#i hope some folks will notice all the details from the story in here! if you've read it and you recognised it please let me know!

[starflungwaddledee]

from: @starflungwaddledee to: @post-it-notes7

message from santa: "happy holidays post-it-notes! 🎄🥳 i know you very politely only wished for a few modest things- characters high fiving, or struggling in christmas attire- but i hope you'll still enjoy this given that i kinda went the opposite direction entirely! i'm an enormous fan of your work and most times you post anything i wind up browsing your art tag from tip-to-tail in enraptured delight. as such, i thought it was only fair i give back something a little more significant in gratitude for all the joy your work has given me. i knew i wanted to do a comic, so i was thrilled you already had a whole storyverse for me to work from!! this scene seemed the most obvious choice (chapter 8 of "wishful thinking" on ao3) given that i enjoy a dramatic fight scene 😂 i tried to stick as beat-by-beat to the writing as i could and worked in as many details as possible; i hope it'll be fun to see it envisioned this way! merry christmas! ~starflung 🎀🔔 "

#phew... this is by far the most ambitious piece i've ever posted here! 12 pages! this is why i've been so afk from other work haha! #shout out to the poor mods who sent through assignments and received no small amount of all-caps panicked screaming from me in response!! #me?! draw a gift for THE post-it-notes7!? immediately knew i had to overachieve to stand any hope of being up to the bar haha #if you feel these characters look a little different to how i usually draw them- that's totally on purpose! #i worked really hard to match post's designs and styling for them rather than my own; seeing as this was a gift! #actually think it stands out a *lot* surprisingly- given that they are still the exact same orbs. really interesting to compare to my usual #i hope some folks will notice all the details from the story in here! if you've read it and you recognised it please let me know! #genuinely hoping someone just recognises it on the first page. iconic canyon fight... what an honour to draw for this fic tbh #also thank you to the mods for handling all the wips and progress on this ridiculously sized entry from me with such grace #it's being posted on my personal blog due to length for anyone wondering. should be seamless... fingers crossed. #my art #my comics #meta knight #galacta knight #hnk secret santa #cw violence

[kimberleyjean]

Why are there Infinity Loops or Möbius Strips in Good Omens?

The infinity loop, it's the idea of something that is unlimited and endless, you know...

In this post, I'm going to explore some of the symbols in the show that I think relate to this concept of eternity. For example, have you noticed that the infinity loop shows up amongst the symbols at the start of Season 1? While God's narrates about her "ineffable game" of her own devising, here it is on screen:

Why do we see so many infinity symbols here? Where else can we see this same symbol?

Read on for the places I've spotted it in both S1, S2 and the book. I’m hoping you’ll let me know if I missed any, and what you think it all means!

Eternity in Good Omens

In the book, when Crowley is explaining the concept of eternity to Aziraphale, he uses the idea of a bird which flies every thousand years to the same mountain to sharpen it's beak. Here's the conversation, with Aziraphale's interruptions edited out (pg. 55 - 56 in my hardcopy):

“Just you think about it," said Crowley relentlessly. "You know what eternity is? You know what eternity is? I mean, d'you know what eternity is? There's this big mountain, see, a mile high, at the end of the universe, and once every thousand years there's this little bird—” “Okay. And every thousand years this bird flies—" "flies all the way to this mountain and sharpens its beak—” “Sharpen its beak on the mountain," said Crowley. "And then it flies back—” “And after a thousand years it goes and does it all again," said Crowley quickly.”

This story originally came from a folk tale called the Shepherd Boy. It's very short and you can read the Brother's Grimm version here. (Update: The Annotated Pratchett also thinks this may be a reference to James Joyce's Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man).

If we take Crowley at his word, then eternity in Good Omens is represented by repeating the same thing over again, whether that's flying forever to the same mountain, or having to watch the Sound of Music "over and over and over and over and over and over and over" into infinity.

The Infinity Loop

The common symbol for infinity, ∞, was invented by the English mathematician John Wallis in 1655. Being an extremely popular symbol, it shows up in a lot of places, including the Rider-Waite Tarot deck. Several other uses are detailed on the wikipedia page.

So, where does it appear in Good Omens? In addition to God's monologue, we also see it during the S1 baby swap sequence as part of the Satanic nun's costumes. Here it is on the upside-down watches they wear:

Here it is again on Newt's belt buckle in S1:

Here's another possible infinity symbol on Newt's computer screen, when he's working at United Holdings:

Outside of the show, it also appears on the merch released post-S2 (though a little bit disguised in the form of the snake wrapped around them). Included is the tagline of "The end was just the start".

There are also two references to infinity in the book. Here's the first very near the start (pg. 14 of my 2015 hardback edition):

“He [God] plays an ineffable game of His own devising, which might be compared, from the perspective of any of the other players, [ie., everybody.] to being involved in an obscure and complex version of poker in a pitch-dark room, with blank cards, for infinite stakes, with a Dealer who won't tell you the rules, and who smiles all the time.”

And here's the other, closer to the end, at the airfield (pg. 363 of my edition):

“Adam glanced up. In one sense there was just clear air overhead. In another, stretching off to infinity, were the hosts of Heaven and Hell, wingtip to wingtip. If you looked really closely, and had been specially trained, you could tell the difference.”

So, Good Omens makes a few references to infinity, which I find interesting in itself. But wait, there's more!

The Ouroboros

There is another symbol which also appears in Good Omens and also suggests a form of repetition - the ouroboros. The ouroboros is an ancient symbol depicting a serpent or dragon eating its own tail and depicts an eternal cycle of renewal - an end which comes back to the start again. I recommend taking a look at the whole wikipedia page, which is quite fascinating:

Now, this would be a rather abstract representation, but I think this appears on the wall of Nina's cafe. Unfortunately, in my image Terry's name has been cut off, but it does say Terry and Neil within those segments of the loop:

So we have the infinity symbol, the ouroboros... anything else? Well, yes, there is a third symbol for us to ponder over.

The Mobius Strip

Closely related to the idea of the infinity symbol is that of the mobius strip. To oversimplify things, the mobius strip is a object which is a continuous surface in a loop. At first glance, it appears to have two sides, but these are indeed all part of the same side (maybe we should call this "our side"?). As shown in the below gif, an object traversing the surface of the strip can repeat in a continuous loop.

Where does the mobius strip appear in Good Omens? Well, it appears in the book. Here it is being used to refer to Anathema's broken bike wheel (pg. 92 in my 2015 hardback edition):

“Behind the Bentley a bicycle lay in the road, its front wheel bent into a creditable Mobius shape, its back wheel clicking ominously to a standstill.”

And again, describing the discussions of the Them, while Adam is coming into his powers (pg. 229 in my hardback):

“Serve everyone right if all the nucular bombs went off and it all started again, only prop'ly organized," said Adam. "Sometimes I think that's what I'd like to happen. An' then we could sort everythin' out." The thunder growled again. Pepper shivered. This wasn't the normal Them mobius bickering, which passed many a slow hour. There was a look in Adam's eye that his friend couldn't quite fathom—not devilment, because that was more or less there all the time, but a sort of blank grayness that was far worse.”

Not only does the word "mobius" appear twice in the book, but Neil has continued to be interested in such ideas, releasing the song Mobius Strip in April 2023 (as brought to my attention by @embracing-the-ineffable). The song is a meditation on the nature of time, magic and how things tend to repeat. In the song, the grandfather shows the boy a trick to creating a mobius strip using paper, tape and some scissors. Here's how the song concludes:

"I'm... Somewhere on the strip We all are, walking the sign of infinity into the darkness And I'm looking for signs of a life, in a memory Reflected in the mirror I'm a mobius strip We all are We only ever see one face It's the twist that brings you back where you started"

If you're unfamiliar with the idea of creating a paper-based mobius strip, here's a video on how it works:

Is the loop Aziraphale and Crowley?

To form a mobius strip, you need to cut the paper first, flip it, and then join the ends back together.

To me, this reminds me a lot of the S2 opening sequence, when we see the bridge disconnect, separating Aziraphale and Crowley on either side, only to then reconnect at another place.

Does this mean the bridge, and perhaps the loop, represents our ineffable duo? This merch sure seems to suggest so...

That could be one interpretation of this sequence, though I'm sure there are others. What do you think? Does the loop say anything about Crowley and Aziraphale's relationship to one another?

Put it all together and...

In summary, we have at least three different symbols signifying some sort of repetition in Good Omens - the infinity loop, ouroboros and mobius strip. So, what might they mean? Why do you think it's been included, and so often? Even more importantly, have I missed any? There's endless details to be mined from this show, so I wouldn't be surprised if there are more.

I have a few theories, but nothing concrete yet, so I'm really interested in hearing everyone's ideas!

#good omens meta #ineffable mystery #good omens clues #good omens analysis #go meta #good omens s2 #good omens s1 #good omens season 2 #good omens season 1 #good omens #good omens details #infinity symbol #infinity loop #mobius strip #newton pulsifer #ineffable husbands #ouroboros #Youtube

[lonicera-edulis]

do u have any advice for someone downloading lotro for the first time??? u make it look so cool!!! 🌸

Well, I am not very sure I am playing right. I can't speak to people nor offline nor online somehow, so I am missing a lot.

• First, you will have to type password everytime you go to play.

• Then, choosing a server to play on. Each one has their own purpose, there are American and European, some are RP oriented, some are for raids, etc. Although I've heard people there are insufferable with particular rules. (I play on Landroval and I like it so far).

• There are lots of setup to prepare. For graphic options there are videos and articles.

In Options you will find UI settings, where you will be able to change size of various elements (map radar, quest tracker, etc.)

• For a good time I didn't know how to change size of a text in quest dialogue.

• You can look up how to set up chat as well, and text there can be colored for you to notice stuff easier.

• And once you set everything for your use, you can save it by typing /ui layout save [name] in chat. If you change something accidentely, you can make it look like before with /ui layout load [name] command.

• Then there are useful plugins to help with better game experience:

I have Deed Tracker, Emotes Helper (to have all emotes automatically in a separate window) and Lotropad (very useful for saving commands so you can just copy/paste them, other game details; and you can upload images (maps with specific locations for example, but I put funny backgrounds for my text xD)

I also have Opaque Quest Tracker and MoorMap.

And SongBook for those who want to be musicians. But I only play My Little Pony and TF2 Soldier Theme xD

• Another things I was unaware for a good time are cosmetic outfits (I don't remember why but I couldn't slot anything there so I assumed it's a pay-for-thing, there happened this funny screenshot though) and one bag instead of 3 separate ones (opening one bag is more comfortable for me, and to make one you just need to drag slots from other bags to the first one while in edit mode).

• There is also a Filter Panel, to filter out some loot, quests and sounds. For items you need to drag it into a panel (I put lootboxes there).

• There are things like LOTRO points you can get through doing deeds in game rather than transfering your money (I spent my first good bunch on making steeds faster for the whole account, but you can also save some for buying a game content expansion).

• Folks in chat also remind of codes sometimes that give you useful stuff (to redeem a code you will need to go to the LOTRO store).

• Yeah, since I am a f2p player, I have to write down destinations to navigate easier in Middle Earth. I am writting them down to not forget:

• Finally, there is also https://lotro-wiki.com/, quite useful. And if something is unclear for me, I go to search for answers in websearch or on YouTube.

• And, I see people do play the game differently, you can skip quests and do whatever, but I am personally here for going through LOTR story and watching the stories of LOTRO characters too (even if I am mostly interested in dwarves and hobbits, but oh well). There are also seasonal Festivals in game, they are fun! You will be able to get a good looking outfit and a beautiful steed.

I think I wrote down most of what brought confusion to me first time. For sure I forgot something important, but I hope you will be able to find answers. Good luck.

#gaming tag #apologies for the late reply #it was a bedtime for me

[vitanithepure]

Favorite outfit

Here it is, my entry to day #1 of Wyllvember!

***

First days of traveling together were hectic and filled with so much uncertainty it all became a blur. People came in, made shelter at the camp you now call your home away from home. And only now, after all of you put some distance between yourself and the immediate threat, do you have time to take it all in.

You start noticing details, the mannerisms of your new companions, discovering their little quirks and habits. Like Lae’zel always being up first, starting the day with a series of training rituals, going on through motions she could probably do in her sleep. Or how methodically Shadowheart brushes and ties her hair each morning.

And then there is Wyll. He seems to be the most accustomed to life on the road. From the way he swiftly puts up his tent, to how organized were his amenities, how little clutter he carried around. The same couldn’t be said about his wardrobe. It was practical, yes, the Blade of Frontiers wore leathers that allowed ease of use, allowed for good maneuvering with his choice of weapon and provided decent protection in battle.

This practicality clashed with the frills adorning his clothing, the golden clips and buckles. They didn’t seem to serve any purpose, but certainly gave Wyll a distinguished look. A very odd choice for someone styling himself the champion of the common folk. Yet far be it for you to judge, for he really is an undeniable force of good in this region of the Sword Coast.

“Tell me if I intrude upon your time, but that faraway look on your face tells me you could probably use the company this evening. And I wouldn’t mind it as well.”

You startle hearing Wyll’s voice so close, wondering if he took offense at your scrutinizing gaze. The smile he approached you with hopefully means no.

“Sorry, didn’t mean to stare. Go ahead, lots of room here by the fire.”

“I got the feeling you were looking through me, rather than at me, but either way, there is no need to apologize.”

He sits down next to you, and from this distance you can see more details on his outfit. The leather is obviously starting to wear out. It visibly took a lot of cuts and blows that were meant for the wearer, and the jerking underneath looks patched as well. On it, you notice, is a crest. It shows a merchant ship, sailing out on the sea. You recognize it. 

“Say, is that…Baldur’s Gate? On your chestpiece?”

Wyll looks down to touch the symbol. His smile widens in a way that makes you sure there are many good tales to be told about the place.

“Indeed, you are looking at a Baldurian, born and raised. Pride of the Gate, I like to think of myself, but that is a story for an entirely different evening.”

“You put a lot of attention to your outfit, this your favorite?”

“It kept me alive for a long while, so I guess it is only fair for me to keep using it. A life I led before this one taught me appearances do matter, but it’s hard to apply that when one travels the wilds as much as me.”

“And yet, you manage to make it work.”

He throws a playful look your way. It’s really not hard to notice the charm the man spreads around himself, but it’s not of the stifling kind. There is genuine affection and kindness to Wyll, one that you would not normally expect from a rugged monster hunter he makes himself to be.

“Glad I am to hear it! Now, I believe there are countless other things we can talk about apart from my choice of fashion, as flattering as you make it out to be.”

And it’s true, the conversation flows easily and freely between you two, long unto the night, until the chill of the night air forces you back to your tents. You count this evening as the most pleasant one since all of this happened, and you hope, as you fall asleep, not the last one spent talking to Wyll under the stars.

***

The favorite outfit in question is:

I absolutely adore him in it!

#WyllWeek #Wyllvember #am I doing this right? #it's the first time I take part in any kind of fandom celebrations like this :D #wyll ravengard #bg3 #baldur’s gate 3

[improvised-finish]

15 Lines of Dialogue

Share 15 or fewer lines of dialogue from an OC, ideally lines that capture the character/personality/vibe of the OC. Bonus points for just using the dialogue without other details about the scene, but you're free to include those as well!

Tagged by @archaiclumina, thank you so much! (And apologies this took so long to do, it slipped my mind)

Admittedly I don't have a ton of dialogue for Lehon'a written yet and I'm currently working on a story featuring someone else's character for a gift exchange, so I don't have anything really new. But! I figured I could grab a snippet from one of my finished fics to perhaps convince people to give them a quick read. So here's a chunk from one of my Wondrous Tails fics, which you can find in full here!

-------------------------------------------------------

“Hi, Lehon’a… I hope you, uh… haven’t been waiting long,” he said, scratching the back of his neck with a nervous chuckle.

“Nah, I just came to get a bit of this stuff in me before we get to spilling our guts, so to speak,” she replied. “D’you want some? I just finished this one, I’ll grab both of us another, if you’d like. On me.”

“Yes, I would. Like one, I mean. Please. And thank you.”

“Of course, G’raha.” She stood up, steadying herself on the edge of the table and making a mental note to order some water in addition to their beverages. “Be back in a sec,” she said as she strode off to the counter, leaving G’raha to sit in one of the two unoccupied chairs.

While Lehon’a was waiting at the counter for the drinks, she watched Y’shtola walk in and scan the crowd for familiar faces. Eventually she spotted Lehon’a, who pointed behind her to where G’raha gave a shy wave. Y’shtola took a seat right as Lehon’a returned with the tray of glasses and the pitcher of water.

“Doesn’t someone usually… bring that to you?” Y’shtola asked, more confused than anything.

“Yeah, but I figured I’d save ‘em the trip since I’d have to walk back over here anyway. Still left a tip, don’t worry about that,” Lehon’a replied, setting the beverages on the table and pouring herself a glass of water.

Y’shtola let out a laugh, shaking her head.

“So getting back to business, as it were,” Lehon’a began, “you’re probably wondering what in the seven hells could be so important that I felt the need to wrangle you both here and intoxicate myself for your amusement.”

“I did notice that after a brief moment ashore you seemed to make haste towards the source of liquor, yes,” Y’shtola said with a wry smile.

Lehon’a’s already red face grew a slightly brighter shade.

“Anyroad,” Lehon’a enunciated, clearly trying to move past that point of discussion. “I wanted to talk with you both after what happened in the vault. And not the fight in general, you both held your own in the heat of battle. I guess what I'm trying to say is… when I went to use a dance to heal all of us, I took your hand,” she continued, gesturing to Y'shtola, “and… well, you both gave me quite a look after that.”

-----------------------------------------------------

Tagging a few folks who I believe also have some writing they might like to share (as always, these are optional, no pressure): @azems-familiar @ferrocyan @sasslett @gatheredfates @otherworldseekers and anyone else who's got dialogue to share!

#ffxiv #tag game #lehon'a nhavareh #warrior of light #my wol #g'raha tia #y'shtola #my writing

[mauesartetc]

Here's a lineup of characters from one of my personal projects. The concept was "vampire teenagers".

I want advice on how to enhance their personalities through their designs and if theres any room for improvement.

From left to right: 1. nerdy inventor/gamer 2. bookish deadpan-snarker 3. friendly and cheerful 4. mischevious and wild

Cool! The first thing I noticed is that these folks look really slanted, which might have been the product of drawing on a tablet at an angle. (Don't worry, this happens to me too.) I just transformed them real quick so their heads were over their feet. Also, it looks like you intended this to be a height chart sort of lineup, and in those cases it's best to make sure everyone's feet are planted on the same ground line, and that none of the characters overlap the others. I also noticed that gamer guy's femurs were a bit long, so I made them more proportional. Directed happy dude and wild child's gaze toward the viewer, as well, just so there's some connection there.

As for the brainy girl, you'll want to make sure that her hair strands don't form awkward tangents with her neck, and that her book doesn't obscure any important details of her design. How are her hips shaped? How far does her skirt come up? How is the skirt gathered at the upper edge? We don't know because the book is covering that entire area. But also, it's just good practice to have characters hold props away from their bodies so the props read clearly in silhouette. Gamer guy's a good example of this; it's obvious he's holding a drink with a straw.

Now that all that's out of the way, let's talk personality. Brainy girl and happy guy's personalities are coming across fine, but I'm not getting "nerdy" out of gamer guy. In fact, he came off as more "cool" than anything, probably because of his laid-back pose and the fact that I thought his goggles were sunglasses at first.

Or if the story takes place in the modern day, he could have more modern protective eyewear, like those clear plastic goggles that slip on and off like glasses. However, if you wanted to push the "gamer" angle, you could switch out the goggles for a VR headset, and make sure his drink more closely resembles G Fuel or something similar. And really, the type of "inventor" gear he has will depend on the types of inventions he creates. If you picture an average day for him, which kinds of accessories would help him the most?

Regarding the wild child, their clothes certainly convey a kind of wildness, but their pose and expression are much more mellow. Let's make things look a bit crazier.

And honestly, if I didn't know this character was a vampire, I would have thought they were a werewolf. Pointing their fangs down instead of up would probably help a lot with that.

Hope that helps!

#character design #redline #ask #chinesegal

[marshallpupfan]

Over the last few months, I've seen many folks discuss their thoughts on the upcoming spinoff "Rubble & Crew". One of the biggest things I encounter, however, is confusion over the sudden appearance of Rubble's family. In truth, it does seem to conflict with what we know about Rubble's backstory. Just what's up with that, anyway?

Even though I don't have any interest in the character or the spinoff, I still came up with a theory of my own. Just for fun, I figured I'd share it. Of course, this is just a guess, so who knows what'll really happen.

First off, for those of you who haven't seen it or don't remember the episode, season one's "Pups Get a Rubble" gave us a glimpse at Rubble's history. Long story short, he was found wandering around while claiming he was "on his own". Later, when the young bulldog tagged along during a mission, he did something that impressed Ryder enough to allow him to stay at the Lookout as a permanent member of the PAW Patrol.

From the TV show's perspective, that was surely a few years ago, as the Rubble we know today is a lot older now. And that's why fans are so confused; just where was Rubble's family all this time? Have they been looking for him? If his family's so big, how'd they lose him in the first place? Did Rubble go wandering off on his own, and for what reason? And am I really going to keep carefully handpicking certain screenshots of Rubble that feature Marshall as well?

As of right now, we don't have the answers. Of course, this hasn't stopped fans from thinking up their own theories. And, I said before, I came up with one of my own, so I figured I'd throw in my two cents, too. Let me know what you think!

This will be another long post, so hit "Keep reading" to see more.

=================

Let's assume Spin Master will at least try to link the spinoff to Rubble's established backstory. Perhaps some big construction job went down somewhere, and Rubble's family was called in to help out. Maybe it was serious, maybe not, who knows. But the important detail here is that it's big, and it required their full attention for many days and many nights.

Rubble, being so young, wasn't allowed to go with them to help out. For that matter, he didn't understand what was going on or why everyone was suddenly gone so much. They kept telling him things like "we've got a big job to do" and "you stay here, we'll be back later", but rarely ever any more than that. Soon, as the days went by, Rubble started to believe nobody cared about him anymore, nor did they want him around, either. Sad and lonely, he finally came to the conclusion that he's now on his own...

...so he ran away from home.

Due to the job keeping everyone so distracted, the family didn't realize the young bulldog was gone until it was too late. They went looking for him, but nobody had any idea where he went or even which direction to start. Months go by, and they still can't find him. They're soon forced to give up their search, fearing he's gone forever... but deep down, they still hope to find him someday.

At this point, Rubble's found by Ryder, Chase and Marshall. He claims he's "on his own" because, from his perspective, that's what Rubble truly believes. As stated before, he joins the PAW Patrol and spends many years in Adventure Bay with his new family, serving as their construction pup and helping out on countless missions and rescues. Over time, he becomes well known among the townsfolk... in fact, you might even say he turned into quite the celebrity! But of course, Adventure Bay is a small place, so the events that go on there don't exactly make headlining news around the world. Anyone who knew Rubble prior to his running away from home would never think to look for him there. It's just one small town in a very big world! It would take him doing something in a big city to get noticed...

Cue Liberty calling the PAW Patrol about Mayor Humdinger's disastrous misdeeds in Adventure City, and the pups rush to go and stop him. As we know, the film ends with a big mission, and the pups are later awarded the key to the city for their heroic deeds. This certainly makes headlines, which is later seen all around the world. Knowing their job is done, the pups proudly head back home to Adventure Bay, with Rubble none the wiser that his appearance there was about to change his life...

Back in... wherever Rubble's family lives, Grandpa Gravel, Auntie Crane, and the rest of the family are all taking a break from their latest job when they decide to watch some television. The news is on, and the report starts talking about these heroic pups that saved the day in Adventure City. Soon, images of the pups flash on screen, and it doesn't take them long before one in-particular catches their eyes.

"Wait... that bulldog...?" "That looks like our little Rubble!" "It couldn't be him... could it?"

The news report has their full attention now, and they listen closely to the names of each pup as they're listed off.

"Chase... Marshall... Rocky... Zuma... RUBBLE?!? IT IS HIM!!! It's our little Rubble!"

"He's grown so much... he even has a full head of stylish hair, too!"

The whole family is overjoyed to learn that Rubble is indeed alive and well! And he seems to have grown into quite the hero, too! Wasting no time, they head straight for Adventure City to greet their once-lost member of their family! Well... they soon discover he actually lives in Adventure Bay, so they quickly change course and head there instead! And once they arrive, Rubble immediately recognizes them and freezes in disbelief. The family disembark their vehicles, and they all embrace Rubble with hugs and tear-filled smiles.

The family is reunited once again.

Rubble soon gives in and starts crying, too... but of course, he admits he believed they didn't care for him anymore. Realizing why he feels that way, Auntie Crane explains why they were all so busy/gone so much when he was younger, and she apologize for leaving him alone as much as they did. Rubble, being older now, finally understands the responsibility they held and apologizes for running away and worrying them so much, too. But now that the family's reunited, they invite him to join their crew so they'll never be separated again!

But... he can't do that. When they ask him why, Rubble says he has another family now. Sure, he's not related to any of the PAW Patrol pups by blood, but he knows they all still love and care for each other as if they were. He can't choose between one family or the other, but as it turns out, he doesn't have to!

"Builder Cove" is an upcoming town that requires numerous construction jobs to get it up and running. Conveniently The best news is, it's neighboring Adventure Bay! Rubble doesn't have to choose between his two families; he can now stay in either location and help out whenever he's needed! Rubble is overjoyed, as he now has the best of both worlds at his paws. What more could a pup ask for in life?

=================

Well, that's my theory! I do think Rubble's appearance in Adventure City is likely the key that connects everything, which might also explain why the spinoff's animation so closely matches what we seen in the theatrical film. Then again, maybe I'm way off, and Spin Master's explanation will be nothing more than "Rubble's family is here now because we said so". Hopefully there's more to it than just that, but... we'll just have to wait and see.

#PAW Patrol #PAWPatrol #Rubble #Rubble Paw Patrol #RubblePawPatrol #Rubble and Crew #RubbleandCrew #Rubble & Crew #Rubble&Crew

[photo1030]

Leather and Lace -

Chapter 1:  And That Is When Everything Changed...

OK so this is my “origins” story, so to speak, where it all begins. This is the intro to my OC / reader character. In my mind, as I envision and write for it, her name is Ellsbeth Monroe. She is loosely based on Merida from Brave; awkward and mouthy, too smart for her own good sometimes. She is sarcastic and always says what’s on her mind, getting herself into trouble more often than not. She comes from a good family, but doesn’t always play the part of “high-society” too well. She’s not a “Disney princess” perfect beauty, either. Pretty in her own way. 

When I write my stuff, I have “Ellsbeth” in mind, but I write it as second person/reader perspective as I feel that perspective just immerses a reader so intimately. 

**This is also a rather long one. I didn’t want to break it up, as I wasn’t sure where to do it, or if the events could stand on their own as a cohesive story. Hope some of you like it...enjoy!

Summary:  Arthur is out on a scout when he comes across a woman in need and brings her to the camp.

Warnings: Mentions of assault (certainly not in graphic detail), hanging of a character, allusion to racial discourse (again, certainly not in graphic detail), medical scenario (I am not a medical professional, just did a little research)

Next Chapter

*This image is gifted to me by @namesaretomainstream

Once in a lifetime, you meet someone who changes everything...

   He kneels in the soft earth, hidden in the brush and trees, silently watching. His eyes are slightly squinted, as they roam over the homestead laid out in front of him. Arthur makes no sudden moves, no nervous twitching of any kind. He is ever so patient to wait. To look at him, one would think he simply wandered onto the property and was taking a rest. Arthur may act like he doesn't notice things, but in reality, he sees everything. The homestead that he is scouting belongs to a Mr. Calvin Dent, a rich importer who recently moved into the area. He was in town about a week ago, boasting of his "highly successful business" and how Rock Springs was "damn lucky he'd come here to bring proper commerce to the area". The arrogance of some people really is surprising sometimes. While his pretension may have instilled envy with some folks, it also made him a target. Trewlany happen to be in Rock Springs at the time, and upon hearing of a new mark, of course he made sure to let Dutch and the gang know of such an opportunity.

   And so here Arthur found himself, scouting out a rich man's house with no idea of what, if anything, is inside. He's been out for several days already over this:  a full day's ride out from camp and then two days watching. If this guy is truly as important as he said he is, there's no telling what Arthur is going to run into. Maybe Mr. Dent has guards that follow him everywhere. Maybe he has attack dogs. Or maybe he takes zero precautions and is a total idiot. Nothing surprises Arthur anymore. But its his caution that has kept him alive all these years. So Arthur will sit and wait as long as he needs to.

   But as luck would have it, Arthur overhears Mr. Dent talking to a subordinate about how they need to go into town for a meeting at the bank. They need to hurry and go and get back to the house as his family is due in, traveling from the East, to join him here outside of Rock Springs. They are traveling by train so Dent needs to finish his business dealings with the bank and get over to the station before they arrive. Arthur smiles at this news. If everyone is leaving the house, that means no bloodshed or even contact to worry about. So he bides his time, waiting for Mr. Dent and his associate to leave.

   Once the men leave the property, Arthur carefully emerges from the wood-line, making his way to the barn first. He leads his horse, Buck, around to the back of it, tying him there to wait. With the horse close and easily accessible, yet hidden from view, Arthur slowly makes his way to the house. He's been watching and listening for two days, so he's sure there is no one else here with Mr. Dent and his assistant gone, but you can never be too careful. Popping out a windowpane on the back door, he reaches in to unlock it and lets himself into the house. He takes a scan of the floor plan, and quickly finds Mr. Dent's office. Making a beeline for it, Arthur starts to dig around. But he doesn't find any money of real significance, just a few dollars, which he pockets. He does find a ledger with a delivery schedule, though. Flipping through a few pages, he tears some out and puts them in his satchel. Maybe they can follow it for some robberies later on. With nothing else in this room, Arthur decides to try the bedroom.

   He makes his way down the short hallway and rounds the banister to head up the staircase. Arthur's heavy footfalls ring out of place in such a decadent house as this. He runs his dirty and calloused hands along the handrail as he ascends, noting the smoothness of the varnished wood. He raises his eyes to look upon the paintings and the delicate sconce fixtures along the walls and on the tabletops where oil lamps and candles sit to light the way when nighttime falls. When he reaches the top of the stairs, he proceeds to move through the upstairs living area, cautiously popping his head into each room making sure all is clear. He eventually makes his way and finds the master bedroom. Upon entering, he arches an eyebrow as he sighs heavily in annoyance. In the center of the room is an enormous 4-post bed, with lavish tapestries hanging from the corners. Giant, fluffy pillows and thick blankets adorn the mattress. "Some people live such different lives," Arthur shakes his head. He's never even slept in a bed like this for an hour, let alone done it ever night.

   He looks about and sees what he's been looking for:  a safe. A mischievous smirk crosses the outlaw's face as he strides over to it, crouching down before the lock. He tilts his head to the side, studying it. Its too large for him to lift and carry out, so he'll have to crack the lock here. Arthur hasn't been playing with the thing too long before he hears voices. He freezes, holding motionless as he waits for another sign of some kind. And then he hears it again: voices clear as day. Shit, they're back already?! He quickly and quietly stands and walks to the window to see Mr. Dent and, what Arthur assumes to be, his family; a woman and three children, riding in a wagon, talking loud enough to alert any living thing in the vicinity of their presence. Apparently they arrived early and were already on their way to the house, meeting Mr. Dent on the road before he even made it to town.

   Before he can think of what to do, Dent's wife and children quickly walk up the steps of the front porch and into the house, trapping Arthur upstairs. He swiftly crosses the room to silently close the door to the space that he currently occupies, then makes his way back to the window. Mr. Dent is still outside talking to his associate. Arthur is waiting for Dent to enter the house as well before he can climb out the window to make his escape, and needing him to do so before his wife or children make it up the stairs and find Arthur hiding there. Arthur's heart is racing as he really had no intention of roughing anyone up today, and certainly not in front of children. He turns his head towards the sounds of footsteps on the staircase down the hall, then back to the window. The second he sees Dent and the other man walk into the house, Arthur has the window open and climbs out onto the roof top. He just barely makes it out before he hears the children plain as day, just feet from him on the other side of the wall. The little ones burst into the room and begin jumping up and down on the fancy bed. With what he hopes is enough of a distraction, Arthur climbs down the side of the house, using the rose trellis as a make-shift ladder. "I'm gettin' too old for this shit," he mutters to himself as he hastily climbs down.

   As his feet hit the dirt, he presses his back to the house, staying out of sight for a few moments. When he's sure its safe to move unseen, he darts behind the barn to where his horse is still waiting for him. "C'mon, boy, time to go," he whispers as he mounts the horse and quickly leads him to the wood-line, escaping being caught. Arthur spurs Buck into a canter, pushing him further away from the homestead. After checking over his shoulder a few times, he's confident that he is not being followed and finally allows himself to relax.

   "It's always somethin'", Arthur mumbles, lighting a cigarette and hastily tossing the match to the ground. His face twists into an annoyed frown. Micah was supposed to run this job. But no, he had better things to do. Or so he convinced Dutch. Arthur takes a long drag off of his cigarette as he mulls over the newest member of their gang. Arthur is not too impressed with Micah Bell. Although, he is good with a gun. That, Arthur will give him credit for, at least. But as far as everything else is concerned, Arthur just doesn't think he measures up. But Dutch seems to like him, so they're all stuck with him for now. So good ol' trusty Arthur was sent out on this job instead. Like a god damned obedient dog. Damn it.

   Arthur decides he's had enough, as he tosses the empty cigarette butt to the ground, and its time to head back to camp. He sticks to the woods, rather than the roads. Its an occupational habit. He'd be home sooner if he followed the road, but he's also more exposed, too. He isn't too far along when he hears screaming. Arthur instantly freezes, his hand instinctively goes to the revolver on his hip. Squinting his eyes and scanning his surroundings, he waits for the sound of gunfire, horses, or some other sign of an oncoming attack that usually follows such an alarming sound, but it never comes. Instead, he hears the screaming again, this time louder and much more urgent. Its a woman. And unfortunately, due to the nature of it, Arthur fears the worst.

   He kicks the side of his horse, spurring him into motion towards the sound. Arthur races through the trees and brush of the woods, and it doesn't take him long to find the source. He comes up through the grove and finds four men with a woman pinned to the ground. Two of them each have an arm of hers, holding her in place, a third has himself positioned between her legs. The fourth is standing off to the side, arms crossed and smugly watching the disgusting scene. Arthur's stomach lurches and turns at the very sight of it. His vision turns red and things slow down to a crawl in his mind’s eye. The woman is screaming desperately, trying to get these men off her as they try to muffle her, thrashing as much as her poor body can in a powerless attempt to free herself.

   As you lay there on the ground, you're trying to block out everything that's happening to you. Your senses are completely overwhelmed; your muscles ache and your thighs burn from the friction of the man looming over you. But more than anything else, its the hatred; the hatred that burns in you at the audacity of these men that they can, and will, lay their hands on you and commit such an assault. And you know these men, too. That's what is so revolting about this whole thing. "You always thought you were better than everyone else, didn't you? You're were always so damn smart, weren't you?!" Walt yells at you. Walt is the one standing off to the side.

   Suddenly, the startling sound of a gunshot and a spray of blood shocks you as the man’s eyes who is jirating above you go wide, his motions halt instantly and he slumps over to the side. "What the hell?!", you can hear Walt yelling. Another shot rings out and then another in rapid succession, and the other two men who have been holding your arms down drop instantly.  A bullet lands between each of their eyes with such precision, causing the back of their heads to explode and rain red droplets everywhere. With them now out of your line of vision, you can see the source of the gunfire. A man with the gun in question is stalking towards the lot of you at an alarming pace. Your vision is blurred from the tears in your eyes, your head is drunk with adrenaline, but you can definitely make out the look of anger that burns intensely on his face. You have no idea who he is or where he came from. Or even if he’s there to help you, for that matter. For all you know he’s getting these men out of the way to make room for himself. As the stranger stalks even closer, gun still raised and now pointed at the last man, Walt holds his hands up in surrender. "Hey...hey listen, I don't want any trouble with you. Please, mister. This doesn't concern you," stammers Walt, motioning to you as you lie on the ground still, frozen, afraid to move a muscle, yet your wide eyes dart back and forth between the two men. The stranger says nothing and shows no sign of halting, nor does he point his gun elsewhere. "She ain't worth it!" Walt yells at the stranger, starting to fidget anxiously. "Aw, c'mon..." Walt says under his breath, realizing now that the man will not be stopping. "Spare me some mercy, I'm begging you," Walt pleads in a last effort to save his worthless hide, as the mystery man is now only a few feet from him. "There ain't no mercy for your kind," the stranger says coldly. And with another echoing gunshot, Walt goes down, just feet from you, without any more hesitation and a gaping hole in his chest.

   You cover your mouth and let out a muffled scream, shocked at the sight of the men's bodies scattered about you. The stranger turns his attention from the crumpled forms before him, satisfied that they are all dead, and then finally lets his eyes fall upon you. Realizing that his attention in now fully on you, you quickly remove your hand from your mouth and scramble backwards on your hands, desperately trying to get away from the man, before finally stopping and holding your scraped-up hands out in a feeble effort to protect yourself. "No, no!!" you shriek at him. You are shaking violently now, trying to control your sobbing. Arthur hesitates slightly before he slowly holsters his gun, and raises his own hands up in surrender. He tentatively walks towards you, getting just a bit closer and crouches down to your eye level so he can get a look at you. "It’s alright, I’m not gonna hurt you," he says. His voice is deep and rough, but not threatening. He notices your torn blouse and ripped skirts. Your nose and mouth are bleeding from where those men back-handed you into submission. As he looks you over, the look of anger hovers over his face again, but just briefly.

   You anxiously watch him as the man slowly stands up and heads back to his horse and saddlebag to get some bandages, a canteen, and a shirt that he has wadded up in his bag. He returns and offers you the canteen first. You blink away the tears in your eyes, hesitating before you raise your shaking hand up to accept the water from him. Then he tentatively reaches over to dab the cuts on your face in an effort to clean you up. When you shrink back from his touch, he stops instantly and holds the bandage out to you, offering for you to do it on your own. Lastly, he offers the shirt. “‘M sorry, it ain’t the cleanest, but it’ll get you covered for now.” You slowly extend your hand out and nod in gratitude as you gingerly take the shirt from his grasp. You still watch the man carefully out of the corner of your eye as you push your arms through the sleeves, wincing slightly, as your body just aches all over.

"What’s your name?", Arthur asks, crouching down in front of you again.

Your head is pounding at this point so its difficult to discern that he's speaking directly to you, but you eventually process the words. "(Y/F&L/N)". You look at him expectantly, waiting for him to offer his own name in response, but he hesitates. 'Do I give her my real name?', he thinks to himself.

"Arthur Morgan". 'Dumbass' he immediately thinks to himself. He's not sure why he didn’t lie. 'You never give out your real name to a stranger', he berates himself internally. But Arthur can only guess its because you do not appear to be a threat, as he doesn't feel the necessity to lie to you. "You want to tell me what happened, here? I mean...aside from the obvious? Who were those men?"

   You look over at the bodies of the men who assaulted you. "Those men," you spit out in anger, "they chased me from Rosewood. You know, the railroad town? There was an accident there. My father..." And you halt at the mention of him. "My father is the doctor in that town. He tried to help, but when he failed to be quick enough, the damn town turned on us. And we ran. And...they most assuredly followed." Arthur was expecting more information when you stopped, unable to carry on.

   After a few moments, Arthur gently asked the question, "And where is your father now?" You don't answer him right away, trying to form the words that go with the thoughts in your head. “He’s left back a ways," your voice barely above a whisper as you stare at your hands that are now folded in your lap. You lift your eyes to meet the man's in front of you. "Can you help me? Please? I can't leave him there.” Arthur hesitates a moment. He really shouldn't get involved with this. But the sight of you in such a vulnerable state leaves him completely at your mercy. "Sure, of course," he says and proceeds to stand up. He moves towards you to offer his hand to help you up as well. Your legs burn, and your balance is wobbly at best as you stand and stumble slightly into him, grasping his forearms for support. Arthur hums to himself, thinking of what to do. He whistles for Buck, who quickly saunters over at the call. Arthur turns towards you, but he hesitates as he looks down at you. " I...uh...I’m gonna put my hands on your waist and lift you on up onto the saddle. That OK?"  The empathy he shows you seems contradictory to the initial first impression you have of him:  this large, intimidating man, who coldly shot and killed four men in minutes, without hesitation or any second guessing. You offer him a small, yet grateful smile at the consideration he displays and give him a short nod in approval. He gently places his large hands, strong as they are, on your hips, and effortlessly puts you up onto Buck's saddle before he begins to walk along with the horse from the ground.

   It doesn't take you long to walk to the tree where your father was left hanging. As soon as you see his lifeless body swaying gently in the air, it causes the memory of what happened to flood your mind two-fold. Flashes of Walt and his friends chasing the two of you down. Them grabbing your father and beating his face, locking him into a choke-hold as one of them grabs a rope. You cover your face with your hands at the thought of one of them holding you down to the ground to watch as the other three wrap the rope around your father's neck, tossing the end of it over a branch before pulling it taut, hoisting him up into the air. You begin to choke back the sobs again. Arthur stands quietly, not saying a word, giving you your moment to grieve. Eventually, he clears his throat, before silently lifting his hands up to you, helping you down from the saddle before climbing up onto the horse himself. He gently hands you his knife from his belt. "When I get under him, cut the rope and I’ll grab him." You don't say anything, gingerly taking the knife out of his hands. He nudges Buck forward, maneuvering him to stand underneath your father's body. He looks to you then, and you begin to slice at the rope. The tension of the bond snaps and Arthur quickly grabs your father. The man’s lifeless body is carefully draped across the front of the saddle and he walks his horse a few steps away from the tree.

   "Where do you want to bury him, miss?" Arthur poses the question to you, but as you open your mouth, your mind goes blank. You simply stare at your father's body, blinking back the tears that continually form in your eyes, unable to answer. "How 'bout right here, then? Under the tree?" he offers. "Its a nice shady spot. Kinda quiet an' all." You sniffle slightly and nod in agreement, reaching up to wipe your cheek. "Alright then," he says quietly. Arthur dismounts from Buck, rubbing his hands together as he tries to think of how to do this. All that he has on him that he can possibly use to dig a grave with is his hatchet. He carefully bends to set his shoulder under your father's chest and pulls him from the saddle. He walks back towards the tree with your father over his shoulder before he gingerly bows to lay him on the ground. He turns, walking back to the horse, and pulls his hatchet from the saddlebag. Coming back, he kneels alongside your father's body and begins to hack at the ground with the hatchet. Fortunately, the ground is soft and gives easily. After watching for a few moments, you pull yourself out of your own fog, continuing to wipe the tears from your cheek and join Arthur on the ground. You slowly use your own hands to pull away the dirt that he's pulled up. You both work in silence, and it doesn't take long before the two of you have dug a decent sized hole to lay your father in. You gently lay him out and fold his hands over his chest, before taking one last look at the man's face. "What was his name?" Arthur asks you. "Andrew", you reply quietly. Sadly, you begin to pull the dirt back into the hole and over your father, finally laying him to rest. Arthur helps you to collect and place a ring of rocks around the mound, and as you whisper a few last prayers and say your good-bye, Arthur places a cross at the top of the grave that he's fashioned by lashing two sticks together with some bits of rope he had tucked away in his saddlebag. You look over at it as he pushes it into the soft earth and notice that he's used his knife to carve your father's initials into the center post.

   With the task completed, Arthur kneels across from you, studying you for a moment as you sit staring at the fresh grave, grasping the loose dirt in your fist. "Can I take you somewhere, Miss (Y/L/N)? You got anywhere to go? Any family?" he asks you. You shake your head, but your eyes do not leave your father's grave. "No. No family. It was just me and him." You both go silent for a few moments more. Arthur sighs. "You should come back with me, then, back to my camp. You can't stay here by yourself. If I leave you here, you’ll die, I'm certain of it." You finally break your vacant stare and force yourself to look up at Arthur, confused like you've finally just noticed him there. Before you can answer, he adds "Fair warning, though, we aren’t on the right side of the law. But, we’re better than those other asses I found you with, that's for sure." You sit and ponder his proposal for a moment. What choice do you really have at this point? "OK. If you think that will be alright. Thank you, Mr. Morgan," is all that you can say in reply.

   The two of you travel for the next few hours in silence. You're sitting on the back of the horse, behind Arthur, watching the scenery slowly pass you by. You have no idea where he's taking you, and to be honest, you really don't care at this point. The further away from Rosewood you get, the better as far as you're concerned. Eventually, the sun starts to set and you can feel the temperature starting to drop, the dampness of the coming evening starting to be evident.

   "You doin' OK back there?", Arthur asks, turning his head over his shoulder slightly. "You been pretty quiet for awhile, now." "Mmm Hmm...I'm alright. Just...thinking, I guess." "We should start looking for a place to bed-down for the night," Arthur says. "I'll make sure we're outta sight well enough. You'll be OK as long as you stay close to the fire." "Sure. Whatever you think," you reply simply. You are completely at this man's mercy and you know it. You are not in a position to challenge anything that he suggests, so your intent is to amicably go along with whatever his plan is...within reason, of course.

   Arthur finds a quiet spot tucked along the treeline, facing an open field. The large, thick branches of the trees provide adequate shelter from any weather the two of you may encounter, as well as a screen against anyone who may happen to travel past. Arthur hooks his arm around yours as he easily lowers you to the ground before swinging his own leg over and down. Walking towards the front of Buck, he gently begins to stroke the horse's graceful neck, patting him gently before he looks over at you. "I'll get a fire goin' if you want to pull down the bedroll and blanket and get it all laid out." "OK", you absent-mindedly answer and go about the motions to fulfill the simple instructions he's given you.

   It doesn't take Arthur long to get a nice flame going for the two of you. You sit down on the bedroll that you laid out, warming your hands over the fire, shivering slightly with the chill now coming into the on-coming night air. He effortlessly lifts the saddle and its blanket off of his horse, laying it next to the fire for himself. But before he sits down, Arthur walks over and picks up the blanket that goes with the bedroll and drops it over your shoulders. "Here, keep this around you and stick close to the fire." "Thank you," you say with a slight smile as you pull the fabric closer to you. "I’m gonna go try to find a rabbit or something for us to eat," he informs you. You nod soundlessly in acknowledgement. He then extends his arm out to you, and in his hand is a gun, trying to offer it to you. "Know how to use one of these?" You nod again, but don't move to take it from him. He pauses briefly, as he looks at the gun, then proceeds to set it down next to you on the blanket. When he straightens back up, he looks down at you for a moment. You look so tired, so defeated, causing him to sigh to himself. "I won’t be too far off. You need me, you holler, understand?" "OK." And you watch him turn and walk off into the woods. Your eyes linger on his form until it disappears into the greenery before you pull your legs up to your chest, wrapping your arms around them and set your chin upon your knee. You sigh heavily, staring first into the fire, then off into the distance over the meadow, letting your mind begin to unwind itself.

   Arthur manages to find a few rabbits relatively quick, bringing them back to your small camp. He promptly skins and roasts them over the fire, looking over at you every so often. He notices how you keep staring into the flames of the fire, lethargically blinking as if in a trance. But, he leaves you to your thoughts for now. Arthur, of all people, knows the necessity to be in one's own head. As the meat sizzles quietly, he gingerly pulls pieces of it off the stick he's using to cook it on and offers some to you, but you shake your head, declining. "C'mon, you gotta eat somethin'. Ain’t gonna do you no good to get sick on top of everything else," he gently reprimands you. You really have no appetite at all, but you reluctantly take a hunk of the meat from his hand, smiling slightly at him in thanks.

   "So," he says tentatively, as he sets himself down onto the saddle-blanket from his horse. "All this commotion over some accident, huh? What happened? If you don't mind me askin'." You shift your weight a bit as you pull the blanket even tighter around yourself before answering him. "They were blasting a path into the hillside to make room for the new track to be laid out. Apparently the charges weren't laid right. A lot of men were injured. My father and I tried to help as many as we could. Like I said before, my father was the doctor there, I was his assistant and fellow doctor, I guess you could say. Walt's brother, that's the last man you shot, was hurt pretty bad in the explosion. But my father was tending to another man. That man has a family with 4 children, the youngest is barely 2 months old. He is also a black man." You look over at Arthur with a knowing look, to which he rolls his eyes, sighing slightly in annoyance as he gets your meaning. "Walt's brother died before my father could tend to him. So Walt flew into a rage that my father would “let his brother die” over this other man. Well, it just escalated and got worse from there." You pause as you replay it all over again in your mind. "Walt instigated a riot, cornering my father and I. They were beating him, hitting him so hard." You winced at the memory of it. "Next thing I know, we were both running, a group of men on our heels. I actually thought we were going to outrun them. But Walt and his cronies found a way to cut us off. And....well, you know the rest."

   Arthur shakes his head. "Your father sounds like a good man," he offers, looking over at you. "He was the best," you reply with a small grin on your lips. Arthur is in deep thought for moment. "I'm truly sorry for your loss, Miss (Y/L/N)," he says to you. You look at him for a moment or two before dropping your eyes to land on the fire again. "Why are you helping me, Mr. Morgan?" you finally ask him, your voice soft and frail. Arthur breathes in and exhales deeply, now his turn to stare into the fire, thinking. "There are few things that will push me to anger like that. I don’t take kindly to men who beat up on women or children." Arthur's voice is low and steady, absolute. You study his face as he tells you this, his eyes still on the flames in front of him. You obviously don't know him well at all, but you just know that his statement is fact.

   It's dark now and your eyes are suddenly incredibly heavy. Seeing that you are about to fall asleep sitting up, Arthur encourages you to turn in for the night. "You take the blanket and try to get some sleep, alright?" "What about you?," you ask him, concern skipping across your face. "Won't you be cold? How are you going to sleep?" "I’ll just lean back against my saddle here (as he shuffles himself back into the leather, crossing his arms over his chest), pull my hat on down and let the fire keep me warm." "Are you sure?" you ask, not completely convinced. "Oh yeah. Besides, I want you to get some rest, so I’ll be up keeping watch over you 'til morning." Arthur motions with his hand for you to lay down, so you slowly lower yourself down, curling your arm under your head as a pillow. You lay there watching the fire for a bit, observing how the flames dance and pour themselves over the wood buried within. Their patterns are hypnotic and the crackling of the fire is soothing to your nerves. Eventually you glance up to the outlaw sitting a few feet from you, slightly surprised to see that he is already dozing quietly. You watch his chest gently rise and fall with his even breathing. You are now finally able to study him without fear of being caught doing so. He is a rather large, bear-like man, tall and barrel-chested. His beard is rather overgrown and his hair is overdue for a cut. His clothes are stained with dirt, even before he dug your father's grave, so you can only assume he's been out here for awhile. But judging by the calloused hands and how quickly he's fallen asleep, you can only imagine how hard his life must be, regardless of the nature of it, good or bad. And despite the fact that he's fallen asleep before you, you have no doubt that he'll be up again soon enough to keep his word to look after you through the night. So you allow yourself to finally relax and fall into a deep slumber, letting the blissfulness of oblivion overtake you.

   In the morning Arthur is slow to wake. As he feels consciousness wash over him, he stretches his legs out and rolls his neck. An all too familiar popping sound comes from his stiff joints. He groans slightly as he rubs the sore muscles of his neck. Drawing his hand over his face as if in an effort to literally drag the sleep away, he opens his eyes and eventually looks over to the bedroll where you are asleep. But his eyes do not find you there. Confused, he looks around for you. Its still relatively dark out, the sun still yet to rise. A slight panic sets in and he bolts upright. Damn it, he shouldn't have fallen asleep, he tells himself. He stands up, brushing off his jeans and looks about again, turning himself around and stepping away from the treeline towards the meadows behind him. Arthur doesn't get too far when he finally sees you, standing out in the clearing, the blanket pulled around you, watching the sunrise. Arthur sighs in relief, hand over his mouth. Suddenly, he stops his fidgeting for a moment. Why was he so panicked over you just now? You're nothing to him; a stranger he's only known for a few hours. In fact, if he was smart, he'd have taken you to the nearest town and left you there. But for whatever reason, that just didn't occur to him at the time.

   He walks into the clearing, tentatively approaching you, clearing his throat as he gets close to you. When you do not respond to him, he stretches his neck, trying to see your face. You don't move, your eyes fixed on the lightening skyline. It hardly seems like you're even breathing. The darkness is retreating quickly as the sun is now coming over the horizon. The early dawn light falls upon your face, casting it with a warm glow. Flecks of copper from the rising sun are reflecting in your eyes which are vacant, as if focusing on something else altogether. Arthur doesn’t say a word. Doesn’t feel he needs to, actually. And for this you are grateful. You know he is standing there, knew the moment he started towards you. You are grateful for his presence, for his protection and for his understanding for your need for peace and quiet in this moment. And Arthur finds standing quietly with you oddly comforting in return. And then finally you speak.

   "This is my favorite time of day, when its so peaceful. This is the time of day when anything is possible, Mr. Morgan. Good or bad, the day hasn't been decided yet. A blank slate." Your voice is even and quiet, a peaceful tone to it. "This is when everything changes." You continue to stare ahead at the sun, its red and orange hues now spilling over the grasses. Arthur looks at you, pondering your words before he turns his head back to follow the path of your gaze. "For example, you could be a horrible man, Mr. Morgan. No better than those you found me with. Or, you could be the merciful fellow with the beautiful eyes who saved my life and gave me a new one. Anything is possible as of this very moment." You finally turn your face from the horizon and look at him, a calm smile drawn across your lips. He picks up no sense of fear or hesitation from you. In fact, its been a long, long time since anyone looked at him the way you are right now. Kindness, respect? Arthur's chest tightens just a bit at the thought of this. You don't know his horrible background, don't know of all of the terrible things that he's done. You're innocent of his tendencies, and honestly, this makes Arthur nervous. How would you react if you knew who, and what, he truly is? Yet still, there’s something about you that he just can't shake.

   "Look, Miss (Y/L/N)," he starts warily. "I gotta warn you, my gang, we ain’t exactly saints. I’ve done some bad things, evil things, in my life." You look at him for a moment, studying his blue-green eyes and the conflicted emotions harbored there within. "Good and evil, Mr. Morgan, you can’t have one without the other." You cross your arms over your chest, tucking the blanket inwards to ward off the morning chill, and turn to face him directly now. "So tell me, what exactly is it that you and your people do?"

"We rob."

"I see. Is this a 'Robin Hood' situation where you rob the rich and give to the poor?"

"If by 'the poor' you mean us, then yes," he says dryly. And then he looks down at his boots, kicking a bit of dirt with his toe. "But we don’t steal from anyone who can’t afford it."

"And who decides who can afford it?" you ask, raising an eyebrow at him.

"We do."

"I see," you say again, with a smirk.

Suddenly Arthur is slightly embarrassed to admit his lifestyle for some reason, yet at the same time, you don’t make him feel badly about it either. "It’s up to you. You still want to come back to my camp?"  

"You’ll be there with me, right?"

"Sure."

"Then OK."

---------------------------

   You sit atop of Arthur's horse, Buck, gingerly setting your hands about his waist so as to not fall off. He doesn't speak much, to your relief. Your mind is both cluttered full, yet void of any coherent thought. You have no idea what your future holds now. You don't know this man that you are riding with, yet trust him enough to leave with him to join his "gang" as he refers to them. Although, what choice do you really have? He gives you the rundown of the dynamics of the group, how they are known as the "Van Der Linde Gang", a collection of misfits and thieves, run by a man named Dutch. He doesn't go into too much specific detail, but you can tell by the way he talks about them that he holds these people close. The whole ride back to his camp, you're mulling the situation over and over again in your head. You're hoping you've made the right decision. When you think about it, if this man was going to kill you, he would've done so already, wouldn't he?

   Its late in the morning at this point, and as you are lost in your own head, you do not notice that you have entered a clearing and start to see evidence of other people. You've arrived. As Arthur's horse saunters into the camp, you look about and notice the inhabitants. Heads turn and eyes are on you, as they are curious about the new arrival. He leads Buck up alongside some other horses and halts. He swings his leg over the front of the saddle and drops down to the ground before he turns back around to face you. He looks up, lifting up his arms, offering you both his hands. You stare back at him for a second, slightly hesitant. He makes a slight motion toward you, letting you know its OK, before you lean forward, allowing him to place his large hands onto your hips as he carefully lifts you down from the saddle. Your feet touch down softly, as Arthur gently places you on the ground. Your own hands linger on his forearms for just a moment, almost afraid to be released from his security, before a modest "thank you" leaves your lips.

   "C'mon. Let's get you settled," he says as he starts to lead you towards the center of the tents and tables. His left arm extends outward in front of you to show you the way, while his right bends to corral you forward. He's careful not to touch you, yet you still feel it is a protective gesture all-around. Arthur's attention lands on a small group of people who are standing off in front of the two of you, deep in conversation. Three of them to be exact.

   As you approach them, you take in their appearances. Two men and a woman, all three clearly older than either of you or Arthur. The oldest of them is a silver-haired gentleman, tall and slender, smartly dressed. He's lean with sharp blue eyes, yet there's a calmness to him. The other man appears to be a bit younger, with black hair, trimmed mustache and an intimidating presence that you can see, even from this distance. You can't make out what he's saying from where you are, but you can hear his voice and its most captivating. The woman he is talking to appears to be about his age, standing with her arms crossed over her chest. She has a harsh demeanor about her, clearly able to hold her own with these two men. Suddenly, you are very nervous and fall behind Arthur's step just a bit, creeping slightly closer to him as if seeking his protection again.

   "Good, you're all together. I need to talk to you 'bout somethin'" Arthur announces as you both approach the small cluster. All three faces turn to look first at Arthur, then to you, before returning back to Arthur in confusion. "What have we here?" asks the dark-haired gentleman, pointing at you with a hand that holds a cigar. "This is Miss Y/L/N," says Arthur gesturing to you. "She's gonna be stayin' with us for a bit. Hope that ain't gonna be a problem." The three of them stare at you for a second, trying to process what has just been told to them. "Miss Y/L/N, this is Hosea," Arthur motions to the silver-haired man, "and Ms. Grimshaw. And this here is Dutch. He's the one runnin' this here show," nodding to the dark-haired man. You smile at them in an attempt of a greeting.

There is an awkward silence and after a few moments, its Ms. Grimshaw who breaks the stillness. "What the hell is this, Arthur? Another mouth to feed?", asks the older woman, clearly annoyed by being caught off-guard and faced with this new challenge presented to her.

Arthur rolls his eyes at her. "We'll just add another cup of water to the soup and we'll all eat," he says. When he realizes that his answer will not satisfy her, he sighs in resignation. "Fine, she can have my ration if that makes you happy.”

"And what about space? I don’t have another tent right now," she complains sharply.

“She can have mine for now.”

"And just where are you going to sleep, then?" she counters quickly, planting her hands firmly on her hips.

"By the fire, like I do when I'm out. Look, what difference does it make?" Arthur bites back. You don't know him that well, but it sounds like he's starting to get annoyed.

"Look, if I may," you interject as you finally find your voice and step up to fully stand next to Arthur now. "I don't want to be a burden to you folks. And, I have no intention of sitting idly by and letting other people take care of me. I certainly want to earn my keep, if you would be so kind as to let me stay here. At least until I figure out what my next step is. I can cook, I can clean, I sew and launder..."

"Can you use a gun?" interrupts Dutch, who has decided to speak. You pause for a moment, looking over at him. "Not to the capacity that you are thinking," you tell him, "but I can hunt. I'm quite good, actually. So I'm not fast, but I am accurate with a gun."

"We can work with that," he says with a smirk, placing his lit cigar into his mouth.

   "But what I think you will find most useful, Mr. Van Der Linde, is that I am a doctor. I'm sure in your line of work, you can see the benefit of that. Most towns don't even have their own doctor, yet you will have one at your fingertips." Dutch raises an eyebrow at you and turns to Hosea. The two men share a look before turning to you with doubt in their eyes. It is not common for women to be in the medical profession so for you to claim to be a doctor is rather hard to believe. You lift your chin up a bit in defiance, tired of having to justify this claim yet again. "My father is...was...a well respected doctor. He was the chief physician at the local hospital back home in the East and also taught at the university. So he started my education at a young age. While most men start their medical training in their 20's, I have been studying medicine since I was 9 years old, and educated by one of the best in the field." Your voice is getting firmer now as you continue, as speaking proudly of your father has you finding your confidence again. "The only thing I don't have is a damn piece of paper that tells you so. So when I tell you that I am a doctor, Mr. Van Der Linde, you had better believe it." Arthur cringes a bit at your brashness. He's not too sure how his people will take to an "outsider" speaking to them in such a manner.

"I already look after the people here," Ms. Grimshaw barks out irritably. "If anyone needs tending to, I take care of it."

   You look over at her now. The two men may be the ones in charge, but its this woman who actually runs the camp itself. You can tell that right away. If you are going to be allowed to stay, you're going to need her on your side. She's the one you need to make nice with. "I don’t want to assume any authority, Ms. Grimshaw, nor do I want to over-step," you try to assure her. "But if I can take some of the burden off of you, specifically the medical care, that could free you up to do the hundreds of other things that I'm sure need your constant attention around here. I can't even begin to imagine what it takes to keep a group like this going, but you've clearly been on top of it," you say turning and looking around the rest of the camp for the first time. "I imagine keeping a group of this caliber together is like herding a box of kittens," you say with a slight smile, looking back to her again. To your relief, Ms. Grimshaw's brows suddenly soften a bit and with a chuckle, she replies "Girl, you have no idea." The men have been silent during this entire exchange between you two, letting Ms. Grimshaw feel this situation out. 'Damn,' Arthur thinks to himself. 'This is some 'Hosea Matthews' style sweet-talking at its best coming from her.' After pondering on you a bit longer, she finally relents, throwing her hand up in defeat. "Alright. If you want her to stay, Arthur, then she's your responsibility."

"Miss Y/L/N, we are not angels here, just so you know," warns Dutch.

As you turn your eyes back to the man, you tilt your head, considering his statement. "No one ever expects an angel to set the world on fire, now do they, Mr Van Der Linde?"

"I like this one," says Hosea, nodding in approval with a smile. Suddenly you feel like a cocker-spaniel puppy that just got adopted.

"We done here, then?" asks Arthur. Dutch lifts his hands up in a surrender motion. "Alright, then," says Arthur before turning to you. "C'mon I'll show you where you'll be stayin'" You nod a "thank you" to the three heads of the camp and turn to follow Arthur. You let out a breath that you didn't realize that you were holding and wring your hands a little to try to get feeling back into them as you now notice they are numb from your nervousness.

   "Well, that went better than I thought it would," he says to you as you walk through the camp. "Really? That went well?" you ask in disbelief. "You're here still ain't you", he counters. Arthur leads you over towards a wagon with a tent pitched over it that is far off in the corner, further away from the others. The tent sides are rolled up so you can see inside as you approach. "Well...uh...this is it,' he says. "It ain't much, but it'll keep you dry and out of the elements." He waives his hand around in an effort to show you about. You look around at his humble surroundings and smile. "Its perfect, thank you," you say to him. "Oh I certainly don't know about that," he chuckles, bringing his hand to rub the back of his neck. All of a sudden, Arthur realizes that, now that he has you here, he's not quite sure what to do with you. Normally Ms. Grimshaw would handle this, but considering the previous exchange, he thinks twice about that. "Listen, sit here and relax a minute. I'll be back." He nods at you, and quickly turns to leave the tent.

   You watch the man walk away, leaving you by yourself for the first time since you left Rosewood, and you suddenly feel very exposed and vulnerable. You walk over to the tent flaps where Arthur was just standing and look out into the rest of the camp. As you watch the inhabitants milling about, occasionally you notice eyes turn your way, causing you to shrink back a bit into the shadows of the tent. Taking a deep and shaky breath, you casually look around Arthur's space. They are simple surroundings, nothing fancy. There's a cot with a single blanket, a trunk set at the foot, and there's a bedside table next to the cot. Walking over to it, you notice a framed photo sitting on top. You pick it up and see that it is of Arthur as a young man. "I'd recognize those eyes anywhere," you chuckle. He is sitting with a beautiful young woman, too. "Hmmm, I wonder who you are, Pretty." Setting the photo back down, your eyes lift to the side of the wagon where Arthur has things pinned to the wood. Walking closer, you notice the photo of him with the other two men you have just met, but all much younger. "So, you've been together a long time, huh? Maybe one is his father?" you wonder out loud. Next to the photo are sketches also pinned to the wagon wall. Images of landscapes, beautifully drawn horses, faces of people who must be important to him. As you look down at the table opposite the cot, you see a few pencils carefully laid out and realize that the sketches must have been done by Arthur himself. Something about that makes you smile to yourself a bit. A few books also lay upon the table, along with maps and ledgers. You slowly walk back over to the cot and lower yourself down onto it, letting your muscles relax and deeply breath in and out again, waiting for Arthur to return.

   In the meantime, Arthur makes his way back through the camp and over to the common tables. There, he finds the person he's been looking for: Abigail. "Hey, Abigail. Got a minute?" The woman turns her head towards the voice calling her name. "Well, hey there Arthur! I heard you have a new friend," she chuckles. "A woman, no less." "Uh, yeah...about that,' he replies awkwardly. "Look, I need your help with somethin'."

"Oh?"

"Yeah, the girl's been through the wringer. She's been roughed up, her clothes torn up a bit. I was wonderin' if you or the other girls had any clothes that you could let her borrow for now?"

"Roughed up? You mean...?"

"Yeah" and he drops his head down, not meeting Abigail's gaze.

"Oh, that's awful. I'm sorry Arthur."

"Don't apologize to me. Didn't happen to me," he shakes his head. "Anyway, I was also hoping maybe you could go talk to her, look after her for a bit, and get her acquainted with things here?"

"Yeah, sure Arthur."  

"Maybe in a day or so, after she gets settled here, one of you girls can take her into town, get her some new clothes?"

"We ain't got extra money for that, Arthur," says Abigail, frowning at him, a little annoyed.

"I'll take care of it, don't worry. I'll give you the money, you just worry about gettin' her there, alright?" he says dismissively. "Besides I think you owe me a favor by now."

"Yeah, probably two or three at this point, I reckon." Abigail sighs, straightening out her skirt absentmindedly with her hands before giving Arthur a small smile of resignation. "Alright, fine. I'll go talk to her." Arthur simply nods in thanks and turns towards Dutch's tent. Now that he's back in camp, and has gotten you looked after, he needs to talk to Dutch about the scout at the Dent house that he was on and turn in the bit of cash and pages from the delivery ledger that he was able to grab.

   Back at Arthur's tent, you're still sitting on the edge of the cot. Leaning over, you hold your face in your hands, exhausted and overwhelmed. With your eyes closed, your welcome the darkness and the calm it brings. The scent of the grass and leaves at your feet, mixed with leather and cigarettes from the tent, fills your nose, keeping you grounded and from fading off entirely. "Hey there." You hear a sweet and friendly voice cut through the void of your mind and you lift your face towards the sound. You see a woman with kind eyes, a button nose, and a sweet smile standing outside and peering into the tent at you. "Oh, hello", you say softly in return. You quickly sit up and straighten out your hair in an effort to make yourself presentable for what, you assume to be, another audition. (To be honest, you're still a little shaky from the last introduction).

   "Arthur's gotten himself tied up already," she informs you. "Not even back an hour, so he asked me to come by and check on you. Said you may need some clothes to wear?" She cocks her head to the side a bit as her eyes roam over you, taking in your appearance. You look down at the shirt of Arthur's that you are still wearing, fisting up the material in your hands as they sit in your lap. You shrug a little. "This shirt is surprisingly comfortable," you say with a chuckle. The woman replies with a laugh of her own. "Yeah, that's because his shirt is ten times too big for you. Its like a dress on you." "Well, I guess I just need a belt and then I'm all fashionable, aren't I?", you giggle.

   The woman enters the tent and casually sits down next to you. As she moves into the tent, you now notice a small boy who has been tucked shyly behind her skirts. "I'm Abigail. This here is Jack." "Nice to meet you both", you say, nodding at Jack. "I'm (Y/N)." Abigail's eyes flit over you now that she's gotten closer, taking in your bruised face and torn skirts. "Arthur told me what happened to you. Damn animals," she says in disgust. "I hope they got what was comin' to them." "Oh yes," you nod slowly. "Mr. Morgan certainly saw to that." "Good. Well, what do you say we go over to the girls' tents and see if we can get you something better than Arthur's old shirt to wear?" Abigail stands up and offers her hand to you, which you gratefully accept. "Thank you", you say with a thankful smile.

   Stepping back out of the tent and into the sunlight, Abigail leads you and Jack across the camp and over to a collection of smaller tents and tables where a group of women are gathered. "Ladies, we have a new arrival in our midst," she announces. "This is (Y/N). She's going to be stayin' with us for a bit. She ain't got nothing but what she's wearin', so I was hoping between the few of us we could spare some clothes for her to borrow until we can get her some of her own." The girls halt their activities and all move their eyes back and forth between Abigail and you. Again, you are a bit self-conscious of being judged, because if these people don't care for you, you have nowhere else to go. But thankfully, the girls all nod in agreement and quickly introduce themselves. You are not the same size as some of them, but in a flurry of activity, they all offer up something for you, whether it is a blouse, skirt, shawl, nightshirt, even hair ribbons and combs. The small pile of items that accumulates on the table brings tears to your eyes. This may be a gang of outlaws and thieves, but they have shown you more compassion than "civilized" folks have back in Rosewood. "I can't thank you enough, ladies, really," you gush to them. "This is truly gracious of you all." "Ah, don't fret about it," says the pretty blonde known as Karen. "We take care of our own around here. Don't you worry." And the next half hour is filled with questions. The girls want to know all about you:  where you're from, what you do, are you married, do you know how to steal, etc, etc. The bonding moment touches your heart as these strangers have instantly taken you in.

   As the conversation dies down, you are sitting next to Abigail, watching Jack as he sits on the ground, poking at some bugs he's found. "He's your son, yes?" you ask. "Yep, that's right. That's my boy," she says proudly. "He's adorable, so happy," you observe. "Yeah. I'm real lucky. I wish I could do more for him, but I do the best that I can," she says, her smile dropping a bit in disappointment. You shake your head Abigail. "I've seen people do half as well with twice as much at their disposal. You have nothing to feel guilty about, Abigail. He's happy, healthy and a bright boy. You should be proud." This makes Abigail smile brightly as she watches Jack. Finally she turns to you. "Thank you for that, (Y/N). I appreciate you sayin' that. Its been hard. I probably would have lost my mind by now if it wasn't for Arthur." This statement gives you pause. "Is Arthur his father?" you ask. Abigail huffs out a laugh. "God, no. But he's helped me out more than Jack's father ever has, I can tell you that." "Oh. I'm sorry to hear that, I guess."

   "That's Jack's father", she says and you look in the direction Abigail is pointing. You see a tall, lean man standing with a group of other men. He's handsome, for sure, and you can see the resemblance, even from a distance. "Are you still together?" you ask. "Honestly, I don't know what we are," she replies. "We were together for awhile before Jack came along. Totally wild for each other, too. But when he found out I was pregnant, he didn't know what he wanted. Said he wasn't fit to be a father. Spooked him and he ended up taking off for almost a year." You could see her face twist up in annoyance, which made you instantly regret bringing up such a sore subject. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to pry," you said quickly. "Oh no, its fine. Not like people around here don't know," she dismisses. "Anyway, John took off for awhile and during that time, Arthur stepped up and watched over me and my baby, helped me out when he could." "That's wonderful of him," you acknowledge. "Well, he and John are like brothers, practically raised together by Hosea and Dutch. So I guess he felt it was his responsibility to his family." This made you think about your new friend, Mr. Morgan. You cast your eyes about the camp until they find and settle on the man. He's over by one of the wagons cleaning his gun. To look at him, he seems most intimidating, almost frightening. He's big and very gruff, doesn't smile much. But your own brief experience, and now this information from Abigail, confirms that there is obviously more to this man than the brutish exterior that he exudes. And almost as if he can feel you eyes on him, suddenly Arthur lifts his head to meet your gaze upon him. You instantly blush and offer a slight smile and small wave of your hand to him. His face almost seems confused, as if he's not sure why you're even looking at him, but he tips his hat to you, a slight smile to his eyes.

   "Eventually John came home and we've been tryin' to make it work," Abigail continues. "I know he wants me, but not too sure how he feels about Jack," she says quietly, not wanting Jack to hear. This statement instantly sets you on the defense. "Oh that's convenient for him, isn't it?" Your face instantly flushes, your eyes burning. "You know, for what its worth, there's a difference in someone who wants you and someone who will do anything to keep you. You remember that. I know I don't know you very well, but I can tell that you are clearly worth more than that half-assed attempt that you're getting." Surprised by your defense of her, Abigail looks at you, seeing your eyebrows pulled in frustration and your mouth twisted up into a scowl. After a few moments, her eyes are glassy, holding back tears of her own. "You really mean that?" she asks softly. "Of course I do! I think love is when two people get together and say 'I really want this' even when its complicated and messy. Maybe John has his own hangups, I get that. But its not fair to put all of the work on you." When Abigail replies with a stunned silence, you cringe, internally cursing yourself and your mouth. "I'm sorry," you say again quickly. "I'm so sorry, I really should mind my own business," as you shamefully cast your eyes down to your feet. "No...its OK. I appreciate it, actually." Abigail turns her face back to Jack, then looks over at John, thinking on what you just said.

   A few hours later, there is a bit of a commotion from the direction of the hitching posts. Two men have ridden into the camp, causing all sorts of racket. One is a slight man, Hispanic, from what you can tell, and the other is a large, burly man, about Arthur's size, maybe bigger. The larger man is holding his arm and wincing as he shuffles around to the front of the horses after he dismounts. A few of the other people from the camp walk over to the two arrivals and you can hear them talking. Eventually, the lot of them turn in your direction, with Dutch pointing at you. A smirk crosses his face as Dutch calls you over. "Miss (Y/L/N), we need your assistance," he says with a wave. "Would you come over here, please?" You get up from the table where you and Abigail are cleaning vegetables for tonight's dinner and quickly walk over.

   "What can I do for you gentlemen?" you ask, looking around the group of faces, lingering on Arthur's familiar face before eyeing up the man holding his arm. The Hispanic man grins and chuckles, "Well, there's a lot you can do for me, miss, if you really want to know", he says as he raises his eyebrows at you. "Hey!" Arthur quickly smacks him across the chest and scowls before you can even counter. "Watch your mouth, Javier. She's new, ain't used to your nonsense yet." Javier shrugs in response. "Sorry, miss" he says, smiling sheepishly. You roll your eyes at him, a slight grin sitting on your lips. "It's alright. We'll deal with it later." Dutch clears his throat to catch your attention. "If you don't mind, Miss (Y/L/N), Mr. Williamson here is in need of medical attention. That is why you're here, isn't it?" he asks, raising an eyebrow at you. This is a test, and you know it. You instantly realize that you have to be careful with how you play this, else you risk being run-out of another situation. "Yes, of course" you answer sweetly.

Turning your attention to the large man, "Hello, Mr. Williamson. What’s the trouble?"

"Can hardly move my arm," the burly man answers you, wincing at the pain radiating from his shoulder down his arm.

"Do you mind telling me what happened?"

"What does that have to do with anything?" asks Ms. Grimshaw, who has come up to stand behind you with her arms crossed. She is clearly not believing in your medical skills and is ready to call you out on any mistake you make.

Sighing quietly to yourself, you look over to face her stern scrutiny. "I'd like to know just how he got injured because that could affect how I treat him," you say, trying to keep your annoyance at bay, as you return your eyes back to the man, waiting for his reply.

"Bar fight," he grunts out. "Wrestling with some guy and fell down some stairs."

"Did you win?"

He smiles at you, "You know it, girl."

You chuckle slightly and nod as you step closer to him, lifting your hands up to gingerly run them along his strong arm and shoulder. Your fingers trace over the muscles, slightly pinching here and there. "Where does the pain start from?"

"My shoulder" he says between gritted teeth as you poke around.

You continue to feel about his shoulder, gently moving his arm slightly to see how the tendons move under your fingertips. "Feels like it’s just dislocated, easy enough to fix, even out here." you smile up at him reassuringly.

"Is it gonna hurt? Fixin' it, I mean?" he tentatively asks you as he shifts his weight nervously. Its actually rather sweet to see such a large man be so skittish.

"Well, yeah. It's not going to tickle, that's for sure. But it will be quick." You pat him gently on the forearm. "Here, sit down." You walk over and grab a chair from one of the nearby tents and sit him down. He looks up at you nervously from the chair. This man has never met you before and suddenly he's supposed to trust you? And this fact is not lost on you, either. You smile at him as you catch his bearded chin in your fingertips and look down into his questioning face. "Don’t worry, Mr Williamson. It’ll be fine. I promise," and you give him a quick wink. He smiles hesitantly at you, not sure if he’s more nervous of what you're about to do, or how you smile at him.  

You bring over another chair and sit down opposite Mr. Williamson. "OK. Just take a nice, deep breath and relax, OK? Just try to relax the muscles in that shoulder and arm, yeah?" You lift up the hand of his injured arm and set it upon your opposite shoulder and place your other hand at the bend of his elbow, pulling it down slightly to square-off the angle of his arm. He flinches a bit with the movements, as everyone else gathers around to watch.

"What's your first name?"

"Bill"

"Well, Bill, we haven't been formally introduced yet. I'm "Y/F&L/N" Just got here to your camp." Bill looks at you in total bewilderment. You know what's going through his head:  'Who the hell are you and what the hell are you talking about right now?!' But the reality is, you're trying to distract him in hopes that he will forget about the pain in his shoulder to allow the tension in his arm to ease up a bit, as that will make manipulating his arm back onto its socket that much easier. As you're talking to Bill, you slowly start to massage the shoulder muscles in an effort get them to relax enough to allow the shoulder to pop back on its own. He's so preoccupied by the feeling of your hand along his shoulder and upper arm and that he doesn't realize that you've slowly started to work his arm open, twisting it from his torso. This tactic of distraction is one that you've seen your father use time and again with his patients. He always was a master at it.

"Alright, I'm going to twist your wrist a bit and then push along the shoulder here to guide the arm back into the socket. On three, yeah?" You check that he's ready and Bill nods to you nervously. "OK then. One…" and you move quickly while Bill is distracted, focused on your counting, popping his arm before he even realizes you've done it. He lets out a sharp yelp and freezes, eyes squeezed shut. After a moment, he opens his eyes and looks at you, “What the hell happened to 'three'?!” You smile in response. "Sorry...how does it feel now, though?" He carefully moves it around. "Shit, that's a hundred times better." he says incredulously.

"Good. Now, don’t go crazy with it. You don’t want the muscle to tighten up too much and get stiff, but try not to move it around too much for a few hours at least. In fact, I'd prefer to put it in a sling, if we have any fabric around here anywhere to fasten one. Oh," and you point your index finger at him, "and no bar fights for awhile." You lay a hand on his good shoulder and give him a slight squeeze for reassurance before standing up. Straightening your skirt a bit as you stand, you look over to Ms. Grimshaw who is still standing with her arms crossed, scrutinizing you. “Satisfied?”

She rolls her eyes a bit at you. "For now," she huffs.

Dutch exchanges a look with Arthur before bringing his cigar up to his mouth with a smile.

As the day is drawing to a close, and the sun has begun to set behind the trees, the men have congregated around one of the fires, drinking beer and talking about everything and nothing. There is a calm atmosphere about the camp and everyone has started to settle. The smell of fresh wood smoking on the fire fills the air as it crackles from the heat of the flames. And, of course, the topic eventually comes to you and they all look over and watch you move about with Abigail and Jack. They're trying not to stare, but then again, you're not even paying attention to them to notice.

"Great, another stray," complains Micah Bell, shaking his head in annoyance.

"I don’t mind her," says Bill. "Seems nice enough. Surely nice enough to look at."

"Eh, if you like that sort of thing," says John dismissively, drawing on his cigarette. "She's kinda mouthy."

"Smells like flowers too." Bill continues.

"Oh, well its nice to know where your priorities are at, Bill," Micah retorts back, rolling his eyes.

Uncle pipes up. "He ain’t wrong. If I was a few years younger or she was a few years older..."

Arthur throws his hand up as he exhales his own smoke from the cigarette that is hanging between his lips. "I’m gonna stop you right there, old man."

"What, are you savin’ her for yourself, Arthur?" asks Javier, raising an eyebrow as he leans out on his knees onto his elbows, eyeing Arthur curiously.

“No. But did you look at her? She ain’t gonna want any of us clowns.” Arthur waves off the lot of them.

   Over at the tables, Abigail notices out of the corner of her eye that the men are all staring at you and talking, like they are staking out some new job, and chuckles, shaking her head. "Idiots" she laughs to herself. "I'm sorry?" you lift your head up from the book you are reading to Jack and look at her, confused. "Oh nothing. Apparently you are the new topic of conversation around here." And she tilts her head over to her right to indicate to the group. You follow her direction to see the collection of eyes on you. Some divert away shyly, others do not. "Oh. Well, they're in for a disappointment. I'm not all that special," you tell her. Her laugh is more of a snort of derision in response. "To them you're a shiny new toy to play with." "I'm not in a mind to 'play' with anyone," you say slightly annoyed at the idea of it. Abigail shakes her head again. "Oh I wouldn't worry about any of them. They'd never get out of line with someone here in camp. Well, except maybe that one, that Micah. Still haven't figured him out yet," she says as her face twists up in slight distaste. "But if anyone tries anything, you just let Arthur know. He'll deal with 'em." You look over to the side again and catch Arthur's eye and smile softly. Just he did earlier, he startles a bit, not expecting you to look over, but he nods to you all the same. And Abigail is right, somehow it does feel a lot safer with him around.

----------------------

   You've been in the camp of a few days now when Mary-Beth approaches you and asks you if you'd like to go into town. She says that Mr. Pearson is in need of supplies so a few people are using the opportunity to head in together. "I figured we could get you some new clothes and any other personal things you may need," she offers. "I appreciate the offer, Mary-Beth, really, but I don't have any money for such a thing right now," you reply, slightly embarrassed. "Oh don't trouble yourself about it. Arthur gave us girls some money to help get you set up." "He did?" you ask. "Yep, he sure did," she says with a slight twinkle in her eyes. "Oh. Well, then, I guess its OK," you respond tentatively. "Excellent! This will be fun!" she says excitedly as she wraps her arm around yours and pulls you towards the wagon. As you come to stand by the wagon, waiting for everyone to compile a list to those who are going out, you look around to see if you can find Arthur anywhere. But unfortunately, he is nowhere to be found. "Has anyone seen Mr. Morgan this morning?" you pose the question to the group. "He's already out. Left right after breakfast," informs Mr Pearson, as he goes over the final supply list with Lenny so they can plan the day's events. "Why, what d'ya need?" "Nothing. I just wanted to talk to him real quick is all," you reply. You wanted to thank him for offering the money for you to get some things of your own. "He don't stay put for too long, missy. That man comes and goes faster than the prairie winds around here," says Mr. Pearson dismissively. Oh well, you'll catch up to him later, you suppose.

   The trip into town is peaceful, giving you the opportunity to see what your new surroundings entail. The landscape is beautiful, rolling hills with acres and acres of trees. Its a pleasant day, warm, with the sun in and out of the clouds. You tilt your face up to the sky and let the sun warm your face. The gentle rocking motion of the wagon comforts you. You inhale and exhale deeply as you think over the events of the last few days. You still have a hard time wrapping your brain around your current situation:  your assault, your father so brutally taken from you, and now you are living in refuge with a gang of outlaws. You gaze over at your traveling companions. Mary-Beth is very sweet, hard to believe she is a thief. Although that is probably what makes her so good at it. Same with Tilly. She's adorable and so smart. You can't help but wonder where she'd be if she wasn't with this gang.  Mr. Pearson is driving the wagon, chattering away to anyone who will listen. He is certainly a character. Seems nice enough, though, and definitely committed to his role with the gang. Lenny is riding on his horse alongside the wagon. He's a young man, handsome and very articulate. He seems very pleasant with a good-nature to him. These people are not at all what you'd expect a "gang" to look like. But then again, you haven't crossed them either, and you hope that you never have to.

   The town is pleasant enough, although not much to it. Everyone in your group scatters upon arrival, each with their own agenda. Pearson is heading to the general store, Lenny over to the blacksmith, Tilly apparently has a lead that she is chasing down, which leaves you and Mary-Beth on your own. "Come on, (Y/N), there's a dress shop down the way here," she says as you start to walk down the street. In the boutique, Mary-Beth helps you find a new skirt and blouse, new boots, a brush for your hair and some undergarments. You eye the money that she lays down on the counter to pay for you. You still feel guilty for letting Arthur offer up his money for you. You make it a point in your mind that you must find him the minute he returns to camp to thank him. In fact, since you've arrived in his camp, you really haven't spoken to him too much. You're not sure if he is intentionally keeping a distance from you or if that's just the way of things.

   Back at the camp, Arthur has returned from his morning hunt with some meat for Pearson's wagon. "Just left a bit ago. He took a group into town," Ms. Grimshaw tells him when he huffs that Pearson isn't there to put-up the meat. "Including your girl," she adds with a smart tone. "Ugh...she's not my....nevermind..." he grumbles as he waves her off. Well, if you are in town for the time being, this is a good opportunity to take a nap in his own bed for a bit, he thinks to himself. He's still given you his tent for now until he can procure something else for you. So he heads over to his tent and notices that you have the panels only half drawn back. In fact, they are almost swagged and tied back as if they are curtains welcoming you into a room. By doing so, you've let the fresh air in, yet keep the direct sunlight out, keeping the interior nice and cool. Shaking his head with a "whatever" mumbled to himself, Arthur walks into the tent. And as he does, he looks around, about to set his satchel down, and halts as he suddenly notices how clean and tidy his space is now. His clothes are washed and folded neatly, sitting on the trunk at the foot of his bed. His jackets are not only hung, but brushed of the mud that was caked on them from the last job he ran. The tables are dusted and there are flowers in a cup by the bedside. Arthur walks over to the end-table and picks up the cup, staring at the blossoms for a moment. They are just wildflowers from the edge of camp, but still pretty. They are the ones that he saw you picking with Jack yesterday. A smile comes to Arthur's face at the memory of Jack proudly walking with a fistful of flowers for his momma, you tailing behind him with some of your own in-hand. He carefully sets the cup back down and turns around, heading out of the tent again and back to where he left Ms. Grimshaw.

   Meanwhile, you and Mary-Beth have finished your shopping, and after a few more stops, make your way back to the wagon that Mr. Pearson left parked outside the general store. It looks like you and Mary-Beth are the first to make it back, so you decide to sit and wait for the others. You are sitting on the wagon's steering bench when you notice a man approaching the two of you. He walks with an arrogant swagger, a self-satisfied smile on his face. "Why, good afternoon, ladies," says the man, a bit too friendly for your liking. His eyes run up and down over you as he runs his hand over his mouth, making you extremely uncomfortable.

"Piss off, you," says Mary-Beth. "Keep it movin'"

"Oh, now is that any way to talk to a gentleman, miss?"

"If I see one, I'll let you know," she hisses at him.

The man turns his attention back to you, "What about you, sweetheart? Are you any nicer than your friend here?"

"Nope" you simply reply, trying your best to avoid any further interaction with this person.

"That's a shame," he says stepping closer to you, almost at your feet now. "'cause I could show you are good time. A real...good time." And he reaches out his hand and runs his finger along the top of your boot. Ugh, this man just makes your skin crawl and you can feel your face contort in disgust. But suddenly, the man watches as your body language suddenly changes and your face relents into a smirk.

"You had better move on, like my friend suggested, sir." you say.

"And why would I want to do that, pretty thing?"

"Because I don't appreciate your advances very much."

"Hmmmm....and you think you're going to be able to do something about it?" he sneers, leering at you.

"Me? Oh probably not...But he will." And you nod your head towards something behind the man. And at that moment, the man feels the cold metal of a revolver against the back of his head. The man freezes as the smugness instantly drops from his face. He turns his head slightly but all he can see from this vantage point is the barrel of the gun, the large fist that holds it, and a pair of very angry steel-blue eyes at the end of it. The man turns back to you, and you tilt your head as you speak. "So tell me sir, just what was it that you were going to do with me?" you ask in a  sweetly sarcastic tone. Its now your turn to be smug. "I...uh..." he stammers. "Now, before you answer, I think its only fair to warn you," you start, "that the only thing that my friend here with the gun hates as much as a woman-beater is a liar. So I'm going to ask you again. Just what was it you planned to do with me?" you voice cool and even now. As you pose your question again, the man hears the gun at his head cock back, loading the bullet into the chamber.

"Please, miss, I didn't mean anything by it." The man's face goes pale, his eyes pleading with you now.

"Oh, I think you did." You slowly stand and climb down from the wagon. You bring yourself to stand about a foot in front of the man now, arms crossed and eyes burning with contempt into his. "I suggest that you think very carefully about who you approach and what you say to them from now on," you coldly chide the man. The man nods sharply at you, looking for any possible sign that he is free to leave.  After holding his gaze with your defiant stare, making him sweat it out for a few more moments, you finally look over the man's shoulder and nod to the person behind him. The man hears the hammer of the gun click back and feels it slowly leave the base of his skull. He closes his eyes in relief before opening them, looking at you again. You raise you eyebrows at him, "Go on, then. Go." And you shoo him away with your hand. The man turns abruptly to leave, coming face to face with the person who held the gun to his head moments ago. He gasps as he now realizes just how close he came to getting shot, as the man looming in front of him is very large, very angry and very not amused, staring him down.

   You step up next to Arthur as you both watch the man trip over his own feet to get away from the two of you as quickly as he can. You turn and look up at Arthur. "Well, that was fun," you smile at him. The scowl on his face instantly drops as Arthur looks down at you. "You OK?" he asks, concern on his face. "Yes. I am now, anyway," you sigh. Arthur simply replies with "Hmmmm". "That's the second time you've saved me, Mr. Morgan. You're a pretty useful fella to have around." You raise an eyebrow at him with a smile. "Yeah, that's me: Mr. Useful" he huffs. "Well, better than 'useless', I suppose," you chuckle in response.

   "How did you know we were here, Arthur?" asks Mary-Beth. Arthur breaks his gaze with you and turns back towards the wagon where Mary-Beth is sitting. "Came back into camp shortly after you all left. They said you'd came here to town. I wanted to make sure you didn't run into any trouble." He turns back to you. "Guess its a good thing I did." You slowly let out an exhale, "Well, I'm surely glad you did, Mr. Morgan." And you lay your hand on his forearm and smile in gratitude. Arthur looks down at your hand and then back to your face, and the corners of his mouth turn up into an ever-so-slight smile in return.

    When you get back to camp, you help the others unload the wagon of the supplies and as you collect your own items to head back to the tent, Arthur offers to help carry them for you. You graciously accept his offer and he follows you to his tent. You figure this is a good time to thank him for offering to pay for your things, as he is a more private man and you're sure he would appreciate the one-on-one conversation. But as you both enter the tent, he decides to confront you about the cleaning before you have a chance to say anything. "So I wanted to ask you, did you clean up in here?” He poses the question to you as he sets your packages on the cot. He catches you a bit off guard, as the tone in his voice is almost one of annoyance. "Um... yeah, I...I hope you don’t mind," you say quietly, averting your eyes from his intense stare. "Just wanted to do something to thank you is all." “You don’t need to do any of that," he says slightly perturbed. "You've been bringing me coffee, washin' my clothes and now cleanin' up after me...I didn't bring you here to wait on me.” His reaction leaves you speechless, as you're not really sure what you've done wrong. "I...I'm sorry, did I offend you? I didn't go through your things or anything, I swear." "No, no I'm not offended," he interrupts, waiving his arm around, dismissing the idea of it. He turns about in the tent, pacing slightly, not sure how to give voice to his concerns. "It's just...its been awhile since anyone's looked after me is all," and with that statement, he plants his hands on his hips in frustration. You stand silently not quite sure how to handle this. "Oh...well...," you think a moment on your response to him. "How about this, then:  you look out for me and I’ll look out for you. Deal?" "What?" he asks, totally confused as to what you're suggesting. "You know, if no one is looking after you, and I clearly need someone looking after me, why don't we agree to look after each other?" you ask innocently, your hands fumbling with your fingers nervously. Arthur is looking at you like you have two heads. "Why in God's name would you want to look after me?" You shrug at him. "I don't know. 'Cause we're friends?" He furrows his brows at you this time. "I'm not really one to make friends, Miss (Y/L/N)." This causes you to try to muffle a small giggle, despite the intimidating scowl he is giving you right now. "That may be, Mr. Morgan. Yet, here I am."

------------------

   At this point, you've been in the Van Der Linde camp for a little over a week. The people have seemed to have taken to you quickly and accepted your presence here. By now, you've returned Arthur's tent to him, as Abigail has offered to let you stay with her and Jack, seeing as John is still keeping his own tent for now. "You sure?" Arthur asked you when you insisted he go back to his own bed to sleep. He was sitting at the table drinking coffee when you approached him about it. "Yes, I'm sure. Thank you for the kind offer, but Abigail says she has room for me and you can't keep sleeping out by the campfires. You really should be up off the cold, damp ground. You need to get your proper rest, seeing as you have so much to do around here." You poured him another cup of coffee and sat yourself down opposite him with a cup of your own. The gesture had thrown Arthur a little. He's not used to someone putting his comfort first, but the stiffness in his joints didn't let him argue too much. "Alright, if you're sure. I'm glad to see you gettin' on so well here, then." He casually strikes a match along the tabletop to light a cigarette. "So far, so good, it seems," you admit. "The girls have been very kind, and Jack is excited to have a new friend", you laughed. "Although, I'm still working on Ms. Grimshaw. She's going to be a tough one to crack," you say as you tap your finger on the table for emphasis. Arthur let out a gruff chuckle at your comment. "Yeah, well good luck with that one. I've known her for years and I'm still working on it myself." "Great," you replied, rolling your eyes.

   And its been a bit of an exhausting week, too, as Ms. Grimshaw is really putting you to work. The camp chores are usually divided up, yet Ms. Grimshaw has you either doing or assisting with each and every task. Whether it is washing clothes, chopping vegetables for meals, feeding and watering the horses, sweeping out the tents and wagons, she always finds something for you to do. She's even gone so far as to send you out with Mr. Smith to hunt. Honestly, you didn't mind hunting with Charles, though. It gave you a chance to get out of the camp, and Charles is a very pleasant fellow. He even said he'd teach you to track, too. But with Ms. Grimshaw, it is a matter of pride, a game of wills, between the two of you at this point, so you do not dare complain. But truth be told, its getting to be too much. Even the other people in the camp are starting to notice that you never sit still, ever.  

   At the moment, you are carrying two heavy water buckets for the laundry washing, one in each hand. As you walk through the camp from the creek, suddenly the handle snaps on one of the buckets, sending it crashing to the ground, splashing and drenching you with water. You let out a sharp yelp and freeze, blinking out the water that is dripping from your hair and into your eyes. "Damn it!" you yell to yourself and toss the other bucket in anger to the ground as well. You close your eyes, tilting your head back in frustration, and sigh deeply, hands firmly planted on your hips. "Shit," you mutter another profanity to yourself when you realize that you do not have any other dry clothes to wear. You only own a few pieces of clothing and they are all on the line drying right now. Trying to figure out what to do, you notice the same shirt that Arthur gave you the day he found you folded and sitting on the top of the clean pile of clothes. Sighing, you snatch it up from the pile and, ducking behind one of the wagons, you quickly exchange your own soaked shirt for Arthur's dry one.

   It isn't too long afterward that Arthur comes around the corner of the wagon from where he's been chopping firewood, with a bundle in his arms, when he almost runs right into you. Startling you, you jump back with a loud gasp. "Woa, watch where you're goin’," he rattles off to you in a huff, not paying attention. But then he pauses, looking down and noticing your clothing. "Wait, are you wearing my shirt?" he asks, his face confused. At this point, you are just so overwhelmed and frustrated that you say nothing in response, but just start to cry. Arthur's eyes shoot open as he panics, afraid he's upset you. "No, no, no, don’t cry! It's OK!" He drops the bundle of firewood he has and places his hands on your arms, trying to get you to calm down as your breath is broken, your eyes glossy and your lip quivering. "Hey...Hey...its alright, you can keep the shirt if you want it that badly," he pleads. He hates seeing a woman cry. Its so unsettling to his nerves. Feeling quite embarrassed, you try to pull it together, attempting desperately to stop crying, as you take deep breaths. "I'm sorry," you shake your head. "Its just been..." "Too much?" he offers when you can't even finish your thought. You simply nod quickly in response, wiping your cheeks with the back of your hand. Arthur sighs, thinking a moment. "OK, come with me." And he turns, tilting his head to the treeline of the camp before he starts to walk away. You stand there momentarily, not sure what he's doing, but proceed to follow him, rushing a bit to catch up and keep in stride with him. "Where are we going?" you ask. "You'll see," he replies, offering no other details.

   The two of you take a walk out of camp and along the creek-line. "Grimshaw's got you runnin' pretty ragged, huh?" he asks you. "Yeah," you reply wearily. "You want me to talk to her?" he offers. "No. No offense, but I don't want to make it worse." You pause for a few moments. "No, this is just a test to see how far she can push. At least, I hope that's what's happening," you guess. "Well, she is hard on everyone, that's for sure. But she does seem to be on your ass quite a bit," he admits. Arthur knows first hand how harsh Ms. Grimshaw can be. And he knows full well he's delivered you to a wolf by bringing you here. He can only hope that you can withstand her wrath. But so far you have done nothing but impress Arthur, so he doesn't have much doubt in your enduring strength.

   After about fifteen minutes, you get to a point where the path you are walking starts to incline. The ground is becoming more craggy and rugged, changing from the green of the woods and hills to a more rocky terrain.  "Mr. Morgan, where are we going?" you push, almost a whine in your voice. "Just trust me," he answers and continues to lead the way up the hill. After climbing another ten minutes, you reach the top of the hill and see where there is an opening in the rock-face. It almost looks like a doorway. Arthur leads you over to it and pauses, turning back over his shoulder at you before he grins and walks through it. Rolling your eyes in annoyance, you follow him. When you walk forward, you see that the rock-face opens up to reveal a grand view of the entire hillside below you. You hadn't noticed the steady incline as you were walking, but now, you are on higher ground and looking down and out over the great expanse of the meadows beneath you. From this view, the countryside seems to go on and on forever. And what adds to the breathtaking view, is that the sun is starting its decent for the day. It hangs low, a huge red ball hovering in the sky, bright hues of gold, orange and red cascading over everything.  

   You stand there in stunned silence, taking in the scenery around you which instantly puts you at ease and calms your nerves. Your jaw drops slightly in awe of the view, making you forget any of the previous aggravations. Arthur says nothing, but slowly walks over to the edge of the drop-off and sits, his legs dangling over the side. Staring at his back for a second, you eventually move to join him, slowly lowering yourself down to the ground next to him.

   "It's not the 'blank slate of the early dawn' that you like so much," he says with a slight flourish of his hand '...but I think its still pretty nice," his voice is quiet and contemplative as he tilts his head in emphasis, staring out straight ahead before he turns to look at you out of the corner of his eye. His statement makes you grin. You both sit quietly for a few moments before you ask him "How did you find this place?" He inhales deeply, thinking about his answer. "Oh, wanderin' 'round. Actually, I come here a lot, you know, when I need to clear my head and all." You curl your lips into an understanding smirk and nod in agreement. "Do me a favor, would ya?" he asks. "Don't tell anyone about this place. Its kinda 'my spot'. Well, I suppose now its your spot too," he chuckles. At this you actually start to giggle. "OK, deal. Thank you for bringing me here, Mr. Morgan." "Sure. Its like you told me the other day: you look out for me and I'll look out for you, right?" You both turn and look to each other now, smiling. "Right..." you answer, before you both turn back towards the skyline.

...and that is when everything changed...

#arthur morgan #arthur morgan x reader #arthur morgan x female reader #arthur morgan x f!reader #rdr2 #rdr2 fanfic #red dead redemption 2 #arthur morgan x oc

[blindbeta]

Would it be ok to portray a deafblind character as not wanting to be blind specifically because vision is important to Deaf culture? There are other blind characters and not all of them feel the same way about being blind. Also the deafblind character doesn’t get cured, and their attitude is more like “yeah I don’t like it but I need to learn to accept it” instead of thinking their life is ruined or something

A DeafBlind Character Not Wanting to be Blind

Note: DeafBlind is written with an uppercase D and B with respect to Deaf culture and for the ease of screen-readers respectively.

I am not DeafBlind myself and so I’m not sure. I think all the additions you listed could be beneficial, but I don’t have a way to measure how beneficial. I don’t feel comfortable giving an answer about blindness here because I am not DeafBlind. However, I didn’t want to leave you with nothing, so I wanted to share a few links.

Vision is indeed important to Deaf culture. However, there are Deaf people like YouTuber Jessica Kellgren-Fozard who are blind in one eye or otherwise visually impaired. There are DeafBlind people such as writer Elsa Sjunneson. They are still part of Deaf culture.

A character who loses vision may have all manner of difficult, alternating feelings about it, particularly when learning new ways of doing daily tasks or if the vision loss progresses over time. However, realistic, messy feelings can still read as ableist (or not) depending entirely on how it is written and the way the story treats blindness and DeafBlindness. My suggestion is to try to find DeafBlind people online and listen to their experiences, perhaps even get someone to read your story. If you’d feel more comfortable, you could also ask blind people who aren’t Deaf to read your story as well, as extra readers. It sounds like that might give you more peace of mind.

Good luck and I hope this helps some.

Would any DeafBlind people like to add anything? Reply, reblog, or send an ask or message with your thoughts and I will add them here.

@wolfrayets added:

I am only Deaf, but I've found that since Deaf culture tends to be proud of/unapologetic for their Deafness (in terms of culture and a very widely accepted social model of disability), many DeafBlind people I meet in Deaf spaces are similarly unapologetic and outspoken about being DeafBlind. Deaf people communicate with DeafBlind people by signing against their palms, or in cases of low vision, DeafBlind people can often still make out ASL because it's based less on detail and more on overarching handshapes. Check out adapted ASL, tactile ASL, tracking ASL. So they definitely wouldn't need to be language deprived or isolated from the Deaf community if they are DeafBlind.

BlindBeta: I also notice something similar with a lot of blind folks, so I think this would be important for DeafBlind characters. Perhaps the character meeting DeafBlind people in the community might help them feel more confident.

This has been cross-posted on WordPress.

#blind #blind characters #deafblind #ask #anon ask #scheduled post #deaf #deaf culture

[aconflagrationofmyown]

How did you become such a good writer? You have an amazing imagination and such a way with words that really makes me feel like "oh shit, I'm physically in the world of this book experiencing what the characters are." You write like nobody else I have seen in the Elvis fanficdom (I truly mean that) and I am humbled by your talent.

Please tell me a little more about your writing process! I hope to one day write even half as good as you.

(Also I need you to continue the Elvis x Godfather AU fic, kthx. Pretty please? I will even help you with Italian dialogue, lol. I'll do anything for it. Here, take my firstborn. :P )

Oh my darling, this is a downright humbling ask. Between insecurity and imposter syndrome, it’s a wonder I manage to keep enough words from being deleted that I’ve actually got series of fics in progress. 🥶 So truly, I’m astounded and touched by your compliments and I adore chatting writing, so let’s see if some rambling of thoughts will be of any aid to you. 🌹 I just snuck a peak at your current fic (forgive me that I’m not in a season where I am reading much, it’s nothing personal, just business that is currently keeping me from exploring more) and I was immediately sucked in by how gorgeously you describe action? It’s poetic yet not overburdened, the way you write people’s movements and elements moving, makes me envy you that. I often feel my descriptions are quite Spartan most the time, so hearing it mentioned as transporting is always a surprise. I don’t think of it as my strong suite. I’ve no real notion how to write a kiss, for instance. Ha.

So, stories…They come to me usually as intriguing beginnings, with an occasional outpost of a stellar scene or two in the middle, and then the muses sit back and cackle like malicious banshees as I beg them for an ending. So, most of my stories are started in faith, often abandoned halfway through, as no clear ending comes. But so far in this fandom I’ve made the most progress and due to the help of this community of friends, I actually have a plot end for both my works. I know some people think of an end and concoct plots around them, and for some it all seems to come at once. And then there’s me with the beginnings and no road map. Which camp do you consider yourself to be in? 😃

And then there’s the work of plotting and outlining which I wish I was better at, as it appeals to me. But the minute I do it, all creative force dies within me. So it’s all buried in my lil noggin for safe keeping until the time comes to write the chapter. What I do plan out, however, is an emotional arc to a story, and a redemption/devolution plot for each main character. Knowing what growth I want to happen when, and what setbacks occur at what times has given me the strangest freedom of settings to accomplish it in -often none I would have plotted out intentionally. But that way I’m not forcing my relationship to grow in the confines of my plot, but rather my plot is the vehicle for the relationship to form and grow. I adore motifs, and I try to pay attention to how they appear in real life. I believe life is very subtly cyclical and the stories that ring truest to me are likewise.

I have a nasty habit in real life of observing everything like it’s witting material. Long before I started writing, I used to feel rather like a detached observer of other people’s reactions to life. It made me notice types of people, and while you can’t peg folks (much as I find personality tests a rather fun attempt) I do hold fast to the fact that in a story, if someone changes for worse or better, if they react for worse or better, it needs to be in character. It’s amazing how much this little detail can help something feel real. You can have a character fail, but if they fail in a way that doesn’t ring true to what we know of them and their motivations, it’ll feel like unnecessary drama to me. Does that make sense? Likewise with the victories -which victories will mean much or little to them? Does it ring true as being fully what they’ve always worked for? And who are they working for? Their own happiness and success? Or do they find more satisfaction in aiding others to reach the summit? Anyway, watching and identifying types of people and keeping those traits consistent on paper is easier said than done, as I’m learning every day. 😂

Lastly, (I suppose) I’d credit any vocabulary, thematic potency and rich setting to the sheer amount of old books and songs I’ve grown up immersed in. My favorite authors are Stevenson, Dumas and Mitchell. All of them set their stories in the middle of massive, world-changing events, yet their stories remained personal. Culture and necessity shape a person as much as taste and upbringing or anything else, and it’s a delight to try to immerse myself in a world different from my own. Basic goodness and basic evil may always remain, but the shades of grey and the loved ones getting caught in events far more powerful than their own strengths and best intentions yet trying their utmost to do well in the times they have been placed in: those are the stories and themes I adore the most in songs and literature. And they’re starkly abundant in dear Elvis’ near mythic life arc. So, here I am weaving tales about what could have been. 🥹

My messages are always open for a grand ole chat about writing, if you ever wanna pop in. I love you dearly and appreciate you so much. And The Godfather AU?! Oh how it has my heart still! I’ll totally take you up on the dialogue and any other suggestions you have that might ignite the smoldering concept. 😘

#love notes #interactions #wordcraft

[redux-iterum]

when you say “second arc”, do you mean like how the canon books have arcs (the prophecies begin, power of three, etc)? if so, does that mean you’re actually going to be writing 3-4 major warriors arcs so like… 20+ books?

The plan for now is to write three arcs for Iterum, their equivalents being The Prophecies Begin, The New Prophecy, and Power of Three. Lynx may end up continuing this series into the rest of the arcs, but that's a "may", not a "will". For now, her main task is organizing families and characters in the background and writing the lore posts for the history of the Clans. I will be the actual author of the Iterum books up to the PO3-equivalent.

We don't know how many books will exist for the next two arcs. Sparks in the Sky, the first arc, has four books planned, so we're halfway through this part of the story (insomuch as how much has been written and completed). I would like to have four books per arc, but I don't guarantee that will be the set number. There could be three, there could be six. It all depends on how we hammer out the overarching story per arc and how much room it needs to be told. If I can help it, the pauses between each book, even from the end of an arc to the start of the next, will only be six months, but that too is not a promise. It's just my hope and intention. Lynx won't let me go any faster. Something about "pacing myself" and "not burning out" or whatever.

While I'm here talking about the future, I want to say one more thing - a little notice, or warning, or however you want to put it, so that all the information I feel I should give in advance is in one post. The notice is that the second and third arcs have some very significant differences from canon that stem from creative decisions and the lore of this universe.

The main cast of the second arc has several very big changes in its roster, with some characters that weren't relevant at all in canon getting the spotlight and former protagonists being placed in lesser roles. I expect there to be a bit of an outcry for some of the changes, but we're doing our best to give the replaced cats respectable places in the story and their Clans. I won't go into further detail just yet; we'll get more into this when the fourth book of SitS rolls around and comes closer to its conclusion. The plot is largely the same, it's just the characters that have been altered the most.

The third arc's story takes much more liberties due to the significance of the lore of Iterum within the setting. The main cast is expanded a good deal, with the original main characters retaining their places and new characters popping up to share the spotlight here and there. The differences of this arc, I'm much more confident about, because it's a culmination of culture and belief coming to a head and becoming the focal point of the story. Further details, I'm keeping under my hat until we're well into the second arc. Don't need to spoil things so far in the future! Regardless, I think folks will enjoy it, and I'm very excited to eventually get to that part of the story of the Clans.

That's about all I have to say for now. Any further questions are welcome, but if they lean into spoilers, you know the game we play with those at this point.

#also im just teasing lynx #shes generally right about our pacing #im just impatient #ask #anonymous #i speak #important

[captain-astors]

Hi, can you do 003 for Arima Kishou please?

I ABSOLUTELY CAN! Fun fact this is about the length of Edgar Allen Poe’s The Telltale Heart. God I was hoping someone would ask for him yet, despite my excitement I feel like I'm going to disappoint the Arima likers and dislikers twain, but no matter. 

Mood for this entire thing: Screaming.

Behold the most horrendous thing I’ve ever written. 

How I feel about this character: all caps warning for about a paragraph bellow the first sentence.

Places him in a shoebox with no notable amount of affection nor violence, simply acceptance that this is where he belongs. 

THIS IS A MAN THAT SLEEPS WITH BLANK, WHITE SOCKS ON IN THE MOST NEUTRAL, BORING NIGHTCLOTHES YOU’VE EVER SEEN. AS A CHILD ANY POTENTIAL EXTRAVAGANT FASHION TASTES WERE FORCEFULLY SUCKED OUT AND ABSORBED BY SOUTA LIKE A BLACK HOLE OF REPRESSED HOMOSEXUALITY AND TOXIC MASCULINITY, AND THE SCRAPS OF ANYTHING BARELY NOTICEABLE LEFT BEHIND WERE TAKEN BY RIZE TO MAKE THAT LOVELY DRESS. HIS UNIQUE HAIR COLORS ARE A GIFT OF PITY FROM GOD BECAUSE OTHERWISE HE WOULD BE SO TERRIBLY NON-DESCRIPT THAT ABSOLUTELY NO ONE COULD RECOGNIZE HIM, EVEN IF THEY’D KNOWN HIM FOR YEARS. HIS FACE AND CLOTHING ARE TOO NEUTRAL TO BE IDENTIFIED BY THE MOST ADVANCED AI. GOODNIGHT. Okay. Now that I’ve cleared up the feral screaming, funny story. I don’t know if I’ve ever detailed my terrible facial blindness here (probably not, it’s not a crucial detail about myself) but that applies to fictional characters as well. Things like moles, hairstyles, clothing, and speaking mannerisms are lifesavers. I do genuinely believe him to be a very neutral looking character, but half the reason for my rant above was the fact that I kept wondering “Why is Kaneki fighting himself” for 2 pages of the end of the first manga, and did not recognize him as the same guy for a truly unfortunate number of chapters in the second despite moving on to :re very quickly after finishing the first tg. Then I thought he and tatara were the same person for a while. It was bad. And I don’t know why the glasses didn’t mark out SOMETHING for me, I think I’m just too used to seeing them on and off faces at different times that it just… didn’t register? But I really don’t have any good justification for it. 

I don’t understand why some people hate him so violently but at the same time his adult version falls into the “a guy” category for me. Had his moments, but I definitely could’ve found more constructed sympathy for his plight had the story not been so afraid of allowing the reader to be bored by focusing on someone else that it wasn’t constantly bashing me over the head with “but don’t you care about how KANEKI is affected by this?!?” No actually I don’t, because I understand him well enough from the last hundred-something chapters that have revolved around this guy to have a good idea of what’s going on inside his head. Arima remains a mystery, his choice to put the responsibility of the fate of this all on Kaneki instead of someone else when he passes or trying to tough out his inevitable fate up to interpretation, and I think that’s a portion of the reason he’s passionately disliked by a large portion of the fandom. This is all speculations of a madman, but from my point of view his mistreatment of Haise/Kaneki/Whatever, while ultimately motivated by the desire to exploit, wasn’t the byproduct of explicit malevolence, but rather in that aching pattern of every garden child, say it with me folks, being afraid to/not knowing how to healthily love, or even care about a person in a genuine way that doesn’t end up hurting both people involved. He did care about Kaneki, but first and foremost he felt a responsibility to use him. Tangent to more general and less Arima-focused thoughts, this isn’t to say that writing a character in a way that leaves things up to imagination is a bad thing in writing. In fact, I really enjoy taking the broken pieces of a puzzle and attaching them together into an image of my own liking after being left with little to work with (Hi Shikorae), but the thing about Tokyo Ghoul is that this is the case for a lot of characters. It’s the inverse of the Arcane (the show not the game) problem, instead of every side character being so deeply fleshed out when they don’t always need to be, the vast majority of side characters are left to interpretation though some of them logically shouldn’t, we could’ve been given a little more to work with… maybe. I’ll never know if this is just my sadness over the lack of content for my own favorites when I speak like this but still, I feel like every character I’m attached to is left in this awkward “almost works perfectly but not quite” area as a byproduct of lack of attention, whereas Kaneki does the same but as a byproduct of too much (Juuzou lives in the middle ground good for him). I am filled with righteous fury that is only quelled by unending love for this story, somebody sedate me. 

Not the worst option for “One-Eyed King” placeholder but I’m not even going to pretend I understand the why of it enough to criticize or praise. I don’t think it was necessary if the One-Eyed King was more of a symbolic concept of revolution than a person to begin with but honestly I could just be missing content. Such a cool name for something that seems ultimately underutilized, but I do like the note of Arima being unknown as the One-Eyed King when, similarly, unlike his brother’s, his revolution is a quiet, bitter and clever thing that takes years instead of equally clever but flashy, impossible to ignore. I could ramble for hours on the dichotomy of their plans to take down the circumstances and system of the origin, the merit of taking things down from the inside out and planning for the generation to come, vs. screaming the injustices of the world in everyone’s face, making a mockery of it all until you can’t look away because it’s always been everywhere but now you can see it too. How unfortunate the conclusion of their plans both ended up in the hands of Kaneki to execute, by design or otherwise.

Oh hey back to my issues with the lack of focus, those were almost completely gone with Jack! I love Jack-Arima and half of the reason for it is his dynamic with Fura. I live for the extremely controlled, calm, quiet, powerful and intelligent yet isolated Arima being temporarily pulled out of his almost machine-like world by the aimless yet fun-loving Taishi, who in turn learns what it means to be striving to protect something, and what it means to take a life. My qualm with it? I wish it was longer. It would’ve hurt even more to know he had to live the rest of his short life pressed back into a stifling role if he actually got to learn, even briefly, what it means to live normally. But, something something in order to know how to love you must be loved, the world didn’t raise him right and even that small period of time would have thrown a ripple in the chain of events that led to his choices and bad father figure role. Even so I like to imagine he looks back on those few weeks where he got to try to “live normally” (even if it trailed right back to ghoul extermination) with fondness.

Anyways to summarize Arima is another one of those characters I am choosing to be oh so normal about. I say choosing but I couldn’t stop if I wanted to. Just a guy, but in a way that makes me want to pelt him with beanbags affectionately. It’s funny how little and how much I care about him simultaneously. The disjunction of man, am I right? 

Any/all the people I ship romantically with this character: And thus the disappointment of everyone commences. Congratulations on being the first person to pick a character I actually have opinions on. I see the arieto in your icon, you’re so right for that, but I flip between seeing eto as aro or shipping her with Itori, Rize, or both, and I want everyone to die alone unless it’s tragic, witnessed, unpreventable or caused by themselves, seeing their lover in their final moments is not a kindness to either but a cruelty. Hello, yes vashwood and lawlight did shape me fundamentally, and I am the world’s most spiteful creature, a russian nesting doll of mutually assured destruction. Anyways I especially want Arima to die alone, besides Kaneki, unloved with that as an exception and staring the one child who latched on to him and hoped for so much in the eyes with the guilt of knowing “I did this to him and because of me there’s a good chance he will get worse from here on out.” Arieto is a hilarious pairing conceptually and personality wise, and outside of a canon universe I can absolutely get on board, the hijinks would be legendary, but in-universe? Eto’s LEAGUES too good for you Arima. Love you, but you could stand to suffer some more. 

Oh also I’m not quite sure if I ship them but Arima and Fura kind of have the energy of guys who kissed once in highschool and have adapted the mentality of “if I don’t talk about it, it didn’t happen.” But they do think about it. So maybe I ship them in the Jack era for 5 minutes of poor judgement, teenage-ness, and the intrinsic desire to make that rivalry homoerotic, and then I’m just here for the bisexual denial. 

My favorite non-romantic relationship for this character: H a i s e that is his son and he does not know how to raise him and I can’t even say he’s really trying but he’s definitely there and just. Oh I wish he knew how to lead a normal life. Also Furuta, they never met in the parts of the story we’re shown, and they don’t particularly need to for me, but just conceptually they’re such fascinating foils. Living manifestations about everything I love and hate in the non-protagonists of Tokyo Ghoul, they should both burn. The most siblings to ever not sibling. 

My unpopular opinion about this character: I don’t care what power scaling this universe gives us and how far up on it they place him. I could beat up this old man in a fight. I COULD. I WILL. I’M GOING TO KICK HIM DOWN A FLIGHT OF STAIRS, WITNESS AND REVEL IN MY SPECTACLE. Also he has no charisma. None. He’s strong and intelligent, that is all he has going for him. And some nice hips but you didn’t hear that from me. 

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon: The realization. Some kind of spinoff that further detailed the schemes and functions of his collaboration with Eto behind the scenes. Give me the forbidden one-eyed monarchs, not their narrative child. 

Favorite friendship for this character: Oh… the potential of Kureo being a healthy mentor figure (if you don’t elaborate enough on what happened with him teaching arima about quinques, I will assume the best for today), Akira (take notes on how to parent, Arima), Fura (but particularly the potential of them growing more distant and formal over the years as Arima is absorbed by his work and quiet aspirations.) 

My crossover ship: I don’t have one so I’ll just note that I listened to “The Way It Ends” from the Death Note musical for most of this and by god I have never felt so cringe.

Oh wait actually Elendira the Crimsonnail but just the Trimax version obviously. Trans queen.

#kishou arima #Dear god what have I created and what compelled me #I swear I don't hate Kaneki I just hate the writing. Kaneki is a very nice boy and though I do want him to die alone as well #he can be happy if he wants to. #tokyo ghoul #mediocre art #miscellaneous not-art things #technically it is art but it's not art centric alright. #zeph answers questions about media/characters/ships

[sugareey-makes-stuff]

I was hoping to get this out a couple of weeks ago, but life presented a series of unexpected events and things, so here we are. Better late than never, so happy belated birthday, @vdoshu! Gosh, where do I even start when it comes to all the rare pairs doshu delves into? I’m so happy I got to know them through the Rare Pairs server, because it has been a delight to read about so many different ships I normally don’t seek out. I absolutely loved what doshu did with their fics for HP February Frankenfest 2022, where they wrote 18 works for 9 different challenges! Wowww! That had to be insane and tricky to take on and manage, but number of stories about different ships that came out of that? Amazing. Doshu certainly owned it. I love how they’re also willing to take a prompt and turn into something more, whether it be something soft and pure, fun and playful, or deliciously dark or sexy. Being able to read more about rare pairs we don’t see has certainly warmed my rare pair heart and helped me appreciate characters who don’t get the spotlight shined on them enough. Thanks for broadening my horizons, friend! And while we’re at it, here are some of my fav doshu fics: 👓 >>> They (Percy and Oliver, G, 1.2k)

Summary: In a moment of courage, Percy writes new pronouns on the paperwork for that upcoming job at the Ministry. Oliver notices.

The second person PoV is so powerful here. It really puts an emphasis on how important details and the use of words are within a given environment. As a person who accepts “they/their” as pronouns, I think we all want to make sure we have a support system of folks who can embrace us for who we are. People as a whole want to feel seen, and yes, that’s exactly this story is about. I love that Percy has that from Oliver, without even asking for it. 💖 🌹 >>> Fifty Fake Dates (Ginsy, M, 200)

Summary: She couldn't remember who had asked first, but she knew that tonight would mark fifty dates.At some point along the way, they'd stopped feeling fake.

I have no idea how doshu did it, but this is legit what Ginsy is right here! This little snippet of what they are and what they want from each other is perfect. It’s just so them. There’s desperation, sexual tension and want, but underneath all of that, there’s so much more. Love, love, love! 🥒 >>> Zabini’s Zucchini (Blaise/Ron, E, 7.2k)

Summary: There have been rumours about Zabini's massive zucchini. Ron Weasley needs to investigate.

OMG. So, I know this was based off a prompt that was kicking around from the last Rare Pairs fest, and when doshu decided to write this afterwards because it wasn’t claimed (yet), it was everything we could ask for. Like the tags say, this is crack treated seriously. Yes, it’s crack but it’s sexy, hot crack? I don’t really know. I mean, I’ve always liked Blairon, but like damn! Ron’s PoV here is well written, especially with him spying on Blaise to see what he’s up to, and lol, I’m sure you’ll have different thoughts about what one can do with courgettes after reading this. Heh. 🕰️ >>> Thursday Night, 8-10 p.m. (Hermione/Percy, M, 1.3k)

Summary: Hermione is much too busy with her career to honestly put the effort into a relationship, and while it took her some time to wrestle between her desires and her society-imposed expectations, she finds that she prefers things this way. She can seek out companionship in her friends when she needs it. She can seek out social interactions with coworkers at the Leaky after work, or at the SPEW admin offices at the weekend. And if she needs sex, she can pencil it into her planner like any other appointment, thank you very much.

I love how this is so on point from Hermione’s perspective, and how there is absolutely no sex on-screen. It’s honestly not needed. The fact that consent and negotiation is handled so well between Hermione and Percy by the way they communicate with each other...it just works. I’d love to see more of these two, since they are truly people who don’t beat around the bush and they know how to state exactly what they want. These lions do not mess around. Rawr. 🩲 >>> Leathers and Lace (Flintwood, E, 7.7k)

Summary: Things were much less complicated when Wood played for a different team.

HELLO. Okay, so this is def one of my favourite Flintwood fics because the way things are slowly revealed over time is refreshing and clever. We usually see the boys going full force when they get injured, but there’s a lot of exploration about the aftermath, especially for Marcus. And boy, does he discover a lot about himself and Oliver. Marcus’ thoughts and narrative is 10000% him, lol. Grumpy, doubtful, and he really doesn’t give himself enough credit. Also, knickers, and more than one pair! Yayy, my fav! The UST between Marcus and Oliver though is chef’s kiss, as teammates and competitors. It really crackles through this whole fic. Such a spicy read that’s so worth it! You can find more of doshu’s work on AO3. Make sure to leave kudos and comments to show appreciation for their fandom contributions. doshu, please keep blessing us with all your rare pair goodness. I hope the week is treating you well so far! :)

#vdoshu #happy birthday #rare pairs #percy weasley #oliver wood #ginsy #hercy #blairon #flintwood #hp fanfic #rec lists #spicy #origami #lettering #friends with bdays #sugareey recs things #sugareey does lettering #sugareey makes origami #fandom friends

[bisonofyesterday]

Attention freaks, it’s me, Bison the Great, half of you following me probably only know me from Monument Mythos fanart, the other half know me from discord, but unbeknownst to most people I'm actually pretty fascinated with the ancient and archaic history of humanity! As it happens, they made a whole show about this, Genndy Tartakovsky’s Primal wrapped up its second season about 4-ish weeks ago to much deserved tumultuous fanfare and much less-deserved angst over its finale (which I won��t be getting into), but my main point is that it just won’t leave my head! Such a fantastic show both in animation and story, I've been deep-diving into surface-level videos and articles about the olden days of our species ever since the show’s ending and I thought “Say! Why not post a couple poorly done first-thought essays to Tumblr dot com about Primal Season 2 specifically!”, at the very least I hope these next couple posts provoke your thought glands the same way the show did for me!

First order of business is the show’s beginning, essentially its first three episodes, Sea of Despair, Shadow of Fate, and Dawn of Man (lot of Ofs here). Many folks, fans included, lamented the major lack of prehistoric fauna within season 2 compared to season 1, I get this sentiment entirely, but I think it’s a bit of a short-sighted critique, for I believe the lack of dinosaurs and other creatures is intentional. Primal Season 2 turns its setting of inaccurate savage creatures into one of inaccurate human history, essentially uplifting the Primal aspects of it to a new level, and this is not just thrown in overnight either, the first three episodes do a fantastic job at nudging us into a world that not even Spear and Fang are familiar with, let’s look at Sea of Despair, which I've come to think of as season 1′s last hurrah in a sense. Spear and Fang, immediately after the end of season 1, build a raft to go save the former-slave-turned-slave-again Mira from her captors.

This episode has all the Primal stops, hunting for food, unreasonably antagonistic wildlife, some funny moments, the works, which is saying something as the entire episode takes place in the middle of a goddamn ocean. Our heroes are already in a life-threatening situation before they even reach land, but more interesting is our selection of baddies.

Our first evil-doer, if you can even call them that, is the star of a moment I personally find hilarious, whales. Spear and Fang, being a caveman and a dinosaur respectively, have most likely never seen a whale before, so the sight of these titans TERRIFIES them, of course the whale does nothing to them, but it’s a nice bit of brevity and realism, as well as arguably sets up the task to come, more on that in a bit.

Now to someone that does a lot more evil (the crime of Living), we come to a giant turtle! Most likely an archelon from the size, a species from the late cretaceous and also the largest turtle to have ever lived. Our poor turt friend becomes the prey of two angry carnivores, but it also has some fight in it, as it tries to kill Spear after Spear tried killing it, eventually our duo wins however, by how else? Working together, Spear forces the thing to breach near the boat and Fang kills it instantly with a bite to the neck.

The next few creatures solidify my point here much better, as Spear and Fang (after eating THE ENTIRE TURTLE) meet some flying fish and a dunkleosteus, only to be immediately threatened by what the Primal Wikia tells me is a ornithocheirus and a MEGALODON!

Look at the picture here, notice all these little things and details, these are, in-fact, accurate reconstructions! Sure they might be exaggerated in some ways (dunkleosteus is kinda shrinkwrapped and has a weirdly long lower jaw), but notice the skin over dunkleosteus’s armored skull, the proto-feathers on ornithocheirus, megalodon! Uh, being a giant shark.

This isn’t the first time Primal’s been weirdly accurate, in season 1′s The Night Feeder, the smilodon is accurately stocky, and I'm sure there’s other moments as well. What I find fascinating here however is the fact that they chose to leave our main characters’ homeland with these creatures in this manner, this along with the next episode are going to be the last times fauna has a major antagonistic position in Primal, so why not go with all the shots? Hunting creatures, fighting creatures, and a titan the main characters seem hopeless to fight against. Side-note, it’s always annoyed me how people dismiss Primal as just dumb fun when bringing up its scientific department, while yes, stuff like Fang’s wrists and Terror Under The Blood Moon’s featherless raptors are woefully inaccurate, as are some blatantly fictional creatures before and later on (the saber-toothed wolves in A Cold Death, the man-bats and the giant spider in Terror Under The Blood Moon, the giant vultures in Vidarr, they’re NOT argentavis), but to write off the ENTIRE SHOW has having nothing of scientific substance in it it is a bit absent-minded I think, though of course I'm not saying it’s actually secretly scientific genius either.

After defeating the mega shark, Spear and Fang are washed ashore on a new land, which immediately segues us into the next episode, Shadow of Fate, ominous title! I want to clarify here that I’m NOT trying to recap episodes word-for-word here, only to point out moments that help my greater point. And with saying that, the count of prehistoric creatures is EVEN LESS in Shadow of Fate, ultimately relegated to a poor arsinoitherium and a male t-rex that the fandom has affectionately named Red.

The REAL stars of this episode are, instead, a Celtic tribe! Of humans! They speak Gallic so I guess they’re French. The tribe has recently taken in Spear, who has also just awoken deeply confused, Spear’s never dealt with another person before, he’s only dealt with things either below/the same as his own level or with Mira, and with Mira he witnessed personally the kind of things a whole group of smart-people could do to innocent smart-people, so naturally our hero is terrified of the implications of his current state in this new, weird place.

The Celts aren’t bad though, in-fact, they’re much better off than Spear, being kinda bronze-age, the technology level of Primal season 2 is something I’ll get into in another post, point is, in the times of the Roman Empire, the Celtic Tribes were spoken of as savage barbarians, here however, Spear is the barbarian, note how the Celts have buildings, agriculture, how they ornately decorate their bodies and clothing, compare this to Spear, who in this scene is depicted as a scared animal backed into a corner.

A continuation of Primal’s “unprimaling”, Spear is disconnected from his animal buddy, who’s attitude is the only attitude he’s ever truly known, individuals fighting for their survival all the time and following where the food is, he has NO idea what to do against an established tribe with an army, a doctor, and a leader, and thankfully he doesn’t get to find out right now, as the Celtic Chieftain calms down the situation and Spear.

Meanwhile with Fang, she and Red have been hanging out, being lovey dovey, doing what it is that animals do, they even go hunting! Unfortunate for everyone involved however, it’s a hunting trip into the Celtic Tribe village and a battle erupts. Note here that Red doesn’t seem to comprehend that Fang cares for a person, neither does Spear comprehend Fang’s love for Red until it’s too late. Red, a being from a different walk of life and time, much like Spear and Fang, is killed in the whole scuffle, Shadow of Fate ending with Spear solemnly leaving the Celtic Tribe to be with his grieving friend. Goodbye Red, you were truly a complicated end to the animalistic antagonist of Primal, much more thought-provoking than the megalodon anyways.

When I say “unprimaling”. I do not mean Primal has lost the focus it had in season 1, far from it, the things that happen in these episodes are in-fact an evolution or at least a spin on season 1′s formula, just now set in a place dominated by, compared to Spear, much more advanced humans, instead of very angry animals and monsters, Primal isn’t being un-Primal’d, it’s still Primal, but it’s being unprimaled, as in lifted up out of the land of beasts Spear and Fang hail from, Spear has to deal with people who bypassed where he is loooong ago, and this is nowhere better shown than in Dawn of Man, a truly fitting title.

In this episode, Spear’s hanging out with a still grieving Fang, thankfully their relationship hasn’t been strained at all despite the village fight, but that’s unimportant information at the moment. They find a cave and rest there for the time being, and Spear decides to do some exploring both inside and outside the cave, where he finds remnants of an ancient people, people like him.

Throughout the episode, Spear imagines how these people could’ve functioned, how they were so like him as they lived alongside ancient beasts of their own, bison latifrons, Irish elk, pterosaurs, theropods, hunted by and battled with prehistoric people, primal people.

Spear’s kinda lonely if you didn’t pick up on that.

At night, Spear even tries to worship the moon, the same religion he observed the much more advanced Mira practicing, but it doesn’t give him anything, he doesn’t know what to do with it, all of the things these folks do now either confuse or scare him, they’re not like those old people, who lived a much simpler, albeit a much more dangerous life, Spear’s just kind of a lost soul now even next to his best friend. And speaking of being scared of the new generation, Spear and Fang are happened upon by what they quickly realize are Mira’s captors...

The Scorpion, in reality a Viking clan, filled with Vikings! And they ride cave bears!! Another major example of just how advanced these people are in comparison to Spear, taming untamable animals to be their mounts (I mean, Fang, but Spear and Fang are equals so-). These guys are more advanced than the Celts even, having intricate weaponry and clothing, even shields! Uh, again, I’ll talk about cultures and technology in another post. For now, this is the true end of Primal’s unprimaling, as Spear and Fang defeat the Viking intruders and track their scent back to their village, to Mira’s location, which leads into the next episode and my personal favorite, The Red Mist, but that’s off-topic, just remember that after this point there's never really a major animal villain again when the Vikings introduce a whole new breed of villain to the show.

The beginning of Genndy Tartakovsky’s Primal takes to a slow buildup of tuning out the animalistic side of season 1, giving creatures a final spotlight as antagonists, and into the barbarity of ancient man, mingling with both good and evil tribes. People who, while primitive compared to you or I, are basically aliens to our favorite caveman and dinosaur. Folks on the road to getting where we are today, but who’ve also left a lifestyle like Spear’s behind, Spear is now as much as a living fossil as we thought Fang was to him, and this is accentuated the more season 2 goes on and even in its ending.

Tune in next time where I hope I talk about the cultures and technology of the bronze age/ancient/medieval age world of Primal season 2!

#genndy tartakovsky's primal #bisonprimal #genndy tartakovsky's primal season 2 #primal

[thebigshotman]

(My movie review this week got ranty and long lol, I did NOT like it. It’s under the cut for interested folks so as to avoid dash clutter!)

Hello everyone! I hope everyone had a great week. It’s time once again for my weekly post where I talk about the movie I watched in film class in college! This week, though not in person due to an ice storm, we watched “Breathless”, a French film by Jean Luc Godard.

…I’m gonna be real with you guys. My inner “late 2000s media reviewer” came out watching this, if you know what I mean. I didn’t hate it, it just…frustrated me. So many elements that could’ve been good that were spoiled by “artistic French film” BS. Not that it being a foreign language film made it automatically bad, but every trope associated with that phrase was in play. Let’s go into detail, shall we?

The plot concerns a man, Michel, who thinks he’s the cream of the crop, who ends up stealing a car and shooting a police officer. He then flees to Parish, where he runs into an old flame, an American woman named Patricia. He starts to romance her again in occasionally creepy ways…for a long time…but when she finds out what he did, things heat up as she battles with herself whether to turn him in or not. What will happen? Well, the movie is in no hurry to allow you to find out. Because before she finds out, we have to endure a 20 minute long, ad-libbed conversation between their actors in a bedroom as they talk about everything under the sun that comes to mind.

It could’ve worked; Tarantino movies famously do just that and often. But those moments in his movies are scripted. This wasn’t, and it shows. Maybe it’s cause I’m Ace, but a 20 minutes long bout of pillow talk wasn’t fun at all. There’s another thing, too: The two leads are amazing separated; they have individual stories and its interesting to see how things will work out, genuinely. But the second they’re together after they first meet up again, things get boring. The American girl occasionally struggling with her French is cute, though, to her credit.

And another thing! You start so excitingly, with a man wanted for murder and meeting an old flame while on the run! How the hell do you screw this up so badly and remove anything and everything exciting and intriguing about it until the last 30 minutes?? …But to avoid sounding like those aforementioned reviewers, I’ll put a clamp on my complaints now. Cause there were some good aspects that made me feel like it wasn’t a waste of 90 minutes.

The editing was easily the only thing that kept me engaged during that very slow scene. This movie was the origin of the “jump cut”, and it definitely shows in a very positive way. So many disorienting, small leaps in time, with no indication what happened between them! It was kinda fun, I’ll admit it. Fun fact, that ended up inspiring Richard Lester during the making of Beatles’ film “A Hard Day’s Night”, which thereafter inspired every music video ever made. I wish we watched that instead…

Anyway! The music was great. If you liked Cowboy Bebop’s OST, like me, there’s a lot of good stuff here. Tellingly there was no music during the pillow talk. And like I mentioned, the acting from the leads was phenomenal…I just only noticed it when they were separate. Finally, the first and last 20 minutes were great. What I thought the entire movie would be, but frustratingly that wasn’t the case.

Overall, I’m glad it watched it for the good aspects, but I am not watching it again. Give me the Richard Gere remake to watch for the first time instead of this again. The good parts were interesting, but not enough. If all of Godard’s films were like this, I have no idea why he’s viewed so highly. Guess this is my first “old movie” hot take lol

Anyway! Next week, fortunately, is a movie I’ve wanted to watch for ages! “Dr. Strangelove” by Stanley Kubrick. Look forward to my thoughts on that one next week! Replies to threads and the many asks in my inbox will come tomorrow night and Sunday. See you all then!

My thoughts on this movie in a single gif…the actors were good looking, too. Another good thing at least

#(…I hope at least half of this was interesting 😂 at least next week’s movie will be fun!) #(look forward to more activity this weekend everyone!) #STRING PULLER-out of character

[thebigpalooka]

I finished Sonic Frontiers!

Copying my Twitter thoughts over here because I had a lot of thoughts!

This is gonna be a sort of general review, gameplay and experience type stuff. No spoilers (gonna make other posts for that), although I do mention the names of locations and minor combat stuff so if you’re trying to be TOTALLY without info going in, I’ll put things under a read more anyways, here we go:

My overall sensation emerging from credit roll was that, when it comes to the gameplay itself, almost every specific critique I read was fair, but the game is fun in spite of all of them, and occasionally it's SO great that it kind of resets the I-ain't-putting-up-with-this-shit meter to zero.

I struggled with the controls quite a bit but it felt like a skill issue to me, lol. As I’ve mentioned before, I’ve never actually played any 3D Sonic games, only watched playthroughs, so this was my very first time. I didn't notice any of the glitchy behavior others reported (like falling through the map etc) and was usually too task-focused to be bothered by the pop-in, EXCEPT on Chaos Island where it's legit hard to see what's going on due to the 2D camera lock, which was my least favourite part of the gameplay by far.

Ares Island definitely felt like the high point in pretty much every respect.  Shark Guardian was FUN AS HELL, as one example, and Ares Island also has the absolute best, coolest, dumbest, most fun Titan fight in the game.

I saw a lot of folks talking about pacing issues towards the end, which ... I didn't have a problem with like, the rate at which things occur, but there's def a bizarre halt of natural momentum at the end of Rhea Island, and I really felt like the order of the last two islands should've been swapped.

Without spoiling details, the plot point which happens at the end of Rhea Island should've happened at the end of Ouranos Island, and either you proceed right to the final boss fight OR proceed to Rhea Island at that point. But yeah, feels like the game is building a sense of urgency and then just... changes its mind lol.

Anyway.  Having said all that, the dialogue and character interactions are definitely a highlight and while I don't think you'd HAVE to be a Sonic fan to like the game, I can easily see losing patience if you're not.  The story itself never felt in-question, and there's basically zero surprises but that's ... not a bad thing? Not for me, anyway. I got exactly what I expected and am satisfied. And the music is A+++ without exception. So yeah, in a way, it feels like the game's themes of growth and improving yourself are hugely fitting for the game itself as a whole. It’s got a lot of rough edges but a huge amount of potential.  Really feels like the same experience I had with the Sonic movies, where I really loved the first one in spite of it being obviously imperfect and missing some cool opportunities. My hope is that we get to see the same arc, another game that builds on what was established here and is sort of more confident about what it wants to be.

#sonic frontiers #sonic the hedgehog #no spoilers #lol please interact with me regarding sonic frontiers #i'm not okay and i'm not normal #could still be fun tho