#especially when neither of us were able to move and change those circumstances at the time
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omg evren please say more about tonynat on some sort of mission where they need to fake date!! <3
@meidui, you've never known this because i have unfortunately never gotten around to answering any of your asks before, but you always send the best ones <3 I started writing this response back in May and couldn't ever figure out how to write the last scene between tony & nat, but I've taken a crack at it now in the hopes that you can enjoy this insane infodump of meta & a bit of fic before you move on to healthier and happier things :)
!!!!!!!!!! ahhhh yes gladly !!!!!!!!!!!!
(and sorry this took so long i hope you don’t mind that I wrote you a novel lmfao)
((Also I’m going to talk A LOT about IM2 but bear in mind that it's been about a decade since i've watched it so if I misconstrue anything please let me know!))
First of all, I absolutely adore Tony and Natasha separately, and I think had they been able to interact more in the MCU canon they would have served to ease each other’s insecurities and curb their more self-destructive tendencies. There’s undoubtedly a lot of parallels between their histories and their motivations for choosing to be heroes:
they’ve got a lot of red in their ledgers, so to speak
they’re trying to even out the scale of all the harm they’ve done
they place the blame of those harms squarely on their own shoulders even though they are both–to varying degrees–victims of the systems they were a part of when enacting that violence (I will say I feel this is much more true in Nat’s circumstances with the KGB than in Tony’s with the US military-industrial complex, but the case can be made for him too what with Tony’s enduring addiction and mental health issues stemming from his relationship with his father who expressly expected him to take over the company [sidebar: i would make the case that tony does not and has never liked building weapons as these are not things that he chooses to do with his engineering prowess in childhood or at MIT, and while he is leading SI he acts out in ways that in my view indicate he’s deeply unhappy with his life and is trying to numb the pain] + the way he was manipulated and ultimately almost killed multiple times by Obadiah)
traumatic medical experiences involving painful, life-changing surgeries AND loss of bodily autonomy
But! There’s also some similarities in how they try to cope with these burdens. For example, they’re both extremely competent at what they do and in a perpetual state of trying-to-prove-themselves (this tends to function more internally for nat and more externally for tony) so their default mode is often to obscure what they feel/think in most situations from everyone but an extremely select group of trusted friends as a means of concealing emotional vulnerability. They are also both prone to throwing themselves into an unhealthy work/life balance because there’s always something more they specifically could be doing to help and it seems as though neither of them can bear to forgive themselves for inaction if their involvement could have saved even one more life regardless of the personal cost.
(That last point especially *COUGH endgame COUGH*)
So in my opinion they would’ve come to be able to recognize these habits in each other at a level of familiarity that Rhodey and Pepper do for Tony or that Clint does for Natasha, but in a shorter time period. Furthermore, because they see themselves in each other, I think they’d be much more discerning over when is the appropriate time to push the other hard to treat themself better because a coping mechanism is becoming overly destructive and when they should give the other a bit more leeway because, yeah, what you’re doing right now probably isn’t the most healthy way for you to process things in the moment but I understand where you’re coming from and I know that if I try and get you to work through things too quickly or in the way i think would be best I might accidentally end up pushing you farther away. I’d rather you be overworking and/or emotionally distancing yourself in my orbit so I can be here for you when you come up for air.
I’m going to put the rest of this under the cut because i haven’t even gotten around to the point of your message lmfao (thank you so much for the ask btw !!!)
However! The crux of the issue is that, for all of their similarities and potential compatibilities, Tony and Natasha first met when Tony was dying (stressful in its own right but in Tony’s case, it specifically ties directly back to the aforementioned medical trauma + previous near-death experiences) and Natasha was undercover on behalf of SHIELD collecting intel on him for a superhero initiative that he did not know anything about and did not know he was being considered for. They don’t really get the chance to engage and interact in good faith because of the inherent nature of “Natalie’s” mission, but I think that the sources for potential long-term mistrust go a bit deeper than that superficial subterfuge.
Natasha in this situation is manipulating tony to gather information on him and denying him full control over medical decisions, and he is not privy to this prolonged, imbalanced dynamic until much later. Plus, Natasha’s own assessment of Tony is that he is not fit for the Avengers, but that Iron Man is. I feel this could be interpreted by Tony as Natasha suggesting that SHIELD reassign someone else to pilot the suit, further digging into those previous harmful thought patterns for tony that he’s only as worthy as the weaponrymachines he builds, no one values or wants him as he is, people are going to force him to relinquish his creations if he doesn’t give them up voluntarily and with a smile with the now added bonus of: this suit makes me feel like my life is worth living again and now they want to take it away from me because I’m not good enough for it.
As is, this setup makes total sense for their first meeting: Natasha is an agent and a damn good one and Tony is a very powerful man who people are regularly trying to pry information/resources/technology/expertise from by any means necessary.
The problem lies in the fact that these two are then tasked with being on an elite superhero squad where they have to place very complete trust in each other and I just don’t really see that happening without some intense heart-to-hearts about what went down in IM2. Now, as we stated before, these are two people who are very reluctant to open up and share their internal strife even with the few people they’ve developed trusting relationships with over the course of years, so I don’t imagine they would willingly offer that painful transparency to each other.
It seems that the ideal conditions for this sort of conversation to take place would call for a mission requiring only Tony and Natasha to work in an extremely close capacity with each other that involves high stakes and high emotions and in which the success of the mission lies critically in their ability to improvise off each other in order to hide in plain site using the cover of an innocuous personal entanglement.
I sense a fake dating mission!!!!!!!
(Bonus points if the context of the mission harkens back to the one or both of their previous traumas.)
So, to FINALLY get around to the point of your ask, my ideal tonynat fake dating mission would serve the primary purpose of allowing tony and nat to work through the events of IM2 and develop their friendship. This would have to involve recognizing the many similarities they share regarding their motivation to undo the violence and harm that they both wrought in their previous lives and then using that foundation of recognition to build trust and eventually camaraderie and understanding!
And because this is my personal dream tonynat fake dating mission story, the secondary purpose would be to make steve jealous and have an early-onset Feelings Realization™️and/or tony-induced Gay Awakening© because i have perpetual stevetony brain rot and I simply cannot engage with any story without figuring out a way to shove a stevetony plotline into it🤪
The time: the nebulous space after AI/IM3 but before CA:TWS.
The place: a foreign nation with a highly advanced technology sector (I’m thinking either Singapore or Japan or Germany).
The mission: identify and infiltrate a corporation that is suspected to be funneling technology and product to [INSERT VILLAIN ORGANIZATION HERE] [PROBABLY DOOM LOL].
I imagine it would start with Fury assembling the Avengers to brief them on the situation and the long and short of it is this: a weeks-long mission that will involve Tony and Natasha attending a technology expo abroad to figure out who is supplying [VILLAINS] with their tech, infiltrate their operations, gather intel, and collect evidence. There should be no reason to expect any flashy shootouts, Fury insists while leveling a one-eyed glare at Tony, but Clint and Steve will rotate 4 day surveillance shifts on the helicarrier which will be hovering nearby over international waters and Bruce and Thor will be on call in case they do need back-up.
One last thing: undercover identities. Trying to conceal Tony Stark’s identity would be like trying to sweep an elephant under a carpet–Hill has to talk quickly to cut Tony off from reminding them all again how he managed to stay under the radar in Tennessee for a week and if it’s so damn hard for him to go undercover then how come the powers that be at SHIELD couldn’t find him in Buttfuck Nowhere, USA?–but it doesn’t matter because he’ll be able to blend in effortlessly at this conference under the guise of exploring new opportunities for SI to diversify its ventures in the tech sector.
Natasha, on the other hand, will need something a bit more involved. She’ll be attending as Nadine Roman, an aspiring model and Stark’s latest conquest, Fury explains while Hill drops a file detailing the persona in front of Natasha.
At this, the energy in the room shifts a bit as Steve, Bruce, and Tony all have subtle, but undeniable reactions to this news. Bruce frowns slightly, as if trying to imagine what this scenario would even look like. Tony’s eyes slip over to Steve and his smirk falls for just a moment before snapping back into place, albeit looking a little bit more forced than before. As Steve tries to clumsily disguise his own surprised expression, he remembers seeing a story in the news recently about Tony and Pepper’s split as he had been flipping between the international news section and sports.
“So…I’m going to fake date Triple Imposter over there?” Tony finally offers into the silence.
Fury considers him for a second, and is just opening his mouth to respond when Natasha–still studying her file to get the rundown on ‘Nadine’–says “Yeah, if you can handle it,” eliciting an unapologetic snort from Clint where he sits beside her.
Cut to the actual mission, and by all appearances ‘Nadine’ and Tony are technically pulling it off with no issues. Not like it’s hard, really, Red is a literal pro at undercover operations as Tony is quite well aware of having been on the receiving end of one of them. She slips into the role of harmless arm candy flawlessly, batting her eyes and smiling coyly over her bare shoulders at egotistical corporate executives with an almost surgical precision. Her flirting and the prestige that accompanies her temporary status as Tony Stark’s companion gains her access to secret meetings and lowly-lit offices where she fades into the background, making herself known and forgotten with equal efficacy.
For his part, Tony is providing the perfect cover for Natasha to work off of. He parades her around the first day, every bit his ostentatious self to make sure everyone gets the image of her on his arm cemented in their minds. He pretends to be too tipsy to notice when his date seduces men right behind him while skillfully avoiding the drinks that keep getting shoved into his hands. He schmoozes with global industry leaders who make him want to tense his body in disgust, but he forces himself to relax, fielding unwanted touches and unearned familiarity all while trying to pry information out using his own forms of deception and sleight of hand.
It’s strange Tony thinks playing this game again. It hasn’t been all that many years since this was his real life, though it feels like it’s been lifetimes. Considering how many near-death scares he’s had in the past few years, it may as well have been several lifetimes since the last time he’s flounced around one of these conferences with some nameless darling of the night on his arm and one too many drinks in his blood and a desperation to be outside of himself, even if just for a moment, even if he had to kill himself oh-so-slowly to do it.
Oh right.
In all the madness that’s been Iron Man, the ecstasy of building something to do good for a change coupled inextricably with the immense mental toll of his recent heroics, it had been easy to let himself forget what it had felt like to live with the shackles of a duller but more persistent type of misery around his neck.
It unnerves him, too, how easy it is to slip back into this life, but he supposes he had been born and built for it. It’s practically muscle memory or an instinct hardwired into his DNA, so deeply ingrained in him he couldn’t cut out the rot no matter how badly he might want to.
Tensions build as the days pass, until one day while Natasha is off trying to uncover potential industry connections to [VILLAIN ORGANIZATION], it happens. Tony’s in the middle of a conversation that he hates about the merits of private-sector civilian surveillance. But, because he’s Tony Stark and he’s smarter than all of these sleazy business fucks put together, he finds himself dominating the discussion. And, because he’s working this goddamn mission right now, undercover in plain site, he’s arguing for it. Arguing the merits of private sector civilian surveillance.
He finishes the point he was making, met with painfully unsubtle nods of approval and he can practically see the rusty gears in the brains of his so-called contemporaries trying to figure out how quickly they can relay what Tony’s just said to their own company boards.
He knows he’s lived this exact scene at least a hundred times before at no less than a few dozen past expos. He’s never been able to observe the charade so clearly before, though.
As he’s turning away from the crowd of executives surrounding him, Tony doesn’t register that instead of sipping at the glass of water he’s been nursing all night, he’s raised it to his lips and forcefully thrown his head back to drink until his brain realizes that the burn he expected to light a path down his throat hasn’t come yet.
Muscle memory. Just like all the worst parts of him, the parts he will never be without.
Horror dawns on him as he slowly lowers his arm, and the breaths start coming fast and shallow while the cold, cold weight of hysteria begins to settle in his chest, freezing him from the inside out.
I need a drink he thinks for the first time in a long time, and that… That scares him. Because he could do it, it would be all too easy to start again here, now. Someone would no doubt be thrusting another drink innocuously into his hands soon enough because of course they would, he’s Tony Stark and Tony Goddamn Stark is a drunk. Ever since that first drink in the dark of Howard’s office when bourbon branded his mouth with its awful liquid fire and his father branded his soul with a taunt Tony never stopped repeating Stark men are made of iron Stark men are made of iron Stark men are made of iron.
The next few seconds seem to collapse and stretch simultaneously around Tony as if he has suddenly found himself suspended in the middle of a black hole. There’s a slight tremor to his hand as he sets the now empty glass down. The conversation is still moving around him: attention snaps back to him and predatory smiles greet him in excess before he’s even finished turning to face them again. A thought passes through the haze in his oxygen-starved brain that he’s about to be eaten alive, consumed whole and used up so thoroughly that there will be nothing left. It’s so asinine that for a brief instant mounting distress gives way to sharp disgust at the momentary lapse of rationality.
A light hand settles on his shoulder, and Tony’s entire body tenses under the phantom weight of a much heavier grip. Someone else used to know how to spot the onset of his little outbursts once. A friend, a desperately trusted father figure, or so he had deluded himself into thinking once because he had wanted that, had wanted anyone to notice when he was trapping himself inside his own brain again and maybe even to care enough to bring him back down to earth when he did.
Panic seizes Tony’s heart in an iron grip, and it feels like Obie’s hands inside him.
Natasha looks up at him, but he doesn’t catch the expression on her face, eyes zeroing in on the spot where he had just set his empty cup down. On the table, someone has helpfully cleared the glass and set down a complimentary martini on the corner of a napkin.
It’s all a blur of a crashing martini glass and his own breath and blood loud in his ears and his body on autopilot getting him the hell out of there because yes, yes this is bad but if he doesn’t leave now it’s going to be worse. Vodka drips down his hand as he practically runs out of the hall back to the refuge of their hotel suite and he hasn’t even thought about the consequences, the damage control until he hears Natasha’s voice light and unbothered and a second later a round of raucous laughter from the crowd he’d just had eating out of the palm of his hand and then the door slams shut behind him and all he thinks about is the path back to the hotel.
When Natasha slips into their rooms later that night, Tony doesn’t waste any time deploying his own damage control strategy, but not so he can manage appearances in front of the men waiting to pounce on him once more on the expo floor. He can’t really bring himself to care less about keeping up appearances with them, and it won’t matter after tonight, anyway.
“I’m going back to the helicarrier. I’ll be much more useful there running surveillance and the suit is always available in case you need it.”
Natasha tilts her head and raises one eyebrow pointedly as she silently considers Tony’s words for a moment.
“No.” She says firmly, with a tone that would have ended the discussion before it even began were she not talking to a man whose stubbornness was outmatched only by the magnitude of his lack of self-preservation.
“Excuse me?” There’s just the slightest edge of panic to Tony’s voice, but even that small crack is threatening to collapse the entire facade.
“I need you here. There’s no other part of this mission where you’d be more useful.”
“That really isn’t your call to make,” Tony says brusquely, getting up from where he had been sitting in their lounge and walking over to face the view of the nighttime city skyline as it shines through the massive windows.
“It’s not yours either. I wouldn’t have taken this mission if I didn’t know you could do it, Stark.”
“Why?!” Tony bursts out, expression crumbled when he spins around to meet her head-on. “What changed Natasha? Two years ago, YOU said I was a liability, so what exactly has changed?” His chest is heaving with the effort of catching a breath, eyes wild and body frozen still against the backdrop of the city lights, held captive under Natasha’s assessing gaze in a way that’s so much more restricting than even the bounds of social convention he broke to escape the expo floor an hour ago.
For a few, awful seconds, Natasha’s face is totally blank as she stares back at Tony and he wonders desperately for a moment if she’s evaluating him in real-time, if she’s writing the mission debrief in her head right now about how Tony Stark has shown himself unfit for espionage, unfit for combat, unfit for superheroics, unworthy of so much more than just the Iron Man su—
“I did.” Her voice shatters the spiral he had just begun to fall into, sympathy written in the downward tilt of her mouth and the way her eyebrows draw towards each other, wrinkling the skin between them. Tony is so abruptly, acutely aware that this is an emotion she’s choosing to let him see, but unlike the way she had laughed airily at the jokes made by the businessmen at the conference downstairs or their first interactions together when she had still been Natalie, this is not an act. The masks have all dropped.
“What?”
“ I changed. I made the wrong call about you.” She slowly makes her way over to him.
Tony breathes out an incredulous laugh, one hand coming up to rub his face. “You’re really going to try and convince me that I’m not everything you wrote in your report to Fury? After what you saw down there?” The words are quiet in the still air between them.
“What did I see? Tell me why I was right.” She raises one hand to lower his from his face, not letting it go once she does.
“Isn’t it obvious? This… all the— the schmoozing and the grandstanding and the— God, the weapons. It’s like I never even left the industry, it all comes back so easily. That’s who I am, who I was raised to be. You saw it down there, I know you did. Please don’t— don’t lie to me.” He swallows heavily around the last admission, the unspoken again echoing louder than if he had just said it.
“I don’t know,” Natasha starts, a small smile forming on her gorgeous red-painted lips. The shade matches the color of the tie Tony wore today. She had hidden a microphone in the knot before they left earlier this afternoon. “Doesn’t seem like it comes all that easily to you. I imagine we’d still be down there schmoozing and grandstanding together if it did.”
A beat of silence passes before Tony breaks into a startled grin, Natasha’s smile growing in response to his. “I always forget that making jokes is something you do,” he admits, chuckling softly.
“Looks like we’ve still got a lot to learn about each other then.”
“Guess so,” the words just shy of a whisper as he finally pulls his hand from Natasha’s gentle hold and breaks their gaze to look away.
“Tony,” she says, resting one hand on his cheek to gently guide him back. “The man on this mission? That isn’t you. Maybe it was, once, but I know it isn’t now because I see you choose to be better than him every day. To do better than him. That’s who you are: the choice you make, over and over, every day, to be better.” Her eyes flicker away for just a fraction of a second, almost imperceptibly, if Tony hadn’t been hanging on to her every word, eyes fixed on hers. “And I… I wouldn’t hold yourself responsible for the person you were raised to be.”
He takes in a shuddering breath, unsure how he found himself here without any of his social armor. How Natasha disarmed him of his usual tactics, avoidance and distraction and redirection, he isn’t quite sure. But there’s a trust he feels blossoming in his chest as she cradles his head in her hand that pushes fear at bay, and he knows he should be wary, trusting the spy, but there’s a haunted edge to her expression that makes Tony think that, for once, perhaps he isn’t the one who stands to lose the most if he falls headlong into trusting.
“It’s too much,” he admits, “pretending to be who I was. It— it reminds me of Obie, and drinking, and… it’s just a lot. A lot to deal with alone.”
The corners of her eyes wrinkle tenderly as she smiles warmly at him. “It’s an act, Tony. You know this. You’re the only person who can do it, exactly because you’ve done it before, for so long. You fooled me didn’t you?”
His lips quirk up at the quip, he imagines that he’ll never quite get over how bizarre it is to hear Natasha banter with him like this, but it doesn’t much matter as long as he gets to experience the delight of her humor again.
“And Tony?”
“Yes?”
“I promise you, you’re not alone anymore.”
—
as far as the steve b-plot goes i’m thinking that steve would initially be feeling a sort of vague discomfort that he can’t quite pin down a reason for so he eventually just decides ‘oh you know what Nat is right and i’m probably feeling lonely and should try dating again after this mission is over’. but then he starts to see tony and nat acting more and more comfortable and affectionate and intimate with each other during the expo in a way that feels…. not so fake anymore and discomfort intensifies into a weird sort of frustration and anger and ultimately he realizes it’s jealousy and he spends a few days stewing in the helicarrier watching tony dazzle natasha in front of god and probably some villains and everyone else on the expo floor and he’s like this is so weird am i jealous of tony?? I don’t like nat like that she’s a great friend but i only see her as a friend and then one day on the ninth day of his latest shift because he’s started insisting to clint that he extend his rotations (clint is very on board with this bc as far as missions go this is literally a cakewalk to him & Nat and he promptly peaces out to go raise his secret family) steve’s watching the surveillance footage of the expo and he sees tony laughing so genuinely as he and natasha demonstrate an iron man gauntlet and he’s so enamored by tony’s joy and the way he squeezes his eyes shut and presses his lips together into a smile because he physically can’t contain his amusement and his laugh lines deepen so beautifully and he’s like oh. OH. i’m not jealous of tony i’m jealous of NATASHA. Because she gets to make tony laugh like that and touch him and be his and it’s all for a mission of course it is but what if it isn’t?? Because steve’s never seen tony laugh like that before and that was all for natasha and cue steve-centric shenanigans as he works through his gay pining for tony stark while simultaneously convincing himself that tony and natasha are now in a real relationship and angsting over that too. i feel like this would eventually resolve itself by nat and tony somehow getting themselves in danger as they finally hone in on their target and steve has to go save them and he’s carrying a bruised and bloodied tony stark out of his makeshift prison and tony is so delirious with gratitude that he kisses steve and steve feels guilty about THAT bc even though he’s elated he’s like ‘oh naur :( tony is cheating on my best close friend natasha with me and how could i do this to her’ meanwhile natasha is completely oblivious to this whole pity party steve is throwing himself and tony has literally been asleep in a hospital bed for 17 hours and thinks he dreamed that kiss when he wakes up steve thinks he’s in a love triangle but it’s literally all in his head bc he’s an emotionally constipated idiot but damn it if he isn’t tony’s emotionally constipated idiot
#if it's all the same to you i'm going to hang on to your 1872 ask a bit longer :)#signed sealed delivered#meidui#tony stark#natasha romanoff#mcu#meta#fic!#evwrites#scribbles#tonynat#plus a dash of#stevetony#bc it's me and of course there's stevetony
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[SPOILERS UP UNTIL AOB PART 5] hold on, what happened with friday? 🤔 by the end of the main series, rozemyne has already turned 15, so frida has too. do you think she moved to the nobles' quarter as it had been agreed? there was no indication she wasn't going to, but i do wonder. what if rozemyne nullified the contract to have frida move to alexandria and educate/mobilize the alexandrian merchants? frida's family did spend a lot of money in her lifestyle and education, and frida herself has worked hard, with the idea of moving to the nobles' quarter since young. but their goals were to create a connection with nobles and to open up her own store to win lots of money, respectively. both things could be achieved by frida moving to alexandria, which would even include the perks of being given preferential treatment by the aub and having many merchants from all over the country wanting to connect with her as a store that frequently does business with rozemyne. i do consider the fact that rozemyne might not take any action towards this, as she is aware of the shortage of human resources in ehrenfest, but i imagine she will want to get the merchants up to speed asap to get her library city, and ferdinand won't be able to stop her, because it would certainly makes things easier in easing relationships between merchants and nobles in alexandria (and because he is whipped). who is going to supply frida with magic tools to get her devouring under control, you may ask. rozemyne has already mentioned wanting to create job opportunities for commoners with the devouring and grey priests before, and research that could help with that has been carried out already too, such as the small teleportation circles that use little mana/magic stones that even commoners can collect. the properties of parue fruit have been kept secret from nobles as well, and even though they don't grow in alexandria, maybe there are other similar feyplants in the territory (the creation of a tree research institute was mentioned after all). i'm getting too off-topic now uh. okay, so frida moving to alexandria would benefit both her and rozemyne, but what about damuel's brother? honestly, i don't care if he was established as a decent guy, i just don't want frida being someone's mistress. surely, rozemyne could give him a compensation or whatever.
anyways, i'm thinking of post-canon today
Hmm, I always assumed that Frieda's contract with Henrik would be re-negotiated or even canceled, especially given the new advancements and opportunities by Rozemyne brought to both Henrick and Frieda. The contract / relationship between Henrik and Freida always seemed like it was the 'best case' solution given the circumstances where there was only 1 solution offered within that society. It was to the benefit of both parties, they are respectful but neither seemed to necessarily desire a master/mistress relationship, but that was the only known solution. Henrick always comes across as a decent family man, and this contract was mostly to benefit his family and help strengthen his connection to a powerful wealthy man whom he had a good working relationship with.
Rozemyne was thinking about the future of the devouring kids and low mana nobles and giving them an alternative to just being sent to the Temple or orphanage or worse dying. I'd like to think that all the changes she created afforded Frieda more options or at least got her thinking and asking for alternative options for herself, especially as she has a very lucrative business (and money) in the Italian restaurant. All she really needs is access to magical tools, perhaps by now she can afford them? Perhaps the temple could offer a magical tool program where those with the devouring are allowed to borrow magical tools to drain their mana and then exchange them when they are full or come to the temple to release their mana - it could all go to help the temple.
I would hope that some of the insights and changes being made could help Frieda to live the life she ultimately really wanted. To be fair, she did seem content in the arrangement, and was promised a store to run and more or less the life she wanted (running a business instead of being adopted and becoming a noble), but now that she has her business, I would assume Gustav, Benno, Rozemyne and Frieda herself would want her to stay there and continue to managing the restaurant.
I don't see Frieda moving to Alexandria, mainly because she seems too close to her family to move away from them. Rozemyne wouldn't want to separate her from her family, especially from her beloved and aging grandfather. She has been running the restaurant successfully for years and seems content and happy to continue working there and also with Elise to develop more new dishes and train new chefs. I think if she does honor the contract, Henrick seems amiable and I can see him agreeing to her continuing to work at the restaurant, or perhaps creating another restaurant in the noble area. If she can have the contract dismissed or a better solution offered, then I would see her wanting to continue with the restaurant because it is really hers now, it is her area of expertise.
I can also see her continuing to have a relationship with Rozemyne, perhaps eventually visiting Alexandria to help setup a new restaurant (like Lutz does for new workshops). Rozemyne is still a benefactor of the business, so Frieda has a connection to Rozemyne already, no need to move to continue the connection. Frieda doesn't need to be the go between merchant there are others like, Benno, Lutz, or her brothers who will most likely succeed her grandfather eventually. Frieda does still have the devouring, and even if a better solution is given to her to manage it, she is still smaller and weaker than the average person - a lot of travelling doesn't seem wise for her unless Rozemyne's springs make carriage travel more comfortable, or she can get a ride on a highbeast.
I will add one caveat and that is children. Frieda has the devouring and it has been stated multiple times that people with mana need to be matched with people with a matching mana level, or at least within a similar range in order to conceive children. If Frieda ever wanted to have kids she would need someone with a similar mana level, I would assume Henrick would have taken this under consideration as children with mana are desirable.
A lot of marriages (at all levels of society) are arranged or out of necessity or political - feelings doesn't always matter to the parties, that attitude isn't uncommon and Frieda always came across as very pragmatic and practical over emotional and romantic to me. So, IF she did want children, staying with Henrick might be her best option. Not sure how soon the changes will happen that would give Frieda the opportunities to meet someone else with the devouring. Also if her child did have sufficient mana, the child could even become a noble (like Christine) and that too might be desirable and another noble connection for her and her family in the future.
I guess bottom line, I don't think Frieda's situation is all that bad - her grandfather found the 'best' noble to make a connection with and one that would not only respect Frieda (not lecherous) and her wishes but was also not too greedy (asking too much of the family). I do think there are better options available to both, and that both sides would want to do what was best and continue to have an amicable relationship with each other. I think Frieda is smart enough to forge a path that she will find fulfilling for herself. If the contract bothers her she will seek an alternative, if not she will do what is required of her and continue with the plan agreed upon. She will make the best of her life either way.
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Thinking about the last time I saw my James and how I basically did pull up and say “get in, let’s drive.” And how we spent hours just driving and talking and I only had a Ron Pope cd in my car so I will forever associate A Drop In The Ocean with James.
#he’s the only ex I still care about#not in a pining way#but he’s just such a good guy and deserves the best things in life#it was never going to work out long term for us anyway because long distance relationships are hard#especially when neither of us were able to move and change those circumstances at the time
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New Girl on the Block (11)
(aaaaaah thank you guys so much for all of the replies in the last one! I get so giddy reading them! Anyway, here’s chapter 11 of New Girl on the Block. I hope you all enjoy and please feel free to check out the mini series connected to this called Journal Entries!)
Ch.1 / Ch.10 / Ch.12 (Ao3)
Chapter 11: Aw~ You Really Do Care
Gentle breezes that swayed this way and that were always known for creating calming atmospheres. They blew through the wisps of your hair like a sweet kiss from nature and quietly stole your troubles from the deep sigh that you’d let out from finally getting fresh air. They weren’t supposed to harshly wrap around your limbs and torso, condemning you to a make-shift cage that was built to keep you paralyzed as you were carried through the air by a magical, maniacal, part-time villain. And this, Marinette decided, was going to be reason number forty-seven for why she hated Hawkmoth. He ruined the little things. Not only was she going to scowl at every autumn breeze from this moment on due to bitter memories, she was also reminded that she can’t even have a small lunch with friends between classes without getting blasted across the street. With all of the akumas centering around Dupont, she had hoped that her chances of getting ambushed would decrease, but that was apparently too much to ask for.
She’ll give Hawkmoth credit on one account, though: this was the first time she’d gotten caught up in an akuma while in civilian form since she transferred schools. Nevertheless, one time is still one too many, especially when this was bound to happen again sooner or later.
Marinette thrashed against Whirlwind’s hold, and although she didn’t put too much effort into it for the sake of subtlety, she could tell they weren’t going to budge. She needed to find another way to get down that wouldn’t alarm or anger the akuma. Maybe she could convince Whirlwind to get on the ground somehow.. But she already seemed on edge. What if she got aggressive? These akumas were never reasonable, and Marinette couldn’t turn her head to see if Felix and the others were out of range yet.
Marinette held back a groan. Why did there have to be so many obstacles!
“I’m not seeing any ‘company buildings’.” Whirlwind remarked, frowning as she scanned over the city rooftops. “Where did you say they were again?”
“It’s- uhm -” Marinette faltered. She hadn’t expected to be addressed once they started moving. “It’s on the other side of town. If I remember correctly. You should be able to find one if you fly Northeast from here.”
Whirlwind perked up. “Oh, good! I must say, I’m quite impressed with your navigation skills. I barely know what ‘Northeast’ is, myself.”
Marinette forced a smile in response. The akuma wouldn’t think so highly of her if they knew that she was only pointing them in the opposite direction of the café.
They started moving again, the fresh surge of wind almost making it difficult to breathe as they rushed over the rooftops. It reminded Marinette of the time she had to fight Santa Clause while standing on top of his weird, gizmo sleigh, except this time she didn’t have Tikki’s magic to protect her.
Her eyes flicked to the streets below, a part of her wondering what would happen if she fell, another part of her wondering if that’s what she’d have to resort to to get out of this mess.
Come on, Marinette, think! She told herself. Come up with an excuse! Something to get you on the ground. The company is.. Unground? You need to.. Go to the bathroom? Get your phone? You’re-
“Airsick!” She gasped. “I’m getting airsick!”
In hindsight, she probably should have thought the excuse through before blurting out her imaginary nausea- how would she escape once Whirlwind brought her to ground? Would she make another excuse to go inside? How would Marinette be able to slip away to go transform if she made it that far? -but it had a decent effect. Whirlwind immediately stopped, causing the winds behind them to burst forward. Marinette briefly wondered how fast they’d been going to create such a force when coming to an abrupt halt.
“What was that?” Whirlwind asked. “I couldn’t hear you over my winds.”
Marinette hesitated. This was her chance to change the excuse if she wanted to. Should she stick with her airsick story or change it? What would she change it to? Should she just wait for another opportunity to arise? But what if this was her only chance to escape?
“I-”
Before she could utter a word about landing, a silver staff flew past her, smacking Whirlwind right in the stomach. The akuma let out a yelp of surprise and pain as she was launched backwards, and the winds curling around Marinette’s arms and legs lost their holds. That might have been ideal.. had she not been dangling over five stories high in the air.
A scream ripped itself from Marinette’s lungs as she plummeted towards the ground, her arms flailing for support that simply wasn’t there. All coherent thoughts spiraled out of control as the deafening winds rushed around her. This wasn’t part of the plan. She needed to stop falling- she needed to grab something. Were there people in the street? Were there cars below her? What was she going to land on? How close was the ground? Was she going to survive the hit? What was going to happen if she couldn’t help fight the akuma?
Ice cold terror gripped her pounding heart, and she shimmied in the air to look for witnesses should she transform. What other choice did she have? She couldn’t allow herself to die. The Ladybug miraculous was too important.
Adrenaline coursed through her veins, helping her panic with more “what if”s but giving her no solutions. What if someone saw her? What if Whirlwind saw her, giving Hawkmoth her identity? What if she hit the ground before she fully had time to transform? Everything was happening so slowly yet so fast all at once. Time was crawling as her mind raced, but in the blink of an eye, the grey strip that was the road grew five times as wide as it was before in her teary, blurred vision, and Marinette knew her time was running out. She needed to do something, and she needed to do it now.
“Tikki, spots-”
A grunt cut her off as she landed in a pair of leather-clad arms. They pulled her closer to the chest of her savior, who flashed her an all too familiar smirk.
“Don’t worry, Miss.” Chat Noir said, hopping across a few cars while he carried her to safety. “I’ve got y- wait.”
His pace slowed, though not by much considering the circumstances, and he stared down at her with wide eyes. “Marinette?”
Although her mind was reeling from almost- you know -falling to her death, she wrapped her arms around his neck, a relieved smile spreading onto her lips. “Chat Noir. Right on time, as always.”
“I- What are you doing here? And why is your face all red?” He asked, bewildered. She didn’t blame him. It’d been a while since they saw each other on the battlefield, let alone in a place so far from her house or school with her face the color of a cherry tomato.
“I was having lunch with my friends, and there was a small accident in Chemistry class earlier.” She explained, glancing over Chat’s shoulder to make sure the akuma wasn’t following them. Aside from a few car alarms and faint police sirens, it was quiet. Whirlwind must have a slow recovery time. That was going to come in handy later.
Chat Noir stopped in a random alleyway and carefully set her back down on her own two feet. “You mean the friends from your new school?”
Marinette wobbled a bit and placed a firm hand on his shoulder to regain balance. Now that she wasn’t in imminent danger, the shock and adrenaline in her body seemed to be wearing off. It left her heart racing and her body shaking, but she’d fallen enough times to know that it would pass in a few minutes as well. (And wasn’t it sad that she could say that?)
“Those would be the ones.” She replied after a few deep breaths. “We got attacked as we were leaving, and I went to lure Whirlwind away from everyone. I didn’t count on her picking me up to leave.”
Chat Noir frowned, offering a soft rub on the back to help her relax. “I appreciate your tenacity, Princess, but you could’ve gotten seriously hurt! You need to leave the rescuing to us heroes.”
Marinette resisted the urge to roll her eyes. Felix had said the same thing back at the café, neither of them realizing the horrible irony that she was one of the heroes. Sometimes she just wanted to expose her identity to Paris simply so she could do her job as Ladybug in peace without any resistance.
“Anyway, I actually wanted to ask you about your new school.” Chat Noir remarked, bringing her from her mullings.
Marinette gave him a questioning look. Wasn’t he supposed to be fighting the akuma right now? Whirlwind wasn’t going to stay down forever. He needed to stay focused on the task at hand, dang it! Or at least leave her alone so she could transform and tell him to focus as Ladybug!
“Where did you go, you mangy cat!” The akuma roared in the distance. “Come out and face me like a proper hero!”
Aaaand she’s up now. Marinette mentally sighed. It was going to be hard knocking her down again. With her winds protecting her, an ambush will be the only way to get close, and she’ll be expecting that now. Maybe she can find another way to get the folder-fan thing. (That’s what she assumed to be the akumatized object, anyway.)
“Woops,” Chat Noir muttered, his gaze flicking towards the sky. Woops would be right.
“That’s my queue to go.” He said, offering her another quick smile before taking out his staff. “Stay safe, Princess!”
His staff extended, which vaulted him into the air, and he disappeared onto the rooftops above, out of sight.
Finally, Marinette thought. She was starting to wonder if he’d ever leave.
“Marinette!” As soon as the coast was clear, Tikki zipped out of her purse, flying around her holder with a worried look. “Are you alright? You didn’t get hurt, did you? That was too close!”
“I’m fine, Tikki.” Marinette assured with a soft smile. “See? I’m not even shaking anymore. I just hope we can defeat this akuma before next class period. You know how much Felix hates being late.”
Tikki giggled. “I think he’ll understand being a little late today.”
Marinette chuckled. “Tikki, spots on!”
Magic wrapped around her skin in a flash of bright light, creating her signature red and black-spotted costume. A smile graced her lips at the surge of power that washed over her body, and she threw her yo-yo towards the top of the rooftop. Now she was ready to face Whirlwind.
Her yo-yo pulled her onto the rooftop that Chat Noir stepped onto moments prior, but by the time she got up there, he was already blocks away and fighting against Whirlwind as best he could on his own. It.. wasn’t going well, but that served him right for wasting time while the akuma was vulnerable.
Nevertheless, Ladybug threw out her yo-yo again to swing in their direction. She still had to protect Paris, after all, and if she waited any longer, she might be fighting Whirlwind alone while trying not to look Chat Noir’s civilian self in the eyes.
Hopefully she was underestimating him, because it only took half a swing for something else to stop her in her tracks.
It was a cry. But not just any cry. Someone was calling out her name.
Her civilian name.
Ladybug’s arms flailed around as she stumbled onto another rooftop, and she looked to the streets below for the source. There should only be about four other people- aside from Chat -who knew her civilian self was in that area, and that fact had her begging that she’d heard something wrong.
She should have known that she’d never be that lucky, though, despite her powers literally being based around life and luck. It took less than a second for her to spot a blonde boy in dark clothing running through the streets where she’d initially fallen as Marinette, and in all honesty.. she was stunned to see him. Not because she truly thought that the universe would be convenient for once, but because.. it was Felix. Not Claude or Allegra or Allan, who she’d certainly expected to be crazy enough to follow after her, but Felix.
Felix who makes a point of avoiding people as much as possible because he supposedly hates them.
Felix who would usually rather stay home than go anywhere with the group at any time because he claims they are torture to be around.
Felix who had looked too terrified to even move right before she lured the akuma away from the café.
He was there, and he was searching for her. Not only that, he was desperately searching for her. Moving the debris that he could, looking through car windows, calling out her name multiple times- he was doing everything in his power to find her. And she’d be lying if she said she wasn’t extremely touched by the sight. Felix has helped her so much over the past month, but she’d always assumed that that was done out of the kindness of his own heart, not because he liked her, especially with how often he griped and grumbled about the trio dragging him to their group hangouts. Seeing him so worried now, though.. It almost made her smile despite herself.
He really did care about them, didn’t he?
Ladybug shook her head and swung down to the street he was on. Whirlwind probably wouldn’t try to harm him purposely, but that didn’t mean the loose debris from the fight a few blocks down would magically avoid hitting him. She needed to get him to safety before the akuma realized that her second opponent had arrived.
“Sir, it’s not safe here.” She said as she landed behind him. “You need to come with me.”
Felix jumped out of his skin and whirled around. His expression was coated with terror and frustration, once again throwing Ladybug off. She’d never seen him this frantic before.
“Oh, thank goodness.” He said after realizing who she was. “Please, I need your help. My friend- her name’s Marinette. She tried to lure the akuma to help us and got kidnapped! I tried to follow them, but they moved too fast. And then I saw her fall and-”
Recounting the events put him in a fresh state of panic, and he ran a hand through his hair as he scanned the streets once again.
“I understand,” She replied softly, placing a hand on his shoulder to hopefully calm him down, “but I need to remain calm for me, okay? We’re going to clear the area, and then I’ll do everything in my power to find her.”
Felix’s gaze snapped to hers. “What? No, I don’t think you understand. She fell! She might be suffocating under the debris or critically injured in an alleyway or on a rooftop somewhere! We can’t just leave!”
Ladybug held back a smile towards his concern, as that would be wildly inappropriate at the moment, and reached down to pick him up. “I’m sure she would appreciate the sentiment, sir, but you being here makes our jobs harder. Please let us handle this. I’m sure she’s perfectly safe somewhere.”
“What are you-” Felix gasped as she scooped him up bridal style, and the mix of sheer outrage and bafflement that exploded onto his features once he realized what was happening made her wish that she had a camera.
“Put me down this instant!” He demanded, scrambling in her hold. “I need to find Marinette!”
“We’ll do that,” Ladybug promised, “just as soon as I get you somewhere safe.”
Jumping over cars and weaving through alleyways, she managed to carry Felix a good few blocks away within five or ten minutes. He was strangely light for being so tall. Even as he continued to squirm in her grasp, she had no trouble lifting him to a sheltered and secluded area.
“This is ridiculous!” Felix hissed, throwing himself off of her when she finally allowed him to do so. “What kind of hero ignores a person in need! Aren’t you supposed to save those injured by the akuma? Marinette could be out there dead while I’m perfectly fine, yet you waste time taking me somewhere I don’t want to go! Have some common sense and prioritize! Listen to what I’m telling you!”
Ladybug pursed her lips to avoid a sigh. If it weren’t for the fact that plenty of other people who were just like this made her job way more difficult than it already was, she would probably be laughing a bit towards the irony of his claims. “Sir, every life is a priority to us-”
A scream echoed in the distance, one that abruptly grew louder as the source grew nearer. Ladybug shifted into a fighting stance, but by the time she pulled out her yo-yo to use as a weapon, a blur of black was flying right past them.
It landed hard in a dumpster near the end of the alleyway, a deep groan erupting from the surprise visitor a moment later. That fall clearly hadn’t been pleasant for whoever got thrown, and Ladybug had a pretty good idea of who that person was. Not many people got thrown around by akumas on a near-weekly basis.
“You okay, Chat?” She asked, putting away her yo-yo as she moved forward to help him up.
Her partner eyed her through a pained, squinted gaze while he rubbed the back of his head. “..My lady? When did you get here?”
She offered a smile and helped him sit up as she answered, “Only a few minutes ago. I was helping a civilian get to safety.”
Chat’s gaze slid to the spot over her shoulder, where she assumed Felix was standing, and a frown tugged at the corner of his lips.
“You’re here too?”
The question was more of muttered, but she heard it all the same, her eyebrows knitting together. What did he mean ‘too’? Did they know each other?
“I’m looking for my friend.” Felix spoke up, jumping at the opportunity to recruit another hero. It was probably for a good thing, since she didn’t want to think too much on who Chat did or didn’t know personally. “She was taken captive by the akuma while trying to protect us and fell from the air about twenty minutes ago. Have you seen her?”
Chat’s eyes widened, confusion and surprise swirling onto his features. Ladybug, for the life of her, couldn’t figure out why. Her alter ego had told him that she risked her life to save her friends. Minor surprise should have been the only reaction he had to that question.
“Wait..” Her partner said with furrowed eyebrows. “Was this girl’s name Marinette?”
Felix straightened, hope rising to his silver eyes. “You know her?”
“I put her in an alleyway a few blocks from here.” Chat Noir answered, gesturing in the general direction. “She was a bit shaken up, but otherwise fine. How do you-”
“No time for chit-chat.” Ladybug interrupted. She wasn’t going to get trapped in another one of Chat Noir’s spiraling conversations. “We kind of have an akuma to take care of.”
Chat Noir pushed himself out of the dumpster, and although he looked reluctant to drop the subject, he nodded. “Right. I’m ready when you are.”
Ladybug gave a satisfied nod and turned back to Felix.
“I know you’re worried for your friend,” She said, “but she’s safe. So I would greatly appreciate it if you went and hid until all of this was over. If you don’t, it’ll only make defeating Whirlwind harder.”
Felix frowned, clearly not on board with the idea, but he agreed anyway. “I’ll.. go back to the café. My other friends should be there waiting for us.”
She smiled. “Thank you.”
Felix spun on his heel and started off in the opposite direction of Whirlwind, to her relief. With him out of the way, taking down Hawkmoth’s newest pawn should be a piece of cake.
“You ready, Chat?”
Her partner didn’t respond, drawing her gaze over to him. He was staring at Felix with a quiet frown, watching the blonde walk away. Why did he look so troubled by the sight of the blond?
“Chat?”
This time his ears twitched, and he turned back to Ladybug with a questioning gaze. “Huh? Sorry, I got.. distracted.”
Ladybug tilted her head to the side slightly. “Are you sure you’re okay? You looked upset.”
Chat waved off the comment, plastering on a smile. “Nah, you know me, My Lady. I’m perfect, as always.”
She frowned. “If you’re sure.. I think I have a plan to beat the akuma. Are you ready?”
“You know I am.”
“Good. Then get ready to be the distraction.” She replied, quickly throwing her yo-yo into the air. “Lucky Charm!”
~~~~~~
Adrien ran through the Parisian streets, following the tip of their school building to find his way back. That akuma took longer than he thought it would. By the time he got back to class, it’d probably be over.
So much for gaining more free time to go see Marinette. He thought, sparing a glance down the alleyway that he’d dropped her in as Chat Noir. It was empty now, as one would expect. LB’s miraculous ladybugs would have brought her back to where she was before the fight started. Even so, he couldn’t help feeling disappointed. It was the first time he’d seen her in almost two weeks as Adrien or Chat Noir, and possibly his only chance to talk to her for a long while. Tardiness at Dupont was pardoned when they got attacked by the akuma directly, but running off to video- or even capture -it wasn’t permitted. When Father saw his disciplinary marks, Adrien’s already tight schedule would no doubt coil around him even further.
Adrien paused to catch his breath- running to school was so much easier as Chat Noir -and scanned the street for Alya. They needed to regroup before he got back to class or it might be suspicious on his part, since he specifically said that he was going to keep Alya safe. (Note to self: never use Alya as an excuse again.)
“Alya!” He called out. “Can you hear me?”
He’d wanted to go find that café that the blond guy from Rosemary mentioned, just to see if he could at least spot Marinette and maybe even catch her as Adrien, but Whirlwind ended up taking all of his free time. It was admittedly frustrating, being so close yet so far when it came to talking with her. They lived in the same city, for Pete’s sake! He should be able to drive over to her house and say hi without any struggle at all!
Speaking of which, what was with that blond guy? He totally lied about Marinette attending Rosemary! Unless they hadn’t met yet when Adrien first visited.. but that didn’t make any sense. He visited after Marinette said that she had her new friends come to her house, the same friends that were with her at the café. Meaning the blond guy.
Adrien could give him the benefit of the doubt and say it was an honest mistake. Perhaps that guy really hadn’t met Marinette yet and she was referring to other friends that they were with. It did sound like she had a whole group now. Besides, why would the guy lie for no reason? People don’t usually do that.
Either way, Adrien knew which school Marinette was at now, and that was all that mattered. His plan to go apologize could finally be put into action.
“Adrien?”
A faint reply caught his attention, and Adrien glanced up to see Alya wandering around at the end of the street.
“Is that you?” She asked, looking around for him as well.
Adrien put on a smile and waved his hand as he approached her. “Yeah, it’s me! Where did you go? I couldn’t find you!”
“I was trying to get a shot of the akuma, but by the time I got here, the fight was practically over!” She answered, spotting him a second later and moving to meet him halfway. “Where did you go? You disappeared in, like, the first five minutes! How did you get down here so fast?”
“Oh, uh..” Adrien rubbed the back of his neck, nervousness crawling onto his features. He probably should have come up with an excuse for his absence before he tracked Alya down. “I decided to take a shortcut. I guess I should have told you?”
Alya scrunched up her nose. “A shortcut? I don’t remember any shortcuts around here.. Well, I’m sure there will be other chances to film akumas. It just stinks that I didn’t get to record the hostage situation. Did you happen to see who that was? It looked like a girl from where I was standing.”
“Sorry, Al.” Adrien said, offering a sheepish look. Chat Noir might know it was Marinette who fell, but he did not. “I got there after the hostage was rescued.”
Alya clicked her tongue, displeased. “Drat. Did you see anything interesting while you were out there?”
Define interesting. Adrien thought to himself. Finding Marinette and the blond who was looking for her in the same battle had been extremely interesting to him, but he doubted Alya would feel the same way.
“She had a pretty cool costume.” He recounted as they started their way back to the school together. “It was all blue with a white cloak and this weird, spinning, white skirt thing. She also used a white and dark blue folder as a fan to control the wind. That ended up being the akumatized object, if I remember correctly-”
“Oh, hang on.” Alya cut in, switching to the memo on her phone. “Let me write this down for the blog. I got some of the footage, but it was grainy at best because of the distance. These details are great to add to it. Did you see anything else?”
Adrien thought over what he could tell her and what he should keep secret. Would he be able to know what the lucky charm was if he was watching from a random alleyway or behind a car?
“Not really.” He answered. Giving more information at this point might not end well for him if his lady followed the blog. She was too clever not to put things like that together. “You’re not going to name-drop me on the blog, are you?”
Alya shook her head. “No, no, you know I keep my sources a secret. It would lead other reporters to my scoops.”
“Right.” Adrien replied, relieved. Not only would name-dropping compromise his personal tips, it would also give people the opportunity to look for him through news footage and other things. He didn’t want anyone disproving the excuses that he’d given to Alya about his whereabouts. “That makes sense.”
Once she jotted down Adrien’s comments, Alya pulled out her phone to rewatch the footage. Although the image was being jostled around a bit from walking, he could still see how utterly grainy the video was. He could barely tell who was who, and he was one of the people who actually fought in the battle. The only reason he knew it was Ladybug snatching the akumatized object at the end was because she was the only one who had red pixels.
“I would have just shot the scene without zooming in,” Alya said as she put the phone away, “but doing that made everyone look like specks. I hope Lila can clean it up for me.”
Adrien furrowed his eyebrows. “I didn’t know Lila edited videos.”
“Oh, she doesn’t.” Alya smiled. “She has an uncle who’s this big-time movie editor.”
Ah. Another famous uncle. He wondered if that was the same uncle who was supposed to be an incredible actor or the one that owned a humongous plaza. Gosh, did Lila even have any uncles in real life?
“You think he’s going to have time to do it?” He asked.
“Maybe not, but it couldn’t hurt to ask, right?”
Adrien shrugged. No, it couldn’t hurt. At least not until Lila promises to get it to her uncle and then never gives the video back. How many false promises has she made now? There was the one where she said that she would get a gig for Nino, one to Alex about getting her this special, glow-in-the-dark spray paint, one to Max about getting some high-tech chip for Markov- She’d promised so many things that he couldn’t even remember most of them now! How long until those words buried her alive? How long until his classmates actually started demanding the fruits from her supposed labor? Were they just going to wait on her to deliver for the rest of their lives?
Adrien heaved a small sigh. He would make them see reason eventually. He would.
But first he needed to pay another visit to Rosemary.
~~~~~~
Marinette pushed herself to go faster as she weaved through the different alleyways that led back to the café. Her legs were already aching from the fight that Whirlwind had dragged out, but she imagined the pain to be minor in comparison to how worried sick her friends probably were at this point. As a civilian, she should have made it back to the café about twenty minutes ago, give or take. If it weren’t for the multiple calls and messages asking if she was okay and her frantic responses that “yes, I’m fine, but please stay put till I get there”, then the group would probably be searching the streets for her right now. She would have stayed transformed to get back, but the fight drained all of Tikki’s energy. Marinette was lucky to have found an alleyway to even hide in before she de-transformed.
Come on, come on, She thought, her gaze flicking left and right. I know it was around here somewhere- oh!
Marinette lit up at the sight of the café. She could see the group standing in front of it, huddled together and looking around to try and spot her. Felix was a step or two behind the trio with a deep frown on his lips and his arms crossed against his chest. His fingers tapped rapidly against his bicep, giving way to his nervousness towards her absence, and he glanced from side to side along with the others. His franticness from earlier appeared to be contained now, but still very much there.
“Guys!” She called out, breaking into another sprint despite her body’s protest. She was going to have to grab an ice pack or two once she got home.
The group’s attention immediately snapped to her, and the trio practically sank to the ground with relief.
“Marinette!”
“Where have you been?!”
“We’ve been worried sick-”
They collided into her with a group hug, each sniffing and blubbering about not being able to find her. Claude was out right crying into her shoulder.
Marinette hugged them all back and apologized profusely, the guilt from upsetting them to this point twisting sharply through her stomach and heart. She couldn’t bear to see them this way, and the fact that this was inevitably going to happen again only made it worse.
“I’m so sorry for making you worry.” She said, wiping away a tear of her own. “When Chat Noir save me, I was told to stay put till the fight was over, and-”
“No, don’t apologize.” Allegra interrupted with a watery smile. “We’re just happy you’re safe.”
A scoff brought their attention up to Felix, who was now standing next to them.
“Don’t apologize?” He repeated, glaring at the other three in disbelief. “She almost got herself killed! Are we supposed to encourage that behavior?”
“She was trying to protect us.” Allan defended. “She was only doing what she thought was right.”
“And that’s supposed to make it better?” Felix countered. “She was reckless and idiotic! There were a million other ways to make it out of there safely without getting yourself kidnapped.”
“Hey, lay off!” Claude yelled, sounding surprisingly angry. “She’s been through a lot today already, so just leave her alone!”
“So, you’re willing to just let this slide?” Felix asked, growing agitated himself. “You’re telling me that as long as she dies out of the ‘goodness of her heart’, then it’s fine?”
“She didn’t die!”
“But she could have!” He shot back. “Doesn’t that bother any of you? What if the heroes didn’t get there in time? What if Whirlwind decided she didn’t care for civilians anymore before they even arrived? What would have happened if the miraculous cure couldn’t bring her back for some reason? There were too many variables that she didn’t know about and she went anyway. That’s not something that should be praised!”
Allegra shot him a glare. “Felix-”
“No.” Marinette interrupted, putting a hand on Allegra’s shoulder as the girl trailed off. “No, he’s right. I wasn’t thinking properly, and I jumped in with a plan that half-formed at best and didn’t look for other options until it was too late. I thought I was running out of time and panicked, but that’s no excuse.”
Marinette stepped forward, and Felix quietly stared at her in response. His eyebrows were still furrowed, the grief of the situation reflecting in his silvery blue eyes. She understood why he was angry and upset. She understood why he had that desperate look in his eyes as he tried to explain his displeasure towards her behavior. Felix was the only one to see her fall, after all. The only one to know how close to death she actually was. Seeing Chat Noir sacrifice himself over and over again helped her know exactly what that felt like.
She wanted to pull him into a hug, to tell him that everything was okay now and that she was okay now, but touch wasn’t exactly his thing. So she settled for something she knew was alright and lightly grabbed his hand.
“I really am sorry.” She apologized again. “I promise I’ll be more careful next time.”
Felix’s gaze softened slightly, and he shocked her by lightly squeezing her hand back. “I’d rather there not be a next time.”
Marinette offered a small, sheepish smile, knowing she couldn’t make that promise. She had too many responsibilities as Ladybug to stay away from akumas completely, but she could try to avoid them as a civilian. For his sake and the others’.
Allegra placed a gentle hand on Marinette’s back. “We should head back to the school. They don’t really give us lee-way for being late.”
“Well, they should today since we kind of got attacked,” Allan spoke up, “but I don’t quote me on that. Also, I’m calling my turn on driving Marinette.”
Allegra and Claude put a hand to their chests and gasped, both knowing that Allan hadn’t called a turn yet which made him automatically win. Marinette caught a smirk twitching onto Felix’s lips due to this fact, and she smiled with him, mainly because it was nice seeing him relax again.
“Oh no!” Claude said defiantly. “If you’re taking Marinette, then I’m gonna be riding with you too!”
“Same here!” Allegra agreed. “I’m not leaving her side until the teachers are forcing us to for our next classes.”
Marinette let out a small chuckle. “Is there enough room for that?”
“There is now.”
Allan snorted. “Yeah, we’ll be fine. Our cars are pretty big.”
“Are you going to be riding with us too, Felix?” Allegra asked, glancing at the blond.
Felix’s hand tightened slightly around Marinette’s, but he shook his head. “No, I.. I think I’m gonna drive back alone.”
Claude frowned. “Seriously? After that whole rant you made two seconds ago?”
“Aw, let him be.” Allan said, waving off Claude’s comment. “It’s just more Marinette for us, right?”
Although the frown remained, the brunette made a half-shrug. “I guess that’s true..”
“Cool.” Allegra smiled. “Then I call the seat next to Marinette!”
“What!” Claude scoffed, whirling back to Allegra. “You can’t do that!”
“I just did.”
“Technically,” Allan cut in, “I should get to sit next to her, since I’m the one driving her.”
Allegra and Claude both shot him a glare, bringing out a giggle from Marinette. They did not seem to appreciate Allan’s accurate logic.
Her gaze shifted to Felix, who was silently watching the trio bicker. His expression was neutral again, composed, but the way he continued to hold onto her hand told her that he wasn’t quite alright yet.
“So..” She said, almost awkwardly. Should she try to make him feel better? “I guess I’ll.. see you at school?”
Felix’s eyes flicked to her, and she mentally slapped herself for even speaking. “See you at school”? What kind of dull question was that?
“Yes.” He answered. The response was shorter than usual, but she’d try not to overthink it, since the last hour has been a long one for all of them. That’s probably why he decided to drive back alone in the first place.
Allegra cut into the conversation by looping her arm with Marinette’s and pulling her towards Allan’s. The movement was quick and sudden, and it caused her hand to slip out of Felix’s in the process. She glanced down at her palm, curious at the sense of emptiness that immediately swept over it. It was as though she hadn’t been ready to let go herself.
Marinette looked back to Felix to see if he felt it too, but his back was already turned to her as he walked back to his own car.
Huh.
Maybe it was just her.
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The Unexpected Reward - Chapter 18
Summary: Natsu and Lucy go on a job together, but what they bring home is something neither anticipated. Forced to make a life changing decision, they have to adapt quickly, but that's never easy, especially given the circumstances. As they work together on their toughest adventure yet, they find themselves drawn to one another, in ways they never realised.
Rated mature for a reason. Although this chapter is all fluff.
With one last glance in the mirror, Lucy eyed herself closely in the reflection. Her eyes followed the movement of her manicured hand slowly drifting down the length of the lacy bodice, smoothing over a few creases in the skirt before finally resting under her bump. She studied the silk material carefully, appreciating the way it flowed off of her curvaceous body and delicately trailed along the floor behind.
It was beautiful, unlike the enormous meringue-like frock her friends had so graciously picked out for her. Gone were the days of wearing intricately designed, overly priced, princess dresses that left little room to move, let alone breathe. No, the one she'd picked out was much more flattering, less poofy, and delicately sat in just the right places. It clung to her every curve and emphasised all the parts Lucy liked about her body, whilst also accommodating her growing bump. Her silky blonde hair had been loosely pulled back and curled, decorated with small gem encrusted pins throughout. And her make up had been left minimal, giving her a simple but elegant finish—the look she favoured nowadays.
Her hand began rubbing small circles were it lay, a recent thing she found herself doing, a comfort to her racing heart as it pulsated through her body, echoing the erratic movements of her unborn baby.
She was anxious; who wouldn't be? But she knew that her guild mates would never allow such a day to go badly, they'd all put too much effort into planning it to allow for such folly.
As for Natsu… well, the boy didn't know what'd hit him once the guild found out. He had no idea what getting married really entailed, and figured, like she, it would happen much further into the future than it had. Their friends, however, had given them little choice in the matter, and within a month of the proposal, she was standing in her dream wedding dress about to make that lifelong commitment to the man just as clueless as she was.
In some ways, it all seemed rather convenient. If Lucy didn't know any better, she would've put her fateful coupling down to destiny, but those were the delusions of a small child who'd grown up alone in a big mansion, destined to marry some self important aristocrat and play housewife for his money.
A different life entirely.
Her meeting Natsu had changed all that; he'd opened her eyes to what life could really offer. She'd concluded, after many years as a member of Fairy Tail, that destiny really could be burned to ashes, that fate stood no chance against the likes of her friends, and that she was no different. It had been her choices that'd lead her down this path, and that she had always been in charge of her own future.
So getting married was no longer some massive event that held such great importance in her life, for she had found her true happiness. Married or not, her feelings towards the dragon slayer would never change, her heart belonged solely to him and had done for much longer than she'd ever admit to.
Instead, the wedding would be used a day of celebrating their long lasting friendship, their deep bond and most importantly, the love they'd shared so unconditionally for one another. They'd been through so much together; the pain and heart ache; the cheer and laughter and everything in between; every memory was precious and every moment from now on, even more so.
The longer she thought about it all, the more her eyes began to prickle with unshed tears, threatening to streak down her powdered skin, "Ugh… Stupid feelings..." She whispered, using her finger to wipe up the wetness.
"Aw, Lucy, you don't have to cry! Save it for the actual ceremony, you'll ruin your make up otherwise." Levy was quick to take out a clean tissue, dabbing away at her friends eyes whilst trying not to ruin her masterpiece. "Thank goodness for waterproof mascara, huh?"
"Sorry Levy, I don't know what came over me." She just couldn't understand it; where had all these emotions come from? "It must be my hormones…"
"Nope, I'm pretty sure it's because you're about to get married, Lucy. I imagine lot's of bride's get a little teary on their wedding day." Mira began, offering some words of encouragement. "And besides, Natsu will be just as emotional, I bet."
If memory served correctly, Natsu would be, no doubt, still in his boxers, piling food into his face alongside Happy and Haru, with not a care in the world. It was just a gut feeling, but somehow, Lucy was pretty sure their morning had gone very differently to hers. "Hmm… I don't know. Are we even talking about the same person here? I mean he's probably not even dressed yet."
Mira chuckled lightly, although Lucy saw right through it. She knew that if her words were true, the barmaid wouldn't hesitate to go full Satan-soul on the slayer's ass, ripping him a new one. But the woman said nothing more about it as she reached up to place the veil atop of Lucy's head, before standing back to marvel at the beautiful bride, "There. I have to say, Natsu's one lucky guy! You look good enough to eat, Lucy!"
"Um… thanks, Mira." Blushing, Lucy turned away embarrassed, knowing exactly what the take over mage was inferring, "How much longer until we're ready?"
"Twenty minutes. So we need to pick up the pace or we'll be late." Erza's thunderous tone came sharply from the doorway as she entered the room, her athletic body filling her own, full length dress out in ways Lucy felt slightly envious of. "And the bride shall not be late to her own wedding. We've all waited far too long for it to be ruined now."
Lucy chose to ignore that last bit, never one to dwell on what her guild mates inevitably spoke about behind her and Natsu's back. She quickly put her heeled shoes on and made her way to the door, "Is Anna here yet? She's supposed to be walking me down the aisle."
One of the few decisions Lucy had been allowed to make about her wedding day was who she wanted walking her down the aisle. In replacement of her mother and as someone who meant a lot to both her and Natsu, Anna had been the perfect choice that no one could really argue with.
"I'm here, Lucy!" Anna called, waving her hand as she entered the room, awestruck by how radiant the bride looked in her glistening gown, "Wow! Don't you look stunning! Then again, the Heartfilia gene has yet to fail us." She winked and smiled, "Let's hope this baby follows the same path, hmm?"
Chuckling, Lucy smiled for the first time that morning, feeling a sense of comfort and relief with Anna around. She shared the same kind disposition and caring nature her mother once had; maybe it was a Heartfilia thing? But if Lucy closed her eyes for just a moment, she could almost trick herself into believing Layla was standing right there with her. Maybe, in some weird way, she was, and that's all the young blonde could hope for.
"Time to go!" Erza bellowed, shooing them all out of the door, "We have a wedding to attend!"
On the other side of town, up on the hill where the small cottage stood, a very different story was unfolding, one of complete bedlam, and no one, not even Lucy, should've expected any different.
"Dammit! Why do I have to wear this ridiculous thing anyway?" Natsu grumbled, pulling at the tie around his neck, unhappy that he'd been forced to wear it instead of his beloved scarf. "It's tryin' to choke me, I swear!"
"I don't think it's alive, Natsu…" Happy uttered, having watched his friend battle the urge to destroy the thing for the past ten minutes.
"Yeah, but if it was, I'd totally beat it and burn it to the ground!" Fisting the air in triumph over his imaginary brawl with the inanimate object, the fire breather sniggered.
"You could just burn it now."
The fire mage's smirk turned into an all out evil grin as he went to summon his fire, reaching for the offending material dangling over his shirt.
"Although, I doubt a certain scary lady in armour would be too pleased… Not after everything she went through to get you to wear it in the first place."
And then it all came crashing down again, his need to set fire to it dissipating. He knew better than to go against something Erza had chosen and groaned obnoxiously, throwing his head back onto the pillows in a huff, causing hot smoke to seep from his mouth, "Stupid tie… Stupid Erza…"
Hearing a thump next to him, his eyes rolled to the side, his neck twisting in turn, only to find that Haru had slumped down onto his back as well.
His large blue eyes were fixed on his father's mouth and his lips were pursed slightly as he continued to stare. Then, with a look of determination, he blew with all his might, over and over again in the hopes of forming his own puff of smoke.
Unable to keep his amusement in, Natsu turned over to observe the baby closer, intrigue furrowing his brows and fascination lighting up his face when an untimely idea came to mind.
"Hey Happy, d'ya think Haru might be able to learn magic soon?" He contemplated the thought for a moment as he sat himself up, pulling the little one up with him.
Stopping to think about it, the exceed scrunched his nose up in disbelief, not entirely sure if now was really the time to be having such thoughts, "Really? But he's only just learnt to walk."
"I know, but look at him. He seems to want to." Natsu wasn't sure if he'd even be able to teach him how to breath fire, not without the use of dragon slayer magic and that was off the table. But then again, that wasn't the only thing he could show him. "It'd be kinda cool to see, don't ya think?"
"Uh… I'm not sure now is the time, Natsu… you don't wanna be late." Happy erred on the side of caution, but after one look of his friends scheming face, he was quick to give in, "Then again, it would be pretty cool to see what he does, I guess."
"That's the spirit! We got some time to kill before that Snowflake gets here anyway, so might as well have a little fun." Natsu grinned wickedly, ideas of how to go about it swirling around in his head. "Hey little guy, come 'ere! Daddy's got something to show you!" Igniting his palm, he watched excitedly for Haru's reaction to his magic.
The little boy, although startled at first, stared in wonder at the tiny flame so close to his face, and watched it flicker with the slight movements of his father's hand. It was captivating to be within reach of such burning hot fire, even if he'd seen it so many times before. Although the bright heat was something he so readily associated with Natsu, being this close to it was a first for him, and that made it all the more thrilling.
"Fire!" The child exclaimed, using the springs of the mattress to bob up and down in his excitement.
"Heck yeah, it is! And now that it's just us, we can be awesome fire dragons together, right Haru?" Natsu sniggered like the mischievous imp he was, and brought the kids hand up next to his ignited one.
But after taking one look between his and his father's hands, the little boy pulled away again, a sad expression adorning his sweet face as he stared into his empty palm, "No…" He mumbled, his bottom lip jutting out and his eyes filling with tears, "No!"
"I don't think he understands, Natsu." Happy interjected, not convinced the boy was anywhere near old enough to fully grasp how to handle magic.
"'Course not—not yet anyway. But he will one day, and it's gonna be the best!" The slayer kept his smile as he guided the little boy onto his lap, ruffling his thick hair affectionately to cheer him up again, "Chin up, kiddo! It takes a long time to learn how to wield magic. But with some practice, you'll be the toughest little dragon around, you'll see."
Listening to that calming tone, the child glanced up at his adoring parent, comforted by the big grin that always managed to reach his eyes, a gentle touch that embodied the very bond they shared. The mood was infectious and with a little coaxing, the small boy couldn't keep his lips from curving upwards, brightening the room around them once again.
With newfound courage, he reached his arm back out, placing it near to Natsu and waited expectantly, "Oh, so you do wanna be a dragon, huh? Alright then, but ya gotta give me your best roar first!" Natsu smirked, proud to have taught his son the 'non-magical' version of roaring (aka shouting really loudly) at the very least. And he did just that; at the top of his voice; no encouragement needed, "Whoa! That was super awesome, little guy! Now let's see how you handle this!"
"If you're about to do what I think you're gonna do, then I hope for your sake, Lucy never finds out." Happy warned, not wanting to take any responsibility for what was inevitably about to happen.
"Hey! I'm not stupid enough to burn down my own house. What do you take me for, an idiot?" The answer was yes, but Happy's restraint held strong, knowing he'd be heard even if he'd muttered it under his breath. Natsu, on the other hand, took no heed and brought both hands out this time, taking hold of the chubby little ones waiting for him, "Are ya ready?"
Igniting the flames once more, Haru watched the blazing magic slowly seep onto his fingers, a gentle warmth tingling his flesh, enough to make him flinch as it encased each tiny fist. After a few unsure moments, and the opening and closing of his palms, his blue eyes lit up with a wonderment only children seemed to possess, his very soul shining just as brightly as the flames he'd been gifted.
"Daddy! Daddy, fire!"
Natsu chuckled, as he leant back on the bed, using his now fireless hands to prop himself up, "Haha! I knew you had it in ya! Now you get to be just like a real fire dragon, and as long as you play with it on me, you can't burn anything, either." It was fool proof, he was certain of that. And with the look of sheer astonishment on that cute little face in front of him, Natsu could hardly contain himself.
"Yeah, right! Like you're one to talk…You're the first person to destroy things. It's why we never have any money." It was true and Natsu knew it, but that didn't stop the unimpressed glare he sent Happy's way.
"Why else do you think I put him in my lap?" The slayer tilted his head, his annoyance short lived, "He can't burn me so it's fine, and he's not really wielding fire, it's just pretend." He added, his infamous grin returning, and attention now fully diverted from the child he was supposed to be watching, "They'll go out before long."
"Sure, but, uh… I think Haru may have different ideas…" The exceed said, quietly gesturing to the boy in his lap.
"Huh? How so?" The fire mage asked, but by the time he'd turned around to see, it was already too late, "Haru!"
With one touch from the child's fingers, the fire caught on to the covers they were sitting on and spread like a fuse to a bomb.
"Get out of the way!" It lit up the entire bed in a flash, giving Natsu only seconds to get Haru off of it in time before they both landed in heaps on the floor.
It'd gone up so quickly; such was the destructive nature of those flames, and now his and Lucy's bed, the very bed they slept in every night, was a pile of smoking ash on the floor, the fire extinguished along with it.
Silence. All that could be heard was the silence…
"I… I-I'm dead… I'm so dead…" The dragon slayer's voice was barely a whisper, and his horrified expression said it all. The crushing weight of impending doom loomed over him and no amount of blinking was going to bring back their disintegrated bed, no matter how hard he tried.
What was he going to do? He'd been in control of the situation; he had a plan and it was fool proof. Not a few seconds he'd peeled his sights away from the child—just a few damn seconds and now...
And what about Lucy? She'd be furious, no… outraged by it all! He'd be seeing her in less than thirty minutes from now; how could he look her in the eyes, say their vows, then tell her she'd be sleeping on the couch?! That was a conversation that ended badly no matter what way he looked at it.
"You were saying?" Happy teased, covering his mouth with his paw, the rare look of mortification on his friend's face was priceless.
"Lucy's going to kill me!" His gaping sockets could barely keep his eyeballs from falling out, and his mouth hung low enough he could almost lick the ash off the ground.
"Daddy fire! Daddy fire!" Haru cheered, clapping his hands together while laughing, unaware of the chaos he'd unleashed, seemingly impressed with himself.
"Y-Yeah..." The young man slumped back against the dressing table, the feeling of dread taking over him the more he played out in his mind how he was going to tell his new, and very pregnant wife of the unfortunate news, giving him zero hope for survival, "You're gonna be the end of me, kid!"
"Like father, like son!" It was all too funny for the little exceed, who was attempting, but failing, to stop the flow of cackles escaping his mouth.
"Hey! Stop laughing would ya! It's not funny!" Natsu snapped, the sound of Happy busting his guts slowly grinding away at him.
"But it is! You should've seen your face! Shame Reedus wasn't here to draw the picture!" Happy continued to shriek with laughter, infecting little Haru as well.
"Not you, too!" Natsu complained, but his voice held no real consequence. After all, it was his idea to let the one year old play with fire, and it would be his sorry ass to own up and take responsibility.
"What the hell is going on in here?!" Startled by the unexpected but familiar voice, the trio of boys twisted their heads to see an out of breath Gray standing in the bedroom doorway.
"Oh, it's you… Don't you know how to knock?" Natsu dead-panned, apparently more annoyed by Gray's intrusion than the burnt bed.
"Never mind about that, I ran all the way here 'cause your house is smoking! What did you do this time, fire breath?" Glad to see everyone was fine, the ice mage sighed in relief that it appeared to be nothing serious.
"Hey! Why do people always assume it's me? Maybe it was Happy?"
"But it was you, Natsu."
"Shh! I'm trying to make a point here!"
"It was obviously you, idiot! You're the only pyro here!" Gray shook his head, hardly believing that this was the guy about to get married. "Anyway, we need to get going, or Erza will have our heads."
"But… but what about the bed?" Natsu whimpered like a child, pointing to where it once stood.
"Wait… You burnt down your own bed?! What is wrong with you, Dragneel?! Of all the days to be a bigger idiot than normal, you pick today?" Gray smacked his palm over his face exasperatedly. He hadn't even noticed that it was the bed that'd been burnt, but now it was clear to see where all the smoke was coming from.
"Come on, numbskull! We don't have time for this!" Grabbing hold of the still-in-shock Natsu by the collar, he used his ice magic to freeze all of the ash lain bare on the floor, effectively halting the smoke and yanked his rival out of the house, determined to get to the cathedral on time, "We'll deal with your stupidity later, but right now, you gotta get married and I'm prepared to drag you all the way there if I have to."
Lucy could feel the blood pulsing in her ears, her hand clutched at her belly as the sickness she'd been suppressing all morning finally reared its ugly head. She felt sticky and clammy from the extra adrenaline coursing its way through her body—and was now an appropriate time to say she needed to pee… again!?
"Take a deep breath and try to relax yourself." She heard Anna whisper into her ear as they both stared at the large cathedral doors. "When you walk down that aisle, remember its only you and Natsu that matters, no one else, okay?"
Giving a shy nod, she inhaled deeply, as if that was going to be her last breath and tried to calm herself down.
"Are you ready?"
Bowing her head once more, Lucy could hear the guests grow silent behind the large doors, the loud creaking signifying they were opening. Planting one heeled foot over the threshold, the blonde looked up to everyone that was waiting for her entrance, and it was in that moment time seemed to stand still.
Among the gasps and gleaming faces; the decorated pews and hard stone floor; hazy, chocolate eyes scoured the ancient hall. There they all were; her friends; her family; every single person that held such importance in her heart. It made her happy, ecstatic even, that this joyous day could be celebrated with the people closest to her, the people that'd accepted her for who she was and nurtured her into the person she was today.
She hadn't even realised she'd stopped breathing until her lungs began to ache, forcing her to inhale a large breath of air as her legs began to slowly, and shakily, walk forwards.
Her dress glimmered in the dim light of the medieval building, capturing the eyes of the crowd, lighting up the very aisle as the long train behind her rippled with each step she took towards the altar.
But nobody, not even the keenest of dragon senses could see the pure beauty the way he did. With heat pooling in his belly, he watched the girl he loved make her way towards him, dazzling as brightly as the stars she wielded. His mouth ran dry, and his heart skipped many beats, making him question whether it was just his imagination. She appeared before him within a blink of an eye, and it was all to easy to just wash the others away.
"She's all yours, Natsu." Anna said, releasing her arm from Lucy's firm hold and winked at them both, gladly stepping back to let them take centre stage.
But neither mage heard her as their eyes connected for the first time, too enraptured by what stood before them, too absorbed in their own little world, and nothing could penetrate it.
"You… You look beautiful, Lucy." Natsu wasn't easy to fluster, but the pink tinge on his cheeks told her she'd succeeded. "Really… really beautiful…"
Her own bashfulness became evident too, her eyes soaking in his glorious form as if she'd been starved of him, "You're looking pretty good yourself, Natsu." She studied him up and down, her gaze becoming hungry for more. It wasn't very often she got to see his exceptionally toned body in something so formal, and she was totally going to make the most of it.
"T-Thanks..."
The playful wink and cute chuckle only served to make the pink on his cheeks grow darker, as if this was the first time she'd ever paid him a compliment.
‘Wasn't Lucy the one that usually reacted like this?’ He wondered, unsure why his face was suddenly feeling so hot.
“Although, I have to say, it’s still a little strange seeing you without your scarf on.” She admitted, unable to take her eyes away from his slender neck. Usually it didn’t come off until he was ready for bed… or other, less innocent things.
"You can thank Erza for that! She stole it from me and made me wear a damn tie instead." His petulant tone had the blonde sniggering into her hand, his instant annoyance enough to quash any tension left between them, "She even made Haru wear one."
Lucy glanced over to where Haru was sat in the crowd, who, although dressed in something entirely impractical for a toddler, was happily waving to his mother with the biggest grin on his face, "Poor guy…" She said, waving back, "He does look super cute in it though."
A loud cough from the front halted them in their tracks, finally breaking them out of their little bubble, "When you're quite finished." A loud voice echoed through the cathedral walls, making both mages stand to attention and face the front like naughty school children.
An older gentleman with a bald head and long beard stood before them, his bushy brows making it hard to see where his wrinkles stopped and his eyes began glared impatiently at the pair, tapping his fingers on the book he held in his hands, "Now, let's begin."
With an exaggerated sigh, his voice traipsed along the pages of his book, an aged tone that said he'd spoken these words all too many times before, had read those same lines, and joined countless lovers together in matrimony over the years. He was practised and poised, an elegant and poetic speaker, able to captivate his audience…
Unless they were Fairy Tail, of course, and more specifically a pink haired, impulsive dragon slayer, who's attention span rivalled that of a five year old. He'd zoned out the moment the old guy had started rambling, too interested in getting to the good bit—eating food and kissing Lucy, obviously.
It all sounded like drivel, mindless, unnecessary drivel, that seemed never ending, and the hall was so deafeningly quiet, which, was unnerving to say the least when trying to distract oneself.
Well, except for one faint noise, that was.
Thanks to his excellent hearing, he could hear little Haru babbling from the pews. He was being ever so quiet about it considering his lack of awareness for what was going on, and the sudden urge to turn around and take a peek at what he was doing seemed almost too much for the fire mage.
With the slightest quirk of his head, he glanced back to see the small boy playing with Happy's tail, minding his own business, perfectly content without him or Lucy there.
Satisfied to see the infant playing so calmly, Natsu went to turn back around again when a loud 'Daddy!' stopped him in his tracks. The small boy, who'd not been aware of his father's peeping only a moment ago, was now trying to scramble over the blue exceed to get to him.
"No Haru, you gotta stay there. Stay with Happy!" The desperate fire mage whispered, pointing to the cat as a sheepish grin took over at the chaos he'd caused. "Daddy will be over in a minute, kay?"
"You're making it worse, Natsu, turn around!" Lucy whispered rather loudly, never looking away from the old man still talking as she leaned in.
"Sorry Luce, but I could hear Haru talking to himself. I just wanted to see what he was doing." Natsu explained, rubbing the back of his head in habit, "Not my fault he caught me looking."
"You looked at him first, of course he was going to notice you." She said a little louder, enough that the people sat closest to them could hear.
And that was all he needed for the small smirk to creep its way onto his lips, "Oh, so you were watching, too?"
"N-No…" She stuttered, giving herself away, "I wasn't…"
"Liar."
"Okay, fine. But why do I have to listen to this and you don't? I'm just as bored as you are." She admitted, her whispers getting louder the more irate she became, "Do you know how many times I've had to keep myself from yawning? And I really need to pee, too!"
As important as she knew this part of the ceremony was, it didn't half drag. Couldn't they just say 'I do' and be done with it already? Who cared about some God when her feet were starting to hurt!?
"Well, aren't you full of surprises… Maybe you should've gone before." He sniggered, knowing exactly how to push her buttons, relishing in the glare that had imminent death written all over it.
“It’s not like I’m carrying your baby or anything…” She huffed, crossing her arms.
"Alright, if your that desperate, I could always make him go faster." His face lit up with the most mischievous grin, igniting a small flame on his pointer finger.
"Natsu! You can’t do that! You’ll get us kicked out!” She rolled her eyes, though she appreciated the sentiment.
"Aw, come on! Not even a little singe?" He pointed his fiery finger towards the man in front of them, edging it slowly closer on purpose, "His brows need taking back a bit, don't you think?"
Lucy chortled at the thought, highly amused by the man's enormous brows being set on fire and couldn't stop the giggles that followed, her restraint finally caving, "Maybe just a little bit!"
"Will you two pay attention and turn to face each other." The old man grumbled, none the wiser to their little inside jokes. "Present the rings."
The blonde continued to chuckle as she turned to face her partner in crime, her steady heart picking up pace a little now that they were staring right at each other.
His unwavering smile and silly behaviour was something she had always admired. His ability to lighten any situation, regardless of how grim it may seem, instantly had her smiling along, too.
"Now, Natsu, please say your vows."
Inhaling a deep breath, the young mage knew he'd never been good with words. Lucy had always been the speaker, the writer, the one able to talk her way out of most situations, and although the vows he'd prepared were not long like sappy love letters or poetic or book worthy, they came from the heart and that's all he could offer her.
"Luce… I gotta admit, I never saw this coming." He chuckled, his hand tangled into the hair at the back of his head, "And I know for sure you didn't either, but that's okay because no matter what happens, we'll always be Natsu and Lucy, and we'll always be partners."
Without looking away, he held her shaky hand and slipped the precious ring onto her finger with ease, her delicate skin soft against his loving warmth.
"I've always known you were special to me, it just took a while to realise how much, I guess… And apparently adopting a kid with your best friend isn't normal, so…" He shrugged nonchalantly, never giving it much thought, but earned a giggle from Lucy in return. "But I knew you'd put your all into being the best Mom you could, just like in everything you do. You're a super kind person with so much love to give, it's why you're so precious to me, and I wanna protect that with everything I've got. So, that's my promise to you, Lucy, I will protect your heart, so long as it continues to beat."
She gasped, feeling the air leave her lungs as if she'd been winded. It was short and to the point but those sweet sounding words of his, the very meaning behind them were enough to make her knees tremble. She stared, mouth agape at the man that stood before her, blown away by his promise, astounded that he'd once again found the perfect things to say.
A few unplanned tears escaped as she looked over to the little boy in the pews, then peered down to her rounded tummy, feeling the butterflies and the baby's movements fluttering around inside. So much had changed, and this would be a whole new chapter to add to their never ending adventure, an overwhelming thought that seemed all too much for her to get to grips with.
Feeling a warm hand cup her cheek she looked up to the sweet smile of her lover, the person that meant everything to her, and felt this fingers wipe away her tears. He always had a way of filling her with encouragement, even, it seemed, with just a single gesture.
"Thank you, Natsu. Now Lucy, you may begin." The old guy uttered, his gruff voice quieter than before.
Placing her free hand over the top of his, she brought them both to rest on her belly, her smile reaching her eyes as the small kicks poked at their skin, making them both chuckle.
"Natsu, there are so many things I could say that I admire about you; I could also find an equal amount of things that annoy me, too." His sudden pout made her giggle once again, along with the rest of the guild members, "But that doesn't matter, because that's the person I fell in love with. You're loyal, brave and strong; your silly, impulsive and like to fool about, but you also bring smiles to everyone around you, an ability that only you seem to possess.
I can't remember how many times you've shown me the light, lifted me up in my time of need and carried me until I could stand on my own two feet. Your presence and comfort has always been my safe place, somewhere I can call home. You're such a beautiful person, and I'm so lucky to be able to call you mine."
Tears began to fill her eyes again, and she was sure his had become a little watery too.
"So, in return for all that you do for me, and us as a family, I promise to play with your hair when your motion sick and rub your back when you eat too much." Natsu's cheeks lifted up to his eyes, scrunching them closed in amusement as she, too, grinned back at him.
"I promise to love you with all of my heart, to lift you up in your time of need and put a smile on your face when your feeling down. I promise to be loyal, brave, and strong for you, too; to fool about and make you laugh, and to always be there to stop you from going overboard.
I'll forever stand proudly at your side, and hold your hand through whatever life throws at us. You've shaped me into the person I am today, and if it weren't for you, I wouldn't have this wonderful life, such amazing friends, or a family to call my own." The tears that welled began to spill down her pink stained cheeks, but the smile that had been there all along never wavered from her lips, "You're my everything, Natsu, and you will be until the day I die."
A single tear drop slowly trickled down and dripped off of his chin as his breath hitched in his throat. As time once again stood still, it felt like he and Lucy were the only ones present; no longer able to see the guild watching their every move, or hear the grumpy old man scold them for not paying attention. Lucy was his sole focus and without waiting for the final lines to be read, the young groom impatiently pulled her in, and welded their lips together in a display of affection that had the crowd wooing and whistling for them in celebration.
"Congratulations to the happy couple!" Mira mewled, throwing confetti and flower petals over the two still very much consumed by one another.
"Can you believe it? After all these years, they're finally married!" Levy squealed in her excitement, deafening poor Gajeel in the process.
"Who'd have thought our boy, Natsu, would've ever settled down?" Wakaba stood from his seat, cigarette at the ready.
"Yep! It seems like only yesterday he was pulling pranks and starting fights with the other youngsters." Macao smirked, his arms crossed cockily over his chest.
"That's because it was yesterday, Dad! Natsu hasn't changed that much…" Romeo shook his head at the two old farts, but smiled when he looked back to his idol, "Then again, he does have a family now. I guess getting married just kinda made sense."
"Nothing they do makes sense, kid. You only have to look at 'em to see that." Laxus spoke from the pew behind, his thunder legion companions sat right along with him.
"Yes, but they have made their pairing work. As a team, they're like clockwork and as a couple, they're impenetrable." Erza's smile brightened her face as she glanced on at the two newly weds, proud of her friends and of how far they'd come.
"Alright guys, let's move this to the guild! I wanna get my booze on and the bar is waiting!" Cana yelled, drink bottle already in hand as she, along with most of the others filtered out of the cathedral, not wanting to spoil the couples moment.
Natsu and Lucy, however, were in a bubble all of their own; where soft, tinted lips met hot, firm ones in a passionate battle that neither wanted to lose. But the need for air was far stronger, forcing them to separate and stare into each others eyes as they caught their breaths.
"You know, you're supposed to wait for me to pronounce you husband and wife before embracing like that." The bushy browed man said from behind the altar, glowering at the couple he had no hope of controlling.
"Oh… uh, sorry about that… Kinda got swept up in the moment." Natsu grinned sheepishly, chuckling to ease the tension, while Lucy just hid herself behind him.
"Hmm… Well it doesn't matter now. What does is that you are legally bound. Good luck to you both."
"Thanks!"
They watched the man take his leave, only then noticing that the hall was empty, "Huh… Where'd everybody go?" The fire mage was sure the hall had been filled just a moment ago.
"So you guys finally came up for air, huh?" Gray walked over, he and Juvia, along with Happy and Haru the only ones left. "Everyone's gone back to the guild to wait instead of watch you both suck face. Seriously, how long can you hold your breath for?"
An oblivious Natsu only shrugged, but a blushing Lucy was quick to hide her face from Gray's knowing smirk, turning the opposite way to where Juvia was standing with the little baby in her arms, and the blonde's face lit up instantly, "Oh, look at him! Isn't he just the sweetest? And he didn't cry once throughout the whole thing! What a little sweetheart!"
"Yes, Juvia is quite surprised herself that he stayed quiet. Juvia can't say he does the same at night though." The water mage chuckled through her tiredness, a look Lucy was all too familiar with, "But Juvia doesn't mind, not when Gray is so willing to get up with him."
"Aww, Daddy Gray to the rescue, huh? And here I thought you were worried about the whole thing. Looks like you're doing just fine to me!" Lucy said, turning her attention to the ice mage standing there.
"Worried? Who said I was-?" And then it clicked, "Natsu! You told Lucy what I said? That was just between us!" Gray turned to the fire mage, who, had since recovered his own son from the pews, walking him back to where they were all standing.
"Yeah, I know. That's why I only told Lucy, duh!"
"Don't 'duh' me, you weren't supposed to tell anybody, and that includes Lucy!" If he could've smacked his head on a wall, he would've… Or better yet, smack Natsu's!
"But I tell Lucy everything…"
"Oh, you do, do you? That's funny, because I'm certain there's something you haven't told her yet, right?" The look of fear that flashed across Natsu's face was enough to make the ice mage drop his annoyance in favour of revenge.
"Not told me what? Did something happen?" Lucy cocked her head as she looked up from the cooing baby, her sights flickering between the squabbling duo scowling at each other.
"Should I tell her, Natsu?" Gray's smirk was almost sickening, his own pleasure outweighing the consequences.
"Don't you dare, Popsicle!" The fire mage bit out through gritted teeth, "Or I'll rearrange your face with my fist!" If looks could kill…
"Is anyone going to tell me what's going on?" The curious look on Lucy's face quickly turned to frustration the longer she was kept waiting, "Natsu?" Slowly she traipsed her way over, backing him against the rows of benches.
"Uh oh! Looks like hell is about to break loose..." Happy sniggered from his perch on the altar, high fiving Haru as he began to giggle, too.
"Oh dear… You may have started something there, Gray dear." Juvia said, passing the sleepy newborn over to his father.
"Nah! Natsu had this one coming." He sniggered, shushing the baby back to sleep.
A vein popping on her forehead, Lucy's irritation had just about reached breaking point, "Speak!"
Swallowing thickly, the young man looked up to his very new, very pregnant wife, just like he knew he'd have to and wished momentarily that the ground would swallow him whole, "Well… Uh… I-It's kind of… Um…" What was he supposed to say? "I-I was playing with Haru this morning and, u-uh, stuff happened and our bed is now… gone."
Raising a brow, the girl looked even more confused, "Gone? What do you mean, it's gone?"
"Gone… As in it was there… and now its not." He really wasn't doing himself any favours.
"Natsu..."
"Happy did it!" He panicked.
"Hey! No I didn't, you burnt it! You let Haru play with your fire, not me! I warned you it would end badly, but you wouldn't listen and now-"
"You did what?!" Her eyes were blood red as she glared at the suspecting dragon slayer, her hair reminiscent of a certain Satan soul mage. “You burnt down our bed?!”
It was in times like this he was glad that she couldn't out run him, especially not at the moment, as he pegged it for the exit.
"Natsu Dragneel! Just you wait 'til I get my hands on you!"
Her yelling from behind reminded him of all the times he'd found himself in this exact predicament, whether it be from destroying a building or their bed, it brought a smile to his lips at just how familiar it all felt. It seemed as their evolving relationship and family changed and grew, his vows rang true, they would always be Natsu and Lucy, and that would forever be the same.
With one solid push of the large cathedral doors, he opened them wide, allowing the natural afternoon light seep into the old walls. Readjusting the boy in his arms, and with Happy flying over head, he chanced a small glance back at his livid wife stalking her way over to him, and grinned mischievously, sealing his already doomed fate with his final words, "Come on then, Luce! But you'll have to catch me first!"
Thanks for reading!
#nalu#fairy tail nalu#nalu fanfiction#nalu fanfic#nalu family#fairy tail#fairy tail lucy#fairy tail natsu#natsu dragneel#lucy heartfilia#lucy x natsu#fairy tail 100 years quest#ft nalu#fairy tail fanfiction#fairy tail fanfic#the unexpected reward#fanfiction writing#fanfiction#fandom writing#fairy tail fandom
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Will you read to me?
Pairing: Spencer x femReader
Summary: You're feeling unsettled after a case, so Spencer helps you get some sleep and get a smile back on your face.
Word count: 1863
Warnings: fluff (is that a warning idk), mentions of an unsub, feeling overwhelmed after an unsub touches you (just your hand and waist nothing in detail). Tiny bit of angst I think mostly fluff though
A/N: Ok so this is my first attempt at writing a fic, it ended up being longer than I thought it would be, anyways if you would like to give me some feedback that would be greatly appreciated, hope someone out there enjoys this, I really liked writing it. Ooh also if I missed any warnings pls tell me.
A/N2: Hey so my old account got deleted so I'm reposting my fics if you have a sec I would appreciate it if you could boost it so i can try and get to where i was, thank you.
It had been a tough case, especially for you, the victimology fit you in every way and so you had been used to draw the unsub out, nothing had gone wrong but you could still feel his hand where he had touched yours, his alluring presence was lingering around you , all you wanted to do was go home and shower this feeling off but first you had to get there.
Unfortunately, there was still 2 hours left in the flight. So, until you did get home you would settle for sleep hoping time would pass faster, though you just couldn’t stop your mind from thinking, well overthinking. Spencer noticed this and it hurt him to see you like this he himself knew nothing had happened but he didn’t like the thought that you had even gone near that creep, to think about what he would have done to you, if the circumstances were different.
He couldn’t imagine what he would do if something had happened, you and him were close, very close, you had first bonded when he noticed your Dr who coin purse on your first day at the BAU, he hadn’t gotten a chance to say anything because at that moment Garcia bubbled into the bullpen announcing that they have a case. but when he saw it again on the jet, he couldn’t resist but to ask if you like the show, you love the show and your face visibly lit up at the mention of it as did his, you both exchanged a few words before Derek piped in to ask if that was the show with the flying phone booth but before Spencer had the chance to correct him, you did. ‘well firstly it’s a Tardis which stands for Time And Relative Dimensions In Space, secondly it isn’t a phone booth it’s a police box.’ Once you finish you simply smiled at him but before he could answer you piped up again early. ‘ ooh ooh and do you want to know why it’s a police box’, Derek honestly couldn’t care less but he couldn’t bare to take away the joy in your face that was brought by this nerdy little show you clearly loved, Spencer might also have been giving him a look that said ‘don’t you dare say no’, so he decided to indulge you, ‘sure kid tell me why it’s a police box’. Spencer saw your face light up even more if it was even possible, and so you began’ So the Tardis is supposed to change in appearance depending on where it is because of a component that is called ‘the chameleon circuit’ but something happened to it so it no longer works and is stuck as a police box, its explained in the first Dr who series in an episode called An Unearthly child. Oh and…..’ by this time Derek has lost interest and was only half listening but Spencer’s full attention was on you as you talked about something that clearly brought you joy, at this point he decided to chime in and so you two spent the rest of the jet ride to wherever it was you were going discussing your favourite episodes, plots and Drs. And so, a beautiful friendship began to bloom.
As spencer’s memory of that day came to an end he couldn’t help but be visibly sad at how much of a contrast your feeling were to that day, there was no smile so big you had dimples no hands moving around animatically as you talked and no interrupting your own sentences as you thought of something else you thought needed to be said. And certainly, no you trying to convince him that David tenant was the best Dr. now there was only an uneasiness about you, you looked sad and in slight distress.
Spencer couldn’t keep sitting there doing nothing, he wanted to take those feelings away no, he needed to take them away, he wanted to go over to you and hold you, place you on his lap and let you bury your face into his cardigan like you had done so many times before on your movie nights, but that wouldn’t be appropriate while the entire team was around, and he didn’t want to make you feel worse by being so forward so instead he stood up from his seat opposite Derek and J.J and made his way to you on the sofa holding his book, you were sat in the corner looking so small, holding a now cold cup of tea.
Your mind was anywhere but there so it took Spencer calling your name quietly before you realised anyone was sitting there, and as you saw him all those bad feelings were drowned out by those of joy and love, they weren’t gone but their overwhelming words were dulled, Spencer just had that effect on you, you weren’t completely sure when your feeling changed from hey that’s my friend, to hey that’s my friend who I would like to kiss, marry, and have babies with. Maybe it was the day he showed you how to do physics magic, or the day he brought you coffee every morning for 2 weeks because he spilled one the previous day on your white shirt, or maybe the first time he hugged you, you knew he wasn’t big on hugs but after a tough case for everyone he could see you needed it and honestly once he was there holding you he never wanted to stop, after that he wouldn’t hesitate to hug you, you both waved it off as friendly but you both just wanted to be as close as possible, maybe when you came to terms with the fact you would both try your best to have physical contact with each other, be it holding hands or falling asleep on each other’s shoulder is when you knew you wanted a lot more.
You were brought back by Spencer’s voice, ‘are you ok’,’ ‘oh, ah yeah sorry , my minds just wandering I guess’ you said looking down at your hands feeling bad for lying, he clearly knew you weren’t he was a profiler after all, and as you stared at your hand you once again remembered his lingering touch on your left hand, before your mind could wander further Spencer held your hand ,he spoke up ‘ don’t think about him, I know that’s what your doing , but he’s gone now were he cant hurt anyone else, were he can’t hurt you’. You looked away from him feeling silly ‘I know that, I don’t even know why I’m acting like this it’s ridiculous honestly he didn’t do anything he just touched my hand and waist but the thought of his hands on me just makes me feel sick, it’s like I can still feel him and I just want to wash it off and that’s all I can think about every time I try to sleep, I just want to sleep and forget about it spence’ as you said this you subconsciously scratched the back of your hand where his had been, spencer took both your hands once again before you could hurt yourself, ‘hey y/n, it isn’t silly, after seeing the crime scenes and knowing what he did to those women it is perfectly reasonable to be feeling like this’ you nod at his words and lean your head on his shoulder as you take in his familiar comforting smell, ‘thanks Spence’ you hear him hum in response as his head leans on top of yours.
You sit in comfortable silence just being with each other not even realising he hadn’t let go of your hand, it isn���t like you had made a move to either, and neither of you were planning on it. The jet was silent as everyone was either asleep, or going through some files, it was peaceful, it was wonderful.
You were the first to break the silence ‘what are you reading’ , ‘Alice’s adventures in wonderland’, you looked up at him from your place on his shoulder with a soft smile and simply stated ‘that’s my favourite book, I have a copy in my desk right now’ , ‘I know, that’s why I’m reading it, ‘ his reason made your heart swell as he continued, ‘even though it Is considered a classic I’ve never actually read it, I must say I am enjoying it’, ‘how far along are you’, ‘about half way’. Truthfully Spencer could have been done with the book already even though he had started it at the beginning of the flight, however this book was different, this was your favourite, this one meant so much to you and so he wanted to take it all in, he wanted that feeling you get when you first read a line that impacts you, a feeling you only get once with that line, a feeling he was getting often in this book because he knew you loved it and so he loved it.
The silence was disrupted by a very large yawn coming from you, he must admit you looked very cute when you were tired (he may also love the fact you were wearing one of his cardigans that you had claimed as your, and you also had very cute sweater paws). ‘Here lie down’ Spencer said, you knew you wouldn’t be able to fall asleep so you asked, ‘will you read to me’ there was barely a beat before you felt the need to justify your request, even though you didn’t need to he would do anything you asked. ‘it’s just I don’t think ill be able to sleep, and your voice is very calming’, the last part you said quietly and felt a light blush on your cheeks, spencer simply smiled and simply answered ‘of course ill read to you’, and so you laid you head down on his lap and he began reading once you were fully comfortable, ‘would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?’’ ‘’that depends a good deal on where you want to get to,’’ said the cat………’’ and so Spencer kept reading to you, an you kept listening, his hand made its way to your hair and began to play with it while your hand drew lazy nonsensical things on his leg , and as you heard the words you had read a million times before, and as the man you held so much love for played with your hair all your worries and thoughts melted away and you slowly let sleep take over , you felt conflicted as you didn’t want to miss this, miss Spencer’s voice recite something that meant so much to you, it was like hearing a completely new story, but at some point you let it take over and so you were finally able to sleep, Spencer never stopped reading to you or playing with your hair in fear of disturbing your peace, he was so happy there was a smile back on your face, he would read to you every hour of every day if it meant seeing you smile.
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hello im feeling extra “touch the stove”-y today so. i was looking for any dialogue where solas just straight up lies and (of what i could find online/transcribed, obv) i didnt find anything that was 100% untrue. he’ll completely avoid the question, change the subject, give part of the truth, etc etc etc, but nothing was just Entirely A Lie
what really gets me is that there’s a handful of convos where someone infers something from what solas says, and he will even point out that he didn’t directly say that. like, he tells people how to see through his shit, lmao
here is an embarrassingly long ass list of examples, all sorted by what kind of not-lying he’s doing lol, just bc i am unhinged<3
*note that some of these are cut from longer bits of dialogue or have been split up from one conversation into different categories*
literally just Not Answering The Question lol
Dorian: How much “will” do they have? They’re amorphous constructs of the Fade.
Solas: Hmm.
Dorian: Solas, have I offended you?
Solas: If you have, why would it concern you?
Dorian: Solas, what is this whole look of yours about?
Solas: I’m sorry?
Dorian: No, that outfit is sorry. What are you supposed to be, some kind of woodsman?
Dorian: Is it a Dalish thing? Don’t you dislike the Dalish? Or is it some kind of statement?
Solas: No.
Dorian: Let me get this straight, Solas.
Dorian: You’re an apostate – neither Dalish nor city elf – who lived alone in the woods studying spirits.
Solas: Is that a problem for you?
Solas: [has a whole tactical moment about the red jennies lmao]
Sera: Where d’you get all this, then?
Solas: Do you wish to be unnerved by another tale of my explorations of the Fade? Or do you wish to learn something?
Vivienne: You must be pleased with what was revealed at the Temple of Mythal, Solas.
Solas: Why should those ruins please me, Enchanter?
changing the subject before he backs himself into a corner
Gatt: I don’t see any tattoos, but you’re carrying a staff. Are you from a Chantry Circle?
Solas: No. And I would prefer not to discuss it.
Solas: I find the fall of the dwarven lands confusing.
Varric: What’s so confusing about endless darkspawn?
Solas: A great deal, although that is a different matter.
giving the truth, but not the whole truth
Blackwall: Skyhold. How did you find it?
Solas: I looked.
Blackwall: Now you sound like Cole. You looked?
Solas: This world is full of wonders for those who seek them.
Blackwall: You spoke of seeing death and destruction. Did you fight in a war?
Solas: There are struggles across Thedas at any given time. I doubt you would have heard of it.
Blackwall: An elven skirmish?
Solas: In a manner of speaking, yes.
Cassandra: Solas, have you always lived alone? Out in the wilderness, as an apostate?
Solas: For the most part.
Cassandra: Have you ever encountered templars before?
Solas: Only at a distance. I am an apostate, after all.
Cassandra: And they never caught you even once?
Solas: I am a very careful apostate.
Dorian: We found elves, living ancient elves, at the Temple of Mythal. Does that bother you, Solas?
If Inquisitor allied with the Sentinels:
Solas: I am pleased we were not forced to kill them, if that’s what you mean.
Iron Bull: You’ve got an odd style, Solas. Your spells are a bit different from the Circle mages or the Vints.
Solas: That comes from being self-taught.
Solas: I discovered most of my magic on my own, or learned it from my journeys in the Fade.
Vivienne: So, an apostate?
Solas: That is correct, Enchanter. I did not train in your Circle.
Solas: You are a man who made a choice... possibly the first of your life.
Iron Bull: I’ve always liked fighting. What if I turn savage, like the other Tal-Vashoth?
Solas: You have the Inquisition, you have the Inquisitor... and you have me.
from cutscene at beginning
Inquisitor: [mentions the anchor closing a rift]
Solas: Whatever magic opened the Breach in the sky also placed that mark upon your hand. I theorized the mark might be able to close the rifts that have opened in the Breach's wake – and it seems I was correct.
from cutscene at beginning
Solas: [to a Dalish Inq] You are Dalish, but clearly away from the rest of your clan. Did they send you here?
Inquisitor: What do you know of the Dalish?
Solas: I have wandered many roads in my time, and crossed paths with your people on more than one occasion.
Inquisitor: [Crossed paths? dialogue choice]
Solas: I mean that I offered to share knowledge, only to be attacked for no greater reason than their superstition.
from “I’d like to know more about you” convo in Haven
Inquisitor: What made you start studying the Fade?
Solas: I grew up in a village to the north. There was little to interest a young man, especially one gifted with magic. But as I slept, spirits of the Fade showed me glimpses of wonders I had never imagined. I treasured my dreams. Being awake, out of the Fade, became troublesome.
actually telling the truth but no one picks up on the gravity of it
Solas: [...] I believe the elven gods existed, as did the old gods of Tevinter. But I do not think any of them were gods, unless you expand the definition of the word to the point of absurdity. I appreciate the idea of your Maker, a god that does not need to prove his power. I wish more such gods felt the same.
Cassandra: You have seen much sadness in your journeys, Solas. Following the Maker might offer some hope.
Solas: I have people, Seeker. The greatest triumphs and tragedies this world has known can all be traced to people.
Cole: No, inside. I don’t hear your hurt as much. Your song is softer, subtler, not silent but still.
Solas: How small the pain of one man seems when weighted against the endless depths of memory, of feeling, of existence. That ocean carries everyone. And those of us who learn to see its currents move through life with their fewer ripples.
Cole: You didn’t do it to be right. You did it to save them.
Inquisitor: Solas, what is Cole talking about?
Solas: A mistake. One of many made by a much younger elf who was certain he knew everything.
Solas: Empires rise and fall. Arlathan was no more “innocent” than your own Tevinter in its time.
Solas: Your nostalgia for the ancient elves, however romanticized, is pointless.
Solas: Our people used to be here.
Sera: Pfft, you say that everywhere.
Solas: It is more true than you want to believe.
Vivienne: You must be pleased, apostate. With the Templars dissolved, your rebels will be most difficult to pacify.
Solas: My rebels? Am I an agent for their cause, whispering poison into the Inquisition’s ears?
Solas: How comforting.
Vivienne: You enjoy seeing yourself as a villain?
Solas: No more than any other clever man who wonders what he could do if pushed.
Vivienne: [about the Temple of Mythal] Now you know the elves were once a mighty nation.
Solas: I always knew, Enchanter. The Temple of Mythal is just another reminder of what was lost.
(in the Emerald Graves): These forests have changed much since I was last here.
during the Fade!Haven cutscene
Solas: It seems you hold the key to our salvation. You had sealed it with a gesture... and right then, I felt the whole world change.
Inquisitor: [romance option] “Felt the whole world change?”
Solas: A figure of speech.
Inquisitor: I’m aware of the metaphor. I’m more interested in felt.
Solas: You change... everything.
pointing out that people assume he means things he did not directly say
Cole: There is pain though, still within you.
Solas: And I never said there was not.
Solas: You may well become fully human, after all. I never thought to see it.
Cole: When did you see it before?
Solas: I did not say that I had.
Iron Bull: We’ve got the alliance with my people. Given how much you love the Qun, I figured...
Solas: I might scold you? Berate you for your decisions?
Iron Bull: Hey. The Chargers died as heroes for the good of the mission.
Solas: I never said otherwise.
Sera: Don’t you start.
Solas: I’m reasonably certain I said nothing.
Vivienne: [talking shit about grey warden mages]
Solas: I never claimed mages should be above the law, Enchanter.
Vivienne: No, darling. You merely implied it, while offering no viable suggestions for improvement.
after infamous “side benefits” dialogue
Warrior Inquisitor: You find my muscles enjoyable?
Solas: I meant that you enjoyed having them, presumably.
Warrior Inquisitor: Ah.
Solas: But yes... since you asked.
diminishing things he does actually know by saying he he “believes” or “thinks,” or that things were vaguely “said” or “told”
Solas: I say what I believe to be true, even if it gives offense to those who prefer the lie.
Dorian: That orb Corypheus carries... are you certain it’s of elven origin, Solas?
Solas: I believe so. Why do you ask?
Solas: It is said that we lived at a pace that sustained us for... ages.
making it sound like he’s talking about something/someone else, but it’s just him lmao
Cole: Do you know a lot about wolves?
Solas: I know that they are intelligent, practical creatures that small-minded fools think of as terrible beasts.
Solas: No man can kill so many people without breaking inside. To survive... those you fight must become monsters.
Iron Bull: The ones that kill innocent people, yeah. The rest... I don’t know.
Solas: The mind does marvelous things to protect itself.
during In Hushed Whispers
Inquisitor: I’m glad you understood what he just said because I’m not sure I did.
Solas: You would think such understanding would stop me from making such terrible mistakes. You would be wrong.
misc
this one i wanted to include because it’s the only circumstance (that i came across) where someone directly asks solas to lie and he literally says he can’t
during the fucking crestwood breakup scene
Inquisitor: [angry option] Tell me you don’t care.
Solas: I can’t do that.
Inquisitor: Tell me I was some casual dalliance so I can call you a cold-hearted son of a bitch and move on!
Solas: I’m sorry.
*also note that most of these are banter transcriptions from the wiki; some are cutscene / other dialogue posted by either @/daitranscripts or u/karinini on reddit; it’s not all his cutscenes obv, but I’m not about to look up every single one individually sdlkfj*
#i am................incredibly embarrassed that i did this#forgive me. the brain worms would not leave until it was Done#also sorry that its ugly no matter what i did tungle was NOT happy w my formatting. just know its clean and easy to read in my mind :/#and i know none of this is new information but i am riddled with terminal grad student brain disease so i like having my evidence organized#long post#(bc its long as hell if u open the read more)#im going to put this in my#ref#tag. bc i sometimes get tripped up writing his dialogue to be cryptic but true
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Alright, on to chapter 126 of AoT!
I’ve been waiting to get to this chapter and talk about it a bit!
It’s, in a lot of ways, kind of the climax of the development we’ve seen between Levi’s and Hange’s character’s since the start of the time skip, and really since Hange took over as Commander of the SC.
One thing I want to talk about is Hange’s reaction at the start of the chapter, after they shoot that one soldier dead. They’re crying, and while obviously this is in part because of the pain of having to turn against one of their own, the pain of having to choose, and pick one life over the other, this being Levi’s life over the soldiers pursuing them, when I first read this chapter some months back, my initial impression was that Hange was crying, also, because of the tragedy of the entire situation, in which both they and Levi, two veteran members of the SC, who had dedicated everything they had, from the beginning, to the salvation of humanity, were now being hunted by the very people they’d tried so hard to protect. It’s an incredibly powerful image of Hange, their expression one of hardened determination, while a tear slides down their cheek, and it’s the next two panels, Hange going back to Levi, and telling him “There’s no one after us now. Levi...” which really gave me the impression that their tears were for him too, for the helpless, vulnerable state Levi is in, for him being at deaths door, for the tragedy of their being betrayed by their own people, and how it’s led to this. It strikes me as particularly heartbreaking, that Levi and Hange both were the most dedicated and selfless of soldiers for the Survey Corps, the two that in many ways most embodied the ideals of that group, to fight for and protect humanity, no matter the sacrifice to themselves. Levi especially never expressed or conveyed any desire for himself, not even something as simple as curiosity, but fought only for the hope of one day giving humanity back it’s freedom. I think Hange’s tears are shed here because of that, because they have to look at Levi like this now, broken, almost dead, ravaged and betrayed by the very people he fought and risked his life for again and again and again, unable to fight back as those same people now come to kill him. That Hange had to kill two of those very people in order to protect Levi’s life is what, I think, is so tragic to them, what brings them to tears.
Hange’s entire dialog in the forest, when they think Levi is unconscious still, reveals a lot too, I think. They talk about how they’ll be on the run for the rest of their lives in the Yaegerist’s take control of the island, how they’ve now become “enemies of the state”, and that reflects, again, the tragedy I think Hange feels over their situation. How it’s them specifically, them and Levi, who are now being hunted, all their previous contributions and dedication to humanity’s cause forgotten and thrown in the trash. It’s reflected too in how we see the Yaegerist’s take up the chant of “Dedicate your hearts” twisting it to fit their own, deluded views and beliefs, perverting it until it loses all of his previous meaning. “Dedicate your hearts” was what the members of the Survery Corps cried out in service to humanity, in service to humanity’s survival, it’s hope and freedom. And now, the Yaegerist’s are using it as a cry for the destruction of humanity, for the eradication of everyone but themselves. What Levi and Hange both fought for in their military service was to save humanity, they both represented that ideal in pureness and conviction, never wavering or straying from it, and so the Yaegerist’s specific persecution of them really highlights just how corrupted and perverted their own driving philosophy is. That they wish to destroy the two soldiers who most encompassed in themselves the genuine ideal of the Survey Corps, the salvation of humanity, the desire to make a better world, a better future, a hopeful future, for the most people possible. The Yeagerist’s want to stamp that out, and Levi and Hange are like the last, real bastions of that ideal in living, tangible form.
I think that’s only emphasized in how neither Hange nor Levi ever consider for even a moment the possibility of giving up and letting Eren have his way. Every other member of the SC, Armin, Mikasa, Jean, Connie, at some point, contemplated and even for a brief moment, accepted, that there was nothing they could do, and were going to stay on the island and just let the Rumbling happen. They give up, even if only for a moment, and try to logically excuse that decision. But Levi asks Hange in that forest, “If we keep running and hiding, what will that get us?”, and reminds Hange that he knows them too well to buy that they were ever genuinely thinking of staying there and doing nothing. It isn’t an option, for either of them. Inaction has never been something either of them could abide. Levi specifically was drawn to Erwin because of his refusal to do nothing, to have the guts to make a decision, no matter the outcome, and Levi himself has always strived to act, to do the same and make a choice, and to commit to that choice fully, and accept the consequences. So neither of them were ever going to give up, were ever going to just sit there and let the Rumbling happen. Both Levi and Hange really affirm beyond doubt in this moment how deeply they embody the ideals and goals of the Survey Corps, to dedicate your heart, body and soul, for the sake of humanity. To sacrifice your own hopes and dreams, even your very life, for that ideal. It’s never even a question for them. And them being the last two surviving members of the SC veterans, it only feels appropriate. They were there before everything changed, when it really was just a pure and simple attempt to defeat the Titans and win humanity back their freedom, and there they remain, even after everything has changed, the circumstances, the stakes, the enemy, still fighting for that same goal, to save humanity.
I also just want to point out the look of total despair on Levi’s face when Hange asks him what happened with Zeke, and later on in the chapter, when they’re talking to Pieck and Magath. I think Levi is burdened by a deep sense of regret here, which is something he always tries his best not to be, and it’s because he allowed Zeke to escape, which led to him making contact with Eren and setting this entire disaster off. Levi chastises himself, saying “I screwed up. I wasn’t able to figure out if he was truly ready to die... I let him get away again.”. I think Levi is blaming himself for what’s happening, even though it’s really not his fault, it’s Zeke’s and Eren’s. But Levi’s almost obsession with making choices without regret is born from, I think, a deep struggle to hold to that philosophy. He tries so hard to believe in it, to live it, But I think Levi struggles with believing in it, with making a firm and unyielding choice, and pushing past whatever the consequences are to keep moving forward. He’s someone who’s experienced so much pain and loss in his life, and because of that, because of those experiences and that grief, just over and over again having everything he’s ever loved and cared for ripped away from him, its made it only more of a struggle for him to carry on and not regret. For all of Levi’s seemingly stoic, harsh exterior, it’s plain, I think, that inside, he’s in actuality the most deeply feeling, sensitive and compassionate character in SnK, and the most deeply affected character when it comes to the suffering and pain of others. He understands it, and empathizes with it, more than anyone. In some ways, Levi strikes me as almost brittle inside, so easily hurt, so easily moved to compassion and understanding. He has a terribly soft and vulnerable heart. It’s why he’s so non-judgmental, too, I think, when he sees someone else struggling with their own choices, why he refuses to ever try and force others to agree with him, or convince them that he’s right and they’re wrong. Why he tries, in his awkward but kind way, to comfort them. Why he says again and again that he doesn’t know what is or isn’t the right choice. Because he knows how hard it is. Because for Levi, despite refusing inaction, and despite striving to always act and not regret his choices, he still has to live with and carry the weight of those actions consequences, the outcomes of his decisions, and he isn’t ever able to divorce himself from that, from the feelings of pain and sadness and heartbreak that comes with each loss, each defeat, each failure. He feels too much, and too deeply, and he’ll always struggle to continue on, even as he refuses not to, even as he dedicates himself to it. It’s precisely BECAUSE it’s hard for Levi to not regret, to keep fighting and acting, and push through his pain, that makes him so heroic. He never succumbs to what I think are obviously real, probably at times overwhelming feelings of depression and despair. He always keeps fighting, even as he’s drowning. I think Levi is drowning all throughout this final arc, the waves of his sadness and struggle against feelings of hopelessness always threatening to drag him under. But he never lets them. He never stops swimming, never stops pushing towards the shore. And that’s Levi’s true strength. That refusal to give up, even when he’s filled with despair and regret.
One last thing. I’ve never seen anyone else mention how Levi saved himself from dying when Zeke detonated the thunder spear by shielding himself with his own blade. Levi tucked himself up against it and braced for the impact of the explosion. If he hadn’t thought and acted quickly enough to do that, he probably would have died. Well, just another example of Levi’s refusal to give in to hopelessness. Anyone else probably would have.
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The Villainous Paranoiac Just Wants An Uneventful Holiday (Part 2)
You need a break from your break at this rate.
You are exhausted.
You and Grim arrived back at the dorm with maybe ten minutes to spare before the other students came back from the parade and immediately set about working on completing your escape route as quickly as possible.
Only for the guy you’ve mentally dubbed “Scarabia Student A” to come to your door and tell the pair of you apologetically that because of Grim’s threats, Asim-senpai had decreed that neither of you would be allowed lunch and needed to remain locked in your room until defensive magic practice that afternoon.
On the plus side, your impromptu imprisonment let you and Grim work on the escape route undisturbed for the next hour. On the down side, it meant you both were starving after the exertion of the parade march and the digging.
The only reason you two didn’t collapse during defensive magic practice was because Viper-senpai snuck you both some bread and dried meats when he came to let you out. He also took the trouble to invite you two to a secret meeting on Asim-senpai’s behavior after dinner tonight.
You have to grudgingly admit, he is good at what he’s doing.
He has Asim-senpai do something cruel, then appears to the victims of said cruelty as a “savior”, doing what he can to soothe their pain “in spite of” his subordinate position to Asim-senpai, cultivating feelings of gratitude and empathy towards himself and resentment towards his puppet.
Even if you know what he’s doing, it’s difficult to resist that instinctual response.
Grim’s subvocal grumbling of “It doesn’t look like that white-haired jerk’s being controlled, fgnah.” is proof enough of that.
This way, once Viper-senpai drives Asim-senpai to overblot, no one will question him fighting against the dorm head he claims to be so loyal to, and his behavior before and during the overblot will make him appear to be the ideal replacement for the “mentally unstable” dorm head.
He’s definitely aiming for the dorm head position. The little performance this morning where he blatantly usurped Asim-senpai’s role of water-provider is proof enough of that.
Still, you muse while shouting out directions to Grim during magic training. Viper-senpai’s either very confident in his magic abilities or very ignorant about overblot to think that inducing it in Asim-senpai is in any way a good idea.
Especially if he’s under the delusion that his Unique Magic could somehow control an overblotted Asim-senpai.
It’d be better to just frame Asim-senpai for the actions he’s already committed under the influence, maybe show him shirking some dorm head duties if that was insufficent. You just don’t understand why Viper-senpai’s going through all this trouble and making a move now instead of closer to whenever elections for dorm heads are held, to make his win seem more legitimate.
Hopefully, you’ll be able to gain more information once you and Grim go along to this evening’s meeting with your plan in mind.
The after-dinner meeting starts pretty much how you expect it to.
Viper-senpai plays on the feelings of the other Scarabia students masterfully, painting himself as a concerned friend who only wants what’s best for his dorm head, but is at a loss due to Asim-senpai’s refusal to listen to reason. You and Grim give the input he clearly wants when he subtly cues you to.
However, when Grim tells him to just challenge Kalim for the position, Viper-san crosses his arms and coldly states, “No. There’s no way I can do that.”
Wait.
What?
“Gak! Y-you were the one who asked for advice, yanno...” Grim mutters, clearly as off-kilter as you feel.
From there Viper-senpai subtly divulges the sordid details of his slavery to the Asim family due to the circumstances of his birth, and how that conglomorate has been interfering on Asim-senpai’s behalf and at Viper-senpai’s expense for the entirety of their time at Night Raven College.
And all the while you’re sitting here, head feeling like it’s spinning a million miles a minute, trying to stop yourself from over-empathizing with the vice dorm head and figure out what this all means.
You don’t doubt for a single second that what he’s saying about the Asim and Viper families is true. However, his actions thus far have shown he is gunning for the dorm head position, even using this show of vulnerability to manipulate the other students into following him.
But why put himself and his family in such jeopardy for a simple school title?
“Asim-senpai doesn’t embody ‘the spirit of Scarabia?’ What does that mean?” You ask, latching onto a thread of the conversation in hopes of getting some clarity.
“There are different requirements for the position of dorm head in each of the seven dorms that a candidate must meet, which are taken from the virtues of the Great Seven.” Viper-senpai explains. “Duels are just an easy way to determine if the current dorm head meets that criteria or not. For example, in Pomefiore, the dorm head must have the greatest expertise in poisons, like the Beautiful Queen before them.”
One of the other students says something about Viper-senpai’s prudence and tactical thinking is much more like the Sorcerer of the Sands than Asim-senpai, but it sounds distant and far away to your ears.
Your brain is too busy buzzing over this new piece of information.
The dorm heads are supposed to be those who best embody the Great Seven.
The same Great Seven who’ve been appearing in your dreams practically every night before the overblots in their corresponding dorms happen.
What if— what if the reason that all the overblots this far have been dorm heads isn’t because the position of dorm head itself and the stresses it causes?
What if it’s because the criteria for the position of dorm head corresponds to the member of the Great Seven that dorm represents, which might contribute to who goes over the edge somehow?
After all, if you’re going by magic use and stress alone, then Buchie-senpai would’ve been the most likely candidate for overblot during the Magift incident. He did Laugh With Me an entire horde of civilians to stampede the coliseum after all.
But it was Leona-senpai, who best embodied the positive and negative qualities of the King of the Savannah, who ultimately overblotted. You even said it to him yourself when you asked him for help in investigating potential overblots outside of Night Raven College before the break. You thought at the time that his overblot was just because of the level of mental stress he was under, but if his status as a personification played a major role somehow...
But, then that means—
That means Asim-senpai isn’t automatically guaranteed to overblot because he’s a dorm head.
But Viper-senpai’s plan just plays off the common denominator of past overblots to make him seem in enough danger of doing so that the authorities are forced to recognize the signs and remove him from the position that’s “stressing” him so much.
Even the Asim family can’t object if the school is acting in the interests of their son’s mental health. They likely as not would decide to remove him from the “toxic environment” of Night Raven College altogether, either by transferring him to Royal Sword Academy or by paying for Asim-senpai to graduate early.
Though wouldn’t that mean Viper-senpai, as Asim-senpai’s servant, would be forced to leave with him? Or does he think that he’ll be able to convince the Asims to let him stay somehow?
In any case, that’s why you and Grim are still trapped here—because Viper-senpai’s under the impression that you both have some direct line to that useless birdbrain of a headmaster and can report the situation back to him.
But the amount of magic needed to keep up the charade until the headmaster actually notices, combined with the fact that everyone is saying that Viper-senpai is the rightful embodiment of the Sorcerer of the Sands means—
“Viper-senpai, you’ve got to run!”
You seize onto him, desperation evident in your face.
Viper-senpai retreats a step or two, blinking in alarm as you follow him to not lose your grip on his hand or his clothes. “Prefect, what—?”
“You said it yourself!” You can barely keep your voice from edging into hysteria. “You’re closest to Asim-senpai, and the way things are going, he’s going to overblot just like Rosehearts-senpai did. A-and overblots are illogical, they’re practically insane with hatred! They go after the people closest to them— you remember how badly Buchie-senpai was hurt when Leona-senpai overblotted, right?!”
Viper-senpai’s eyes are fixed on you as you shake your head, reliving those awful memories. “The only reason Trey-senpai didn’t die when Rosehearts-senpai overblotted was because Ace and Deuce got in his way and pissed him off more. If you stay in Scarabia...Viper-senpai, you’re in more danger than anyone else here! You need to get out of here, please, just run!!”
Please, you mentally beg as you stare at him. Please take the out I’m giving you. Call it off here, get out, get away, change your name, do whatever you have to to escape. Just, please, please don’t overblot on me too.
Viper-senpai’s brow furrows.
He slowly shakes his head. “I’m sorry, Prefect. Even if I wanted to, I’m bound to Kalim. I must follow him to the end.”
“But you could die.” You make no effort to hide your dismay, hands clenching around what they hold. “I-I can’t...pl-please don’t make me...”
His free hand begins moving towards your uninjured cheek—
CRASH!!
The sudden commotion makes the two of you leap apart, staring wildly at the source of the noise.
Grim sits dazed in the center of several overturned metal dishes and a golden lion-shaped tureen.
“Ow, ow, ow, that huuuurt!” He complains loudly, rubbing his little head. “What the heck, why’s this dumb thing empty if it smells good?! Aah, I’m so hun—”
“SSSHH!!” Practically everyone in the room hushes.
“Could you be any louder?!” Scarabia Student B hisses, looking around.
“Do you wanna just begin screaming for the Dorm Head, you stupid cat?!!” Scarabia Student A whispers furiously. “Seriously, if he wakes up and sees us here like this, we’re dead tomorrow, don’t you get that?!”
“Sheesh, I’m sorry.” Grim harrumphs, wandering back to his cushion. “It was just an accident, what’s gotten you all so worked up, fgnah?”
“Oh gee, I wonder why.” A third student somewhere near the back mutters.
“They were having a moment.” You think you hear a fourth student hiss, but you’re pretty sure you’ve misheard that one.
Viper-senpai clears his throat and goes to peer out into the hall. “...There’s no sign of movement. I think we’re safe, for the moment.”
You fiddle with your tie and collar, trying to straighten them as much as you can. “I-I apologize for my outburst. My behavior was inappropriate and not conducive to the matter at hand.”
Viper-senpai huffs a little laugh. “Don’t be. You’re only looking out for others’ wellbeing, that’s nothing to be ashamed of. You know better than anyone how dangerous these kinds of things are, after all. You’ve survived three of them.”
“Four.” Grim corrects from his cushion, tail flicking back and forth. “There was that creepy one in the Dwarf Mines that broke Yuu’s ribs at the start of the year, right Yuu?”
Your tie feels a little tight as you finish adjusting it, fidgeting under everyone’s scrutiny. “...yes. It’s a long story.”
“Will the dorm-head really overblot though?” The kid you’ve mentally dubbed “Scarabia Student B” pipes up. “I just can’t see it...”
“Well, he has exhibited a lot of the symptoms shown by other dorm heads before their overblots.” You say carefully. “An obsession with achieving a certain goal is something Rosehearts-senpai, Leona-senpai, and Ashengrotto-senpai all had in common, and Asim-senpai’s desire to improve Scarabia does fit this pattern.”
“Is there nothing that can be done for him Prefect?” Viper-senpai urges, gripping your shoulders. “Kalim may be unreliable at times, but I grew up with him. He calls me his friend. Are you saying there’s no way we can stop him from overblotting?”
You shrug gently, trying not to dislodge him. You don’t want his hackles raised now. “I’ve yet to see an overblot prevented, but that doesn’t mean it’s impossible. Keeping him from using too much magic would be a big plus, because the blot would have less of a chance to build up. Other than that, it might be best to prepare for the worst? Just in case.”
“Maybe call the family doctor on the sly!” Grim chips in. “See if he can come here to take Kalim home rather than the other way round!”
Viper-senpai nods slowly, like someone accepting news of an imminent loss. “I’ll certainly take your advice into consideration. However, I will not leave. I can’t abandon the dorm—can’t abandon Kalim— during this crisis. I won’t run and leave everyone to face the danger alone.”
“Vice dorm head!” One of the younger students chokes out.
It feels like something hard and unforgiving is lodged against your breastbone.
“I-I won’t let it.” You stammer, feeling yourself flush a deep red in embarrassment at your verbal blunder. “I won’t let it come to that, Viper-senpai. I’ll stop this overblot. No matter what it takes. I swear to you, on my life, I’ll stop it!”
Viper-senpai gives you a not unkind chuckle, meeting your gaze head-on. “Well then, Prefect. I’ll be in your care.”
You can’t hold it for more than a few moments, your breath hitching as you look away. It feels like there’s so much blood in your cheeks that the one Asim-senpai slapped earlier is beginning to hurt again.
“We-we’ll help out too, Jamil!” Scarabia Student A claims, standing up as well.
“Y-yeah! You’re much more fit to be dorm head than Kalim-senpai!” Two more students in the back push towards the front.
“Our dorm head should be someone who embodies the virtues of the Sorcerer of the Sands, not someone who paid their way in and is overblotting because they can’t take the heat.” A tall third year proclaims.
“Yeah!”
“You said it!”
“We’re all equal here!”
“You guys...” Viper-senpai looks genuinely touched, staring out at his sea of carefully handled supporters.
“What are you all doing here at this time of night?”
Asim-senpai stands in the doorway, glaring angrily at all of you.
You can’t quite help the two shaky steps back you take.
“Geh, he found us!” Grim mutters, hiding behind your leg.
“Ka-Kalim.” Viper-senpai says, hands held up placatingly. “We were just—”
“It seems I went to easy on you today, if you all are still overflowing with energy this late at night.” Asim-senpai says coldly. “You should go outside to the courtyard to practice magic until you hit your limits.”
A chill goes down your spine. “Asim-senpai, that’s really not a good idea, we were just—”
“You. Shut up.” The dorm head stalks towards you. “Do you think you can presume to order me around? Was one meal enough to make you think that lying tongue of yours could do whatever it wanted? Maybe we should switch to practice using offensive magic this time—you’d make a fine moving target.”
It’s suddenly much harder to breathe.
“D-dorm head!”
“Why you—!” Grim snarls.
“Kalim.” Viper-senpai steps in front of you, blocking you from Asim-senpai’s view. “The Prefect was only referring to your idea of starting the march two hours earlier tomorrow. Everyone needed to be notified of that, so we’ll be turning in now.”
“T-two hours?!” Scarabia Student B gasps, only to be quickly hushed by everyone around him.
“...” Asim-senpai seems to contemplate this for a moment, before closing his eyes. “Very well. But no one will be eating until dinner tomorrow for this failure to listen to directions the first time, understood?”
Viper-senpai opens his mouth to protest again, but then slumps. “...Yes, Kalim.”
Asim-senpai waves a hand. “Well? What are you all waiting for? You’re dismissed.”
The students of the dorm begin to slowly, sullenly file out into the hallway, many of them grumbling and muttering under their breath.
You take the opportunity to escape, scooping up Grim and clapping a cautious hand over your friend’s big mouth so he can’t say anything else as you edge past Asim-senpai.
“Thank you.” You mouth at Viper-senpai as you speed walk out of the room.
He shoots you a small smile in response.
The journey back to your shared room is quick and uneventful, though you feel constantly on edge the entire way there.
You aren’t able to relax until you’ve nodded a “goodnight” to Scarabia students A and B and shut the door firmly behind you, sagging against it.
You really should learn their names at some point.
“Well?” Grim asks after you hear the lock on your door click into place and the guards wander off for their patrol. “Did you get it?!”
The hard and unforgiving feeling against your breastbone hasn’t faded at all.
You turn your back and unbutton your shirt, removing the source of said feeling from its hiding place.
“Your timing with knocking that stuff over was perfect.” You turn back around and flash Viper-senpai’s magic pen. “But we need to get our escape route finished quick, he could notice it’s gone missing any second now.”
You’re sort of amazed that he hasn’t already. You kept expecting to hear someone begin chasing after you and Grim as you left, angrily screaming about the theft. If he hadn’t stepped in for you when you protested magic practice...
Thank Ace and Buchie-senpai that you somehow got away with this.
“Yes!! That’s my minion for ya!!” Grim cackles softly, grin sharp and savage as he leaps back into the hole in the floor. “I still wish I coulda bonked him over the head, but imagine his face once the idiot’s realized he’s been duped!”
“Just so long as that experience stays imaginary.” You mutter, bringing the pen over to the locked window and looking at it under the moonlight that seeps in through the slats.
There’s blot staining over half of the crimson gem.
You wince just looking at it. How much magic has Viper-senpai been using for this much for accumulate?
Still, he’s probably not so stupid that he’ll risk casting magic without it, so ar least he’ll be on magic-using probation for the duration of time that you have it.
All you have to do is keep it away from him until the blot’s dissipated and you can report his plan and living situation to Crowley and other teachers. The other teachers will force the dumb bird to actually do something about Viper-senpai’s slavery. He won’t have a reason to overblot anymore. Everyone wins.
Though unfortunately, you can’t do much about stress-induced blotting, and you have no idea if he can still overblot while separated from his magic pen. Maybe you should investigate whether or not you could just...smash it and get him a new, non-blotted magic pen as a replacement? They do those, right?
“It’s done!” Grim hisses, prompting you to stash the magic pen away again and button up your shirt. “It’ll be a kinda tight squeeze though.”
You purse your lips at the small hole. “...It’ll have to do. We don’t have any time to waste, c’mon.”
To say it’s cramped would be an understatement. You’re more covered in scrapes and dust than you’ve ever been by the time you drop onto the ground of the floor below, panting and wheezing for breath. Your bruised cheek is throbbing again.
“Now I know what it feels like when spaghetti gets made at least.” You whisper.
Grim nods. “You can say that again. Now, we’re in between guard patrols, but we’ve still gotta be extra quiet so they don’t hea—”
GRRRRRARGGHH
You stare at your monster cat’s stomach as its complaining rumble dies away.
“Hey! What’s that noise?!” Comes the patrolling student’s cry.
You close your eyes. “Grim.”
“What?!” He whispers back, ears flicking in embarrassment. “I didn’t get any lunch! I can’t help being super hungry!!”
“Grim.”
“Oi! The Prefect and the cat have broken out again!” A Scarabia guard yells as he rounds the corner. “But how?! I could’ve sworn Achmed said he locked their door!”
“Ah!!” His compatriot cries, pointing up at the hole in the ceiling. “Look!! They’ve totally destroyed the floor of their room! Is that how you pay us back for our hospitality?!”
“How dare you?!” The first guard gasps. “That stuff’s really expensive to fix! Everyone, get over here! We’ve got another escape attempt!!”
“Fgnah! Yuu, let’s go, before their buddies get here!” Grim yelps, taking off down the hallway with you hot on his heels.
You hear the door to your prison slam open behind you, accompanied by Viper-senpai’s infuriated roar of “PREFECT!!”
You bundle Grim under one arm and run faster.
You seriously need a break from your break at this rate.
Hopefully you’ll get one, if you can figure out how to make it out of this dorm alive.
#my art#my writing#twisted wonderland#twst#jamil viper#twst jamil#kalim al asim#twst kalim#twst grim#twst yuu#twisted wonderland yuu#villainous paranoiac yuu#binder#i will admit that a lot of this was inspired by that one scene from Aladdin#where Abu snatches the lamp from Jafar’s cloak before the Cave of Wonders snaps shut#yes this does mean Yuu is Abu in this analogy#the Prefect IS Grim’s minion after all#Scarabia Student C is scandalized Yuu seduced the vice dorm head for his magic pen#Yuu: I DID NO SUCH THING. NO SEDUCING WAS DONE. N O N E#(a little seducing was done)#twst chapter 4#needed more flirting and we all know it
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Why Cap Being Internally Closeted Is Not Only Possible, But Valid Representation
i wrote this to a lot of mitski and onsind, so you can’t blame me for any feelings that bleed through
now i don’t know if it actually exists, but i’ve heard of there being a lot of discourse surrounding the captains story arc regarding his sexuality- i believe the general gist is that having a queer character that remains closeted to themselves is either unrealistic or ‘bad’ representation, and as someone who really treasures the captain and relates to his story so far a lot, i thought i might break this down a bit.
i’ve divded up every complaint i’ve heard about this into four main questions which i’ll be covering below the ‘keep reading’, because this is gonna be pretty comprehensive. full disclaimer i reference my experiences as an ex-evangelical non binary butch lesbian a couple times, and i spent a year studying repression and the psychological impacts of high demand sexual ethics for my graduating sociology paper, so this is coming with some background to it i swear
the big questions:
can you EVEN be gay and not know it????
but isn't this just ANOTHER coming out arc, and aren't we supposed to be moving beyond those?
but if cap can't have a relationship with a man because he's a ghost, what's the point?
since cap's dead, isn't this technically bury your gays, and isn't that bad?
1. "but is it really possible to not know? Isn't that bad representation?"
short answer: no and no.
before i get into the validity of the captain's ignorance about his own orientation as 21st century rep, let's break down how the hell the captain can be so clearly attracted to men and still not even consider the possibility that he might be gay, as brought to you by someone who literally experienced this shit.
the captain's particular situation is both a direct result of the lack of information around human sexuality he would have had (aka clear messaging that it's actually possible for him to be attracted to men. i don't mean acceptable or allowed, i mean physically capable of happening- the idea that orientations other than heterosexual exist and are available to him, a man), and a subconscious survival mechanism. the environment in which he lives is outright hostile to gay people, while the military man identity he has constructed for himself doesn't allow for any form of deviation from societal norms, let alone one so base level and major. as a result of this killer combo of information and environment, instincts take over and the mind does it's best to repress the ‘deviant’ feelings until a. one of these two things changes, or b. the act of repression becomes so destructive and/or exhuasting that it becomes impossible to maintain. the key to maintaining a long-term state of repression of desire is diverting that energy elsewhere, and a high-demand group such as the military is the perfect place for the captain to do this (this technqiue is frequented by religions and extremist ideologies worldwide, but that’s not really what we’re here to focus on).
while the brain is actively repressing ‘deviant’ feelings (aka gay shit), this doesn't mean you don't experience the feelings at all. when performed as a subconscious act of survival, the aim of repression is to minimise/transform the feelings into a state where they can no longer cause immediate danger, and something as big as sexual/romantic orientation is going to keep popping up, but as long as the individual in question never understands what they’re feeling, they’ll be able to continue relatively undisturbed. you know how in heist movies, the leader of the group will only tell each team member part of the plan so they can’t screw things up for everyone else if they get caught? it’s kind of like that.
this is how the captain appears to have operated in life AND in death, and it’s a relatively common experience for lgbtq people who’ve grown up in similar circumstances (aka with a lack of information and in an unfriendly-to-hostile environment), and accounts for how some people can even go on to get married and have children before realising that they’re gay and/or trans.
personally, while i can now identify what were strong homo crushes all the way back to childhood, at the time i genuinely had no idea. there was the underlying sense that i probably shouldn't tell people how attached i was to these girls because i would seem weird, and that my feelings were stronger than the ones other people used to describe friendships, but like-like them in the way that other girls like-liked boys? no way! actually scratch that, it wasn't even a no way, because i had no idea that i even could. i even had my own havers, at least in terms of the emotional hold and devotion she got from me, except she treated me way less well than cap’s beau. snatches of the existence of lgbt people made it through the cone of silence, i definitely heard the words gay and lesbian, but my levels of informations mirrored those that the captain would have had: virtually none, beyond the idea that these words exist, some people are them, and that's not something that we support or think is okay, so let's just not speak about it. despite only attending religious schools for the first couple years of primary, until i got my own technology and social media accounts to explore lgbtq content on my own- option a out of the two catalysts for change- the possibility of me being gay was not at all on my radar. don’t even get me started on how long it took me to explore butchness and my overall gender, two things which now feel glaringly obvious.
when shit starts to break down, you can also make the conscious choice to repress which can delay the eventual smashing down of the mental closet door for a time (essentially when the closet door starts to open, you just say ‘no thanks’ and shut it again by pointedly Not Thinking About It). in the abscence of identifying yourself by your attractions, it becomes quite common to identify with a lack- in my case, this meant becoming proud of how sensible and not boy crazy i was, and in the captain’s case, this means becoming proud of how sensible and not sensuous/wild (aka woman crazy) he was, identifying with his LACK of desire for women and partying (which, even in the 40s, involved the expectation of opposite sex romances and hook ups). i’m not saying that’s the only reason he’s a rule follower, but i think the contrast between About Last Night and Perfect Day pretty much support this. (the captain getting on his high horse about general party antics that he inherently felt excluded from because of underlying awareness of his difference & his tendency to project his regimented expectations of himself onto others, vs. joining in the reception party, awareness of how the environment supports difference in the form of clare and sam, and relaxing his own rules by dancing with men- the captain doesn’t mind a party when feels like he has a place there.)
so the captain was operating in a high demand, highly regulated environment (primarily the military, but also early 20th century England itself), with regimented roles, rules, and expectations. working on the assumption that he wouldn't have had out/disclosing lgbt friends, he would have had little to no exposure to lgbt identities, and what information he did receive would have been hushed and negatively geared. while my world started to open up when i started high school was allowed to have my own phone + instagram account, resulting in me realising something wasn't quite 'right' within a few years (making me a relatively early realiser compared to those who don't come out to themselves until adulthood), in life the captain never had that experience. he didn't receive the information he needed, his environment didn't grow less hostile. with the near-exception of havers related heartbreak, his well disciplined and lifelong method of repression never became destructive/exhaustive enough to permanently override the danger signals in his mind and allow him to put his feelings into words. neither of the most common catalysts for change happened for him, so he continued as usual, even after his death.
BUT, and here’s where we come to why this is actually great representation, arrival of mike and Alison represents the opening up of new world. for the first time, the captain is actively made aware of the fact that his environment is no longer hostile, and better than that, it’s affirming. he’s also getting access to positively geared information about lgbtq people and identities, so option a of the two catalysts for change is absolutely present, and resoundingly positive.
the captain’s arc is also relatively unique as it acknowledges the oppressive nature of his environment, but actually focuses on the internal consequences, and the way that systems like those that the captain lived in succeed because they turn us into our own oppressors. for whatever reason, we repress ourseslves, and often can’t help it, and i find that the significance of the journey to overcome that is often overlooked in more mainstream queer media. perhaps it’s just not very cinematic, or it remains too confronting for cishet audiences, but ghosts manages to touch on it with a lovely amount of humour and hope. Jamie Babbit’s But I’m A Cheerleader is another favourite piece of queer media for the same reasons.
not only does it show this, but as the captain continues to get gayer and lean into some of his less conventional traits (like an interest in fashion and the wedding planning), it shows lgbt people who have been or are going through this that there CAN be a positive outcome. it takes a lot to unlearn all the things that have painted you as wrong, especially when a massive institution is desperate to continue doing so, but you can do it, you can be happy, and it's never too late. (i've been meaning to say that last point for ages for ages, but a mutual beat me to it here)
2. not just another coming out arc
i absolutely support the demand for queer stories that don’t center around coming out (it’s like shrodinger’s queer: if you’re not coming out on screen, do you really even exist?), but i don’t align with the criticisms that the captain should already be out. for the reasons mentioned above, the captain’s particular story is fairly different to the ‘young white teenager who mostly knows gay is fine, it’s just everyone else that’s got the problem, but have a unremarkably straight sounding soundtrack, a trauma porn romance, and a cishet saviour’ that we keep seeing. the captain’s ongoing journey with his sexuality emphasises the overaching theme of the show: recovering from trauma and humanity’s endless capacity for growth, and i think that’s worth showing over and over again until it stops being true.
additionally, while the captain’s journey regarding his gayness is a big part of his character and story, ghosts makes it clear that it’s not the ONLY part, and being gay is far from his ONLY characteristic or dramatic/comedic engine. the fact that i’m even having to congratulate ghosts for doing that really shows how much film and television is struggling huh.
while all queer media is, and should be, subject to criticism, i think if it helps even one person then it absolutely deserves to exist, and i can say i’ve found the captain’s journey to be the lgbt story i’ve found that’s closest to my own, which says a lot considering he’s a dead world war 2 soldier who hangs out with other ghosts including a slutty Tory, a georgian noblewoman, and a literal caveman.
3. if captain gay, why he no have boyfriend????
another complaint that’s been circulating is that since the captain doesn’t, and likely won’t, have a boyfriend, that makes him Bad Representation because it follows the sad single gay trope. i kind of get the logic from this one, and a lot of it is up to personal interpretation, but part of me really enjoys the fact that the captain’s journey towards accepting himself is separated from having a relationship.
coming out is often paired with having romantic/sexual relationships (either as the reason or reward for doing so). my own struggle with repression didn't end the second that came out, and i still struggle with letting myself develop & acknowledge romantic feelings as a result of actively shutting them (and most other feelings in general) down for years, and statistics show that lgbtq youth in particular tend not to live out their 'teen years' until their twenties. by not giving cap a relationship straight away, ghosts separates the act of claiming identity and sexual orientation from finding a partner (two things which are, more often than not, separate), and also provides some very nice validation to folks who have yet to have the relationship they want, especially when lots of mainstream queer media is now jumping on the cishet media bandwagon of acting as if every person loses their virginity and has a life defining relationship at sixteen. it’s essentially a continuation of the earlier theme of “it’s never too late”, and who’s to say the captain won’t get a gay bear ghost boyfriend to go haunt nazis with??? people die all the time, it could happen.
(also, i think him and julian will have definitely shagged at least once. it was a low moment for both of them and they refuse to speak of it.)
lots of asexual/ace spectrum fans have come out to say how much they’ve loved being able to headcanon cap as ace, and while that’s not a headcanon i personally have, i think it’s brilliant that ace fans feel seen by his character- we’re all in this soup together babey (and sorry for cursing everyone still reading this with that cap/julian headcanon. i’m just a vessel)
4. “okay, but cap’s a GHOST- doesn’t that make this Bury Your Gays?”
this is a bit of a complex one, but i’m going to say no as a result of the following break down.
Bury Your Gays (BYG), aka the trope where lgbtq characters are consistently killed off (and often with a heavy dose of trauma, while cishet characters survive) is probably one of my least favourite lgbt media tropes. BYG has two main points:
1. the lgbt character is killed, thus removing them from story entirely- hence the use of the phrase ‘killed OFF’ (killed off of the show/film)
2. the character’s death reinforces the perception that lgbtq people’s lives must end in tragedy, instead of being long and fulfilling, or are inherently less valuable. bonus points if the character is killed in a hate crime or confesses same-gender love right before they die (that one implies that queer love genuinely has no future!)
not every death of an lgbtq character is bury your gays, and i personally feel that the captain is an example of an lgbt death that isn’t.
first of all, while the captain is dead, so are the vast majority of characters in ghosts. the premise of the show means that death is not the end of the line for its characters- for most of them, it’s the only reason we get to see them on screen at all. as such, the captain being dead doesn’t remove him from the story, so point one is irrelevant.
at the time of posting, we don’t know how or why the captain died, but we've had nothing to suggest his death was in any way related to his latent sexuality, so his mysterious death doesn’t actively play into the supposedly inherent tragedy of queer lives, nor the supposedly lesser value. that’s as of right now- since we don’t know the circumstances of his death it’s a little tough to analyse properly. while the captain’s life absolutely features missed opportunities and it’s fair share of tragedy, hope and growth (which seems to be the theme of this post) abounds in equal measure. the captain may not be alive, but we DO get to see him growing and having a relatively happy existence, that for the most part seems to be getting even better as he learns to open up and be himself unapologetically- that doesn’t feel like BYG to me.
while writng this, it’s just occured to me that death really is a second chance for most of the ghosts, especially with the introduction of alison. from mary learning to read, to thomas finding modern music, they’ve all been given the chance explore things they never could have while they were alive, and hopefully grow enough to one day be sucked off move on.
in conclusion,
i love the captain very much and i hope his arc lives up to the standards it’s set so far. i don’t know where to put this in this post, but i’d alo like to say i LOVE how in Perfect Day, the captain wasn’t used as an educational experienced for fanny at all. i am very tired of people expecting me to be the walking talking homophobe educator and rehabilitator, so the fact that it’s alison and the other ghosts that call fanny out while the captain just gets to have fun with the wedding organisation made me very happy.
here’s a few other cap posts that i’ve done:
the captain’s arc if adam and the film crew stayed
a possible cap coming out
the captain backstory headcanon
if you’ve read this far,
thank you!
also check out @alex-ghosts-corner , this post inspired me very much to write this
#i subluxed all my fingers and wrists doing this but worth it#bbc ghosts#bbc ghosts headcanon#bbc ghosts analysis#the captain#caphavers#the captain x havers#ben willbond#lgbt representation#lgbt rep#queer media#lgbt media
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I first saw Slipknot at age 14.
No one knows how I managed it. I'm not sure I even remember. These days, you have to be 16 or 18 to get into Standing areas. I do know I had to buy tickets on the phone, back in the old days (2005, that is). A singular ticket, too - none of my friends, not even the classmate who had gone with me to see Linkin Park the year before, was that into Slipknot.
But I HAD to see them. This was the Subliminal Verses tour cycle, and Vol. 3 was my first and favourite Slipknot album, even to this day. It's the reliable old warm blanket for my soul whenever I need it. It's on right now, as I write this.
My memory isn't that good, but luckily I unearthed a livejournal (livejournal!) diary entry about the event I made the next day.
August 16, 2005. I went right after school. I went to a very conservative Anglican secondary school, too. I tried not to get caught in the bathroom, as I coloured my nails black with permanent marker (I know, don't laugh) and changed into my standard metalhead baby outfit - Slipknot band shirt, black cargo shorts, and my pride and joy: steel-toe boots I somehow managed to cajole my parents into letting me own.
I caught the bus to the open-air war memorial park where the gig was going to be. I got there at 4pm, 4 hours early. A couple other maggots were already hanging around. I found myself surrounded by tombstones, and I read them all. It was the middle of the Hungry Ghost Festival, too - a very fitting time for Slipknot to pay a visit to this godforsaken hellhole of a small town I lived in. (Especially given the paranormal circumstances surrounding the making of Vol. 3.)
While I wandered around the venue (no security or sound guys were around at all), I spotted two white vans pull up to the stage, in the middle of a clearing. It was them! I spotted Joey and missed him by a hair's breadth. I was quickly ushered behind the stone archway entrance by security then.
(Funnily enough, while walking around, I got mistaken for Joey more than once. I am the same height as him, had the same long black hair, same pale skin, and was wearing almost exactly what he had been. One person claimed from behind, I was a dead ringer, apart from when I turned around, and they realised I was Chinese.)
It was soundcheck time. A sound guy testing the mics would say random things, like "testing one two three two one.... fudge fudge, I like fudge...." The band even did Purity, so us earlybirds were given a rare treat, and we screamed along from the entrance, and drummed our fists on the sides of nearby porta-potties. I hope no one was in there at the time. Whenever we got a glance of any of them, we'd scream and cheer. Finally they left again, but were soon to return.
This was the first time I'd been a part of the metal community. I was barely allowed internet in those days. But here, random strangers were friendly, striking up conversations like they'd been friends for years. Two big guys, called Trevor and Ted, looked out for me the entire gig after, keeping other big dudes from crushing me too much (I'm 5'3, remember). Other people commented on me being so baby, because I was only 14, and said they would take care of me.
When we were finally let in, right after the usher cut the rope, I ran in, screamed "WOOOHOOO!" along with a few friends I'd made. I only briefly stopped to receive this RoadRunner Records compilation CD from a roadie, then resumed running like a madman screaming and dashing into the VIP cage.
I was right up against the barricade - the first time I would ever be at a gig. People from assorted magazines and press took photos of us, and I think I got my photo taken about 10 times at least.
(This is how I got in trouble with my parents the next day. My photo had ended up in a local paper - you can see examples of that here. They had no idea what I'd been to see the night before, and were horrified when they saw what Slipknot looked like.)
We saw Sid filming us from the stage with a camcorder and screamed at him. We saw Jim and screamed at him too, and he flashed the victory sign back at us. I remember Metallica playing at the time, another one of my favourite bands.
The concert was a brutal religious experience I will never forget. People with their arms outstretched, crying and screaming out loud, moving like the devil possessed them.
The new friends around me made sure I was alright after every song! There were huge guys fainting behind us who had to get carried out, but I endured, a tiny 14 year old child. We got a family speech as per tradition, of course. "Are you guys out there all looking out for each other? We're all one big family, and we gotta look out for each other." What Corey said held true - strangers hugged, shook hands, talked, and made friends. I was heartened by how close-knit the maggot community was. It really did feel like a family, and it's felt like that ever since.
Of course, I did my first Jump The Fuck Up. It is possibly the most euphoria I've ever experienced all at one go. (Later, in 2020, I was extremely disappointed that I didn't get to do it again in London.)
They did the death masks for Vermilion, and I remember Chris helping Sid fix his mask and shirt when they'd changed back. Sid hung out near Clown's drums for most of the time too, and hugged him from behind and just latched on at one point. It was pretty adorable.
Fun fact: The version of Eyeless you hear on the 9.0 Live album is from Singapore, as is Eeyore. There are very few photos and videos from the crowd of this gig, because in 2005, very few people had camera phones. The crowd at the Slipknot gig in 2020 was a sea of arms with phones, filming the gig rather than experiencing it. Yes, I'm going to be that cranky old geezer who complains about the good old days.
Joey as usual, was fucking amazing and never failed. However, due to the fact that I was right up front, only his tiny head was visible behind his vast drum set, I couldn't see him the entire gig.
Amazingly, the government told Slipknot they were not allowed to do obscene gestures, curse, vomit (possibly due to the decomposing crow pre-show ritual), simulate humping on objects, throw faeces, or jump off stage (looking at you, Sid). I don't think our totalitarian government knew who they were dealing with, because watch what happens next.
Near the end of the gig, Corey tells the crowd “your government has given us a laundry list of things we aren’t allowed to do, your government has told us we are not allowed to swear”. Crowd goes “BOOOOOOOOO” and Corey goes “BUT WE DON’T GIVE A FUCK!!” And they launch into Surfacing, the last song. Everyone riots. Best night of my life.
You can find the setlist from that gig here. It had everything I wanted and more.
This story later got immortalised when Kerrang asked maggots for gig stories, for an article which came out in 2020. I had forgotten entirely, until people began messaging me to tell me, and one friend sent me a scan of it!
On the way out, I managed to get a shirt. I remember calling my best friend at the time, and got everyone at the merch booth to go "IF YOU'RE 555 THEN I'M 666" for her. This shirt has since been lost to the landfill, because my Christian mother took it upon herself to dispose of it the first opportunity she got. Needless to say, our relationship is not very good.
After that, I even managed to get that Roadrunner compilation album they were giving out signed. The band was staying at the Carlton. Unfortunately, Joey wasn't there, neither was Clown, and Mick was swarmed by guitar nerds so, 6/9 it is. It is a great regret of mine that I'll never have anything signed by him, nor will I ever get to see him perform ever again.
The next day, I went to school, my head swimming. Yes, I went to see Slipknot ON A SCHOOL NIGHT. I was a giant bruise, from my ribs and my chest, to my hips and knees, from being slammed into the barricade like a screen door in a hurricane. Most of all, my sore, headbanged-out neck could barely hold my head up. Classmates thought I had been in a fight. I was torn between battle-scarred exhaustion and hyperactive ranting about the most amazing gig of my short life (it still is, to this day). When teachers spoke to me, I wanted to reply, "Fuck trigonometry! I've just seen SLIPKNOT. Do you not understand that my world is different? Do you not understand that *I* am now different?"
My country was a small, conservative town that Slipknot had graced with their unholy presence. Corey Taylor once said that where he grew up in Iowa had a way of making a 16 year old boy feel like a 36 year old man (or something to that effect). I felt that in my weary bones as a teenager, being from a place just like that. Years later, Watain would run into worse trouble, and wouldn't even be allowed to perform. The Christian stranglehold is stronger than ever. It was a good thing that back then Slipknot had the element of surprise, striking serpent-fast and choking this society by the neck for a too-brief time, before they departed.
After that, my desire to play the drums only grew like a weed. Joey Jordison had, has, and will always inspire me as a drummer, and seeing the beast live (or what little I could spy behind the massive riser) had only spurred me on. I had always been a noisemaker, be it driving my parents mad with chopsticks on pots and pans, or driving my teachers mad with pencils on my desk. But of course, my parents wouldn't have any of it. I'd have to wait a good 14 more years before I'd be able to afford lessons and later, a kit of my own. Better late than never, right?
There will never be enough words to describe the impact Joey has had on my life. And it isn't just Slipknot, either. I could write another essay on his time with the Murderdolls and its influence on my own gender-non-conforming ways. Suffice to say, my wardrobe doesn't look too dissimilar to his during the early Dead in Hollywood days.
I told my boss I could not come into work today. I was grieving. I said that my music teacher died, as I didn't think she'd understand the magnitude of my loss. In a way, it's true. And I am not the only one Joey has nudged on the path to being a musician, that much is certain. To the rest of us, I wish strength and love for you in this difficult time. The best way to honour Joey, who truly loved music, both the creation and appreciation of it, is to pass that gift on. Teach it to someone. He is the reason I picked up the sticks in the first place, and one day, they'll be handed on, the heavy metal baton for the next generation.
And finally: remember that the ones we have lost are never truly gone.
Vinnie
P.S. See if you can spot me in the crowd photos in this post!
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living after midnight
Brooke Thompson x Montana Duke
Summary: Brooke and Montana get a bit intoxicated and get a bit carried away while going night swimming. Based off this post I made a week ago hehe
Words: 3.1k+
Warnings: mentions of alcohol and also vague mentions of weed, stripping (no nudity tho LOL), lotssss of sexual tension, lots of fluff, slowburn, friends to lovers, weird yearning angst for like .02 seconds lmao
A/N: Hey guys, sorry if this is random but I got random inspo for brotana so.. here this is lmao. Believe it or not I did try to make this under 1k words but.. I got carried away so I’m sorry that’s it’s long 😭. But the fic happens sometime after Brooke and Montana meet but before any camp redwood fuckery happens lmao. Anyway I hope y’all like this!! This is also probably the fastest I’ve ever written a fic so I hope it’s atleast decent haha. Anyway enjoy <3
A gentle breeze danced against Brookes exposed skin. The midnight air cold on its own regard but it seemed to blend perfectly with the extensive heat that radiated from the bonfire she sat in front of.
The night was entirely pitch black. The moon was vacant from the sky, leaving the only source of light to come from the giant fire that sat at Brookes shoes.
It was admittedly a bit unsettling being in almost the total darkness, especially with how many girls had recently gone missing in L.A as of late but the beer in her system had mostly put those thoughts to rest. Plus, being with three men and Montana was also reassuring. Even if she didn’t exactly know Xavier, Chet or Ray that well but.. she knew Montana.
It was nearly impossible to forget about how they met.. in the girls locker room in the showers and well; it’s not as if things were any less weird now. Showers or not.
It’s not as if Brooke and Montana were best friends or super close, because that definitely wasnt the case; but they weren’t acquaintances either by any means. The weird tension and ‘playfulness’ that lied between them ruled out being friends.. or that’s Brooke liked to think anyway when she had one too many things to drink. Like now.
Her legs twitched a bit restlessly; content at the ambience that surrounded her but not content with her current state of being. Like how she knew she should be enjoying herself, drunk, not caring about particularly anything at all but instead all she could do was fucking care. Her thoughts were purely infiltrated with Montana and it was embarrassing, to say the least but now that she was intoxicated there was really no harm in fighting it. No matter how annoying and taunting those thoughts truly were.
After all, Why should she not think about how nice it would be to feel Montana’s hands (which she knew had to be soft and delicate) on her waist and down her back? Why should she not think about Montana’s soft lips moving against her own, a few strands of her bleached hair (which definitely had lost it softness due to excessive over bleaching) brushing up against her face accidentally?
That was a rhetorical question; because she knew exactly why she avoided those type of thoughts on a normal day to day basis. Not because it would make things awkward between them but because it was beyond fucking painful to imagine scenarios that would never happen.. Never.
The smell of the fire and the sounds of the wood crackling, which was far too dry and poorly stacked (neither Xavier, Chet or Ray could build a proper fire to save their life), helped bring Brooke out of her thoughts and bit more into reality. So did the gentle sway of the tree branches which she could see in her peripheral vision, since they were right on the cusp of a forest that cut off to a beach. Ocean waves which slowly dragged across the sand were also soothing to listen too, albeit distant over the sound of Brookes friends screaming and laughing and being heavily intoxicated over what was more than just alcohol and weed.
Brooke reached down and swiftly grabbed the beer can which was previously lodged upright in the sand. Lifting the can up to her lips and cringing and unconsciously tensing up as she swallowed until the can was nearly weightless - wiping her mouth with the back of her hand just to see-
“Montana?!” Brooke nearly yelled. Both alcohol and temporary shock making her speak way louder than what was realistically needed.
Montana, who was previously standing several feet away with the boys was suddenly seated right next to Brooke on the log with no warning. Probably having moved over while Brooke was poorly chugging the alcohol she hated.. but she couldn’t help but to notice that their thighs (as well as basically their entire sides) were touching as she tried to wipe the alcohol that had embarrassingly dripped down her front in a frenzy.
Chet and Xavier looked back at them from a few feet away as they smoked what Brooke knew had to be a joint. Briefly laughing and giving the pair of women an amused glance before turning around and immersing themselves in whatever conversation they were previously having.
Brooke sheepishly met Montana’s gaze, feeling her cheeks grow nearly unbearably hot at the awareness that she was now being watched.. studied almost.
“Sorry,” Brooke added with a giggle.
Montana responded with a slight upturn of her lips; amused with Brookes actions not because she found it necessarily funny or pitiful, but for the sole reason that.. it was cute and endearing that Brooke couldn’t really hold her alcohol for shit.
It made her unique and different from everyone else Montana acquainted herself with. People that Montana had to basically learn to keep up with.. but Brooke on the other hand was different.. She was a breath of fresh air, and that’s why Montana assumed she was so attracted to her (besides her looks, of course).
Montana tried her best to ignore and not be bothered by the fact that Brooke was wasting perfectly good alcohol by wiping it off herself (alcohol that Montana wouldn’t necessarily mind licking off Brookes lips.. or her neck, or really anywhere else off of her). Instead focusing on how suffocated she felt here.
It wasn’t necessarily anyone’s fault. After all; she loved Chet, Xavier and Ray dearly but.. they were also undoubtedly preventing anything from happening between her and Brooke.. and that needed to change.
Montana huffed. Her deep brown eyes quickly flickering at the flame and then Brooke before speaking.
“Im bored,” she announced. Suddenly standing up and not letting her eyes break the gaze she suddenly held with Brooke.
Brooke responded with a simple hum. Her jaw quickly dropping once she noticed that Montana’s bright red nails quickly darted down under her own shirt. Hooking the material under her fingertips before quickly raising the shirt up and over her head. Throwing it back somewhere behind the log Brooke still sat on.. somewhere where Brooke was almost certain Montana wouldn’t be able to locate later.. which was probably done on purpose.
Brookes jaw still stayed ajar when she saw Montana’s hands automatically fly down to the small jean shorts she was wearing. She could do nothing but watch as she saw the button unhook- wait.. what exactly was happening?
“Montana, what are you doing?” Brooke asked with a laugh.
Brooke tried her best to fight the urge to look at her friend who was now well.. in her bra and underwear, out of what she was trying to convince herself was respect, but it wasn’t working. She knew for a fact her cheeks had to burnt bright fucking red; she tried to laugh off the feeling but Montana still stared.. her smile slowly growing wider until sudden laughter momentarily broke the tension again.
Brooke and Montana both looked behind them just to find the boys laughing and whooping as well at Montana’s sudden lack of clothes.
Brooke smiled back at them but it only lasted a second before she found herself overtaken with a emotion she never really felt around Montana before.. was it jealousy?
Just the sight of them staring at Montana (who obviously didn’t give a fuck, or was thriving off the attention more than anything) was enough to make Brooke stand up.
“Go swimming with me?” Brooke suddenly proposed. More than certain that her sudden impulsivity was coming from the alcohol more than anything.. it had to be, right?
Brooke looked Montana in the eyes again as she watched the other woman’s expression suddenly change at her words; looking utterly shocked and.. maybe a bit thrilled.
“You want to go swimming?” Montana nearly sneered, her tone reeked off utter disbelief, “and what are you gonna wear?”
Brooke laughed at what the other woman was implying. Her dark brown eyes slipped down to admire the rest of Montana’s body that she dared not to look at previously. Only looking for a second at the matching cherry red set that Montana wore. A bra which was most definitely too tight and cut a bit small, along with a thong with sat a bit high on her hips which only accentuated her figure even further.
She didn’t have time to think; her eyes darting back up to meet Montana’s which she knew were watching her.
“I’m not going naked-“
“You don’t have too. It’s not like their gonna see us anyway once we get away from the fire. Here.”
They both spoke in hushed whispers. Weirdly paranoid that maybe the boys would overhear and wanna join which- was something they both clearly didn’t want, although unspoken.
The distance between them was minimal enough due to alcohol (and other substances in Montana’s case) running high in their systems. Making personal space something that was now nonexistent.
Montana extended her hand out to Brooke to take. She quickly grabbed her hand, hoping desperately it wasn’t sweaty from how close they were to the fire and also.. just from the situation she was bound to find herself in. But due to Montana’s reaction (or lack thereof) she knew she had nothing to worry about.. sweaty palms or not, she knew Montana wouldn’t judge her. No matter how insane the circumstance; Brooke always felt safe around Montana. That’s why she supposed she was currently following her into the pitch black - her vision getting more and more sparse as they walked away from the fire and into some nearby trees that framed the beach..
“Are you sure they can’t see me?” Brooke asked, trying her best to look through the trees and see if any of her friends happened to be looking but - she couldn’t really make out anything besides the subtle outline of her surroundings which included Montana.
“They can’t see you. Relax,” Montana said with a giggle. “Now do I need to help you undress? Your taking forever and I’m hot- and it’s not like I haven’t seen you wearing less-“
Brooke tried her best to look offended and shocked by her reference to how they met. She knew that normally with nothing in her system she would’ve easily sidestepped Montana’s ruthless flirting but.. something felt different about tonight. After all; why should she keep trying so hard to resist something they both felt? And it wasn’t like anyone could see them anyway..
Brooke quickly turned her head to where she knew Montana was and stepped closer until they were barely a foot apart. Her feet nearly stumbled on Montana’s from the proximity; biting her lip to prevent herself from stupidly giggling once she felt hot breath on her cheek.
She grabbed Montana’s hands which first held hers back limply but briefly held hers tighter before Brooke directed her hands on her shirt.
“Take it off,” Brooke uttered. Her voice barely audible but not quite loud enough to be discerned as a whisper.
Montana didn’t hesitate as she quickly took Brookes shirt off, barely feeling the soft fabric against her fingertips before she quickly threw it behind them into the forest. Montana didn’t wait for Brooke to say anything before her fingers were quickly undoing the button and the zipper of her jean shorts which were only thrown somewhere in the forest as well (hopefully near her shirt.. Brooke could only hope).
Brooke tried her best to not look bothered by her sudden lack of clothes but she also knew that was purely idiotic since they were in the pitch black.
Nevertheless she looked down at herself, trying to discern whether her figure was actually visible or not but Montana grabbed her hand again. Making her gaze snap upward as she led her out. She knew they were going out to the water now; the sand under her feet and the fire now visible from a distance as they continued to go out. The sand becoming more grainy and nearly painful to step on as they got closer to the water.
Brooke quickly looked over her shoulder before she took the first step in - still holding onto Montana’s hand. She quickly glanced to see if any of the men they had came with were watching but surely enough they were still talking and laughing as if they didn’t even notice they had gone missing.. and they probably hadn’t given how fucked up they were.
Perfect.
She continued to hold onto Montana’s hand as she went further and further into the water; not phased by the sudden coolness she felt as the water wrapped around her legs.. submerging her further and further until they both finally stopped. The water lapping around Brookes waist, and well, nearly Montana’s chest since she was a few inches shorter than Brooke.
The water seemed to be a perfect temperature despite them being at the ocean; and the rocks had since disappeared under their feet and changed back into soft sand which also made the current situation a bit more enjoyable.
Brooke tilted her head back a bit, worried momentarily that her hair might get wet but it was worth it. It was absolutely breathtaking.
The night sky which previously looked completely black and void of any light whatsoever was now painted with what looked to be a million stars.
“Do you see this?” Brooke asked.
“What, the stars?” Montana answered, her voice holding a bit of amusement to it and almost as if she was trying to hold back a laugh.
“Yeah,” Brooke affirmed with a nod. Still keeping her gaze fixated to the night sky.
“What about them?” Montana asked.
The water rippled a bit as Montana started to a take a few steps closer towards Brooke, dissatisfied at the distance between them.
“Nothing. I just- it’s beautiful. I never do things like this,” Brooke responded, tilting her head down to make eye contact with Montana as she finished her sentence.
Montana smirked.
“Never?” She asked with a laugh. “C'mon. I’m not wet enough, let’s go deeper.”
Before Brooke could protest, Montana grabbed both of her hands and pulled her deeper in the water.
“But I didn’t bring a towel!”
“Your not gonna need one. We can warm up by the fire, remember?”
They continued to keep wading until the water almost spilled over Montana’s shoulders. The water barely touching Brookes collarbones but getting some of her hair wet regardless.
She hesitantly let go of the other woman’s hand in the water, intent on using her hand to help her gain balance since a few rocks were still on the ocean ground but - the exact opposite happened.
Brooke didn’t even have time to gasp or scream before her left foot quickly slid on a random rock that just.. of course.. had to fucking be there. Her hands quickly landed on Montana’s shoulders; the rest of her body accidentally falling into the other woman’s but she only felt Montana’s hands suddenly grab gently at her back. Holding her in place against her body.
Brookes eyes instinctively closed shut but when she slowly opened them and reluctantly lifted her head higher up (silently cursing herself for accidentally getting her hair almost entirely wet now) she noticed.. how close they were to each other.
Her nose was only centimeters away from Montana's shoulder.. which meant-
“Are you okay?” Montana asked softly, speaking unintentionally right next to her ear which made a shiver run up Brookes spine.
“Mhm,” Brooke responded.
She rose her head up further - her vision fully black now due to closing her eyes so tightly and being disoriented from slipping, but she knew from hearing Montana’s voice that she had to be close. Very close.
Moving her head a bit to the left.. almost microscopically, not wanting whatever ‘this’ was to necessarily be clumsy but she knew she didn’t necessarily have a choice in the dark.
“What are you doing?” Montana continued to whisper.
Brooke couldn’t help but to smile and let out a giggle that made her sound far more drunk than she actually was. She knew exactly where Montana’s lips were now due to her speaking. Thank god.
“You’ll see.”
Brooke leaned in slowly. Briefly bumping noses before catching Montana’s lips with her own. The feeling so heavenly and overdue - not enough but simultaneously far too much to take in all at once.
The taste of dull, gut wrenching beer started to flood her mouth. It was all that Montana basically tasted like.. that and a bit like smoke but Brooke didn’t mind. If anything it made the feelings of infatuation temporarily stronger. Brookes nails started to pierce the other woman’s back; wanting nothing more than to just have.. more. More of Montana; her taste, her hands, her touch.. the feeling was both pathetic but impossible to fight any longer.
The mere thought that this was something she was previously holding herself back from having was almost laughable but- that would be something to think about for another time.
Montana’s lips softly broke from hers.
“Eager.. aren’t you?” She teased.
Brookes eyes still refused to adjust but she knew Montana had to be grinning.
“Sorry.. I just-“
“Don’t be sorry. You have no idea how long I’ve been wanting to do that,” Montana said lowly.
Montana suddenly leaned in with no warning. Her hands softly grabbed Brookes shoulders; leaning in to pull her bottom lip with her teeth.
After she let go, the feeling to kiss her again was strong but.. she thought of something better. The thrill of the chase was something Brooke always enjoyed, after all.
Brooke took a few steps back suddenly before quickly heading for the shore. Not really going that fast at all due to the resistance of the water pushing up against her legs but she laughed regardless.
She could hear Montana laughing and calling her a jerk in the distance but it was all just noise at this point. Her voice, the water rushing, the fire and their friends (which grew gradually louder as she approached) all started to sound the same.
Maybe the alcohol was finally kicking in.
Even though Brooke definitely felt tipsy, she still felt nervous the closer she got from being fully submerged out of the water. Maybe it was due to the fact she wasn’t certain what was going to happen at the fire, or if their friends had even heard anything but she knew atleast now she would have Montana. Exactly how she had Montana was something to be determined later, but as she finally stepped out and away from the nearly black ocean waves and ran up to the fire to go wait for Montana - she was comforted by the thought that things would now never be the same and forever would be different between the two of them.
Which had to be a good thing; right?
Taglist: @michaellangdonstanaccount @langdonsexual @jimmason @blakescoven @dark-mei-rose @9layerdevilfoodcake @prophecy-is-inevitable @matildaofoz @beautyiswithinchaos @frenchlangdon @king-with-no-crovvn @melodylangdon @littledemondani @celestialrequiem @sojournmichael @ritualmichael @waitinvain @twilightzone24
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#brooke x montana#brooke thompson x montana duke#brotana#ahs fanfiction#ahs fanfic#my fic#will post to ao3 soon 😌#did I procrastinate my Andy fic to write this?? maybe lmao#I’m almost done w my Andy fic tho I swear 😭#i know I never talk about brotana so this is probably random asf but I just wanted to write something wlw 😌
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Choices {Daryl Dixon} Prologue
Summary: Earning Daryl Dixon’s trust for the most part was harder than surviving the end of the world. For you, though, all it took was one trip gone wrong into Atlanta. Safety is never guaranteed.
T/W: this series follows the story of TWD (the show, not the comic) and will contain: strong language, violence, depictions of gore, depictions of vore, major character death, spoilers (if you haven’t seen the show before), sexual themes, drug use, heavy themes (will be trigger warnings for those scenes). Read at your own risk, I am not responsible if any content upsets you, you have been warned.
There was a low, somber air around the farm. It had been quiet for the most part of the week. Most had been snappy, and Carol… well, it was easy to imagine how a grieving mother was to be. Especially given the circumstances.
Daryl Dixon, it seemed, though, was highly affected by what had happened. He had fought with Shane over looking for Sophia and had spent so long tracking the forest - hell he’d even almost killed himself with his own damn arrow looking for her. He had hope. He had given Carol hope. Yet… she had been in the barn the entire time, locked up like cattle. She had been in there. She had been a walker for god knows how long and… Daryl had been looking for her.
There were footsteps, but Daryl sat still. He didn’t care for people. He hadn’t ever since Carol had pushed her way out of his arms and stormed back to the farmhouse. It was soul-crushing finding Sophia there. It truly was. Daryl felt defeated.
“Hey…”
Usually, that voice would bring him so much comfort but Daryl would not look over, not even when he felt you plonk down beside him.
“Daryl, look… about Sophia…” you were slow with your words, quiet. You didn’t want him to explode on you. You knew that out of everyone, you were the least likely to get any aggression from the younger Dixon brother, yet you couldn’t help but be cautious around him.
The sun was setting nicely, an amber glow falling amongst the trees. There was a chill in the air but neither of you minded. It was kind of nice compared to the blistering heat that had been present earlier in the day.
You took in a breath. It wasn’t easy to talk to Daryl when he was upset, but he had blown up on just about everyone lately and you had kept your distance. But you didn’t want to anymore. You knew why he was acting out and… you didn’t want him to push everyone away from himself.
“...Daryl,” you began with a sigh, “what happened to Sophia wasn’t your fault. It wasn’t anyone’s fault….”
Daryl didn’t answer. He didn’t even acknowledge your words. He was starting absentmindedly towards the farmhouse.
“I know you blame yourself, you think you could have done more for her but… Daryl, she was in the barn. She was bitten a long time ago…”
“That doesn’t help.” He replied gruffly. At least he wasn’t screaming at you.
“I know…” you sigh again, stretching your legs out in front and placing your hands on your lap, “but… she was only twelve, Daryl… I hate to say it but Shane was kinda right, she didn’t stand a chance.” You scoffed. Daryl made a grunt in response, “She was only a kid… in a sad kinda way, death was probably a good thing for her. She was growing up in a world full of death and decay. Death was a kind outcome for Sophia.”
“...try tellin’ Carol that…”
“... yeah, maybe we keep that between us, huh?” You knocked your shoulder against his.
It went quiet for another moment. You took the pause to think about what you were going to say next.
“This ain't a world for kids to be growing up in Daryl, you know that, right?”
“Yeah..” Daryl scoffed.
“I mean… I know I sure as hell don’t wanna bring kids up like this.”
“... so that’s it, huh? All we do is bump uglies?”
“Daryl…” you sighed, “that’s not what I meant.”
“No, go on and say it, cause I thought-“
“Daryl,” you cut him off, “I don’t wanna raise a kid in this world. Look at how much it changed Carl. If, and when, I have kids, I wanna… I wanna be able to bring them up in some sort of stability. I wanna be able to let them learn how to ride a bike in the middle of the street, or to play kerby for hours on end, I want my kids to have a childhood, not what Sophia or Carl have to endure.”
It was Daryl’s turn to sigh. He plucked up the courage to finally look over at you. Your side-profile was blooming with the golden hue from the sunset. It cast a kind of angelic look across your face. You weren’t looking at him, not even with your eyes. Daryl’s gaze lingered only for a moment before he turned his head.
You were right. Sophia’s death was a tragedy. It shouldn’t have happened but… this was no world for a kid to be living in.
“So, what, you wanna build up some kinda civilisation? You wanna rebuild humanity?”
“I guess…” you chuckled lightly. You knew how crazy it sounded, “you think I’m hoping for too much?” You looked over at Daryl and for a moment, your eyes met.
“Girl, I think you’re batshit crazy. You’re hopin’ for something’ way outta your zone. Try hopin’ for a rabbit for dinner.” He was joking, but the seriousness in his voice would throw someone less familiar with him off.
“Yeah… I guess I am hoping for too much. But you gotta have hope, right?”
“Yeah… it drives ya forward… gives ya something - anything - to cling on to… I… I hoped Sophia was alive… not just for my sake, or for Carol, but for everyone… cause if that little girl could outsmart all the geeks in the woods, we mighta stood a chance.”
You looked over at Daryl. He was staring at the ground. He was blinking a little too often and you knew that if you were looking at him head-on, you’d find tears in his eyes. Rick, Shane, Lori, Dale, everyone else, they didn’t see Daryl for who he truly was. He was a very broken man, but you saw beneath his hardened shell. It hadn’t been easy breaking him down, it had taken you since the start of the outbreak to get this far.
Daryl was a good man. People never even tried to see the good in him, though. They saw a hot-headed redneck and… well, they didn’t want to look after that. You saw him, though. You saw Daryl and he saw you, too.
“I kinda blame your old man for all this.” Daryl broke the silence, “he should not have left her alone.”
“... I kinda blame him, too.” You agreed, “but he didn’t have any other choice. If he did, I know he would not have left her like that. I’m sure he feels guilty enough without us pointing fingers.”
“I suppose…” Daryl took a breath, “what took ya so long to come see me, anyway?”
“I don’t know, maybe the fact you’ve been kinda rude to everyone else? I didn’t want you breaking up with me over this.”
“Nah, I’d never do that.” He managed to shuffle a little closer before slinging his arm over your shoulder. You melted into his touch. You had missed him.
“Will you come back, now, angel?”
“Back?”
“Will you move your damn tent back to camp, Daryl Dixon?”
“I don’t think you’re leavin’ me much choice, are ya?”
“I am not.”
You pushed yourself up and out of Daryl’s touch. He wanted to grab you back but you had already taken a couple of long strides forwards to get out of his reach.
“I am sorry about Sophia, Daryl. I know finding her meant a lot to you. At least you got your closure.” The golden glow was engulfing you now and Daryl really didn’t know how he’d been so lucky to land someone like you.
“Yeah…”
“Can you come back? You gotta shower- don’t look at me like that!” You chuckled, “come on, I’ll make it worth your while.”
Well, you didn’t need to say much more for Daryl to be pushing himself off of the log he had been perched on.
#Daryl Dixon#daryl dixion imagine#daryl dixon x reader#daryl dixon x y/n#daryl dixon x you#twd#the walking dead#twd imagine#the walking dead imagine#twd Daryl#twd Daryl Dixon#the walking dead Daryl#the walking dead Daryl Dixon#negan#negan x reader#negan x you#twd negan#the walking dead negan#twd x reader#the walking dead x reader
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To Be Trusted
read on Ao3
Bucky witnesses Sam having a nightmare. He does his best to help.
--
Warm water gently rolls down his knuckles as he scrubs at a plate, handing it to Sarah, who runs a towel over it. “Thanks for helpin’ with the dishes,” she says, and he smiles, turning off the faucet.
“Least I can do. You’re letting me sleep on your couch.”
“Bucky Barnes, you are always welcome here, and don’t you forget it.” Waving the towel at him accusingly, she smiles as he laughs, hanging it over the faucet to dry. “It’s nice to have an extra pair of hands around here. Especially tonight, since Sam decided to go to bed early like an old man.” She pauses. “No offense.”
Smirking, he shakes his head. “None taken.”
Sam had been tired out after the Flagsmashers excitement, and neither of them could blame him. But Sarah was his sister, so of course she was still going to tease him for it. “Speaking of which, it’s probably about time I went to bed, too. I’m supposed to be takin’ the kids to Gloria’s in the morning. You and Sam can do your training or whatever it is you Avengers do.”
Bucky smirks again, sticking his hands in his pockets. “We’ll try to make ourselves useful.”
“That’s what I like to hear.” She pats his shoulder with a wink, then heads toward the stairs. “Good night. Get some sleep.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he replies, watching her go with another smile. “Good night, Sarah.” She waves, and then he’s standing alone.
Giving the kitchen a once-over, he turns to turn off the lights, stretching his arms above his head. Even though it’s dark in the house, with the only source of light being the moon peeking through the window curtains, he doesn’t feel that sense of dread he used to when he lived in that apartment on his own. Things are so different here with the Wilsons, and he doesn’t think he would ever be able to express just how much that means to him.
He’s pretty tired from everything that happened, too, but he’s so used to powering though that it’s a strange feeling to actually want to sleep. But this house, and that small, worn couch he sleeps on, makes him feel safe. Like his memories can’t reach him here, because he’s busy making new ones.
And right now, the couch looks pretty inviting.
But first, he quietly heads down the hall. The boys’ shared room as well as Sarah’s is upstairs, but Sam’s is right across from the bathroom. And Bucky glances toward the closed door as he passes, wondering how Sam must be feeling. He’s finally accepted the mantle, but surely he must have a lot of pressure on his shoulders; yet, he’s been handling it all with grace. Bucky couldn’t be more proud to call him his friend...and partner.
He changes into a t-shirt and sweatpants and exits the bathroom, standing there in the hallway for a moment to let his eyes adjust to the dark. He’s about to continue walking when his ears pick up a quiet noise coming from behind Sam’s closed door. Bucky’s not one to eavesdrop (unless it’s for a mission), but his curiosity - and concern - is peaked. He steps up to the door, straining to hear something further. It sort of sounds like he’s talking to someone under his breath. “Sam?” he calls cautiously, waiting to hear a response. He doesn’t get one, and the noise continues.
His gaze slides down toward the doorknob, and he can’t help but hesitate. He has this feeling of dread building up in his chest, because he’s pretty sure he knows what’s going to be waiting for him on the other side of the door. He knows because he deals with it all the time. Not as frequently since he began staying with the Wilsons, but still there. And he doesn’t want to have to see Sam like that. But he knows if it were him, Sam would come to his aid, and so the choice is simple. Metal fingers curl around the doorknob quietly, and he pushes it open softly.
The room is almost completely dark, save for the moonlight that streams through his window. Sam is on his back, legs tangled up within the blankets, his face twisted up in pain. His head jerks back and forth, incoherent mumbles escaping through parted lips, body tense and rigid.
Bucky stands there for a moment, his heart aching. It’s exactly what he was expecting, but it still hurts to see Sam so distressed. He’ll be damned if he makes him suffer any longer than he already has. Stepping forward, he places his right hand on Sam’s shoulder. “Sam, hey. C’mon, pal.” It takes a moment, but the words work. Sam’s eyes fly open and he sits up straight, gasping loudly. Bucky moves to stand in front of him right away, keeping a hand on his shoulder. “Hey, it’s alright. You were dreaming. You’re safe.”
Sam’s bare chest rises and falls quickly with each shallow breath, glazed eyes barely blinking, staring at Bucky but not really seeing him. And then his gaze slides upward, and they make eye contact. “Bucky?” he breathes, voice broken, a sheen of sweat covering his face and chest.
Just his name on the other’s lips breaks Bucky’s heart. He wonders what it is, but thinking on it for just a moment makes the answer become clear. Sam is always put-together, incredibly strong and brave, a good head on his shoulders. Seeing him like this just hurts, and Bucky almost doesn’t know what to do. But he recovers as quickly as he can, offering a sad smile and moving to sit on the end of the bed.
“Yeah, it’s me,” he says, keeping his hand on Sam’s shoulder to ground him. “Take some deep breaths, Sam. You’re gonna be okay.”
His eyes fall closed again as he tries to steady his breathing, unconsciously leaning in to the touch. Bucky continues to coax him, knowing it’s what Sam would do for him. It’s nice to be looked after when these things happen; and he’s glad he can be there for Sam this time.
A few long minutes pass. It’s a slow, gradual process, but Sam’s breaths are soon evened out. He opens his eyes again, letting out a quiet breath. “Thanks, Buck,” he mumbles, and it’s genuine. Under normal circumstances, Sam would almost definitely make some smart comment, but now isn’t the time. Bucky nods, slowly letting go of the other’s shoulder.
“You’d do the same for me.” It’s certain, he has no doubt in his mind. Sam is calm now, but he doesn’t look much better than he had a few minutes ago. So Bucky shifts his weight a little. “You wanna talk about it?”
Sam exhales slowly, looking toward the window. “...It’s been a while since I thought about him.”
Bucky frowns, face betraying his confusion. “Who?”
“Riley. My wingman.” He releases another shaky breath. “We were partners when I was in the force. There was nothing I could do to save him. Was just up there to...watch it all happen.” His shoulders sag a little, and he lets out a humorless chuckle. “He’d hate to see me like this. Tell me to get my head outta my ass and keep moving forward.”
Sighing quietly, Bucky offers a small, sad smile. “Sounds like a pretty good guy.”
Sam eyes him for a moment. “You two would have gotten along. I don’t know if that’s a good or bad thing.” Quiet falls between them. Bucky wracks his brain to try to find something else to say. Something to make Sam feel better.
All he can do is lift an arm. “You want a hug or something?”
Under normal circumstances, Sam would most likely laugh at him for even suggesting such a thing, probably assuming that the other was joking in the first place. But he doesn’t laugh, he just stares for a moment, and then he leans forward, resting his cheek on Bucky’s shoulder, much to the latter’s surprise. “If you say anythin’ about this, I’ll kill you,” Sam mumbles, but the threat is empty.
Swallowing, Bucky’s heart skips a beat and he smiles a bit, wrapping his arms around the other. “What, me? Tease you? Never.” If anything, he’s just grateful Sam hasn’t started crying. He has no idea what to do in those types of situations. But this? He can definitely do this. It’s been a long time since he’s embraced someone so fully, but he finds himself glad that it’s Sam who ended up being first after so much time had passed.
He’s warm, and Bucky passes the time by watching Sam’s back rise and fall, much more even than it had been before. He can see the curve of his spine, the muscles relaxed along them, outlined thanks to the pale moonlight. And what a strange situation Bucky is in, he thinks, holding the man who once tried to kill him so gently, hoping that the nightmares that plague him will leave.
Bucky can deal with his own dreams. He doesn’t think he can take knowing that Sam also has to suffer.
It’s been quiet for awhile, so Bucky glances down. “Sam? Maybe you should try to get some more rest. It’s gettin’ late.” There’s no response. He shifts a little, trying to get a look at his face, brows knit together. “Sam?”
He can’t see it too clearly, but he knows by the silence that his friend has now fallen asleep on his shoulder. Somehow. Heat creeps up Bucky’s neck and toward his cheeks and ears, grateful for both the darkness and the fact that Sam can’t see it. He’s not sure why he feels so...warm. Sam trusted him enough, felt safe enough against Bucky that he was able to forget his terrible memory and rest again. And Bucky...doesn’t remember what that was like. To be trusted so fully when for so long, he couldn’t even trust himself.
Slowly, he releases his embrace, taking Sam’s shoulders gently. Maneuvering carefully, supporting his head, he pushes him back to lay against the pillows. Much to Bucky’s surprise, Sam doesn’t stir. His face is a big contrast to what Bucky had found earlier; his jaw is slack, his brows are relaxed, and he looks at peace. Bucky can’t help but stare for a few moments. Under the pale moon, Sam has finally found restful sleep, thanks to Bucky. And Bucky looks on with a fond smile.
After what seems like hours, he moves to pull the blankets over Sam’s chest, who mumbles something under his breath before falling silent again. “Just needed a hug, huh, pal?” he whispers, smiling a little to himself in the way he’d never be caught dead doing if Sam could see him. “You big softie.” Of course, he knows he’s a hypocrite, but he doesn’t really mind much.
Finally, he rises from the edge of the bed, walking toward the door. He knows Sam would rather die than talk about what happened come morning, but Bucky’s okay with that. He doesn’t mind keeping it a secret for him. Glancing over his shoulder once more, he smiles again. “Good night, Sam.”
And with that, he leaves the room quietly, heading to the couch, and falls into a dreamless sleep.
When he wakes in the morning, the blanket is thrown over him and a cup of coffee is already poured on the table. A single sticky note reads, “Thanks.” And Bucky grins, getting up to grab the cup and head out the door toward the boat, where he knows Sam will be waiting for him.
#marvel#mcu#tfatws#sambucky#the falcon and the winter soldier#sam wilson#bucky barnes#sarah wilson#not me writing MARVEL#gross I hate myself#nothing but respect for my cap tho#my writing#agoldengalaxy#my post
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important question number 3 what do you have on boba and sintas vel 👀 - lekkui
i have... some things! honestly, i wish sintas’s portrayal had been a little more solid in the EU. it varied wildly between writers and in certain comics, she had little more characterization than “beautiful, tough bounty hunter chick.” i hope if they revisit her in new canon, they give her a more nuanced, more consistent depiction. also i’ll be ignoring said comics for the purposes of this post bc it’s my blog and i’m too sleepy for salt right now
but yes, onto the bullet points!
for those unaware, sintas vel was a female kiffar bounty hunter who boba tried to start a new life with when they were teenagers. they both got out of the bounty hunting game and settled down on concord dawn, where they got married and had a daughter, ailyn. boba was 16 and sintas was 18 at the time.
one of the things i find most interesting about the two of them, especially when they were teenagers: ailyn was consistently the more logical and level-headed of the two of them, while boba was always more emotional and impulsive. tragically, it’s this impulsivity that leads boba to fuck up so badly and, ironically, to transform into the emotionally detached asshole we know later on.
but yeah, this dichotomy is seen pretty early on in a flashback-by-proxy, in which we learn that the whole romantic run-away-together-and-get-married-and-start-a-new-life-somewhere-far-away plan? 100% BOBA’S IDEA.
in particular, we get the briefest snippet of an exchange where boba is trying his hardest to convince sintas that this would be a good idea. and, no exaggeration, it goes like:
sintas: “i mean, it’s kind of very obvious that you don’t know what you’re doing--” boba: “THINGS I KNOW: YOU’RE GOOD AT SHOOTING THINGS. YOU’RE PRETTY??? I TRUST YOU A LOT. see this is a good idea :)”
TEENAGE BOBA FETT: PURE OF HEART, DUMB OF ASS
anyway, boba fett and noted-morosexual sintas vel make their way to concord dawn. here’s some things we know about their relationship before everything went to shit:
nicknames! they referred to each other with the first syllable of each others’ names: bo and sin. very cute :)
they got married using a traditional mandalorian wedding vow. neither of them had any idea what the mando’a meant, bless their hearts.
as a marriage token, boba gave sintas a small red heart-of-fire gemstone tied on a simple leather cord. it was the best he could afford which, at the time, wasn’t much. however, it had significance to sintas as a kiffar; kiffars are near-humans whose members possess an unusually high occurrence rate of telemetry, or the ability to read memories from objects. heart-of-fire gemstones were said to be among the best for storing such memories.
SHIPPY FIC WRITERS TAKE NOTE. three words to describe boba in a committed relationship: PROTECTIVE. AS. HELL. absolutely unwilling to tolerate so much as a dirty look towards sintas. maybe even a little paranoid. kind of understandable given how much grief he’d already endured in his short life.
it didn’t save them
ok, fair warning, here’s the point where shit gets traumatic, so if you want to know nothing but the relatively happy stuff, STOP READING HERE. also, CWs for manipulation, sexual assault, murder, and imprisonment, bc nobody in this canon is allowed to be happy :(
last chance to turn back!
ok. onto the traumatic shit.
so! boba and sintas are doing fine. operation stop-being-teenaged-bounty-hunters-and-try-to-pass-for-normal is going pretty well! not only do they have their own functional little family unit, but boba has a job as a journeyman protector. basically think of them as like. mando frontier lawmen. and on top of that, boba has been taken under the wing of his superior officer and son of a local magistrate, lenovar.
we don’t know much about lenovar (like, is that his first or his last name, for example...) but we know that boba and sintas trusted him and that boba in particular looked up to him as both a friend and mentor.
however, lenovar was not what he seemed. once he had the young couple’s trust, he managed to get sintas alone and raped her.
in the aftermath, sintas performed some brutally pragmatic mental calculus: lenovar was a high-ranking journeyman protector and son of a magistrate. she and boba were two struggling teenagers with a baby, escaping checkered pasts. retaliating against lenovar would likely destroy them. which meant not only that she couldn’t retaliate against lenovar; she had to make sure boba wouldn’t, either.
so. how do you keep your extremely protective, impulsive former-bounty-hunter husband from flying off the handle and murdering your rapist?
you don’t tell him about it. you don’t tell anyone about it :(
argh just reading this i’m feeling salty that we get so little of sintas’s perspective on any of this. it’s all just “how did this make boba feel? how did it affect boba’s life?” and it’s like GOOD GOD. this woman is now maybe 20 years old, making the absolutely-gutting decision to keep her sexual assault a secret from her closest friend bc it’s the only way to protect her and him and their daughter from being steamrolled by the system. and like, nobody thought to expand on that?
nope, we just get a comic where she’s needlessly sexualized and drawn to look young enough to be boba’s daughter despite the fact that she’s older than him and ugh
OKAY. enough salt. moving on.
sintas’s plan works for all of a year, at which point boba somehow finds out the truth. and everything goes straight to hell.
boba, finding out that sintas kept her sexual assault by lenovar a secret for a whole year (and remember, boba was probably continuing to work under and look up to lenovar during this time), is utterly furious. of course, he wants nothing more than to murder the shit out of lenovar and is only further enraged when sintas tries to logically talk him out of it. in his anger, he proceeds to verbally torch ALL the bridges in their relationship, at one point even cruelly questioning if ailyn is even his daughter. he then storms off and makes good on his threats to kill lenovar
in the aftermath, boba was branded not just a murderer, but the murderer of his superior officer—an even more serious crime. yet, despite repeated interrogations, he refused to say why he had done it, fearing that doing so would drag sintas down with him. he only insisted that he felt no remorse for killing lenovar and that lenovar deserved to die.
in the end, his efforts didn’t save sintas—the courts seized all of what meager assets they had, leaving them all penniless. boba was then exiled from concord dawn and wouldn’t see his wife and daughter again for fifty years.
after everything that happened, boba was a changed person. it’s as if that spark of optimism and dare-i-say goodness that had survived his father’s death was snuffed out, leaving only a cynical, angry shell, laser-focused on violence because it was the one part of his father’s legacy he hadn’t yet failed.
sintas and ailyn, meanwhile, struggled to pull themselves out of poverty, with sintas reluctantly returning to bounty hunting to support them. ailyn never forgave her father for abandoning them, which led to its own equally-disastrous tragedy some decades down the line.
moral of the story is to listen to your wife and don’t make her sexual assault all about your stupid need for revenge. like, i get that the rapist needs to die but maybe like... work with your wife and make it look like an accident? don’t be an impulsive fucking inconsiderate idiot? maybe realize that your wife probably just endured the most hellish year of her life to protect YOUR dumb ass?
honestly, as frustrating as teenage!boba is, you can’t even be that angry at him bc like... he and sintas were both victims reacting imperfectly to absolutely shit circumstances. lenovar is the real villain here.
never going to be over how tragic it is that these two kids tried so fucking hard to derail their villainous origin stories, only to be forced onto even more brutal tracks bc the one adult they should’ve been able to trust in their situation ended up being a predator :(
#snowberry-pie#sintas vel#boba fett#lenovar#the fact that sintas was never spotlighted as a perspective character in the EU....... criminal
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Guardian rewatch: episode 12
We start the episode in the Snake Tribe territory, which is supposedly still somewhere within the confines of the Dragon City. It is baffling that it took citizens of this place so long to figure out that there are mysterious beings and demi-humans living among them, it truly is.
While the scene is mostly centred around the conflict between Zhu Hong and her tribe, and the ominous warning of the war brewing, it also does a really lovely joy of showcasing, yet again, the fierce loyalty not only she, but Guo Changcheng have to the SID. This boy remains the most precious muffin of a human.
At the SID, Sang Zan is learning to write under a loving watchful eye Wang Zheng. The once fierce and ruthless warlord is now the softest archivist. On a separate note, I am not sure how good of an archivist he might be considering that he is evidently illiterate.
Anyway, it’s heart-warming to see those two happy together. I sure hope nothing terrible happens to them in the future.
Our actual power couple, on the other hand, have done a full reversal into the relationship they had in the beginning; only it’s somehow even worse now. Shen Wei, who properly messed his cover up during the last adventure, has his guard up as he is being questioned in relation to a case. Zhao Yunlan, who grew to see this man as a friend and partner, is no longer amused by secrets, nor intrigued by them. He is now furious at their existence, upset at what he must perceive as lack of trust on Shen Wei’s part.
Shen Wei serves Zhao Yunlan a cup of tea with a side order of avoidance, hoping that by ignoring the subject of himself it will go away.
When in the previous scenes together they were always across the desk from each other, or next to each other, leaning in closely, body language open, there is now a rift between them. It’s awkward; neither of the men want to be here, but their needs are the opposite to each other, and neither of them are willing to back down.
Shen Wei goes on explaining in great detail his connection to the case and to the victim, despite Zhao Yunlan’s attempt to change the subject with a very unsubtle, “your body surely recovered fast”. The latter then proceeds to stubbornly talk about Shen Wei’s archaic ways, which earns him an incredulous “Are you even listening to me?” from the professor. The incredulity is wonderfully misjudged, considering the circumstances.
“I only want to hear you tell the truth”
We rarely see Zhao Yunlan open and vulnerable. I can’t off the top of my head remember him ever being open and vulnerable with anyone who is not Shen Wei. Zhao Yunlan operates on false bravado, aggressive charm, weaponised smiles. But with this man, he purposefully lowers his guard. I trust you, he seems to say, and I always have. Why can you not trust me?
Shen Wei gulps.
He then continues talking about the case, which is the last straw for Zhao Yunlan, who explodes, smacking his palm hard on the desk.
Shen Wei startles, looking hurt. I just… don’t understand what he was expecting. Once again, this is a man who, from Shen Wei’s perspective, has unmasked him on the first day they met. This is a man who has been poking and prodding him for weeks. And I get that it is hurtful when someone you care about does not respect your boundaries, I do, but truly honestly hoping that the same someone will just accept the relationship terms that have never even been discussed is a little bit unrealistic, especially when Shen Wei is not divulging anything.
Shen Wei is bad at communicating. Which is, I suppose, not news to anyone.
“It seems that Chief Zhao still hasn’t given up on suspecting me.”
“Not suspicion, but lack of understanding.”
Zhao Yunlan is trying very hard. He is trying to close the rift between them: by pulling the chair over next to Shen Wei’s and settling down on it, by reminding Shen Wei how much they have been through together, by telling the man that he is being perplexing. Shen Wei, on the other hand, has raised his barriers all the way back up, smoothly explaining that he is just a normal man who ends up being in the wrong place at the wrong time. He has got a polite smile playing on his lips, his mask fully in place.
Zhao Yunlan does not even pretend to have believed Shen Wei, he gives up on the conversation with a dejected “Fine, forget it.”
He makes his excuses and pulls his phone out to make a call to Wang Zheng to check up on the rest of the team. Just as that happens, the SID gets attacked by the magical sound waves, and Zhao Yunlan sprints into action.
Shen Wei calls after him, and then asks to come with. Considering they have just spent some very awkward time together, more or less fighting about Shen Wei lying an awful lot, Zhao Yunlan would be well within his moral rights to reject help. He doesn’t, however. Even now, the trust he has in Shen Wei - in his good intentions, in his friendship - is unwavering.
At the SID offices, Tan Xiao is using his sound device to get past the two ghosts energy beings, and break through the safety measures protecting the Hallows. In other news, apart from being susceptible from curses or poisons slipped through the letter box, the SID HQ also does not have anything that might stop a human from breaking into it. How those people survived for this long is a mystery.
A point of complete diversion from me: I am currency watching a contemporary drama entitled To Dear Myself. It’s about young professionals in Shanghai who get their lives broken in about ten different ways; Zhu Yilong’s the leading man; there will definitely be a lengthy think-piece on it here. But the reason I’m bringing that up here is that it also has Chen Weidong, the actor who plays Tan Xiao, as a contextually neurodivergent rich boyfriend of one of the protagonists.
It’s kind of surreal seeing him here; there’s only been about two years between the filming of those two shows, but he looks so different. Oh, and, he is very good as well.
Back in the world of Guardian, we see Sang Zan shaking off the sound attack and attempting to stop Tan Xiao. He does not succeed as such, but manages to pull a string which activates the Indiana Jones-style set-up with loaded crossbows. It’s very silly; I kind of love it.
While evading the arrows, Sang Zan flings the Awl up in the air, Zhao Yunlan catches it. How close is the University to SID? He took about five minutes to get here! The chief gets a barrage of premonitions which include Zhu Hong knocked out in the future, as well as in the present, and a little sneak-peak into the Disaster Wedding incident.
He then proceeds to pass out into Shen Wei’s slow motion embrace.
There is nothing wrong with this. This is beautiful.
Shen Wei checks on Yunlan briefly, but Tan Xiao goes on the offensive, which deserves him: a) a shot of dark energy right into his chest, which flings him across the space, b) the meanest of Hei Pao Shi’s death glares. This is the moment Tan Xiao earns an uncharacteristically rough treatment he’s going to get at the end of this episode.
She Wei carefully places unconscious Zhao Yunlan next to the wall, calling out his name. We can only presume that the lab has a second exit, as Tan Xiao manages to get away despite the two men currently being more or less in the doorway.
An indeterminate amount of time passes, and Zhao Yunlan wakes on the sofa, Da Qing in human form miaowing at him, his team and Shen Wei nearby. The team goes into a full debrief mode: Wang Zheng reports that she is generally able to repel sound waves, but was taken by surprise; Da Qing and Lin Jin speculate about the shield being affected by the waves as well, since an apparent Undergrounder managed to get through it.
Zhao Yunlan notes that the sound waves ability seems to be doubled, and used for both attack and suggestion. He notes that the powers can be numerous, while grinning conspiratorially at Shen Wei.
Shen Wei quietly despairs. He probably genuinely thought that this conversation was truly over. He takes a few seconds to come to terms with Zhao Yunlan actually teasing him about him maybe being an Undergrounder, before composing himself and stating that compound abilities don’t actually exist.
Da Qing, who doesn’t necessarily pick up what this conversation really is about, but does note that *something* is up with those two, comes to his own conclusions, asking Shen Wei and Zhao Yunlan to stop flirting.
Lin Jing comes up up with this.
“Comrades!”
Thank you, Viki subbers, for notifying the audience that the word “Comrade” is also a slang for “gay”.
Lin Jing springs to his feet, saying that he needs a sample test of a human consciousness - presumably to create that clever brain chip of him which would make one immune to the wound wave powers. Zhao Yunlan very theatrically feigns a big scary headache to see whether Shen Wei would volunteer to take the test in his stead to spare him the pain. It’s an underhand move, but it works nonetheless.
We briefly return to the Snake Tribe, or, more specifically to Zhu Hong’s Fourth Uncle asking whether she is still mad at him, while she is forcibly restrained and bound to a pillar. What is it with this show and binding people to pillars? In reality, the one bound to a pillar is actually Guo Changcheng, which the Fourth Uncle doesn’t pick up on even through Xiao Guo is not actually wearing the clothes Zhu Hong arrived in. Zhu Hong springs the trap, plies her uncle with the same wine, and then goes to regroup with the others, leaving Xiao Guo behind for the time being, because, I guess, it makes more sense for Zhu Hong to be alone when she gets hypnotised later in the episode.
Honestly, it’s easier to not think about too much about this scene, so let’s return to the main characters.
Lin Jing is just finishing the experiment on Shen Wei, who is lying on the lab bed in his undershirt, seemingly asleep. I would assume that Shen Wei has gone into some kind of a meditative trance to try and affect the way his own brain works and emulate the human activity. He does not stir when Zhao Yunlan walks over, and call him.
“Shen Wei? Professor Shen?”
Having received no response, Zhao Yunlan leans in to…
... Count this man’s eye lashes? Admire the effects of his skincare routine?
Oh, no, sorry. Here’s the excuse.
Thank you, Guardian, for this moment.
As Shen Wei wakes up and rises, he lets Zhao Yunlan know in no uncertain terms that he did see through his ruse.
“You don’t have a headache anymore?”
This snaps Yunlan out of gazing at Shen Wei with barely contained lust to pretend that his head indeed still hurts. Considering that Shen Wei does not look concerned, and knowing that Zhao Yunlan’s health and well-being is his number one priority in life, we can conclude that he did know that a headache was just an excuse to get Shen Wei out of his shirt check Shen Wei’s brain activity. Our professor collects his things and leaves with a brief goodbye.
Lin Jing is staring at the readings, checking that the computer has worked properly. Noticing that something is wrong, Zhao Yunlan asks, “Did you see live pornography in his head or something?” Not that I blame his for his mind being the gutter, but also, wow Zhao Yunlan’s mind is in the gutter.
Lin Jing dismisses the idea of mind reading as a whole, and shares his findings that Shen Wei’s consciousness was unwavering, like a dead man’s. Unfortunately for Shen Wei, whatever it was that he did to appear human has not worked well at all.
Zhao Yunlan smirks.
Outside of the SID building, Shen Wei is still frozen in place, contemplating his future actions as he is thumping the Pendant of Pining.
“Should I tell him after all?”
Yes, Shen Wei, you should.
“If I tell him, will that put him in danger?”
I am afraid the the good ship Zhao Yunlan Being In Danger sailed the day Zhao Yunlan became Lord Guardian and Chief of the SID.
(Am I again getting unreasonably frustrated with a fictional character of a show that aired several years ago? You bet I am.)
What follows in the episode is a brief interlude of Zhu Jiu being horrible to Tan Xiao, and making inappropriate comments about him and Zheng Yi. We also learn some of Tan Xiao’s backstory, which expands on his character and explains that the reasons he felt so protective of the little girl was because she reminded him of a sister he once had.
Back to SID offices.
Zhao Yunlan is doodling Shen Wei and the Envoy as he tries to reconcile the two in his mind.
It does sound like he still has doubts that the two are the same person, despite the overwhelming pile of evidence that made him draw to this conclusion in the first place. If anything, it is quite surprising that it took him this long to figure out that the enigmatic mysterious handsome professor and the enigmatic mysterious handsome Envoy are the same person. It is also curious that he seems to think the Envoy is much taller.
Da Qing watches his friend’s mental agony in absolute bewilderment.
Very shortly, they will get a ping for the sound wave energy from somewhere close to Zhu Hong’s home and rush to the scene to find that Zhu Hong has, indeed, been put under mind control, as she attacks Chu Shuzhi.
Here’s another piece of fight choreography for me to tear into.
Okay, good things first. I really like that the actors are doing their own fighting. Jiang Mingyang is generally looking good in combat, and his reactions continue to be on point. Gao Yuer is very flexible, and her kicks are great.
The fight itself however, is another example of the time/money constraints.
The opening punch is… fine. They do lock arms for a split second, which indicates that Zhu Hong properly swung that in rather than stopping the energy, but they are also out of distance, so safety-wise that’s okay-ish, and at full speed it looks alright . But the way Lao Chu is sticking his thumb out and then wraps that around Zhu Hong’s wrist just gave a full body shudder. This is how one gets they thumb dislocated (which I have never done myself, but I hear is very painful) and/or gives their partner a nasty bruise. For anyone out there who needs to hear this, if you ever perform a fight, please tuck your thumbs in line with your fingers and avoid hurting yourself and others. Doing otherwise adds nothing apart from a small but completely avoidable risk of injury.
Then there is this kick-punch-kick combination.
The three moves in isolation are good, but they don’t flow together, at all. I think, and this is pure speculation, that the sweeping punch in the middle was actually meant to follow the previous two moves, then the kick would come next, leading into Chu Shuzhi restraining Zhu Hong. That first kick (which is the same as the third kick, shot from a different angle) just does not belong there as a follow-up to the two punches. I can speculate that it was cut there because it looked cool - which it does - but it also sacrifices any hope this fight had for coherent storytelling.
Then there is a capture and a swivel, very similar to the finishing move used in Zhu Jiu/Sang Zan fight in episode 11. Zhu Hong gets pressed against the tree, and the team shows up to sedate her and bring her back to the headquarters.
Tan Xiao and Zheng Yi watch this scene unfold at a distance, as Zhao Yunlan appears behind them. The SID chief calmly lets Tan Xiao know that he’s been abandoned by Zhu Jiu, and the other man offers no resistance to being captured.
The narrative brings us to the boxing ring, introducing us to it as Zhu Jiu’s energy farm, and then briefly cuts to SID, where Chu Shuzhi realises that they have not retrieved Guo Changcheng. The puppet master springs into action, leaving Lin Jing to wonder since when his friend is so protective of the rookie. If he paid attention, he would have noticed that Chu Shuzhi was protective of the rookie since day one.
We then move to the interrogation of Tan Xiao, which is happening in the hospital set, with Zheng Yi tucked into the hospital bed, even through it was never established that she would need medical attention, and, considering that she would have no issues walking out of the hospital very shortly, she clearly does not. Here, we see some more flashbacks, detailing Tan Xiao and the girl’s backstory, the abuse she suffered, and the bond the two forged. The young man is admitting to all the crimes he had not committed to protect her, and Zhao Yunlan is honestly moved. He sounds almost regretful when he lets Tan Xiao know that he will still be persecuted for his crimes.
Right on cue, Hei Pao Shi portals in.
Zhao Yunlan greets him with a customary “long time no see”, but the most acknowledgement he receives from Shen Wei is a side-eye which does not even focus on his face.
In fact, the Envoy is doing as much as he can to avoid even turning to Zhao Yunlan. He simply announces his purpose to the room in general and teleports Tan Xiao away. It’s easy to see what he is doing. In Shen Wei’s mind, the less communication he has with Zhao Yunlan as Hei Pao Shi, the better are his chances to separate his two personalities in the eyes of the other man. That said, showing an abrupt and uncharacteristic change of behaviour is the opposite of suspicious.
Even Da Qing notices the change Hei Pao Shi.
“Lao Zhao, what did you do to upset him? You used to do small talk, not anymore?”
Zhao Yunlan smirks, replying that he knows the reason why. He then notices the little girl crying, and goes to comfort her the only way he knows how, with a lollipop. When that does not work, he gestures for Da Qing to leave with him, and returns with a familiar black cat and an adorable “ta-dah”. It’s so sweet it makes my teeth hurt.
As this is going on, Hei Pao Shi is being his glorious over the top avenging self. For one, he is actually floating above Tan Xiao, which I don’t think he ever seen him do before. He then proceeds to throttle the young man, lifting him in the air and throwing him back on the ground.
He does so in order to shake the sound wave equipment out of him, sure, but it is easy to assume that Tan Xiao also brought the Envoy’s wrath onto himself by his misguided attempt to hurt Zhao Yunlan earlier that day. It’s deliciously petty; we know that the best way to earn Shen Wei’s ire is by threatening his companion. And, to be fair, Shen Wei had a bad day: this is as good a way as any to get some of that ancient anger out of his system.
As Hei Pao Shi realises that the man he arrested is a simple human armed with some clever technology, and the real homicidal Undergrounder is the girl he is protecting, so does Zhao Yunlan. Even miles away, even when they are having arguments, their analytical brains still work in sync. And, as plot twists go, this one is neat, albeit not entirely unpredictable.
Unfortunately, realising that the girl is dangerous, brings along a realisation that Zhao Yunlan left his friend in her care. He rushes to the hospital to check on Da Qing, finding the ward empty. If this was Zhu Jiu’s plan all along, it’s a good one: having access to a brainwashed SID member would also spell easy access to the headquarters and the Hallows - which is exactly where Zheng Yi leads Da Qing, taking the Hallows and leaving the Yashou to go into a berserk mode as he imagines or remembers Zhao Yunlan/Kunlun saying “I will abandon you”
Next up, episode 13: The Disaster Wedding.
——
Notes.
Every time Shen Wei lies my brain supplies me with Why You Always Lying song. Every. Single. Time. Which means I sing it a lot around the flat, to my partner’s great chagrin.
Whoooo boy and I thought the Episode 10 recap was the crackiest one I’ve done.
#guardian#recap#rewatch#zhao yunlan#shen wei#now with gifs#sometimes my brain is like this#I'm not sorry
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