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phoenixyfriend · 3 years

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The Family Tree is... a Disaster

Takes place in the TCW Leverage AU. It does contain a few deviations, namely that the narrative ended up shifting Plo's role in Ahsoka's life, and Ventress's role overall.

This is mostly just dialogue where I outline the fuckery that is the disaster lineage family tree, not actual fic. It stemmed from my incessant need to justify "25yo Obi-Wan somehow got custody of 9yo Anakin without Shmi dying."

Warnings for: canon character death (modernized), canon violence (modernized), and references to Nazis and white supremacists (Palpatine collects WWII weaponry as a parallel to his canon display of Sith artifacts in his office as chancellor, and Ahsoka thinks it's sketchy)

----

"Okay," Cody says, setting down a glass of whiskey as he drops into the seat across the table. "What the hell is your family tree like?"

Obi-Wan raises an eyebrow, and continues cleaning off the definitely-not-stolen crystal komodo dragon he'd won in today's job. "I beg your pardon?"

"You and Skywalker," Cody says, gesturing between Obi-Wan, who is just sitting there minding his own business, and Anakin, who is across the closed-for-tonight bar and doing something inadvisable on the pool table. "You've said he was your brother, and mentioned raising him, which, sure, I'm over twenty years older than my youngest brother, people take over parenting roles all the time. But you have different last names, have mentioned stepfamilies that the other doesn't have, reference things as 'your aunt, not mine,' and I am just getting... very confused. I figured it was personal and I could leave well enough alone, but considering your older brother almost shot us today--"

"Okay, Xanatos is not my brother," Obi-Wan immediately says. "Just. I just have to stop you right there. Xanatos was a student of my father's for a time, but I promise he's not family. Nobody except maybe Komari would consider him even close, and she doesn't count since she's in prison for life and the farthest thing from stable."

Cody gestures. "That, Obi-Wan. That's what I'm talking about. I don't even know who Komari is."

Obi-Wan purses his lips in a failed attempt to not smile. "Do you actually want the explanation? It's long and unnecessarily complicated."

"So's mine," Cody snorts. Obi-Wan waits, patient and pleasant, and is rewarded when Cody sighs. "Please."

"Of course, my dear. To answer your first question, though, Anakin is my half-brother." With a smile, Obi-Wan digs a piece of paper and a pen from his briefcase. "So, center of the chain: me, my father Qui-Gon, my grandfather Yan, and my great-grandfather Yoda. With me so far?"

"Easy enough. Do you have to go back that far?"

"Great-grandfather Yoda is still alive and regularly escaping the old folks' home to terrorize younger relatives, so yes," Obi-Wan says. "Given that you may just meet a tiny, meddling relative of mine when he's bored, we do in fact have to go back that far."

"...how old is he?"

"We don't know for sure. A hundred and eight-ish is the best guess." Obi-Wan shrugs. "It's not a huge deal, mostly he likes bothering Anakin these days. Anyway, grandfather. Yan Dooku. Inherited a minory duchy from his maternal grandfather decades back. Mostly hangs around there because he's on terrorist watchlists in the States."

"Oh, lovely."

Obi-Wan grins. "Trust me, it gets worse. Anyway, grandfather never actually married, but spent most of his time with his 'best friend' Sifo Dyas, who died about a decade back."

"Gay?"

"Well, we know that now, but they got together in the seventies, and this was back when they were both working government jobs, so, you know. It happens."

"Good to know," Cody says. "So, Yoda's kid is Yan, who inherited a title and land from a maternal relative, and had a life partner but never married. With you so far."

"All of Yan's kids were adopted," Obi-Wan continues, sketching out the first branch away from the Yan/Sifo partnership. "Rael was actually grandfather's cousin, maternally, and ended up in his custody after getting orphaned at five. These days, he does most of the stewardship duties at the Serenno Duchy. His daughter Nim is teaching military history at a university in Germany."

Cody nods. "Uncle number one is named Rael, technically your dad's cousin, has a daughter. Got it."

"About a decade after Rael, they adopted my father, Qui-Gon. He and grandfather fought, frequently, but they did care for each other. My father was a botanist, did bio-engineering. We'll get back to him later, because he's where things get complicated." Obi-Wan made sure to leave room around the name. "Just a few years older than me was--is--Komari Vosa. She is... serving a life sentence. I think she fought Jango once."

"She fought my father?"

"To the best of my knowledge, they both almost died, yes," Obi-Wan says. "She's in maximum security these days. She was an assassin. I'll get a call if she breaks out, and I'll let you know along with everyone else."

"Bad news auntie, got it."

"Last adoption, sort of, is Ventress," Obi-Wan finishes off. "A few years younger than me, is technically grandfather's personal assistant and does secretarial work and the like, but we all know he's planning to leave as much of the inheritance to her as he is to the rest of us. She's aggressive and unpleasant, but she takes care of him and hasn't actually threatened to kill any of us yet, so that's fine."

"How'd she join?" Cody asks.

"Ky Narec was a friend of Qui-Gon's; Ventress was his daughter. Ky died a few years after Qui-Gon did, and Ventress was a mess, after." Obi-Wan shrugs and scratches that connection into the little sketch of a family tree as well. "Grandfather offered her a job until she got herself back together, and then she just kind of... stuck around."

"Youngest aunt, more of a cousin." Cody summarizes. "Now we go back to your father?"

"Qui-Gon Jinn was a man of many skills," Obi-Wan says drily. "Adequate birth control was not one of them."

It's almost a pity that Cody wasn't drinking anything, because going by the way he chokes, Obi-Wan's pretty sure the spit take would have been spectacular.

"I'm sorry," Cody says. "Can you repeat that?"

"I was an accident," Obi-Wan says, not even bothering to hide his smile. "So was Anakin."

"So that sounds like... a story."

"It is," Obi-Wan confirms. "My biological mother has never been in the picture. They had a fling, she wasn't sure if she'd want to abort or give me up, just that she wasn't ready to be a parent, and Qui-Gon volunteered to take full custody so she could go back to her life after the birth. I've never met her, but I kept her family name. You can consider her irrelevant beyond that."

Cody nods.

"So, when I was about a year old, Qui-Gon reconnects with an old flame, they get married two years later. Step-mother number one is Tahl. Lovely woman, I absolutely adored her, and she had a daughter, my stepsister, Bant Eerin."

"I met her, right?" Cody asks.

"Yes, she was the doctor who patched up my bullet wound a few months ago," Obi-Wan says. "With the giant glasses that make her look a little fish-eyed."

"She was nice."

"She is," Obi-Wan agrees. "At any rate, that was our family for a while, and then Tahl died when I was fourteen. Bant wanted to go to a magnet school for medical studies, and Qui-Gon's grief was... not optimal for taking care of multiple teenagers, shall we say, so Bant moved in with her paternal uncle, Kit Fisto, and Kit's son Nahdar. He's a marine biologist, incredibly friendly, and has no idea of any of the rest of my side of the family's questionable activities. If you ever meet him, you will pretend that we are a legal firm with a team of security consultants."

Cody raises a brow. Obi-Wan despairs. "Best you could do?"

"We're not that likely to run into him." Obi-Wan draws out a new line. "So, Qui-Gon deals poorly with grief. This is also around the time that Xanatos came around to ruin our lives a little. He was a very rich and unpleasant man, but he's dead as of four hours ago, so you don't have to worry about him. Or his son."

"His son?"

"Anakin handled that," Obi-Wan says. "Thoroughly. Granta Omega is no longer an issue. He's not dead, but... well. Anakin has his ways. Er--I should probably mention Feemor; he was my father's assistant at the university for a long time. Anakin and I still call him our uncle."

"Also a person to avoid mentioning criminal activity to?" Cody prompts.

"Well... no, but only because I don't think he'd care. The man is, forgive me, more of a 'walking sweatervest' than I am. He's a very bland and unassuming man. He once described himself as the background character of the soap opera that is my family's existence."

"Sounds like a charmer."

"Oh, he's very kind and clever, and witty as well. I adore him, and he really is family. He's just also very, very normal. Not boring, but..." Obi-Wan trails off and shrugs helplessly. "He's an editor for an agricultural research journal. Also not someone I anticipate us running into."

"Noted."

"Right, so, Qui-Gon dealing poorly with his grief didn't involve much drinking, but there were a few months of him trying to... lose himself in the pleasures of the flesh?" Obi-Wan tries, and then deflates at the look on Cody's face. "He was slagging around. Shmi got pregnant with Anakin, who was born when I was sixteen. Shared custody at first, Qui-Gon got him weekends and every other holiday, that sort of thing, and then they got married because they actually did like each other well enough, and it was easier on the taxes."

"So Shmi is stepmother number two."

"Shmi is stepmother number two, yes." Obi-Wan sketches in Anakin and Shmi. "About nine and a half years after Anakin was born, Shmi and Qui-Gon were in a car accident with... well, it later turned out it wasn't an accident, there was a hitman called Maul involved, he's actually Ventress's second cousin or something, I don't know. Grandfather handled most of that problem. Qui-Gon died, Shmi was in intensive care, and I got custody of Anakin as his nearest adult relative. We weren't very close before that, because I was off at university by the time he was old enough to form memories, but that changed once he started living with me. I more or less raised him as a single parent from that point."

"This is why he jokes that you're like a father to him."

"Precisely," Obi-Wan says. "Shmi took about a year to recover enough to move again, and grandfather covered the costs. She still had to live with a dedicated carer and attend daily physical therapy. At that physical therapy, she met Cliegg Lars, whose son Owen was also a patient there. They hit it off, and three years later, they married. When Anakin refers to his stepfamily he's talking about the Lars out in Nevada."

"Nevada?"

"They have a farm. A very, very normal one. We don't drag them into our activities, unless we have an at-risk person who needs a safe house." Obi-Wan pauses, and then decides this really needs to be stressed. "This is important to me and Anakin, that we don't get them involved unless there's absolutely no other choice. Shmi's been through a lot, and the Lars are busy enough running the farm."

"Works for me," Cody says. "We've got enough safe houses that it shouldn't be an issue. I'm guessing this story doesn't end there, though."

Obi-Wan grimaces. "My own love life has been... a bit of a mess."

"I already know about Kryze, at least."

There's that. "I was temporarily engaged to a friend, Siri Tachi, shortly after high school. We were in a relationship, but this was mostly something done to appease a relative of hers that was getting overbearing to the point of absurdity, and she couldn't just cut them off. We broke off the engagement after the relative passed, and we're still friends."

He notes that down, then adds the other embarrassment of his early years. "First marriage was actually a drunken joke between myself and my best friend when we were in college. We got it annulled a few months later because we just didn't have time to drop by the courthouse before then, and he's actually engaged to Asajj now."

"Asajj?" Cody asks, watching in fascination as Obi-Wan tries to mark in both his own short marriage and the newer, long-term engagement without crossing any lines. He settles for just writing the name twice and including an asterisk with 'this is the same person.'

"Ventress," Obi-Wan clarifies. "Yeah, Quinlan's a fun guy. His little sister, Aayla, treats Anakin like a beloved younger cousin."

"Are they also off-limits for criminal activity?"

"No, Aayla's the one that taught Ahsoka how to vent-crawl," Obi-Wan says. "And I'm pretty sure Quinlan has contacts in every major government branch, criminal organization, and Fortune 500 company on the planet. I reach out to them regularly."

"Resources, then."

Obi-Wan nods. "Some time later, I married Satine. We had a son; you've met Korkie. We split due to incompatibility a year and change before Qui-Gon's death. Satine doesn't engage in criminal activity, but Bo-Katan is..."

"I've met Bo-Katan. I know what she's like, Obi. You don't have to explain."

"She works with Maul sometimes."

"...the man who killed your father?"

"Yes. It's all very stupid and convoluted." Obi-Wan still writes her in. "So, that's them. Korkie goes to boarding school, and I try not to involve him in anything. Anakin and Ahsoka like to teach him self-defense and the like, but Satine is adamant that he stay unaware of my less legal dealings until he's an adult."

Cody shrugs. "Makes sense. Is that every--wait, no, Skywalker's married."

Obi-Wan grins. "Yes, and Padme's got twins on the way."

"I was there when he told us," Cody says drily. "He was very loud about it. Okay, how does Ahsoka fit in?"

"Hold on, I forgot Beru," Obi-Wan mutters. "Owen's fiancee. Same rules as the Lars. Okay, you asked about Ahsoka. Right. So. Um."

He dithers. Cody waits for him, and then Obi-Wan just gives up. "Ahsoka, dear, would you like to explain how you joined the family, so to speak?"

Ahsoka looks up from whatever she and the boys are doing--there are multiple beer glasses and straws and duct tape involved, and Obi-Wan doesn't really want to know--and then flips off the table and over to Obi-Wan and Cody. She looks over the family tree chart, and then says, "Oooh, did you tell him about the cult?"

"You were in a cult?" Cody demands.

"No, Komari was. She was head priestess or something. I dunno, it's why she's in prison and stuff."

"I did not tell him about the cult," Obi-Wan mutters, already regretting this. "The Bando Gora aren't a problem anymore. I've already gotten to explaining how you and Anakin know each other."

Ahsoka rolls her eyes, steals his pen, and starts sketching in around Quinlan's name, over by Asajj since Obi-Wan's section is too crowded. "Okay, so, Quinlan's adopted. His dad is Tholme, and Tholme's dad is Plo Koon. Plo Koon is good friends with my Auntie, Shaak Ti, who raised me. They live next door to each other, out in the country, and I'd play in his yard a lot, because he had puppies, and he took me to visit his bees. Whenever Auntie needed a babysitter, she asked Quinlan or Aayla to do it since she knew and trusted them, and Aayla needed pocket money."

"This is so unnecessarily complicated," Cody mutters.

"It is!" Ahsoka chirps. Her grin is far too sharp. "So, this one time, Aayla was watching me when I was fourteen, and she was just helping me with my physics homework. BAM, the door slams open, and in stumbled Skyguy with his arm missing. I've never met him before, and my first introduction is him shortly after he's gotten an unplanned amputation."

Anakin, on the other side of the room, giggles. Obi-Wan just sighs. The Fett brothers appear to be in the land of 'horrified fascination.'

Ahsoka revels in it. "There's blood everywhere, I'm screaming, Aayla's panicking, Anakin's halfway to unconscious and insisting we can't call the hospital, and nobody can get Obi-Wan on the phone. Quinlan's in another country, and Auntie Shaak and Uncle Plo are at a movie, so they've both got their cellphones off. Tholme was faking his death at that point to get away from an incident with the Irish Mob, so we didn't even try him."

"What the actual fuck," Rex breathes.

Ahsoka continues with relish. "We get Bant to pick up, and she's there an hour later with Padme, because Padme knows how to drive the way Skyguy does, and the entire drive there is just Auntie Bant on speakerphone telling Aayla how to stop the bleeding and get him stabilized while Padme's screaming at traffic at the top of her lungs."

"I owe Aayla a fruit basket," Anakin muses aloud. "The anniversary of her saving my life is coming up, it's warranted."

"Five years, baby!" Ahsoka crows. She fist-pumps.

Obi-Wan just drops his head into his hands. "You're killing me, children."

Anakin shrugs, grinning. "You know, I think Fett Senior might have been involved in that fight."

"My shitty dad cut off your arm?" Rex demands.

"No, I think he was busy fighting the Interpol guy," Anakin says. "But he was definitely there. I think. Blood loss kinda got to me after a bit, but I'm pretty sure Jango Fett was there, and also Boba might've been hiding in the getaway car?"

"I need another glass," Cody mutters. He doesn't stand up, though.

"Wait," Rex says. "So who cut off your arm?"

Anakin shrugs with an unsure noise. "Someone tried to convince me it was Grandpa Yan, but he was in the middle of a court case in Italy for some kind of parole violation when it happened, so he had an alibi."

"...did he actually violate parole?" Cody asks, and Obi-Wan thinks he looks like he doesn't know if he actually wants an answer.

Ahsoka shrugs. So does Anakin. Obi-Wan carefully looks at a spot behind Cody, and doesn't explain anything about wine tastings used as covers for illicit arms deals.

"The arm?" Rex prompts, sounding a little desperate to get back to the question he likely thinks is the most important.

"I still say it was Skeevy Sheev," Ahsoka chimes in.

"It wasn't Palpatine," Anakin snaps.

"Your creepy older friend who took you to operas and gives you fancy gifts and knows way too much about swords who was conveniently there to talk to the police and cover for you so you didn't get arrested for getting in the middle of a gang war in the first place, yes," Ahsoka says, dropping into a chair and sighing dramatically. "The guy who definitely hasn't been trying to convince you for a year and change that your wife is cheating on you with your older brother."

"Ahsoka!"

"What? He is."

"Anakin," Rex says, "your life sounds like a trainwreck."

"I'm not going to assume a frail, elderly man cut my arm off!" Anakin protests. "Even if he wanted to, he doesn't exactly have the muscle for it!"

"Grandfather's older," Obi-Wan points out, even though he knows it won't help. "And he definitely still could."

"Ha!" Ahsoka shouts.

"He could have hired someone?" Cody suggests. "Doesn't need to do it himself, if he has enough money."

Obi-Wan has a sneaking suspicion that Cody is deliberately stirring the pot as revenge for Anakin sending him eighty-seven cat memes inside an hour during last night's dinner.

"You all suck," Anakin declares. "Also, what the hell do you mean 'knows way too much about swords,' Ahsoka? You know way too much about swords!"

"Yeah, but I'm like ninety-percent sure that his antiques are Prussian and mid-century German military officer dress uniform relics, and pairing that with the Nazi pistols he's got on display--"

"He's just a history buff! And his family's German, of course he prioritizes that region, it's not like he doesn't have Russian or French or English antiques in there too, it's all sides of the war and--"

"I'm just saying he's almost definitely sending me sketchy glances like he thinks I'm planning to steal the silver on the three occasions you've had me with you when you stop by, and I'm pretty sure it's got less to do with my criminal record and more to do with me being, you know, not white."

Anakin looks ready to blow, so Obi-Wan interrupts. "Ahsoka, you were explaining how Anakin passing out on Aayla and scaring us all half to death led to your friendship?"

Ahsoka blinks at him, and then sticks her tongue out at Anakin and turns back to the chart. "So basically, Skyguy had to recuperate in Uncle Plo's living room for a week or two, and I kept showing up to bother him because he was bored and nobody would give him a laptop for 'security reasons,' because he had to lay low and stuff. He made me help him sketch out designs for a prosthesis and do all the writing for the math he had to do for the 3D printer, and we got to chatting."

Ahsoka hops up and back onto a table, legs swinging below her. "I decided he was cool and started following him around while he was getting used to only having one hand, mostly because I was bored. He showed me how to hotwire a car, and explained the best places to put a bug if you were looking to make it sneaky, and he picked my pocket to show off so many times when he was walking around Uncle Plo's house that I made him teach me that, too. And, uh, then Aayla found out and they got into a shouting match about it and decided they both needed to teach me parkour so I could get out of any mess I got myself into, since I was obviously going to follow them into a life of crime."

"And you did," Anakin says, far too proudly. "You're the best thief in this half of the country."

"Only because Aayla moved out east."

Anakin rolls his eyes and pulls Ahsoka into his side, digging his knuckles into her skull. "Best thief! You are the best thief! Be proud of yourself!"

"Let go!"

"Never!"

Obi-Wan sighed heavily and rubbed at his forehead. "Children, please."

"You're not my dad," Ahsoka growls out at him. "Skyguy, I'm going to bite you!"

"Good luck, the only arm you can access is the one that's going to break your teeth."

Ahsoka shrieks in outrage and stomps on Anakin's instep.

It's almost funny, for all that Obi-Wan's seen it play out a million times before, but the really interesting part is seeing Rex's look of fond dismay.

Obi-Wan thinks he might be adding a branch out to the Fetts soon. He's not actually sure if Rex is interested in Anakin or Ahsoka, and he's smack dab between them in age, so that's not a help either, but... well. The expression is familiar enough.

"Please tell me you don't match-make," Cody mutters to him.

"No, I plan to let the pieces fall where they will," Obi-Wan responds, just as low, and far more amused. "I'm simply trying to predict where those landings are to be."

Cody looks at him, and then back at the roughhousing trio, and sighs heavily. "You know, I really didn't think that you technically being minor royalty was going to be the least convoluted thing in your story, Obi-Wan."

He laughs, because it's true. "I'm first in line to inherit the title, since Rael denounced his claim. Nim isn't interested, and Qui-Gon's dead, so... I'm next."

Cody makes a face. "Delightful. I'm guessing that's not a connection we can safely make use of."

"No more than the Kryze or Naberries, I'm afraid." Obi-Wan claps him on the shoulder. "Chin up, I've plenty others in the metaphorical rolodex, all far less legitimate and far more amenable to work with our little outfit."

"Rolodex, really?" Cody snorts. "You're not that old."

Obi-Wan smiles winningly. "You don't know how old I am, Cody. All my IDs are fake."

"Anakin's twenty-four, and you're sixteen years older than him, going by the story you just told me," Cody points out. "I do know how to do basic math, Obi-Wan."

"I had to try," Obi-Wan admits. "I threw a lot of information at you all at once; I'd hoped you missed some of the ages in there."

"I have eight brothers," Cody scoffs. "And literally dozens of cousins, plus niblings, uncles, aunts, and so on. I have experience on this."

"If I asked you to list of the age of every single relative you have, you'd be able to do it?"

"Do you want me to draw a chart? I can draw a chart."

Obi-Wan can't help but laugh. "I'd be delighted, my dear."

Cody rolls his eyes, but Obi-Wan thinks--it's hard to tell in the dimmed lights of the closed bar--that there's a hint of a blush on the man's face. Obi-Wan lets himself slouch to the side, drops his head to rest on one fist, indolent debauchery in every line of his body. Cody does his best to ignore him, but Obi-Wan knows how to smile lazily and blink slowly and draw a man in.

(The whole 'indolent debauchery in every line of his body' phrasing is Anakin's, from back when he was a teenager trying to read highbrow literature to impress a cute girl... and to come up with new insults for his older brother.)

"So," Cody says, with a cough meant to somehow distract Obi-Wan from whatever's showing on the man's face. "Why, uh, why is your grandfather on terrorist watchlists?"

"Well, he didn't initially do anything," Obi-Wan says. "He was just a gay man who didn't hide it quite well enough, and had too much money and too white a face for someone to just call the cops on a faulty report. The Red Scare was technically over by that point, I think, but if a few people made suggestions that he was more loyal to the country that gave him a noble title than to the United States... he received a few warnings, of course, and it could have all blown over..."

"But?"

"But my grandfather is not a man to do things by halves, and instead decided that if the government was to list him as a threat, then he would oblige and make himself a threat," Obi-Wan finishes. "Living up to their labels, rolling with the assumptions, whatever you'd like to call it. It all irked him, and so he made some incredibly questionable decisions to make the government's lives harder. Some weren't bad, like donating to anti-war foundations that were protesting the Gulf War and the interventions in Yugoslavia, that sort of thing, and some were... nobody really looks well on gunrunning, you know."

"For fuck's sake..."

"Indeed," Obi-Wan chuckles. "Ironically, he has minimal opinion on the optimal form of economics, for all that virulent xenophobia and the remnants of anti-communism were involved in the whole mess. He just wanted to create problems for the people that were causing him problems."

Cody shakes his head. "I want to judge that, but you've met my father."

"Jango Fett is, indeed, also not a man to do things by halves," Obi-Wan agrees, attempting to nod gravely but breaking into a smile at the end. "That man is absurd."

"At least he's not dragging Boba into it anymore," Cody mutters. He drags over the fresh sheet of paper and pen that Obi-Wan offers him. "Okay, right, let's start with Jaster..."

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milfcodeddean · 3 years

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Memento Moratus Sum

Emma Haunts the Necklace- The Fic <3

Starts more post/concepty and becomes a fic bc I did not plan on this it was stream of consciousness! I have not seen all of the later seasons and it was hard to keep track of what plot points to mention even of all the seasons I have seen!

AO3

Emma dies and Dean keeps her necklace to have something to remember her by, partly out of grief for what could have been partly as an act of emotional self flagellation. He wears it under his shirt, a secret, just like any thoughts he has about his dead daughter.

Emma is a ghost because she didn’t do enough to be a monster and earn her place in purgatory but she isn’t human enough for heaven and she’s anchored to the necklace.

She follows Dean around silently, quickly learning enough about ghosts to know if she reveals herself too soon or ever really then Dean is going to burn the necklace.

During season seven Dean is haunted by two ghosts, Bobby, who is actively reaching out for him, and Emma, who is a silent observer. I think Emma hides from Bobby, he’s a hunter and she doesn’t want him to tell Dean about her, OR Bobby sees her before she knows ghosts can see other ghosts and they talk and he pities her but agrees to not let Dean know

Dean is wearing the necklace when he goes to purgatory. Emma is still a ghost here but it’s different, and she’s been watching this man for months now, he’s her world now. She keeps some of the monsters away, she makes him wake up when there are threats at night, she watches him befriend a monster and burns with pain at the knowledge that maybe she could have had that. Maybe she didn’t need to kill him, maybe he would have loved her not just as a dead hypothetical but as her.

Dean comes out of purgatory with an extra extra passenger. She watches with a sense of smugness as he rages at Sam, she pretends he’s also mad over her. She doesn’t like Sam’s attitude towards Benny either. She gets to see her great grandfather and she sees him die. She talks to his ghost, he calls her granddaughter (forgetting the great) even after learning she’s an amazon, before he gets reaped.

There’s an empty room in the bunker she pretends is hers. She moves objects in there, never quite decorating, but practicing telekinesis where Dean won’t see it and making up a fantasy of a life she could have had. She still never minds being tethered to Dean, especially now as he doesn’t sleep around and spends less time in bars where she’s left uncomfortably watching. She likes going to the grocery store, she likes watching him cook, maybe a few times she’s kept a pot from boiling over or a bag from falling. She’s learning to live from watching Dean, he doesn’t know it, but he’s teaching her life skills. She doesn’t know the names for the dishes he teaches her to make or the parts of cars or guns but she etches the motions he makes into her mind. She likes Charlie, she wishes she could meet her, and she likes larping. She imagines herself as an Amazon warrior of antiquity, armored in bronze.

She tried to wake Dean and Charlie out of their djinn dream but nothing worked, she tried to fight the djinn to no avail either. When Dean and Charlie hugged she wished she could be in their embrace too.

She’s glad it’s Bobby’s ghost they use for the trial, she’s so glad she never revealed herself.

Sam is slowly growing on her, she doesn’t love him but he means enough to Dean that she would try to stop him from dying.

She knows about Gadreel. She hides harder now, afraid too of the new angel in the bunker. Castiel she likes, Castiel she watched in purgatory and she watched beat her father bloody in the crypt and she understood brain washing and the control of authorities. She almost reveals herself and her knowledge of Gadreel when Dean kicks Cas out of the bunker, but her hesitation lasts too long.

She’s tethered to Dean so she isn’t there when Kevin dies. Kevin had been another one she enjoyed observing, she envied him his mother in so many ways, Linda had been everything Lydia hadn’t been. When Kevin dies he’s haunting the bunker too. It’s almost like having a friend. He pities her, but she’ll take anything, he’s sort of her age in some ways and she teaches him how to be a ghost.

Crowley almost gives her away. He knows she’s there, but he saves her presence as a bargaining chip against Dean, a surprise tidbit to bring up later.

The father of murder can see her too. Cain keeps his eyes on her father most of the time, but the spark in his eyes and smirk when he sees her and her bloody pink shirt cut straight through her.

Her father dies. She wants to run to him, to fling her arms around him and greet him with her bloody lips and stained shirt and tell him she forgives him and she loves him and she’s sorry he’s dead but can she at least spend some of eternity with him and she wants to teach him to be a ghost and she wants to tell him so many things she’s noticed. But Crowley does something that locks her voice and powers and keeps her from the room.

Demon dean leaves the bunker with Emma’s necklace ripped off and dropped beside a bedstead.

Sam picks up the necklace. Emma hates him touching it but it’s all she can hope that he doesn’t destroy it. She doesn’t know if he recognizes it, but he doesn’t throw it away, and brings it out to show Castiel as evidence for Dean’s absence. Castiel names it as Amazon gold, recognizes it as Dean’s, but does not know it’s origin. Emma has to hear her story from her murderer’s lips. She almost shows herself, but she’s afraid Sam will cast the necklace into a fire. If they could do that to Bobby, they’ll do it to her. But she doesn’t feel like a vengeful uncontrolled spirit, perhaps it’s the Amazon magic, but she feels calmer than she ever was during her days of life.

Her necklace stays in the bunker, she watches demon Dean from a distance at first, she tries to comfort him strapped to the chair but he calls her a hallucination and lets something between a sob and a laugh out before turning away. She tries, she wipes his brow, she begs him to become human again or to die, she tries to keep the devil’s trap intact. Still she is called a hallucination. It’s almost nice to be important enough that he’d hallucinate her.

When Dean, normal human dean, is back, he fixes the necklace with pliers and holds it staring at it in his hands. He’s alone in his room. Emma gently puts her hands over his where they are clasped around her anchor to him. She doesn’t know if he can feel her. Her name comes from his mouth in a breathy whisper, wet and rough, a word unused to being spoken. He bends over himself, weeping with the necklace pressed to his mouth. Emma weeps as well. He would not weep if he did not love her, but he is a hunter and she has to chose between this silent spectatorship where she can pretend she is living in rooms beside him, or the knowledge that if he knew she was haunting him, he would burn the necklace to send her on.

She doesn’t know if there’s another afterlife for failed amazons, and from what she understands of Heaven, hers would be something pathetic like the day she met Dean before she died, or an eternity as a ghost watching him weep.

She hates watching Dean with Amara those few days. She hates the burning wretched envy risking corrupting her as he holds a baby girl that isn’t her. She hates that Amara loves Dean. And she hates even more that Amara brings back Mary instead of her.

She never realized that she wanted to be brought back and resurrected so badly and that it was even an option until she watches Dean reunite with Mary.

Dean mentions her to Mary- almost - he says he had a kid, and the cut off gesture to the necklace means her. Emma stopped minding that Dean never spoke about her. She didn’t want him to talk about her with Sam, and she quickly realized he didn’t talk about his grief with anyone. But he did wear her necklace, and sometimes he took it out from under his shirt and rubbed his thumb over the metal and she would pretend it was his thumb stroking the back of her hand. Dean didn’t talk about her and she didn’t need him to. But now he had, and with his mother. And he implied he had thought about what he would want for her, that he wouldn’t want his life of violence and moving for her.

Emma likes Mary as a warrior woman, but can’t help but understand Dean’s pain when she leaves. She understands being the surprise child older than a parent wants too much.

She tried to help Dean as she always has, but the British Men of Letters terrify her. She knows they would either keep her to study or destroy her and she can’t trust anyone to keep her secret from their spying.

Later it seems the world collapses again. Cas dies. Angels don’t have ghosts, she can never meet him. And Kelly has eyes only for her son until she is reaped. Emma wishes she could comfort Dean or that she could truly leave him to his grief. She turns away as he ties Castiel’s body with yellow curtains. She stands beside him watching the pyre.

She doesn’t understand Dean’s attitude towards Jack. She’s watched jealously how Dean interacts with Krissy, with Claire, with the orphan boys at the home, and she has her fantasy of how Dean would have treated her had she lived. The jealous part of her doesn’t want Dean to like Jack, but most of her wants Dean to go back to acting like how she expected him to, she wants the man she could pretend was being her father. And she watches Jack enough to be afraid of their similarities. To see herself in him. And if Dean hates him, would he have hated her. Does he only wear her necklace because she’s dead.

She watches silently when Dean finally breaks, confronted, and tells Sam that he sees her in Jack. She hears how he loves her. She watches Sam realize the enormity of his crime and apologize. She accepts the apology, even if it wasn’t meant for her ears. Dean doesn’t see her, but she sits beside him on the opposite side of Sam on that floor.

Something has changed.

Sometimes, it seems like Dean is glimpsing her out of the corner of his eye. He stares at the steamy bathroom mirror while he’s shaving, right at the red smear on the pink of her shirt. He nicks himself, swears, and swipes a hand through the steam, through her image. He does double takes in the rear view mirror, glancing twice at the backseat where she sits, pretending she’s part of his road trips.

Jack brings back Castiel. Jack has powers beyond what Emma could have imagined. And Jack is both nice and not fully indoctrinated into hunting ways. Emma also likes Jack, she understands so much about him, and she likes the shows he watches, she likes the way he’s nice, and in her elaborate fantasy of what if she was alive, she decides he’s her brother.

It’s hard to find a time when Jack is alone but near enough to Dean and the anchoring necklace that she can talk to him, but it happens.

Emma focuses everything she has into appearing, a heavy grounding feeling she hasn’t felt since Dean was a chained demon. The words catch in her throat, unpracticed at speaking, but she blurts out to Jack that she’s his sister, the words spilling fast, that she’s Dean’s dead daughter, she doesn’t tell him that Sam killed her, she’s seen Sam with him, their closeness she can’t decide if she envies or not. She tells him she’s an Amazon, how she’s dead but anchored, how she doesn’t have a heaven or purgatory or hell, how she wants to come back. She tells him that she likes his shows and she tells him she loves Dean and Castiel and she finds things she likes about Sam. He doesn’t look at her with pity. He looks at her with a bright spark to his eyes.

But he doesn’t resurrect her. At least not right away. Apparently he’s been too recently warned off from the idea of asking for forgiveness rather than permission. He thinks she should reveal herself to Dean first, before they decide. Emma hates the idea, she spent all of these years afraid of Dean destroying her anchor, and now she’s afraid of his rejection, what if he resents her watching him all the time, what if he blames her for not doing more. What if he wants her gone instead of brought back.

The Amazons,in their scant days of raising her, taught her to be brave.

Jack asks the family to stay after dinner.

Emma takes a deep breath, more for the instinctive motion than for a need for air, and materializes.

There’s a beat of silence and then a mess of noises. Dean drops a mug, Sam’s chair skids, everyone one is talking at once.

Emma can’t find words to say to Dean, she wants to stare at him as she always does, but she can’t bear to see rejection on his face. She waits and Jack opens his mouth to introduce her but then her name comes from Dean’s lips. It’s like that dark night where they wept in his bedroom again. She has called him many variants of father in her mind in several languages, but it is the most childish “daddy” that slips out.

No one else in the room matters, he looks at her, meeting her eyes instead of the gorey wound, and she gets eye contact without having to pretend she is what’s in his sight line.

He doesn’t ask if she’s a ghost or if she’s dead or any of the silly civilian questions. He only manages “how” before fumbling for the necklace, and she nods confirmation. She wonders if he’s planning on burning it.

He asks how long and suddenly words spill forth, she tells him she’s been here the whole time, watching, she says she sorry about Bobby and Kevin and Charlie and Kelly and Cas and Benny she tells him the ones she helped with being a ghost, she tells him about watching the others move on, she says she’s sorry she couldn’t do more when he was a demon and something in his expression breaks, she says she’s sorry she never showed herself.

He holds up a hand, stopping her before she apologizes again, and says he remembers her when he was a demon, that he had thought she was a hallucination, she nods and cries anew.

She wants to tell him that she’s watched him and loves him and even if it’s embarrassing she wants to say she’s pretended to be alive with him, and she wants most of all to ask if he loves her, to hear it said to her face.

Instead he asks weakly why she’s here now.

She says she wanted to come clean about haunting him, says she’s thought about it for years and was scared he would burn the necklace, says she’s learned about ghosts from him and she’s never felt vengeful, she doesn’t feel corrupted, and maybe it’s because she’s a monster. His face twitches at that word.

Jack interrupts, changing the air in the room and suddenly both she and Dean remember their audience. Sam’s eyes are wet and he looks something close to afraid. Emma hopes the look on Castiel’s face is softness for her too and not just Jack.

Jack offers to bring her back, tells Dean that they didn’t want to do it behind his back. Emma turns invisible again out of the sick swoosh of anxiety that overwhelms her. She barely hears through her ringing ears that Dean desperately agrees and says yes, fumbling to take the necklace off and pass it to Jack.

She’s going to have to wait a few days. Jack is going to bring her back where her body is, and that’s more than 24 hours of driving away, and Dean wants to be there.

It’s a weird car ride, they know she’s there, and she sits between Castiel and Jack in the back of the Impala. They had her pick a set of Jack’s clothes to replace her bloody shirt, they have food and water for her. Emma doesn’t have a name for the emotions she’s feeling and they’re almost overwhelming.

They don’t have to dig her up to bring her back, Jack’s powers allow for that at least, and Emma is glad, she’s watched Dean dig up enough graves to imagine what she’ll look like.

Then Jack’s eyes glow bright gold.

It’s like what she imagines being born feels like. Overwhelming and dark and bright and both blissful and painful. And then she is gasping with real lungs and the sunlight is bright in her eyes and she can feel the textures of her clothing and the grass.

And then arms and hands are on her, Dean is pulling her to her feet and into his embrace in one motion.

She’s never been hugged by him, and it’s better than her jealous imaginings when he held others. She never wants to let go, she feels safe and warm and loved and his hand is on her hair and she can smell him and feel his heartbeat.

He finally lets go and steps back to look at her, keeping a hand on her shoulder and cupping her cheek with the other. There are streaks of tears matching her own on his face. His hands leave only to be replaced by Jack.

Jack’s hug is different but enthusiastic, there are no tears, he is beaming, part proud, part delighted, she can’t help but smile back. He calls her sister and she accepts him as brother.

Castiel does not embrace her, but his greeting his warm and his eyes match his smile. He clasps her hand between his and Emma’s heart swells.

She knows Sam doesn’t know how to look at her or how to talk to her. She doesn’t know what she wants from him either. She knows hes sorry, she’s heard it from his own lips, not to her, but to the only other person to whom it would matter. She smiles hesitantly at him, instead of glaring, and waves.

Then she slips her hand back into Dean’s and lets him pull her into another hug. She feels light and giddy and afraid this is all a dream. If she died and this is heaven then she would accept that too.

But it’s real, she changes out of her bloody shirt and into a blue one of Jack’s, she drinks water for the first time in years and eats fruit snacks from a packet pulled from Castiel’s trench-coat pocket, and a cereal bar.

A few hours later they stop at a nicer diner than Emma usually sees them eat at, and Dean tells the hostess it’s his daughter’s birthday and Emma gets to order foods she’s been curiously watching people eat for years off the menu. The restaurant gives her cake.

Emma’s cheeks hurt from smiling, and Dean’s eyes have not lost their cheerful crinkle and Jack is beaming and even Sam and Castiel look endlessly pleased.

Later there will be harder talks, about the things she’s witnessed, later she’ll talk about haunting their steps, about the years of questions built up, later she’ll realize she doesn’t remember how to sleep and Dean will sit and try to stroke her hair and talk softly and it’s nice but not enough. Later it will be Castiel who explains how to become human, how to adjust to having a body, how to sleep and how to tell if you like a food or not. Later she will argue with Dean about her usefulness on hunts and he will tell her how scared he is of her dying again. Later Mary will come back and die. Later Jack will die and a demon will wear his corpse and she will hate and fear it, later God will tell her she is an interloper in his story.

But for now Emma has a family and a piece of cake and a table of smiles.

#emma winchester #emmanatural #dean winchester #dad dean winchester #my writing #this was not planned this was just me thinking Hey what if Emma haunted the necklace and was there watching events and like the Emma feeling #s spilled over into a whole 3.5k fic so #i might put this on ao3? the start is so weak tho #yes that is a reference to buried ghosts and bitter truths

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heyitsphoenixx · 3 years

Text

I Hope You’re Happy Pt.3

Yup, somehow this is still happening because I still have ideas that won’t leave my brain. I’m not promising any kind of schedule, but I think I’ll keep going with this if you still enjoy it, lmk.

TW: suffocation, needles, forced injection. Brief mentions of murder and death. SFW. Lots of angst.

All Parts AO3

gif by: @/henricavyll

The day after waking up from the hospital, Cassie finally found the courage to go see Gail. Her parents had begged her to stay in bed and rest, but she knew she couldn’t go another day without seeing her and letting her know she was, given the circumstances, reasonably okay. Every bone in her body was also begging her to rest, which she found annoying after being able to run at a full sprint to the Fishers’ house off the adrenaline. The memory made her wince, she was trying not to think about it.

Cassie sat in her car parked just outside Make Me Coffee, watching Gail take orders and wipe down counters from her window. More memories were coming back to her at an overwhelming rate as she watched.

The day Cassie and Nina both dropped out and drove back home, Cassie moving in with her immediately to take care of her, collapsing on the couch together as soon as they walked through the door, Cassie holding her in her arms and promising she would never let anything bad happen to her ever again, that she would kill that son of a bitch. Going out and looking for jobs the next day and being asked over and over again why a former med student who was two semesters away from graduating was applying to be a waitress or a bartender or a maid. Walking into a coffee shop as a last resort with knotted hair, muddy shoes, and a tear-stained face, ready to bully whoever it was into giving her a fucking job, and then being met with Gail. She looked at Cassie like she was the last orphan left who nobody wanted, but it wasn’t a pitying look. She looked at her with empathy and love, how Nina would look at her.

Cassie threw open the door, the bell attached taking a beating as the ringing reverberated throughout the coffee shop. She felt like a wild animal and wouldn’t have been surprised if she were frothing at the mouth. Everyone’s heads turned to her in an instant, frightened eyes in headlights waiting for her to pounce on any one of them. She scanned the room for whoever owned the place and saw a well dressed woman cleaning used mugs behind the counter. She had gorgeous long hair and wore a baby pink puffy blouse and skin-tight jeans. She had stopped cleaning when Cassie entered and was just looking at her expectantly. It made Cassie stop in her tracks.

“I need a job,” Cassie barked.

The woman walked out from behind the counter towards Cassie, in no rush. She moved with the grace of a lion, her pink stilettos demanding attention. You could hear each step as the entire shop was silent with baited breath. As she stopped in front of Cassie she assessed her, deciding what she was, friend or food. She saw her knotted hair, her muddy shoes, and her tears. She saw her running mascara and smudged lipstick, her bitten down nails, and her scraped up knees. She slowly looked back at Cassie’s eyes. They were hard as steel, furious, and inconceivably tired. Her own eyes became soft in return.

“What’s your name, sweetheart?” the woman asked gently.

“Cassie.” She stiffened at the kindness in her voice.

“Nice to meet you, Cassie, my name is Gail. My only rule is that you speak to me and my customers with respect. Can you do that?”

“Yes ma’am.”

“Alright then, I think we might be able to work something out. Come with me, Cassie, let’s get you cleaned up.”

___________________________________

Gail held Cassie with a vice grip on her couch, daring everyone and anyone in the world to make her let go as Cassie sobbed.

“I just-I can’t believe it! She’s dead, she’s fucking dead! How could she do this to me, Gail? How could she fucking do this!”

“I don’t know, Cassie, I don't know.” She ran her hand over her back to try and soothe her. She didn’t know Nina that well but she knew the general story of what happened, why the two of them had dropped out together. She couldn’t bear seeing Cassie like this, strong, stubborn, idiotic, brilliant Cassie, completely collapsed.

“I’m gonna fucking kill him,” Cassie said in a low and steady voice.

“No you’re not, but I will.”

Cassie broke into sobs again, sounding like her lungs were going to give out. Gail did the only thing she could think of in that moment and just held her until she cried herself to sleep on her couch.

___________________________________

Cassie watched an older man crudely put a tip in Gail’s pocket, and she watched as Gail handled him with a smile on her face before turning around, taking the two dollar tip out, ripping it in half and letting it fall to the floor in front of him. Cassie grinned with pride. She desperately hoped Gail wouldn't think less of her after this, she didn’t think she’d be able to handle that.

After a few deep breaths Cassie finally left her car and made her way inside as Gail’s back was turned behind the counter, not paying attention to the bell’s ring. Cassie was back to her floral pastels today in a light blue summer dress, figuring no matter how she dressed she certainly couldn’t hide from her now, not that she’d ever want to.

“Excuse me ma’am, but I need a job.”

Gail whipped around at her voice, nearly hitting her head on a nearby shelf and staring at her in shock. Cassie tried not to laugh at the sight.

“And just where the hell have you been?” she demanded, loud enough that everyone turned their heads in annoyance.

“Well apparently you’re supposed to take three days to fully resurrect and this would be the fourth day since I left, so I’m only a day late-”

“Oh, shut up!” Gail said with a smile as she ran around the counter to wrap her up in her arms and whirl her around like Cassie weighed nothing.

“Ow, ow, ouch, Gail, put me down, I’m still sore,” she gasped through laughter. Everyone’s eyes were watching with interest now. Gail put her down and gave them all a look.

“Alright, everybody out, right now! That’s right, I don’t wanna hear it, we are closed! What are you all doing getting coffee in July anyway? Go get a damn ice cream like normal people for all I care, just get out!”

They all shuffled out muttering complaints and insults under their breath but Gail acted like she didn’t hear a word of it and just beamed at her.

“Okay, sit down and tell me everything. Don’t you dare leave out a single detail, or I’ll know,” she said as she started making Cassie’s favorite cappuccino.

“I mean, there’s not much to tell really,” Cassie teased.

“Oh, do not give me that” Gail scolded. “As if I haven’t been watching the news every second of the day waiting for your name to come up in the obituaries.”

Cassie noticed at that moment that Gail was wearing the necklace she had sent to her around her neck, half of a golden heart with ‘Cassie’ engraved on it.

“I’m sorry I didn’t come straight to you when I got out,” she apologized, preparing herself for what was coming.

“Wait,” Gail paused. “You said you only got out of the hospital yesterday, but I’m not the first person you’ve come to? And you went off to see someone else while you should be in bed? Cassie, I swear to God-”

“I didn’t go to him-”

“Ha! I knew it! I can’t believe you saw that stupid boy before me!”

“It was completely by coincidence. I even went to another coffee shop to try not to be seen-”

“You went to another coffee shop? Oh, you’re gonna wish you were dead now.”

Cassie just laughed and shook her head as she sipped at her cappuccino, grateful to finally have some good coffee. Gail walked around to the door to turn around the sign so it said CLOSED outside, then came to sit next to her, elbow on counter and head resting on her hand.

“Seriously, I missed you. I was worried.”

“I missed you too, Gail.” Cassie was finding it hard to look at her.

“Hey, you don’t have to tell me everything right now, I’m just glad you’re alive, Cassie.” Gail put her other hand on Cassie’s knee and squeezed reassuringly.

“Thanks. I do want to tell you, trust me, I want to tell you everything. I just...” She trailed off, thinking about why she couldn’t tell her. She wanted to, right after Mrs. Fisher she was the next person in line she wanted to spill her guts to, but...

“It happened... fast. I remember different events clear as day but it’s like they’re all jumbled around and I can’t get the order straight in my head.”

Cassie suddenly felt very separate from herself, like she was watching herself holding her own coffee and talking to Gail from the corner of the room. She didn’t feel like herself at all. She saw Gail starting to look worried.

“We don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to, honey,” Gail assured her.

“No, I’m fine. I want to figure this out,” Cassie said, determined.

“Well, have you seen the news lately? It’s all they’re talking about all day. I could tell you what they’ve gathered so far and you could tell me what’s right and what’s wrong, and we can go from there.”

Cassie considered this for a moment. “Do you have a pen?”

___________________________________

“Just stop-fucking-MOVING! STOP MOVING!”

His knee was anchored onto her chest to stop her from taking a breath under all 200-some pounds of his body, and he was pushing a pillow onto her face for the same reason. He was going to kill her.

Think, Cassie, think. You don’t have much time left, she thought.

How long does it take for someone to suffocate again? Fuck, just fucking THINK! I don’t care how many braincells I’m losing right now, I need to fucking think. What was it? Two and a half minutes. Right. Jesus, they teach some fucked up shit in med school. I wonder if he’s counting too. Probably not, he’s panicked, full of adrenaline, he’s just hoping I’ll collapse any second now. Okay. Help him out, then.

She thrashed even harder to distract him as she forced her head to turn to the side under the pillow. She could breathe. She took a breath before letting out a few more whimpers into the comforter underneath her so her voice was still muffled. She did this a few more times, taking a breath, thrashing, whimpering, until she felt it had been long enough that he would believe it if she stopped moving.

He paused for a moment as she held her breath beneath him, making sure she had truly stopped moving, and then lifted himself off of her and slowly laid down next to her on the bed, still handcuffed to the frame. He then began to violently weep. She rolled her eyes under the pillow, but took the opportunity to breathe a little easier as his loud cries drowned her out. He slowly began to roll off the bed and onto the floor facing away from her, sobbing into one hand while the other was still raised in the air from the handcuffs. She watched him with one unobstructed eye under the pillow as she took shallow breaths.

Think, Cassie. Think.

She couldn’t get to her tools at the foot of the bed without alerting him. She couldn’t knock him out or fight him, he was much stronger than her.

Making sure to move slowly but steadily without moving the bed, she moved her arm to check the pockets of her nurse costume to see if they were still there. She felt the small bottle and the syringe.

Quietly grateful and still terrified, she watched him still loudly weeping as she carefully removed the pillow, unscrewed the cap of the bottle and then drew the liquid up into the instrument.

Channeling every ounce of stealth she had in her body, she crept toward him with the syringe in hand, holding her breath now out of fear rather than necessity. She reared up, and in one swift movement, jammed the needle into his handcuffed arm. His yelled as his back slammed against the bed from being curled up. He reached to grab her arm but she pinned it behind his head with her other arm and leaned on it with all her body weight, keeping the needle deep in his vein. He struggled against her for about ten seconds before she felt his muscles relax and he finally slumped against the mattress, unconscious. She blew a sigh of relief, thanking her past self for taking the anesthetics.

Cassie took the needle out and carried her heels as she ran. She ran faster than she had ever run in her life. The old wood floors hurled splinters into her feet through her tights. All the men downstairs were knocked out, drugged from the spiked alcohol she gave them, so she didn’t care anymore about stealth. They’d all be out cold for another twelve hours at least.

She took the stairs two at a time, practically jumping down the last few to the floor. She made her way through the living room, leaping over dozens of passed out men, before bolting past the door into the cold night air. She ran over the gravel of the driveway and tried not to fall over the sloping hills, finally making it back to her car. She threw open the trunk and quickly changed, ripping off her wig and costume for a pink sweater and jeans. Even from this distance she could still see the lights on in the living room and in the room where Al Monroe sat on the floor, handcuffed to a bed, unconscious. She still wanted him dead, but this would do for now.

“That’s for Nina, you son of a fucking bitch,” she gasped out.

She drove and she drove and she drove. She couldn’t stop driving. The windows were wide open as she tried desperately to catch her breath, feeling like her lungs were still being crushed but of their own volition now.

I can make it, she thought. I can make it, I can drive home and act like nothing happened, no one will ever know the fucking difference.

She kept driving, lights blurring ahead of her as she had a terrible thought.

The police will come. They’ll come to my parents’ house if I’m there. Fuck!

She swerved into a u-turn that was so illegal it would have gotten the police’s attention on it’s own had it not been around 3am and there were none in sight. She eventually made her way to the hospital and stepped through the doors, feeling on the edge of death. People raced by her from every direction as if she were invisible.

“Hey,” she croaked out to anybody who would listen. No one did.

“Hey!” she cried, her voice hoarse. It was all she could do to make sure she kept breathing. The assistant at the desk turned to her.

“Yes ma’am?”

“I think... I need... I need...”

Finally, Cassie collapsed onto the floor.

___________________________________

“Holy shit, Cassie.”

Gail had been listening intently with wide eyes, writing down what she’d heard from the news next to what Cassie had told her and combining the two stories as Cassie recalled correctly.

“Yeah,” said Cassie grimly, tightly gripping her coffee cup with both hands. She couldn’t believe it herself, and she’d pulled off quite a lot in her time with other men that Gail didn’t even know about.

Gail looked at her for a moment in shock before abruptly standing up, phone in hand.

“I’m calling my brother,” she said, which was definitely not the reaction Cassie expected.

“What? Why?”

“Because you’re gonna need a lawyer, and he’s taking you on whether he likes it or not.”

#pyw #promising young woman #carey mulligan

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sasa-gay-yo · 3 years

Text

Just Us (Chapter Ten: Request)

← Chapter Nine

“We only have a bag of flour to give you this time.” He handed me a bag smaller than any ones they had before. I knew this might be the last time they would give me anything for my bread, so I took it without any word, but not without a nasty look. The cloth tied around my mouth hid my frown from him as I looked down at the small bag that even had a hole in it. This wasn’t going to make more than twenty loaves and I knew I was quickly running out of my own supply. I had tried to use my extra money to stock up as harvest came, but the price of wheat flour was so ridiculous, only the government could afford it. They bought most of the stock themselves and were hiding it. This small bag of flour was probably scooped out of a big box as they laughed in tricking me.

I walked out the doors of the stock yard, pausing as the soldiers carried out another covered body on the stretcher. I wondered if I could recognize the person if they showed me their face. I had started giving the people my own names and using the interactions I had with them to guess their positions in Shiganshina. Some refugees were nice and would have a conversation with me while I ate my allotted rations on the edge of the stage they set up. It was a precaution so the refugees couldn’t run and push over the food stand like they had done a few months previous. It happened on my day off, so I wasn’t there to see it happen, but the next day, a stage had already been built with stairs that forced them into single file lines. If they pushed each other, the Garrison now had an above view to punish and hit those who forced themselves in line.

I had conversations with some children and taught them a hand game from my youth to pass the time. Some of their parents would talk to me too, if they were young, and ask about the situation outside of the stockyard. Since violence had increased outside the barracks, they easily found a scapegoat and restricted the refugees to only the stockyard. It had no effect on the violence, but it seems the citizens of Trost found comfort in having someone to blame for the slow downfall of humanity.

The trio never talked to me. Their grandfather always greeted me with a smile in line and I would give him the four loaves of bread for the children. The boy, Eren Jaeger, would get into fights with the guards more and more, but he would always be pushed to the ground or saved by the girl. It reminded me so much of myself. Was he getting beat up because it was something to do? Maybe it was the only thing that would make him feel something throughout the day. I desperately wanted to approach them and talk to them, but I never was able too. As soon as I would spot them, they’d disappear to some place in the stockyard and the smaller children would crowd around me to play the “clapping game” as they called it.

Everyday I walked home alone, knife gripped in my pocket, I thought of what I would say to Eren Jaeger if he ever was thrown on my doorstep. He probably wouldn’t care for the pity of an older woman who had no relation to him. He also probably wouldn’t care about my time in the Underground and how I thought he acted like I did. I had made a game plan and everyday would go over it and tweak some parts. I’d have the trio help me make bread, talking to them about anything. Slowly, I’d tell them I was an orphan and maybe find some relation with them. The only adult figure around them seemed to be the grandfather and that made me wary because of the situation they came from. Their parents were no doubt killed by titans.

I took the cloth off of my mouth as I got far enough away from the stockyard and took a deep breath of the slowly freezing air. It was going to get cold again, but the farmers had predicted a nicer winter than last year. We’d be lucky to get any snow this time, but it was better because they could chance growing more late winter crops. I decided that for the end of the year, I might as well open my shop and keep the tradition of year-end and winter pastries, hoping people would buy even without the fresh fruit. Another motivation is that some of my supplies were going to go bad and I didn’t want to lose more money than I had already. People like something sweet when they’re going through a bad time, so I’d hope they’d want my sweets.

“Eva! Eva! Eva!” I looked up and saw Elias running towards me, paper in hand. He had a growth spurt over the summer and fall months, and now he was almost to my chin. His hair was also much too long, but he wouldn’t let me cut it because apparently the other boys at school also had hair like his. During summer and current late fall, I had taken them in pretty much everyday, commissioning them to make bread with me and giving them a few slices. Since Wall Maria had fallen, their parents had gone a bit crazy and so had a lot of other people in Trost. The Order of the Walls had grown into a huge following and not just a tiny cult anymore. They were going to build a church soon in the city square and the kid’s father was too busy with that to care for the proper needs of his children. I mended their clothes, helped them with homework, and even let them sleep on my couch when they got a little too full after dinner. Their parents didn’t even notice their absence when I brought them back home.

“Yes, Elias?” He pushed a piece of paper into my hands and I saw the hundred percent he had gotten on the spelling test we had worked on together. I was awful at spelling, but I knew enough to help him. We would use flour, spread out on the table, to practice spelling words. This past list was increasingly difficult and I had to even look at it again a few times.

“I got a perfect score on the spelling test!” his smile beamed up at me and made me stop thinking about the year-end and the refugees for a few seconds.

“I’m proud of you Elias. You practiced hard for this.” He started following me back to the café and I knew he probably would want to come in and do his homework on Levi’s table. It was funny that Elias had such an unconscious affinity for him. His favorite toy was still the horse, he would sit at his table and do homework, and he started drinking tea because I refused him coffee. When Elias sat at the table doing his homework, it helped to fill the void that was left.

Levi hadn’t returned in four months, almost five this coming Monday. The only thing I had was the button down and two letters he had sent before his work consumed him. I was waiting on a reply from a letter I had sent maybe three months ago. I knew that he was still alive and right outside of Trost, but only cadets would come in and out for refugee security. Everyday, I would hear them open the gates a six and I would open the window of my apartment, hoping to see him on his horse. I’ve probably watched the Scout cadets come into Trost so much, they must know my face by now.

I missed him.

Elias grabbed my hand unconsciously as we walked and broke me out of my thoughts for a second time. It seemed that there were three reasons I woke up everyday. The refugees, the kids, and the Scouts. It’s good that I had things to live for now.

“Can I do my schoolwork in your café, Eva? There’s a lot of people over at Daddy’s house today and June’s at the bookstore.” June had recently got an apprenticeship at the book binder’s shop as he had no sons to pass it down to. I had given him the recommendation and once he saw the knowledge June had about books, he accepted her in. She was mostly selling books to people, proving her worth to the book binder, before she got to learn the secrets. Sometimes she would bring back broken books he had given her and think of the ways she would fix it. I was surprised at how close she actually was in her guesses. However, her new job had left Elias to fend for himself and grow up now without his sister at his side. He would play with friends, but once they had to go home, he was by himself. I was happy to indulge him in anything he wanted to do since I was alone too. We’d be lonely together.

“Of course, Elias. We can go pick up June when she’s finished too.” That was good enough for him and he ran ahead, turning right out of the alleyway to get to the door of the café. I wonder who would fill my days once Elias was old enough to gain an apprenticeship. Jonas would be off somewhere delivering, the kids would be gone, and Levi would be on some expedition. Maybe I’ll get a cat.

“E-Eva?” I turned the corner and stopped walking to survey the scene. My stomach instantly dropped and I felt like I wanted to throw up. Why were these two here? Elias looked up and the tall, blonde man, instantly recognizing him. Their faces didn’t seem distressed and they were just leaning against the wall of the café, horses tied to the wooden posts. He can’t be gone, I would have felt it.

“Miss Evylnn Flynn?” He was the first to speak up and Hange kicked herself off the wall, wagging her finger at me.

“I knew you were lying to me! Both of you!” They weren’t sad or upset. He had to be fine, but why were they here and not him? I can’t say I wasn’t disappointed to not see him behind Erwin’s shadow.

“Miss Flynn, we would like to have a word with you in private?” Erwin gestured to the door of the café and I swallowed hard. Was I in trouble? Why is the Commander here to talk to me in private?

“Elias, you can go up to my apartment and do your school work on my desk. I’ll come up and get you when I’m done talking to the Commander.” Elias looked back at me, his eyes whimsical. He was pretty much meeting his hero and I was pushing him away from it. Erwin looked down at the boy and smiled. To pay him for listening, I’d ask Erwin to talk to Elias. If he had time to come and talk to me personally, he could spend five more minutes to entertain Elias.

“Can you do that for us, Elias? I promise it won’t take too long.” He nodded rapidly and Erwin reached down to fluff his hair. As soon as he was done, Elias ran up the stairs to my apartment, shutting the door with a slam. I’d have yelled at him if I wasn’t in this situation. My heart was speeding up and, if they could, my palms would be sweating.

“Miss Flynn?” Erwin turned and gestured to the café door again. I nodded once and walked over, unlocking the door and leading them both in. What could they want? My mind was running through a hundred scenarios. Most of them ended with something happening to Levi. The other popular answer was that I was somehow in trouble.

Once the door closed behind me, I got the nerve to turn around and smile at them. Hange’s presence made me slightly more comfortable, but this was the first time I had met Erwin. His energy was completely overwhelming and even if he looked nice, you could tell the amount of power he had. It was like the positive version of Levi.

“Can I get you two anything to drink?” I whipped my hands on my jacket, looking to the floor.

“Do you have any juice? I’m so thirsty, I barely had time for lunch!” I smiled a bit at Hange and walked over to the icebox I had. The only consumers of the juice were Elias and June, so it was nice to give it to someone else.

“C-Commander?” I asked, silently cursing at my stutter. How was he more intimidating to me than Levi had ever been? He smiled at me and nodded before sitting down at the center table. I picked out another glass bottle and took one for myself. Hopefully they liked orange.

They both were just staring at me, waiting for me to come and join them. I handed them the juice and paused for a few seconds before sitting down. They both seemed so relaxed and I was exactly the opposite. My hands were fidgeting under the table and I dare not look at Erwin. Levi would probably yell at me for how shy and weak I seemed to them. Hange even downed her juice and let out a big ‘ah’ as she slammed it down on the table while we sat there. Only then, I realized the thin film of dust on the table. If Levi found out I sat his Commander on a dirty table, it would be over for me.

“Miss Flynn-”

“Eva. You can call me Eva. If we’re going to be seeing each other multiple times, it’s better to be one first name basis.” He smiled a bit, probably to calm me down, and continued.

“Well, Eva… I don’t know how to begin this conversation, but I believe I can start by asking you what your relationship with Captain Levi is?” I blinked and looked at Hange. She was leaning forward, smiling at me, expectant at my answer. Had they found out? Was there a reason Levi might have told them about us? What if there’s only suspicion and I’m the one who outs us because I wasn’t careful? Was Erwin trying to intimidate me off of a hunch Hange had?

“Why are you asking?” I wasn’t going to give them a straight answer. Erwin smiled a bit, a genuine one this time, and put one hand up.

“We have no ill will with the conversation. Both Hange and I are just curious about the situation our Captain may be in. The way you answer, however, might lead to some concerns.” Well, that makes me not want to answer your question, Commander. I took a sip of my juice before sitting up straight again. If we were to have this conversation, it would have to seem like I was being truthful. My hands were still shaking as I sat them on my lap.

“What has the Captain said?” Hange almost jumped out of her chair.

“Barely anything! I’m aching to know how Levi is when he’s with you! Is he a cuddler? Does he know nothing about relationships?” My eyes widened at her answer and it made me believe that he had to have said something to them. But, why? Did they back him into a corner?

“I’m sorry to disappoint, but the Captain and I are only friends. I haven’t seen him in over four months since I closed my café.” Hange leaned back in her chair and laughed crazily. I was starting to see what Levi meant.

“I appreciate the loyalty you have to Levi’s and your private life, however, he has already informed us of you two’s relationship. We are only finding time now to come and visit, but we’ve known for a month.” I choked on my juice at Erwin’s words and wiped my mouth, swallowing hard.

“He… did?” It was squeak and that got Hange laughing even more. So, how did they know if they were being truthful? Erwin nodded and handed me a handkerchief from his coat pocket. I thanked him and wiped the leftover juice off my hands.

“He believed it best that, as the Commander, that I know about your existence for various reasons. Hange also happened to be in the room because she is the only person who has officially met you and vogue for your personality. I had no idea about your visit to the Scout Headquarters until yesterday and that is a security risk.” I nodded and tried to calm down my racing heart. It was… interesting to finally have someone know about our relationship. Especially the Commander of the Scout’s. It was also concerning that the one who gossips the most in the Scouts also holds that information. Levi had told me how Hange revealed weekly who was having sex with who during boring meetings.

“May I ask, what were his reasonings?”

“As Commander of the Scout Regiment, I am the first line of defense for my soldiers. I pledge to protect them as best I can within our job description. This pledge of protection goes to their families and loved ones as well. I believe it to be Captain Levi’s intention that you are also under this hedge of protection concerning this period of political and societal unrest we are currently experiencing. He told us about a recent mishap you had with the refugees in Trost.”

“Oh, yes, that makes sense.” He shifted in his chair and pulled out an envelope from his jacket.

“Another reason is that I have personal services that deliver mail much faster than the average carrier and much more secretive as well. Currently, the Scout’s are being monitored for reasons I cannot reveal to you. He believes, and I concur, that if your existence is publicized to the government, you could be used as bait or a bargaining chip. Some in the government are not happy with Captain Levi’s placement and rank in the Scouts and the repercussions of his past come back to haunt him. If not now, sometime in the future.” I took the envelope off the table and recognized Levi’s wispy handwriting. A response to my letter. This made my heart sing with joy. He hadn’t forgotten to write back, but he was pushed in a difficult situation that didn’t allow him to. I shouldn’t have doubted him so much.

“Did the monitoring begin around three months ago?” He nodded and I noticed Hange was looking between be and the letter. She’s very curious about Levi’s private life, and I couldn’t blame her. I had been that interested in him as soon as he walked into my café.

“There is information that the Scout’s have been given that can be perceived as a huge security threat if society gets wind of it. I also agree with the government’s judgement on that and am trying my best to limit security breaches in the Scouts.” That’s when the real reason they were here hit me. It wasn’t to deliver a letter and oogle at our relationship. I was a security threat to them. I was in trouble. My mind went back to the night Levi and I had before he left. Had he told them about that too? How much has he said?

“I see. That is why you came here today, I assume.” I looked him right in the eyes and he didn’t seem to have any anger in them. I remembered Levi and I’s conversation about Erwin. I wasn’t going to know at all what he was thinking until he specifically told me.

“I have known Levi enough to build trust with him. I trust him with information that is top secret and dangerous for society. If certain things get out, it could cause riots and more civil unrest as the expense of the Scouts. Levi has told me that you support the Scout’s endeavors the most out of any branch of the military. I hope that the support you have for us also translates into loyalty.” He didn’t blink, waiting for my response.

“He hasn’t told me anything of that nature, Commander. The only thing he has told me is that he cannot morally support whatever the Scout’s are doing at the beginning of the coming year.” Hange seemed to let out a sigh of relief and I even saw Erwin sit back an inch. I understood why they might be on edge about that. They have no idea how Levi is when he is with someone like me and I am someone who frequents the refugee camps.

“Yes, that seems to be a common theme among our officers. However, we do not have the power needed to fight back against orders directly from the government. I hope that once the plans reach the public ear, your support of the Scouts and Captain Levi doesn’t waiver. It would be a shame for the Captain to have a good thing leave him for something that he didn’t have a choice in.” I took another breath and noticed my heart was slowing down. I wasn’t going to be thrown in some dungeon and tortured for the information I don’t know. That made me feel better about this conversation.

“Now, I must plainly state the requests we have for you. They shouldn’t be unreasonable, but I will say this is the first time we’ve had someone of Captain Levi’s rank be involved with a normal citizen. I think you can see why we have the need to be cautious and explain common Scout things to someone who isn’t in our place. You could be a security threat if you do not know proper protocol.” That was only slightly demeaning.

“Yes, Commander. I do understand the need for me to know what I can and cannot do or say.” He smiled again and it amazed me the duality he had. He made you feel welcomed with his smile, and then completely intimidated with his status and demeanor.

“As you are in a relationship with someone who is given classified information on a daily basis, it can be possible for it to easily slip out of Levi when he isn’t thinking. We ask you not to repeat anything you hear from Levi, even if you disagree with it. There may come a time when people you know are involved or put in danger by the operations of the Royal Government, therefore I’m asking you to bear some of the pain of a Scout officer in these situations.”

“It seems you’re setting me up for the coming year, Commander… or at least you have a situation in mind currently.” Hange smirked and pointed at me.

“You’re smart, Eva. I can see how you might last around Levi’s.” I wonder what they think Levi and I’s interactions are. They probably don’t think I’m the one who makes him suffer with my words more than he does me. Imagine if they knew how much I made their Captain blush. I smiled thinking about it.

“The next request. As I extend my protection to you, I request you do the same to Levi and any Scout who is in need of assistance. Captain Levi was once a wanted man, and the government could easily turn their back on him if they deem it worthy of their agenda. There might come a time where you will have to shield or protect Levi or members of the Scout Regiment from the Royal Government. I’m best stating that, as someone in a relationship with the Captain, you may need to lie and commit treason for his or our safety. You are a part of the Scout Regiment now, and that is some of the responsibility that comes with it.” I sat there and thought that one over. It was a huge request, but not one that would easily deter me from Levi and the Scouts. I thought of the Garrison soldiers kicking down Eren Jaeger everyday, or Mitras not dispatching any MPs or food supplies to the districts struggling to stay alive. If I knew it was for the better, I could easily betray them. I owe nothing to the government.

“You don’t have to accept this right awa-” I shook my head and stopped him.

“No, I can do that. The government has never done anything for me. I can easily betray them for a cause and people I believe in.” This made both of them smile instantly.

“Levi was right, your loyalty and regard seems to be astounding, Eva. I believe he has found a fine woman to be with.” I looked down at my hands, trying to hide the blush with my hair. I don’t know why that compliment hit me the way it did, but people admiring our hidden relationship made me happy, I guess. Especially the Commander. It wouldn’t happen much more than this, so I should savor it.

“Am I able to make requests, Commander?” I looked up at him again when my blush subsided.

“Erwin. You can call me Erwin, and I will try my best to accept them. If it is something I cannot do, I will have to refuse. Our positions of freedom are very different, Eva.” I nodded and took another sip of my juice. There has been something bothering me since Levi and I had talked about Erwin.

“If you are asking me to put my life and reputation on the line for the Scouts and Levi, I must request that equally. I understand you cannot predict the outcome of expeditions, and I know we both know that Levi won’t die simply because of that. I’m specifically asking for you to protect him against the government.” He crossed his arms and I still couldn’t tell what he was thinking.

“I don’t think I know what you mean, Eva. You can’t be asking me to commit treason for one soldier? I am unable to do that.” I shook my head at him and formulated my next sentences. I also had a specific scenario in my mind.

“If the government asks something of Levi that would lead to his certain death, no matter how it will help society, I want you to do everything you can to protect him from that fate. Refuse his service. Discharge him from the Scouts. Anything it takes. I know he’ll take it, no matter what they give him, but I want to be selfish for him. He’s too valuable to humanity to be lost in such a simple manner. ”

“It seems you’re setting me up for something, Eva… or at least you have a situation in mind currently,” he mimicked my words and it made me smirk a bit. We could play the same game with each other. It felt nice to be able to be on the same level with him right now unlike the last few minutes. We were bartering back and forth. I was in my element. I could never match his strategy or intelligence, but I knew how to make a deal.

“Secondly, give him more breaks. Every time I see him he’s tired and complaining about the amount of paperwork he has to do. I haven’t seen him in person in almost five months because of whatever you seem to be planning. At least a monthly break. You know how he gets when he’s overworked.” This made Hange laugh again and I noticed then how quiet she had been throughout Erwin’s requests. It made me think how intelligent she was as well. All the officers must be. She had her quirks, but she knew when to be serious.

“That… that is something I cannot promise you. I can try my hardest, but when we are as busy as we are now, I cannot let anyone slack off because their family requested it. You must see I have to be fair about it.” I frowned, not liking that answer, but I knew he wasn’t going to change that. I was being more selfish than I could be right now. I even had one more, morbid request to get through. This one was one that I had thought about over the last few months. What if.

“Lastly, if Levi does die, I want you to tell me directly, Erwin,” I looked up, locking eyes with him to make sure he knew how important this request was, “I won’t believe any random cadet or Garrison soldier who comes to deliver the news and I won’t believe it if I don’t see him come back with the rest. I’ll make up excuses and scenarios. I want you to tell me personally that he’s finally gone and let me go get his things from the HQ. If it comes from you, I know it’s true. It doesn’t have to be in person, a letter would suffice, but I want it directly from you Erwin,” my eyes were pleading for him to accept, “Can you do that?” He looked back at me after thinking for a few moments.

“Yes, I can do that, Eva. However, a letter can easily be copied and someone can steal my signature. If I do send you something… I’ll send it along with my bolo tie,” He pointed to the green orb on a cord around his neck, “I can’t assure how quickly the news will come, but you will be the first civilian to know. This request, however, I have no anticipation of needing to do any of this.” I nodded, accepting that answer. We both had equal confidence in Levi’s ability.

“Thank you… Erwin.” I sat up and looked to Hange, waiting for her to say something. She had been leaning more and more forward as I talked through my requests. She wanted to say something, but wouldn’t interrupt her Commander for it.

“Oh, it is my turn! I only have one request for you and then a ton of questions to ask you! Is that okay? I know you have the kid to take care of. By the way, son? Brother? Who is he?” I held my hands up and shook them ‘no’ when she said son.

“He’s just a boy I watch because his parents don’t. I take care of him and feed him. He has an older sister, too.”

“Ah,” Erwin nodded, “Captain Levi also told me you take kids off the street and give them a second chance. Is he one of those children?” I raised an eyebrow.

“No, he has a home and family. What else has Levi told you about me?” I didn’t know we were just giving out information about each other to people. Hange answered my question again.

“You own a café where he gets tea. It’s your past caretakers café. You were given it after he died. Uh, what did he say about your character? He said you’re fiercely loyal, which is definitely true, and that you’re very charitable, hence taking care of the kids. He didn’t say it all nicely like that, but I think you can guess how he said it.”

“He said something to the effect of ‘She has this awful part of her where she puts all her faith in anyone and takes in brats to give them a second chance’, which, I understand why Levi sees that as a bad thing, but I find it nice to be charitable.” It made me laugh for the first time, Erwin trying to mimic Levi’s tone of voice.

“My request!” Hange hit the table, like she just remembered that she had one to give. I wonder how crazy this one was going to be.

“I’ll try my best, Hange.”

“My request is that you make him happy,” My heart skipped a little when she said that and she continued after she heard no protest, “We don’t know much about him or the way he thinks, but we do know what he’s been through. The expedition before he met you, his two friends from the Underground were eaten by titans when he wasn’t there to save them. He was getting so temperamental and would blow his lid at anyone just like that when we came back. No one could blame him, he had just lost his friends to titans and he found out that he didn’t even need to. There are a lot of details, but I’ll leave that to Levi. Anyways, we needed to get him out of HQ, so I recommended this café because I think your strawberry turnovers are excellent! After he came here, he started to change. Mellow out as much as Levi could. All the officers started wondering why he’d changed so rapidly and we thought he was sneaking out to go drink himself to death. Then, I saw you at the year-end festival with him. I knew then it was you, and think of the amazing confirmation he gave me when he kept requesting me to go get you after his injury!” I felt tears well up in my eyes for some reason. I remembered how he looked when he walked in: tired from death. I didn’t know it was the death of his friends that made him that way, and here I was trying to tease him over some tea. I was such an idiot.

“I think you’ve made Captain Levi feel something he’s never felt before. He still acts the same towards us because he has to keep up this façade, but with you, I’m sure he’s completely different. Actually, he has gotten more relaxed around the cadets and makes them run a bit less. Slowly, your impact is breaking into his everyday life. So, my request is that you keep doing that. He’s a broken kid, but he’s found someone to heal him. That’s what he told us you do, isn’t it?” The way Hange was looking at me, I just wanted to cry then. I don’t think anyone’s ever said something like that to me. She’s putting me at such high regard for something that I so desperately want to do for others. It was a confirming moment telling me that I was doing something right.

“I-I promise, Hange.” Her smile grew bigger and Erwin slowly stood up, signaling her it was time to go. I stood up too, but held my hand up to him.

“Yes?”

“I have a last, small request for you, Erwin. That little boy, basically as Commander of the Scouts, you’re his hero. He’s starting to have this obsession with them ever since I got him this toy. If you could just talk to him for a bit and tell him about the Scouts? You know, minus the bad things?” He huffed once in laughter and agreed to do it. When I yelled to call Elias down stairs, he almost fell on his face when he tripped on the kitchen door. He looked up at Erwin expectantly.

“Elias,” I put my hands on his shoulders, pushing him forward, “This is my friend Commander Erwin. He knows how much you like the Scouts and can tell you about it if you want…” I trailed off at the end, but Elias had already ran up to Erwin, looking up at the man three times his size.

“How big is a titan?!” I smiled as the two blonde haired boys sat.

Hange came over to the counter where I was sitting and hopped up there with me. I didn’t mind and made room for her, staring at the interaction that was happening in front of us. Elias was even showing him the toy I had bought.

“So… What does Levi think about the kids?” She so badly wanted to prod Levi’s brain and find out how he ticks, but she’d have to do it through me. Now that they knew everything, I’d guess I’d tell her a little bit.

“Levi bought him that horse. Elias doesn’t know it, but Levi said he wanted an eight year old boy to have what he wanted at that age. He’s only talked to June once I think, but he helped her win over some boys in her class. I don’t think he could tolerate Elias’s questions as much as Erwin is doing right now though.” She nodded.

“When you two have kids of your own, I think he’ll like them a bit better than he does other people’s kids.” I choked on the air and coughed loud enough that both Erwin and Elias stopped their conversation and looked over at us. Hange just waved them off and patted my back. Kids? He hasn’t even kissed me yet.

“Hange, we’ve only been together for a few months, and for most of them I haven’t even seen him.” She shrugged and gave me her crazy smile again.

“I don’t know, you two seem pretty compatible. Now, I haven’t seen you interact, but from what I can tell, you like each other enough. I’ve never seen someone hang around Levi as long as you have. Mark my words, you’ll have cute kids. I want to help name one!” I gave her a crazy look, willing her to stop talking about the topic. Imagine if she mentioned it to Levi, how irate he would be with her. I can’t even talk about sleeping in the same bed with him.

“Hange, we’re not-” Erwin stood up and patted Elias’s head again. Thank gods they were done. I don’t know if I could deal with any more of Hange’s future visions and questions. Is this how Levi feels with me?

“Hange, it’s time for us to get back. We have another meeting soon and Levi’s waiting to reprimand us for coming here when he said not to.” She puffed out air like she wanted to continue our conversation further, but hopped off the counter and walked to the door with Erwin.

“It was good meeting you, Eva. I’m sure we will have many more of these in the future.”

“Bye, Eva! Bye, Elias! Don’t worry, Eva, he’ll be home soon! Hold on a bit more!” Hange screamed as she walked out the door behind Erwin. I could still hear her gossiping as they got on their horses and rode off back to HQ.

“Eva, why did they want to talk to you?” Elias broke the silence as I stared at the door. Home. He’ll be home. Was I home?

“Elias, can you keep a secret? A super, super top secret that no one else can know?” His eyes widened and he nodded over and over again.

“Yes, I can. I promise!” I smiled down at him and ruffled his hair a bit more.

“Even Erwin doesn’t want you to tell this secret to anyone.” That got the boy more excited to know, and I knew it would keep his mouth shut.

“I promise! Tell me, tell me, tell me!” If Levi had already told two people, I guess I could too. What’s the harm in telling an eight year old boy?

“Captain Levi and I are together.” He pulled a weird face, sitting down at the table and pulling out his school work. His excitement immediately dropped away.

“That’s it? I thought it was going to be a fun secret, Eva.” This little boy is incredible. The first person I tell, and he could care less.

“You’re the only person in Trost who knows, Elias. It is a fun secret!” I tried to defend my relationship in front of the eight-year-old. I guess he was picky on which Scouts he liked.

“Eva, can I have some juice please?” I gave him an annoyed look as he completely skipped over the subject. I should’ve told June first and not a little boy who still thinks girls have cooties.

“No, you can have it after you finish your homework.” He groaned at my payback and shifted back and forth in his chair. I didn’t waiver and decided to ignore his pleas in favor of reading the letter I had been anticipating for months.

His handwriting was so nice and I wondered even who taught him how to write so well in the first place. My handwriting was awful because the orphanage had a limited budget for pencils and teachers. I could barely read cursive and only used it to sign my name. When I told Levi this is a response to his first letter, he had laughed at me in his reply, but wrote it all in print for me. Even his print was perfect. It made me annoyed, but they were pretty to look at in addition to their contents. They weren’t love letters by any means, but they were nice to receive and imagine what he was doing.

Dear Mara (This one doesn’t seem to fit your face, but it’s the only one I could think of),

As you requested in your last letter, for some reason, my daily routine:

4 AM - I am either up or wake up from an hour or two of sleep to take a shower. The water pressure is the best at this time as no one is taking one.

5 AM - I make myself tea, now, it’s the peppermint you sent me. I thank you for that, but now my tongue can’t stand any other flavor that’s not on par with it. I’ll light a candle and do some light paperwork and plan the morning workout for the cadets, waiting for the sun.

6 AM - The cadets have 30 minutes to get ready in full gear and come to eat breakfast until seven. I eat early, limiting the interactions I have with Hange as she’s loud in the morning.

7:30 AM - Training starts with a morning run and workout. They might do hand-to-hand after or work on ODM. Whatever I feel like sitting and watching that day, I make them do. On the days when they’re getting really annoying, I’ll make them practice ground maneuvers since it’s hard to kill titans with no trees. Recently, we’ve been starting to go over formations for the mission I can’t tell you about.

12 PM - We eat lunch, and recently it’s been bad. The food shortage has hurt our stock and I know the Garrison probably laughs at us as they get to eat meat. We ran out of meat last week.

From then on, the cadets have classroom work to do to memorize our signals and formations. I usually do more paperwork and we have officer meetings over and over again until dinner at six. After that, surprise, paperwork again. We went to the capital to get talked over again last week, so that was a break in my routine, but other than that I do paperwork until my eyes hurt, then I’ll go make more tea and take some biscuits from the canteen. Sometimes there are small disputes I have to settle, cadets to discipline, or one-on-one meetings with Erwin. Recently, he’s asked me if I want to create a Special Operations Team with the best Scouts for the next mission and beyond. I’ve been studying and reading over the files of each Scout. Maybe, you can help me form the team if I come across any trouble picking, but it’s not like there are many to choose from.

I plan to tell Erwin about our relationship soon. During our meetings in the capital, my position is always questioned and threatened by the four heads of the Royal Government. If they find out about any weakness, not that you are weak now that I’ve trained you, they might use that against me. If I tell Erwin about you, he can give you certain protections. Other than him, I have no intention of telling anyone else and it hasn’t seemed to come up in regular conversation. Hange always has something off to the side to say about you, and I suspect she knows something, but she keeps quiet around others. If she doesn’t keep her mouth shut, you might not hear from her again. Perhaps I will tell my Special Ops Team since trust is needed for a team to work, but that won’t be for another few months or even a year.

You asked me if I needed anything and currently, I would like a bit more tea, if possible. I’m limiting myself to three cups a day since my tea leaves are dwindling. I’m struggling without you and your tea, but I know you can’t ship yourself here through the carrier system. I was right about the cuddling… I miss it and it does make it difficult to try and sleep, knowing a much more comfortable option exists. I won’t go on more because I don’t miss your teasing. Hopefully, I will see you in the next month's time, but right now, it seems the Royal Government is about to monitor us. Going back and forth to you might harm you, and I won’t risk that. It’s helped, this feeling of missing you, by the cadets used for refugee security. It’s been reported almost everyday that a light-brown haired woman, no older than 30 with light green eyes leans out a window about a café with a red lettered sign and stares at the Scouts coming in during the sunrise. I knew right away it was you. I hope you’re getting enough sleep and not being irresponsible with the amount of hours you work on the refugee’s bread.

I must now go to another officer’s meeting in Erwin’s office to discuss something boring. I’d rather be helping you knead dough for a thousand loaves then sit in his office one more time.

My questions for you: Has the Garrison brought those brats you said to sponsor over yet? Have you decided to open back up the café? Has the girl gotten her apprenticeship? Have you told Jonas that if he touches you one more time while I’m going, I will break his fingers? You said you might cut your hair, is this true? Have you yet?

Till your next letter and next delivery of twenty grams of peppermint tea,

Captain Levi

Chapter Eleven →

Chapter Masterlist

xx Everyone say thank you to MAPPA for Levi and Armin’s faces <3

#levi ackerman #levi ackerman x reader #levi ackerman x oc #levi x reader #levi x oc #levi heichou #captain levi #aot #aot levi #snk #snk levi #attack on titan #attack on titan levi #shingeki no kyojin #shingeki no kyoujin levi #original character

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supertvngames · 3 years

Text

Naruto AU - Shuji Uchiha Scenarios Part 1

Shuji Uchiha is the adoptive brother of Naruto Uzumaki. And the half-brother of Sasuke Uchiha and Itachi Uchiha from their mother’s side, and half-brother Shisui Uchiha from their father’s side. And as well as my OC.

-Pre OS-

Mikoto Uchiha adopted Naruto but has to move out of the Uchiha Distract and into the late 4th Hokage Minato and his wife Kushina’s with the newborn child. Over a while, an Uchiha man was given permission to help Mikoto. The Uchiha man is the father of Shisui Uchiha. They accidently conceive a child, the child was named Shuji. Weeks after Shuji was born, his birth father died.

While growing up, Shuji had a big brother worship towards Shisui as Sasuke towards Itachi. Shuji and Sasuke tend to argue who’s the better big brother, Shisui or Itachi. However out of all his big brothers, Shuji actually favors Naruto because Naruto took the time to listen to him and play with him. Shuji is also seem patient with Itachi than Sasuke is. Even if Shuji likes Shisui better, he looks up to Itachi. And Shuji even considers Sasuke to be most relatable.

Shuji even met Izumi, Itachi’s lover. Shuji sees Izumi as a big sister-figure, mainly due to Shuji not being as stingy as Sasuke especially when it comes to Itachi.

Shuji is practically a mama’s boy, he is always seen with his mother Mikoto. Shuji learn about not just cooking and cleaning, but learn about Mikoto’s fighting skills at a very high level. Mikoto is a role-model to Shuji.

Shuji doesn’t get along with his stepfather Fugaku. Mainly due to Fugaku not being the type to open up his feelings and being a hardass.

Shuji, in-person, witness the death of his mother Mikoto and his big sister-figure Izumi in the hands of Itachi. Naruto was staying for afterschool after a prank gone messy. Shuji and Sasuke found each other as they see Itachi, as he spares them seeing the potential of them obtaining the Mangekyou Sharingan. Both Shuji and Sasuke try to fight off Itachi yet they had no progression. Shuji had to break down the news to Naruto about Mikoto’s demise.

Shuji did his best to enter the academy, to be with his remaining siblings, so he wouldn’t be alone at the house. He was then accepted.

Shuji tries to convince Sasuke to move into his and Naruto’s house because they’re family, and they’re all that’s left for each each other. Sasuke, however, prefer to live in an apartment, to which Shuji visits to keep his half-brother company and see how he’s doing. They train from time to time.

Shuji along with Naruto have been oppressed and discriminated by the Konoha villagers. Shuji has notice that this has happened before the Uchiha massecre, however now, it’s more nasty. Shuji simply doesn’t understand why they hate him and his big brother but he definitely wish the villagers are dead.

While with Naruto, Shuji noticed a girl who has been looking from afar. The girl was Hinata Hyuga. To Shuji, she seems rather cute and nice. Shuji encourages Hinata to come and hang with him and Naruto. Shuji even noticed another girl, Hinata’s little sister Hanabi Hyuga, to which both Naruto and Shuji convinced her to stick around as well.

Shuji helps Naruto train, especially when it comes to preforming the ordinary beginner jutsus.

Shuji does make time to make food and clean, and Naruto does his share as well since the two are working together.

-Original Series-

Shuji and Sasuke may have hold resentment towards Itachi for what they did to their parents and clan. However, Shuji wants to put the revenge mission on hold. After all, there’s nothing they can do for right now. Both he and Sasuke had some disagreements. Yet they still train together.

When Shuji sees that Naruto failed the graudation exams, he purposely funk himself so they could be ninjas another time. Shuji simply doesn’t want to leave his big brother’s side, until Naruto told Iruka that Shuji failed the graudation on purpose because he knows that they need the money.

When first meeting Konohamaru Sarutobi, Shuji thought he was some sort of strange kid even for the grandson of the 3rd Hokage Hiruzen Sarutobi. Shuji, like Naruto, began to befriend Konohamaru. Naruto and Shuji played with Konohamaru, Moegi, and Udon. Even invite Hanabi after convincing Hiashi that she needs to stimulate her mind in order to be an effective fighter. It’s the only way to have her live her life better.

Instead of a three-man squad, it’ll be four-man squad for each team: Team 7 - Naruto, Shuji, Hinata, & Sasuke Team 8 - Kiba, Shino, Sayuri, & [A new girl character, a non-clan one] Team 10 - Ino, Shikamaru, Choji, & [A new girl character, possibly a Sarutobi] Same could be said for Team Guy/Gai, and two more teams in the same year as them. One team would have three girls and one boy, both teams have females senseis

Shuji overheard some girl’s talk about Naruto, how she is badmouthing him as an orphan. Shuji pummels Sher to the ground. Enraged that someone is making of his brother after he and Shuji lost their mother.

When seeing he’s on the same team as his brothers and the girl he loves, Shuji was rather happy that they got to stick together. Shuji can fight along side with his relatives and his love, he reassures Hinata that they can all protect each other, they all have each other’s back. Yet, Shuji couldn’t help himself to protect Hinata (and his brothers).

When visiting the Hyuga District to pick up Hinata, Naruto and Shuji get violently angry at Hiashi for badmouthing his own daughter Hinata, being stopped by Kakashi. Hearing Hiashi says that Hinata is a “failure” and that the Hyuga, Shuji remarks that if she was a failure, she’d be taking after him, a lousy good-for-nothing selfish man who is nothing more than someone who brought two girls into the world only to refuse to take responsibility as a father.

After seeing Hinata having a bad situation at her household, Shuji offers to invites Hinata to his and Naruto’s house, at least dinner so he could cook, maybe once every afternoon as a getaway and to get to know each other.

There are times in B rank missions that Shuji ends up in trouble to which Hinata comes to his aid, although, Shuji isn’t upset. Shuji is, in fact, happy to see Hinata becoming stronger and more confident.

Shuji would even help out Naruto and Sasuke from danger as well, especially if it seems over his head, yet he doesn’t want to bear losing his only family he has left.

Shuji would grow from 1 tomoe at the early of the original series, to 1-&-2 tomoe, then 2 tomoe at the middle, later 2-&-3 tomoe, and then fully mature 3 tomoe at the end of the original series.

Shuji did run into Orochimaru at a different place and time, possibly on a mission soon before the Chunin Exams arc with a mix members on Shuji’s part. However, unlike with Sasuke who woke with the power up, Shuji woke up yet he is technically dying but manage to fight on.

It was until later on, Shuji was at death’s door compare to Sasuke when receiving the Curse Mark, until something alerting happens to either of his brothers or Hinata. Shuji finally overcomes the mark’s effects on him and began to have a murderous anger.

When Shuji sees how horrible Neji went through, being enslaved with a mark that can kill you, losing a parent, all that at such a young age. All the while, Shuji holds a grudge against Neji for looking for an opportunity to kill Hinata, yet Shuji still sympathize Neji.

Shuji sees that Gaara, like his big brother Naruto, a special power (although, it’s the power of a Tailed Beast) to which his own village fears and hates him for something that can’t be helped, yet also sees that Gaara got it worse than him and Naruto especially since he has his own father trying to kill him, unable to communicate with his siblings properly. Shuji pities Gaara.

After the Invasion on Konoha by Suna and Oto, Shuji’s speech patterns became more aggressive, especially after the mark reactivates. In Japanese, at first, Shuji’s 1st person pronoun was “Boku”, then it became “Ore”, to show how aggressive Shuji became.

Shuji begins to see that things between him and Hinata aren’t going anywhere. He sees Hinata showing more visible affections towards Naruto.

Shuji and Neji are having a rocky relationship. Until later on, when Hinata becomes temporarily blind, seeing Neji took care of her and even go out to help her condition, Shuji finally fully forgives and trusts Neji, and even tells Neji what’s on his mind, which is vowing that he will find a way to free him and the Side Branch family.

When he and Sasuke heard that Itachi return, and is after his big brother Naruto, Shuji was scared and furious. By the time he and Sasuke run into Hinata, Shuji explains to her on the way that Naruto is in danger and that they need to find Naruto as quickly as possible.

Shuji have to remind Sasuke that they have to run away with Naruto and nothing more, they can’t take on Itachi since he did defeat Kakashi. By the time, they did met up with Itachi, Shuji tries to think of how to escape with Naruto, only to see Sasuke charges at Itachi with a Chidori with Shuji thinking “What a dumbass”. Shuji tries to help Sasuke out but Itachi beats the crap out of Shuji and put him in a coma as well.

By the time both Shuji and Sasuke woke up from their coma, like Sasuke, Shuji became different than he was before. Shuji became rather moody, bitter, and has guilt. The encounter with Itachi and Kisame haunts him. He, his brothers, and Hinata were in a no-way-out situation to which they all could get killed. Shuji tries to rationalize and justify his failure only to see the fact he wasn’t good enough. Shuji finally begins to see why Sasuke couldn’t put the revenge mission on hold, so Shuji then train with Sasuke more than ever.

Naruto and the others began to see Shuji is becoming more and more bitter after each mission and those missions was that they either failed or even success through dumb luck. Especially since he and Naruto seen the suffering and unfortunate events in different places. Shuji ask them how many times they are going to get beaten before they wise up and they realize that being a ninja isn’t a game. Think of Leo from TMNT 2003 Season 4, I admit he was a jerk but he has his reasons.

When Kakashi told Shuji let go of his revenge like Shuji did once before he was put into a coma. Shuji told him that he didn’t let go, he put it on hold, and that Itachi plan to take his older brother Naruto away from him. Shuji already lost his mother, his big sister figure Izumi, and eldest brother Shisui, he not planning to let Itachi go around free. Kakashi tells him that he too lost his loved ones and he only look into the past. However, unlike Sasuke, Shuji doesn’t buy it, his response is “you no longer seek retribution? You dishonor your loved ones. I will honor the memory of my fallen”.

Well, that’s it for the scenarios for Shuji Uchiha for now. I might have more plans for him, some I having a bit of a mix feeling, but I’ll discuss them another time. Until then, see ya.

#naruto #naruto shippuden #shuji uchiha #oc: shuji uchiha #uchiha shuji #oc: uchiha shuji #oc #original character #au #alternate universe

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connieswriting · 4 years

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I’m here now// Fred Weasley

Pairing: Fred Weasley x Reader

Request: @bengaliandslytherclaw “can you do a Fred Weasley x Reader post Hogwarts and war and also a Ravenclaw reader with a bit of angst and fluff mixed and maybe not in the Burrow thanks”

A/N: I hope I did your request justice. I just didn’t include the part about being a Ravenclaw since I couldn’t get it to appear naturally in the story. I hate the ending but I had fun writing it, I hope you enjoy it and please send in requests! I had a couple busy weeks but I have time now!

----

You took another sip of your tea looking out of the window in your shared apartment with Fred. Even though the war had long since finished, the pain that you felt was still very much prominent. All the loss, the grieving of so many people at the same time, all of the funerals that didn’t seem to end; the constant questions to which you could never actually answer truthfully, all of the “How are you holding up?” and “How are you feeling?” with those pitiful smiles that you dreaded; the tears that seemed to not be able to stop falling down anymore. Maybe it was better to become apathetic, maybe it was better to just not have a soul anymore, at least you wouldn’t be feeling like this, so depressed, so out of you, so dependent of other people to do your menial tasks that you couldn’t seem bothered to do anymore. It was too much, too much had happened in such a short amount of time, so many people had been killed right in front of your eyes, so many children, just finishing up their first year at Hogwarts, so many young people that could barely even count as teenagers yet, so many of them that had become orphans, you included, overnight. You had lost, along with your family, so many of your friends that it was almost impossible to know how you were even able to be coping with everything.

All the memories of you smiling, laughing, having fun seemed so distant at the moment, so far away, almost as if someone had them and told you about it afterwards, almost as if you had them but in another life, a life where you hadn’t known this kind of pain, this kind of dull feeling always present in your chest. It was hard to believe that Bill and Fleur’s wedding had been a mere year ago, not with all those laughs and kisses you had shared with Fred, in between all those glasses of champagne that were basically bottomless, something that you didn’t seem to be able to do now. Had your parents still been alive this day, they would have most certainly told you to stop shredding tears for the people you lost and instead focus on the people you have in front of you right now. Your mother would have most likely added that you shouldn’t be feeling like this since you knew what was to come before the war had even began, so you just should have been prepared.

The mug on your hands had long since gone cold, but you couldn’t be bother anymore, part of you felt maybe the cold your pair up well with the hot tears that started falling down your face once more. It had started to rain a while ago, adding so much unnecessary cliché to the moment. The front door opened and closed quietly, a tall red-haired emerging from it. You had noticed that the pain you were feeling in that moment seemed so less prominent that you it was supposed to, adding a tad bit of guilt to the list of emotions you had been feeling in the past days. Perhaps you had gone through so much and got hurt so much, so quickly that any of the really bad emotions you had been feeling was wearing off, you tried to reason with yourself, using the sleeve of your sweater to clean your tears away.

“Hey, love” Fred started kneeling in front of you, though you didn’t turn to meet his eyes. “Feeling any better?” You chose to ignore the generic question, you knew he already knew the answer by heart, he was just trying to strike up conversation, wanting you to talk the way you used to, so carefree

(so naïve)

So full of life, so excited

(so unexperienced)

You shook your head in your mind, trying to get all those thought out of it. The truth was that you couldn’t feel that way anymore, you couldn’t be happy, joyous- every time you tried to talk you seemed to get chocked up. You tried going to a therapist for a while, well, you tried many therapists, right after the war, but it made pretty obvious rather soon that none of them were going to work out since none of them could actually understand what you were going through, none of them could, none of them could understand what you felt, what you were still feeling.

“Mom is organising a family lunch tomorrow, if you feel like finally getting out of the house” the boy continued, unbothered by the lack of response or even movement from his girlfriend. “She specially requested your presence (Y/N), she even told me to go to the Burrow today, just the two of us, so we could spend the night there and maybe help out tomorrow, maybe it would take your mind off of things, keeping you busy. We could take the train there, or call for a car, if you don’t feel like using magic to travel.” You didn’t move, predictably- it had been like this for weeks. Him trying to sough out any sort of response out of you, inviting you to get out of the house, even if just to get breakfast at the café right next to your apartment building, cracking his usual jokes, retelling the pranks him and his twin had pulled back in their days at Hogwarts, giving you your favourite flowers and cooking meals for you since if he did not basically force-feed you, you would just neglect all kinds of food, your stomach too filled with anger and repulsion of surviving whilst your friends had all died in your place to accept anything willingly.

Fred sighed heavily, resting his hands on your thighs “Please, just say something, anything!” he looked at you, your face still facing the window, not a single muscle moving. “How long are you going to keep this up? Were all doing awfully you know, for Merlin’s sake, Georgie is half deaf, I almost died! But still, here I am, here we all are, trying to cheer you up, trying to get you to feel better, like we didn’t go through the same things!” It was the first time he had raised his voice at you, keeping any negative thoughts out of your way, preferring to take care of you instead.

“Oh, that is so nice of you!” you scoffed, finally turning to look at his face. It held a mixture of anger, relief and guilt. “In case you haven’t noticed, I don’t exactly need help, I don’t need you, Fred, your mother or anyone, as a matter of fact, to cheer me up.”

“Obviously you don’t. I am so sorry I spent all this time trying to get you back on your feet when you didn’t even need any help at all with it. So dumb of me to have missed how you’re already doing so well on your own. What an absolute wanker I am.” He threw his hands in the air, dramatically.

“Okay, I’m sorry, when exactly did you hear me say that I was ‘back on my feet’? I just said I didn’t need your constant smothering. I need to grief on my own.” You put down your mug on the tiny coffee table next to you. “You’re right, you went through some things I went through, but certainly not exactly everything. You didn’t see your best friend being killed right on front of your own eyes, you didn’t lose both your parents only a few hours apart and you certainly didn’t almost lose the person who had promised to marry you as soon as the war was over…” You added the last part in a whisper, almost uncertain if you really meant for him to hear it or not. Fred was shocked to say the least. Ever since the battle at Hogwarts, you two had barely spoken two words, not from lack of effort on his part, this had not only been his first time opening up but also yours.

“Do you have any idea what it was like hearing about the explosion and how it had caught you? Do you have any idea the fear I felt during those hours when you were unconscious? I had already lost so much; I couldn’t bear to even think I had lost you as well. Yet, I had to put up with seeing you laying in that bed, so much blood on you, your family around you crying so much that I could barely even comprehend it for a second. All those thoughts that had gone through my head during that time, all those “I have officially lost everything, my soulmate is gone as well” that kept popping every single time I thought they were gone for good, every…” she trailed off, resting her face in her hands “You’re right, I have been inconsiderate towards everyone lately, specially you, but I just got so close to never seeing you again that that has basically been all I could think about every time I look at you. A life without you in it, without you at my side, it’s just…” the warm tear started rolling down your face again, prohibiting you from continuing.

“I… I had no idea you felt like this. I can’t believe I actually put you through that” Fred took the opportunity to speak up once more, pulling you into his arms “I’m here now, I survived, right? Shouldn’t that be all that matters” he spoke quietly, softly, letting you cry on his shoulder “Why didn’t you just tell me how you felt? Why didn’t you tell me what you had been imagining?” He pulled you away from him, analysing your face, using his thumb to brush away your tears.

“It’s not like I could just go up to you right after the war had ended and tell you what everything that had gone through my mind during those hours. Not with everyone so relieved that you had survived, it wasn’t the right moment, and the, as time passed, I couldn’t bring myself to do so and I kind of just kept everything to myself, piling up all of my feelings. My parents were gone, Hannah was gone, and it just felt I had no one to talk to anymore…”

“You had me; you have always had me! It has been so awful to you lately I just wanted to get you to open up a bit, so… well, so this wouldn’t happen!” he smiled apologetically, pulling you into his embrace once again. “Oh, blimey, I can’t believe this, love. Look…, hey, look at me” Fred held your chin, hosting your head up “I’m here now, I pulled through, I’m with you now and, trust me, I’m not going anywhere. I regret to inform you that you’re basically stuck with me for life now, (Y/N).” You laughed a bit, he immediately smiled, it was the first time he had heard that wonderful smile in weeks and Merlin, had he missed it. “Promise me that any time you’re feeling something like this again, every time that you’re feeling, even if just a little bit, blue you’ll come to me, so we can do it, go through whatever it is, together.”

“Yeah, yes, I promise. It has been awful not talking to you, I missed you so much” He leaned forwards, capturing your lips in his. If there was a list of things he missed about you, kissing was certainly right at the top “Now, how about we start getting ready to go to your parents house? I reckon it’s time I left the house, I reckon I’m in need of a distraction and your mother is providing the perfect one” He didn’t answer, he just pulled you into his embrace again. After all this pain, it felt like heaven to be able to hold Fred once more.

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emrysarthurpendragon · 4 years

Text

Breath in, breath out

Merlin sat anxiously in their car. A couple of days had passed since they first met Arthur and now, they were heading to the hospital together. The lady Morgana dialled his mum and told them Arthur was alive and ready to have visitors. Still, one thing was bothering the little boy… Arthur was going to live with that woman. He hated her. He found Arthur and he wanted him to stay with them, in their domain with plenty of rooms and even ONE domestic! Since his parents told him the news, Merlin had been pouting on his sit and mumbling about life being unfair. His parent’s chatters broke the silence until they parked not far from the hospital. Merlin jumped from the vehicle and took his father’s hand from one side, his mother’s from the other. They walked together to a desk where a kind woman shows them to where Arthur’s room was. In an attempt to ease the boy’s fears, they let him stay in the children service, where Merlin stopped for a moment, next to an activity room filled with various sick kids of all ages. A teenager with long brown hair and sparkling eyes. He was playing guitar before he noticed his new spectator and wink to him.

There was music there in the derriere

Like a language that we all could understand

I remember the day that I earned my first pay

When I played in a small pick-up band

There I spent my youth, and to tell you the truth

I was sad to leave it all behind me

For I learned about life, and I found a wife

In the town I loved so well

Merlin blushed when the older boy knelt in front of him. Something was happening … they both felt it. Merlin wanted to cry, because he missed this boy so much … and it was stupid, because they never met!

But when I returned, how my eyes have burned

To see how a town could be brought to its knees

By the armoured cars and the bombed-out bars

And the gas that hangs on to every breeze

Now the army’s installed by that old gas-yard wall

And the damned barbed wire gets higher and higher

With their tanks and their guns, oh my God, what have they done

To the town I loved so well

Now the music’s gone but they carry on

For their spirits been bruised, never broken

They will not forget but their hearts are set

On tomorrow and peace once again

For what’s done is done and what’s won is won

And what’s lost is lost and gone for ever

I can only pray for a bright, brand new day

In the town I love so well

Scenes from a long-forgotten battle made him shiver and Merlin stepped back. These were from his nightmares, the one he had since forever. The ones he talked of with his grandpa Gaius, who never judge him or call him crazy. He shared them with his parents too, and they sent him to a doctor. A kind man who let him draw on many papers. The other day, he drew a big Dragon with yellow scales! His name was… Kikigarah!

“Merlin, what’s wrong?” his mother’s called and Merlin shook his head. If he started being weird again, the doctor will make him take yucky medicine. Instead, the boy smile and pointed to the musician.

“I like music! Can he play for Arthur?” he asked, and notice how the teenager chuckled when Merlin made decision without asking him first.

“Who is Arthur?” the stranger asked, standing again so he can greet young Merlin parents properly. From his place, Merlin still wondered where he met that boy before. “I’m Gwaine, I play for the kids when I don’t have school,” he explained.

“What’s that smell?” a huge man asked, and an older Merlin stared at the direction the smell came from.

“Gwaine! Pull these feet of your back into your boots! We’re all going to die!” he yelled, throwing a rock at him.

“Ouch! It hurts!” the Gwaine from the fake world.

“Well, you hurt our noses!”

The moment vanished. What if it were true, Merlin wondered? He had to protect Arthur from dangerous scent. Just in case. Maybe with some tissues or with a hug, so he can hide his face in his hair and smell his shampoo. His favourite with strawberries and apples!

“Arthur is my friend!” Merlin claimed, “He does not know it yet, that’s all!”

Both adults and Gwaine laughed at the claim. Still, the little boy was not done yet. Gwaine asked who Arthur was and, of course, he had a duty to be as precise as possible.

“His bad daddy killed his mummy and now, he’s hurt. But my mum and dad are nice and kiss a lot! It’s not all parents, I promise!” he said, “And Morgana killed the bad daddy, so now Arthur is safe and I want to…”

“Merlin, stop. You can’t tell these things to Gwaine. You’ll make him uncomfortable.” Balinor said. Merlin lowered his head and whispered a quick ‘sorry’. He just wanted to answer properly, and as a six-year-old, he didn’t realise some things were private. Except his parents’ bedroom. He knew not to break in when there were giggles from his parents in it. They were trying to make him a little sister, even if Merlin couldn’t fathom how laughing in a bedroom was going to help them. Maybe they did not know they had to ask Santa. Instead of rummaging his thoughts, Merlin took off when he noticed chamber number 28, where Arthur was supposedly waiting for them. With a happy squeal, Merlin pushed the door open and barely avoid colliding with Morgana. The beautiful woman laughed when she saw him but earned nothing from Merlin, except a disdainful glare.

“I don’t like you,” the child murmured. He turned his gaze to the bed, where Arthur blinked lazily. “You’re awake!” Merlin yelped, not even noticing he was the one who woke the other boy. There was a strange mask on his face, making him look like a fish but the oblivious child just ignores it as he sat on the bed.

“Hi Arthur! I’m Merlin! You remember me?”

Arthur nodded, still slightly confused. He stopped crying about his mum a couple of days ago, but he never expected to meet Merlin again. Still, he seemed more friendly than strange now, and it eased the blond orphan. Merlin acted as a friend and with no such thing as pity in his eyes.

“Dada told me you’re going to live with Morgana. If you don’t want, just tell me so I adopt you! I can! I just have to write it on a paper!”

“I… I like ‘Gana…” Arthur whispered, confused by Merlin’s words. He also felt touch by the way the brunet kindly offered to give him a new home.

“What? But … but she’s old!” Merlin pointed, like it was some huge con. Only then did he notice all the adults were staring at them with a mix of annoyance and amusement. “Can you all go outside, please? It’s between and Arthur and I! Except Gwaine, we want the music!” he ordered. The ‘olds’ laughed, not even bothered by how Merlin talked because they knew he was a good child deep inside. Gwaine took a sit next to the two six-year-old with his guitar still in hands.

“You know, kids, I think we are quite the trio,” the teenage boy laughed. “Arthur, Merlin and Gwaine, all from the round table. Do you want a song about King Arthur and his merry companions?”

“The merry companions are with Robin Hood!” the two kids corrected, exchanging a smile while Merlin cuddled with Arthur. Merlin who was always so scared around other kids most of the time, felt at home here.

“So, this is a song about King Arthur and his Queen, Guinevere.”

“I don’t like it,” Merlin pouted.

“You did not even let me start!”

“Arthur loves Merlin and Merlin loves Arthur. Like mummy and daddy,” the younger boy claimed. “Grandpa Gaius says it’s okay for boys to love boys and girls love girls. Grandpa is always right. I say Merlin and Arthur are married!”

Behind him, Arthur blushed. Merlin realized he probably think the wrong things and they both turned red while Gwaine laughed. In another life, the teenager would have teased them but now, he just shook his head and let his finger started a lullaby about a beloved King and his lands. A land of magic, with mighty knights and flying dragons. It took a minute before Merlin’s rubbed his eyes and sucked his thumb. Arthur started dozing off too, his breathing slowing down under his oxygen mask. The one he wore since he first came here and struggled to breathe with his broken ribs.

Gwaine smiled at the two sleeping forms. Something inside him wanted to protect these children, like an older brother. Arthur, with his bruises covered body. Merlin and his good nature. With much care, the teenager left the room, where he met the adults.

“They fell asleep. I uh… I should go home. I have works to do … well … uh … goodbye?” Gwaine murmured.

“It was nice meeting you, Gwaine. Feel free to come again later,” offered the woman he thought was Arthur’s guardian. Morgana, was it?

“I will,” he promised with a bright smile.

They were all going to meet again. Maybe not now. Maybe in a couple of weeks, months or years. He felt like something was about to happen. A change they all needed. Something about Merlin and Arthur, even if they were far too young to change the world.

#whumptober2020 #no.13 #oxygen mask #merlinbbc #fic #sfw

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stahlop · 4 years

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Once Upon a Time 2x21 “Second Star to the Right” Review

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Oh, man! What the hell just got unleashed on us! Bae lived with the Darlings and got taken to Neverland and found himself about Hook’s ship! Tamara killed Neal! Regina actually killed Greg’s father! And this is all going to be tied up in the next episode?

Summary: After going through the portal, Bae finds himself in Victorian London and ends up living with the Darling family. David and Mary Margaret go to extremes to find Regina, while Emma is still convinced that Tamara is up to no good.

Opening: Big Ben turning to 8:15

New Characters:

Wendy Darling: She’s not afraid of Bae when she first meets him. She comes after him with a statue before realizing that he’s just hungry. She starts hiding Bae in a crawl space in the wall of their nursery. Bae asks if her parents suspect and she makes the statement that all kids think is true, ‘they’re grown ups, they can’t see anything that’s not right in front of them.’ Which of course is when her parents show up and demand to know who Bae is. When they find out he’s an orphan, Mrs. Darling invites him to stay with them. Bae wakes up that night while Wendy is waiting for the Shadow to come. She and her brothers are very excited about the Shadow coming. She tells Bae that the Shadow started appearing around the same time Bae appeared and it’s so wonderful because it can change shape and travel between worlds. And it’s so wonderful because it has magic. This instantly sets off Bae’s alarms, since he came to this land to get away from magic. He tells them not to let the Shadow in and Wendy is disappointed. John accuses him of not believing, but he tells them he comes from a land that is full of magic, which makes Wendy excited again. Wendy, when the boy from the magic land tells you to stay away from magic, listen! Bae tells Wendy and her brothers that magic destroyed his family and Wendy finally looks chagrined about entertaining the idea of going with the Shadow. Bae makes Wendy promise not to let the Shadow in, and she unhappily agrees. The next day Wendy is sitting out by that damn open window (someone needs to teach her to respect an open window!). the Shadow comes back and Wendy is as excited about it as she always is. She claims that this magic is different, it’s from a place called Neverland where there are no grown ups and you can fly. Bae tries to keep her in the house, but she’s determined to go. She comes back the next morning and while she’s telling Bae about all the wondrous things you can just see that she is trying not to cry because her magical adventure was not all she thought it was going to be. She tells Bae that once nightfalls you can hear all the children crying for their parents and they aren’t allowed to leave. It’s called Neverland because once you step foot on the soil you can never leave. She’s in tears now. Then Wendy reveals that the Shadow wanted a boy and that’s why she was allowed to go home, but he’ll be back for one of her brothers. Wendy finally admits that she should have listened to Bae about magic. That night the Darling children booby trap the nursery so the Shadow can’t take John or Michael. Ok, I get the lights and the matches, because that can make a shadow disappear, but what exactly were they hoping to accomplish with jacks on the windowsill? Seriously? It’s a shadow, not a burglar. The Shadow gets through all their traps, because it’s a shadow, and Bae herds everyone into the crawl space, except for Michael. Wendy’s freaking out because the Shadow’s going after her brother, but then Bae offers to go instead, and Wendy’s even more upset because this is all her fault (yes, it definitely is, listen to Bae next time). So, yeah, Wendy made some bad decisions and now Bae is off to Neverland.

Character Observations:

Bae/Neal: First of all, I loved how seamlessly they transitioned from Bae falling through the portal in the previously ons straight into the opening scene. Also, the actor playing Bae’s voice has changed since last season, so there’s that. So, Bae pulls himself up on the other side of the portal and immediately starts calling for his Papa :(. And then, he almost gets run over by a horse and carriage, but jumps back in front of a sign that says Kensington Gardens. And then, if you still weren’t sure where we were, Big Ben starts ringing. Bae has found himself in merry ole London, England, and from the shadows of the people we see, Victorian London, England. Six months later Bae is living on the streets of London and looking like Gavroche from Les Miserables. He’s not having much luck finding food until he sees a window open at a very nice house. He sees some fresh bread laid out on a table and just goes to town on it and stuffing some in his pockets. And then a big St. Bernard starts barking at him from under the table and Wendy comes out. But once she discovers he’s hungry she gives him more food. And apparently lets him live in the crawl space in the nursery. That seems really cramped. The Darling parents discover him and Bae is quick to tell them both his parents are dead and he can’t go back to the workhouses. Mrs. Darling takes pity on him and lets him stay. Bae is so excited to have found such a loving family. Wendy wakes up Bae that night to inform him about the Shadow that’s been visiting them. At first, Bae is entranced by Wendy’s wonder and excitement about the Shadow, until she mentions magic. Then he is all business, making sure they don’t open the window for the Shadow. John accuses him of not believing in magic, but Bae tells them he came from another realm where magic ruined his life and it’s not to be trusted. He makes Wendy promise not to go with the Shadow. But, she doesn’t listen. Bae awakens a few nights later (he has a bed now), and Wendy is waiting for the Shadow. Bae tries with all his might to keep her in the nursery, but she’s convinced that Neverland will be wonderful and she goes off with the Shadow. Bae has slept on the windowsill (of an open window that he literally could have rolled off of) and is there when Wendy returns. She tells him of all the wonderful things in Neverland. He questions why she came home then. She tells him of the children crying for their parents and how the Shadow doesn’t let them leave once they’ve touched the soil. She tells Bae that the Shadow wants a boy and is coming for one of her brothers. Bae is determined not to let magic destroy another family. They set the nursery up to ward off the Shadow, but it doesn’t do any good. Apparently the Shadow can blow out candles and open locked windows. Michael doesn’t make it into the crawl space where they’re all hiding so Bae goes out and offers himself to the Shadow as long as the Shadow promises never to bother the Darlings again. He thanks Wendy for letting him be a part of her family and the Shadow takes him. the Shadow flies Bae through the London rooftops (and Bae looks like he’s in danger of hitting those chimney’s more than once). Once they start getting close to Neverland, Bae can hear the children on the island crying and he remembers Wendy’s words about not being able to leave, so he struggles against the Shadow’s grip. He remembers the matches in his robe pocket and lights one and that finally gets the Shadow to let go of him and he falls into the ocean. The Shadow can’t find him in the water and gives up (pretty easily). Luckily, he’s pulled out by one Captain Hook and aboard the Jolly Roger. And that’s the story of how Neal met Captain Hook!

At six in the morning, Tamara is going out for a run, so that wakes up Neal. He then hears a fight happening outside and hears his father’s voice. Neal breaks up the fight and then berates Gold for essentially ignoring him since he’s been in town since the whole reason for the curse was so he could find him. Neal is upset that Gold hasn’t even met Tamara yet, but Gold thinks Neal is still hung up on Emma so she’s not important. Neal tells him he hasn’t changed and he’s not worth his time. Gold wonders why he’s still in town then. Neal has to remind him of Henry, and then tells Gold to stay away from both of them. Emma comes by Neal’s room to search it. She thinks she has something to do with Regina’s disappearance and Neal can’t believe Emma is still on the Tamara is evil kick. Emma finds sand in the closet after Neal tells her that Tamara likes to run in the woods. She thinks that Tamara is lying to him about other things if she can lie about this so easily. Neal doesn’t think it’s a big deal. Neal and Emma are on the beach searching for Tamara. Neal thinks Emma is letting her emotions get in the way and that’s why she’s trying to break up him and Tamara. Emma tells him that it hurt that he didn’t come after her in jail and that he found Tallahassee with someone else. Neal is about to defend himself again when Tamara runs up. After she runs off Emma decides she needs to search somewhere else, but Neal finally, FINALLY apologizes for letting August convince him to send her to jail. And he’s sorry that he never searched for her because he was afraid she’d never forgive him since he never forgave himself. This is completely contradictory to what he told August in Selfless, Brave, and True where he was worried about Emma breaking the curse and his father finding him. Neal tells her there wasn’t a day that went by that he didn’t regret leaving her. Well, that may be true, but you were too much of a coward to find her again because you were afraid of your father. Too bad you’re exactly like him. Look, it’s great that Neal finally apologized to Emma, because he needed to do that, but the fact of the matter is that he never would have come back to find her if she hadn’t found him first. He knew the curse was broken and he was still too pissed at his father, 100 and some odd years later, to go find Emma in Storybrooke. So, I still can’t forgive him, but I guess I can understand why Emma might. After a phone call from David, Emma and Neal go into the cannery looking for Tamara and Regina. Emma wants to make sure Neal has her back. He tells her he does if it turns out to be Tamara, even though he doubts that it is. David radios Emma that they found Regina with Greg and Neal immediately does an ‘I told you so’, but then Tamara comes up behind Emma and knocks her down with a pipe. She takes Emma’s gun and points it at Neal and goes on about how magic is a poison and needs to be gotten rid of. Neal seems to be focused more on the fact that she lied to him rather than the gun pointed at him! He finally gets her to admit that she’s been lying to him from the beginning and she never loved him. Neal is devastated, but tells Tamara he can’t let her leave SB, so she shoots him! Neal is just like WTF! But he still doesn’t realize how serious she is until she points the gun at his head. Luckily, Emma, finally recovered from the pipe to the back, kicks the gun out of Tamara’s hand to save Neal. Emma and Tamara fight and Neal isn’t doing so well. Emma gets the upper hand and then Tamara throws a bean and both Emma and Neal are pretty much screwed. Emma is holding Neal by his hand, but he tells her that she won’t be able to hold on to what she’s holding onto and him at the same time. He insists she let him go even if it means his death. He doesn’t want Henry to grow up without parents like they did. Emma tells him she loves him. He says it back and then lets go. Ok, I have to assume that all this is said in the heat of the moment because just five minutes ago Neal was in love with Tamara and accusing Emma of being jealous. Neal thought he was going to die so that’s why he tells Emma he loves her back. Unless he’s still loved her all these years. But, it’s also been 11 years since they’ve seen each other and they are two totally different people so Neal could be in love with 17-year-old Emma, but he doesn’t know 28-year-old Emma at all. He lets go of Emma’s hand (a nice juxtaposition to when his father let go of his hand in Desperate Souls) and falls into the portal, most likely to his death. RIP Neal.

Gold: He is continuing to be a complete asshole. Honestly, what the hell is Belle going to think when she gets her memories back? The guy that I love decided to be everything I hate just because my alter ego decided she liked power better than being good. I have no idea if they’re having sex, but would it be considered consensual, and how would Belle feel about it since Gold is pretty much using her body just because the person in it looks the same? The whole thing is repugnant. But onto the actual plot. Neal interrupts Gold telling Whale to kiss his boot for daring to look at Lacey. Neal stops him from kicking Whale’s face in and Gold is pissed. He sends Lacey off to the pawn shop while Neal berates his father for spending all this time looking for him and now barely acknowledging his existence. True statement. Neal gets hurt that his father isn’t even trying to have a relationship with him and that he’s never even attempted to meet his fiance, Tamara. Gold tells him that he’s obviously still in love with Emma. Neal tells him he hasn’t changed and he’s not worth his time. Gold fights back saying that Neal is still in town for a reason and Neal reminds him of Henry, and that’s the only reason he’s still there. Gold at least looks upset about that. Did Gold really forget about Henry being Neal’s son and that’s the reason he’s in town, or is he so self-centered that he thought Neal was there for him and Emma? Like, I don’t even understand what’s going on in his head anymore. David and Mary Margaret go to cash in the favor Gold owes David by having him help them find Regina. Gold happens to have one of Regina’s tears which will help them find Regina by combining it with one of Mary Margaret’s tears and dropping it in her eye. Weird. Lacey comes out after they leave seeing that he really can do magic and is impressed. She wonders why he never told her about this. Gold tells her about magic coming with a price and how it drives people away. Lacey tells him he’s hanging with the wrong kind of people then. She wants to see what else he can do, so he makes a necklace appear out of thin air and gives it to her. Lacey asks if he can make her immortal like him, he tells her yes. Okay, Gold, you know Belle wouldn’t want that at all. He tells her about the prophecy that foretells his undoing. He tells her that it’s complicated when she tells him to get rid of whomever will be his undoing. She thought nothing stood in his way. And then he pulls her to him in what would be a really sexy and seductive mood if it were any other two people in this situation, and he tells her he is that man. Gross.

Emma: She’s on the hunt for Regina. She, David, Mary Margaret, and Henry realize she’s missing, and most likely not by her own volition since her office is unlocked and the security system has been overridden. David suggests that she took a portal back to the EF, but Emma, rightly so, says she wouldn’t leave without Henry. David and Mary Margaret think Gold overpowered Regina, but Emma says he’s too preoccupied with Lacey (I’m glad someone in this town notices these things). Emma is convinced it’s Tamara again. David and Mary Margaret don’t think it is and think she needs to get off that train. Emma points out that Tamara came to town the same day August was killed, but David and Mary Margaret still aren’t on the same train as her. Emma tells her parents to go to Gold and find something that will help them and she’ll look at Tamara’s room again. Emma tells Neal she’s there to search his room for real this time. Um, that usually requires a warrant, but small town and emergency, I’ll allow it. She tells Neal that Regina is missing and Neal can’t believe she suspects Tamara. Emma finds sand on the floor of their closet and since Neal tells her Tamara runs in the woods that’s proof in her eyes that Tamara is a liar and has probably lied to Neal about other things. I mean, it’s true, but it’s also a big stretch. They go looking for Tamara on the beach and Neal thinks that Emma is jealous. Emma asks him what he wants to hear. How it killed her that he never came looking for her? That he found Tallahassee with someone else. Thankfully, Emma knows how to hide her emotions well because she plays this off as if it doesn’t bother her much when we know she’s constructed high walls around herself so that it will never happen again. Tamara interrupts their moment with her jog and Emma starts to realize that maybe she is jealous since Tamara kind of just proved that she was jogging along the beach and Emma doesn’t pick up a single lie . God dammit, Emma! You really need to get that super power under control. Neal gives a big apology speech that Emma doesn’t want to hear at first, but by the end she’s kind of okay with it and starts looking at Neal like he might not actually be a villain in her story. But I still think she’ll never be able to forgive him completely because he completely changed the trajectory of her life and not in a good way. Later on, Emma and Neal are walking along the docks when David calls her and tells her about Mary Margaret smelling sardines, Emma figures out pretty quickly that Tamara played them because the cannery is right there. Emma questions Neal’s loyalty when he comes with her into the cannery, but he says if Tamara is the bad guy he’s got her. She and David almost shoot each other, but he gives her a radio and they go their separate ways to look for Regina. When David and Mary Margaret find Regina and Greg, they radio Emma and tell her. She’s shocked that it’s Greg, and Neal basically tells her ‘I told you so’, except that Tamara then bashes Emma with a pipe and takes her gun. Emma wakes up in time to save Neal from getting shot a second time and fights with Tamara. She gets the gun but Tamara has a magic bean and she uses it to create a portal so she can escape. Emma is holding onto a pipe for dear life so she doesn’t go down the portal. Neal eventually helps her down and they’re about to leave when the portal opens up a little bigger and Emma is once again holding on for dear life while trying to keep Neal from going down the portal. He wants her to let him go, but she knows he’ll die because he’s been shot. He goes for the Henry angle so she’ll let him go, but she can’t let him go. She doesn’t want him out of her life again. She tells him she needs him and loves him. Neal tells her he loves her too and then lets go. The portal closes and Emma is left on the cannery floor with a big hole beneath her. Emma is devastated. Now, I know this seems like Emma has been jealous and that she wants to be with Neal again, but I disagree. I think this is Emma trying to be a comfort to him because she knows he’s going to die. She does care for him, but he was engaged to Tamara not five minutes ago. He barely apologized to her. This is teenaged Emma telling him these things, not the Emma of now. Present day Emma would never lay her heart out like that unless she knew it wasn’t going anywhere. And yes she’s crying over him, but he was still a big part of her life and he’s Henry’s father so regardless of her feelings for him now, she’s still mourning the part he played in her life overall and whatever the future may have brought them (though I still don’t believe it would have been an intimate relationship). Emma comes back to the loft completely shell-shocked and informs her parents that Neal is dead and Tamara killed him. David tries to comfort her and Emma doesn’t know how she’s going to tell Henry. David gives her the most fatherly kiss and this is just a real good father/daughter moment right here.

Mary Margaret/David: They annoy me a lot in this episode. David wonders why Regina would need to override her alarm code. Well, David, you’re supposedly an officer of the law, figure it out. Luckily, Emma is there to help him out. Mary Margaret is at least smart enough to figure out someone broke in and stole the beans, but when Emma thinks it’s Tamara, she gives that condescending mom stare to her. The ‘we’ve already talked about this, honey, and you were wrong’. They think Gold took Regina, but Emma’s apparently the only one observing the town nowadays, because she knows he only has eyes for Lacey. David and Mary Margaret both think Emma is wrong about Tamara and don’t want to go down the wrong path looking for Regina. Emma tells them to go to Gold and find something to help them find Regina while she looks into Tamara again. They go to Gold and remind him that he owes them a favor, so he reluctantly helps them find Regina. He wants to know why they want to help her, and Mary Margaret says she owes Regina after killing Cora. Interesting choice of words instead of saying she feels guilty. Gold wants a tear to mix with Regina’s, that he so happens to have, and Mary Margaret quickly thinks of something to make herself cry. Gold mixes it and tells them to drop it in Mary Margaret’s eye and she’ll basically see and feel everything Regina does. David tells Mary Margaret she doesn’t have to do this, but she thinks if she helps find Regina it will help heal her darkened heart. David just looks at her like there isn’t anyone more good and selfless in the world, and he drops the potion into her eye. At first it looks like it isn’t going to work, but then Regina starts getting electrocuted and Mary Margaret starts convulsing. David isn’t sure what to do, but he’s freaking out about it. Mary Margaret seems to pass out for a minute, and when she comes to she tells David that it was the worst pain she’d ever felt and that Regina is strapped down and powerless to fight back. Mary Margaret couldn’t tell where Regina was, just that she was cold and that it smelled like sardines. David relays this to Emma who figures out Regina is at the cannery and tells David and Mary Margaret to meet her there. David and Emma almost shoot each other because apparently David can’t sneak into someone’s supposed secret hideout without making a ton of noise. They split up and eventually find Regina with Greg. David and Mary Margaret catch Greg about to kill Regina and David shoots the machine that was administering the electricity (why didn’t he shoot Greg instead? At least shoot him in the leg or something so he couldn’t run off?). Greg manages to get away (because David is incompetent), and Mary Margaret won’t let him go after Greg because Regina needs medical help from Mother Superior. Um, can’t you just call for her and she’ll appear? Isn’t that how it worked back in the EF? Isn’t that what basically happened in Selfless, Brave, and True when they needed her to help August? Why can’t Mary Margaret stay with Regina and call Mother Superior (hell, call her on the phone and get her to come over) while David goes after Greg? Anyway, at least he’s smart enough to tell Emma that it’s Greg they caught with Regina. Mary Margaret and David have brought Regina to the loft and Mother Superior uses her magic to remove the cuff and heal her (again, why couldn’t this have happened at the warehouse?). Emma comes in and they immediately know that something is wrong. They are in shock when she tells them Neal is gone and ‘she’ killed them (they know it’s Tamara, she doesn’t have to clarify, they know). David does the fatherly thing and comforts Emma, while Mary Margaret is watching over Regina. She is shocked that David and Mary Margaret saved her. David says they’re family, regardless. Regina is worried because Greg and Tamara still have ‘it’, and Mary Margaret has the good sense to be worried about what it is they have. They are appalled about the fail-safe. Especially since her plan was to take Henry with her to the EF and leave them all to die. But they have bigger things to worry about since Regina no longer has the trigger.

Regina: She is bound to a medical slab. We start with her trying to see where Hook stands on this whole matter. He just wants to kill Gold and Regina scoffs that he doesn’t even know who he’s working for. Greg comes in with his electrocution machine and she sarcastically asks if it’s part of his mission, but he’s clear that this is personal. Greg starts putting electrodes all over Regina and it’s clear he wants answers about his father, and he’s willing to hurt her to get them. She’s adamant that he left town, but Greg still doesn’t believe her. He turns the machine on and Regina is her normal, sarcastic self, asking if the machine is supposed to frighten her. But you can see that she’s nervous when Greg starts attaching the wires to the electrodes. He once again asks where his father is. Regina rolls her eyes and gets electrocuted for it. This goes on for a while. Tamara comes in after distracting Neal and Emma and Regina calls them fools who go around stealing magic. Greg tells her they’re there to destroy magic and Regina looks confused. I don’t blame her because she told Henry in Welcome to Storybrooke that magic can’t be destroyed when he tried to blow up the well. But I’m sure Greg and Tamara wouldn’t believe her anyway. Regina laughs at Tamara when she tells her that they’re there to cleanse the world of magic. She thinks it’s ridiculous that the two of them could destroy magic. But she sure as hell gets nervous when Greg tells her there’s more of them all over the world. Regina tells them that it’s not going to work, but Greg tells her it’s been done before, that Storybrooke is not the first bit of magic to cross over. Later on, Tamara sees Emma and Neal on the monitors and tells Greg they have to go. Regina is not looking so smug anymore. Her eyes are red and teary and she looks like she’s praying Emma finds her soon. Greg puts the dial up to a 9 and you can see Regina visibly wince before he even asks her where his father is for the last time. She finally tells him before he can electrocute her at such a high level. She killed his father the minute he left town and buried him at the campsite. She says this with such venom in her voice. I suspect she’s pretty sure she’s going to die at this point. Much like when she said she told the kingdom she regretted not being more evil when Snow and Charming almost executed her in The Cricket Game. She tells Greg to go ahead and kill her. She just wanted to see the look on his face when she told him. So he electrocutes her at a level 9! He does it two more times before David finally he comes in and shoots the machine. Regina is pretty much out of it by this point, so she doesn’t get to see David and Mary Margaret rescue her. She wakes up in their loft and is astounded that they saved her. They tell her she’s family. She tells them Greg and Tamara have the fail-safe. They can’t believe she was going to kill everyone with it. Regina’s pissed they were going to abandon her in Storybrooke, because that’s the same thing as killing everyone. Again, Regina is playing the victim when she was going to do something much worse. But that’s all to say that she doesn’t have it anymore and that’s a big problem.

Greg/Tamara: Tamara pretends to be training for a marathon so she can meet with Greg in secret at the cannery. Tamara shows Greg the magic portal beans that she found in Regina’s office. Greg gets jealous that she knows what they are because Neal told her. She tells him that as soon as this is all over she’ll be taking off the engagement ring. Greg gives her the fail-safe diamond they found on Regina and she says she’ll send it over to the Home Office to look at. Greg sets Regina up to be electrocuted so he can get information about his father from her. Regina tells him he left town, but Greg refuses to believe that his father never came to find him. He wants Hook to lend him a hand (with his good hand), but Hook isn’t so much into torturing the Evil Queen as he is killing Rumplestiltskin. He tells Greg to find him when that part of the plan is happening. Greg asks Regina where his father is and when she refuses to answer him, she gets her first dose of electrocution. Tamara ‘runs into’ Neal and Emma on the beach to throw them off the track. She tells Greg they believed her. Greg ups the dial and electrocutes Regina some more. She calls them fools for stealing magic but Tamara tells her that’s not what they’re doing. She talks about magic being unholy and needing to be cleansed from the earth, and it feels like Tamara is talking about The Crusades or something. Tamara and Greg are pretty confident that they will do what they’ve set out to do. Regina doesn’t believe the two of them can destroy magic, but Greg informs her that there are more of them everywhere. After he ran away he talked about the magic he saw and magic believers found him, believers that don’t believe magic belongs in their world and are willing to do something about it. They also sound like they’re in a religious cult. Regina tells them destroying magic won’t work, but Greg tells them they’ve done it before. He tells her they are there to stop magic and electrocutes her again. Tamara sees Emma and Neal on the cannery monitors and tells Greg they have to go. Greg still hasn’t got the information about his father. He and Tamara argue, and he tells her they wouldn’t even know about Storybrooke if it wasn’t for his father, so Tamara tells him to meet her later while she runs off. Greg turns the dial up to 9 and this scares Regina enough that she finally tells him that his father is dead and she buried him near their campsite. Greg doesn’t believe her and electrocutes her again. Greg tells Regina she’s never going to hurt anyone ever again, but David comes at that moment and shoots the machine. Greg runs off because Mary Margaret is insistent that they save Regina instead of go after the guy who tried to kill her. David tells Emma that it was Greg, but then Tamara hits Emma with a pipe. Neal focuses more on the fact that Tamara was lying to him this whole time rather than the fact that she just hit Emma with a pipe! She grabs Emma’s gun and tells him that she is working with Greg and they’re there to get rid of magic, something he should be familiar with. Neal again is stuck on the lying part. He finally puts together that their whole relationship was a lie. I see how Tamara managed to dupe him for so long; he’s not the sharpest tool in the shed. Tamara tries to get him to understand that it was her job, and he finally realizes she never loved him (dude, get off this track), and that’s when he tells her he can’t let her leave. She gives him a warning and then shoots him about one second after that. Cold-blooded. Damn! She’s about to shoot him point blank in the head when Emma kicks the gun away. Tamara and Emma fight (and Tamara’s a good fighter, definitely trained) and Emma thinks she has the upper hand when she gets her gun back, but Tamara pulls out one of the beans and throws it at them and runs off. Greg is digging at the campsite and finds his father’s skull. He’s completely devastated. Tamara finds Greg reburying his father and tells him she’s sorry. She tells him the Home Office has gotten back to them about the diamond. She tells him he’ll never believe what it does, and that the Home Office wants them to move to the next phase of their plan. Greg is shocked that they want them to move so quickly, and even Tamara is a little wary. They have to blow Storybrooke off the map.

Questions:

Why does it look like Gold, Lacey, and Whale are having their fight after a night of drinking? Are they just leaving The Rabbit Hole at six in the morning?

How does Tamara send over the fail-safe diamond to the Home Office and get the information back all in one day? Does she actually send it to them, or do they just know what it is from a picture?

How long was Bae in the crawl space before the Darlings discovered him?

Is the Shadow there for Bae since it started coming to the Darlings window at the same time he arrived?

How did magic kill Bae’s mother? Didn’t Rumplestiltskin just tell Bae she ran away and died? Or was kidnapped by pirates and died? (I know he told Bae she died)

Really David, this is how you want to use your favor? To find Regina?

How the hell does Gold have a tear from Regina?

Why doesn’t Gold make a locator potion to find Regina? Why do they have to use a potion that makes Mary Margaret see, feel, smell, touch, and hear what Regina is going through

What magic did Greg see in Storybrooke as a child? His father mentioned that it seemed as if the town had dropped on top of them, but all Greg saw was a storm. And then he couldn’t find Storybrooke when he brought the cops, but that could have been the hysteria and fear that just prevented him from finding it. So really, Greg never originally saw any magic. He just knew that Regina tried to steal him from his father.

How does Wendy know so much about where the Shadow is from? It doesn’t talk. How does she know it’s realm is different from Bae’s and that you can fly and all that?

Ok, I get that Neal happened to be with Emma when she went to go search the cannery, but why is David bringing Mary Margaret along on police business when someone potentially dangerous is there?

Why is Mary Margaret still wearing her coat when she’s caring for Regina? Or did she change out of the blue sweater and is now wearing a trench top?

How did Greg happen to find the exact spot his father was buried in? Besides not having been there for 28 years, they had a pretty big camping area when they were there.

How did Tamara find Greg where his father had been buried? They were supposed to meet at a rendezvous point.

How do the folks at the ‘Home Office’ know what the fail-safe is? Is there a Curses 101 book that they can look these things up in?

Observations:

Kensington Gardens is the setting of the prequel to Peter Pan, titled Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens. It is also where a statue of Peter Pan is currently located.

Gold tells Whale to kiss his boot and Neal says he’s surprised he didn’t turn him into a snail. Rumplestiltskin did this to the man who tried to take Bae in Desperate Souls when he became the Dark One.

Neal doesn’t think it’s odd that Tamara takes several hours a day to go running since she’s training for a marathon. So, I looked it up and Google says that you should cap a run at three and a half hours while training, so I guess it’s not that odd.

Bae goes from sleeping on the floor to having a bed within a day, unless it takes the Shadow a lot longer to come back.

There is no mention of Peter Pan on Neverland.

Gold gives Lacey the same necklace Belle dreamed of him giving her in The Crocodile.

Emma tells David and Mary Margaret to look for Regina in the cannery basement, but there are windows all aroundwhere Greg and Regina are with the sunlight shining in when they are found.

Big Ben is at 8:15 when the Shadow takes Bae past it.

The Shadow takes Bae toward the second star to the right.

Yeah, Tamara hitting Emma with the pipe would definitely have broken her neck. No way she could have survived that.

Timeline Issues:

I’m pretty sure we’ve established that Gold is a few hundred years old. He became the Dark One when Bae was 14. So, let’s say he’s been the Dark One for 200 years. If it is currently 2013 in the timeline, and since we’ve seen that the EF and our realm run concurrently, that should mean that it was at least 1813 when Bae dropped into London. Except that the story Peter Pan was published in 1904, which means Bae would have had to have dropped into the Darling’s lives at least a few years before the book was published. Let’s put Bae coming to our world in 1902. That would mean it would have been 111 years since he dropped through the portal. Now, he may feel like he’s been around longer since Wendy says time works differently in Neverland, and it would also account for how long Hook has been around, but that doesn’t explain why Gold says he’s a few hundred years old when he’d really only be around 160 or so (and no, his time stuck during the curse doesn’t count toward his age).

So Greg and Tamara know that the diamond is part of the fail-safe, which means they are going to try and destroy Storybrooke themselves. Hopefully, Emma finds them before that happens. I’m looking forward to Bae and Hook discovering that they have a connection with Milah. Tamara and Greg keep referencing the Home Office, which seems pretty ominous. And we saw the true version of Wendy in Neverland, and it was not all it was cracked up to be. Neal is gone, but at least Emma got some closure before it happened. The final episode is next!!!!

Please leave comments and reblog! Let me know if you’d like to be tagged in future reviews.

@searchingwardrobes @thisonesatellite @justbecauseyoubelievesomething @laschatzi @profdanglaisstuff @mariakov81 @lfh1226-linda

#once upon a time #once upon a time review #once upon a time rewatch #once upon a time 2x21 #once upon a time second start to the right

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crybatty · 4 years

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When I first made the Crybatty au, I didn't have a story in mind. I was just listening to Melanie Martinez songs and thought "what if I made an adorabat au based on these songs" and then I did, drawing The first Crybatty picture that same day. Then I started to develop it further to the Au you know today.

However, Those early pictures weren't as story focus as the pictures today so you don't know the full story.

After some thinking, I've decided to explain how each song from the crybaby album fit into the story and I'll do the same for k-12 when I finish all the k-12 pictures.

There will be some retcons and things that seem like they don't fit, but that stuff happens when you add ideas to a story that weren't intended from the beginning.

Adult themes mentioned, so be warned

Here is her story in semi chronological order.

Crybaby

Pretty simple, this is a general song about Crybatty herself: she's overemotional, unpopular, and cries lot. Now here is her full backstory:

Born to rich parents Eugene and Sonara, as a baby she was ignored and raised by her older brother (dun dun dun!) Despite him only being 5 at the time. When adorabat was 4, both Eugene and Sonara were killed by a monster. Since her parents were cruel to everyone, non of her relatives wanted to take Crybatty or her brother in so they were Both sent to the orphanage. Soon, her brother was adopted but not her, so she was left alone there. The Orphan keeper and the other orphans were cruel to her because of how easy it was to make her cry or lash out. She dealt with this torment until she was 13. A new sheriff and his wife moved into pure heart valley and decided to adopt her.

Now she can live a happy life, right?

Dollhouse

It's because of this song that I decided to explain Crybattys backstory and I had to rewrite some stuff to make it fit.

Despite being adopted, she didn't gain rest from conflict. While Mao Mao and Badgerclair weren't mean to her, they argued constantly and their behavior reminded her of not only her birth parents, but also the orphan keeper. Badgerclair drank alot like Sonara, Mao Mao was constantly sleeping with other women like Eugene, and they wore the facade of being a perfect family.

These memories brought up more memories, some about her brother. She remembered how her brother started smoking weed at only 7 to deal with the stress. She also remember how on the day her brother was adopted (by drug dealers), the orphan keeper wanted Crybatty gone, so she tried to force the parents to adopt both her and her brother, but they refused and only took her brother. All she had to remember him by was a small bat doll he gave to her as a baby.

Tag, you're it/Milk and Cookies

These songs go hand and hand both in the album and In the Crybatty story.

Sometime after her brother was adopted and before she was adopted, Crybatty was forced by the Orphan keeper to take a big trash bag to the dumpster across the street at night. While walking back, she was approached by the King of pure heart valley, Snugglmange. He previously saw Crybatty when he visited the Orphanage and when he saw her, he was instantly obsessed. He couldn't rest until she was his. He approached her in the dark and when she ran away in fear, he chased and captured her, taking her away to his castle and locking her in a secret room. The only other person who knew she was there was the Royal alchemist Camille. She was horrified by the kidnapping but because she was in love with the king, she kept her mouth shut.

The king didn't want her to be his wife or even for sexual reasons. He wanted her because just the idea of her being his was like heaven for him. She was his, he owned her. He eventually made her get her now famous tattoos, the tear drop and the triangles above her eyes, as proof of his ownership of her.

Days after he took her, she had enough of his outbursts and found a way to escape. However, she knew he'd find a way to get her back, so she had to take drastic actions. She baked a batch of cookies and put poisonus chemicals in them that she stole from Camile. She gave the cookies to the king and she watch as he died from the poisoning. Then, she left.

When she got back to the orphanage, the orphan keeper didn't seem to care, or even know, that Crybatty was missing for days. However, the Orphan keeper and the other orphans noticed her new tattoos and of course, would tease her about them (although, some did like them). At first, Crybatty hated them as they were a reminder of the king. However, soon she began to see them as victory scars. Even though he did kidnap her and forced these tattoos on her, she did end up killing him and these tattoos were proof. She even began to embrace her the name that all the kids would call her as a insult, Crybatty, because the king called her by her real name Adorabat in a creepy way.

Although still emotional, she decided to not take shit from anyone anymore.

Pity party

Pretty simple song with a simple placement in the story

Crybatty had finally been going to school after being adopted. She decided that she would try to be nice to everyone as a way to make friends. And a week before her birthday she tried to plan a birthday party and she invited everyone she thought she was friends with. However, come the day of the party, no one showed up. Despite her trying to see the bright side, this was Crybattys emotional breaking point. She realized trying to be nice would get her nowhere, so she would close herself off from everyone so no one would hurt her again. However, suddenly there was a knock at the door and when Crybatty answered it, she met a girl named Honey

Honey went to the same school as Crybatty, however she didn't get an invitation to the party because Crybatty didn't notice her. Honey though, noticed that all of the kids that Crybatty gave an invitation too either ripped it up or threw it away behind her back. Honey grabbed one of the crumpled papers and went to the party anyway, the only person to show up. Crybatty was overwhelmed by emotions and hugged honey, instantly wanting to be friends with her. They shared a slice of cake (as Crybatty threw her cake on the ground in anger earlier) and enjoyed the small party together.

Sippy cup

Story about the things Crybatty sees around her.

She sees the constant conflict between Mao Mao and Badgerclair due to Mao Mao constantly sleeping with other women. Mao Mao even cause Penny and Benny to divorce. And even though Badgerclair wants it to stop, she doesn't leave Mao Mao because she feels like only he would ever love her.

She sees how insecure Honey is about her body and appearance. Honey's guardian, who Crybatty would later learn is Camille, was always making honey feel bad about herself and so she became taking unhealthy diets.

Both if these problems Crybatty had no control over, she all she could do was watch.

Mad hatter

Crybatty eats a strong edible and trips out

Carousel

How Crybatty meets someone special.

Crybatty went to a pop-up carnival one day. She went on a few rides, not really enjoying herself. Until she go on the carousel where while waiting for it to start, she sees a cute boy she immediately gets infatuated with. She's had small crushes before, but there was something different about him. He got on the seat in front of her which is a good metaphor because he was so close yet so far. When the ride stopped, he got off and she was unable to catch up to him. She spent hours trying to find him at the carnival, but she couldn't. She gave up and decided to ride the carousel one more time before leaving. However, when she got on one of the horses, she saw that on the horse next to her was the boy. She talked to him and they became quickly attached. She learned his name was Edwin.

~~~~~~~~~

So that was part one, I promise part two won't take like 5 years to write, I hope. Hope you enjoyed reading this long explanation.

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monstaxvibes · 5 years

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Nicotine (2)

pairing: changkyun x reader

genre: teenage angst, bad boy au, drama

count: 1.6K

warnings: underage substance abuse, slight addiction, toxic relationship, violence, ADULT LANGUAGE

Inspired by the lyrics to the song Nicotine by Panic! At The Disco, Attention by Charlie Puth and the UK tv show, Skins.

******TRIGGER WARNING******

Includes drug abuse, underage intoxication, addiction, violence, and cursing. If you are triggered or not comfortable with these subjects, please DO NOT READ!

Also includes toxic relationships! If you or anyone you know is in a dangerous and toxic relationship, please reach out for professional help!

—————————————————————

In the smokey and strobe light haze, Changkyun watches her from across the room. Surrounding him is a crowd of girls who are trying way too hard to get his attention. Dancing sexily, rubbing up against each other, and whispering for him to pay attention to them instead. But it's useless. His eyes are only set on Y/N.

Set on her gorgeous smile and the way her tight skirt hugs her curves so nicely. On the sway of her hips and the sexy movements she makes as the DJ drops the bass. And on the way her face scrunches up as she laughs with the girls she calls her friends.

Little did she know that all of those slutty girls have tried to get with Changkyun behind her back. But he will never tell her that. He knows that he breaks her heart more than enough times by just being the guy he is. But he would rather die than ever tell her that the last bit of loyalty she thinks she has is indeed fake.

He adores her big heart and would kill anyone who would try to break or taint it. But her beautiful heart is not as it was the day he met her. Her heart is slowly becoming black, lifeless, and cold as stone. Most of it is his own doing. Surprisingly enough, she still has a little bit of her pure and beautiful heart left. The last thing Changkyun wants is for her heart to turn completely cold due to her so-called friends. Lying to the girl he loves to avoid hurting her is okay, right?

He doesn't know how long he can fake ignorance, but for now, it will do. Y/N is the first and only girl he will ever love. And Changkyun thought if he turned her more like him, that he might be able to keep her by his side forever. To fight this fucked up world together. But she’s not like the other girls. She has feelings, and she cares and loves way too much, and he’s never experienced someone like that before.

No one has ever cared about him. No one except, Jooheon. He’s like Changkyun’s brother. But the way Jooheon shows that he cares is unconventional. He uses any means to put Changkyun in his place, and it’s been like that for years.

They were both orphans and have been in and out of foster homes since they were little kids. One day, they both decided to run away and be strays since it’s easier than getting beat up by foster parents and other kids in the system. School was the small light at the end of the dark tunnel. They hoped that getting an education will get them out of the streets. But it turns out the educational system is just as fucked up as the foster system. It turned a blind eye to mental instability and was made to have kids like Changkyun and Jooheon fail.

When Changkyun found this out, he hated the world, and every stupid piece of hope even given to him. He turned to drugs to numb the pain but still desperately wanted to get out of the streets. He ended up dealing to get some money in his pocket and worked under a drug lord that expected the dealers to make a certain amount each week.

When Joo found out, he beat Changkyun up pretty severely, but he never said a word about it. Instead, he followed his best friend into that dark world and started dealing under the same drug lord. Changkyun now knows that Jooheon’s beating was just a way of showing him a taste of what was in store for the drug-dealing life.

Jooheon was always better than Changkyun in school and was extremely talented in music. Maybe he would have made it. But he left it all behind, just for Changkyun. They made a promise as kids that no matter where they go or what they do, they will do it together. They have no one else in the world but each other.

Jooheon is now an underground rapper when he’s not dealing at his raves. Changkyun sometimes joins him in the underground rap scene, but all the money is in dealing, and he would rather make money. Yet, he still finds himself writing raps in his free time. Maybe Changkyun would have made it too.....

Jooheon suddenly interrupts Changkyun’s private pity party.

“Bro . . . Why don't you tell her the truth?”

Jooheon knows everything between Changkyun and Y/N. He knows Changkyun’s true feelings. He also knows Changkyun’s been in love with her since grade school, long before he won her over in junior year.

“What’s the point of treating her like shit? I can't watch you ruin yourself and Y/N anymore!”

“Joo, you don’t understand. You can change for the girl you love. I mean, look at you now. You are leaving me behind, and you are becoming a better person for Alison. You stopped doing drugs, barely throw raves anymore, and you sent all your buyers to me. I can’t do that shit. I’m not smart or talented like you. I never was. I’m too bad of a person. I’m also bad for her. I cheated on her once to try to lose feelings, but that never worked. Now when I try to be with other girls, I think of her and how much I’m hurting her, and I can’t do it. I can’t touch them. After they try to kiss me and pull me closer, I shove them away and leave. And I always end up in front of her house. I always end up wanting her. Needing her. But I’m too fucked up to be good enough for her. But at the same time, I can’t let her go. Trust me; I want her to leave me. I want her to break my heart. But she won’t, and it angers me. She’s too kind, and that makes me want to keep her even more.”

Jooheon smacks Changkyun’s beer right out of his hands.

“Get your shit together, Changkyun! Stop with your drunk, whiny, dramatic bullshit and man the fuck up! Do you think it was easy to tell Alison I would do ANYTHING to become a better man for her?! Hell no! You and I are so deep into this drug business that leaving it will leave me broke and homeless again. But I’m doing it because I love her. Only her! I would do anything for her. Even if it means getting the shit beat out of me for telling the boss I want to leave. But it doesn’t matter because it’s for her. It’s for our future together. So man the fuck up and stop being so selfish. Cause if you don’t, someone's gonna take her right from you, bro.”

“No one would dare,” Changkyun scoffs.

“Well, it seems like it’s happening right now,” Jooheon says, nodding his head towards Y/N.

Changkyun snaps his head towards Y/N and witnesses his worst fear. The one thing he gets nightmares from.

With that beautiful smile of hers, Y/N slurs pure seduction to the guy whose hands are burning to touch her body. The body that Changkyun claims as his. The dark room and marijuana smoke make it difficult to see everyone's face, but he knows exactly who this guy is.

And he fucking hates him.

This wolf of a boy has had his eyes on Y/N ever since the friendship between Changkyun and him was destroyed. He wants her attention. He doesn’t want her heart. He hates the thought of her choosing Changkyun over everyone else.

The tall boy is wearing the grey and green school sweatshirt. His black hair flops over a thick, green bandana that covers his forehead. His malice grin is shining from afar. A smile clearly aimed towards Changkyun.

He is the one person who makes Changkyun burn with fury. The only person Changkyun would go to hell for so that he could drag him down into the fiery pits as well. The devil himself disguised in that fucking perfect, pretty-boy face.

Im Jaebum.

Changkyun rips himself off the couch, and his vision starts to go red. Jooheon holds him back and forces Changkyun to look at him.

“Do you know what you’re getting yourself into?! There’s no coming back from this Kyun,” he yells sternly.

All Changkyun does is glare in response, and Jooheon knows exactly what he’s chosen to do. He lets Changkyun go and whistles towards their crew. They all follow Changkyun from behind, preparing to face JB’s fucking pack of wolves he dragged along with him to the rave.

Everything happens so quickly, yet Changkyun sees it all in slow motion. When y/n hears Changkyun yell out her name, her eyes widen in fear as she stumbles over her words of explanation. Jaebum stands there, grinning with an evil, toothy smile. Fucking bastard.

Without a second thought, Changkyun watches Jaebum’s face momentarily scrunch up in shock before he takes a swing. Jaebum stumbles backward and spits out the blood that flooded into his mouth.

JB’s friends flinch to jump in, but Jooheon and his crew threaten them to stay back. It will be a fair fight, or the crew wouldn’t hesitate to take them all.

Despite Y/N’s screams, Changkyun grabs Jaebum and shove him into the glass table. JB groans and heaves in pain.

“WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU THINK YOU’RE DOING WITH HER, HUH?!” Changkyun screams.

Jaebum smiles with bloody teeth and starts to cackle like a maniac. Changkyun feels himself shaking with rage and swings again until he feels the other boy’s skin on his fist. Again and again and again until Jaebum shoves him away and throws his punches.

It makes Changkyun fall back, but he can’t help but smile. The stinging pain is finally something he can feel despite his constant numbness. The pain is tangible, and he can’t help but love it. He laughs and shrugs off his leather jacket.

“I’m just getting started, asshole.”

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lightningmastertrilogy · 5 years

Text

Path Of Lightning: Origins chapter 11: We all have scars

Summary: Liz feels off, and doesn’t understand why, but she knows it has to do with the rain.

Word count: 1.6k words.

Read chapter on wattpad.

Chapter:

Liz was sitting in Aiko's office as the latter did some tests. She could hear the rain outside, and she couldn't help but feel bitter.

The pitter pattering of the rain always brought an unpleasant feeling. A feeling of loneliness, and sadness. She never truly understood why.

Aiko noticed.

"Stop being so grumpy, that won't help hide those veins." Aiko scolded her. "Apparently your demon energy depends on your emotions just like Penergy. So relax!"

"It's raining." Liz said and sank into her chair. "I hate rain."

Aiko sighed, knowing that she couldn't reason with her. She showed her a familiar device. She figured that Liz was connected to it. "Do you know what this is?"

"That's..." Liz's eyes widened as she looked at the device the illusionist used months ago. This device was the reason she found out her true nature. "How did you get that?"

"That doesn't matter, what matters is that the blood right here is yours." Aiko said.

"So what's your point?"

"I guess I'm asking for permission." The teacher said and crossed her arms as she rested her back on the wall. "I wanted to use your blood to find a way to make some kind of medicine or even provide others with a way of healing. So now that I know whose blood it is, I'd like your permission."

"Most people would use that blood to gain demonic powers, not to heal others." Liz commented, remembering once again her encounter with the illusionist.

"I'm not interested in those powers. I don't need them." Aiko said with a serious expression that was rare to see on her. "I am a genius. I've been one ever since I was born. I thought that with my knowledge of energy I could do anything. That was until my mother died. This is the least I can do to make up for being so helpless."

Liz was at loss, since this was the first time she heard her talk about her family or act seriously. While her expression or tone didn't say much, Liz couldn't help but wonder. Did Aiko feel guilty over her mother's death?

The blonde found herself relating to her a bit, because she lost a parent too. Jack was the father she never had.

"So?!" Aiko's malicious smile came back to her as fast as it left, completely changing the mood and surprising the blonde. "Am I allowed to use it?"

Liz felt a chill going down her spine. Something told her that she wouldn't accept no as an answer. "Sure, whatever. Can I leave now?"

"You're delusional. No one ever left this room alive."

"Huh?!"

"Joking." Aiko laughed and pushed her outside. "Have a nice day!"

Liz rolled her eyes and headed to the cafeteria. She couldn't have a nice day as long as it rained. She took a seat next to Yuki who was staring blankly at nothing. She rested her head on the table and let out a heavy sigh.

Can this day be over already?

"What's up?" He asked, still clearly distracted.

"I hate my life right now." She said. "You?"

"I'm in love." He said.

"Love is mean and cruel. Only fools fall in love. Your life officially sucks." She said in a monotone voice, while the boy turned to her offended.

"Hey! That's not how you reassure someone!" Yuki said with a frown.

"Life is cruel. Deal with it." Liz answered. This really wasn't her day.

"Wow, that's cold." Yuki muttered and rested his face on his palm.

"That's ironic, coming from an Ice user." A third voice joined the conversation.

"Ah! Miss Nosaru!" Yuki exclaimed, feeling a bit embarrassed. "I did not know you were here!"

"What's up with the 'miss'?" Liz asked him.

"Don't you know that she is a member of Aether's leading family?!" Yuki whispered. "Show some respect!"

The blonde raised an eyebrow, before resting her head again and raising her hand lazily in a saluting manner. "Yo, Nosaru..."

"What on earth is wrong with you?" Nosaru asked, curious by the lack of energy that her partner was showing.

She still wasn't fond of the whole 'partner' thing, but it was something she had no choice but to get used to.

And it was something that helped her notice how uncharacteristic the blonde's behavior was.

"It's raining..." Was the only answer she received. Nosaru looked at Yuki who shrugged in return.

"Apparently, she is traumatized from the rain." Yuki answered dryly. Not sure what to make of her behavior.

"It's just rain." The blue haired girl said. How can rain be traumatizing?

"It's not just rain. It makes me depressed, and I can't even fight in it..." Liz complained then sighed, already tired of the conversation. "Rain is evil."

"What are you? A cat?" Nosaru said and crossed her arms. It didn't take long for her partner's state to annoy her completely so she grabbed the blonde's arm and forced her to stand. "We're going outside."

"What?! No!" Liz complained and tried to escape the grip. "Yubi! Help me!"

"It's YUKI! Miss Nosaru don't you think you should..." He stopped when he received a murderous glare from the blue haired girl. He sat down and pretended he didn't know the blonde.

"You traitor!"

"Stop acting like a child." Nosaru said and pushed her outside.

"I officially hate you." Liz said and rubbed her arms trying to warm up under the rain. She was surprised when she saw a golden chain heading towards her. She blocked it with her scythe but the moment she did, the weapon almost fell off her hands, and she tried to catch it several times. "What was that for?!" She asked angrily, but her partner wasn't fazed.

"So, you're clumsy under than rain." Nosaru said then summoned a sword and attacked her. "What if you were in a fight and it started raining? You'd get yourself killed."

Liz summoned the same weapon and blocked the attack, but her stance wasn't as strong as usual. "I'll deal with something like that when it happens." She answered, struggling not to fall.

"I can't have a reckless partner." Nosaru said as she pushed her away. "If you don't face your fears, you'll never overcome them."

"That's easier said than done!" Liz complained, trying not to slip due to the wet ground. "What about you? Did you ever manage to overcome one of your fears?"

Nosaru's frowned and clashed their swords again almost making the blonde fall, thankfully, she grasped her hand and helped regain her balance. "This isn't about me."

Flashes of that day, of hidden faces, and a rainy funeral, made their way into her thoughts.

This wasn't about her, or her family.

"Of course." Liz scoffed, glaring at her.

Suddenly, A thunder stroke nearby and Nosaru was surprised when Liz's hands suddenly gripped into her arms and the blonde buried her head on her shoulder. She could tell that she was shaking out of fear, not cold.

"I need you to live." A soft and gentle voice played in the back of Liz's mind when she heard the thunder, and then she saw a smile, a warm yet sad smile. She could've sworn her heart stopped. She pulled away once it was over, and crossed her arms, looking away. She choose not to think about the voice.

"Are you okay?" Nosaru asked, a hint of hesitance showed in her voice.

"I've always hated rain." Liz confessed. "Lately, it's been worse. The leader of our group, was like a father to me. He passed away on a rainy day too. I guess what I'm trying to say is that every time it rains, I can't help but feel that a tragedy is near."

Nosaru looked at her almost uncertain before talking, but if she shared something like that with her, she needed to share something as well. "My mother was sick for a while. She had a rare disease and... passed away few years ago." She started, and the blonde looked at her in surprise and confusion. Nosaru made sure to avoid her gaze.

"My brother became an orphan at such a young age. Father became cold and distant, as if he blamed himself for not doing anything. Aiko was probably the one who suffered the most. She is still trying her best to keep this family from falling apart. The tragedy awakened my powers, and here I am. You're scared of the rain, and I'm scared of being left behind." She sighed. "You're right. I still haven't overcome my fears."

She confessed her weakness, she confessed the fact that she was still running away from the truth. Perhaps Liz was right, perhaps she needed to overcome her own weakness before telling others to do so.

Liz was taken by surprise by the vulnerability she saw in her partner's blue eyes. "Why are you telling me this? I mean this is something important to you."

"You told me something, so it was only fair for me to tell you. We both can relate to the loss of someone important." Nosaru explained. "And I admit you're easy to talk to." She admitted with shrugged. There was no pressure, no pity, no judging looks for her vulnerability. It was just a talk with two people who were more similar than they initially thought.

The moment was ruined when they both ended up sneezing. They looked at each other then started laughing at the ridiculous situation. Liz noticed that this was the first time she saw her partner laugh. It was soft and melodic, something so genuine coming from someone who obviously suffered so much.

Nosaru's laughter died, but a smile remained on her face. "You know, my sister will probably kill us." She said.

"I'm totally going to kill you." Came Aiko's voice from behind.

They both turned to her and looked at her with fear. Aiko ended up gripping their ears and dragging them inside.

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devilgem-archive · 5 years

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heya!! do you mind if i ask a bit abt ur kyokoswap au?? if u dont wanna thats fine but any info/hcs u have abt it wld be cool bc the au seems rlly neat!! tho again if u dont wanna def no pressure ^^; have a wonderful day!! :D

VIBRATES EXCITEDLY i’ve been waiting 50 years for someone to ask about this!!!!!kyoko magica is one my oldest and most developed aus, i’m more than happy to answer this!

aside from minor adjustments to better fit each character’s arc, the story itself follows canon’s exactly! starts with kyoko having a dream about mami, ends with mami tearing apart kyokami in a new world. ofc a lot of the girls’ original traits remain in tact. kyoko is more like her pre-tds self, kind but ditzy and reckless, mami retains her ladylike grace, homura her overprotectiveness and so on…i always prefer leaving aspects that makes characters…themselves in swap aus if u get me? or maybe that’s just me

KYOKO

swaps with madoka. madokyoko or kyokami, as i like to call her!

a simple christian girl with a plain, ordinary life. kyoko had everything she could ever ask for: a loving family, supportive friends, amazing teachers- just everything! all of that changed when she meets a mysterious blonde girl in a post-apocalyptic setting in a dream…and that very same girl appears in her life the very next day!

while she has a kind heart, she is known to be fiery and unreasonable at times. this temper was usually displayed in heated confrontations with mami

the sakuras used to be rather poor. their financial status improved when the akemis stepped in to assist them, and the two families had forged a close bond ever since

eating is practically her hobby. still hates wasting food and will call out anyone who does so

is a d@ddy’s girl through and through. her father is wise and caring, so she often seeks him out for advice

her wish varies from time to time. in the first timeline she wished to save a cat she named Amy, while others had to do with wishing one or all of her friends back or to be able to defeat walpurgisnacht etc. her final wish was to erase all witches from the past,present and future with her own hands, which caused her to ascend to godhood and leave no trace of her existence in the new world.

kyokami felt lonely when she first realized she had no way to get in touch with her loved ones on earth. it felt even strange to be god herself…she’d always been a girl of faith yknow? she eventually embraced her fate as the composer of the universe, and is perfectly happy in bring salvation to magical girls all over the globe.

ophelia is the witch of abandonment. unlike gretchen, who desires to save the world, ophelia wants to destroy it. kyoko’s faith in humanity died the second ophelia was born…and the all-powerful wudan witch stops at nothing until this cold and cruel world is nothing more than barren wasteland

MAMI

switches with homura! her nickname is homumami, but she’s usually mamicifer to me

i like to call her moemami (or moemi???) in her ‘moe’ phase

was orphaned at the age of 6 when a fatal car crash killed her parents and left her paralyzed from waist down. the hospital had practically been her home since, until she was officially discharged yeaaaaars later

used to wear her hair in drilled pigtails, complete with colorful flower clips that surprisingly correspond to her future friends’ colors. in later timelines she would let her hair down and replace the childish clips with her signature bronze ones.

used to be wheelchair bound before contracting. learned to utilize her healing powers so she could walk again; she used crutches and ribbons to assist her during the early timelines. in later timelines, she fully healed her injured spine the same time she changed her personality

she had a big crush on sayaka in the past…something she’d rather forget. it still flusters her

her wish ofc was to redo her meeting with kyoko sakura

her birthday falls on may 1st. more abt it here

mami has a major sweet tooth.

candeloro is a miserable witch, literally shackled with chains of despair, forever alone in this nightmarish prison- her eternal pity party. although she comes off as aloof at first, her true nature warm and inviting, almost needy even.

she has her own set of ‘clara dolls,’ known as delightful dolls. there’s four of them, each resembling the girls of the quartet but represent the hostess’/mami’s worst aspects: vexation (kyoko), disgust (madoka), cruelty (sayaka) and love (homura)– the youngest doll is the least favorite and looks suspiciously a lot like the good-for-nothing’s dolls (see sayamura for the answer)

HOMURA

switches with sayaka. i lovingly dub her sayamura

was kyoko’s friend from childhood. they attended the same catholic elementary school together before mitakihara middle school.

sported her ‘moe’ appearance pre-contract. after making her wish, she ditched the braids and glasses in order to look ‘cooler’ (@ which kyoko wld say she always looked cool in her eyes

kyoko had been her knight in shining armor for as long as she could remember, and homura really wants to repay that by protecting her as well! she is also hella gay for her bff

her wish was to have the strength to protect others

her shield is very similar to the one seen in the original madoka manga, though it lacks the hammerspace storage. her firearms are formed via magic

her desire for kyoko, self loathing and jealousy are big big factors to her inevitable demise.

homulilly here is a mix of her nutcracker and mortal world forms. each and every one of the clara dolls still exist along with lotte, luiselotte, liese and lillia.

love is in fact, one of homura’s dolls; because homura and mami cherish the same person deeply, their feelings intertwined and therefore ‘share’ ai. post-rebellion, ai continues to pose as one of the delightful dolls and attempts to revive homura’s memories behind mamicifer’s back

SAYAKA

switches with mami. her nickname is mamisayaka here!

ghost and lonely are big inspos,esp for oktavia

came from a rather well off family, so she never really needed to worry about provisions when she was left on her own. still, all the money in the world could never fill the gaping hole in her lonely heart

knows how to play the violin

her parents and kyousuke and hitomi all perished when a theater collapsed on itself. old wounds reopened when madoka left her to live life her own way

is the ideal big sis! cheerful, sporty and has good grades…For A Sayaka. beneath the facade she’s a depressed slob who doesnt take care of herself as much as she should. its oke as long as she hides it all with a smile :)

oktavia von seckendorff is very highkey based off lewis msa; deadbeat-esque familiars, an abandoned mansion/concert hall labyrinth and a disembodied glass heart, which sits at the very bottom of her lagoon- that kind stuff. those she falls in love with, whether romantically or platonically, are never to leave her- she wont be alone, never again. one condition must be fulfilled in order to kill her successfully: stay. if she’s truly feels content, she will accept death without fail.

MADOKA

swaps with kyoko. kyodoka has a nice ring, doesnt it?

used to be exactly like the sweet and well-meaning canon!madoka in the past, a key difference was she would resort to stealing and breaking other rules to keep herself and her parents and little brother alive.

her mother was a businesswoman who wanted to take a more innovative approach to her work. alas, this would cost junko her entire career and the kaname family became penniless

madoka wished for her mother’s dream project to become reality. just as ur familiar with canon!kyoko’s story, it backfired horribly. disowned from her family, her mother became an alcoholic, dad gets pushed around and baby tatsuya doesnt understand whats going on. days later…press f for the kanames and madoka’s broken heart.

is vile, absolutely vile. can be sweet in one moment then violent and emotionally manipulative in the next like the two-faced bitch she is

rarely uses honorifics to address people anymore, unless she’s playing sweet to get something out of someone. uses ‘-chan/kun/san’ for those she sincerely cares for; she didn’t call homura ‘-chan’ before she began sympathizing with the latter

has a minor problem with booze and tobacco, namely the latter.

she loves loves loves melons!

knowing the value of being frugal, madoka hates wasting things that could be put to better use. she can be kind of a cheapskate in some sense, though she's sane enough to avoid resorting to ridiculous extremities.

kriemhild gretchen is exact the opposite of canon!ophelia. this towering witch continues oh so obsessively reaching for what she cannot; that one faraway glimmer of hope sitting at the endless skies of her labyrinth she calls paradise. shes stubborn as all hell, and will not let herself be destroyed UNLESS one convinces her the world is already a happy place in no need of saving

NAGISA

nagisa is nagisa.

the same charlotte that ate mamisayaka’s head is now a bapy that lives with her post-rebellion

her wish remains the same: to have one last cheesecake with her mother

not much to say here

thats all i can remember from the top of my head! if you want me to elaborate further, pls ask me @mahoutrauma!!

#pmmm #askies #anon #kyokoswap au #trash aus #headcanons #if only i put effort in my writing assignments as i did with this

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yes-these-obsessions-are-healthy · 6 years

Text

TBH I think Orochimaru's obsession with developing and discovering new jutsu is just a byproduct of his desire for immortality at any cost, and that his views of self-serving immortality was a gradual logical conclusion for him than an innate one.

Early Years

He was orphaned as a child and showed a desire to see his parents again. Hiruzen commented that the shed snake skin on his parents' graves is a symbol of rebirth and rejuvenation, and so Orochimaru naturally took that to heart and it became a motif of his fighting style and abilities. He grew up to see Jiraiya, despite being a fool, as a comrade, and he greatly respected Tsunade's chakra control and spirited nature (Orochimaru is far from a misogynist in any respect) as well as her ability to put Jiraiya in his place when he got too goofy. Orochimaru took Tsunade's little brother Nawaki under his wing, or at least doted on him as a friend of the Senju family or like an uncle. He was his sensei, so at least in an official capacity he had responsibilities toward him, responsibilities that were not inherently self-serving. And so he had at least four people (Hiruzen included) upon which he could say he was close to.

Nawaki's Death

While Orochimaru was a quietly confident, reserved, and cagey individual in his early years, Nawaki's horrible death shook him as much as it did Tsunade. For the first time since the death of his parents, he felt an emptiness and sorrow that he was unable to properly fix the source of. He was powerless to reverse death then as a child as he was in that moment while watching Tsunade sob uncontrollably over her little brother's body. He was not one for tears, he was not one to feel despair in the capacity that everyone around him seemed freely able to do, but in his own way he felt it. The fragility of life, the ease in which people can pass away, and the finality of mortality -- pointless, it was pointless. And so his heart hardened more that day.

Dan's Death and Tsunade

Upon Tsunade's second tragedy with the death of her lover Dan (during the Second Shinobi World War), I feel like Orochimaru had by then developed his views to the point that love was not enough to shield people from their ultimate expendability in life. Tsunade loved Nawaki fiercely, and he died. Tsunade loved Dan fiercely, and he died. Orochimaru was orphaned at a very young age but he doesn't recall hating his parents, and they were dead.

He admired Tsunade's concurrent crusade to train medical nin and place them in team cells so as to significantly lower the mortality rate during missions--now pushed even more fiercely after Dan's death, but deep down inside he knew it was staving off the inevitable. Still, he did not find her contemptible for such efforts because they were driven by logic and strategy as well as passion.

Ame Orphans

Another thought: Before the Sannin split up to do their own thing (Jiraiya to travel; Tsunade to train medic nin, at least initially; Orochimaru to work with Danzo, I guess), the Sannin met Yahiko, Konan, and Nagato in the Rain village, again during the Second War. Orochimaru's first instinct was to kill them, but the line delivery of his suggestion was not one of malice or sadism but pity, and not even a mocking pity. The war with Hanzo and the destruction that they the Sannin had caused was not unknown to Orochimaru since he had a huge part in it, nor did he feel guilt about it, per se. He was realistic about it, just as he was realistic in claiming that the trio of kids would likely suffer from starvation and disease before dying cold and alone in some burned-down house. This was a very accurate assessment of the situation before Jiraiya intervened and decided to train them for a spell. This was perhaps one of the final times that Orochimaru displayed genuine sentiment at the thought of death as a form of personal loss and suffering rather than the individual as a unit/pawn that can be cultivated, manipulated, and ultimately broken or discarded when it can no longer be used.

Sakumo Hatake and Disaffection with the Leaf

While Tsunade has clearly shown that tragedy and death do not necessarily break an individual, shinobi are successful partly because that is one of their most enduring rules -- no emotion, get the mission done. This is just conjecture, but it is unlikely that Orochimaru had not at least had a passing conversation with Sakumo Hatake, given how much renown he accumulated as the “White Fang of Konoha” during the Second War, and the news of his suicide after being branded a disgrace for choosing to put the lives of his team over the success of the mission may have further solidified Orochimaru’s growing conviction that people fear death so much that they are willing to act irrationally and forego what is logically most beneficial for the group because death’s severing of peoples’ close bonds is more detrimental and dangerous than the potential for failure.

And even though Sakumo succeeded in preventing the deaths of his comrades, his very human decision--a decision he was able to pull off because he was strong enough and capable enough to do so, an ability that Orochimaru did not possess in the moment when Nawaki died, an ability Tsunade did not possess when Dan died in her arms--still led to his death by his own hand. Tragic irony by this point was only becoming somewhat comical to Orochimaru, something that you can't help but laugh at because it is so ridiculous and yet the people around him are so blind. I don’t think it’s too much of a stretch that this scandal, if Orochimaru had paid attention to it at all, wouldn’t have furthered his graudal dissatisfaction and contempt of the Leaf for their circumstantial and hypocritical war time politics. Orochimaru always operated in shades of gray, but the Leaf's inability to reconcile the psychological anchors of their soldiers with the requirements of a shinobi must have read to him as being foolish and wasteful and a futile attempt at denying human beings' true nature, a nature that he himself had begun to gradually shed over the years.

Little Side Note of Orochimaru's Ability to Connect with Others

To say "camaraderie" and "friendship" would sound too Shonen, because Orochimaru did not grow up without enjoying the company of his sensei and teammates, but he was someone who either had the willpower to cut those ties and find satisfaction in his own company (like how some people just prefer to be alone and never report feeling 'lonely'), and thus psychically fulfilled with his own person (arguably, like Sasori, or Kakuzu to a certain extent) or he was born with something that allowed him to form bonds with others but those bonds were separate from his Self. He could live and thrive without them, sever them if he had to when he pleased if they furthered his own goals. Opportunistic and self-sufficient, independent but not the point of being incapable of working in tandem with others. Mentally, he was more than versatile and can not be be placed squarely in either the "Does Not Play Nice With Others" or "A True Team Player" boxes. Whatever is best for the situation and the long run is good enough for him, and he is not someone who does not clutch his chest in pain when his actions unintentionally benefit another, unless that benefit interferes with his own net gain.

Tanzaku Town and the Offer of Resurrection

When Orochimaru and Tsunade finally met again in Tanzaku, I honestly don't think that Orochimaru was kidding when he said he would resurrect Tsunade's loved ones in exchange for her healing his arms. He had been working on this technique for a long-ass time, upgrading it from Tobirama's original jutsu, and he was more than willing to show it off and give her a taste of it in return for her services. This here is where Orochimaru's demented way of thinking seems to reveal itself most clearly, though: For Orochimaru, the most powerful driving force that can encourage or break someone is grief and love. He saw how Dan and Nawaki's deaths ruined Tsunade for a time and changed her to the point that she developed a severe phobia of blood after the former died of blood loss (something he used to shake her up to compel her to agree, what an asshole). Playing with her head aside, I think that in that moment, him offering her her loved ones back seemed logical to him. She had been pining for them for so long beneath all that brassy exterior and gambling and medical ninjutsu, so why would she not jump at the chance to see them again?

But he underestimated Tsunade's grudge factor and her own maturity. She was able to throw away the ability to see them because of what he had done to the Leaf Village, the place that all three Sannin had grown disillusioned with in their own way, and that surprised him big time because on top of him having been one of her closest companions for a long time and seeing how their deaths wrecked her he had also become a master at manipulation and human psychology to Hannibal Lecter-like levels.

Aaaand that's all I got. At what point he went all Dr. Machiavellian Mengele, I have no clue, but he wasn't a completely heartless bastard in the beginning.

Edit: Added a few more ideas cuz my thoughts were running in every direction when I first wrote this and I wanted to get them down as soon as possible. P.S. If you have any more insights or want to debate with me on any of the characters or backstories I have mentioned, please do. I am not an Orochimaru, Tsunade, Jiraiya, or Sakumo stan, so any of your insights would be coolio. Also, apologies for long-winded sentences. I don't breathe sometimes when I'm trying to make a thought and it reflects in how I write :O

#orochimaru #character analysis #tsunade #jiraiya #sakumo hatake #jesus i'm going all in here #it's not as cohesive as i would like it to be but i'm not completely dissatisfied :X #konoha

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