched anything except for that one scone.

“D’you want another scone?” I ask him.

“Huh?”

God, what’s wrong with him? Somewhere between the women and now, something’s changed.

“Are you hungry? You’re awfully quiet all of a sudden.”

“I’m fine,” he says, not very convincing because he’s still staring in front of him.

I shuffle closer and hit him with my shoulder. I don’t know why. I keep it there, so our shoulders and arms are touching. It feels nice. I feel warm inside, but that might be the alcohol.

I can see someone coming over, so I reach out and grab Simon’s hand. I can feel him jump slightly, but he doesn’t react otherwise. It’s a man, relatively attractive, that goes straight for Simon.

“Simon! It’s been a long time, mate!”

Simon’s face lights up and he pulls away to shake the man’s hand. “Michael! I didn’t know you were coming.”

The man, Michael, shrugs. “Danielle talked me into it. What about you? I thought you said you couldn’t make it?”

I raise an eyebrow. Interesting. Simon laughs, but it sounds more like a nervous laugh. I’m not sure what’s going on. He makes a gesture at me. “Baz talked me into it as well.”

Michael turns to me. Like I said, relatively attractive. Next to Simon, he’s much less handsome. He looks at me curiously. “Baz, huh?”

“That’s me,” I smile. I’m using my empty glass as an excuse not to shake his hand.

“You’re, uhm… Together?”

“Yes,” I say. I’m his terrible boyfriend that he doesn’t even want to talk to.

“Really?” Michael sounds surprised as he turns back to Simon. The latter seems embarrassed for some reason. I’m not following.

“Since college,” I add.

“Interesting.”

Okay, what is happening? Everyone is suddenly incredibly reserved. I’m beginning to think there was something in my drink.

“Say, Michael,” I start. “You wouldn’t happen to know a bully from your school that would be here, would you?”

“A bully?” He turns to Simon again. “Who’s he talking about?”

“We’re only here for him,” I continue, “then we can go home, right Simon?”

He nods slowly, but he’s exchanging looks with Michael and I don’t like it.

“Oh, there you are!” A woman, presumably Danielle, joins us. “Honey, who are these handsome men?”

I’d feel flattered if I weren’t so confused.

Michael puts his arm around Danielle’s waist and gestures to Simon and I. “It’s Simon. I’ve told you about him.”

“Oh, Simon Snow! Nice to finally meet you,” she smiles at him warmly. I like her much more than Anastasia already.

“Hi, Danielle.” He looks like he’d rather jump out of a window than continue this conversation, and I can’t begin to wonder why. I’m quite certain Danielle is not the bully Simon was talking about, because he’d been using he/him pronouns.

I step forward so I’m next to my pretend boyfriend, and raise my glass at Danielle. “Hello, I’m Baz, Simon’s boyfriend.”

“Baz! I’ve heard so much about you! Wait.” She looks between us. I can hear Simon sigh next to me. “Boyfriend?”

“Uhm,” Simon says.

I copy Michael and put my arm around Simon’s waist. I feel him stiffen. We probably should’ve practiced this before tonight, but I didn’t think Simon would indulge me.

“Yes,” I say, because Simon is quiet.

Danielle looks delighted. “Oh, wow! Finally! Congratulations. Michael told me a lot about you two and I’m glad you finally worked it out.”

Michael and Simon both suddenly look very uncomfortable.

“It’s not...” Simon starts.

Danielle talks right over him. “How many times I’ve had to listen to Michael’s rants about Simon, concerning you! And then when he started dating that Agatha, he was very frustrated with him,” she tells me. I’m having trouble keeping track of what she’s saying.

“Danielle--” Michael starts.

“Oh Simon,” she keeps going, facing Simon now. “I told Michael it’d work out! I knew that if you just told him--”

“Okay!” Michael practically shouts, dragging Danielle away. “We’re going to get some food. I’ll see you later, Simon.”

“What?” I hear Danielle say while she’s being dragged away.

I am utterly lost. “What the hell is going on?” I demand.

“Fuck,” Simon replies.

“Simon?”

He’s leaning against the wall again and slowly sliding down to the floor. “It’s nothing.”

“It’s definitely something,” I say. “Wait here.”

I walk towards the table with drinks and drink some water, evading eye contact with the people around me. I’m not in the mood.

When I feel significantly less tipsy, I go back to Simon. He’s sitting on the floor now, with his hands in his hair.

“Simon,” I repeat. “What’s going on? What was she talking about?”

I join him on the floor and poke his leg.

“Can we just pretend this never happened?” He mumbles.

“Absolutely not.”

Simon huffs. “That’s what I thought.”

“Answer me.”

“I’m sure you’ve figured it out by now, you’re smart.”

My head is reeling and I’m glad I’m sitting down. “Pretend I’m still drunk and explain it to me.”

“I’d rather not.”

“Simon.”

“Baz.”

I reach out for his hands and gently take them from his head. I hold them between us and squeeze once. “Simon,” I repeat, quieter.

He sighs and lifts his head. He looks at me with a painful grimace, and then looks down at our hands. “I’ve been talking to Michael a lot over the past months,” he starts. “And after a while he noticed how much I mentioned you, even while I was still dating Agatha.”

My heart is beating so fast, I think I might faint.

“And he made me realise some things, I guess.”

“You guess?” I can’t help but interrupt.

“Yes, you twit. I realised something, and it was incredibly scary. Because I was still dating Agatha, you see? So I told her, and we broke up.”

“You weren’t that sad about it,” I’m starting to understand.

“Not really. We separated as friends. I told Penny, and she told me to take you here with me.”

“So there’s no bully? Why?”

“I just… Wanted to test it.”

“Wanted to test what?” I ask. I feel close to bursting.

Simon laughs slightly. “Test this.” He shakes our clasped hands. “Us.”

“Huh.” My soul has left my body at the moment.

“I was sure you didn’t feel the same way, but then you’ve been saying some things today, and now you’re being weird, so...”

“Simon.”

“You’ve been calling me Simon a lot this evening.”

“Simon.”

“Yes, Baz?”

“Say it.”

“Say what?” Now he’s just teasing me.

“You know what I mean.”

He smiles at me and I’m about to combust.

Then, on the tile floor of this random building, hired for a special event that Simon dragged me to under false pretenses, he says:

“I’m in love with you.”

My head was spinning but now everything is bright and clear and I laugh happily. “You’re terrible.”

He looks amused. “What?”

“I’ve been in love with you for five years, you incredible nightmare.”

His mouth falls open. “Really? Why didn’t you say anything?!”

“I didn’t think you felt the same way!”

“I think I’ve always been a little bit in love with you, it’s just gotten a lot stronger this year.”

“Well.” I say. I can’t believe this is happening.

Simon grins at me. Because he’s in love with me. Simon Snow is in love with me! “Well,” he says. And then, he leans forward.

And then, on this tile floor, he kisses me.

#this is the longest one yet #carry on countdown #coc 2019 #day 14 #carry on #my fics #pretty amazed that i wrote this tbh dfkjsjf

[taggedmemes]

SENTENCE MEME ⟶ PRODIGAL SON / 1.04 always feel free to tweak the sentence to fit your muse.

“You triggered this memory by purposely inhaling chloroform?”

“It seemed like a good idea at the time.”

“You are suffering. Let me help you.”

“She’s a complicated woman.”

“Is she complicated like she’s hard to figure out, or complicated like she has 23 murders on her conscience?”

“She got angry at me, like I’d done something wrong.”

“You’re starting to sound a bit obsessive.”

“I don’t know what that is, so don’t ask me.”

“The killer arranged the scene with an eye for detail.”

“We’ll wrangle the boyfriend.”

“They’re cops, not paparazzi.”

“She made a second career out of making restraining orders.”

“Your body triggered an acute stress response.”

“He’s a suspect because he’s acting suspicious.”

“You hit him like a ton of bricks.”

“When he found out how she died, he wasn’t sad or angry, but scared.”

“If you can’t keep your cool on this case..”

“A favor? After all that?”

“What kind of rabbit hole are you going down?”

“Come on, I’ll take you home.”

“You knew what seeing your father would do to you.”

“He looked annoyingly good.”

“Heaven forbid prison should be an uncomfortable experience for him.”

“Why are you so hell-bent on keeping me from him.”

“Look in the mirror –– you are falling apart.”

“Why are you interrogating me?”

“There’s something you don’t want me to know.”

“Did you know about the murders?”

“You made me promise to never speak of it again.”

“He’s a serial killer, yet after all these years I’m still the monster.”

“I don’t need you to love me, I just need you alive.”

“What is the point of a visitation list if 

“Your mother is gonna kill me.”

“Why did you agree to help her?”

“First rule of co-parenting is listening to your partner’s needs.”

“Oh, dear, you feel rejected.”

“You have no idea how I’m feeling.”

“I think I maaaaay understand you a bit more than you give me credit for.”

“You tell me –– which answer do you want to hear?”

“The truth takes time.”

“You need to sort out your issues first. I don’t want to be in the middle of that.”

“A small thermonuclear war broke out between my mother and me.”

“Keep an eye on him, will you?”

“What exactly are we looking for?”

“Don’t turn your creepy profiler vision on me.”

“Her smile kept me going for months.”

“Can you not touch me with your shaky bandage hand?”

“Careful isn’t really his thing.”

“Oh, is it annoying? Someone taking your picture without your permission?”

“What’s your beef with [name]?”

“When you love someone, you’ll do anything for them.”

“This will destroy us.”

“It is time for you to understand that this has to stop.”

“Don’t you think I would stop all this if I could?”

“You can’t sneak up on people like that!”

“My boss firing me is inevitable at this point.”

“She had to look at him as he strangled her to death.”

“I can’t die. I got a cat.”

“It’s just me, who you’ve been avoiding like the plague.”

“This is about [name]. Of course t is.”

“It was biblical. Shakespearean. Someday Lin-Manuel Miranda will rap about it.”

“You’re spiraling.”

“I’m the only one without any baggage.”

“Thanks to both of you, he doesn’t even know I exist.”

“Can we please talk about something else.”

“I used to have a cat who would leave dead mice at our door every morning, like it was leaving gifts.”

“The perfect metaphor.”

“That’s one creepy ass cat.”

“These murders are gifts.”

“Nobody goes near the event, especially you.”

“For once, I don’t want to get in between you guys.”

“I think I’m gonna interview him.”

“That’s a really terrible idea.”

“If we don’t leave, you might be the next victim.”

“You’re not exactly acting like a cop.”

“You knew they were dangerous but you didn’t know how far they’d go.”

“You can still be scared of family.”

“How are you gonna live with what you’ve done.”

“I took care of that, just like I’m gonna take care of you.”

“For a second there, I thought you were really scared.”

“Trust beats fear.”

“Love what you’ve done with the place. Very cozy.”

“Whiskey rocks?”

“Why don’t you tell me why I’m here, Sherlock Freud?”

“You know I’ve been off my game.”

“I need to know the truth.”

“Are you sure you want to see this?”

“Are you certain you didn’t know anything?”

“How many times do I have to say it?”

“Got anything stronger?”

“These last few months, I knew that something was wrong.”

“He reeked of discount perfume.”

“I thought he was having an affair.”

“I could never have imagined that he was killing people.”

“Maybe it’s the shame, or the fear, but I should have known.”

“I let him get away with this.”

“Think about how many people I could have saved.”

“If you let people know how much real charity work you do, they wouldn’t go around accusing you of being complicit to murder all the time.”

“When a mother truly shows her heart, her children will immediately rip it out.”

“I had no idea how bad it really was.”

“You made it better, I know that now.”

“We let him get between us.”

#rp meme #roleplay meme #sentence meme #sentence starters #starter sentences #KIND / SENTENCE. #BASED ON / TV SHOW. #KIND / IN CHARACTER.

[raywritesthings]

It’s a Meta!

My Writing Fandom: Arrow, The Flash Characters: Oliver Queen, Laurel Lance, Barry Allen, Iris West, Cisco Ramon, Caitlin Snow Pairings: Laurel Lance/Oliver Queen, Barry Allen/Iris West Summary: Oliver and Laurel seek advice from their friends at STAR Labs while preparing for the birth of their first child. Notes: Metahuman Laurel Lance *Can be read on my AO3 or FFN, links are in bio*

Oliver shut off the kettle and poured the hot water into a mug, the tea bag floating to the top as it steeped. “I’m bringing this out now, but just give it a few minutes to cool,” he called out to the sitting room.

“I remember how hot beverages work, Ollie. Haven’t completely lost my mind yet,” Laurel called back. He just caught the end of her rolling her eyes as he walked out with her tea and his coffee. But her smile was still fond.

“Sorry. I worry.” He leaned in to peck her on the lips.

Laurel watched him set both mugs on the coffee table before taking the spot at the end of the couch by her feet. “You always have. Believe me, I knew it was going to go into hyper-drive the minute I said the words ‘I’m pregnant’.” She swung her legs off the couch to lean towards him, slightly hampered by her rounded belly. “And as many times as it frustrates me, I do love that about you.”

“I know.”

“Okay, remember that the next time I yell at you for being a mother hen.”

He scoffed. “I’m not a hen. I’m just… a father.” Every time he got to say those words, he felt a swell of happiness he didn’t know if he could contain.

Oliver reached out, caressing the rounded curve of her stomach that spoke of the life they had created together. Laurel had only just started to really show in the last couple of weeks, and he couldn’t get enough of looking at and feeling their little miracle.

“They should be here soon,” she reminded him.

“Barry’s always late.”

Shrugging, Laurel obliged him by turning around to lean her back against his front as he rested his hands over her stomach. She picked up the mug and blew on the surface, taking a sip. “Ouch.”

“I warned you.”

The little of Laurel’s face he could make out was pouting. He chuckled.

“You gonna kiss it to make it better or what?”

He’d just moved to do so when a breach opened up on the other side of the living room. Through it walked Cisco Ramon.

“Whoops, wasn’t trying to interrupt something.”

“That’s okay, Cisco, we were just waiting for you.” Laurel stood with a little of Oliver’s help. “Where are the others?”

“At the labs. I came ahead because we figured out a way to tweak an ultrasound machine. It should answer your question for sure.”

Oliver raised both eyebrows. “So we’ll know if they have the metagene before they’re even born?”

Cisco nodded. “That’s the idea. Hopefully. I mean, we need you to test it out for sure,” he added to Laurel.

“Okay.” She looked back at him, clearly checking how he felt. As much as he didn’t love the idea of Laurel being a guinea pig for whatever scientific development Team Flash had cooked up this time, it would help them figure out what they needed to prepare, or if they even needed to be preparing at all. So he nodded.

“Great. You can come back through with me.”

They did so, leaving their tea and coffee behind and entering STAR Labs to find Caitlin, Barry and Iris all waiting. Iris walked forward with a big smile.

“Oh, look at you! How’s it been going so far?”

“Well, I can still see my toes most days, so we’ve got a ways to go,” Laurel answered as she returned Iris’ hug. “I don’t know how you managed it with twins.”

“Don’t remind me.”

Oliver accepted his own hug from Barry. “You didn’t both have to come out for this.”

“It’s no problem. Grandpa Joe wanted to babysit anyway,” Barry told him with a grin.

“This, um, machine. It’s safe?” Oliver asked in an undertone.

“Absolutely. Just a normal ultrasound with an added function.”

“Laurel, if you want to get on this table, we can get started,” Caitlin requested.

Soon enough, Caitlin was running the scan while Oliver sat at Laurel’s side, holding her hand and watching the screen and the tiny form slowly growing and gaining shape within the safety of Laurel’s womb.

“Everything seems to be normal. You both didn’t want to know the gender?”

Oliver shook his head while Laurel answered, “Nope. We wanted a nice surprise for a change.”

Caitlin nodded and shut off the machine. “Well, I can confirm the existence of an active metagene.”

Laurel blew out a breath and Oliver squeezed her hand a little tighter. He didn’t know what he’d been hoping for, honestly. Laurel’s Cry had saved her and others from danger many times, so their baby having that kind of protection eased some of his fear. But it would be another difficulty to add to the already challenging job of parenting they were both truly living through for the first time.

“Guess you guys can have a meta reveal party?” Cisco remarked from the other end of the room.

Oliver rolled his eyes. After Caitlin helped Laurel clean the gel off her stomach, the group reconvened around a table in the cortex.

“So, they’re going to be like me? My ability, I mean,” Laurel clarified.

Iris nodded. “Judging by the twins, it’s genetic, yeah. So you two are gonna have no trouble hearing a crying baby.”

Oliver grimaced. “Guess we should take the baby monitor off the registry.” He smirked when Laurel nudged his shoulder with her own. “So what are our options?”

“Well, there’s inhibitors,” Caitlin said. “When the baby is young, that might be the best option.”

Laurel nodded, but he could tell by her troubled frown that she had a concern. He placed a hand on her shoulder and rubbed it lightly, waiting for her to find the words she wanted. “What if we want them to still be able to use their powers? Just to explore them, learn about them. I totally get why that’s risky with the twins,” she added with a hand extended towards the West-Allens. “I guess I just worry about making it like this forbidden thing they’re scared of or that they try to get around the restrictions to use on their own.”

“Ooh like a teenage rebellion thing, yeah,” Cisco agreed. “Well, the inhibitor is something we can make removable. It’s not supposed to be permanent.”

“There is still some danger with the Cry, of course,” Caitlin cautioned. “If handled wrong, the baby or child could seriously hurt someone by accident.”

“You’d want to designate a space for sure,” said Barry. He snapped his fingers. “Maybe something made out of the pipeline materials to keep the Cry contained?”

“I’m not locking my kid up in the pipeline, Barry,” Oliver stated flatly.

“Oh. Yeah, no. But maybe we could make something a little smaller for you guys to have in your house? You know, like a little space for them to just let it out. Like when you give a kid a pillow to hit if they’re angry or upset or just need to vent some energy.”

He looked to Laurel, each of them trying to decide how they felt about that idea. It was true that they generally liked the windows and other glassware in their home.

“We’ll think about it,” Oliver answered for them eventually.

“If we did go that route, I’d want it to be big enough to fit me, too,” Laurel added. “We should teach them how to use it by example.”

Oliver nodded. He couldn’t help thinking, not for the first time, that she was going to make a wonderful mother. Of course, seeing how effectively she had taken Thea under her wing at times, that should have already been clear to him.

Cisco had started taking notes down on a pad of paper and nodded along with the suggestion, scratching something out and writing anew. “We’ve still got time, but I’ll want to start looking at the dimensions and everything soon.”

“Should it go in the house?” Caitlin wondered aloud. “I mean, it might be a bit hard to explain if you have guests over who aren’t aware of, you know.” She made a vague motion like pulling an arrow back on a string.

“The base might be better,” Barry said. Though he tilted his head as Oliver frowned. “Why not?”

“I’m not exactly comfortable bringing a child down there.” They still weren’t child-proofed, after all.

“And we haven’t really decided what’s happening with all that,” Laurel continued. Her own hands rested on her stomach. “I mean, I’m benched at least until this one’s here and I’ve gotten back in shape. And it’s just…”

“We don’t have the kind of insurance you do, Barry,” Oliver explained to their friends’ shocked faces. “Getting out quickly, speed-healing. Going out there is a risk every time. I just don’t know if we can take that risk when there’s someone counting on us at home. Even if the city is counting on us, too.”

It was a decision weighing heavily on them as their due date approached. For now, he was continuing to suit up in order to better transition their team in the event he did end up retiring along with Laurel, who still came to the base to run the comms. Both of them leaving the field at the same time would’ve been too sudden of a shift and left a power vacuum besides. But would their leaving for good do so anyway?

“We want our baby to grow up in a better home than was left to us,” Laurel said. “But we also want them to grow up with us there for them. It’s hard to know how best to balance that.”

Caitlin and Iris both nodded in sympathy while Barry looked to be contemplating those two wants himself.

“You guys will figure it out,” said Cisco, and for once the optimism wasn’t something that bothered him. Maybe because he wanted to hear it. “And we’ll all help, you know.”

“This isn’t goodbye,” Oliver assured them. “We’ll still be in the loop, still be there if the situation calls for it.”

Barry seemed the most relieved to hear that. “Yeah, great. Hey, you never know. Baby Canary might want to be like Mom and Dad someday.”

God, he hoped the world still didn’t need heroes like this by the time their child was an adult. But that was probably a vain hope. He felt Laurel lean her head on his shoulder as a comfort, probably knowing just what he was thinking.

“We’ll see.”

“Thank you guys for helping us figure out what we’re doing here,” Laurel told them. “It’s hard to know what we’d do otherwise. What other families might be struggling with.”

“That is a thought. Heroes in our circle can’t be the only metahumans reproducing at this point,” Caitlin remarked, worrying her bottom lip with her teeth for a moment. “Maybe that’s something to think about, because it could unintentionally cause a lot of chaos.”

“You wanna run a metahuman daycare, Caitlin?” Cisco teased. She shook her head at him. “We can workshop it some other time. You guys ready to head back?”

“I think so.”

Hugs were exchanged, and soon they were walking back through one of Cisco’s breaches to their own place. It was honestly kind of insane, the abilities the people in his life all had. But he wouldn’t trade his life now for the normalcy he’d had before.

“Do you think the baby will, I don’t know, feel forced to do the kind of work we do? Because of this?” Laurel asked, one hand touching her throat.

“I think we’ll tell them they have the choice to be whatever they want to be, whether that involves their powers or not,” Oliver assured her. She nodded, seeming to feel better. At least until she walked over to their coffee table and picked up her abandoned mug.

“My tea’s cold.” She looked back at him with big eyes.

Oliver heaved a put-upon sigh as he walked over. “I’ll make you another one.”

“Thank you.” Laurel set the mug back down and turned around to face him, slinging her arms loosely around his shoulders. “It’s kind of the least you can do. I am carrying your baby.”

“Yes, you are.” He dipped his head down for a kiss, one that turned a little longer as he slowly swayed them over towards the couch. Laurel carefully lowered herself back down, and he followed, lying with his head resting in her lap and his hand rubbing one of her knees. With his ear pressed to her belly, he tried to listen for any kind of movement, but the baby seemed to be resting for the moment. That was okay, too.

“You’re going to fall asleep,” she told him.

“Maybe.”

“I’m not getting my tea, am I?”

“You will, you will. Just… five more minutes.”

Laurel scratched her nails lightly through his hair, and he hummed contentedly. Whatever decisions they had to make down the road, it would be worth it so long as they could find little moments like this for their family.

#lauriver #lauriverweek2020 #oliver queen #laurel lance #laurel x oliver #arrow #green arrow #black canary #my writing

[tenroseforeverandever]

Optimal Distance

Characters: Tentoo; Rose Tyler; Tentoo x Rose

Tags: lemons; lemons on video chat; mutual self-applied lemons; basically loads of lemons!; and the usual fluff, hurt/comfort, humour stuff

Summary: Rose has been feeling sad, lonely, and a little bit envious, left to endure the dreary London winter, while the Doctor has been posted on assignment in Rio, setting up a new Torchwood branch. But a comment the Doctor makes about a strangely bare desk in his otherwise cluttered study inspires Rose to find a way to bring them closer together, even though they are half a world apart.

Notes: This fic is one of many that had been lingering, stagnating in my collection of unfinished fics, just waiting for inspiration to strike.

Many thanks as always to my wonderful betas, @rose--nebula and mrsbertucci. You are absolutely brilliant, and I have no idea what I would do without you. And thanks to @aintfraidanoghosts who is always a voice of inspiration and encouragement (especially if she hears lemons on the menu!) I love you all!

I made quite a few tweaks and edits since they saw it, so as always, any mistakes are mine.I hope you like it!

Also read on AO3 and Teaspoon

OPTIMAL DISTANCE

“Done! You should be getting it any second now!” Rose crowed into her mobile with a rather disproportionate sense of triumph. All she had accomplished was to send the Doctor an email, albeit one with a very important file attached; a file she’d had to navigate his shambolic cataloguing system to find, and that only after she’d excavated his laptop from beneath heaps of books, papers, and crumpled sticky notes on the floor beside his desk.

“Got it!” he cheered. “You are brilliant, you are! A real lifesaver, Rose Tyler! See? My lucky pants, near or far. It’s a good thing you couldn’t come with me, after all. Where would I be now, eh? Without you holding down the fort?”

“Yeah, right,” Rose muttered with a sulky huff, her victorious mood evaporating as she plopped down in the desk chair. She fought against the prickle of tears. She refused to cry about it anymore. It was her own fault she was restricted to paper-pushing for another six weeks. To be specific, she was tasked with reviewing and classifying field reports, a chore that only served to rub in the fact that she wasn’t out in the field, herself, defending the Earth from both alien and earth-born threats. Instead she had to read about it second-hand.

She knew she deserved every bit of punishment she’d received, from her brutal dressing-down from Pete and her subsequent demotion, to her month-long stint inventorying the Small Parts Department (literally the “nuts and bolts” of Torchwood, and ten times as dull as it sounded.) She had been careless and impulsive on a mission, showing off for the sake of a dare, and had nearly gotten herself killed.

The worst part had been the look on the Doctor’s face as he’d rushed into the Torchwood infirmary, not knowing what her condition was, thinking he might have lost her. The guilt she’d felt over worrying him would have been enough (a kazillion times over) to curb any future reckless, thoughtless acts. After everything they had been through, with only a single, human lifetime each, pledged to be spent together, she had nearly thrown it all away in one rash moment.

As it was, she had been lucky to have come away with only deep laser burns to her left shoulder.

She and the Doctor had clung to each other all that night, desperately making love until they were too exhausted to move.

That had been weeks ago now, and Rose was chafing at her restrictions, especially since Pete seemed to be intentionally sending the Doctor to conferences in the most wonderful, exotic locations around the world, places Rose was dying to explore with him. But Pete resolutely refused to allow her to join him.

On this current trip, the Doctor was helping establish a new Torchwood base in Rio de Janeiro, addressing the fledgling team on the importance of employing diplomacy and mediation in First Contact situations. Rio, for God’s sake! And here she was, stuck in the middle of the damp, chilly London winter. She huffed again over the phone.

“Would it help if I said I wasn’t having fun?” the Doctor asked over the upbeat sounds of Samba and boisterous voices in the background. She could just picture the scantily clad, feather-adorned (female) dancers.

“Yes…” Rose picked at the worn piping on the leather arm of the desk chair.

“Oh…”

“Sure doesn’t sound like anyone’s ready to listen to your First Contact presentation. Don’t know what the rush was…”

“Weeell, lunch is almost over, and we’ll be heading right back in. Then, I’ll be cracking the whip! But, blimey, the Brazilians know how to party!  As you can probably hear, they’d arranged for some entertainment over lunch: live band, dancers, the lot! Didn’t want to seem churlish.”

She’d been right about the dancers, then… “Don’t worry, Doctor. I’m just feelin’ sorry for myself. I should be gettin’ to bed, yeah. Loads of field reports to review, tomorrow. You have fun.”

“Right… weeell…” Rose could picture him scrubbing the back of his head with his right hand. “Thanks again. And for the record, I do wish you were here, love. It’s just not the same without you.”

“It’s a bit lonely here too.” She looked around his study, filled with reminders of his presence: it was cluttered with books and papers; an assortment of swivel-chairs, beanbags, and exercise balls; and seemingly arbitrary writing surfaces at various heights and orientations. The traditional desk, where she was currently sat, was essentially an afterthought, a horizontal surface suitable for a computer or a place to deposit bits and bobs, books, and papers. Except it was completely clear of clutter and serving no purpose. It was a beautiful piece of furniture, but she couldn’t imagine the Doctor ever using a desk like that.

“We should redecorate your study when you get home, Doctor,” she mused.

“What? Why?”

“Well, for one, this desk is taking up a lot of valuable space. We really should get rid of it. It’s nice. I bet we could sell–”

“No!” he cut her off. “I love that desk!” There was an overtone of panic in his voice.

“But you don’t use it for… well… for anything.”

“I’d rather hoped to use it someday… erm…” His voice trailed off, but quickly returned with his classic exuberance. “It’s nice and sturdy, Rose, and just the right height.”

“What the hell for? The right height for what?” Honestly, she was afraid to ask, but it was just lovely to talk to him and listen to him prattle on about nonsensical things. She missed this when he was abroad.

“Weeeell…” he stage-whispered into the phone, enthusiastic, but clearly not wanting anyone else to hear, “the height is exactly the optimal distance to take advantage of the length of your legs…”

“Wha? My legs…?”

“Blimey, Rose! This is not a good time. I’m not able to control this stupid body the way I… erm… weeell…” His tone became clipped, irritable. “I need to be focussed for this presentation.”

“Oh, never mind.” Though Rose’s curiosity had been piqued by his cryptic comments and the urgency in his voice, she knew he was on a tight schedule. “You better go give that presentation. Go on, then. Love you. Talk to you tomorrow.”

“Love you, too.”

It was only once she was in her bed, half asleep, with her thoughts restless and drifting, that she realized exactly what the Doctor wanted that desk for… She was suddenly wide awake, the whispers of a plan forming in her mind.

 --ooOoo--

Rose had spent the better part of the night ordering the things she needed to set her plan in motion. The online shop guaranteed next-day delivery and she hoped everything would be there when she arrived home from work. If she managed to slip away for the afternoon (without Pete finding out) as she’d planned, she would be able to message the Doctor just before his lunch… perfect!

She was relieved to have been able to escape the confines of her office with no one noticing, except Donna, the administrative assistant who, being every bit as brilliant as her Prime Universe counterpart, noticed everything. But she had just winked at Rose and signalled with a swipe of her thumb and pointer finger that her lips were sealed.

Rose’s excitement grew when she arrived home to find several large packages waiting for her in the hallway by the door of her flat, kindly left there by the landlady. Rose beamed, her heart pounding as she bustled into the flat, hurrying to get everything set in motion before she chickened out. She had never done anything quite as bold as this before – at least in terms of trying to seduce someone – and she rather hoped the Doctor would be… receptive. Considering he had seemingly procured the desk for a very specific (erotic) purpose, she figured he would be.

An hour later, she was turning up the heating against the chill of the wintery air. Her new outfit was not exactly intended to keep her warm. To be honest, she didn’t think she’d ever worn anything so barely-there (and glittery) before. She flushed, looking at herself in the mirror. It was a bit generous calling it an outfit at all. It was really just strategically placed jewelry.

It was a Samba ensemble, made of thin strips of pink, yellow, and clear crystals. The bra was a halter design, with clusters of gems dripping in simple floral patterns from her throat to just above her breasts. A single, large sparkling clear crystal shone between her breasts, supporting a band of smaller clear crystals that curved below them. Her nipples were (only just) covered with bright pink and yellow crystal flowers. She turned around to look at herself from the back. Her bum was essentially bare, the lower part of her outfit, a thong, impossibly skimpier than the bra and crafted of more of the glittery crystals. Matching wrist and shin cuffs adorned her limbs. Not for the first time that afternoon, she thanked the stars for her Torchwood training and active lifestyle for keeping her fit and trim.

After applying her most alluring make-up, she was ready for the final piece of the puzzle. With shaking hands, she positioned the headdress over her hair. It was heavy, heavier than she’d expected, encrusted with crystals over her forehead and in a band around her head. A pink and yellow fountain of ridiculous, great, feathery plumes erupted from the top.

Rose laughed at her image in the mirror. Ridiculous didn’t begin to cover it: it was completely daft. But the Doctor would love it… or so she hoped.

She made her way to his study where she had set up cameras to take photos of herself using a remote control. Her first pose had her facing the camera, one stilettoed foot hitched up on the desk, and her opposite hand touching her sex through the thin fabric of her bejewelled knickers. She made a point of allowing her tongue to poke out at the corner of her smile. That always drove the Doctor mental.

For her next pose she leaned over the desk, her bare bum inviting the Doctor to take her from behind, as she looked suggestively over her shoulder at the camera. She elected to forgo the third pose she had planned. She’d had to stop her headdress from toppling off several times during the second pose and was feeling rather hot and bothered… and not in a sexy way.

Regardless of the headdress mishaps, she was able to select an image she liked from both sets of photos and upload them to her mobile.

So, you like Samba, do ya? she texted the Doctor, along with the two photos. Meet me for lunch… video chat. I’ll show you my moves.  

If she’d worked out the timing right, he should be receiving the messages about ten minutes before he usually stopped for lunch. She intended to make sure there would only ever be one Samba dancer in his future. Her.

She giggled nervously. She really hoped he would take the bait.

She didn’t have to wait long. Her phone vibrated on the desk. She laughed at the Doctor’s message: Blimey! Don’t move! I’ll be there in five minutes. Meeting adjourned!

He’d taken the bait all right – hook, line, and sinker!

Now for the really challenging part: video phone sex. She’d never done anything like that before. She hoped she could pull it off.

 Rose scrambled to set up her mobile on the apparatus she’d purchased, just for this purpose, at the same time as she’d bought her Samba costume. She took a few quick test shots of herself, perched on the edge of the desk with her leg hitched up the way it had been for the first of the photos she had sent the Doctor a few minutes earlier. It took a few rushed and panicked adjustments, but she eventually got the angles just right to ensure the Doctor would get an eyeful!

She was just situating herself on the desk with her leg up again when her phone pinged with the Doctor’s incoming call on video chat. Her tummy was in knots with equal parts anticipation and mortification. Her fingers shaking, she depressed the button on the remote control she’d programmed to her phone and accepted his call.

The Doctor’s eager, bewildered face filled the entire screen, his eyebrows rising into his hairline at the image before him. “Fuuuuuuck…”

He was swearing, a sure sign she’d gotten his attention in the best possible way. There was only one time he ever swore (well, mostly) and that was during sex. Rose smirked as he reflexively licked his lips, boosting her confidence even more. Her voice still trembled, though. “Like what you see, Doctor?”

His hand ruffled his hair. (Rose was jealous of that hand.) “Weeell, I mean… yes! Of course, I do! Blimey! What’s not to love?” Two hands ran through his hair this time.

“B-better… better than the Samba dancers from lunchtime yesterday?” Rose pressed her lips together, and dropped her leg from it’s provocative pose, and she slid off the desk, suddenly uncertain again and feeling vulnerable, both craving and dreading his response.

The dazed shock on his face softened, full of sincerity and love. “The only person I’ll ever want to dance with, Rose Tyler, is you.”

“I feel so… stupid… doing this.”

“NO! No, no, no, no! This is perfect. Brilliant!”

“I don’t know what I’m doin’…”

For several anxious moments, they watched each other in silence. Then, suddenly, the Doctor spoke, his voice husky and low: “Oh, Rose, I wish I could touch you. I wish I could lean you over that desk, take you from behind, and fuck you senseless.”

Rose released a tense breath. He seemed to be taking the lead, putting that unstoppable gob of his to good use.

“But first, first I’d love to have you like this, facing me. I’d spread your legs and–”

“Like this?” Now that she was relaxing, Rose found herself quite eager to play her part. Holding her headdress in place, she hopped up on the edge of the desk again, leaning back on her hands, her legs splayed.

“Yes, just like that! Beautiful! You’re fucking gorgeous!”

Rose bit her lip, her breath hitching as a flood of warmth pooled low in her abdomen. Blimey, she loved when he talked dirty.

“I’d kneel down before you, goddess that you are, and pull aside those skimpy knickers and bury my face between your thighs.”

“Like this?” she repeated, drawing the soaking strip of fabric to one side, exposing her dripping core to the Doctor.

“Oh, you’re so wet, Rose. I just want to taste you.”

“Guuuuuuuhhh… yeah! Love your mouth on me.”  

“Oh, yes! I’d dip my tongue inside you, savour the taste of you (you taste so good, Rose!), and lick you all the way up to your clit. Fuck, you’re perfect,” he blurted as Rose used her finger to simulate the actions he described.

She sighed at the sensation, closing her eyes, wishing it was his tongue lapping along her aching slit, twirling around her clit.

“Oh Rose, my Rose… I’d stroke that lovely clit of yours with my tongue, up and around, up and around…”

Rose groaned out her pleasure, her fingers dancing over her damp sex. “God, Doctor, I love it when you fuck me with your tongue. Please,” she begged, looking him in the eyes, “I want to see you. I want to touch you too. I want my hands on your gorgeous, thick cock.”

“Fuuuuck, Rose! Wait! Just give me a moment.” His face disappeared from the phone. “Keep going!” his voice called from the background. “I’m still here, licking you, sucking you.” There was a loud clattering noise, and the image on the screen spun around. And then Doctor appeared again, from further away wearing only an oxford. His cock, long and hard, bobbed up against the fabric, leaving a wet stain on the front of the shirt. “There. I’ve propped my mobile up. Can you see me, love?”

“Yeah. ‘S good. So good!”

“Are you still touching yourself?”

“Yeah.” Rose’s eyes rolled back as she pressed down on her clit.

“So I see,” he moaned. “Oh, love…”

“I want you inside me, Doctor. I want to feel you fill me.”

Rose watched with a hooded gaze as he wrapped his hand around his cock. “Oh, I want that too. I want to feel you so hot and tight around me. Nothing feels better than that.” His hand stroked down, then up, with a twist at the top. “You’re so soft and wet…” down again, “and so fucking…” up and twist, “tight!”

At the same time, Rose plunged two fingers inside herself, finding that oh-so sensitive sweet spot, as she continued to work her clit with her thumb. She moved her fingers in and out, matching the rhythm of his stroking hand, the jewels around her breasts chafing her nipples with delicious friction as she moved. She added a third finger, stretching herself wide. “Oh, you’re so thick and hard… I love how you fill me. You feel so good!”

“Fuck, Rose… so do you. You look so fucking sexy.” His hand began to stroke faster. Rose watched, mesmerized, as the dark, throbbing tip of his cock disappeared and reappeared from the circle of his fist. “Are you getting close?” His voice was tight, strained.

Rose continued to work herself, thighs trembling, slick, wet sounds accompanying her lusty groans. “So close…” she whimpered, feeling the familiar heat burning in her core, the pressure building. Her head lolled back… and suddenly she yelped as her headdress tumbled to the floor behind the desk. “Oh no! No!” Her hand stopped moving as despair welled up inside her.

“Rose! Don’t stop. Keep going.”

She wailed, “It’s no use.”

“You’re so beautiful, my precious girl. Oh, let me touch you more. Let me feel how warm and wet you are… I want to fuck you forever and never stop.”

Rose watched him on the small screen of her phone looking so wonderfully earnest, his cock in his hand, still hard, glistening with pre-come. He was bloody hot, and he was hers. The shock of losing her headdress was forgotten in a fresh rush of desire, and another flood of arousal, warm and slick, coated her fingers. “Touch me, Doctor,” she breathed, her thumb renewing its caresses over her clit.

“Oh, yes love… I want to run my fingers over your body; run my hands up your thighs and deep inside you. I love the sounds you make when I stroke you…”

“Please,” she whimpered, arching into the pressure of her thumb on her responsive skin.

“Let me fill you again…”

“Yes!” She watched, in awe, as his hand slowly resumed its motions – up, down, twist – over his long, hard member, and her fingers began their pumping motions again, curling and rubbing against her sweet spot rebuilding her sense of urgency with every stroke.

They were soon lost in their passion, both keening and groaning in a haze of lust and need. The fire within Rose burned hot again, deep in her sex, as she rolled her body over her fingers. The Doctor’s hand increased its speed once more. He was getting close, she could tell, he looked so wonderful and dishevelled, and his cock pulsed with every stroke of his hand. “Doctor!” she cried out. “I’m… I’m… gonna…”

“Hnnnngghhh…” he groaned. “Come for me. Let me see you come!”

Rose’s body vibrated with the need for release, her hand frantically pumping, her thumb pressing down, circling her clit, the heat and pressure building within her… and then, the Doctor shouted. Mesmerized, she watched as his seed spurted in ribbons from him, coating the front of his shirt, drizzling over his hand. The look of ecstasy on his face was enough to bring her over too. Her sex throbbed, grasping around her pumping fingers as she arched off the desk, the burning pressure in her core suddenly exploding outward, engulfing her.

 --ooOoo--

“Well, I need to get out of this ridiculous get-up,” Rose chuckled, pushing herself up to a sitting position. She had made her way back to the bedroom and lain down on the bed, while the Doctor lay on the bed in his hotel room. They had stayed that way for many wonderful minutes, gazing into each other’s eyes and talking quietly as they came down from the high of their orgasms.

The Doctor pouted. “And I suppose I need to get back to my meeting. They’ll all have finished their lunches.”

“Oh my God! You didn’t get to eat! Sorry. I guess I should have timed this better…”

“What? NO! This was perfect! A brilliant surprise. I feel perfectly satisfied.” He winked and flashed her an impudent grin. “I just can’t wait to take you over that desk in person, and peel that ‘ridiculous get-up’ off you, myself!”

“How much longer do you think you’re going to be there?” Rose bit her lip, clutching her mobile and regarding the Doctor’s image with imploring eyes. Training new teams of Torchwood personnel and operatives could be a time-consuming business and was an open-ended job. She and the Doctor could potentially be separated for several more weeks or…

“Just a few more days.”

“Really? You’re not jus’ sayin’ that?”

“Rose, (mostly) Time Lord here! If there’s one thing I know about, it’s time. Have you ever known me to misjudge…?”

Rose gave him a pointed look.

“Nah, don’t answer that. But honestly, love, we’ve only just started getting this lot familiarized with all the tech, today, but they seem to be a quick study, and a few of their key people will be returning to London with us for a tour and more in-depth, hands-on experience. Then Pete’s going to be relocating some of our more capable people to Rio for a few months to get things up and running properly. So, at most, another week.”

“A week?”

“At most… I promise. Now, as much as I would prefer to spend the day here with you, I have to act the responsible adult (complete rubbish, that!) and get back to my meeting. I’ll see you later, love.”

“Not if I see you first.” She blew him a kiss and offered him a little wave of her fingers before disconnecting their call.

 --ooOoo--

Five days later, she stood, poised sexily (she hoped) in the doorway of the Doctor’s study, wearing the Samba outfit, minus the ridiculous headdress (it would just get in the way), and watching as the Doctor pushed his way through the door of their flat. Her heart thrummed at the sight of him.

“Honey, I’m home,” he called out cheekily, making her laugh out loud.

“Right here… erm… Sugarbear,” she droned, her voice as sultry as she could make it through her giggles.

“Sugarbear? Really, Rose,” the Doctor closed the door behind him, “of all the names you could…” As he turned and took a step into the flat, his gaze locked onto her, eyes darkening as they roved over her bejewelled body. “Blimey… now this, this is a proper welcome home!” He dropped his bags and coat, leaving them behind, forgotten, as he strode toward her across the room, loosening his belt along the way.

Rose shuddered at the sight. Bloody hell, he was fucking gorgeous. And he was here. Home. With her. Her Doctor.

“You. Inside. Now,” he commanded, his hands settling over the bare skin of her waist, guiding her backwards into his study with firm pressure. Rose’s core ached in anticipation, a yearning heat coursing through her. His lips crashed against hers as they staggered further into the room, the kiss equal parts demanding and desperate, and Rose was sure she had never felt so desired, so loved.

When her bum hit the desk, she gasped, and suddenly, all the emotion she had been suppressing over the last few months surged to the surface: guilt and remorse, loneliness and jealousy, all whirling together in a maelstrom of unfettered passion, love, and vulnerability brought on by the Doctor’s assertive touch. The tears she had been holding back gushed over her cheeks.

“Rose? Love?” The Doctor broke the kiss, looking down at her with concerned eyes. “What’s wrong? Is this not all right? Was I too… weeell, enthusiastic?”

“No, oh my God, no,” she wept. “It’s… it’s perfect… Better than. I jus’… I jus’… I missed you… I didn’t realize jus’ how much…”.

In one swift movement, he swept his hands behind her legs and lifted her to perch on the edge of the desk. Then, spreading her thighs, he stepped between them and tipped her chin up for another marvelous snog, still passionate, but this time it was a sweet and tender, unhurried sort of passion. Rose melted into him, wrapping her arms around his neck, drawing him against her body and breathing in the comfort of his scent. They eventually drew away from the kiss with gentle pecks and nibbles.

They pressed their foreheads together, and panting softly, Rose spoke into the space between them, “Sorry, I’ve gone and ruined all this,” she gestured to the desk.

“Nah, don’t be silly.” He dabbed the tears from her cheeks with the pads of his thumbs. “Besides, I have a bit of news too. Might as well get it over with.” He sighed dramatically and pulled slightly away from her to fish in his jacket pocket. He pulled out an official-looking Torchwood envelope that he tossed down on the desk beside her.

“W’at’s this?”

“My new marching orders, I’m afraid. I leave in two days.”

“Two days,” she sobbed. “But you jus’ got home and–”.

Taking a deep steadying breath, she dragged a hand through her hair, pulling it back from her face. “God, I sound so needy and selfish… but I just missed you.”

“And I suppose, the fact that I was in Rio,” he smirked at her, his left eyebrow arched, “had nothing to do with it?”

“Oh, that just made me miss you even more, but I admit, I was a bit… envious.” She chuckled, leaning back to look him in the eye. “But you know that stuff doesn’t really matter, yeah, all the travelling? Never did. Just that we’re together. That’s what’s important.”

“Oh, I know,” he reassured her with a kiss on the forehead. “And you know I feel the same... don’t you?”

She nodded, placing her palm over his single, human heart. “Yeah, ‘course I do.” 

“And that’s why, Rose Tyler,” his deadpan expression transformed into a brilliant smile, “I’m happy to announce that your assignment is in that envelope too. This time, you’re coming with me.” He beamed at her, waggling his eyebrows and looking very pleased with himself.

She gawped. “But… wait. What?”

“That is, if you think you can be ready to go on such short notice.”

“You wanker!” She swatted his shoulder. “Of course, I’ll be ready!”

He giggled. “But, really, I mean… if it’s too much trouble, I could always just go back to Rio on my own, I suppose.”

There was a long silence as Rose processed what he had said. When she finally found her voice, the words tumbled from her mouth: “Shut up! No way! Rio? RIO?”

“Yu-p!” He grinned. “We’re the experts Pete’s going to send over for a couple of months to make sure everything’s up and running properly. He said he only wants to send the best, and weeeell… I mean look at us. The choice is obvious.”

“I don’t believe it. There must be a catch.”

“No-pe!” He popped his “p” again. “He wants to make sure the Brazilians get everything exactly right. And the best part is, we’ll be there for Carnival. It’s just a few weeks off.”

“What? Carnival? Really?”

“Yes-siree, Rose Tyler! You can even wear this outfit again, in an official capacity this time, of course, complete with headdress. And ooooh, we’ll bring the baby TARDIS along, too. She’ll love a change of scenery!”

“I still don’t believe Pete would just… Nah, you must ‘ave said somethin’ to ‘im, yeah? Not that I’m complainin’. It’s just he’s been so… lecture-y lately.” She rolled her eyes. “He’s been a right misery. And now this sudden change of heart…?”

“Weeell, I admit,” he pulled on his right ear, “I was all ready to go in today, guns-a-blazing, to try to convince him that enough was enough, but believe it or not, he had already made up his mind. He gave me the news during my debriefing this afternoon. By the way, you’re to meet with him tomorrow–”

“Urrrghh, that’ll be fun…”

“–to go over… erm some… stipulations, but essentially, it’s all set. Said he thought your diplomatic skills would be hugely beneficial over there. Personally,” he flashed her a cheeky grin, “I think he was just getting sick of your constant moaning.”

“Oi, Mister!” She feigned offence. “Is that so? Watch out! I’ll give you constant moaning!” She grabbed his tie and dragged him toward her for another impassioned kiss, then reached between them to fondle him through the fabric of his trousers. As she sucked and nibbled along his jawline, tracing her fingers up and down his growing length, a strangled sound tore from his throat.

She smirked. “Now, there’s the moaning…”

“Stop!” He grabbed her hand, his eyes blazing into hers, and she quivered in response, the hot rush of renewed arousal pooling between her legs. “No more teasing. Brilliant as the video-chat sex was, I’ve had enough of foreplay and imagining over the last few days to last me a lifetime. I am going to take you right here, right now, against this desk, and fuck you so hard you see stars.” He scrabbled at his trousers and boxers, pushing them down over his slim hips. Looking utterly debauched, with his suit jacket, oxford, and tie dishevelled but still in place, he took his thick, throbbing member in hand and gave it a few hard pumps. “You ready?”

“Am I ready? Fuck! I’ve been ready for days. Could hardly think of anything else.” She licked her lips as she took in the sight of his impressive length. “My fingers are no substitute for that.”

With an impatient growl, he grabbed her by the waist and pulled her off the desk. Then he spun her around and pressed in behind her, rutting against her bum. “This all right?”

“God, yes!” she sputtered, the ache of desire burgeoning inside her as he encouraged her to lean forward over the desk, applying a steady pressure to her back, until her breasts pressed against the surface, making the jewels of her outfit rasp over her taught nipples.

With a nudge from his foot, he prompted her to spread her legs, opening her to him. “Oh, yes,” he groaned, “the optimal distance, indeed!” Rose shuddered as his slender finger stroked over the sodden strip of fabric covering her sex and she arched into the contact with wanton abandon.

No further invitation required, he yanked the fabric aside and plunged into her welcoming depths.

She saw not only the stars he’d promised: entire constellations burst before her eyes.

#tentoo x rose #ficandchips #lemons #hurt/comfort #humour #fluff #tenroseforeverandever's fic

[darks-ink]

Play Your Part - 1

Chapter 1: Where The Strong Survive

[cover]

Here's my new multi-chapter, Play Your Part! Currently planned to be 6 chapters, and somewhere around 20.000 words, I'm guessing? Depends on how long the chapters will be, of course.

Anyway, this fic is based on @cordria‘s A World Tipped on its Head, and this first chapter especially draws pretty strongly from that one-shot. From what I've seen it seems normal that people just copy-paste the original as their first chapter but tbh I don't like that much because the styles are usually way different. Also I wanted to tweak some details so. I hope that that's not, like, rude or anything!

As always, weekly updates go up every Saturday! I might change it for the last 2 chapters or so because I want to start posting Weirdward on the 31st but I'll see how I solve that when we get there.

[first] [previous][next] [AO3] [FFnet]

Danny rushed down the street, his eyes cast downwards and his breath loud and raspy even to his own ears. The pavement sped by underneath his feet. It wasn’t fast enough.

“Stupid alarm clock,” he muttered under his breath. Pushed himself just that little quicker. He might not like school, but that didn’t mean that he wanted to be late.

“Need a lift?”

The unexpected voice made him flinch, although he did his best to hide it. Instead he glanced over his shoulder, watching Sam melt into view. She was in her ghost form, her hair white and flickering and her eyes a vivid cyan. Bright, glowing, and sparkling with dark humor.

“No,” he grunted, trying to ignore his tired legs to pick up the pace even further. Somewhere he was glad that it was Sam who found him and not Tucker. No matter how well meaning the boy was, the last thing Danny wanted was to be picked up and flown to school against his will.

She blinked at him for moment, and in the time it took for her to process this, he got a few dozen feet ahead. Then she nodded and drifted down to the ground.

Bright ectoplasmic energy whirled around her. White hair sunk down under the effect of gravity, dyed black once more. Cyan eyes darkened back to violet, and white clothes shifted back to black.

Sam ran a hand through her hair, straightened her clothes, and then sprinted to catch up with him again.

“You’re gonna be late,” Danny panted, suppressing a grin as she joined him.

“Are you kidding?” She laughed. “I can outrun you any day of the week.”

He rolled his eyes, fighting down the retort that came automatically. If she chose to run with him and be late as well, well… who was he to argue? Instead he sent her a lopsided grin, determined to at least keep up with her.

Skidding to a crashing halt in front of his locker, Danny started whirling the combination lock, rushing to get to class in time. The bell rung, however, signaling that he was officially late for his first class.

He jumped in surprise at the loud noise, losing track of how many turns he had taken to unlock his locker. Sam, who could simply use her intangibility to get her stuff, already had her books.

She drifted back across the hallway, her signature scowl back on her face. She then slumped against the lockers next to him.

“We’re late,” she said unnecessarily.

“I got that,” he answered her through gritted teeth. He tried to focus on unlocking his lock, frustrated that he had had to start over.

“Mr. Fenton! Miss Manson!”

This second unexpected voice had the same effect as the first; Danny started so badly that he almost levitated. He spun around, searching for the origin of the voice.

The hallway appeared empty, however. Completely vacated. Danny knew it wasn’t, though. Mr. Lancer, the half-ghost vice-principal, had to be floating invisibly somewhere in it.

He fixed his eyes on the spot he guessed Mr. Lancer would be in. He had no way of knowing, and he really didn’t care except that he had gotten caught by his least favorite teacher once again. It would certainly mean another detention.

The overweight teacher appeared mere moments later. Hands propped against his hips and his eyes blazing a bright red. “Late for school again!” he scoffed, pulling out a small notebook to write their names down. “I expected better from you, Miss Manson.”

“I felt like running,” Sam muttered back. Her arms were still crossed, her body slumped against the lockers.

“Such potential in you.” Lancer shook his head, clearly disappointed, as he finished jotting down their names. “It never fails to surprise me that a child from parents like yours doesn’t flourish in a modern school setting.”

Sam’s eyes narrowed, bright cyan sparking in the darker violet. She’d never been particularly fond of authority figures, and Mr. Lancer’s tendency to compare her to her parents had put him in her bad graces.

Danny, while he heartily agreed with her, remained quiet. He just watched as the teacher took his eyes off of the book, fixing Sam with a glare of his own. He had no intention to get involved, no matter how much it hurt him in his soul to let the others walk all over him.

He wasn’t half-ghost. He didn’t stand a chance against them. And so he had no intention to jump into a situation that could get him killed.

Because, while Sam was normally very considerate of the difference in power between them, she was too riled up now. She could kill him and not even realize until it was too late.

In the end, Mr. Lancer broke the staring contest first. His gaze wandered over to Danny. “And you, Mr. Fenton. Although I’m not sure what to expect out of a mere human,” he paused for a moment, making it clear how dirty of a word he found it, “I still expect you to be at school on time. Detention for you, and I hope you learn your place in our world someday. Miss Manson, get to class.”

The teacher faded back into invisibility, and Danny took a deep steadying breath. Noticed that his hands were clenched into fists, and wondered when that’d happened.

He hated that he got more detentions that anyone else in the school. It was, without a doubt in his mind, because he was the only human in the school. It might be against the law to discriminate based on age, race, gender… but species wasn’t on the list.

“Fantastic,” he muttered, loosening his fists again. Turned back to his locker, even though he needed a few moments more before attempting to unlock it again.

“Come on, Danny,” Sam said after a moment. Her voice was still tense, and cyan still danced in her eyes. “Let’s get to class before you get into trouble again.”

The emphasis on the ‘you’ didn’t go past him. And while her half-smile and elbow nudge suggested that she had meant it playfully, it just felt like a sour reminder to him.

“What’s on the list of torture for today?” he asked, trying to get his mind off of that topic again. There was no point, anyway. There was nothing he could do to change things. Instead he set about to make his third attempt at unlocking his locker.

“Twenty new reasons to stare at the sole human on the planet, either in distraught pity or in discriminatory frustrated anger.” Her smile was halfhearted but understanding. “Also known as another biased English lesson on the twenty greatest halfa authors of all time, making doubly sure to ignore and/or taunt the human greats such as Shakespeare, Melville, and Doyle.”

Danny sighed gustily as his locker finally opened. “Great.”

“You gonna skip again? I’m sure Tucker will record the whole lesson for you to watch later.”

“Nah.” He shook his head, grabbing the books from his locker. “Ever since Lancer figured out how to duplicate, you can’t hide from him. He can be teaching his lesson and hunting you down at the same time. Skulker’s got nothing on him. Skipping is just too much work now.”

“To class, then?”

He hesitated one last second. Then he slammed his locker shut and nodded. “To class.”

“… and that is the main reason why Arthur Prachet far surpassed his human counterpart during that era. Also a major player in the rise of Prachet’s work was the fact that Shakespeare’s answer to Prachet’s novel rhyme-scheme, the insufficiently thought-out and frankly annoying iambic pentameter, never seemed to catch on. The fact that only two of the human’s works survive to this day is surely a testament to how dreary and drawn-out the human culture had gotten by that point in history.”

Danny tuned out the teacher, only looking away briefly to add another tally to the top of his paper – the forty-eighth of that day. Having finished this task, he fixed his eyes back on the whiteboard behind the teacher. He wouldn’t get scolded for not paying attention, anyway; this particular teacher in fact seemed to prefer it if Danny did absolutely nothing.

And, well. Danny was glad for a chance to not write down every detail of the lesson. As a result, his English notebook was full of blank pages, marred only by the tally marks at the top of every page.

When the teacher managed to slip in another slur against the human species, Danny shifted and added another tally to his page. Wondered, quietly, how many more the halfa could fit in a single lesson. So far the record had been fifty-three, but with almost 15 minutes left, it didn’t look too good for the record.

He let his eyes drift towards the windows, letting himself sink deeper into his thoughts. ‘Really’, he thought bitterly, ‘everyone in my family is half-ghost. Doesn’t that mean that I am one too, kind of? Even if I don’t have any powers, that doesn’t make me human, right?’

Even in his own mind, the word ‘human’ had sounded like a dirty insult. The word had been so deeply drenched by negative connotations that, even in the comfort of his own thoughts, it sounded vile.

With a huff, he picked up his stream of thoughts again. ‘I mean. If two dogs have a puppy that looks like a kitten, it’s still a dog, no matter what it looks like or can do. I just wish…’

A ball of paper hit him in the head, and Danny jerked up. Send a glare at the offending piece of paper, absentmindedly adding another tally to his paper – the teacher had surely gotten in another insult while Danny had been distracted, just because he was in the room.

He unwrinkled the paper, quickly reading the scrawled words – Betcha wish you coulda phased through that – and scowled. He raised his head to fix Dash – the obvious sender – with said scowl, pointless as it was. Without the glowing eyes a halfa would sport, he simply couldn’t hope to reach the same level of intimidation.

Still, like it wasn’t bad enough that he had to listen to teacher drone on and on about the brilliance of half-ghosts and their powers, his fellow students had to add to whole thing. Like he had chosen to be the only pure human on the whole damn planet!

Dash just grinned back, flashing his eyes a menacing red. He ripped another piece of paper out of his notebook, scribbled a message, and balled it up. Then he lobbed it through the air, forcing Danny to make the difficult choice of what to do with it.

On one hand, he could catch it and find out what Dash had threatened him with. On the other, he could bat it off into a corner and ignore it for forever.

In the end he didn’t have to pick. A ball of cyan light intercepted it before it reached him, disintegrating the paper into ashes and dust.

“Hey!” Dash called out. His eyes turned red fully as they darted around, looking for the creator of the ectoblast.

Both Dash and Danny found her simultaneously – not that it was hard. Sam lounged in the back of the class, her eyes still bright and sparks of matching cyan still writhing around her hand.

“You stupid--”

“No energy manipulation in this classroom!” the teacher shouted, interrupting the incoming fight. Then, unbelievably, he followed it up with, “Fenton, detention!”

Danny’s head whipped around. “What for?!”

“Stop instigating my class.” Lancer flared his eyes red, warning.

“But--”

Danny bit his tongue, cutting off the retort. It made no sense, but he couldn’t win this confrontation.

It wasn’t fast enough, though. Red energy sparkled around the furious half-ghost teacher, as bright as his eyes.

Having no desire to get into this fight, Danny slunk out of his seat and beat a quick retreat from the room before the situation got worse. Sure, the teacher probably wouldn’t actually attack him, but, well. Everyone knew that sometimes it was hard to control ghost powers, especially if you’re angry.

And the last thing Danny wanted was to get evaporated over something so stupid. So ordinary.

Still, he couldn’t help but feel a brief pang of disappointment. The record for number of human slurs spoken in a single class would remain unbroken.

“Danny, sweetie,” his mom said when he finally came home from yet another day in hell – sorry, school – as she pushed her goggles up on her forehead, “it’s not your fault. There’s nothing wrong with you.”

Danny groaned, dropping into a chair in his parents’ basement lab. “Tell that to the teachers and the other students.”

“You’ll get your powers eventually, honey.” She smiled at him. “Slow development runs in your father’s side of the family, you know. Jack didn’t get his powers until he was eleven…”

“I’m fifteen.” A scowl found its way to his face once more.

“Which isn’t unheard of,” she lied smoothly. “You’re a Fenton.”

Danny rolled his eyes. “What does that have to do with anything?”

“You come from a long line of powerful half-ghosts. Before you know it, you’ll wake up and you’ll be just like your great-grandfather, the--”

“--great halfa explorer who helped conquer the new world from the human barbarians,” Danny finished dully. They had had this exact conversation dozens of times, and he had practically memorized it by now. “Has it ever occurred to you that I might never get ghost powers?”

She blinked at him. “Of course you’ll get your powers. You just need to think positively.”

“Yeah, sure.” He shrugged, figuring he might as well go along. His parents were both stubborn to no end; if they wanted to believe that he would still get ghost powers, there was nothing he could do to change their minds.

“In the meantime, look at this.” Her aura brightened slightly as she picked up her latest device. “It’s called the ‘Fenton Human Hearer’.”

It was placed in Danny’s hands, a grin on her face. “Jack and I know that there are pockets of humans left in this world. If we ever find one, this will turn their incomprehensible mutterings into something we can understand!”

Danny raised a skeptical eyebrow, eyes on her instead of the invention. “Don’t they speak English?”

A whir from the machine. Then, “Don’t they speak English? Fear me.”

Now he dropped his eyes to the gadget. From the corner of his eyes, he saw his mom do the same. Maddie shrugged, then plucked it out of his hands. “I’ve never met a true human. I wouldn’t know.”

“I don’t count?” he asked, not sure how he felt about the implication. Was it because he was better than a human, or just because she refused to concern the possibility?

“You’ll get your powers,” she said with conviction. “You’re a halfa – a Fenton.”

He nodded quietly, his unasked question thus answered. She still believed that he would get his powers, even if he was years and years past even the latest of late bloomers.

It didn’t make sense to him. Why keep denying it? Somehow, against all reason and expectations, he wasn’t a half-ghost. He hadn’t inherited any of his parents’ powers, not even a shred of their ectoplasmic sides.

Consumed by these thoughts, he silently watched his mom tidy her side of the lab. His parents were constantly working on all kinds of inventions, and thus new pieces of technology appeared and disappeared on a daily basis in the cramped basement. Most remained unpopular, however; his parents’ obsession with humans made their inventions largely useless to the rest of their half-ghost society.

Maddie paused in her work, picking up a small, strange-looking necklace. She studied it for a moment, a crease in her brow. “Where did…” She shook her head. “I wish Jack would tell me when he gets new things. Danny, can you put this on Jack’s workbench for me?”

Nodding, he slipped out the chair again. Took the necklace from her hands, turning to head towards the messier side of the lab.

But, just as her fingers slipped from the chain, a surge of energy flooded throughout the lab. It was powerful enough for even Danny to feel it, the hum of pure power in the air.

He saw his mom twist around, her eyes widening in surprise and fear, glowing vivid chartreuse. Similarly colored ectoplasm formed around her hands, as if to fight this unseen enemy.

It was the last thing Danny saw before blindingly white light wrapped around him. He screamed in terror, feeling the energy ripping at his body, and could do nothing but clutch the strange necklace to his chest.

Then, blissfully, he passed out.

#danny phantom #dp fanfic #phanfic #dp fanfiction #phanfiction #fanfiction #danny fenton #sam manson #maddie fenton #dark writes #play your part

[surveys-at-your-service]

Survey #235

“the monster you made is wearing the crown; i’ll be the king and you be the clown.”

What is your favorite move franchise? The Lion King. What was the last fast food you ate? I had a hot dog from Sonic and one of those pretzel twists things. What is the saddest book you’ve ever read? Johnny Got His Gun by Dalton Trumbo. Do you prefer heroes or villains? Villains. Duh. They're like, always more interesting. What is something you think is overrated? Uhhh coffee, for one. But like what you like. What political cause are you most passionate about? Gay rights. What country would you most like to visit? South Africa. Have you ever considered having children? Literally the only period where I wanted kids was later into Jason's and my relationship. Hell, I wanted three while he was always like "onLY TWO." Now, I don't want a single one, ever. I would be an awful mother for many reasons. If you ever took field trips as a child, which was your favorite? The zoo with Dad, my then-best friend, and her mom. One and only time I've seen meerkats. I was so excited I almost cried. Do you have any weird family traditions? It's not like, a tradition, I think, but we have a unique thing where saying "I love you mostest period" is something Mom, Dad, and my sisters have used for all my life. It's a way of saying "I love you more than you could ever love me, no arguments." Now Sara's been dragged into it lmao. Have you ever considered acting? Nope. Who was the last person you slept next to? Sara. Do you think you can be in love and still cheat on your S.O.? You can't "be in love" with a person and fucking cheat on them, no. Do you subscribe to any streaming services? We have Netflix. Idk about anything else. Have you ever been in a physical fight? No. What is the most embarrassing thing anyone has on video of you? I don't even wanna know. Did you ever get lost as a child? Yep, in a Wal-Mart lmao. This old lady helped me find my fam. What is your favorite condiment? Honey mustard. Or ketchup. Depends. Have you ever had an existential crisis? Very surprisingly, not really. Do you like country music? Begone, demon. It's still so weird to me that I loved it as a kid, but I really just grew up with it. What color are the eyes of the person you love? Brown. What is your favorite kind of flower? I looooove orchids. What town were you born in? Not the best thing to share on the Internet, eh? Do you know how to play any card games? I only vaguely understood/understand Magic: The Gathering. It's honestly really fun, but very complex in rules. It was Jason's thing so he got me into it. I miss my PS3 working because I used to have the "Duels of the Planeswalkers" on there, and doing it digitally is much easier and helpful. I loved it mostly because the art is fucking incredible. It was an old little aspiration to wind up designing the art some day and I don't think I ever saw Jason more excited. What is something about your childhood that you miss? Being more into video games than I am now alskdjf;awe. I'm more of a viewer of let's plays now than an active gamer; meanwhile, as a kid, video games were my favorite things in the world. Did you ever have MySpace? Do you miss those days? Yeah, I had one. Honestly though I can barely remember it (other than the song on my page was "Pocketful of Sunshime" lmaooooo as well meerkat-flooded), so it doesn't matter. What is the best television show you’ve ever watched? Meerkat Manor is my favorite show of all time, but as a proper show could have been better. AP made up their own shit and deviated from the KMP facts A LOT (guess what: Mozart killed a competitor's litter before; not exactly MM's her, right?), and not only was that confusing, but just annoying. Give me the real shit; don't just tweak stuff for dramatic effect. I could list a novel of lies in the series. Now, what I feel is the best show without a meerkat bias and just has an overall good plot. I kinda wanna say Supernatural, but the boys dying five million times got old. Possibly Fullmetal Alchemist. Are there any songs you can’t listen to because they bring back memories? I 110% refuse to hear "Stairway to Heaven." Have you ever saved someone’s life? Funny this is brought up after recent events. My sweetheart online bud had a cerebral aneurysm while having an extremely difficult time talking to me, and no one was home quite yet. Her final message was concerning and she didn't reply to me for a while, so I wound up messaging her again after a bit, and her boyfriend heard the b.net notification sound. Saw it was me and asked what was up. Told him, and he figured out she wasn't sleeping on the couch, she was passed out. He told me he never would have known if I hadn't said something. So does that count, even though I didn't like, physically save her? Have you ever broken any major bones? No. Are there any websites you’ve used for over 10 years? Good question? Idk. WAIT HOLD THE FUCK UP, KM's 10th birthday is coming up real soon. Wow. I know YouTube has been much longer. Idr when I joined deviantART. Maybe there's more, I dunno. Do you have any siblings? If so, what are their ages? My two immediate are 22 (ew) and 26 (double ew). Anything exciting taking place today? No, today was A N X I E T Y !! ! ! !! !! What are you craving? Okay so I have been MEGA in "the mood" lately and it's frustrating especially because I don't masturbate so I have like nO OUTLET. Who did you last hit? Nobody saving for when I was a kid repeatedly slapped my sister's arm for doing something I don't remember. How do you do in school? It depends on the subject, but in anything, I am a MASSIVE procrastinator, and I need to fix that. Schoolwork, good good, homework in the library, good good, but when I'm at home, I cannot seem to convince myself to work. As Sara puts it, home is like my "safe" place, and I don't want to bring school into it. Adjusting to school life again after like... two whole years or so of doing NOTHING at all, almost every day all day, is very difficult. I'm SO glad I picked school again, it's just a lot for a person who was so isolated and void of responsibilities to get used to. What’s your biggest goal? Right now, continue to improve my mental health. Fight social anxiety and AvPD. Who have you texted today? Just Sara. Who do you aspire to be like when you grow up? In most ways, especially in kindness, wisdom, relentless determination, passion, creativity, etc. etc. etc. etc., Mark. I think it's obvious he's Role-Model #1. I would loooove to be like Jane Goddall and Steve Irwin, too, feeling with such ferocious potency for animals and how they should be respected and loved. UM AND ALSO, EUGENIA COONEY IS THE SWEETEST PERSON ON THE ENTIRE GODDAMN EARTH AND I WOULD LOVE TO BE AS FRIENDLY AND PRECIOUS AS SHE IS. Oh, and then there's Shane Dawson. I relate to him SO much. He is the most selfless angel that seems SO down-to-earth and relatable as hell. I feel like he could be like, my best friend. Ahhhhhhh there are so many more, I love talking about my inspirations, but I'll chill here. Do you know if you want to go to college or not? I'm in college right now, and I desperately want it to stay that way. I'm fucking going somewhere in my life, and the education it provides will bring me closer to that. College is far from mandatory for everyone, but I feel it is beneficial for me. Do you like grapefruits? I haven't had one in a LONG time, so I don't really remember how they taste. I just know sour. What do you think of guys who wear eyeliner? *drools in Darkiplier* the fuck do you think Do you like online games? Only World of Warcraft, really. Who’s one person you care about more than yourself? Okay, real talk, and I hope this is everybody's answer. No one. I'm putting my goddamn self and my mental peace first for the rest of my life. Are there any pets you’re wishing for? I want another ball python. When’s the last time you used hand sanitizer? Two days ago when Mom and I stopped somewhere to eat. Wearing anything that isn’t yours? No. What type of bread did you use on the last sandwich you made? White. How many doors are in your house? Uhhh six. What was the last compliment you received, that made you smile? Sara said she was really proud of me, and to me, that's one of the biggest compliments you CAN give me. Think you need to lose weight? How much? ugh When was the last time you watched a VHS movie? I don't have a clue. We kept our VHS longer than most, though. We had too many movies on it. What event would you go back in time to see, if you could? Ummmm I dunno. Do you remember the last thing you said you wanted? To hug Sara. Who was the last friend you hung out with&what’d you do together? Sara stayed for a week. We did a lot. Who is the person, other than a spouse, that you are closest to? Sara. If you watched it, who was your favorite Hey Arnold! character? Oh my god, I hated that stupid show, but one of my sisters liked it. Have any good school pictures? or do they all just suck? There is literally ONE picture from elementary school where I think I looked pretty. Do you like trying on clothes or not? & Why? NO. I try to avoid it if I can. It's just annoying to change clothes for like five seconds. What are your thoughts on marriage? It's sweet, but I've come to find it... kinda needless for the most part? Like I know it has financial pluses and the symbolism is beautiful, but it's just that: symbolism originating from fantasies (imo, don't scream at me). It only adds pressure to stay in a dying relationship and makes splitting much more complicated. BUT, even with all that said, I personally want to get married someday, but only if I am *sure* about this person. It's the symbolism I like. That and it's so ingrained into my head that that's the "end goal" of relationships, so I'm pretty much just conditioned to want it. How long have you lived in the current place you’re living? Two years. Do you plan on moving anytime soon, if so where? I want to, but I am not in the financial position or at a level of independence where I'm ready for that. Are you more of a follower, or a leader? Be honest. This may alter with the situation, but mostly, I'm definitely a follower. Are your dreams/nightmares in black&white or color? I've heard of this condition before and it really intrigues me. I dream in color. Have you ever wanted to be some sort of hero outside of video games? I mean, define "hero." Like an action superhero in a literal way, nooooo. I'd die on Day #1, lmao. As a hero/inspiration as a person, of course; who doesn't? Will you admit that you’re at least somewhat superficial? I mean, probably in some places? How often do you go to the mall closest to you? Almost never ever. Our mall sucks and has experienced too many shootings. Do you still count with your fingers, even if only every so often? Yep. Like, always. Have you ever gone on a road trip with just friends? No. Well, I went to the beach with my friend and her mom, but just for a day or two because my separation anxiety from Mom got too bad oof. Without trying, do you act differently around different friends? Depends on the friend. I don't "fake it," just how reserved I am can move around. What was the last thing you drew/wrote on your own or someone else's skin? Probably a butterfly on my wrists when I was actively part of the Butterfly Project community. The last time you spent money, what was it on & how much did you spend? $1.25 for a drink at school. What’s the most money you’ve ever spent on one piece of clothing? Idk, but definitely not a lot. In elementary school, were you more of the bully or the bullied? Thankfully, neither. Do you like when a spouse is clingy, or can you not stand that? I'm sure to a certain degree it would be annoying, but for the most part, hell, I think it's attractive. Especially since I NEED validation you like me. How much do you say you walk in a week outside of school &/or work? Just around my house if you exclude school. Is there anything you wish your parents did differently in raising you? I wish they'd given us chores. Wish Mom didn't spank us. What would you do if the last person you texted asked you out? Lol yo we JUST broke up like an hour ago. We're not ready to get back together yet, obviously. Don't worry a bit, we're both cool. Still best friends, even. To compress a long story, needed personal growth and distance have brought us to returning to just friends. For now, at least. Have you ever received a scholarship? I think so... but not like a huge one, I believe. Who was the last person who got frustrated with you? Most likely Mom. When was the last time you mopped your kitchen floor? I myself have never mopped it. Or maybe once. What is your favorite work of art? I mentioned the Denialism painting in my last survey. What was the last appointment or plan you had to cancel? Plan, my next one with my psychiatrist. What spur-of-the-moment decision that you’ve made has had the biggest impact on your life? I don't know if any have truly changed my life. The ones that did (that I remember) were pondered over. Do you know anyone who is (or has been) a refugee? I don't think so, What is your best friend’s worst habit? She doesn't have faith in herself for ANYTHING lj;ljalwie Do you like spinach and artichoke dip? alksd;fjwei no Have you ever felt like you were about to pass out, but didn’t? Yep, a couple times. What was the name of one of your childhood imaginary friends? I didn't have any. What’s your favorite phase of the moon? Full. Do you wish you were richer? I physically refuse to be anything less than stable, hopefully even above that, once I'm independent. We've been poor all my life and it is fuck-ing HARD. It's stressful as a motherfucker and I am done with it. Very. What’s a middle name you like? Quinn. Fits a lot. I planned on giving that middle name to my hypothetical daughter. Are you scared of spiders? y e a h Do you weigh the same as your mom? No. Were you a Mary-Kate and Ashley fan? Like the average 90s/early 2000s kid. Coffee mugs, teacups, or water bottles? Uh, aesthetically? Teacups, probably. Bubblegum or cotton candy? Gum. I like the taste and texture of cotton candy, it is just RIDICULOUSLY sweet. It bothers my sensitive teeth sometimes. Do you prefer to drink soda from cans, bottles or cups? Cans. They get the coldest. Game you were best at in P.E./gym? Idk, I didn't excel at any. What do you have for breakfast on an average day? I'll typically just have a meal replacement shake or a Pop-Tart. Favorite non-chocolate candy? Sour Punch Straws (gotta be red). Favorite book you had to read for school? The Outsiders. Most frequently worn pair of shoes? My flip-flops, 'cuz they're easy to just slip on. Ideal weather? Cool but not windy (a light breeze is fine) with a partly-cloudy sky. Obsession from childhood? Webkinz. Favorite crystal? Dragon's breath opal. Favorite activity to do in warm weather? Swim or stay the fuck inside. Favorite activity to do in cold weather? Taking pictures in the snow. Five songs to describe you? "Get Up" by Mother Mother, "That's What You Get" by Paramore, uhhh... I don't feel like thinking over this any longer. My iPod isn't near me to scan through what I have, so yeah. Best way for someone to bond with you? Let's have deep philosophical talks about like the meaning of life 'n shit. Top 5 favorite Vines? Oh my god, this is impossible. To name some that come to mind first, in no order: "It's Wednesday, m'dudes *insert mating call*", "I cOUld'vE dROPPED My croiSSANt," "this is why mom doesn't FUCKING LOVE YOU," that one at a club where a girl is doing smoke tricks and the dude just goes "check that out" (or "wow," idr) or something similar (I couldn't find it), and omfg I adore that Snoop Dogg one with the little boy just semi-dancing to that iconic song???? I LOVE IT??????? Man, there are so so many more. Very honorable mention: "a d a m". Ads you have stuck in your head? None, thankfully. What is the first meme you remember seeing? Uhhh maybe Happy Bunny? Idk. Sci-fi, fantasy, or superheroes? Fantasy. Favorite type of cheese? American. What saying or quote do you live by? There's a lot I've picked up on and cling to. #1 is perhaps "Deal with life, or life deals with you." What are you currently stressed about? Some... things I realized about myself that disgust me. Favorite fairy tale? Shrek is a goddamn fairy tale and I will fight to the death against anyone who claims otherwise. Favorite tradition? I don't really have one anymore, but I remember as a kid, I would NEVER let Mom forget to throw some "reindeer food" outside for them lol. Talent you’re proud of having? One that warrants pride, exactly? Not just random talents? Well, uhhh. I suppose writing. I mean it modestly, I really do, but as a kid, my teachers all the way through high school always thought I was cheating or a parent did my papers at home. Some were only convinced by me writing in the classroom. I don't feel as good about my writing as I did in high school, but I am sill proud of excelling in it and taking writing anywhere seriously. If you were a video game character, what would your catchphrase be? I mean, name the game and genre here. Probably like "what the fuck" at like, everything, because I already do that. If you were an anime character, what genre of anime would it be? Like, based on my current life? I dunno. A sad and repetitive one with some bright days to it. Ohhh, and the color scheme and lighting vary with my mental state. Yo that would be dope. Character you relate to? lmao THRALL from WoW for being like "can y'all bastards just chill tf out" until he goes off to an isolated land away from civilization bc he's seen enough shit. Also compelled to help. Any good luck charms? I don't believe in those. Least favorite flavor of food or drink? As far as consistent flavors go, normally cherry or grape. Left or right handed? I'm a righty. Favorite potato food? Fries, when I wish they weren't. Earth tones or jewel tones? Jewel. How many phone numbers do you have memorized? Literally just Mom's. Not even mine.

#survey #quiz #questions #random #bored

[enccrypted]

Can be used for RP and non-RP blogs to get to know a bit about the person behind the screen!

1. FIRST NAME:  my name is something else, but I actually do more commonly go by jun nowadays in my day-to-day life!

2. STRANGE FACT ABOUT YOURSELF:  as a child i rode a bicycle into my aunt’s pool because I have no sense of foresight even though avoiding diving into the pool was the EASIEST thing to figure out in that moment. And riding a bike in a pool is illegal in California, so :( Please don’t call the cops on me

3. TOP THREE PHYSICAL THINGS YOU FIND ATTRACTIVE ON A PERSON:  A lot of my partners I’ve dated on sheer basis of their personality, but... lean? not necessarily super slender but I personally tend towards slimmer builds, I think? And I also really like nice eyes and hands... and I love voices I find soothing and nice to listen to!! Sound is a hate or love thing for me, so if I hear a certain sound or string of sounds I like, I can get stuck on it. And likewise if a sound is just unbearable to me, it sends my brain into fucky spirals. So that’s why I have certain songs on loop for weeks on end, because when I like a certain type of sound, I want it in my ears constantly.

4. A FOOD YOU COULD EAT FOREVER AND NOT GET BORED OF:  these spicy noodles 🍜 they’re called buldak bokkeum myeon, hot chicken ramyeon 😋

5. A FOOD YOU HATE:  I’m actually five years old, so vegetables can get the fuck off my plate. Most of the time they just have some weird textures that I cannot handle in my mouth. I feel like it’d be better if I owned a blender and could make smoothies out of some of them, but that’s a plan for the future when I can actually have full control over my own diet

6. GUILTY PLEASURE:  I love... to eat out... and to eat in general, but it’s hard to eat out a lot because it’s very expensive :( but then my opposite guilty pleasure is packaged ramen that’s cheap as shit... I’m a very inconsistent personality lmao

7. WHAT DO YOU SLEEP IN:  my pants and nothing else

8. SERIOUS RELATIONSHIPS OR FLINGS:  only serious relationships!! I mentally cannot make myself date a person if I haven’t been friends with them for at least a few months, optimally one or two years. I like to know the people I end up dating and feel comfortable around them, really know them before I even think about taking it a step further. Being good friends with a person, talking a lot with them, and feeling that I can speak to them as a partner AND a friend with whom I would trust my secrets (and therefore be honest with them about anything!) is so wildly important to me. And also I just don’t trust like that.

9. IF YOU COULD GO BACK IN THE PAST AND CHANGE ONE THING ABOUT YOUR LIFE, WOULD YOU AND WHAT WOULD IT BE:  so many things. I think about it constantly. My most common daydreams and things I imagine as I lie in bed at night is somehow waking up with my current day mind in the body of my younger self and just living life differently. But I’m sure a lot of us would tweak a thing or two, regardless of whether they’re subtle or hugely impacting, and in reality it’s just not going to happen. So while I’m not “happy” with where I am, I’m at least happy with my efforts and where I’m trying to go from here on out!

10. ARE YOU AN AFFECTIONATE PERSON:  It’s tough to get me to that point, as in I’m really picky with whom I choose to get closer to just based on compatibility, how much I initially feel I’ll be comfortable around a certain person, etc. But once I get to a status of friendship, I’m very free with affection :’) maybe too much? I drop a lot of “I love you”s and I occasionally make a fuss over the people I care about, but only to make sure they’re okay or something. Not overbearing!! I think... sometimes i accidentally say “babe/baby” to my friends and I realise two seconds later that it’s fucking weird but . can’t cry over spilt milk lmao

11. A MOVIE YOU COULD WATCH OVER AND OVER AGAIN:  I’m not a “watch a movie again” type of person because it takes me actually wanting to watch a movie, then making the conscious decision to invest the time in sitting down and watching it... so a song I like! because I can multitask while listening to music and it doesn’t take any huge commitment for 2-7 minute songs: Scenes from an Italian Restaurant. I could listen to most of Billy Joel’s songs on repeat for days, though.

12. FAVORITE BOOK:  My favourite books switch around because I always discover something new, then turn around and go straight back to an old book I used to love after rereading it... over the years I most strongly remember loving: Crime and Punishment, The Great Gatsby, and Howl’s Moving Castle! 

13. YOU HAVE THE OPPORTUNITY TO KEEP ANY ANIMAL AS A PET, WHAT DO YOU CHOOSE:  I want a cat really badly! I do have a stray cat that I hang out with at my school, but that just isn’t the same as having one of my own! And I’ve always wanted a snake since I was a wee bab so, someday, when I’m moved out and financially stable 🐍

14. TOP FIVE FICTIONAL SHIPS [IF YOU ARE AN RP BLOG, YOU CAN USE YOUR OWN SHIPS AS WELL]:  TWO OF MY FAVOURITES ARE WITH JAY: his higgs (death stranding, goldenmasked) and his revenant (iidolum)... I didn’t start off writing with either of them with huge shipping intentions in mind, but I’ve got some plots with him that are my favourite... 😭😭 other than that, cryptane, cryptage, and gibraltar/crypto! That’s five right there.

15. PIE OR CAKE:  it’s illegal to make me make decisions like this. I don’t even like cake and pie that much but when I’m in the mood for either one, they’re equally good. I can choose flavours though: apple pie and chocolate cake.

16. FAVORITE SCENT:  Gasoline? Cigarette smoke? Those are bad for me especially since I’m asthmatic, but they’re really the only thing that come to mind. AND also this oil because it smells vividly of childhood. I still have a bottle I use from time to time.

17. CELEBRITY CRUSH:  I’m not really feeling any right now... but George Michael was always such a cutie :’) 

18. IF YOU COULD TRAVEL ANYWHERE, WHERE WOULD YOU GO:  I want to go home to Australia for a bit, and visit Vietnam again (don’t remember when I last went because I was too small...). Canada, maybe?

19. INTROVERT OR EXTROVERT:  a mix of the two, but currently feeling very introvert.

20. DO YOU SCARE EASILY:  it depends on my mood. I’m either really finicky and easily scared by anything if I’m on edge, or my brain just shuts off and blocks out the whole function of terror so when something happens, I’m just like. yeah??

21. IPHONE OR ANDROID:  android and not interesting in ever switching off.

22. DO YOU PLAY ANY VIDEO GAMES:  this is a blog for a video game character!!

23. DREAM JOB:  I’m chasing a career in psychiatry and I might someday return to mechanical engineering.

24. WHAT WOULD YOU DO WITH A MILLION DOLLARS:  buy a nice small place somewhere!! fund the rest of my education on my own! give some of the money to my friends!!! fill my savings account to the brim!

25. FICTIONAL CHARACTER YOU HATE:  im trying so hard to think of a character that i hate, but I’ve mostly enjoyed the character cast of everything I’ve watched/read/played lately. life’s too short, and so is my memory, for me to remember anything that hasn’t occurred in the past few months. at the least, it makes me a much happier man so, win for me ;)

26. FANDOM THAT YOU WERE ONCE A PART OF BUT AREN’T ANY LONGER:  hate to admit it, but I used to be a Hetalia fan. Lmao. Some of the worst people I met there, but I also met my ex-girlfriend in the fandom, and we made fangames for it together :’) one of my favourite memories of younger years.

TAGGED BY:  i stole it from one of jay’s blogs... my big brain can’t remember which but go follow him on both higgs and revenant anyway

TAGGING:  @deathchasing, @mircoy

#time to change this up. \` * file: meme. #abt jun. #( a little something to kick me back into being here :'] ) #( while i was writing responses i found myself thinking 'what ooc icon should i use' and then i remembered oh. i dont use those anymore... ) #( when did that stop being a thing? for me personally and for rping? or is it just in these circles that no one is using them? im lazy idk ) #long post cw

[chibioniyuri]

Touch the Dark Reread 2019

Kristina, you ask, did you really wait until 3 weeks before CassieCon to start your reread?

And I answer yes, because of reasons. Valid reasons. There’s this trivia quiz that I bombed last year that was filled with “easy” questions, and the Quiz Master has flat-out said that they’d be “more difficult” this time around. What? Procrastination? I sailed passed soft deadlines and now I’m reading because of a hard deadline? I have no idea what you’re talking about. It’s for the quiz.

Last time around, I focused on a chapter-by-chapter breakdown of the book. But let’s be honest; I don’t really have time for that this time. So, the plan is “Things I Noticed This Time Through (TINTTT)” (I need better acronyms)

TtD TINTTT

Rasputin wanted Mei Ling’s spot on the Senate. For prestige? Or so he would have an inside position when it came time to bring the gods back? Mei Ling was “new to the position” when Cassie was about seven, so.... How long ago was he passed over? How long ago did this particular alliance and plot begin? Myra was “kidnapped” more than six months before the start of the book, and Rasputin started killing Senate members six months ago, so at least that long. Were the sneaky plots ironed out by then, or is that how long Rasputin could hold onto his pride before seeking revenge?

Also, I missed it two times now. But Rasputin used to be Tony’s business partner. I’ve been trying to figure out how Tony got dragged/thrust himself into this mess.

Random aside - it’s never come up before really, but Cassie doesn’t shake people’s hands. In fact, it sounds like she doesn’t touch people really at all until she gets to know them a bit, and she tries not to do that much in case she needs to cut and run. That’s.... a really lonely life. She’s probably pretty touch-starved.

Another thing I keep coming back to on my reread is Cassie’s absolutely crazy plan to deal with Tony. Like, it’s smart, don’t get me wrong. She can’t kill him herself, so she arranges for him to get taken down by humans so that the Senate will stake him before he can either... what, bust himself out or tweak people’s curiosity with the medical exam? But she spent like 3 pages talking about how seriously the Senate takes the secrecy thing, so I can’t help but feel that she would get some fallout from that. Did she just not care in her quest for revenge, or was she so secure in her I’m-a-nobody position that she didn’t think the Senate would come after her too?

This book exposes her weaknesses a lot. She wants a person who does the guns and knives thing because she can’t. She gets caught by spells and wards and can’t get around them. She needs a spellcaster. She needs a war-mage. She needs a Pritkin. 

I am.... not a fan of Cassie being outside the time travel loop. It’s easier to keep straight when she’s the one doing the traveling, not the bystander caught up in the time-traveling wake. Gotta figure out this Francoise and Radella mess all over again. /sad face/

And man, it didn’t take them long to slap a tracker spell on her, did it. She thinks it’s a ward and doesn’t find out the truth until the fourth book, but I’m on to you here.

Also, I’m impressed by Pritkin handling both a shotgun and a pistol simultaneously. I don’t have irl experience, but i did recently pick up a FPS game with a shotgun, and the recoil on that thing, even using two hands with a person with enhanced strength, is a bitch.

It’s so nonchalantly mentioned here that I can’t help but feel suspicious: a theory that the earth generates a magical field much like its gravitational field, and that it might be tappable someday. It mimics something mentioned in later books too, about mages trying to tap the energy generated by ley lines to feed magic spells but it being too unstable for common use? And considering that the ouroboros is powered by Artemis’s soul being bound to this plane, and continuously fueled with the combined reservoir of Silver Circle mages, and this has been framed as a problem.... I don’t know, but it’s suspicious. I’m suspicious.

Also, I love the Cass and Billy Joe Show. “’Cause I don’t wanna have to hear about this for eternity if you end up a spirit permanently. I know you. You’d haunt me.”

I know this has probably been repeated (by me) ad nauseum, but good ole LC doesn’t really have a good showing here. I get really, really frustrated really, really easily with his “aww the poor baby human doesn’t know what’s going on, we must coddle her and her delusions” schtick he’s got going on. 

Interesting tidbit: earth is the element Pritkin has the most trouble using, but it forms part of his wards?

“Remember, I have a vested interest in seeing that this goes well.” Damn. Mircea told us from the beginning. We just assumed, like Cassie did, that it meant he was concerned about his immediate survival. But doesn’t Cassie also say later that Mircea doesn’t do anything for a singular reason? Another long-game play, by both Mircea and KC. Brava.

I decided to read the seduction scene, just to see if I could. It is highly, highly discomfiting. I think I’ll be skipping the rest. Considering “the rest” involves feet, I don’t feel bad about this decision.

I am deeply, deeply curious how Pritkin survived the assault on MAGIC. We all know he’s a bad-ass, and wily, and powerful. We know Cassie has a tendency to underestimate people, especially her allies, because she fears losing them. But we never find out what happened in that room after she leaves it, and that bothers me. He could have whipped out some awesome magic; maybe Silver Circle mages streamed in right after the Black Circle. 

Finally: I just had a thought as I read about Cassie finding a naked LC “simply stunning”. Can Cassie claim to have slept with LC? She considers him Mircea at the time, and she was inhabiting another person’s body on top of that. Still.... it’s a weird thought to have, that she kinda sorta slept with her stepdaughter’s beau?? I.... I need to wipe this thought from my brain.

#touch the dark #cassie palmer series reread 2019 #some of these thoughts were the same ones i had last time around too #I didn't take them out because they still feel relevant #cprr19

[midzelink]

Twilight Princess w/o Text Boxes: A Dream Made Possible w/ Emulation

Okay.  So.

Over the past couple months of running this blog, I’ve been thinking quite a lot about emulating Twilight Princesss in Dolphin, and the other day I finally bit the bullet and booted up the game for the first time.  I had fun finally playing around with the emulator’s free look feature, and I decided now was as good a time as any to finally learn how to make GIFs the proper way--with Photoshop--so I messed around with the program a bit and ended up making this GIF, which I posted yesterday.  It’s not great, but I’ve seen worse, so eh, whatever, right?  At least I’m learning.

Anyway, @therealflurrin sees this GIF and it kicks of a conversation between us about emulation: how it works, what free look is, and what the potential for these kinds of tools are: GIF-making, edits, stills...general hilarity, y’know, basic stuff.

They ask me if I have any idea how to disable the UI of the game.  No, I say; I do a quick cursory Google, and something like that would require texture dumping, editing, and reloading, and that sounds like a heckuva lot of work, doesn’t it?  I’ll just stick to what I know how to do.

And then they say something else:

my DREAM is to capture all the TP cutscenes without the text overlays for AMV purposes......someday

And I'm like, ah.

Ah, shit.

I dunno about the rest of you, but back in the day, when I would stay up until 3 AM watching Midlink AMVs during a sleepover on my friends’ computers (because Hylia knows I didn’t have one, and what the f**k is a smart phone, it’s only 2007), I used to daydream about this exact thing.  I watched a whole ton of (mostly shitty) AMVs, and most of them either completely disregarded any scenes with dialogue, zoomed to somewhat hide their presence, or used the cutscenes with text anyway, and their quality suffered for it regardless--but that was over 10 years ago, long before emulation was so readily accessible (and long before I would discover it), and as time passed, I quickly forgot about this little dream...

...until @therealflurrin reminded me of it.

How hard could it possibly be?

I can’t currently find the forum post I found that instructed another user on how to remove the UI of another (non-Zelda) game in Dolphin, but I can more than summarize the process myself after the day I had yesterday.  Essentially, each aspect of the game’s UI is a texture in the game’s files; you can’t delete textures, but you can replace them using Dolphin’s built-in texture loading feature.  In order to do what I had set out to, I had to:

Navigate to the graphics setting in Dolphin and turn on the “dump textures” feature, which could create viewable .png files of every single texture loaded into the game upon boot and direct them into a single folder.

Boot the game, ensuring that the elements of the UI I wanted to eliminate were clearly visible.

Find the textures responsible for these elements in the dump folder, making note of their file names.

Create and duplicate a 1x1 transparent .png file, renaming each duplication to match each of the various textures I want to replace from the previous step.

Place each of these “textures” into a folder that matches the name of the folder created by the dumping process, moving that folder into Dolphin’s custom textures directory, and again navigating to the graphics settings and checking “load custom textures.”

Doesn’t sound too difficult, right?

...Right.

Some textures were easy, of course.  Getting rid of the text itself was as simple as finding the very few textures that had the letters of the alphabet on them and replacing them, but more than a couple of them were vague stills of nonsense, and combing through hundreds of these textures to find the right ones when I wasn’t even sure what I was looking for...

Well, it was quite the headache, and at some point I ended up saying “f**k it!” and just started replacing anything and everything that looked vaguely suspicious.

For instance, after eliminating the actual text from the boxes, there still remained the matter of the “glow effect” behind the text--upon inspection without the obstruction of this text, just a glowing circle.  I just skimmed through the dump folder that resulted from me booting up the game for just a few seconds and I counted more than thirteen textures that fit that exact bill (plus several others that looked like they maybe could have also been the culprit, somehow), and I just kept on rebooting and replacing, rebooting and replacing until those stupid circles were gone.  (Not the best method in the world, I know, but we learn from our mistakes.)  I spent ages looking for the surely-it-must-be-a-long-black-rectangle-texture responsible for the backdrop, was unable to find it, and replaced a metric shit-ton of unimportant-looking textures until it, too, was somehow gone--and after a lot of trial and error, I finally got the result I was hoping for.

In doing so, however, I had eliminated a heckuva lot of textures that didn’t need replacing, and the entire thing left a bit of a...foul taste in my mouth.

So, like the perfectionist I am, I moved all of the work I had already completed to another location...and began again.

This time, I replaced textures one by one, rebooting the game each time to ensure that it was the correct one.  That “long black rectangle” I was looking for ended up being a tall, transparent image merely 8 pixels wide.  Those glowing circles ended up being the dang circle that I suspected least, go figure.  Regardless, slowly but surely, I was able to replicate my previous success.

Now, my custom texture folder looks a little something like this:

And the in-game result has transformed this:

Into this:

(As you can see, I’ve replaced many other elements of the UI outside of text boxes, and I put them into their own sub-folders for organization’s sake.)

It was a lot of work, but as far as ten-year-old me would be concerned, I have created a means in which to achieve my once impossible dream:

Twilight Princess cutscenes without text boxes.

What does any of this mean?

Effectively, I’ve created a “texture pack” of a sorts that removes most of the game’s UI elements, including the text boxes that have obstructed so many of the game’s better moments.  It’s still far from completely finished, but as of now, it serves its primary function flawlessly, and all that’s left of my childhood dream is one eensy, teensy thing:

Recording, baby!

That is to say, video recording of all the game’s cutscenes with this texture pack in effect, so that kind of footage is available and out there--otherwise, all of this work I’ve done will have been for naught, yeah?  Fortunately, I’m not just an idiot with an emulator and Photoshop; I’m an idiot with an emulator, Photoshop, and OBS Studio, ready and capable to do all of the hard work of capturing these moments for me.

And now, all that I have to do...is play the game.

So, what happens next?

I’m not going to put an estimate on how long this kind of thing is going to take; I have a life outside of this blog and outside of replaying a game I’ve played more than a few times, but over the next few weeks I’m going to be playing through Twilight Princess on Dolphin with the intention to:

Find and capture each of the game’s cutscenes without UI interference, and upload them (probably onto Google Drive) for use by the general public.

Create save states throughout my playthrough and upload them as well, so any person with a good PC, Dolphin, and a North American Twilight Princess .iso can jump into the game at any point they’d like.

Find and tweak any remaining elements of the game’s UI that I can find to make the experience as clean as possible...and perhaps upload this “texture pack” for general use if I am able to do so.

...But mostly the first thing, yeah?  I may keep everyone updated on my progress, if anyone particularly cares, but I also may just keep quiet about it and then dump all of these files at once.  Who knows!  We’ll just have to wait and see.

TL;DR

There’s a whole lot of potential with this kind of thing, and even if it’s a decade too late and no one is really making Twilight Princess AMVs anymore, this is something I’m so stupidly passionate about that I intend to see it through regardless.  I mean, Twilight Princess just happened to be the game that I chose!  If it’s possible with this game, then it must surely be possible with others, and maybe this can inspire other similar "HUD-less” projects from others.  But, even if it doesn’t, I’ll be okay with that.

In the end, if I can make even just one person happy with this little project of mine, that will be more than enough.

#loz #twilight princess #loz tp #midna #loztp #dolphin emulator #emulafun #long post #therealflurrin #my projects #my posts #text free tp