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midnightcreator12 · 2 months

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And We'll Keep Marching On Chapter 7 - Fractures and Cracks

AO3 Link

Gonna...just establish some stuff here real quick.

Apparently, ‘setting up a signal’ wasn’t as simple as making a phone call to a mother ship.

Because apparently, Raven had tried to do that when she first landed in the woods and she hadn’t heard anything.

Which found Mikey sitting on the roof with her, watching as she hooked Scrap up to the old satellite dish in an effort to make the signal stronger.

“Why don’t you guys just use cell phones?”

Raven paused, frowning over her shoulder, “Use what?”

“Uhhhhh,” what had she called it when Mikey showed her his T-Phone? “Communicators?”

“Oh, we do,” Raven turned back to the satellite. “But all of my weapons, equipment and armor were confiscated when I was captured…and all of it is likely destroyed by now.”

“Bummer,” Mikey said. “Soooo, how does giving Scrap over a hundred channels help?”

“The idea is to boost a signal for him,” Raven explained as she finally managed to get the stem on the dish open, revealing a bunch of wires and circuits. “Every droid has a short distance distress beacon built into it, how short that distance is depends on the model. Scrap, since he’s a BD-unit, has a longer reach than the average droid but, since it’s been two weeks with no sign of anyone, it wasn’t enough to reach the Paragon. So if I can use this satellite to bonce the ping off any other satellites in the system, it should reach the Paragon no matter where they are.”

“Cooool,” Mikey nodded along, not fully getting what Raven was trying to do but, hey, she didn’t use as many big complicated words as Donnie did to try and sound smart. “What’s a Paragon?”

“It is the Venator of my battalion.”

Mikey blinked, tilting his head.

Raven glanced over when he didn’t reply, hands still fiddling inside the satellite, “A Venator is a class of starship, specifically a battleship. They are built to be, in essence, a mobile home base for the battalions to operate out off.”

“So it’s a flying Lair?”

“Sure, yeah,” Raven carefully pulled some wires out, twisting them together with some of the ones she’d brought up before patting the spot next to her. Scrap trilled, sitting himself down like a little bird.

Mikey’s beak wrinkled when Raven opened a panel on Scrap’s back, “Does that hurt him?”

“No, not at all. Giving a droid pain receptors would be pretty counter-productive.”

Scrap beeped, ears wiggling happily.

“Ok,” Mikey was silent for a moment, watching as more wires were hooked up to Scrap. “What’re they like?”

“Who?” Raven asked.

“Your friends. Er, brothers? Are all of you on the same ship?”

“No, not all. The GAR has over one million troopers on active duty, the two-forty-fourth only has roughly five-fifty. And it not uncommon for batch-mates to be split up over several positions.”

“Batch-mates?”

“Clones were usually made in units of five hundred, give or take a few if…something happened. The first-gens formed a lot of the vocabulary for how we all refer to each other and ‘batch-mate’ was among the first thing.”

“So…the brothers you’ve mentioned aren’t on your ship.”

“None are my batch-mates, no. But they are my brothers,” she nodded at the collection of wires before holding out a hand. “Could I borrow your…uh, cell phone?”

“Oh, sure,” Mikey handed it over. “So what are your brothers like?”

“There’s Jay, he’s the battalion Commander,” Raven turned the phone a few times, frowning at it. “He tries to act all serious and no-nonsense, but Magpie’s favorite pass time is dragging us ARCs into trouble and Jay doesn't exactly put up much of a fight.”

She seemed to figure the phone out. Mikey frowned when the screen went black and lines of numbers started to scroll down the screen.

…well, if something broke, he was pretty sure Donnie could fix it.

Raven kept talking as she worked, “And Crow is technically an honorary ARC. He’s a Medic so he can’t get ranks like that but he usually gets put with us since he’s the lead medic.”

“So, he’d fix Leo?” Mikey asked.

Raven nodded and tapped at the phone, “Yeah. Even if he wasn’t the lead medic, he’s the only one who’s done extra training with surgery and post-op care. And General Ader would probably insist that you all stay on the Paragon until Leonardo was back to full health.”

“They’d let us do that?” Mikey asked. “Aren’t you guys fighting a war?”

Raven hesitated, “We’re…technically operating independently at the moment.”

Mikey tipped his head again, curiosity now fully peaked.

Raven paused again, glancing at Scrap before going back to the phone, “About…five years ago, we were assigned to track down a group of mercenaries that had stolen these things called kyber crystals. We…still aren’t fully sure what happened but one minute we’re dropping out of hyperspace to assist Commander Verd, the next we were drifting in unknown space and running on emergency power.”

“Whoa,” Mikey whistled.

“Yeah, whoa. We managed to fix the Paragon, did some exploring, figured out we couldn’t make contact with the Republic so we’ve just been helping with smaller scale conflicts while we try and figure out how to get back.”

“Why don’t you do the thing you’re doing with Scrap?”

“We did,” Raven nodded to Scrap. “But nothing we tried has made contact so far. So, yeah, you could all stay on the Paragon until Leo is patched up and ready for redeployment.”

“Cool,” Mikey peered over her shoulder to watch the numbers scrolling down his phone screen. “What’s your boss like?”

“General Ader?”

Mikey hummed, “Is she that thing you called April? Force-senative?”

“Yup. She’s a Jedi, all the GAR generals are Jedi. They have this connection to the Force that gives them abilities like telekinesis, telepathy, and heightened awareness just to name a few.”

Mikey gasped, stars in his eyes, “So your leader is a space wizard?”

Raven paused, “...yeah. She’s a space wizard.”

“Cooool.”

Raven chuckled, tapping out a long string of numbers before turning to Scrap, “Alright, send the ping.”

Scrap beeped, antennae flipping straight up in the air and little body trembling lightly.

Mikey watched, expecting to see some kind of indicator that the signal was sending.

But both human and robot sat in silence for a minute.

Raven frowned and put another string of numbers into the phone, “What the kriff?”

“What?” Mikey asked.

Raven hummed, tapping furiously at the screen, then seeming to catch herself and breathe in deeply, “Do you happen to know the range this can get?”

“Uhhhhhhhhh,” Mikey blinked. “That’s a Donnie question.”

“Ah, right,” Raven turned back to the phone.

“....do you want me to get him…?”

“He didn’t seem happy with the decision to let me contact the Paragon. I doubt he’ll want to help me do that.”

“Phs, he’s just grumpy ‘cause he hasn’t slept in a while,” Mikey stood on the roof, stretching both arms over his head until his spine gave a satisfying pop. “I’ll go get him for you!”

“Wait, Mikey-”

Nope! His mind was made up. He didn’t know exactly why Donnie hadn’t voted to call in some help but he’d been outvoted so he had to help Raven set up her cell signal thingy.

So he launched himself off the roof without waiting to see what Raven wanted to say. He landed into a roll down the porch cover, slowing his momentum enough to do a clean flip and land perfectly on the muddy ground. He spun around, beaming up at Raven and waving, “Just hang for a bit dude! I’ll be back in no time!”

Raven didn’t verbally reply…and he couldn’t see her face from the ground. So he gave one last wave before trotting towards the barn.

Donnie had pretty much moved into it, in Mikey’s option, only coming back inside to check on Leo. Which sucked because Mikey wanted all his bros close by…just in case.

He didn’t know in case of what but he knew he felt better when all his bro’s were under the same roof.

Plus, it was a lot colder on the surface then it was in the sewers. He was pretty sure mutant turtles weren’t supposed to stay in the cold for long spans of time.

Maybe he could convince Donnie to come inside after he helped Raven? He hadn’t been kidding when he told Raven that his brainy bro hadn’t slept in a while. Donnie would come in for naps and go right back outside to do…whatever his project was now. Always gone before anyone was up and back after everyone went to bed.

So, get Donnie to help Raven, then maybe Raven could help him convince Donnie to take a nap. Or they could get Scrap to knock him out.

But when he got close to the barn, he frowned.

There was talking coming from the cracked door. And not the usual back and forth that Casey and Donnie had been doing lately.

Nooo, that was definitely April’s voice coming from the barn. Which was odd, since April never went into the barn.

Mikey slowed his pace, almost tip-toeing up to the door to listen in.

“-what is with you? Why did you vote no?” April’s voice sounded mad. “You’re the smartest one here, if anyone should’ve suggested having Raven call help it should have been you!”

“Clearly my option doesn’t hold much weight. I technically didn’t get to vote.” Huh, Mikey wasn’t used to Donnie sounding so…short with April. He usually tripped and tumbled over every other word and wormed in as much terrible flirting and flattery as he could.

Than again…Mikey couldn’t really remember the last time Donnie had gone full ‘heart-eyed babbling dumb-dumb’ when he talked about April.

“Why are you being stubborn about this?” April huffed. “We have a way to actually get Leo help and you wanted to pass it up?”

Mikey peeked into the barn in time to see Donnie spin around to glare, actually glare, at April!

“As much as I hate to admit it, Casey had a point. We are banking solely on you reading her mind to know if everything she said was the truth and we already know she has a way to completely lock you out of her head.”

“I saw her memories, I felt the things she was feeling, I could sense that she was telling the truth! What more proof do you want?”

“Yes, let us rely completely on your powers that you just got a few months ago, which, by the way, have a worse track record than Mikey’s cooking experiments.”

Oh, okay, ouch…but also, what?

“My- you- my powers are not unreliable!”

“Whether or not you can sense danger changes almost everyday, you’ve had random outbursts that break things more often than not, oh, and you conveniently didn’t notice the Kraang in your school until you brought him to our home!”

Oookay, Donnie was doing that thing, the thing where his tone got angrier and angrier the longer he rambled. And…okay, the inconsistencies with April’s powers weren’t fair but Mikey kinda agreed that April never sensing something off about her friend was weird. And she knew the rule about bringing other people to the Lair-

“You’re seriously holding that over me?! I’d known Irma for-”

“I. Don’t. Care.” Donnie gritted out each word, slowly standing up from his chair. “You want me to use my brain? Here’s what I know. We have no concrete evidence that anything good will come from calling down more aliens. Raven is clearly not the Kraang but what if her people are willing to trade us to the Kraang for resources? Or to keep the Kraang off their planet? Or maybe they’ll be just like every other human here and just lock us away like lab rats. Or maybe she just figured out how to trick you so she can escape and leave us high and dry and still in the exact same spot!”

Mikey jaw dropped in shock. Partly because of how harsh Donnie was being but also because he never thought he’d ever see Donnie yelling at April.

Clearly, she didn’t either because she was slowly backing away as Donnie ranted on, “I have been helping Leo! I patched him up and got him stable! I have been handling everything related to his care since we got here! I don’t need help from some random alien person who just showed up out of nowhere that we all suddenly trust for some reason!”

Donnie was breathing hard, glaring down at April and growling, too low for a human to pick up but Mikey could hear it plain as day.

Man, Donnie must be pretty upset if he was growling like that.

April stood, frozen as the silence rang between them.

Mikey almost missed when she muttered, “She figured out Leo’s leg was broken before you did.”

And…no, Mikey cringed when she said that because he knew how torn up Donnie had been about that. Why did she say that?

The effect on Donnie was instant. The anger on his face fell, leaving a slack, shocked expression. It was only there for a second but if Mikey saw it, April definitely did too. Then it was gone and Donnie's face was a mask of indifference as he spun around and sat back at the bench.

April seemed to realize her misstep, because she started to follow, lifting a hand, “Wait, Donnie, I-”

“No, that was fair,” Donnie murmured, dragging a stand full of vials closer to himself. “I was out of line. Now we’re even.”

“No, Donnie-”

“I have stuff I want to do. Alone.”

“I’m-”

Donnie growled again, this time at a tone humans could hear.

It worked because April suddenly jerked back.

Mikey could feel how tense the silence was.

And then she spun around with a sound of frustration and headed for the door.

Mikey squeaked, scrabbling out of the way and diving around the corner of the barn. He listened to April stomping by, peering out to watch her retreating back as she returned to the house, slamming the door when she went inside.

And now, he faced a very serious dilemma.

Raven needed to know the range of her improvised super cell phone, and Donnie probably knew what that meant and what she needed to know.

But Donnie had just had a fight with April. April! If something bothered him enough to snap at her, Mikey didn’t stand a chance.

…unless he pulled out the baby brother privilege!

Mind made up, Mikey stepped out of his hiding place and matched into the barn.

Donnie was bent over the old workbench that was now doubling as a lab table. He’d dug up lab equipment from somewhere, where Mikey had no clue because he was pretty sure Donnie hadn’t brought any of it from the Lair. A few had multi-colored liquids in them and, when Mikey got close enough, he saw a very large canister was also taking up surface space.

“Whhhhy do you have mutagen?”

Donnie startled, head whipping around, “Jeeez, Mikey.”

“Dude, I wasn’t even sneaking.”

Donnie huffed and turned back to his test tubes. “What do you want Mike?”

“Well I was gonna ask you something but now I wanna know about this,” Mikey started to reach out to poke the mutagen canister.

Donnie’s hand snaked out and effectively blocked his hand, “Do not touch.”

“Are you making more anti-mutagen stuff?”

“Nope,” Donnie pulled up a vial, tapping the side. “I’m making something to help Leo!”

“Uhhhh,” Mikey looked from the vial to the mutagen, the back to the tube. “I thought doubling up on mutagen was bad? Like when I got shellacne.”

“You messed around with an experimental compound without any testing,” Donnie muttered. “I am using my expansive knowledge about mutagen and our mutation to create the perfect solution to all our problems! If I can isolate the right chemical compounds in mutagen that regenerate cells and adjust the ratios before combining it with the right cocktail of vitamins, anti-inflammatories and anabolics, I can have Leo back to full health in less than a month!”

“Uhhh,” Mikey reached out to poke at the mutagen again. “With the ooze?”

Donnie smacked his hand away again, “We don’t need anyone else, I can fix this! I’ve already given a list of the medications I need to Casey and he assured me that he would go to the closest town soon. Once I have all the right materials I can create a compound to accelerate Leo’s healing! No unknown alien races needed!” He looked up at the last sentence, grinning widely up at Mikey. “See! I can fix this! I can fix everything so we don’t need to take any risks!”

Aaaand his eye was doing that twitchy thing. The one that happened when Donnie started going full mad scientist because he hadn’t been sleeping enough.

“Dude, I think you need a nap…in a bed.”

Donnie scoffed, turning back to his chemicals, “No I don’t, I need to finish this. Preferably before your ‘friend’ calls down her friends.”

“....why do you not want Raven to call help? She was just telling me about the doctor on her team, he’s her brother! Actually…I think all the clones are technically siblings?”

“Clearly not,” Donnie waved a hand. “She’s a girl, and brother indicates that some of these clones received their genetic material from a man. Ergo, these Kamanoians used a large number of donors to create their army, likey sourcing a number of different people with varying skill sets to cut down on the time needed to tamper with the DNA. Plus, how confusing would it be if they all had the same base doner? You could never keep them all straight if they all looked the same…but then again, she does have tattoos, perhaps that was how they would tell each other apart? Or maybe it’s a ranking system! The stripes could be-”

“Dude!” Mikey interrupted. “Okay, seriously, when was the last time you slept? You’re going off on tangents.” Mikey tugged at Donnie’s mask, making him squawk indignantly. “And you’re trying to make medicine outta ooze? And you snapped at April! Since when do you snap at April?”

The mention of April made Donnie freeze, which meant Mikey had the perfect opportunity to pull his mask down.

He couldn’t help but hiss at the dark circles under Donnie’s eyes, “Dude, just an fyi? I don’t think a few hours every nigh counts as ‘sleeping’.”

“I’ve been sleeping!” Donnie snapped back. “But I’ve also been working! The house needs work before winter sets in, the heating still isn’t working as well as it could be and it’s going to get cold up here. I would also like to add a heating system to the barn so I can keep working in here, then there’s insulating the water pipes or they’ll burst on us, making sure we have wood in case the central heat fails, I need to do a lot more experimentation with the mutagen medicine, especially when Casey gets the things I need, and I have to make sure all the electricals are sealed against any potential water damage-”

“Bro, you already did most of that.”

“I did a quick checks that were, in no way, meant to be long-term fixes. Of course, I can’t do most of those until someone goes into town for more supplies and I still have a few places to scavenge from. So in the meantime, I can work on this!” He gestured to the work table.

Mikey frowned, crossing his arms, “You know, I asked you why’d you snap at April.”

“Did you?” Donnie blinked. Very, very purposely.

Mikey frowned harder, “Aren’t you, like, all goo-goo eyes for her? How little sleep have you gotten that you’re not even thinking about running to make up things?” Not that Mikey thought he should. They both had said things but, honestly, Donnie was always the one reaching out when he and April had spats. It was way past her turn.

Donnie huffed, leaning away from Mikey as he snatched and retired his mask. He crossed his arms, eyes turning down to stare the the floor, “...I haven’t felt like that in a while.”

“Wha- Seriously?” Mikey knew Donnie hadn’t been as star-struck but he’d thought- “But you’re crazy about her!”

“Yeah, I was but-” Donnie sighed, entire body suddenly slumping. “I don’t know. I guess for a while I was just…seeing what I liked about her. But…when she stopped talking to us?”

Oh, Mikey remembered that. Donnie had been super depressed for days when April said she never wanted to see them again.

Donnie sighed again, rubbing his face, “Yeah, well, I don’t know but when she did finally start coming back things were… different? I don’t really know but I didn’t feel the same. I still liked her but the feeling wasn’t as strong. And then when the powers started…”

He trailed off but Mikey nodded. He couldn’t really deny that April had gotten kinda…pushy after they found she had powers, especially with Donnie.

“Soooo,” Mikey tilted his head curiously. “You don’t have a crush on her anymore?”

“No Mikey, I don’t have a crush on April anymore.”

“And you’ve slept in an actual bed in the last seven days, right?”

Donnie gave Mikey a flat look, “I thought we were having a heart-to-heart.”

“We can do that later,” Mikey reached up, poking between Donnie’s eyes. “But your eyebags have eyebags dude.”

Donnie growled, a deep turtle-y growl.

“See? You need some sleep bro.”

He seized Donnie’s arm, pulling his brother out of the chair. Donnie growled again and tried to pull his limb back.

Mikey just tightened his hold. His brothers always forgot how strong he actually was, which worked out great for him in training. And in dragging Donnie to bed when Leo couldn’t do it.

But they both paused when Mikey shoved open the barn door.

Because in the time Mikey had been in the barn, it had started to snow. Fat flakes of white drifted down and, while many melted as soon as they touched anything solid, small piles had started to form on the ground.

And Mikey couldn’t help feeling sad. Because this was their first winter on the surface. He’d always dreamed about it, experiencing a snowfall topside, playing in the snow that wasn’t melted enough to slide down a grate or in tiny drifts.

He didn’t think they’d be able to experience snow in broad daylight…and he wasn’t sure if he liked all the reasons why they could at the moment.

But he had other things to worry over right now. Plus, Leo was awake so maybe he’d be well enough to enjoy the snow with them when it actually started collecting on the ground.

So he kept tugging Donnie along towards the house, intent on making sure he made it to bed and stayed there.

And completely forgetting the clone watching the scene from the roof.

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Sorry to any Apriltello shipers who thought I was gonna fix this! But the show just kinda....spoiled that ship for me. Plus, I don't think April and Donnie really...click.

#tmnt #tmnt 2012 #lone hunter and turtle #tmnt au #fanfic #oc

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mikaa-mina · 4 years

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At Garden’s Edge- ch8: A Day in the Life of a Newt(on Pulsifer)

The lights are too bright, and Newt can’t quite hear what the lady in front of him is saying over the cacophony of beeps. His head also feels quite.... strange. He’s pretty sure that it’s not supposed to feel like it’s floating half a foot above his neck while also feeling like it’s stuffed full of cotton.

Some of the beeping suddenly stops, making it so much quieter in the ER, and Newt can finally understand what the nurse is asking. He tells her he thinks he’s fine, only he managed to hit something in the middle of the road with his bike and that sent him sailing towards the curb, which his bike tire hit at the wrong angle, and that quite firmly ejected him from his seat. And actually, he’s not at all quite sure how he got here, or why he’s here.

The nurse comes closer before he realizes she’s holding a tablet to enter his information in. By the time he realizes, it’s too late.

There’s a sound much like a mosquito hitting a trap lamp with a bright Bzzt! and then tablet goes dark in her hands. Newt grimaces.

It snowballs from there.

She shushes his apologies and uses the flip hospital phone that they use now instead of chargers/beepers to call the nurse station and request a backup one. It, accordingly, powers off halfway through her phone call. She shakes it with a frown and grumbles about the board of offices being cheap with their equipment, turns a sunny smile on him, and brightly says “well, I’ll just take down the basics and get your vitals while we wait. Do you have records here?”

“Uh. Maybe?” probably, “Which hospital is this?”

“The Brugmansia Hospital.”

“Oh! Yeah. I was born here. Uh. I changed my name though. Still Pulsifer for the last name though, figure there’s probably not too many of them around,” he laughs nervously, overly conscious of how awkward he is and how unable he is to do anything about it.

She still smiles, ever professional, and jots down his information. “First name?”

“Oh! Right. Sorry. It’s Newton now. Newton Pulsifer.”

“Thank you Newton, now I’m just going to take your vitals now.”

“Oh- I, uh, don’t really think-”

It’s too late, she’s come up to take his temperature with their new wireless, laser thermometer and it promptly errors out. It continues to error out no matter how many times she restarts it. The heavy seed of dread in Newt’s stomach grows larger. This is exactly why he tries not to go to places like this.

“I’m sorry. Uh, do you happen to have something maybe not, uh, electrical?”

She gives him a funny look for that and he shrinks back.

“Well. Let me get your blood pressure and o2 readings.”

Newt looks dubiously at the machine setup she wheels over to him. Miraculously, it goes okay when she wraps the cuff around his upper arm, and even when it starts. Everything avalanches when she puts the wireless o2 reader on him. Immediately everything in his room fritzes out, the lights even flickering before coming back, but all of the machines are still down or in the emergency boot up system restart.

“Oh bugger,” he sighs under his breath, quietly enough that the nurse fretting over all the technology can’t hear how resigned and unsurprised he is.

The avalanche continues when a nearby nurse ducks in and his tablet powers itself off. The smartwatch he’s wearing starts having three different alarms go off on it, and then there’s some shouts of alarm from outside Newt’s room that he’s really not sure that he wants to know what they’re about.

There are four people in his room now, in varying states of bewilderment and frustration, trying to figure out why everything’s malfunctioning in his room while also trying to get it back up and working. No one’s listening to Newt when he tries to explain that if he could just leave, it’d get better, but then, he’s mostly used to being ignored at this point.

More and more people trickle into the room, Newt spots the tech support guy he wished to be, frowning and scratching his head as he looks at everything. And then he looks at Newt.

A quick mumble about using the loo and Newt escapes out of the room, IV still attached to the weird metal stand and his arm but at least they’re not electronically powered. Just good engineering and reliable gravity.

He figures if he can put enough distance between him, and the rest of all that technology crammed into one small spot, that everything will boot back up just fine. And if not, Newt could write out exactly how to fix it.

So he heads to the loo, because now that he’s made the excuse, he figures he might as well try and also he’s betting on there being a whole lot less fancy technology in there. If only he could actually find said loo. Or any loo, really.

He’s waylaid by a small girl about ten minutes into his wandering of the halls.

“Oh. Hullo there.”

The girl is missing three teeth, has brown hair, and is looking at Newt as if he’s the newest attraction in the city zoo. Under her stare, Newt almost feels like one.

“Wut’er you doing?”

“Er... looking for the loo.”

She looks at him, looks in the direction he was heading in, looks back at him and matter-of-fact-ly says, “you’re going the wrong way.”

He blinks at her, which she takes as permission for her to reach up and grab his hand and start pulling him in the other direction. Bewildered, he followed.

And thus began a brand new game called “Lead the Newt” which had a revolving cast of characters, all under the age of twelve, each insisting they knew where the loo was, and each hiding him from sight any time an adult employee came near.

This scavenger hunt of a game ended at, not a loo (which made Newt extremely grateful he didn’t actually need one), but at a recreational sort of room. There was an old tv in one corner, an open treasure chest filled with costumes and toys, and a few bookshelves. The floor was spongy beneath Newt’s feat and looking down left him staring at brightly colored interlocking foam mat puzzle pieces.

For some reason, all of the co-conspirators find him funny, and really the only tech he might fry in here is a rather old tv that looks like it’s been outdated so many times it can’t recall if it’s outdated or retro at this point, so all in all... This is probably the safest room for Newt to be in. And certainly more interesting than the loo.

And that’s how he finds himself, an hour later, dressed in a paper hat of some kind (its supposed to be a jester’s hat) leaning against his iv pole, making elaborate gestures with his free hand, and telling terrible terrible jokes to a kid in a paper crown and to the amusement of the other kids around him. It’s most certainly a bizarre scene, but no one has commented on it as of yet and due entirely for the fact that the secondary game they’re all playing is ‘Hide the Newt’ any time an adult wanders by. Closets, corners, and blankets have all been heavily featured by now in this game.

So Newt can hardly be blamed for jumping near out of his skin when, after telling a particularly bad punny joke, he hears an adult’s laughter. So he jumps, jerks, and tries to turn to face the voice all in one motion and ends up somehow practically hogtieing himself in his iv cord and going down.

He ended up in a heap of limbs, metal pole, and iv cord wrapped all around him, and his glasses hanging half off his face. “Oh bugger...”

There was a snickering above him from the adult voice and the children alternating between giggles at his fall and joyful cries of “Crow Crow!”, “Mister Crow!”, and “Miss Crow!”. As Newt struggled to untangle himself, with the help of a few kids who both made things worse and better in turns, the other children began pleading with the Crow? Crow?? to pleeeeease let them keep Newt.

The stranger is crouching down to the kid’s level by the time Newt gets mostly upright, and they look a lot like they’re trying very hard not to laugh. “Now. However did you magpies manage to steal a whole person?”

Laughter sounds and they’re throwing themselves at the redhead and the two bags they set down. As the majority are immediately distracted by the prospect of sweets and the passing out of them, the stranger turns to Newt and raises an eyebrow high above dark sunglasses and says, “well? How’d they manage to kidnap you?”

Before Newt can respond the kids answer with excuses that pile over one another ranging from “he just wandered in!” to the actually mostly truthful “he was lost so we were showing him around!”.

“Oh really now?” they seem to be biting back laughter as they continue, “he was lost so you decided to help him by keeping him here?”

Some of the kids looked abashed while others look outright proud of themselves and to Newt’s surprise the stranger threw back their head with a short bark of a laugh before grinning as if proud of them.

Just in case he was reading the situation wrong, he’d done that with people more than a few times, Newt tried pushing through his embarrassment and awkwardness with an “It’s, uh, alright. Really. It’s been kind of fun, actually.”

“Ah. Yeah, they really grow on you.” The Crow glanced at the kids with a mischievous look, “like a fungus.”

Groans and laughter sounded before all of a sudden a shushing and pointing as an adult was seen wandering their way. Before Newt could blink they had him hidden out of sight shoved in a closet between some coats, puppets, and something slightly sticky that he had no intention of exploring further.

He could hear the somewhat muffled conversation of the kids pleading with The Crow to keep their secret before a new adult voice joined the conversation. The voices dropped away a bit, except for the nervous kids right in front of the closet attempting to whisper between each other, before he can’t make anything out at all. He waits, nervousness beginning to creep in because just how long was he supposed to stay in the closet? Actually, about that, he’d really had enough of closets and hiding in them. Terribly stifling and awful and much better really to be out of them.

Eventually there’s the sound of foot falls coming closer and closer to the closet and for a moment Newt’s heart picks up, certain that he’s about to be found and get in trouble. Then the doors are opened and it’s the red headed stranger who jokes, “ready to come out of the closet?”

And Newt’s still full of nervousness and it expresses itself by making him immediately blurt out “already did that once really. Was sort of hoping to not have to do it again.”

There’s a pause where the red head stares at him and the realization that he’s said that out loud crashes over Newt who flushes hotly. “Oh gods, I said that out loud...” and then The Crow tilts their head back and laughs.

“Been there, done that!” They agree with a grin and reach in to pull Newt out. “C’mon, ‘parently they’ve been running a missing patient code for half an hour looking for you.”

Newt relaxed fractionally, “you figured all that out from the nurse in five minutes?”

“Nah. Heard about it when I snuck in through one of the back windows. ‘s right beside one of the break rooms.”

“Oh, okay, that makes- wait. Did you say window?”

But they were already talking to the kids, “Alright you mischievous little magpies, you had your fun but we need to get him back now.” A chorus of “awwwws” and “but!!but!!”s sounded off but The Crow continued on, “if he’s here, he probably needs some help to get better, and I’m sure once he’s feeling better he’ll come say hi again.” Here they glanced over at at Newt expectantly, so Newt nodded since it seemed expected, and then they continued, “alright, so say bye to...”

“Newt.”

The Crow stilled, tilted their head to the side and asked disbelievingly, “really?” as if they didn’t also have the name of an animal.

“Yeah.”

“Alright magpies, tell Newt bye.”

There’s goodbyes and promises to come back and right as they’re leaving the first girl that had caught Newt comes up to The Crow and, in a whisper so very loud she might as well be talking, says “you hafta be nice to him!”

“Oh do I now?”

She nodded furiously, “he doesn’t ree-lize his jokes are reeeeally bad!”

The Crow seemed to choke on something before spluttering into a laughter the kid shushed them for.

“Sorry, sorry,” they managed, fighting back their grin and not looking sorry in the least as they chanced a quick glance at Newt.

The girl frowned, “you’re not sorry at all!”

“I am, I am!”

She looked unimpressed but when bribed with an extra pastry she let it, and them, go.

They’re on their way back to the nurse’s station (Newt didn’t even know what room they put him in) when he breaks the silence to ask, “is your name really Crow?”

“To the kids, yes. You can call me Crowley.”

“Oh. Nice to meet you Crowley. Did you really come in through a window?”

Crowley grinned at him, “trade secret.”

#Good Omens #Good Omens Fanfiction #Good Omens fic #Newton Pulsifer #Crowley #gomens fic #Just Ineffable #humor #comedy #Trans Newt #Genderfluid Crowley #multi chapter fic #multi chapter story #At Garden's Edge #my writing

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obsidianfr3sk · 4 years

Note

I'm not gonna reblog it because I'm not w e a k.

So. #Nodriannoleasesto

- This was pretty popular back in the day, but I thought Nova was going to explode. I literally thought the star was going to become attached to her body until she managed to get to Ace and the helmet and then she was going to e x p l o d e along with Ace.

-Idk what to tell you. I literally thought Nova was going to die. And if she didn't, she would like... Live super happy with ALL the Anarchists except Ace because they were going to me allowed back in the system and they would get Honey's medications 🤡

-WINSTON HAD INNOCENT DADDY ISSUES AND JUST THAT.

- I did see the Magpie thing coming.

- I thought the dude (y'know. The statue) holding the star was Cinder :'^))))

we don’t reblog we die like heros (?

-CÓMO QUE EXPLOTAR??????? COMO QUE ESO ERA POPULAR??????????? ALAVERGA JAJAJAJA ME IMAGINO TODO MÓRBIDA LA EXPLOSIÓN JUAJAJAJAJAJA

-Okey, I think this second point is the one it hurts me the most :(((

-Yo: (a Winston) a veo k eres un hombre de cultura

-I FIND IT SO HARD TO BELIEVE AND MM BETTER EXPLAINS THAT

-That would be a cool touch:)))

#ask response #dawniebb #nodriannoleasesto #ly! <3

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hannahchronism · 7 years

Text

OC Tag -- 25 Questions

Tagged by: nobody, I do what I want (but obviously taken from @tellingscarystories )

Let’s have some fun and talk about our OCs! If tagged, pick the best/most developed OC you have and fill this out!

Rules:

Post these rules.

Answer the questions about your OC below. Go ahead and give more info than just a one-word response!

Tag at least 5 people! (If you don’t have an OC, you should make one and then fill this out *winky face*). You don’t have to be tagged to do this, if you want to do it, tag me so I can see! :D

// I think Tech still stands as my most developed (but it’s only because I’ve had her the longest of any of my currently (semi)active characters.) I might do this again for Lu later?

Questions:

OC’s name: Madelyn Fae Magson / Techno Havoc (/ The Radio Ghost) Fandom (if any): Danger Days Age: Assuming current year as 2027, 22 [can you believe...she was 13(?) the first time I wrote her. My bby. All grown up :’)] Occupation: professional loudmouth Freelance hacker / Rebel

1: Any nicknames?

Oh god, so many. Madelyn naturally got shortened to "Maddy" a lot when she was younger, as well as "Mads" and occasionally (sometimes with negative connotations) “Mad Mags.” Some of Jack’s friends, because they were so used to calling each other by their surnames, just called her “Mags” for a diminutive.

When she first got out to the desert, she picked up the habit of picking up little odds and ends, and with it, the nickname/first callsign "Magpie." (She had always had the tendency to horde things, really, but in-city I feel like clutter is probably frowned upon (at least in higher class places) and then, she spent those years where nothing belonged to her, not even really her body, so I feel like it probably was way worse after she got out.) After that, she named herself Techno Havoc, and from that "Tech", "Techie", and the occasional "Havoc" were born. DK called her "Rusty" (or maybe "Sparky"? I forget. Somebody called her one, someone else called her the other.) Weasel sometimes calls her “Spyro” for? some reason, I don’t even know if I had a reason when he started that. Jack has been known to lovingly refer to her as "Miss Mess" and then Grave almost exclusively calls her "Lil Miss" because he enjoys testing her patience. Then there's the classics: "Firebug" "Spitfire" "Firefly" etc. (cause of her hair. And, y'know, that whole temper thing.)

And then there's the "Pretty Bird" "Little Bird" thing that Mouse took up (from Kobes & DesertMomMouse respectively) but I mean? Those are like those "exclusive" kind of nicknames she definitely wouldn't tolerate from anybody else. Also "Kitten" falls in this category [Try it. I dare you.] but that was technically me who did that.

2: What is ‘home’ to your OC?

The desert, in the very broad sense of the word. Yeah she's got her designated corner of the Haven, and she can drop into the Trade Station more or less anytime she wants, but she's got that thing where staying anywhere too long starts to make her feel trapped, and she sort of struggles with naming a location as "home" in general since her only real "home" she had fell apart so spectacularly, uprooted by her own dang mom. Which, then, you might think her the type to think of people as her home, and I guess that's not wrong? necessarily?? But she struggles with that too thanks to those massive trust issues and a nice (un)healthy dose of C-PTSD. Really, it mostly just boils down to knowing where she doesn't belong, and where she doesn't want to be: home (used just.../so loosely there) is anywhere that isn't those places.

3: Favorite food and drink?

I have said this before but her favorite food is cranberry sauce! (Er, I think it's technically called "jellied cranberry" but we've always called it cranberry sauce.) The canned kind, because it's probably the only kind she's ever had tbh. I don't think she has a favorite drink, though. She's always been sort of... neutral (?) about food/drink in general, to the point where she often considers it annoying/a hassle to take time out of her day to remember to eat & drink. When it comes to alcohol, she’s just as non-picky. (I mean, she’d prefer the kind of ‘shine that won’t leave you blind, but that’s just common sense.)

4: Any scars/birthmarks?

She's got a birthmark on the back of her left shoulder! Just a lil oval, nothing special. She used to have those crazy 'signature' scars on her chest and mouth, but she lost those in ReEducation- partly to reinforce the conditioning, and partly because of BLI's good 'ol "Everything has to be beautiful" obsession. Since hitting the sand for the second time, she's picked up a few scars here and there, mostly concentrated on her outer left thigh (those are self inflicted) and her knees (she cannot, for the life of her, keep them unscraped tbh) but nothing too notable - with the exclusion of a brand stinkin' new one on the back of her right arm. (It's gonna fade a little over time/as it finishes healing completely, but it's there forever now. She's gonna fuckin' treasure that scar, too.)

5: What does your OC do in his/her free time?

She likes to tinker with makking tiny little robots that don’t really do anything besides crawl around, and she’s also got this side hobby/fascination with insects (beetles are her favorite because “they have the most personality”) And y’know how they say “if you love what you do you never work a day in your life” and she does so love to dig and disorder, so she’s got that going on a lot of the time too. And, of course, there’s the matter of expanding her collection of junk, little hoarder that she is.

6: When does your OC think killing is ok?

I wouldn't say she ever thinks it's "okay" so much as "occasionally slightly justifiable." Queen of indecision that she is, I'm sure this fluctuates, but she generally frowns upon the deaths of 'innocents' or anyone otherwise "uninvolved." Directly/physically confronted, if you threaten her life she will fight back and she won't pull punches.

7: Biggest fear?

mmmmmmmmm I wanna say something like losing herself again or being used or people she loves turning on her, but I think all of those really and truly link back to a root fear of being imprisoned again, and all the pain/circumstances around it.

8: What does your OC think is his/her biggest accomplishment?

Not being dead? Most of her loud fronting is that, fronting, and while she knows she's good at hacking (and, to a lesser degree, her engineering) but she has never really assigned much significance to her accomplishments. It's just, all to keep living y'know?

9: How clean/tidy is your OC?

She's a mess honestly. She's got this "system" of "orginization" and it is something that works for her, she can find things, but it looks like/is just a frickin' big ol mess honestly. Things all over the floor, amassed into little piles just everywhere. Expect to get an earful if you move anything up, though.

10: Favorite smell?

Smoke smells of the cigarette and wood variety. It definitely has nothing to do with her brother smelling like those things a lot, obviously.

11: What does your OC smell like?

Sun-baked sand and copper and that weird plastic-rubber smell that hangs around places where there’s a lot of wiring; also maybe a little like a cat, because she’s never more than about two feet away from Glitch. Also sometimes (depending on the availibility & her stress level) cigarette smoke, because she does occasionally smoke+ she also just burns them for the smell. (Plot twist, she's been Neil Josten the whole time. No seriously, there's this post on her blog from way the fuck back where she was like "I burn them for the smell" and I tried so hard to find it in her archive but I can't or I'd link it.)

12: What kind of clothing is your OC the most comfortable in?

She's never really uncomfortable in clothes unless they're a particularly awful texture/stiffness (but I mean..how often does that happen in the desert? everything's old and ratty and worn) but also she's low key most comfortable just ... not wearing any. And this absolutely links back to that thing I talked about once how she kind of never grew out of certain "childish" mentalities. She doesn't generally give any thought to how put together her outward appearance is, and she sheds any "unecessary" garments at the first given opportunity. Sometimes even when she should be wearing them. And then she gets sunburned. ‘Cause she’s dumb.

When clothed, however, she gravitates towards shirts/tops that are too big (plus a few tank tops she basically uses as underwear), and then she has a minor preference for shorts for some reason, but she really won't object to any pair of bottoms that won't fall off her skinny little butt (though, to be honest, most of her pants/shorts end up at least slightly too big as well.)

She's also a known clothing thief - all of your t-shirts are forfeit if she manages to get her hands on them.

13: What do your OC’s living quarters look like?

When she's not in full vagabond mode with the grey tarp, she's got her little unit at the Haven. It's not super super full of anything, because of tendency to flitter around, but she is amassing a bit of a collection in there, as messy and "organized" into chaos as it always is. Some day I’ll sit down and describe all of the occupied units in greater detail, but not right now.

14: Is your OC impulsive?

HAHAHAHAHA YEAH

15: Most treasured possession?

I wanna say the cat? Does the cat count? He's technically a living thing and not really a "possession" because he's got a bit of a feral streak, but .. ?

OH OR - that fuckin stupid silver hard drive/her mom's will. She will not let that thing go, she put it on a freaking string and wears it as a necklace and it makes me (and Jack) so mad. But, she's attached to it, it's so valuable to her.

16: What does your OC consider to be good entertainment?

A nice good shouting match, honestly. She's just... so contrary and really loves to argue.

She's also fond of, like I mentioned above, studying insects. Not from like, a scientific point of view, she doesn't pull them apart or anything, but sometimes she'll catch them and keep them in a little jar for awhile before turning them loose again. Also he doesn't do it much now, but Jack used to write a lot (stories, some songs) and she's always loved to listen to those.

General radio chatter doesn't necessarily always fall under "entertainment" but she does often enjoy it. At the very least, it staves off the silence, and really anything that does that is good.

17: Most noticeable physical characteristic?

Uhhh... used to be her scar(s) but obviously that's a non thing anymore so.....50/50 between her natural hair color (and I mean...I guess even her dyed colors are technically still a physical characteristic) and her slight stature, especially when compared to her brother & parents. She’s pretty damn short and verges on alarmingly thin, even for the desert.

18: You OC is going out somewhere. Where is he/she going and what time is it?

When is she not "out" honestly?

(But, if going somewhere with the thought of social contact in mind, probably Tess's sparring ring or, even more likely, some cozy sunning rock where you'll find a snake and the time of day or day of the week becomes completely and utterly irrelavent.)

19: Did your OC enjoy his/her childhood?

Depends on where, exactly, you want to say "childhood" cuts off. Pre 10-years-old, hell yeah. 10-14, well, not exactly. I don't have much to say about either section right this second though because I tned to spend a lot of time talking about it in relation to how she is now, so it feels unecessary right here.

20: What would your OC die for?

...Love? to be general about it? I can't really imagine her going down in the name of a cause, or.. much else, really? But, if it came to it, I feel like there's some people she loves she'd be willing to meet death in the mosh pit for.

21: What does it take to earn your OC’s respect?

She's got decent respect for anyone who treats people with basic respect to begin with, but the way to get really really high in her sights is most definitely grand gestures. Swallowing your pride and abandonning all you've worked for to bust her out? Great, so great. Doing a death-march into the heart of the city in the name of protecting someone you love? Incredible. Giving the middle finger to the afterlife/death deity for the sake of coming back to your brother? Hi, welcome to the top tier.

And maybe that's a bit more like admiration / love but those tend to blur together a bit in my opinion.

22: Pet peeves?

I'm not even gonna try, the list is so long and so dependent on her moods anyway. Biggest, probably, I guess, is being called rat (but that's...honestly a legitimate trigger rather than a pet peeve.)

23: How forgiving is your OC?

I won't lie, she's got a thing for grudges, and sometimes they can be really easy to invoke with her, but she's honestly just as likely to forget she was mad at you. Not that you were explicitly forgiven, but that she just...forgot to remember.

If you betray her trust though you're done. For like, the rest of forever. (Also: fuck you she has so many trust issues don't make them worse???)

24: What does your OC sleep in?

A cuddle puddle with Vi & Foxy

Typically, just whatever she was wearing as clothes that day. That's part of why she gravitates towards large shirts and such. She's very prone to wearing the same clothes a few days in a row before cleaning/airing them out because of this.

When she’s out wandering, she might actually throw an extra layer on because of how cold it gets at night, and the fact that she’s not so big on blankets, for some reason?

25: Biggest secret?

You know for all her self-isolation and walls-of-defense, I can't really think of any actual secrets she keeps? Obviously she doesn't just dump all of her life on you and she's less inclined to talk about things that upset her, but she's really just an honest person.

Tagging: @jediiwrites @kenziecarrion @wiscowrites @azianxpersuasionwrites & @theichthyostegawrites (but zero pressure to actually do it yo)

#tech #long post for ts

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tipsycad147 · 5 years

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How To Divine The Future With Signs And Omens

SL Bear

For my entire life, I’ve been in perfect health — to the point where I even bragged about it. So my body somewhat showed me up earlier this year when I took a “miracle” vitamin that ravaged my system, leaving me sick for months and eventually landed me five days in the hospital. Because I’d always been so healthy, my insurance was bare bones and when the time came that I actually needed it, it wasn’t there for me — just a faulty parachute strapped to my back. The first time I was in the ER, they wanted to run a host of tests on me. It’s standard procedure and they were just being responsible, but I refused because I knew how much these tests cost and I knew I couldn’t afford them. Also… I was afraid of the unknown. The doctor sat down beside my bed and said, “you need to put your health first. And just think, if you have the test now, you won’t have to have it again for years. Don’t you want to know what’s going on?”

To this, I weakly replied, “no! I want to drop dead one day having never been the wiser.”

He laughed and asked, “oh, are you a nurse?”

This pretty much sums up my feelings regarding the future. I’d just rather not know. Perhaps this is why I’ve always avoided divination. I used my tarot cards for decoration and symbolism. My runes were never cast. And I avoided all the fun-looking pendulums, scrying mirrors and tea-reading books at my local witch shop.

Then a change came. While holed up in the hospital, I started reading about apantomancy.

Using Signs To Divine

Apantomancy is a very old form of divination and has been used throughout the world. Simply put, you place yourself into a meditative state and then observe objects and animals around you, known as signs. You interpret these signs in relation to your situation and future. You can ask questions. You can simply try to see what’s coming. You’ve probably already used some form of apantomancy in your life. The idea of good and bad omens stems from apantomancy, the most famous being black cats and their associations with bad luck. If you’ve ever walked around and seen something you considered a good sign, congratulations, you’re already using apantomancy.

What I like about this form of divination is that it relies so heavily on personal symbols. I have always owned black cats and I don’t consider them unlucky at all, so my personal symbolism would be in stark contrast to the accepted mythos. And that’s great! It’s my future and my interpretations that matter in apantomancy, not a set of rules written by someone else.

I also like that it encourages me to go outside and search for animals. As an animal lover, this is right up my alley.

On The Importance Of Meditation

As I've discussed here before, I have a problem with focus. It’s one of the most important parts of working magic and one of my biggest struggles. To counter this, I generally try to use artistic forms of magic because I’m an artist and I find it easy to focus on art. Apantomancy requires meditation or putting yourself into a trance as it is often referred to, to open your mind. To do this right, I had to learn how to relax and quiet my mind. Incidentally, this is something my doctors also suggested. Go figure.

There are a lot of different ways people meditate but the one that works best for me is to focus on a particular thing. Instead of just “clearing my mind” (which never works for me), I give my mind something to focus on, like a candle flame or a favourite stone (currently using Rainforest Jasper). I’ve also used mantras because I’ve read that a steady, low sound is beneficial, but I don’t live alone and if I sit somewhere making humming sounds I will invariably get comments. If you have a method already for centring, great! If not, just find something that you can use as a focusing point, and go outside.

It’s hard to describe exactly when you know you’re in your trance, but you will know. It takes some time to get there, especially if you’re new to it, but it’s a little like being inebriated. Not dizzy or sick, but elevated somehow; not so grounded in reality. When you reach this state, you can ask a question or you can just observe what you see.

Interpreting The World

In this elevated state, you will be amazed at how you react to what you see. A small brown bird is no longer just a bird, it’s a sign, and everything about it can be read, from its size to the length of time it stays with you. Take in all of these details and try your hand at decoding them. You can reference animal meanings, but it’s so much the better if you just go with your instincts. Think about who is sending you these signs. Your ancestors, maybe? Ask them questions, ask for guidance! Then observe what signs they send you and listen to what they are trying to say.

As you work and start regularly using apantomancy, you will slowly develop your own set of personal symbols because, based on where you live, you will be seeing the same animals again and again. I live in Colorado and see magpies all the time. They are scrappy birds that take all kinds of risks when it comes to their survival, and when I see one, I always think of them as a sign to be more fearless. A rabbit, on the other hand, is a sign to be cautious (Colorado bunnies look both ways before they cross the street). It’s all up to you.

After your session, take a moment to reflect on what you saw and write things down. This will be helpful when looking for patterns later.

Apantomancy On The Go

Is it better to meditate before using apantomancy? Yes. Is it required to use apantomancy? No. You can, at any time, stop and ask for guidance. People probably don’t realise that when they “ask for a sign” they are using apantomancy, but it is that simple. The challenge is being receptive and intuitive to what these signs are telling you. By practising and learning to read them, you will be able to easily use apantomancy in whatever setting you find yourself. Especially if you’ve taken the time to build up an inventory of personal symbols!

Don’t become discouraged if your first attempts are a little shaky. This is a very simple form of divination, but its foundation is your history and how you see things. In the beginning, you’ll have no reference points because everything will be new. If you hate spiders and you see one, you may interpret that as a bad omen. But what if something great happens the next day and you change your mind? This is why journaling your observations is so important. Keep track of dates, times, and details and eventually, you will be able to assign more concrete meanings to certain symbols. These personal symbols can be used in many witchy ways, so it’s wise to keep track of them.

Happy divining, witches!

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https://thetravelingwitch.com/blog/2018/6/14/how-to-divine-the-future-with-signs-and-omens

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walters-tampon-string · 7 years

Text

Annoying Monsters

Fandom: Batman

Rating: K

Warnings: None

Characters: Jonathan Crane, Oswald Cobblepot, Craw and Nightmare.

Relationships: None

AU: Basically Batman Universe but I just remembered that in a comic, Joker mentions that Jonathan had Nightmare since they were a chick so... this is a universe where he didn’t own Nightmare as a chick. Lol.

Description: When Jonathan walked into the Iceberg Lounge, he was expecting Oswald to hand him some mission. What he wasn't expecting was two birds. (Basically How Jonathan Gets Craw and Nightmare)

Notes: I promise this is the last story involving Jon and crows. I promise.

Jonathan Crane very rarely came to the Iceberg Lounge.

Unlike a majority of the Gotham rogues, he wasn’t exactly rolling around in dough. He’d never been a rich man – even before he had made his debut as Scarecrow. The university had given him a very meager salary and he would always blow it on three things – rent/bills, enough food that he could scrape by for a month as long as he skipped a few meals here and there, and books. That fact didn’t really change much when he became the Scarecrow – except now, without his teaching job, he had basically no income coming in and he had to add all the chemicals he used for his fear toxin into his expenses (and occasionally payment for henchmen he hired every now and then).

He wasn’t a traditional Gotham villain. Sure, when he was getting desperate and had absolutely no money, he would turn to thievery maybe pilfering from one of his victim’s wallets, or if he was feeling a little more ambitious, stealing from the bank like everyone else. But thieving wasn’t his gig. He was a researcher first and foremost. That was one thing he liked to establish. He was not some ordinary run of the mill criminal. Add that to the fact that public, grandiose sweeps of theft not only cut into research and formula-making time… but they also made the Batman or any of the other vigilantes crawling around the city aware of his presence and it made them hell-bent sniffing him out and sending him to Arkham before he could get anything done.

This made robbing banks almost pointless for him in a way. Usually, soon after he robbed them, he would be knocked to the ground by one of them and sent to Arkham and all of that cash he stole would be flushed away to its proper place. Now, he was sure there were smarter ways to go about his stealing methods and cash holding system. Edward Nygma was always jabbering to him about private banks and money laundering, which Jonathan was sure did get things done efficiently, but it was all a little too much for him.

Jonathan wasn’t needing to be a billionaire. He just wanted enough to scrape by. In order to do that very thing, he cut a lot of corners if it meant saving his money. He made his own costumes, he always found empty warehouses to set up a new base, he very rarely purchased henchmen, used cheaper fear toxin on those he wasn’t exactly aiming for, and used the more expensive brand on specific targets he wanted to teach a lesson.

And he never, ever went to the Iceberg Lounge.

There were many reasons for that. First one being that this kind of place wasn’t his type of thing. It was more something that people like Edward Nygma or Harleen Quinzel would enjoy. But for him, there was too much dress up, too loud music, too many people, too many INEBRIATED people… it was all too much for him. He would much rather spend his night curled into his house reading a book or brewing a new toxin formula then wasting time pretending he was more social than he actually was. Add that to the fact that Oswald’s admission prices were outrageous and he was willing to charge eight bucks a drink, Jonathan found he could go without.

And while the various exotic creatures Oswald had milling around the place were fascinating to look at (especially the birds), they weren’t worth listening to Oswald brag about each individual one for five minutes each.

So, as a rule, Jonathan decided to avoid the Iceberg Lounge like the plague.

But today was a different sort of an occasion. This time, Jonathan specifically had been invited to the Iceberg Lounge. Oswald had even went through the offer of giving him free drinks, free dessert, and free admission. That uncharacteristic generosity from the man already made Jonathan suspicious, as well as the fancy invitations vague explanation that Oswald wanted to “make an offer with him.”

Part of Jonathan had honestly wanted to refuse. Truth of the matter was that Jonathan didn’t like Oswald all that much. Again, Oswald Cobblepot was more a man like Edward Nygma’s scene – a rich and successful criminal mastermind/businessman who had an ego a mile long. Unfortunately, Jonathan simply didn’t jive with that type. Even with their personalities not exactly lining up, Jonathan was sure even if he could find a few similarities with the man, he’d still find the Penguin absolutely repugnant.

Everything about the man screamed of slimy deception, and Jonathan honestly didn’t trust the man as far as he could throw him (which was not at all). He knew Oswald had a rather bad history of betraying or harming business partners if he himself got some sort of benefit from it. He also knew the man was fair-weathered as hell and had a temper shorter than his actual height. Slight him in any sort of way, and one could not only lose all of their benefits with him… but they could also find themselves with a new foe hell-bent on riddling their body full of bullets.

Jonathan felt like he was walking on eggshells whenever he was with the man, and after years of feeling a similar way with Great Grandma Keeny, he held a certain level of distaste for people like that.

But if he had learned anything in his years of being a rogue, it was that sometimes, he had to do things he didn’t necessarily want to do and deal with downright detestable people at times if it meant it benefitted him in the long-run… and Oswald’s benefits were too good to pass up.

Oswald had a very large stranglehold of territory in Gotham, rivalled only by the likes of Joker and Two-Face, and he had henchmen who guarded it well. Any rogue who didn’t have a good relation with Oswald would have a lot more trouble wandering around certain areas of the city without running into any of Penguin’s gun-wielding henchmen. If Jonathan wanted free access to affluent parts of the city, staying buddy-buddy with Oswald was really his best bet.

Plus, Oswald would sometimes commission him for jobs and pay him rather generous sums of money for doing certain jobs or for selling over some of his fear toxin (Oswald had found it was a good truth serum for those he didn’t like). If Jonathan was being chased, he could use Oswald’s lounge as a temporary sanctuary (granted, he still had to pay the hefty admission sum but the knowledge that resource was there was nice). So Jonathan figured he could swallow his pride, go, and pretend to be a sociable person for an hour or two.

Since Oswald was requesting him specifically and Jonathan couldn’t think of any reasons Oswald would have to be angry at him, he figured Oswald just wanted him to deal with someone who HAD pissed him off… which meant Jonathan would get paid to see people writhe in fear… so it wasn’t too bad of a deal.

So Jonathan walked himself to the Iceberg Lounge, allowing himself to be seated and served a glass of brandy and what looked to be a very foamy piece of cake. Picking at the cake noncommittally, Jonathan got straight to business with Oswald who was sitting poised across from him.

“What is your offer, Cobblepot?”

Jonathan was expecting a mission briefing of some kind. Some instructions and other jargon about whatever poor soul he was going to have to gas.

What he didn’t expect the other man to say was, “Please get these wretched monsters off of my hands.”

Jonathan’s face must have betrayed his confusion as Oswald quickly collected himself and cleared his throat. Raising his hands up apologetically, he said, “I apologize for the sudden er… outburst, but I am having a bit of a problem at the moment and I need your help. Now Crane, you like crows, correct?”

Jonathan felt another cloud of confusion but he decided to answer, “Yes, I think they are alright animals. Smart birds.”

The look of excitement that came over Oswald’s face made Jonathan somewhat uncomfortable.

“Ah yes, good. So you might actually be interested in what I have to offer.”

All of a sudden one of the many doors in the Lounge opened and a horrible squawking and cawing noise filled the room as two henchmen walked in with a large birdcage. Inside the cage were two very unhappy crows, who were flapping their wings and voicing their distaste for the prison. They were making a racket and Jonathan couldn’t help but notice that both the henchmen and Oswald looked uncomfortable at the noise.

The henchmen laid the cage down on the table so Jonathan could get a better look at the twin terrors. Now that they had actually been placed down, they were making less noise… but not by much. They still let out sounds and hopped around unhappily in the cage, their feathers ruffled.

Oswald tugged on his collar uncomfortably and said, “Er… you see, I tried to add crows to my collections. A male and female, as you can see. I thought they would make a wonderful edition because crows are so smart and supposedly trainable … but these two… er, they have been giving me problems. You see, the thing is… I am good at training birds. I’ve had the patience to do it with several… but the problem with crows is while they are trainable, training them is very-“

“Hard,” Jonathan decided to finish for him. He knew from personal experience how hard corvids could be to train. Training that magpie to peck out that bully’s eye had taken him months and months of endless work. It was possible to train them, but it was hard, and required a lot of patience.

Oswald scowled at being interrupted but said, “Uh, yes. Very hard. And normally that wouldn’t be a concern but these two cause… quite the problems. They bother the other birds and they make noise and they grab stuff off my desk all the time. And since they are smarter than half of my henchmen, they manage to steal their food all the time –which I argue is more their problem than mine –but it seems like I might have to actually do something about it.”

Jonathan raised an eyebrow, “Why are you telling me? So you don’t want these two anymore. Why don’t you just release them out in the wild? They can blend in with all of the other crows flying around in Gotham.”

Oswald sighed, “Problem is they’ve been raised since birth around humans… and they know how to mess with humans too much. I trained them too well to so they rely on humans for everything. I fear if I let them out they will get themselves in trouble or something by attacking someone… and while I can’t necessarily care for these wretches, I don’t want them to go off and die.”

Oswald had always been a softie when it came to birds.

“That was where I was hoping you would come in…” Oswald said leadingly, throwing Jonathan a hopeful look. Jonathan finally got where he was coming from.

Jonathan had immediately felt the need to decline. He could barely take care of himself, much less two birds who even an avid bird-lover couldn’t handle. He was a busy man. He didn’t need squalling crows distracting him or causing him problems while he worked.

But the more he thought about it… these two were already partially trained… and they already knew how to mess with a human. Jonathan thought back to that magpie he had trained so long ago. Sure the process had taken awhile… but he had managed to do it with only a bit of food. If he could train a magpie to peck a human’s eye out… who knew what he could get these two to do. He envisioned these two pecking Batman and Robin’s eyes out right after he was through with them… and the thought put a smile on his face.

Besides… he always had loads of stale food and other stuff he could throw to these guys. And think about it… a scarecrow with two trusty crow sidekicks. Really, the aesthetic fit itself. Certainly made more sense than Harley with her hyenas.

With a bit of work (and he had plenty of time), he could get these two crows to be smarter and more able than half of the dumb henchmen he hired.

Acting on impulse for once in his life, Jonathan quickly said, “Sure.”

Oswald looked almost overjoyed, “Ah! I knew you would agree. Their names are-“

Jonathan interrupted, “Ah, that won’t be necessary. I already came up with names for them.”

“Oh uh… what then.”

Jonathan looked fondly at the two birds, picking pieces of the cake and feeding the two of them through the bars of the cage, saying, “Craw and Nightmare.”

#ashs writing #batman #jonathan crane #scarecrow #the scarecrow #oswald cobblepot #penguin #the penguin #fanfiction #nightmare #craw

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