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procrastinatorimagines · 4 years

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I Want Us Part 6

Fandom: Chicago PD / SVU

Series: I Want Us

Part 1 // Part 2 // Part 3 // Part 4 // Part 5 // Part 6 // Part 7 // Part 8 // Part 9 // Part 10 (Final)

Pairing/s: Sonny Carisi x Intelligence!Reader

Warning/s: tw rape, murder, assault

Word Count: 1,795

Summary: The Intelligence Unit’s last case with Manhattan SVU had them flying out to New York to track down an abducted boy, and had Dectective Y/L/N and Detective Carisi growing close in the process. Now, a string of rape-murders in Chicago has SVU boarding the next flight out, believing the suspect to be the same man responsible for a set of identical crimes 10 years prior. As the case unfolds, Y/N and Carisi are brought back together, reigniting the spark between them.

You arrived at the previous night’s crime scene a few minutes before Special Victims, slipping on gloves and treating carefully as CSI went over everything they’d found, or didn’t find more accurately, with you. You were knelt down next to where they’d recovered the body, a grim look plastered on your face as you took in every detail of the victim, she almost didn’t look real.

“Detective Y/L/N,” you heard, standing up and turning you attention towards the woman ducking under the crime scene tape and making her way towards you.

“Captain Benson, welcome back to Chicago,” you greeted, meeting her in the middle and shaking her hand, “sorry it isn’t under better circumstances.”

“Oh, believe me, it never is,” she informed you, eyes drifting from you to the body of Jessica Connors with a mixture of sorrow and determination that made you admire her even more than you already did. You still didn’t know how they did these kinds of cases everyday.

Sonny and Kat came through after their Captain. “Hey Y/N, I hear we’re borrowing you from Intelligence for this case,” Kat said.

“You don’t mind that I asked Voight for you to join us do you?” Benson asked, your eyes unconsciously sliding to Sonny as she did. He hadn’t said anything yet, but a small smile was forming on his lips as he looked at you.

“Of course not, anything I can do to help,” you replied.

“Glad to have you then,” Sonny voiced with a grin, ignoring the pointed look Kat gave the both of you.

“You up to speed on the new victims?” You asked, noticing the way Benson was looking at Jessica’s body, CSI just finishing up at the scene.

“Yeah we are,” she told you, her tone and the familiarity in her eyes suggesting that she actually had worked the first case in New York. She noticed you staring and shook the thoughts from her head.

“We’ll catch him this time,” you said, meeting her gaze.

“Will will,” she nodded, looking around at the scene with a Captain’s eye, “Kat and I will talk to CSI, match up any details, see if we can pick up any leads, you and Carisi talk to any witnesses, the officers first on scene, and the man who found the body,” she ordered, turning to go talk to CSI with Kat when she had your confirmation.

“Hey,” Carisi said with a smile when you were both alone.

“Hey yourself,” you replied, “how was the flight?”

“Not too bad, reading up on this case certainly passed the time,” he said, hesitating before adding in a quieter voice: “I was also... looking forward to seeing you again.”

You felt your cheeks go a little red, remembering yourself as you cleared your throat. “We should, um, get on with our orders,” you managed, flustered by the look in his eyes.

He smirked but agreed, gesturing for you to lead the way to where a man of about 35-40 was stood with two uniforms. He was a bit on the shorter side, dark hair and bright white running gear on, not the most practical for a run in the woods, as made apparently by the mud stains. The long scar across his face was distinctive, but you tried not to stare as you made your approach.

“Mr Tate?” Carisi asked, checking his notes briefly to make sure as the man nodded, the unis leaving you to talk to the him. “Thanks for sticking around.”

“You mind if we ask you a couple of questions?” You asked, pulling out your notebook and a pen.

“Of course detectives, anything to help,” he told you both, running a hand through his hair, “I’ve already told the officers that arrived on scene everything I saw.

“We know, but we just want to make sure all our bases are covered,” Carisi clarified.

“Ask away,” Tate spread out his arms, ready for you to begin. Carisi looked to you, signaling you to begin.

“Do you always run this route?” You asked, looking around at the well worn and clearly marked path; the killer wanted the body to be found.

“Yeah, it’s quite a popular trail,” he confirmed, rubbing at a bit of mud on the sleeve of his jumper.

“You see anyone else?” Carisi asked. It was a pretty wide path, and it didn’t diverge much, the killer would have had to use this trail to move Jessica’s body.

“Just another jogger,” he told you with a shrug, something that probably wasn’t very uncommon, even later in the evening.

“But they didn’t see the body?” You probed further, finding it strange. Jessica wasn’t exactly hidden, she’d practically been on full display of the path, anyone would have seen her from where you were.

“I don’t know... I guess not, they were running past me, so I’d be surprised if they didn’t but...” He answered, you and Carisi sharing an identical look as you put a circle around this other jogger in your notes.

“Remember what he was wearing?” Carisi asked for some clarification as Tate scratched his head, thinking.

“Er, black tracksuit, baseball cap, oh and glasses too, like sun glasses, I thought that was strange given how dark it was,” he recalled, your suspicion growing further with each detail.

“White... black...?” Carisi continued, making sure you didn’t miss any detail about your new suspect.

“White, definitely, had a rucksack on too,” Tate said, face scrunched up in thought.

“You were seen him running here before?” You mused, knowing killers sometimes prefered places that were familiar.

“I don’t think so,” he answered somewhat apologetically, “expensive shoes like those... I’d have noticed. Does that help?”

You and Carisi nodded to each other before you took a card out of your pocket, “it does, thank you, get in touch if you think of anything else.”

He took the card, looking over it before slipping it into his pocket, “will do.” He turned to leave, glancing back at the crime scene one last time, Carisi gesturing for the unis to make sure he got back okay.

“Security cameras?” Carisi suggested, reading your mind as your eyes scanned the surrounding area carefully. There wasn’t any this far into the trail, you weren’t that lucky.

“We should check the entrace and exit, if there are only the two ways onto this route then they had to have gone back to one of the car parks, we’ll check the cameras there,” you told him, pocketing your notes and heading back to Benson and Kat.

“You got something?” She asked as you approached.

“Maybe, we’re going to go see what we can find on the nearest security cameras,” Carisi told her, filling her in on everything the witness had just revealed.

“The park ranger can help, he’s with a couple of officers,” she said, a distant and guardedly hopeful look in her eyes. This was as close as anyone had gotten.

You both went off with the park ranger, being led back up the trail to the car park and the rangers station. It was a quiet morning, not surprising given the amount of cop cars and crime scene tape. You’d certainly find a different route if you saw it.

He led you into the station, his partner already having the tape set up to play. “This your guy?” He asked, hitting play as you and Carisi leaned forward, watching intently.

It was dark, but the time stamp matched up as a dark figure emerged from the direction you’d just walked, his jogging slowing to a walk as he approached an equally dark car. The description matched the one Tate had just given you.

“Can you zoom in on that?” You asked, pointing to the number plate on the car. The ranger nodded, pausing the footage and focusing in on the plate. “Got it,” you nodded, Carisi already calling in for a BOLO on the car, a bentley, a long with as good of a description of the driver as he could in the dim light.

“Thanks guys,” Carisi told them as you exited the station, stepping back into the car park as you made your way towards the stop where the bentley had been parked.

Carisi was about to say something to you when your phone rang, digging it out to see Hailey calling. “Hey, how’s it going with Jessica’s family? We think we’ve caught a lead here,” you relayed to her.

“Yeah we heard the BOLO over the radio, got something that might help you with that too,” she told you, a questioning look from Carisi as you put it on speaker for him to hear.

“Oh yeah? What did the family know?” You asked, your aching for them and what they were going through.

“The parents didn’t know much, but when the little sister let us out she mentioned that Jess had been planning to go on a date the last time she’d seen her, about a week a go now,” Hailey explained, the cogs in your mind whirling.

“About the same time we found Lily Hamilton’s body?” You checked, thinking that maybe the killer had swapped one woman out for another.

“You got it,” Hailey confirmed grimly, “and get this, the sister said that Jess had been super excited, saying she’d found her prince charming.” She emphasised the last words, the images of the fanciful ball gowns all the women had been dressed in fresh in your mind.

You heard Jay calling Hailey from somewhere further away, “okay, thanks, we’ll meet you back at the district,” you said, saying your goodbyes and hanging up.

“Prince charming?” Carisi echoed, clearing piecing it together the same as you.

“Sounds like it fits, let’s check if any of the other girls had dates,” you suggested, taking out your car keys.

“I think I read something about that in a couple of the old New York files,” he agreed, following you to your car as he typed away on his phone, most likely telling Benson the plan.

“Looks like we’ve got some work to do,” you told him with a little bit of hope, “guess you’re going to be stuck we me for a bit.”

Carisi grinned, “I can’t say that I mind.” You smiled as you reached your car, more than glad for the company.

Still, something didn’t sit right with you. Not that you didn’t like easy cases, but this... it was too neat, too quick. 9 women dead in New York without so much as a trace of evidence and this lead just falls in your lap?

You couldn’t quite put your finger on what you were missing, but if it helped stop other women from meeting the same fate, you were going to find out.

#sonny carisi #svu #law and order svu #chicago pd #one chicago #sonny carisi x reader #sonny carisi imagine #svu imagine #law and order svu imagine #chicago pd imagine #sonny carisi imagines #svu imagines #law and order svu imagines #chicago pd imagines #i want us

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babyspiderling · 4 years

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Under the Lights Daveed Diggs x reader

Before I even paste this into Tumblr, I want you all to know that this took me two days of constant writing, and FOUR pages on google docs. I know that the second I hit paste, it’s going to be like one page. Anyways, here’s Daveed x reader.

2010

“Hey, Y/N, I brought you muffins!” A woman with a mouth full of pins, her hair up in a messy bun, measuring tape sloppily tied around her neck, and a pincushion on her wrist, exited a space separated from the rest of the apartment by a thin curtain. Seeing her best friend and roommate enter with goodies, a bright grin fluttered onto her face. “Wanna see what I did while you were gone?” He nodded and followed her to her half of the work room. On a mannequin, a beautiful dress was fleshed out much more than it had been when Lin had left this morning. It had been nothing more than a sketch on paper for the Newsies show. As a major in history with a minor in design, Y/N was accepted by Disney to create the costumes. It didn’t hurt that The Lin Manuel Miranda of In the Heights fame was on her list of references. She had decided to start with Medda’s dress first. Medda was a personal favorite of hers and was excited to do her own spin on it. A deep purple sash had been half pinned under the bodice and sadly hung from its haphazard placement. “The sash would look better if you hadn’t distracted me with food dork.” He smiled and pressed the folded paper bag into her hand. “Alright. I’m going to finish this for Alan. It’s a miracle I have this job. I’m not screwing it up. I also meant to tell you that one of my guys are going to be here tomorrow for a measure and design session. Sweet kid. Amazing dancer.” Lin grinned teasingly as he set his laptop down on his desk. “Am I getting replaced? Is he going to be your new roommate and best friend?” Y/N stuck out her tongue at her best friend and continued her work. The sounds of humming and a machine whirring mixed in with the excited clacking of keys to make a strangely beautiful symphony.

2013

“Y/N! I need your help!” In the tiny apartment in the upper east side, an over-caffeinated Wesleyan Alumni burst through the front door, a paper bag of bagels clutched tightly. At the yells, another Alumni ran from her section of the apartment. “Lin! What’s wrong? Are you hurt?” He thrusts the bag into her searching hands, and lets out another shriek. “Y/N! I’m fine! They want to put The Hamilton Mixtape through a workshop! And if we get this right, they’ll move us to a real show!” Shoving his shoulders, she muffled her screams behind pinched lips. “Lin, you can not go scaring me like that! I’m going to get gray hairs before we even get to the off Broadway! What do you need my help with?” He pulled her onto the ratty couch they had in the little space. “I need a costumer. You’re the best in the business. Not to mention I’ll be with you all the time, so there’s no chance of miscommunications!” Standing from her forced seat, she cradled Lin’s head in her hands. She saw the excitement glimmer in his eyes and softened. “Lin, of course I’ll help you, I am a history major after all. Who else could make it historically accurate while still being functional? Thank you for even considering me, and for the bagels.” She pressed a kiss to the crown of his head. Giving a crooked smile, she pointed a finger in his face. “If you ever scare me like that, I swear I will never cook or bake for you again.” He smiled sheepishly and shrugged in apology. “Sorry, but hey, you’re my costumer now!” She smiled and bumped her hip with his. She dug through her pads of paper and snatched her laptop off the charger. “Alright. Give me your tracks and I’ll get started.”

July 27th, 2013

“Alright, I’m here. Sorry I’m late, I got halfway down the block before I figured out I left my notes on the desk. Who do we have here?” Three men held my attention, understandable since they were the main cast. I recognized Brian D’arcy James from other productions, there was another man with big hair and bright eyes, and finally my eyes fell on Christopher. I smiled at him and gave him a quick hug. “Oh my God! What are you doing here? I haven’t seen you in so long! How’ve you been.” He chuckled and pulled me in again. “I’m good. I was missing our Vanessa for a while, but you’re working with us now so I won’t have to miss you anymore! Lin told me about the project and I couldn’t turn it down.” He turned me to the stranger at the clearing of a throat. “Oh, this is Daveed. He’s playing Thomas Jefferson and Lafayette. He raps.” I looked at him up and down, remembering the songs Lin had written for him. I cocked my head, and he looked at me with nervous eyes. “This will work. This is going to work great actually.” I saw his shoulders relax and sag with relief as I walked back to the table set up for the behind the scenes people. I gripped my pen in my hand, ready to jot down every little thought that passed through my mind for the time of the workshop.

After hours and hours of rehearsals and run throughs, I’d filled up a notebook and a half for costumes for the characters. This time around Lin wanted his cast flexible. Those whose characters were not in the second act were recast as another role, so I had to figure out how to do quick changes not only for the nine main cast members, but for the entire ensemble. As Lin and I packed up our things to head home, the man with the beautiful eyes stopped me. “Hey, Vanessa, right?” I heard Lin and Christopher snicker somewhere behind me and I shot them a look. “Actually, it’s Y/N.” His eyes widened in embarrassment and his hand lifted to rub the back of his neck. “Sorry, I just thought it was Vanessa since that’s what Christopher called you.” I shook my head and smiled. “Oh, no. That’s just a little joke between us. I was the demo Vanessa when Lin was trying to sell In the Heights. I’m the reason why Vanessa never speaks Spanish. I took French all through high school and college.” He nodded and rocked back and forth on his heels. “I’ve got some questions about costumes and everything you do. Could I have your number to keep in contact?” I nodded and pulled out my phone, switching it with his and I plugged in my contact information. “Alright. I’m headed home, but I’ll make a schedule for measuring and design sessions. I’ll see you tomorrow?” He nodded enthusiastically, making his hair bob with his movements. I waved goodnight and followed Lin out of the building.

“So, Daveed.” I looked up from my buzzing phone to Lin out of the corner of my eye, giving him an eyebrow. “What about Daveed?” He shrugged and wore a small smile. “You texting him?” I put my phone down to look at him headlong. “And if I am?” Once again he shrugged and got up to grab a snack. “Nothing, just remember your worth.” I shake my head good naturally. “Alright Dad. Now, I’ve got to sketch out what my brain was screaming during the workshop. And how to create every outfit as a quick change. Thanks loser.”

July 15th, 2015

“Alright everyone! We’ve practiced these changes for weeks! Remember your number, remember your cue. You all have been a wonder to work with and to create for. I love you all and break a leg!” Everyone is dressed in white for the opening number, and I am proud of my work. “Oh, and Daveed;” Daveed looks up at me, a strange look in his eyes. “Yes, Y/N?” I looked him in the eyes, stoic and serious. “If you rip your pants during Guns and Ships again, you will repay me by organizing the scrap bin.” He swallowed visibly and nodded his head. I smiled once again and put my hand out for a group theatre circle. “Break a leg!” Everyone scurried to their cue spot in their costumes and Lin hugged me from behind. “Thank you for doing this for me. I never would be able to have costumes this good if it weren’t for you.” I turned in his arms and smiled. “I’m glad I did too Lin. Now go, they’re calling your name.” I listened from my side of the stage, getting everything in order for the main cast. I pulled Daveeds coat off quickly and held out his blue one for him to slide on. “Hey, Y/N, maybe after the show we can-“ “Diggs! Get to your cue!” I smiled and nudged him. “Go. Talk to me after the show.” He gave a quick kiss to my cheek and went to do his thing on stage. As I pinned the rose to Renée’s dress, her sweet voice teased at me. “You do know that he loves you too, right?” I know what she’s talking about, but I pretend to play dumb. “Who loves me? Nevermind, neither of us have the time for this. Go kick ass out there.” She scrunched her eyebrows at me and pointed her finger to say “This isn’t over.”

The first act went by in a flash, costume changes and character changes took up all of my time. After I had hung up every dress, every coat, every pair of trousers and corset, Daveed had changed and packed up all of his things. I had just finished mending the lace cuff on his magenta sleeve when he had walked in. He wore a sleeveless Oakland jersey with a matching hat pressed onto his freed hair. “Oh! Daveed! Perfect timing! I was just finishing up here. What was it that you were wanting to tell me?” At my question, it was like a switch had been flipped in him. He went from the cool and collected suave man who the fans fantasized over to a shy and awkward man who had run out of words. Self-doubt and insecurity filled my inner dialogue as I watched him shut down and clam up. I was filled with the fear and anxiety that he had come to ask me to stop staring, to stop caring. I let the silence carry on for a while longer until Anthony called for us to leave. “I, I should probably go, then. You were amazing tonight, not a single trip or stutter. I am so proud of you.” I swallowed down the tears making their way up my throat and gave him a watery smile. I grabbed my bag, and started to make a hurried exit until my wrist was caught by a large and calloused hand. “Wait, no. Y/N, I wanted to know if you wanted to grab something to eat, go do something when we don’t have a show. You know, like maybe a date? Unless you don’t want to, then it’ll just be us as friends. I’d actually really appreciate it if you just forgot this whole ordeal and-” I smiled and blushed at his sweet ramblings. I stepped up onto my workbench and gripped his face in my hands. Taking a deep breath I leaned in and connected our lips, praying to every spiritual being in the heavens that they would allow him to kiss me back. I guess praying did me good because after getting over the shock of being interrupted, he kissed me back with the same fervour. Once more, we are called to leave the theater and we break apart, panting lightly with swollen lips and pink cheeks. He helped me down from my step and I lifted myself onto my toes to give a peck to his cheek. “Alright big guy, let’s go home. Lin’s either knowing of what we were doing, or he’s pacing in our living room, police on speed dial. And I would love to go on a date with you.”

#daveed diggs #daveed x reader #daveed diggs x reader #hamilton #hamilton x reader #lin manuel x reader #lin manuel miranda #lin manuel miranda x reader #hamilcast #hamilcast x reader #theatre #theatre x reader

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keepingupwithlinmanuel · 4 years

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Lin-Manuel Miranda: I’ve been writing in lockdown

In his head, Lin-Manuel Miranda has an alternative timeline of what he would be doing right now. The 40-year-old would have recently finished filming his directorial debut, for one, the Netflix adaption of the Broadway musical Tick, Tick... Boom!, which survived just ten days of shooting before everything shut down. Right now, he says, he should be in the edit.

Instead, he’s on a Zoom call, talking to GQ from his home about a filmed version of Hamilton, which wasn’t due out for another year, and he’s apologising for the fact that it doesn’t say “Lin-Manuel Miranda” on his screen, but “Lin-Sebastian’s dad”, as it “defaults to the time I did a parent-teacher conference”.

...

So, Hamilton is coming to Disney+, which is incredibly exciting – and a year earlier than planned. Talk me through how that decision was made.

We realised pretty early, even when the show was off Broadway, this is going to be a tough ticket. And we sort of realised there’s value in capturing what it feels like in the theatre with this company. And the three days we shot this film was the week before the principals started to leave. We all left the following Friday. So it’s the best rehearsed cast maybe in the history of movies – we were performing and what we’d spent a year doing. When lockdown happened we had around 75 per cent of it – enough of an original, a rough cut, to be able to sell it to Disney and partner with Disney. We didn’t have a final edit. We didn't have a sound mix, which in a musical is pretty important. But once it became clear there was not going to be any theatre for the foreseeable future, we all kind of pivoted and said, “Oh, this is actually an opportunity to remind people of the power of theatre when there is none.” And so we got to editing and then it just became like racing. We turned in the final cut, like, two weeks ago.

How do you feel generally about the future for Broadway? Are you optimistic that it’s going to bounce back?

I’m optimistic. I’m not optimistic about any kind of timeline. Like I don’t know what theatre looks like on the other side of this, particularly in the absence of a vaccine. One of the books I've been reading during this lockdown is Will In The World, the biography of Shakespeare by Stephen Greenblatt. And I read it because I wanted to know what did Shakespeare do when the plague shut down the houses? Because there was that sort of meme going around, you know, “He wrote King Lear, what the fuck are you doing?” It’s not entirely accurate. He did write some sonnets. Those are pretty good. But it's, you know, that uncertainty. When we make our calling where people gather, it’s a real one. And what I'm encouraged by is honestly the fact that given that there are no shows right now, it’s actually a time to tackle some of the more systemic issues with our theatre we need to talk about. How to get an audience for Hamilton that is as diverse as the cast on stage. We're in talks, just for ourselves in this moment – at a time where we're talking about systemic racism in the United States – on how to make backstage look more like on-stage; how to address some of the inequities when it comes to black folks and people of colour in the theatre industry. It’s still so predominantly white backstage and at the top, so I think we're seeing people getting their houses in order because there's time to do it and no one has the excuse that we're very busy programming our season. So I can only speak for the Hamilton company, but we are hoping that when we come back, we come back into a world where we're addressing some of these issues and we're having the tough conversations.

...

Yourself and Hamilton are natural kind of bedfellows with the Black Lives Matter movement. But you did take a bit of criticism for not maybe speaking out early enough? Was that just an oversight?

Yeah, absolutely. And I called it a moral failure. And I stand by that, you know. I had been tweeting about Black Lives Matter since 2015. I remember us rehearsing “My Shot” for the first time when we heard the there was an acquittal for the police officers who murdered Eric Garner and how heavy that felt in the room and how we cried in the room. But for some reason, the moral blind spot is not bringing Hamilton and its social channels as a brand in alliance with that earlier. And so, you know, I think we're making up for lost time in that regard. And you're right, there are natural bedfellows. We are a company made up of black and brown actors who reckon with the origins of our country every night on stage.

...

Something that always stays in my head is when you hosted SNL just before the 2016 presidential election and you sang at a picture of Trump in the corridor “Never gonna be president”, which was so funny at the time but is hard to watch now. How do you look back on that?

The night before we'd heard the Access Hollywood tapes. I don't think we've ever heard such vulgarity from a presidential candidate full stop. The fact that that was not career ending, I don't know what that says. But whatever it says ain't good. But, you know, it is unprecedented that a moment like that happened. And still millions of people said, “This is our guy.”

How are you feeling about the upcoming election?

I am feeling… I don't know. I'm feeling uncertain, as everyone else is. I think people are certainly energised. I think there is a lot of… I think a lot of what you're seeing in the streets and in the world is the country really loudly saying, “This guy does not speak for us” and “The integrity of our voting system is more important than ever.” And that's a big concern of mine. But I have no doubts that the majority of this country does not believe that this president speaks for them. It's just a matter of that being reflected in the voting booth or in the mail and voting situation that we will probably find ourselves in. We've seen there's no bottom. There's no bottom to the guy's actions. I feel positive that more people are speaking out. I feel positive seeing that the overwhelming majority of these protests have been powerful and peaceful and, like, with masks and people handing out sanitisers… I've seen the peaceful protests myself in my own neighbourhood. And none of that changes unless we actually dismantle the systems that set them up. You know, it has to be followed – the lip service has to be followed up by meaningful change. I'm encouraged when I see that Minneapolis is looking to reallocate those police funds to the community. I'm encouraged when I see action. It’s very easy to tweet, but much harder to dismantle these inequities.

...

I guess everyone would want to know if you’re working on another stage show. Any ideas in the locker for that?

Yeah, but I can't tell you. I mean, it's weird, because I kind of messed it up because Hamilton had such a public birth, right? Like, I didn't know the Obamas would call and say, “Do you have anything about America and can you perform it at this podium?” But I did. And so that that was the most public writing I've ever done, because I kind of showed everyone the ultrasound in 2009 and then I didn't finish it until 2015. So I can't write that way again, because the scrutiny on me is so much greater now. And, you know, the best idea to kill an impulse is to talk about it. But, yes, I'm writing some new things that I think would work nicely in the theatre and I have some time to do it.

OK, so without asking you to give the game away, can I ask how far you are through the writing process for it?

I'm writing the first three or four songs, which I'll rewrite once I find out what it's really about. You know, because you start thinking you know what it's about and then if you get lucky in a place, it starts to tell you what it's about. And you go, “Oh, shit, I thought I was writing it for this reason, but I'm really writing it for this reason.” So I'm writing the initial impulse songs right now and it'll tell me how much I did.

#lin manuel miranda #GQ #representation #hamilton #politics and advocacy #hamilfilm #unnamed new theatrical project #unnamed disney project #interviews

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mvsicinthedvrk · 3 years

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mmm personality test sorting time !!

i’ve done one character a day for a while & now they’re all done, so: fun sorts for my characters alphabetically under the cut.

i took the 16 personalities test for the mbti, the eclectic energies test for the enneagram, for hogwarts house I was going to originally just choose based on instinct but i did end up using this knockoff pottermore test, and then I did the open psychometrics “which character are you statistically most like” quiz for the last one.

henry strauss--

mbti: INFP (the mediator) -- “Mediators may feel directionless or stuck unless they connect with a sense of purpose for their lives. For many Mediators, this purpose has something to do with helping and uplifting others. Empathetic by nature, these personalities may feel other people’s suffering as if it were their own“ lmfao oh henry

enneagram: oh he’s a type 4 for sure. I agree with that 200%. -- “Fours are emotionally complex and highly sensitive. They long to be understood and appreciated for their authentic selves, but easily feel misunderstood and unappreciated.”

hogwarts house: 42% hufflepuff (then in order: ravenclaw, gryffindor, slytherin)

which other characters are you most like:

#1: charlie from perks of being a wallflower (OUCH!!)

#2: wes gibbons from htgawm

#3: jonathan byers from stranger things

holland vosijk--

mbti: ISTJ (the logistician)-- “Logisticians have sharp, fact-based minds, and prefer autonomy and self-sufficiency to reliance on someone or something. Dependency on others is often seen by Logisticians as a weakness, and their passion for duty, dependability and impeccable personal integrity forbid falling into such a trap.” this is so funny to me. it’s very true.

enneagram: type 8-- “People of this personality type are essentially unwilling to be controlled, either by others or by their circumstances; they fully intend to be masters of their fate... Eights have a hard time lowering their defenses in intimate relationships. Intimacy involves emotional vulnerability and such vulnerability is one of the Eight's deepest fears” legit

hogwarts house: 40% slytherin (then in order: ravenclaw, gryffindor, hufflepuff)-- this actually surprises me because I would have guessed ravenclaw instead.

what other characters are you most like:

#1: carolyn martens from killing eve (i didn’t know who this was but apparently she’s “principled yet ruthless” and that tracks)

#2: severus snape from harry potter

#3: mr. darcy from pride and prejudice (lmfao)

kaz brekker--

mbti: ESTJ (the executive)-- I don’t know that this is accurate because the whole first paragraph of the description is about how executives understand right/wrong and embrace honesty and tradition BUT later in the description some of it aligns: “Executives don’t work alone, and they expect their reliability and work ethic to be reciprocated – people with this personality type meet their promises, and if partners or subordinates jeopardize them through incompetence or laziness, or worse still, dishonesty, they do not hesitate to show their wrath. This can earn them a reputation for inflexibility.”

enneagram: type 3-- “They are frequently hard working, competitive and are highly focused in the pursuit of their goals... They are often self-made and usually find some area in which they can excel... They know how to present themselves, are self-confident, practical, and driven... They are good networkers who know how to rise through the ranks.” THAT’S accurate.

hogwarts house: almost the same as holland, which is unsurprising-- 37% slytherin, then 30% ravenclaw with gryffindor and hufflepuff trailing far behind.

what other characters are you most like:

#1: amy dunne from gone girl (lmfaoooooo)

#2: walter white from breaking bad

#3: vicious from cowboy bepop

martin blackwood--

mbti: INFJ (the advocate)-- “Advocates generally strive to do what’s right – and they want to help create a world where others do the right thing as well... Advocates may be reserved, but they communicate in a way that is warm and sensitive... Advocates might find themselves feeling especially stressed in the face of conflict and criticism. These personalities tend to act with the best of intentions, and it can frustrate them when others don’t appreciate this.” awww that’s sweet I do like that for him.

enneagram: type 2, with 6 being a close second. I definitely called that. “People of this personality type essentially feel that they are worthy insofar as they are helpful to others... Twos are warm, emotional people who care a great deal about their personal relationships, devote an enormous amount of energy to them, and who expect to be appreciated for their efforts.”

hogwarts house: 39% hufflepuff, and then the others are all fundamentally tied around 20-21% each. I’d agree with that.

what other characters are you most like:

#1: landry clarke from friday night lights (initially i was like-- a football player? what? but then his wiki description is: “generally polite, awkward, and enjoys playing guitar” so lol ok)

#2: cameron james from 10 things i hate about you

#3: peeta mellark from the hunger games

melanie king--

mbti: ESTP (the entrepreneur)-- “Entrepreneurs keep their conversation energetic, with a good dose of intelligence, but they like to talk about what is – or better yet, to just go out and do it. Entrepreneurs leap before they look, fixing their mistakes as they go, rather than sitting idle, preparing contingencies and escape clauses.”

enneagram: like holland, she’s for sure a type 8: “Eights are strong willed, decisive, practical, tough minded and energetic.” I think the aggressive aspect of type eights is more obvious in her personality than his, though.

hogwarts house: 47% gryffindor! then, in order: slytherin, ravenclaw, hufflepuff.

what other characters are you most like:

#1: erica sinclair from stranger things

#2: max mayfield from stranger things

#3: lois lane from smallville (yessss)

orpheus--

mbti: INFP (the mediator)-- I was actually surprised he got introverted instead of extroverted, but here we are. “Mediators’ creativity and idealism can bloom even after the darkest of seasons. Although they know the world will never be perfect, Mediators still care about making it better however they can. This quiet belief in doing the right thing may explain why these personalities so often inspire compassion, kindness, and beauty wherever they go.”

enneagram: oh, yep, he’s a type 9-- “People of this personality type essentially feel a need for peace and harmony. They tend to avoid conflict at all costs, whether it be internal or interpersonal... Nines tend to adopt an optimistic approach to life; they are, for the most part, trusting people who see the best in others; they frequently have a deep seated faith that things will somehow work out.”

hogwarts house: my sweet son is 43% hufflepuff, then gryffindor, ravenclaw, and essentially no slytherin.

what other characters are you most like:

#1: flounder from the little mermaid (ok that’s sort of rude)

#2: snow white from snow white

#3: dorothy gale from the wizard of oz (that tracks)

patroclus--

mbti: INFJ (the advocate)-- so, same as martin. “Advocates can speak with great passion and conviction, especially when standing up for their ideals. At other times, however, they may choose to be soft-spoken and understated, preferring to keep the peace rather than challenge others.” i love him sm.

enneagram: he’s a type 2, also like martin, the helper type. this half-surprises me because i thought there was maybe a chance he’d be a type 6.

hogwarts house: it’s actually really close between hufflepuff and gryffindor? 31% and 32% respectively. then slytherin, then ravenclaw.

what other characters are you most like:

#1: eliza hamilton from hamilton

#2: glenn rhee from the walking dead

#3: ben hargreeves from the umbrella academy

wei wuxian--

mbti: ENFP (the campaigner)-- “Campaigners, like all their Diplomat cousins, are shaped by their Intuitive (N) quality, allowing them to read between the lines with curiosity and energy... Charming, independent, energetic and compassionate, the 7% of the population that they comprise can certainly be felt in any crowd.”

enneagram: he’s my only type 7. “They tend to be extroverted, multi-talented, creative and open minded... They often have an entrepreneurial spirit and are able to convey their enthusiasm to those with whom they come in contact. When they are able to focus their talents, they are often highly successful. Focusing does not always come easily for Sevens, however.”

hogwarts house: this test says he’s 29% slytherin, 27% gryffindor, 23% hufflepuff, and 21% ravenclaw.

what other characters are you most like:

#1: george weasley from harry potter (oh that’s genuinely really good)

#2: abby sciuto from ncis (that’s actually perfect too from what i know about ncis)

#3: nymphadora tonks from harry potter

yuri plisetsky--

mbti: ISTJ (the logistician), same as holland-- “Logistician personalities are no-nonsense, and when they’ve made a decision, they will relay the facts necessary to achieve their goal, expecting others to grasp the situation immediately and take action... To Logisticians, honesty is far more important than emotional considerations.”

enneagram: he’s type 3-- “People of this personality type need to be validated in order to feel worthy; they pursue success and want to be admired... When unhealthy, their narcissism takes an ugly turn and they can become cold blooded and ruthless in the pursuit of their goals.” lol

hogwarts house: 31% slytherin and 27% ravenclaw, then gryffindor and hufflepuff in last.

what other characters are you most like:

#1: cordelia chase from buffy the vampire slayer (once again, hilarious)

#2: amy march from little women

#3: tahani al-jamil from the good place

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lopez-richter-fangirl · 5 years

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So. Homecoming. Holy fuck. It’s taken me this long to even start to get my thoughts together. Very spoilery post under the cut. Like, as much as I can possibly remember of the show spoilery. Also rambly. And long. Ridiculously long. So you’ve been warned.

Also disclaimer, this is just homecoming to the best of my recollection and it might not be 100% accurate. So first of all the setlist (this was everything they sang but the order of songs in act 2 is a bit hazy, I think it’s about half right. Also I don’t think hardly anyone at the show could tell you exactly because it was just so overwhelming). They did medleys for all the non-Potter shows in act 1 in reverse chronological order, act 2 they did full songs from all the Potter musicals.

Act 1 TGWDLM, Join Us And Die, Show Stoppin Number We Got Work To Do, Make The Most Of It Ani, With My Own Eyes, Back On Top Gone To Oregon, Naked In A Lake, Speedrun No One Remembers Achmed, A Thousand And One Nights, Happy Ending Holy Musical B@man, Rogues Are We, Superfriends Status Quo, Kick It Up A Notch, I Wanna Be Me And My Dick, Listen To Your Heart, Ready To Go Act 2 Going Back To Hogwarts Harry Freaking Potter To Have A Home Different As Can Be (and reprise) Coolest Girl Cho’s Song Hey Dragon Granger Danger Guys Like Potter Wizard Of The Year To Dance Again Sidekick Voldemort Is Going Down Everything Ends Not Alone Days Of Summer Not Alone (reprise)

Thursday 25th The more I think about it the more I realise I really had no idea what I was expecting from the show. We’d been planning before they even announced what it was to fly out for it, but we had very few details. I didn’t even know they had an orchestra until like two hours before. I’d barely been able to watch any of their rehearsal stories. But I don’t think I’d ever been more excited for anything in my life. I was super excited for AVPW but also, it was my first time seeing any of them, the whole thing felt like a dream, and I had no idea how much it was gonna mean to me so it didn’t even hit me properly until the last night. Whereas I already knew exactly how special this would be, it was entirely once in a lifetime and I was nearly shaking.

Outside the theatre I’ve said it before but genuinely my favourite place in the world to be is surrounded by Starkid fans. Seeing people in cosplay, in merch, talking about the same shows and people I love, I just get such a sense of ‘this is home’. There was the classic waiting-in-line going back to hogwarts singalong. And some la dee da da day thrown in for good measure. Liam was walking along the line filming and doing interviews for the bts. Tessa got out of a car right next to us, we saw Jade and Traci and their friend Bella. They’re all gorgeous it’s insane and unfair.

Inside the theatre Spent over $100 on merch but honestly could have spent so much more, really I showed a lot of self restraint. They didn’t have the programmes though which I’m still heartbroken over. Saw Denise Richter which I was maybe too excited about. Didn’t speak to her or anything but even just to see her she exudes kindness she’s the best. Then we were hanging out in the lobby and Tessa was talking to everyone and hugging them and taking selfies and jumping in people’s group pics and I love her. Like she made my night even without me talking to her because she was SO sweet to everyone she spoke to and I was stood there falling in love with her by the second. Also, let’s talk about how cool the venue was? It looked unbelievable and they had a bunch of posters up with AVPM quotes. And the stage? Y’all have seen by now but they made it look like an actual homecoming dance and it was amazing. Considering how far back our seats were it was actually a very good view, it helped that I had an aisle seat so had a clear view of the entire stage. I’ve posted the pre-show playlist here, it was perfect, especially the JATP like, hell yeah to celebrating all their various projects. At this point I literally thought I was gonna die of excitement. AJ and Clark came on stage and as much as I was having great fun freaking out with the groupchat about how soon the show was I couldn’t wait to put my phone away cause that meant the show was starting. And then the lights went down.

Darren Very pleased to say it was not the Darren show, even though he did give the opening and closing speech. And as much as I have opinions about him, when he walked out for the first time it was a pretty special moment because it’s like, this is it this is really happening. The amount of energy in that room when he came on stage my god. You would not have believed there were only 1600 people there. The whole show people could barely get a sentence out without cheering, which in hindsight was probably annoying but it just shows how incredibly loved they are, and we were as grateful to them as they were to us. I loved the atmosphere in both shows, it was completely different both times and I’ll obviously get to the Friday night show, but there was something special about being in a room of majority backers, all of us seeing these show for the very first time, it was totally new. Again, literally no idea what to expect and it was the most exhilarating feeling. Darren did a little ‘look for your exits pretend we’re at Disney’ which was cute after being at Disney for two days beforehand. Classic starkid fashion, he told us they had no idea how long the show would run for. He made a G.L.E.E. joke so it’s nice to know he’s still on our side at the end of the day. I don’t know if it was him that talked about Starkid performing with a 13 piece orchestra for the first time, but I’m gonna bring it up here anyway. I’m so grateful they were overfunded and that they were able to have the orchestra, because it’s probably something they really wanted and it’s also something they 100% deserve. I’d sell my soul to hear every starkid song with that orchestra, it was magnificent. I really hope we do get an album because it all sounded SO GOOD. Unsurprisingly don’t remember much else of what Darren said because I was just so excited for the show to start.

TGWDLM medley So as soon as the opening started playing even as Darren was still introducing people went insane, literally within two seconds I knew undoubtedly that this was gonna be the best two hours of my life (also the fastest. Often watching theatre shows I lose attention a little bit but there wasn’t a single second of this show that I wasn’t 100% in the moment they’re completely captivating, and it went by way too fast). Oh wow this is where we got to see Joey and Lauren for the first time. Fuck. I cannot describe to you how good they looked. Pictures do not do it justice. Thank god the mustache was gone. Thank god Lauren didn’t wear the boots. She was wearing my favourite hairstyle. Joey’s hair looked great. Their outfits were incredible. They literally could not have been more perfect looks for me and I’m so grateful. I could have cried happy tears at seeing them. This in itself could go on for five pages so I’ll leave it there. They all did the whole iconic zombie pose entrance. Corey sang Joey’s astronomical line which was kinda a shame cause I love the way he sings that line however I’m glad they did it like that cause Joey got to sing a lot in the show (still not enough for my liking but then again my liking is Joey and Lauren singing the whole show so I’m good). Wish they did Lauren’s ‘pines after a cute lil barista’ bit. Also kinda wish they did inevitable so Jon could sing because I love him and he deserves better @ starkid when are you going to hire me. However they made up for that when Jaime went ‘it is time’ and the room was absolutely electric because everyone knew exactly what was coming. That note had me shook from the moment I heard it on the digital ticket and I feel honoured to have heard it in person. Jeff was still her hype man. Jaime’s voice is honestly out of this world, she’s the person I’d most heard sing live but it was still mind blowing. She’s incredible I love her so much. Then Robert came on stage so like, room exploded again. Joey and Lauren should have been on stage doing their bit for show stopping number but again, what do I know? This song was 100% pandering but as much as it’s overhyped it is a good song and Robert fucking killed it, he actually impresses me so much. His voice? He did the hip wiggles, maybe even more than were in the show, and people went absolutely wild for it. He did the working boys bit and of course everyone lost their minds. And I loved it, I loved that atmosphere of everyone being entirely obsessed with every tiny thing these people do because that’s what connects us all. Jon did get to be a working boy (as did Mariah) and sounded great. They actually sang so much of this song holy shit definitely pandering. But they really were giving Hamilton some competition.

Firebringer medley Lauren Walker introduced this one, do I remember what she said? No, I was too busy wondering if they were going to sing Climate Change. They didn’t. You sang three songs from every other show but two from firebringer and one of them wasn’t climate change? Okay sure. This sounds like I’m complaining I’m not this section was still gorgeous and I loved every second of it. Hearing music from firebringer was amazing because it has some of my favourite music from all the starkid shows, and also because apart from TGWDLM which was so recent it’s the only show we hadn’t heard anything from since. They sang we got work to do which again, pandering and not even to what most people actually wanted if we’re being honest. But I’m happy about it because hearing Lauren sing that first line was a spiritual experience. Her voice? No words. So good. Can’t believe I got to hear it live? Properly?!? Also Joey got to be in this bless his heart and I couldn’t stop watching him doing the choreography. Lauren’s little expressions throughout the whole thing are adorable god I love her. Meredith sounded so good. Rachael got so much of a cheer when she sang her bit. Joey comforted Joe after the shadow bit. Then they sang from the proposal bit of the finale. Brian was pretending to be jealous when Meredith was singing to Lauren which made my life, p.s. Joey step up your game. The first time hearing Lauren sing ‘this is the dawn’ literally took my breath away. And with that orchestra!? (Will I ever shut up about the orchestra? The answer is no). The CHEERS for ‘we are womankind’. Hell yeah. And then Lauren did the arm thing like way to literally flex on us Lo. Not okay. They did the little Molag dialogue bit and Denise did the being-blessed-with-knowledge face. Watching Denise off to the side was honestly one of the highlights of the whole show.

TTO medley

Now I’m questioning my memory but I think Jaime went offstage after Firebringer when she wasn’t supposed to because I’m sure I remember her not being on stage for this at first. Like everyone else was there and there was a moment where I was like ‘I feel like someone’s missing...’ and then Jaime walked on late. She did mention Julia having to remind her of her cues. Anyway. Gone to oregon was first and I was reminded what an actually good performer Jeff is. He’s great in that show. Corey got the cheers he deserved at his ‘wisconsin’ bit. Lauren singing Naked in a lake was beautiful. Even if not enough people sang with her when she asked for help (spoiler, we stepped up Friday). She was definitely trying to get us to sing the high bits cause her voice was tired and she didn’t want to but that’s fine. This was one of the songs from that show I really wanted them to sing and I’m glad they did, it’s so much fun. Also Lauren does kinda steal the show but watching everyone else in this song is great. Shoutout to the sax guy, I’m glad we as a fandom always appreciate the band/orchestra. I still can’t believe everyone just lets Lauren sing a whole song about skinny dipping but I’m here for it. Then they did speedrun which was. An experience. Still think Joey should have sung wagon on fire but would I have passed out most likely yes so maybe it was better off this way. I’m glad Rachael got a moment. The ‘faster’ bit was fucking insane I don’t know how they had the breath for it. Everyone clapped pace and I’m pretty sure we clapped faster than the song ever goes so, sorry guys that you had to go through that? I think I have a newfound appreciation for this song. It was either in this or possibly in Naked in a lake that Joey did something stupid and Lo looked at him and shook her head. There were a lot of little looks throughout the show and trying to catch each other’s eye across the stage and it was very cute and probably won’t make the cut even though it should it’s the best part of the show.

Ani medley Moses introduced it and he was wearing like the jacket that’s one of his costumes and he wore in the final SK10 livestream idk you guys I’ve seen that show twice. The Ani band is fucking great, they had Mark, Nick Gage (?? idk there was definitely a fourth person I was mostly watching Meredith let’s be real here), Clark and Meredith all sing. Meredith had the biggest smile on her face at all times it was a joy. Ani is such a fun song so many starkid songs are so fun. Also they added a key change (was it even a key change? I’ve never studied music whatever they did it sounded good.) Actually the whole arrangement of this medley I loved, I hope it makes the people who don’t appreciate the music in this show appreciate it. With my own eyes is my favourite song in that show and I’m very happy they did it. They should have had Denise do her choreo when they did Back on top tbh. I love Meredith in this song though.

Twisted medley Joe came out to introduce it but kept hyping everyone up about Ani first. I really miss Joe he has so much onstage energy. I knew they were doing No one remembers achmed but I was still so excited about it. It’s such a good song. And the whole ‘you ooze sex’ bit in the flesh? That’s all. Obviously the best part was everyone yelling tigerfucker. Experiencing that in person is unbeatable. Then they had Britney and Carlos sing their version of 1001 nights and it was beautiful, I very rarely listen to that version of the song but I should, Britney is unbelievable and I love her so much. I can’t believe she’d just flown in and had such a rough time right before the show, you wouldn’t have known it. Dylan walked out and I kinda thought they were gonna have him and Meredith do a quartet (starkid when are you gonna hire me??) but then he sang ‘and with my wife beside me’ and I was like :’) this is good. That part of the song always gets me and Dylan’s voice is a goddamn gift. I love the overlapping parts at the end of Happy ending too so it’s always a good choice. But why they didn’t sing dream a little harder when Alex was right there I do not know.

HMB medley Pretty sure they had Julia introduce it? Guys it’s been a week gimme a break. Either way she definitely introduced something at some point and I’m glad everyone cheered so much for her because she was the glue of Starkid for a while. Nick Gage sang HMB and they had a reverb (again, is that the right term? not a clue) and he looked so pleased with himself every time we laughed. Then they sang rogues are we (rogues medley would have been better but in fairness that would have ruined the whole thing they had going). I do love Lauren singing we are the harlots and the hussies. A lot. But Denise does it so well. And Jaime’s ‘we’re rising up from the underground’?? I don’t think I have a single thing to say about any of the men in this song and I’m not sorry. Superfriends sounded very cool. It doesn’t matter how many times I see it, I always love the matching tattoos bit, and seeing Meredith’s story afterwards about how she was directing hers at Jade made it even better. I don’t even remember who sang Robin’s lines because I was too busy watching Lauren do the dance, she’s adorable. It was funny watching like five of them doing it cause they were the only ones who had learned it before and the rest not knowing it. Also, I don’t know which makes me happier, when they point into the audience for ‘I wanna be your friend forever’, or when they point at each other. Both are good.

Starship medley Denise introduced the show and um hi I love Denise she’s so cute. She said the thing about her mom calling Starship a show for dreamers and I still think that’s the most adorable thing. I will say for the rest of time that having Alex and Mariah sing Status quo was a weird choice. Also made me pissed that basically no one cheered for Alex but of course everyone went fucking crazy for Mariah. Not even that Mariah didn’t deserve it, but she didn’t deserve it more than Alex. Just saying. It did sound very good with the orchestra and they both have good voices, but I still think we deserved it sounding good with JOEY and the orchestra. I would have died to hear Joey sing that song. Moving on though. Kick it up a notch is always better in rogues medley but I do adore the Jim Brian and Jaime trio anyway. And it’s SUCH a good song. Then they sang I wanna be which I was psyched about I love that song (it was straight from Brant’s verse though like hello what happened to Joey rights). Hearing the older songs makes me wish so much they’d remount them because they all sound so good now it would be amazing. Joey’s voice is legitimately a blessing from the gods.

MAMD medley Brian introduced the show and walked away from the mic before he said dick, which was funny but also reminded me of how they said this would be the most PG show starkid had done which is laughable. Joey did a whole bit in the beginning that reminded me a lot of his jekyll and hyde performance in shitty broadway. I love that man. Again, we deserve a remount of this show if only for Joey’s voice. Then we have maybe the most iconic moment of the thursday show which is when Joe had way too much excitement for his entrance, fucking sprinted on stage, knocked over the mic stand and had to rescue it, spraining his ankle in the process. And recovered BADLY, he was trying to figure out what to say to pull it back and Joey basically had to tell him to just sing already. I feel a little guilty now because it looked pretty bad, but it was really fucking funny. And then the cheer at the head tilt, why do we all love it so much??!? Then Joey sang Listen to your heart with AJ (him and Brian are a better duo fight me). I loved their little added dialogue, with Joey being like ‘do I smell?’ and AJ being like ‘so bad’. I always always love the little dance break Joey is the sweetest boy. I think I remember something like ‘am I doing it?’ ‘not even close Joey’. Then Alle Faye and Ali came out for ready to go and it went from their bit. It was really nice seeing them back together again. It wasn’t like nearly ten years had gone by at all. God it’s weird how nostalgic I was/am for something I wasn’t even there for. The ‘we’re finally ready’ bit sounded so gorgeous with the orchestra, I had it stuck in my head for days. They slowed it down, and we had everyone on stage, and it was just beautiful. The perfect way to end the act, which was over way too soon, and I was already feeling sad about the show nearly being over even though there was so much good to come. Wait how could I forget to mention the ‘my hormones are freaking out’ bit. Fuck all of them for that. Even if I pretty much just watched Lauren with a quick glance at Joey, which is an accurate description of what I did for a lot of the show.

Intermission First quick thing to say, as much as I wish we’d heard some more full songs from the non-Potter shows, I think I like that they kept it separate. The first half was celebrating everything they achieved since where it all started for them, and the second half was pure nostalgia. And even though I wish it wasn’t the case, more people know the potter shows so it was kinda nice that everyone was even more united than they had been for the first half. Secondly, what I should have done during intermission was used the time to recover, because the show was a whole lot of excitement and emotions and I knew it was only going to get worse in the second half. But instead I yelled to the groupchat and met @starkidmelly. More JATP was played, everyone was buzzing, I couldn’t believe I was there. I think it was a long intermission but it did not feel it, Nick came out on stage and it’s like oh shit here we go again.

Nick’s speech He worried me because he said he wanted to take a minute to get sentimental, and I’d already cried a couple of times it was too early in the show to do it again. But then he just talked about the movie Starkid and how it was a bad movie and made us all laugh which I appreciated. What I really did love was how much people cheered for him when he came out, and also for Matt in the audience when Nick shouted him out. Especially on that first night the happiness on Nick’s face at everyone cheering made me want to cry it was so special and he deserves every bit of it and you could tell it still comes as a surprise even now. Also I’ll tag it on now because I don’t remember exactly at what point it was, but at some point in the second act Corey was telling people to stop filming, which kinda made me mad cause they’d asked people not to film and he looked so mad, but was also kinda funny because like, it’s one thing being stopped from filming by an usher but it’s a whole other thing being stopped by Corey Lubowich himself. I probably would have volunteered to leave the theatre if I disappointed Corey like that tbh. But anyway back to Nick, he introduced GBTH with the original cast of AVPM and everyone fucking lost it.

GBTH So you already know what you’re about to be blessed with and then you hear that opening note and people are impossibly screaming even louder and Darren comes onstage and crouches down and it’s like nothing has really changed at all. I’ve been in a room of people singing this song before and it was magical, but this was even more people and even more special. This is where it all started, and there we were ten years later. And it was so surreal actually hearing them sing this in person. Darren put the glasses on and people went insane. The amount of anticipation I felt for Joey’s entrance was ridiculous, and he got the cheers he deserved (almost. he always deserves more). And no matter how many times we see it or how long it’s been it always makes me feel a lot of feelings seeing Darren and Joey on stage singing this together. Joey messed up the floo powder a bit and it was cute. Still iconic. It was deafening when Bonnie came out, which I guess was to be expected we haven’t seen her in nine years. I will say that she did look genuinely happy to be there, and they looked genuinely happy to have her there. Plus the line ‘why do you have to be such a buzzkill’ was so much more funny with the irony of her pretty much bringing the house down. The nostalgia factor ramped up even more here and it was pretty awesome to have that original trio back on stage after so long. Again, so much but simultaneously so little had changed in ten years and trying to articulate those feelings would require a hundred page essay. I didn’t expect them to change the original but I still think they should have kept Lauren’s altered ‘that would be cool’ line. It’s better. But I digress. Jaime got to do her bit and it was a masterpiece. But rest in peace to the whole Cho Chang and Cedric bit, you were deeply missed. Lauren’s entrance, do I even need to say more? Fucking iconic as ever. One of the best moments in all of history. I’m glad they kept in most of the dialogue-y bits although I do not remember what her accent was like. People delivered on ‘whatever I say’ and I love how that’s become our thing. The train bit always makes me emotional, even more so this time with so many people old and new onstage. I always think of Lauren saying she hates the train move but she should have told her face that. Dylan did his entrance from the back of the theatre aka right by us and it was magnificent, he held the note all the way down to the front. They added in the lines about sorting here so Tyler got to do ‘hufflepuffs are particularly good finders’ which was a good choice they did good on that one, Dylan’s ‘what the hell is a hufflepuff’ was drowned out by people still cheering for Tyler, it was a pretty great moment. I may have cried a bit at ‘it’s all that I love and it’s all that I need’. Just a bit. I loved so much that they got everyone to be a part of this song.

Harry Freaking Potter Have I lost all my memories of this song? Maybe. I remember it being amazing. Predictably I watched Lauren a lot, it’s very hard not to she’s so cute when she’s dancing. It’s funny to me how they hold out the mics for the last ‘harry freaking potter’ but most people are already cheering so they get nothing. They should have learned by now.

To Have A Home Was possibly next? I know I got teary again pretty early on in the act (saved the full crying at this song for Friday though stay tuned). I know I’m very far from being the only person who felt the most at home I’ve ever felt. How can you not, surrounded by so much support and mutual love for these incredible people who’ve done so much for us. Starkid is a huge family and it’s tangible in moments like that. And ‘to know this is real’ hits hard. Especially because you can really feel it from Darren, as famous as he is now being on stage with his friends is truly home.

Different As Can Be There’s just something about this song that brings so much energy and Joe and Brian are an iconic duo. And they brought the Quirrelmort vibes strong. Loved everyone shouting ‘prevails’. I’m super glad they did the reprise too. The reaction when they go back to back is incredible. Also, Joe’s ‘Quirrell’ was impeccable.

Coolest Girl I will say to Bonnie’s credit that she did a very good job opening this song, considering how many people were there and how much pressure there must have been seeing as she’s suddenly making a reappearance after so many years. And she did get a lot of love for it. But Meredith coming out to duet with her actually made me cry, she looked so happy and they did a cute little ‘hi’ and I really truly consider this Meredith’s song, even if she didn’t originally sing it, so I’m glad she got to do it. It was a special moment having them sing it together with no resentment or jealousy. And then Meredith confirmed that Bonnie was pregnant again at the end of the song.

Cho Chang Of course Darren sang this. Of course. What would a starkid show be without Darren playing his dumb songs on guitar. But nothing beats a room full of people shout-singing ‘that’s in canada’ (side note, why did this stick so much? every time I saw it on the map when I flew to Canada it’s all I could think of). But also, idk why Darren introduced this song by saying he wanted to test if we knew the words like buddy pretty sure we know the words to your songs better than you do but sure.

Hey Dragon More of Darren playing dumb songs on guitar but this is also a pretty fun song so we’re letting it slide. Also he did say that he didn’t want to do this song and said they should cut it to make time for better songs but that everyone else made him do it, which does not surprise me. He obviously had to call out his own songwriting abilities from ten years ago, it makes me laugh every time he does it but this time he really came for himself with how bad the rhyming was and how the lyrics are dumb. I love that he can’t get through the song without laughing because it is pretty stupid but we love it anyway. They trusted us on the ‘la la la’s and I think we came through.

Granger Danger Okay. OKAY. So after all that Darren was like ‘let’s take it to a school dance’ which did not register for me at all because that song has gone way beyond that and now it’s just Joey and Lauren’s song. But then Darren’s playing it (which I found ??? sweet?? for some reason? idk it was good) and Joey and Lauren are on stage and I’m like here we fucking go. This is what I’m here for. Cannot begin to describe how happy I was to hear this song. I literally had said I refused to die before I heard them sing this live and now it will forever be one of the highlights of my life. The amount of power on that stage. Also the amount of attractiveness. They honestly are a power couple. The most iconic duo singing one of the most iconic songs. Their stage presence just blows me away. And it always makes me feel things too because they’ve done this song so many times and when they were first performing it they had no idea where they’d end up and now they’re fucking living the dream together and I can’t believe how far they’ve come. This is a hole we don’t need to go down though. It absolutely is a crime that they haven’t had more songs together but it does make this one particularly special because it’s fucking THEIR song and there’s no doubt they love performing together and their chemistry is so good anyway anyway I swear I’ll get back on track. This song with the orchestra??!? Holy shit you guys it sounded so good. They managed to take a song I love with every inch of me and make me love it even more. They came out and did a handshake because they’re fucking dorks. My heart genuinely felt like it was about to pump out of my chest, the adrenaline rush from seeing this live was crazy it’s a fucking experience. Joey was remarkably in character when it got to Lauren’s bit but she could not be in character for the life of her when he was singing my god she just did not give a fuck. Her heart eyes were off the charts I swear to god I couldn’t believe that dumb girl. Also Lauren was practically making love to her mic stand half the song which was honestly unnecessary but I love her. And her looking at her crotch murdered me. And then Joey was looking at her for most of the ending and she didn’t look at him once so she sucks. As always the last note was heavenly. When do we get a two hour concert version of this song??

Guys Like Potter Maybe came next? I love the apocalyptour arrangement of this song but it was nice to throw it back to the original and Tyler’s great. Joe tried? We’ll leave it at that.

Wizard Of The Year I think this followed after purely because of AJ saying something like ‘that’s enough about that Potter boy’?? And then he only went and did the whole fucking mouse monologue. And the entire time I was sat there having an internal conflict between ‘this is one of the funniest things I’ve ever witnessed’ and ‘they could have used this time to do climate change’. Honestly hearing him pull that out was wild. But then he sang the song and some of the girls came out to do the ‘gilderoy’ bit (which was the best part duh).

To Dance Again The beginning of this song is always iconic. Most important thing to say here is how I’m even more impressed now with Joe’s dancing after seeing what his ankle looked like. Also, hearing all the tapping (thudding) from the audience brings me inexplicable joy. Lauren ran on stage before her cue when Darren came off and had to book it back off and I feel a bit bad immortalising it because I’m sure she’s glad they weren’t filming that night. While we’re on the subject, the Thursday show was a little messy but like, there were no HUGE fuck ups apart from maybe Joe’s in MAMD and it was all surprisingly well rehearsed considering they’d had barely two days of rehearsal and they’re all so so impressive. Still think they should have had a 40 person kickline but the three person Joe Darren and Brosenthal kickline was still pretty good. Also, I remember someone doing a very cool harmony? It maybe sounded like Holden? His voice is underrated.

Sidekick I cannot remember for the life of me if this is actually where this song goes?? I don’t remember if Joey went offstage or not. I just know that he ended up alone on stage and I damn near lost my mind. I know I’ve said it before but Joey’s performance of sidekick genuinely is a show stealer and I never in a million years thought I’d get to see it live so I feel extremely privileged that I did. God bless whoever included this in the setlist you have my eternal thanks. It’s what Joey deserves (and what I deserve). His voice!?! The high notes?!? Still love the irony of Joey singing this song. Classic cheering at ‘am I the hottest’ because yes you fucking are. He messed up a bit and sang ‘am I the one who takes you home’ twice but we love him. He absolutely killed it and being reminded that they’d not long got back from SDCC and finding out he had a fever made me even more impressed because you literally wouldn’t have known it.

Voldemort Is Going Down More on Joey continuing to kill it (but maybe not in this order). It was good to hear this song again, it slaps. And they all sounded so good too. And there was a super cool little piano riff at one point. This song makes everyone so hype I love it so much.

Everything Ends Haha tear time (jk just about managed to save them for Friday). But it is very much when things get sad because you can feel that the show’s coming to a close. This was Robert’s duet with a person he’d never sung with before and it sounded beautiful. We got the return of Joe’s snape voice or am I imagining that? I don’t remember what he said but I’m sure he said something and it probably made me sad. Literally the whole end of the show is just a blur because I couldn’t believe it was almost over so quickly.

Not Alone Jaime. Just, Jaime. Incredible every time she sings this song. Also, so many AVPW feelings because this is what they came out and sang and this song has been extra special to me since. So I was in tears from the get go tbh. God I’m really really really missing AVPW today so this is a lot just thinking about it. And personal feelings about Bonnie and also how much I love newer arrangements of not alone aside, it was unimaginably special to see the original four singing this together again.

Days Of Summer We knew they’d save this to the end (or at least so we thought) but it was still a bit of an asshole move ngl. Like, do you enjoy our suffering? Seeing everyone on stage together singing this song that’s at the heart of starkid, if there was anyone who didn’t cry I applaud them. Darren gave a closing speech where he didn’t thank half the people he needed to because he hadn’t rehearsed. I wish I remembered more of what he said because it wasn’t exactly the same as Friday, it also didn’t make me cry half as much which I guess was a bonus. They did the little going back to hogwarts reprise probably partly to make us all feel a bit better and got everyone on their feet for it and as much as I never know which house to say I still love that moment of everyone yelling their house. Then they had “curtain call”, except they faked us out because Brian stayed on stage with his fist in the air and I’m like okay what are these idiots up to now. And Nick came out to tell him they sang all the songs and Voldemort’s dead, which of course meant ‘dead?! *skips stone*’ and we all needed that laugh. And then Joe came out and they did the ‘okay is good’ bit so I was sad again and god they really messed with our emotions. And everyone came back out and did the not alone reprise and literally stomped all over my heart because ten years ago they did the exact same thing, except now they were on a bigger stage with a bigger audience and a bigger family and they’ve all grown so much and achieved so many amazing things in their careers and their personal lives and they’ve grown up a lot but they’re still these college kids at heart who love performing with their friends and making people laugh and I didn’t want to leave my seat after they all walked offstage because it really felt like my soul had left my body and I was just completely emotionally drained. And unbelievably happy that I was getting to experience it all again the next day.

Friday 26th The one thing I have to say about the line this time round is shoutout to the kid handing out red vines, I don’t know how many people actually wanted one but it made me smile. As we were waiting in the lobby we saw Denise x2 (Joey’s mom still looked like the embodiment of kindness and Denise always seems so happy to be there I love them both).

Anyway when we got to our seats I just sat down and was internally screaming because we were So Close to the stage and I was like how on earth am I going to survive seeing this much beauty. Also I knew that some people had different outfits and I was trying to figure out if Lauren and Joey were wearing the same thing cause that was the most important thing so it was an anxious wait. Then when they came out being that close to the crop top nearly killed me and Joey looked even hotter in that red shirt than he did on Thursday so like, I want that image tattooed on my eyelids.

Oh and we saw MK, Sean, Sarah and Whitney up in the balcony before the show started. This is how the conversation went down... Sophie: is that MK up there? Me: I think so, that looks like Sean Sophie: it doesn’t look like Sean? (spoiler alert, it was Sean)

Also to quickly go back to the live atmosphere, Friday night was INSANE oh my god. Whether it was that it was the last show or whether it was being closer to the stage but the room was absolutely electric, it seemed like so many more people - including me this time - were singing and fucking reciting all the lines like it makes me so happy that we’re all fucking nerds who love these other nerds to death and memorise all their shows. As was my plan, the first night I took everything in and then the second night I just got to enjoy it and make the most of it. So the Thursday show it was kind of like I was observing everything but Friday I was LIVING it, and I really was living. It was a fucking party. And I could anticipate what was coming and it somehow made it even more exciting than witnessing everything fresh for the first time. I was literally sat there having the time of my life for two hours and I hope they all saw it, they would have just seen me with a huge fucking grin the whole time (apart from when I was crying we’re not talking about that rn). Maybe the most fun I’ve ever had. It made all the money I’d spent to get there 10000% worth it because as amazing as the DVD is going to be and you bet I’m getting it (well the digital download shipping’s an outrage), you can’t buy the atmosphere in the room and it was incredible to be there.

Okay y’all know the drill now so this is gonna be quickfire:

Act 1

Seeing everyone doing their crazy eyes in TGWDLM up close was an EXPERIENCE. Jon was a stand out. Also Jaime. Being so much closer the energy was so much higher for Join us and die. I think that was really my main thing about Friday, aside from how emotions were even higher, was how crazy the energy was it was SO MUCH FUN. And Robert is pretty great.

Have I mentioned Lauren’s look nearly killing me? Yes? Good. The gay came out full force in Firebringer. Lo’s talent is out of this world and I feel so lucky to have witnessed it live.

So many more people sang for Lauren in Naked in a lake and she looked so happy my baby. I made eye contact with her at one of the points she was holding the out mic for the audience to sing so I’m glad she saw me (quietly but extremely enthusiastically) singing my heart out for her. Joey made Lauren laugh when they were dancing during speedrun and it’s the most adorable shit I’ve ever seen. Those two are genuinely in their own world half the time they’re on stage together and I live for it.

Carlos wasn’t there this night so I think Dylan should have filled in for his verse of 1001 nights but my ideas are worthless right? Oh have I mentioned how much I live for over a thousand people yelling tigerfucker? And Robert smashed ‘he fucked a tiger’. Also I’m sure they did it the first night too but I noticed even more Denise and Meredith encouraging everyone to cheer when Joe was doing the dialogue bit I adore them.

Brant got so out of time on I wanna be my god Joey looked like he was trying to telepathically tell him to slow down but he never really recovered. But the chaotic energy felt appropriate? It’s not a starkid show without a mess up.

Joe’s MAMD entrance was more controlled this time but honestly it’s a shame the fuck up won’t be on the filmed version because it was definitely a highlight (I hope you’re okay Joe). Mere and Brian had their arms round each other when they were singing ready to go and I was hit with the ‘oh my god they’re getting MARRIED’ feels. Look how far they’ve come. They were also making faces at each other during one song, I don’t remember which one, and giving Joey and Lauren a run for their money for being in their own world. Still not nearly as bad though.

Intermission

I remember even less of this intermission than the first one. I was just in total shock. Also when we came back from the intermission Nick went ‘two people just got engaged’ and almost literally stopped my heart like I KNOW that’s not how it’s gonna happen but where did he expect me to go with it. And then he wanted to be reminded of their names but someone shouted ‘Joe and Traci’ so he had to be like ‘no I’m not talking about them’ which made me laugh a lot.

Act 2

GBTH was somehow even better this time round. It’s actually a spiritual experience. 100% my happy place. Also Joey didn’t have the headband the first night and I didn’t know I needed it until he came out wearing one on Friday, it was weirdly emotional.

To have a home was worse this time around because I had to come to the realisation that I was gonna leave this home behind. That’s always the worst part, it was the same with AVPW, it’s not just that I miss it it’s also that it’s this happy, safe little bubble where everything feels okay and it’s so sad to lose that. So yeah, cried a lot this time. Also Darren went offstage on Thursday too in the instrumental but this time he went offstage and ran round to the other side to come back on which was so much better good job Darren.

When Lo and Joey shook hands for granger danger they both had such cute smiles my HEART. Lauren still had heart eyes for Joey singing, she was just stood there grinning at him the whole time she loves him so much jesus christ. Also she was staring at him when they were both singing the ‘falling in love’ bit just saying. And they got super close to each other for the end but kept alternating looking at the other person and the audience so they were never actually looking at each other and it KILLED me I hate them. I also didn’t even think twice about singing Lauren’s part during granger danger until halfway through oops and now I kind of want to apologise, Mr Joey Richter I love you.

You could tell there were a fair few people in the audience who’d seen one or both of the other shows and knew what was coming so actually shouted out ‘what’s your fantasy’ when AJ was working up to the mouse monologue which made it even better. It was just as insane and funny the second time, but I still couldn’t believe they actually put it in there.

Back to Mr Joey Richter, he brought the house down with sidekick even more than on Thursday. He’s so talented y’all. You’d expect more cheering for ‘am I the one who takes you home’ but the urge for everyone to yell ‘definitely not’ is too much and it cracks me up. And he pointed at the very least in my direction when he sang the last ‘I love being at your side’ so I’ll take it for SURE.

They got everyone standing even earlier on in the show (during voldemort is going down) and I just felt a sense of elation, the whole show but at this point in particular, because everyone was there having a fucking amazing time and pouring out so much love, from our direction and from theirs, and I feel like that song really does do what it’s supposed to and make us feel united.

Everything ends made me cry a lot because it actually was the end this time, and starkid have some fucking heart wrenching goodbye songs that are supposed to make you feel better but really don’t at all. Not alone made me cry more, obviously. Days of summer was so much worse because it really was goodbye, me having to say goodbye to seeing them and one of the best experiences of my life, them having to say goodbye to each other. SO. MANY. TEARS.

Random point, Lauren looked so fucking cute when she came out in her varsity jacket with the sleeves pushed up because it was too big for her I just wanted to hug her.

Joey and Lauren kept looking at each other during Darren’s speech, Joey in particular kept trying to catch Lo’s eye which killed me he’s too soft. And Lauren pulled a face at the mention of a twenty year reunion like she felt way too old for that and he was smiling at her I hate them.

There were a lot of tears, Joey and Tiffany especially and Lauren pulled her trying not to cry face. In the speech Darren said something about starkid bringing about this group of friends and Joey’s wide eyed already-crying-but-trying-not-to-cry-even-more-face was both heartbreaking and funny and I hope it makes it onto the DVD. I don’t remember much else of the speech other than that it was incredibly emotional and it very well summed up a lot of what we were all feeling about the show and how special starkid was. Also I made eye contact with Joey when we were both crying and we smiled at each other (tried to) and honestly that was a bonding moment for us.

And we saw Bob and Denise on our way out which caused a whole lot more feelings because those are their kids up there performing with all their other honorary kids and yep we’re done here.

I don’t really know how to bring this all to a neat end. I don’t really think there is one. It’s an experience that can’t fully be put into words, the emotions it brought up aren’t ones that I can properly label, and it’s going to stick with me forever. But it was a reminder of how special starkid is. Watching their shows at home, scrolling through their social media, of course it brings me so much joy it’s my reason for living. But getting to see them live and feel the impact they’ve had on so many people? Getting to do it with a friend I made because of them? I just wish I had the words or the time to give them the thanks I wish I could. I really hope they felt the sheer, deep love we all feel for them over those two days.

Anyway, I know this was way too long and half of it wasn’t information people care about but I’m done now. And I’m so excited for the DVD and (hopefully) album so I can experience it all again!

#homecoming spoilers

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aspenthicket · 5 years

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How do you think their feelings (Hamburr) would have developed in cannon era? Like during/before the war or after the war. And how strange it would have been for them because, you know, liking men in this time was wrong (though I think it's easier for Hamilton because of John)

( Headcanon requests open for multiple fandoms! )

Ahhhh, this is such a fun question. Be prepared for an essay lmao. I’m starting off with what’s basically a mini history lesson because I like talking about why I have headcanons just as much as talking about the headcanons themselves. See, you mentioned Alexander potentially handling it better because of his relationship with John and I do want to discuss that, but I wanna talk about Burr first.

The History Behind My Headcanon

So, Burr had a friend named Jonathon Bellamy (you probably already know all this, so bear with me, I’m getting to an explanation of my headcanon). And there’s a possibility they might have been more than friends. Bellamy was in the army as well, though they had known one another before. Burr describes him very fondly and the letter that is most well known between them is the biggest hint at something more, whether it be mutual or one-sided. It’s a letter from Bellamy to Burr, included in a book called “Memoirs of Aaron Burr”. He mentions a previous (and, as far as I know, lost to time) letter from Burr. It seems they hadn’t seen each other in a bit and were stationed far apart because Bellamy describes a dream he had in which he went to Burr’s tent and saw him. He ends the description of the dream like this:

The scene, on your discovering me, immediately changed to something more tender; but I won’t waste paper.

(You can read the rest of the letter + more about these two and Bellamy in general on this wonderful post.) There definitely seems to be a touch of romance, if not outright innuendo, in this letter. Although there are no letters from Burr to Bellamy that give an insight into the potential mutual feelings, it’s worth noting that Bellamy felt comfortable writing this letter and others to Burr. They don’t come across as jokey either.

Sadly, Bellamy died young and it seems to have hurt Burr quite a bit. The point I’m trying to get to is that I tend to involve this in my headcanons. I typically write Hamburr with the backstory of Aaron having been in a relationship with Jonathon and it changes things. It’s not a super long-lasting relationship, but it’s highly likely it could’ve been his first with a man (Burr was nineteen at the time and Bellamy not much older!). It ending in tragedy is definitely not helpful for future relationships and if you add that to some of the shit Burr went through as a kid? There would definitely still be some massive internalized homophobia there, though I do think having been with a man before would give him somewhere to work from.

It’s worth noting that I also personally think (think vs. believe, since I don’t think the evidence for this is substantial enough that I would argue it) that Laurens was the first man Hamilton was ever with romantically and, possibly, sexually. I’m not gonna go on some long rundown of why (maybe later), but I tend to write Laurens as being Hamilton’s first (and only, in historically accurate stuff) male romantic and sexual partner. Once again, it ends in tragedy historically and although I think Hamilton may have had less internalized homophobia than Laurens, he still obviously would have had some and struggled with it.

The Actual Headcanons

I’ll go over it how I usually write it. When they first meet (pre-war if you want musical canon, during the war if you want something a little more true to history) I would say there’s an attraction they probably don’t recognize. I’m going to assume we’re going with musical canon, so Jonathon Bellamy is still alive and Aaron has never experienced a poly relationship, so he’s committed. His lack of noting/admitting to an attraction could easily be attributed to the fact that A. he’s not interested in another partner and, thus, not looking, and B. Alexander is... a lot. Maybe too much, especially then. As for Alexander? Doesn’t even know he’s into men. Trust me, it’s mighty easy to not recognize attraction to the same gender for what it is when you’re attracted to the “opposite” gender too.

So they get along as well as they can. I wouldn’t call them friends—they’re not really around one another enough, with them being in the army and often in different locations. There’s a spark of a friendship there, though. A possibility.

I’d say it’s after the war ends and they’re home when things start, slowly but surely. The thing is, they’ve both lost. And Alexander’s lost recently. And he loves Eliza. He’s not looking for anything. He probably recognizes an attraction, but has little want to act on it. He might be wary to get close to anyone again, considering how many people he’s lost in general and it’s happened again.

And Aaron’s happily married as well. But the attraction’s there and he’s not necessarily ignoring it. Theodosia Sr. 100% know about it and teases him for it. But Alexander’s not receptive, so that’s that.

I’d say it’s some years in. They work together some, which forges a fiery friendship between not only them, but their families. Alexander is, shockingly, a comfort when Theodosia Sr. passes. He’s less pushy, less hard on Aaron in that time until things are stable again. He doesn’t necessarily know the right things to say, but he does, briefly, know how to shut up and lay off. It unintentionally shows that he cares enough to put an effort into it.

The feelings come and grow and they both know exactly what they are. They fight it because I mean really? Him? But also because there’s always the risks of two men, especially two men involved in politics that many, many people would enjoy knocking down a peg or ten. Then there’s Eliza, who isn’t even a third as blind to it all as they assume she is (not because they think she’s a fool, but because they think they’re good at hiding it for.................some reason). Of course they end up getting irritable towards one another because of it, taking out their own frustrations on one another.

Honestly, they’re both the type to have “the cord snap” and just suddenly kiss or misspeak and confess. And then fight it, especially Aaron. It’s a struggle before either can accept it and open up to it, and that’s not even getting into Alexander discussing the situation with Eliza. I think it would take the hardest thing for them both for them to “officially” get together: they’d need to talk. About each other. About their feelings. About John Laurens and Jonathon Bellamy. About their identities in a time where no such understanding existed but they know they’re “different.” About how they’re going to do this and make it work.

And, I mean, at that point you’ve got an AU where they actually learned how to have discussions and, thus, might not be so fucking extra as to involve smear campaigns and duels.

#hamilton #hamburr #THIS IS SO MUCH MORE EXTRA THAN THE LAST #i hope you like this because f u c k #i'm open to a million more of these btw lmao #side note: anyone wanna talk ehamburr? or ehamburrens? LMAO #or almost any character/ship honestly LMAO #Anonymous

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hamilton-one-shots · 5 years

Text

Hamilton High School AU 104

For Lafayette, the morning was much quieter. And definitely a bit lonelier. Of course, he had Rosie to lift his spirits, but... It was weird not having Hercules at a time like that. Not having him when Lafayette could’ve used an extra hand getting dressed, not having him when his habit of turning off the alarm before it could ring and waking Lafayette himself would’ve been much appreciated, not having him when he knew that it was his own choice not to have him around felt... Bad. Lafayette felt bad for not inviting him over or going to see him, but, even then, he wasn’t sure if he’d be able to stand being treated like he was made of glass. Not when it was that much closer to accurate now.

So, he sucked it up and got ready, making a quick breakfast for himself before leaving and walking himself to school. He was hoping it’d be a peaceful walk, but instead, a car pulled up beside him, not three minutes later.

But it wasn’t all bad.

“Hey, babe.. Martha told me you were walking, I thought I’d come pick you up.”

Lafayette smiled and got in the car with his boyfriend. “Thank you..” He kissed Herc’s cheek, then buckled himself in as he started driving.

“So.. I can’t believe what happened to you and John yesterday.. I’m so glad Lee’s out of here for now.”

“Me too... And it’ll heal quickly, as long as I don’t strain myself too much.”

Hercules nodded. “I can hold your bag and stuff for you. I imagine that this is pretty difficult to deal with on your own..”

Lafayette shook his head. “No.. I don’t want to bother you.”

“Babe, you’re never bothering me. You know I’d do anything for you, holding your books is nothing.”

It wasn’t nothing to Lafayette. He shook his head again. “I want to take care of it myself.. I appreciate that you want to help, I really do, but.. I don’t know.. It’s hard to explain.”

“Okay..” Hercules was well aware of how weird Lafayette tended to act when it came to being spoiled sometimes, btu he had no idea what the problem could be, Sometimes, Lafayette was content to be treated like a princess just out of nowhere. Other times, he was refusing help with carrying his books, despite a broken wrist. But it had gone on and off so randomly ever since the two met that Hercules just wasn’t sure how to bring it up.

Instead, the two were silent for the entire drive to school and as they walked up to the building before Lafayette finally spoke.

“You know, John actually has it worse than me. He broke a couple of his fingers, too.”

“Somehow, that doesn’t surprise me,” Hercules said, his lips curling into a small smile. “I bet he hardly noticed..”

“He hardly reacted until we were on our way to the hospital. The poor thing was a bit off the whole time, but I think he’ll be just fine this morning,” Lafayette said with a shrug, having no clue about John’s rather chaotic morning.

“Hopefully.. John’s always raising my blood pressure.”

“Mine too. People probably think I’m the crazy one, but at least I know when to stop,” he said, jokingly.

“Hey, at least I have an excuse,” John said through a laugh, making Lafayette jump. “I haven’t been stable since I was ten, man, cut me some slack.”

Lafayette smiled and shook his head. “You’d think you would’ve learned to control it by now.”

John shrugged. “I don’t care to try when someone’s trying to hurt my loyal friends,” he replied with sarcasm dripping from his voice.

Lafayette chuckled. “Seriously, are you doing alright? After yesterday, I’m just making sure..”

“I’m okay, Laf,” John assured, giving his friend a genuine smile. “I just needed a good night sleep and some food.”

“I’m glad to hear that.” Lafayette smiled and kept walking and talking with him all the way to class, Hercules trailing behind with Alexander and Thomas for a bit.

“So.. What’s up with them two?” Thomas asked. “Like, I know John said I was his first boyfriend, but were he and Laf actually a thing?..”

Alexander scrunched up his nose at the question as Hercules laughed. “Ew..”

“Dude, no. They were never a thing, believe me. They just.. I don’t know. They get along in a way that we may never understand.. Laf was really hurt when John didn’t tell him about what his dad did.. I mean, so was I, of course, but not like Laf was.. They’ve always been like that.”

“Oh.. I’ve just never seen any two people get along like that..” The way that John got along with Laf was closer to how he got along with Thomas himself and Alexander, rather than how he got along with Hercules. And it was nothing like how he got along with Lucy or Susan or any of his siblings, for that matter.

“It’s a really intimate friendship. It’s a little weird, but you do get used to it.” And with what happened the day before, with Lafayette getting harassed and John being reminded of his own traumas, the two were closer than ever.

But even Alexander wasn’t too bothered by it. He understood it. It wasn’t the same kind of love that he felt for John, but there was clearly some kind of love between the two. And the two had known each other for so long, it was more than enough time to develop their own unique friendship. “I know it’ a weird thing to say, but I feel like they would get married if we all weren’t around.. Like, as friends.”

“Oh, definitely. I remember they used to talk about living together and adopting kids to take care of and they said I could always come over with my army of dogs..” Hercules remembered it fairly clearly. A teenage Herc and Laf and a John who wasn’t quite there, taking care of John’s siblings and thinking about what life would be like when they were old enough to make their own. The three were equally close, just in very different ways.

Thomas couldn’t quite wrap his head around it, but he did know one thing. If John needed Lafayette now, he would have to be a monster to tear them apart. His own jealousy meant nothing in comparison.

But Lafayette and John weren’t joined at the hip. Their respective boyfriends were easily able to get more than enough time with them throughout the day. Once it ended and drama practice was finally over, all five friends - and Lucy, of course - made their way to the Washington house and hung out in the living room.

Alexander turned on a video game and sat down on the floor in front of the couch beside John, who sat between him and Lucy.

“Hasn’t he kicked your butt enough yet?” Hercules jokingly asked Alexander, who mocked his laughter.

“Hey, John uses a bunch of cheap tricks. Until I get a fair game with him, he hasn’t won once in my mind,” he stated simply.

John snickered to himself. “You’re just mad because I can beat you so badly.. Trust me, if this was GTA or anything else that wasn’t a Nintendo game, I’m sure you’d own me.”

Alexander grinned at that. “Oh, really?..”

Maybe ten minutes after Alexander set up his Playstation, there was chaos in the living room as five teenage boys and a little girl yelled over a round of Fortnite.

As unfamiliar as he was with the game, John was clearly losing, clenching his teeth as he focused on the game with Thomas and Lucy cheering him on.

“Alright, you can still kick his butt!”

“You can do it , Johnny!”

Lafayette and Hercules, however, were highly entertained by watching someone out John in his metaphorical place when it came to video games.

“Look who’s winning now!”

“Kick his ass!”

“Language!” Thomas warned, pointing at Lucy and shooting a look in Lafayette’s direction.

“Sorry.. Beat him up, Alex!”

Martha smiled as she watched them play from the dining room, George watching with her.

“It’s so nice to see them so happy and hyper for once.. Too many bad things happen to these kids,” she remarked with a sigh.

George nodded. “Yeah.. I’m still a little wary about Thomas, though.. I find it hard to believe that he changed so much in such a short time.”

“Well, the same could be said for Alexander. After all, before meeting John and getting along with Laf and Herc, he wasn’t exactly the peachiest boy. Now look at him..”

“True..” George smiled fondly. “I always knew he needed something to get him out of his shell.. If I’d known it was John, I would’ve introduced them years ago.”

“Same here..”

John lost his mom not long before Alexander came into the picture. Alexander, at one point, was rude, sarcastic, and everything that would lead to an immediate fight between himself and John. Of course George and Martha wanted to do everything in their power to keep them apart for so long, only letting them meet when Alexander had ran out of nearby schools to go to.

Martha put her hand over her husband’s and gently ran her thumb over his knuckles. “They are just kids.. Thomas had his share of growing to do and I’m more focused on how amazing it is that it was our boys who convinced him to do so..” Sure, he began his change for John, but without the other three giving him a chance, what was there to keep him from changing back? From unintentionally hurting John again?

#hamilton #hamilton fanfic #fanfiction #lafayette #hercules mulligan #john laurens #alexander hamilton #thomas jefferson #104 #chapter 104

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everymovie2020 · 5 years

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Dante’s Peak (1997)

Date watched: 24 May 2019

I was going to do a whole disaster movie themed weekend but in the end I only watched four of them (and all ones I'd seen before). So over the next few weeks there might be some disaster movie discussion as I make my way through my extensive list of the greatest disaster movies of all time (although, on the Vulture list of the greatest disaster movies of all time, it does not include Twister, like… I'm sorry, but is that masterpiece not considered a disaster film?).

I decided to start with Dante's Peak and pair that with Volcano, as they were both released in 1997. I do not own DP and haven't seen it since… the 90s? Maybe? If not the 90s, then the early 2000s. And because I wanted to watch it – I was determined to watch it on Friday night – and my usual source of movies for free yielded me nothing, I actually rented it through YouTube and I've gotta say, in a pinch – not bad! Yeah, it cost me $4 but the quality was great and I was able to watch the movie I specifically wanted to watch that night.

Anyway, let's get into the nonstop thrill ride that is Dante's Peak, starring Pierce Brosnan, Linda Hamilton and literally nobody else notable!

Plot:

Pierce Brosnan is the best volcanologist in the biz. He works for… Geology USA! (I forget the official title so I'm giving it a jazzy new one) as a dude who goes out and investigates volcanoes, so, literally, a volcanologist.

Anyway they get a report about this supposedly dormant volcano Dante's Peak, which overlooks the town of… Dante's Peak. And I want to say this is in upstate Washington perhaps? But honestly, I'm not really sure. Could be Oregon. One of those north-western states. Green, lush, picturesque, mountainous, complete with a quaint, small American town where everything is about to go to FUCKING SHIT.

So Pierce rocks up into town and Linda Hamilton is like, "Tear me off a piece of that," and I'm like, "Get it girl."

She's the town mayor so she takes him on a sightseeing tour, complete with her two obnoxious children, and they go up to meet her ex-mother-in-law who actually lives on the mountain. It's up there that they decide to go for a swim when they find two people who have been goddamn boiled to death in a volcanic hot spring.

Honestly, the scene of those two poor bastards boiling to death is really the only thing seared into my memory of this movie. When I think of this movie, I think about those two experiencing one of the worst deaths of all time, and I know they're not real but people have died that way and it would suck so hard.

Anyway, Pierce is like, "There's something wrong with your mountain, let's call a town meeting.” So they have this meeting and the townspeople are like, "are you guys fuckin' serious," and then Pierce's boss rolls in all, "all right guys I feel like James Bond has gotten a little too carried away on this one," and Pierce is like, "well I do NOT agree so I will hang around town to prove that I am right and you are wrong (and also to bang Linda Hamilton)".

Then… what the fuck happens? I watched it five days ago and I'm blanking, because all the ridiculous stuff happens towards the end and the first two-thirds of the movie are pretty boring.

Okay, so the boss dude who doesn't believe Pierce is like, "this volcano ain't doin' shit, we're packing up and leaving," and Pierce is very, very mad about this but happy enough to flirt with Linda Hamilton, and that's when they discover that the town water has turned to sludge.

WELL. Pierce is HOPPING MAD at this point, let me tell you, because god damn it he was RIGHT and everyone else was WRONG.

So they call a town meeting and they're like, "Listen guys, the volcano is about to fuck yo shit up," and the townspeople are like, "Our volcano is dormant, that means it's DEAD, that means NOTHING BAD WILL HAPPEN," and Pierce is like, "Guys, seriously," and THEN there's a massive earthquake because TIMING IS EVERYTHING.

There's a bit of a stampede, and everyone runs out to the front of the town hall/high school (wherever it was they were having the meeting), and sure enough, Dante's fuckin' Peak is blowing up like a mother-fucker. The townspeople immediately descend into PANICCCCC and start piling into their cars to try to escape, meanwhile there's a huge earthquake going on, buildings are falling down, shit is descending into madness and then Linda Hamilton is all, "I left the kids at home. Gonna need to get the kids."

So Pierce is like RIGHT LET'S GET THE KIDS, and then of course it's chaos on the roads, and shit is collapsing – I mean, things are deteriorating – and of course when they get to the house the kids aren't there. Why? They went to rescue Grandma up on the mountain because she was too stubborn to leave.

And like, this is the most realistic thing, because often in disasters people ARE too stubborn to leave, but like… fuck that. I'll be taking my cats and noping THE FUCK OUT OF THERE, thank you very much. Honestly, if I was living in this town, I would've left the second the geologists turned up. Ain't no volcano is gonna get me.

So they're driving up this mountain, and the earthquake is still happening, and the volcano is still erupting, and then they make it through just as half of the mountain collapses behind them, but there's Grandma's house, still bloody standing (of course, everything else is collapsing but not Grandma's house, and the kids have made it there totally unscathed – like sure, okay, sure a volcano is going off and this fucking 12 year old drove a truck up the mountain during a massive earthquake but sure, okay, they're fine. So they reunite but then, what's this? FUCKING LAVA.

Fucking lava, flowing down the mountain like a motherfucker. And the road is cut, so they can't get out that way, and they don't have a car, but they do have a boat and a lake, so they pile into the boat and start across the lake. But what's this? The fucking lake is ACID.

It's basically a game of what can go wrong will go wrong at this point.

So the boat is taking on acid water, and they're trying not to burn themselves, but they're getting closer to the dock on the other side of the lake and the propeller disintegrates. And then Grandma, who SINGLEHANDEDLY GOT THEM ALL INTO THIS MESS – yes Grandma I'M READING YOU TO FILTH – gets out and drags the boat ashore, burning the fuck out of herself in the process.

Because ACID.

I mean like, they probably could've made it without her doing that? They really didn't have far to go.

Can I just say, at this point – if Pierce Brosnan had not come to this town, literally all of these people would've died horrible volcanic deaths.

Then they've got to walk down the mountain – the lava stopped at the lake, I guess? – and Grandma dies, and then they find a truck which Pierce hotwires – he's amazing – and they're tootling down the hill when all of a sudden LAVA. FUCKIN' LAVA AGAIN.

You'd think this volcano was erupting or something with all this fuckin' lava, I mean, I don't know.

And then, in possibly the most ridiculous part of the movie, PIERCE BROSNAN DRIVES HIS TRUCK THROUGH THE LAVA AND ALSO RESCUES A DOG WHILST DOING SO.

I MEAN.

Guys.

Like.

It's lava. It'll fuck your shit up. THERE IS NO WAY THE CAR WOULDN'T FUCKING MELT INTO THE FUCKING LAVA. THAT THE WHEELS WOULD KEEP TURNING. THERE IS NO WAY. LAVA IS VERY HOT.

If there's one thing I know about lava, it's that it's VERY HOT. And sure, it burns the tyres off and they're driving on rims, but like, IT STILL MELTS METAL THOUGH? Because it's VERY HOT.

ANY-WAY. I had a problem with this during the worst movie I have ever seen (Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, seriously, JW:FK, go fuck yourself to death), and I have a problem now with Dante's Peak not representing lava accurately.

MEANWHILE back at the town the Geology USA team is making their escape across the bridge – apparently there's only one way in and out of this town? Seems like a mistake – and of course, all of this sludge and trees and chaos is descending from the mountain because all of the snow is melting, there are landslides, etc etc.

So they're driving across the bridge in a convoy and the first two trucks make it across but not the van holding the boss dude from the start – remember the guy that was totally fucking wrong about the volcano? HIM – because the bridge starts breaking apart. And then he just sits in the van, and they're all like, "OH NO," and I'm like, "GET OUT AND JUMP!! WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!" and THEN he gets out but by then it's too late because the bridge flips over and he dies.

LIKE.

WHY NOT TAKE TWO CARS, GUYS?

It's quite frustrating when these deaths could have been avoided by simply taking less cars.

Anyway, Pierce, Linda, the kids and the dog have made it back into the town, but the volcano is going to hardcore blow its load any minute. They stop to grab this radio thing and of course then the volcano is like "FUUUUUUUUUCCCKKKKKKKKK" (this volcano is big on TIMING, okay) and unleashes almighty hell, and then they've got to drive their beat up, tyre-less piece of shit truck into a mine shaft for safety, and then Pierce forgets the fucking radio thing so he has to go BACK, but the mine shaft collapses, yada yadayada, and then they're rescued.

In summation, they would've died a bunch of times in this movie, but honestly, even driving into a mine shaft wouldn't save you from a pyroclastic flow – I mean, MAYBE it would? But I don't think it would. They weren't that deep inside. I just don't know.

Look, it's… okay. Personally, I think Volcano is the superior movie. DP is possibly a touch more realistic (setting aside the lava driving)? It is based on the St Helens' volcano, though I think the DP version is sped up in terms of shit going from normal to catastrophic.

I mean, the thing that gets me is the lava, like, guys, like… it's super hot. I just feel like lava has been misrepresented in certain movies as not being hot, but it is though. IT IS SO HOT. I just don't believe you could drive a car through it. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe there's a Mythbusters episode. I don't know.

Seriously though, the Wikipedia page for the eruption of Mt St Helens is totally worth a read. Volcanoes are FUCKING SCARY.

#dante's peak #1997 #movies #movie review #disaster movie #pierce brosnan #linda hamilton #literally nobody else famous #volcano #it's gonna blow woah woah woah #VOLCANO!

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auroraphilealis · 6 years

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just a small list of fic recs

Earlier this morning my friends asked for some fake dating phan AU fics and I realized that making a fic rec list might be a good way to show some appreciation for fanfic author appreciation day!

I don’t have all day free like I wish, so I asked my friends for a few smaller catagories that I could shift through and find a few fics to rec from, that way I can get a good mix of fics for people to enjoy, and find as many authors as possible to thank!

Of course, I can’t possibly have read every fic out there ever, so if you aren’t on here that’s no like, disrespect to you or anything. Every single person whose ever written and posted a fanfic deserves to be recognized and loved for what they’ve produce for us, so just know that I appreciate every single one of you, on or off this list!

To add to this, I tired to pick some older, or smaller works that people may have not seen before to give the authors a little lift if possible :)

Without further ado, below you’ll find some fic recs and author appreciation below !

Fake Relationship:

Our Threadbare Lies - @ramonaspeaks - Dan is eighteen years old and newly single. He's ready to come out to his family but he thinks it would be a hell of a lot easier if he had a boyfriend to help him through it.

This is like one of my all time favorite fake relationship fics of all time. Honestly it was so well done and really realistic and the writing is just superb. I can’t even begin to tell you how many times I’ve re-read this fic, (as well as most of the authors other works) because it was just so well done, so thank you, thank you, THANK YOU to the author for all the hard work they put into it! On top of that, it holds really, really close to 2009 timeline (as we know it) and manages to make things work that might not have worked in their AU if they weren’t so smart about it

Maybe, Possibly - @cafephan - Phil’s mother is adamant that he should be settling down, so invites one of his turbulent exes to an annual family get-together the following day. In a moment of panic, he tells her he’s already dating someone. With no other options, he turns to Dan.

aldjflkas I fucking love this fic so freaking much. I’ve read it like ten million times. Everytime it shows up on my dash I open it to read it again. It’s just really funny and sweet in a strange way, and captures an essence of dnp that I really enjoy. I like how easy it is for dnp to pretend to be together in this fic, and how easy it is for them to then transition to ACTUALLY being together. It’s the perfect kind of non-dramatic get together fake relationship AU ever and I really, really do love it. Again, massive thank you to the author!

friends dont treat me like you do - @internetakeover (i think i got your @ right) - Why had Dan agreed to this? Pretending to be Phil’s boyfriend at his ex’s wedding had seemed like a nice idea at first, a way to meet some of Phil’s old university friends while helping him avoid humiliation, but already Dan’s on edge. If Dan allows himself to relax for a day, lets himself watch Phil as much as he wants, touch Phil as much as he wants, carry on their flirtatious banter when normally he’d laugh it off... he’s worried about what Phil might see.

I ended up re-reading this after I stumbled across it again just now hahaha I really love this fic. It’s super cute and a little sappy cause WEDDING FIC but that’s what makes it so worth the read. I love that both Dan and Phil realize how easy their relationship is, and the fact that they’ve technically been dating for a long time and that they love each other. I love that they realize this the way that they do, and it just makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside, so thank you so much to the author <3

Asexuality

Between Us - @winteredspark who doesnt appear to have a tumblr :( - "I think I'm asexual," Dan breathes against the crook of Phil's neck, blinking back tears.There's a pause, then -"Nice to meet you, asexual. I'm Phil," says Phil.

This is the asexual fic that helped me to realize that I’m asexual and that asexuality is a spectrum that isn’t limited to one version or another. I remember leaving a really long thoughtout comment to the author but I can’t not rec it here as well. It’s just such an amazing asexuality fic and it’s a little bit of a different take not it considering the character exists on a different part of the spectrum than most ace fics portray. I will always be grateful to this author for this fic!

let’s save up for something new - @deletablebird - Phil wakes up shivering the morning of October 19th, 2009. Today is the day he meets Dan. Fluff, 3.5k

I love this author with my whole heart and I’ve read everything they’ve written lol. This is just a really, really cute and lovely take on 2009 with the asexual aspect included and it really made my heart happy, so thank you so so much for this fic!

Theater

Disguises - @ramonaspeaks - Phil auditions for a play at a local theater and meets Dan, who spends most of his time acting whether he’s on stage or off.

Again, another fic from one of my favorite authors of all time. This is like my actual favorite theater au of all time. I am completely in love with the whole thing. It feels so real, and their characters are so well fleshed out, and each scene is just actually fantastic. I solidly recommend this one and I am soooo thankful to the author for bringing it into existence!

just touched down in london town - @phanetixs - "Hamilton is actually really nice and the plot is very interesting and okay, well, there’s this guy."In which, London is not as bad in the summer, a cute guy dies considerably in Act III and Phil has actually lucked out for once.

Look not only do I stalk all of this authors fics, but this is one of my all time favorites of theirs. They managed to take an idea that almost seems ludicrous and make it into something not only super hot, but super realistic and really, really, really fun. I absolutely adore this fic and I give you all the kudos my wonderful author. Thank you for writing such a wonderful au!

Which as they kiss, consume - @irrevocablys which for some reason it wont tag you :( - Dan’s an aspiring actor, and Phil’s so over studying Romeo and Juliet.

This was one of my first theater au’s and I truly adore it. its just like got this super cute undertone to it thats incredibly wonderful? I just love the way the characters interact and the ease and flow of the writing <3 thank you for giving us something so beautful

Supernatural Elements

Ride with the moon in the dead of night - @mooksie01 -Phil seriously needs to buy some allergy medicine or something. Or at least open a window next time he performs a demonic ritual. He wouldn't have thought that one little sneeze could've messed up a spell so bad, but now he has a demon on his hands and only six days to get rid of it before he's stuck with it forever....And maybe the demon is acting like a total cinnamon roll, but Phil is positive that it's all just an elaborate ruse.

ajdlsfkjasdlkjfls omfg I love this fic so much. I actually adore fics with supernatural elements in them and this is one of those fics that always stands out to me. It’s just really hilarious and well written and is just overall a fun take on witch phil. I just, i really love it, and I’m so grateful it exists. Thank you wonderful author <3

Reflections of the Heart - @butterflyphil - “Being told to dress up in a dinosaur onesie and have cereal catapulted at your face is a little odd. Waking up to find that you and your best friend have switched bodies? That’s fucking bizarre.”(Or, the multi-chaptered, slightly smutty bodyswap fic that no one asked for. Featuring whiny/annoying!Dan, sassy/beguiling!Phil, unintentional innuendos, intentional innuendos, unnecessary kitchen supplies, and just a pinch of magic).

UHM, THIS IS ONE OF MY FAVE FICS? Lol. I just really freaking love body swap fic and you did such a good job with this fic. it’s honestly just super fun and a little hot and really cute and beautiful overall. I really just, really cant thank you enough for this fic and rec it really really highly!

Vampires & Werewolfs

High - @icandigelvis - Just the ordinary story of Dan and Phil, except one little detail. Phil isn't human in this one. Expect biting, bickering, playlist live, blood, bad jokes and sex.

ajdslfkjasl listen I love vampire fic and this one is just so good. it’s so true to dnp’s personalities and just like, accurate to who they’d be tbh. And like, the fact that it sticks so close to reality aside from the vampire difference is what makes it even better so thank you so much to the lovely author for writing it. It’s everything I ever needed and more from a vampire fic

Taking Every Chance I’ve Got All - @nagirci - Dan wanted was to get drunk, really. Have a good time, meet a few new people. He didn’t really think about getting involved with someone as dangerous as Phil Lester (someone as cold, as pale and, well, as not alive), and he definitely didn’t think that one trip out to a bar would change his life forever.

This is like a really older fic that’s from one of the first phandom big bangs but it’s one of my first favorite vampire fics of all time as well and it’s just. really good and really well thought and the collaboration work on it is incredibly flawless. I honeslty would tell anyone to read it at any time because it comes together so well

Sharp Teeth - @theshyauthor - AmazingPhil is a Youtuber and a vampire and according to Dan Howell, he is the nicest person to exist. From their first meeting in 2009 all the way to that one incident in the elevator at the BBC, this is their story.

Again this is just such a good take on 2009 and the reality of dnp with added vampirism tossed in. Plus the author is a beautiful wonderful person and I really enjoy their writing so its a total please go read this kind of fic x3 Thank you darling for writing something so wonderful <3

be sure to ring the doorbell - @frostbittencheeks - Dan’s a tired sports reporter, Phil’s a friendly vampire with no real sense of boundaries and a propensity for bad Dracula jokes as well as leaving his unconscious victims in Dan’s kitchen. This isn’t how Dan thought courtship goes, but he’ll take it.

Can you tell I love vampire fics? This one is so well done, I literally re-read it constantly. I love the whole idea behind it, specifically the fact that Phil’s version of courtship is literally ridiculous and he doesn’t even think that they need to talk about it hahahaha I just love how funny and adorable it is and it’s just totally worth a few minutes of your time

a puppy sort of love - @symmetricdnp - Dan's supposedly a werewolf. Phil has doubts.

I honestly want to beg this person to write me more of this fic cause the permise is just that good. There are so few werewolf fics in the phandom, and especially ones that are this cute, thoughout , and well written. I absolutely adore this fic and I totally rec it to all of you. The author is wonderful, thank you so much for writing this fic <3

Blind

It’s the blue of your eyes, and the way you’re scared, love - @glitteraccent Soulmate (Color)! & Blind!Phil au

Okay but like this story always sticks out in my memory and I think on it often. It’s one of my all time favorite soulmate au’s and blind au’s, because it was just structured so well and the characters make your heart fall for them really, really fast. I love this author and tumblr wont tag them, but reblog their fic and give them all the love in the world!

#fic recs #fanfic author appreciation day

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headlesssamurai · 6 years

Note

Have you seen Altered Carbon? If so, what do to think of it?

Alright, I finally bucked up enough courage to do another honest, non-sarcastic, write-up for a piece of media. Just been somewhat bitterly reluctant to voice my true opinions on fiction, or anything else really, since it seems like lots of folks are quite intensely engaged in violent uproars of one kind or another. No need to add more noise to the feedback loop, if you know what I mean.

But you’re, like, one of a dozen or so dudes who asked me about this series. So I reckoned I’d write it up for you, it being such a popular subject and all. I’d also like to thank you for your curiosity. It’s pretty damn humbling to know anybody cares enough about what I think to even ask after my thoughts. I’ll make sure to offer a notary warning before I spill any spoilers.

I became acquainted with Richard K. Morgan’s Kovacs-verse a few years back, but accidentally read one of the protagonist’s later adventures before backtracking to the original novel. I found it to be a respectably well-written futuristic detective story in the grand tradition of vintage writers like Robert B. Parker, even if including the predictably pornographic sex scenes in the grand tradition of modern urban sci-fi/fantasy writers like Laurell K. Hamilton (maybe the ‘K’ middle initial is a code for graphic sex content). In preparation for watching the new Netflix series, I re-read Morgan’s Altered Carbon to refresh my knowledge of the future he created.

Now, I’d like to say I’m a prolific reader of novelized fiction and other books, but I’m not one of those “hardcore” purists who always cries “the book was better” while pounding my fist on the podium. Thus in my effort to avoid any such farcical nonsense, I’m going to sort of examine both the book and the Netflix series of Altered Carbon at once, and write about what I enjoy and dislike about both versions, instead of directly comparing them.

I’ve grown so cynical with modern film and TV, I tend to unintentionally generate lists of what I think they’ll change about a book’s story once they adapt it, and what they’ll add and leave out. Usually, these lists are fairly accurate. Game of Thrones, for instance: how depressing it is to be absolutely correct some times. Not that the books were much better, but a pinecone up the ass doesn’t make a kick in the nuts feel any better.

A lot of people would describe Altered Carbon as having cyberpunk vibes, and this is true, but I believe it fits more comfortably into the realm of biopunk than anything else. If you’re not familiar with the concepts herein, Altered Carbon involves a distant future in which humanity has colonized the stars over many generations using sleeper ships, and with a little help from recovered alien star-maps, but has not achieved faster-than-light interstellar travel. The central technology in this universe is the cortical stack, a type of neural backup which allows a person’s consciousness to be digitally stored in a “disc” and uploaded into a new body if they die.

The new bodies are referred to as sleeves, and the filthy rich clone themselves so their sleeves are all identical and genetically enhanced, but most common folk have to accept whatever body is available or is covered by their insurance, or even a synthetic sleeve (which in the novel is a cheap and distasteful thing, but in the series synthetics seem to have superpowers). People can only travel quickly to other star systems in the settled worlds (known as the Protectorate) by transmitting their stored consciousness into another cortical stack on their planet of destination and uploading into a new sleeve there (a process called needlecasting), but physically transporting anything still takes a really long time for ships to travel across the vast distance of space.

Straight out of the gate, this concept does not appeal to me at all. If there’s anything that drains your story of tension and thrills, it’s got to be the idea that everyone lives forever. The way the universe is constructed however, it ends up making the story far more interesting than what I had anticipated. Not everyone can afford to live forever, first of all, since re-sleeving can be an extremely expensive undertaking, and even those who have the money rarely feel the desire to live more than two lifetimes. Additionally there are complications which can arise, such as personality fragging, a type of insanity which occurs when a person is sleeved in one too many different bodies throughout their life.

Certain religious groups also vehemently resist re-sleeving, and for law enforcement various lengthy sentences of storage without the possibility to re-sleeve are the primary means of punishment for most crimes. There are even interesting concepts like criminals who copy their consciousness into several cortical stacks at once, making them difficult to apprehend once and for all. Other criminals and intelligence operatives also utilize virtuality to torture people in a digital environment, allowing them to subject victims to days or even months of agony which equates to only a few hours in real-time. Real death can also still occur, if the individual’s cortical stack is badly damaged or destroyed.

The actual plot involves a former soldier named Takeshi Kovacs, who is paroled early from a criminal sentence and re-sleeved by a rich tycoon who offers to exonerate Kovacs of his crimes if he can solve a murder. While reluctant to work for some rich asshole, Kovacs is almost instantly attacked by mercenaries which makes him curious enough to take the case. Kovacs then works to investigate the purported crime while getting himself into a bit of trouble with the locals, and trying to deal with extreme trauma from his combat experiences.

It’s surprising that in the case of Altered Carbon I was entirely incorrect in everything I thought the producers might add/change/amputate from the original story. I also could not have predicted what they decided to add and how they decided to change certain elements from the story of Morgan’s novel. I believe the series they crafted from his story is competently scripted, very well cast, doesn’t waste too much time with any silly subplots, and is generally a well-paced, adult-themed sci-fi story. Altered Carbon really wants to take itself seriously, in the same vein as things like SyFy’s praiseworthy diamond The Expanse, but its unique setting gets a little too bogged down in conventional tropes for my liking. Gratuitous T&A (as well as other, less commonly exploited extremities) and generous helpings of the fuck-words do not an edgy and intense sci-fi experience make. Good but not great, would be my general assessment of the series.

Don’t get me wrong here, Altered Carbon is plenty intense, even thrilling at certain points, but a somewhat bland smattering of writers and directors, thrown into the recipe with a few others who are brilliant geniuses, create a mixed bag of stylistic choices which don’t always fit together very well. So you’re often left with an unusually faithful adaptation of a badass novel, wonderfully enhanced in certain aspects, but grotesquely mutated in others, and some of the conflicting storytelling elements feel hurriedly stitched together. A Patchwork Man of a story, rather than prime quality tank flesh. None of Altered Carbon’s flaws are crippling however, and all-told I’d say the series is eminently watchable and very worth your while if you enjoy futuristic sci-fi stories.

WARNING: Spoilers ahead.

First the good news. This series stars an extremely talented cast of performers who own their roles with wonderful conviction, and very convincing poise.

Joel Kinnaman has been on my good side since he appeared in The Killing, and even his unfortunate role in the Robocop reboot didn’t water down my appreciation for him. I feel like his role as the newly sleeved Takeshi Kovacs was perfectly cast. Martha Higareda is just a little too cute to be such a badass, but she winds up playing Detective Ortega to that strong female archetype in a far less sensational and much more casual way than what you might expect from the modern trends of scripting for such characters. Though quite the opposite of Higareda in terms of the role she plays, Renée Elise Goldsberry brims with charisma as Quellcrist Falconer, a sort of futuristic Che Guevara if he had also practiced Zen and gong fu, and was a woman. Chris Collins is also incredibly memorable as Kovacs’ A.I. hotel manager Poe.

Ato Essandoh as Vernon Elliott became one of my favorite characters as the series goes on, and though I wasn’t totally sold on the arc of her character Hayley Law as Elliott’s daughter Lizzie completed a very nice trifecta of beautiful lead women who just happen to be racially diverse. The third of these ladies, of course, is Dichen Lachman who I’ve got to say delivers probably the most convincing and most nuanced performance in the entire series, having to run a wild labyrinth of different emotional expressions which all feel very genuine. As was the case with Sylvia Hoeks as Luv in Blade Runner: 2049, Dichen Lachman as Rei hooked me instantly and woudn’t let go. Maybe I just got a thing for sociopathic women or something.

There are also a few minor roles worth mentioning, Marlene Forte does a great job as the overbearing mother of detective Ortega, which again felt very genuine and not forced, Tamara Taylor as ambitious sleazy attorney Oumou Prescott gave me chills with her smug smile (again perfect casting), Kristin Lehman and James Purefoy seem a perfectly matched pair of megalomaniacs, Byron Mann and Will Yun Lee kick ass portraying Kovacs at very different stages of his troubled life, and there is some terrifically believable acting on the parts of child actors Morgan Gao and Riley Lai Nelet.

All that being said, not everything the actors are given to do is particularly well-written, in my humble opinion.

Takeshi Kovacs is something called an Envoy, a type of specially trained soldier who is mentally conditioned to be hyper-aware at all times, integrate and adapt to new environments and circumstances, and even manipulate his own bodily chemistry, allowing him to eliminate the pain threshold, instantly recover from debilitating drugs, and avoid lingering trauma from torture. The Envoys were created to help the Protectorate put-down political dissidents and rebels, which were running rampant throughout the settled worlds at the time of the Envoy Program’s inception. Many of these rebels often followed the outlawed “Quellist” writings of an infamously respected revolutionary leader called Quellcrist Falconer who fought, and lost, against the Protectorate hundreds of years before the time of the novel (and long before Kovacs was born). When she was born, Quellcrist Falconer, like Kovacs, also happened to be from Harlan’s World. In the novel, this reputation causes Harlan’s World to be viewed as a backwater source of rogues and misfits by citizens of more civilized worlds (which is fair, since it’s described by Kovacs as being overrun by crime syndicates and swamp gangs). But even compared to Harlan’s World, Earth is considered a polluted over-populated shit hole.

In the novel he was trained by the somewhat fascist forces of the Protectorate, and the Envoy Corps was an elite black ops group who could be transmitted to any planet and topple the regime in less time than it would take a massive army to win a single battle. In the series, Kovacs is just a random soldier burn during the time of the Quellist revolution, but Envoys were created and trained by revolutionary leader Quellcrist Falconer to combat the very fascist forces of the Protectorate, whom were too used to conventional warfare to properly adapt to Quell’s asymmetrical tactics.

The problem for me, with this particular change in the writing, is that much of the details have been glossed over. I never got a sense of how Quell was able to so efficiently condition her soldiers into such a formidable force, nor did her portrayal emphasize her military acumen in this manner very convincingly. Quell’s character is certainly charismatic and sympathetic to the audience, but I find it much easier to accept that Envoys are the product of sociopathic, strict, and brutal military conditioning than to grasp the concept that a fairly undisciplined group of freedom fighters were able to develop such a sophisticated method of training. If Quell’s rebels were portrayed differently, it might be easier to accept, but in the series they seem more like hippies with guns than hardened elite warriors.

This is one of my only major gripes with the series as a whole, and it wouldn’t even be that big of a deal to me if it didn’t play such a large role in the plot and arc of Kovacs as a character. I didn’t like the way it changed his backstory either.

See, in the novel Kovacs is a former Envoy turned career criminal since Envoys are generally feared by everyone despite their having fought for the Protectorate, so they don’t have a lot of options and their skillset is only useful in a limited context. He’s haunted by his combat experiences, regrets his role in assisting the government in putting down various rebels, and has a cultural misunderstanding of Earth because he’s from Harlan’s World. His criminal ventures could be seen as his own personal revolution, and Kovacs has spent about a century in and out of storage since leaving the military, but has only been consciously alive for about forty years. He isn’t portrayed as a morally centered person, but he has his own system of honor, and he selfishly accepts Laurens Bancroft’s offer because it’s a way out of a lengthy sentence. This gives him a nice arc, because he slowly becomes more morally invested in what he’s doing as certain things come to light, and ultimately risks it all toward the end basically to avenge the death of a prostitute and save a single life, which is a nice shift in contrast from the Kovacs we see leave storage at the start of the book.

In the series Kovacs is a lovesick puppy dog, who misses his one true love. He’s a former Quell revolutionary who also became a career criminal, but the moment he got caught they put him in storage indefinitely, because he’s the last of the Envoys, the rest of which were mercilessly butchered by stormtroopers from the evil Protectorate which has no redeeming qualities whatsoever. When the series begins, he awakens 250 years after he was captured and he finds that the galaxy has become what he always feared, a one-percenter’s paradise ruled by the rich, where the poor are exploited and marginalized and everyone with even the slightest sense of prominence is an irredeemable asshole. Politics aside, this change makes his character arc far less interesting to me, because he doesn’t want to help Bancroft but his reluctance comes from a very different place than the book, and ultimately Kovacs accepts the offer not out of selfishness but because the ghost of his dead girlfriend tells him to.

This also deeply conflicts with the first time we’re introduced to Kovacs, in his usual East Asian sleeve on Harlan’s World where he speaks of caring only for ��getting paid” and seems like a typical devil-may-care bad boy. Then when he’s talking to Bancroft, he tells the tycoon “Some things can’t be bought. Like me.” So which is it? Do you only care about getting paid, or can you not be bought? This makes for a somewhat confusing characterization of Kovacs, who one minute is murderously avenging himself upon psychotic bio-smugglers and claiming he cares for no one, only to turn around and behave like a typical romantic the next. It isn’t entirely jarring, but for me it hurt the dark tone and mature themes to discover the central core of the series is a centuries-old fairytale love story.

Sorry. I like fairytale love stories. But I also like darkly thematic dystopian science fiction, and in my opinion the two mix about as well as apple liqueur and olive oil.

This is all, however, as I said one off my only major gripes about the series. And even the sum of its parts aren’t badly executed. Like I said, Quell is charismatic, Kovacs is haunted, and all three actors (Kinnaman, Goldsberry, and Kim as Kovacs in his original sleeve) deliver convincing performances as well as share a great sense of chemistry, so the love story is believable at least. Visual effects and set design are also wonderful, and for such a high concept sci-fi setting it all feels very seamless. Dialogue is well-scripted as well, and most of Poe’s interactions with other characters are some of the best scenes. It’s also nice to see a series that exploits the naked female form to a fault, yet also makes a point to ensure you get just as much if not far more male nudity to surprisingly counterpoint its shamelessness. I haven’t seen this many swinging dicks since the last time I read YouTube comments. Just makes you feel better when the characters finally ride the stuffed unicorn, know what I mean?

Many of the minor roles from the novel are also modified to make certain characters more important, and some of their roles have been altered so that they are completely different people. Some of these changes work better than others. Rei, as Tak’s sister rather than just some asshole crime boss he once knew, was a change in the story that had the reverse effect of how I felt about the altered Kovacs/Envoy backstory. It makes Reileen a more interesting character than just the Big Bad you might expect in such a story, and causes her motivations, maniacal as they remain, to be far more empathic and invested in the events of the plot. In that light, they made the villain stand out as memorable among the bland villains we often get in movies and TV shows now, thanks to the K-Mart quality antagonists so popularized by the Marvel movies.

While certainly not perfect, Altered Carbon still manages to offer fans of science fiction a fascinating world populated by characters who are easy to give a damn about, and a galaxy spanning story of heartbreak, betrayal, and retribution. I personally wasn’t that big a fan of the romantic warrior monk stuff in this particular story, but that doesn’t mean it won’t appeal to others. There’s enough mystery here to keep you guessing, and enough solid dramatic force to keep us wanting more on its own merits, not by virtue of any stupid cliffhangers. Much of the visual style and action sequences are just icing on the cake, really. Though, I confess, I almost jizzed my pants when I got to see the Phillips Squeeze Gun in action. And there’s nothing quite like one of those sci-fi stories where someone picks up a samurai sword, let alone during the finale.

All told, I’d watch Altered Carbon again, and you should too. Regardless of whatever I say, or my own personal preferences, it deserves your attention. Because it may be adapted from a novel, but a least it’s trying to be something different than most of what’s out there right now, even if its poetic love story doesn’t want it to be. So, ignore cynical bastards like me, watch the damn show and decide for yourself.

侍 headless

#cut-rate journalism #biopunk #altered carbon #joel kinnaman #dichen lachman #martha higareda #renée elise goldsberry #science fiction #anonymeisters #curious people #stuff i write #tv shows #reviews #netflix #gif #takeshi kovacs #detective fiction

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mollymauk-teafleak · 6 years

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A Summer’s Ball...

(Happy birthday to my darling girlfriend @childofdustandashes! Thank you for being (sort of) patient and I hope this justifies the wait. I love you so very much and am continuously proud of you on a daily basis, you’re brave and kind and compassionate and funny and I can’t imagine my life without you in it. Congratulations on one more rotation around the Sun, hope you like your present!)

There’s a lot of things Theo was only willing to do because her best friend Pip asked it of her.

Going with him to the midnight opening of the new Star Wars film. And then going to see it for a second time the very next day. Giving him an arm to stagger home drunkenly from prom and covering for him when Alex and Eliza asked if he was okay, making up something semi-convincing about food poisoning. Listening to him rant and rave after his team lost a hockey game, even though she still only had the most tenuous grasp on the actual rules of the game (and privately did think that maybe his tackle was a little uncalled for, seeing as he was the goalie). Keeping her eyes open when they watched Jaws on one of their many sleepovers so she could tap him on the shoulder when the scary part was over. Giving him some of her health potion when they played video games and his idiocy had left him clinging to life.

Flying out to France where he now lived, had lived for five months, to go to the opening of his boyfriend’s new art exhibit, getting all dressed up and staying in heels for an unreasonably long period of time while he whirled her around the room, introducing her to everyone, making her blush with exaggerated descriptions of how well she was ‘kicking ass’ at law school. In fairness, she was getting pretty damn good grades but people who’d only known her for five seconds didn’t really need to be told that.

Though maybe she was being unfair. It was hardly difficult, drinking exquisite wine that somehow tasted even better just by dividends of being drunk while in Paris, picking at hilariously fancy hours d’oeuvres (though caviar tasted gross and no one would ever be able to convince her otherwise, no matter the price tag) and looking that the beautiful art Georges de Lafayette was finally getting to display to the public. Philip had sounded so excited when he’d called a few weeks ago with the news and when he’d casually mentioned that it just so happened to coincide with Theo’s spring break from college and he’d split the air fare with her and make his couch up for her to sleep on…well, Theo hadn’t been able to say no.

And seeing Philip again really was wonderful, getting to spend time with him and mess around and giggle at people’s ridiculously fancy outfits and put on over exaggerated accents as they clinked their glasses more times than was necessary. Five months wasn’t a really long time in the grand scheme of things, Theo knew, but it was an insanely long time for your best friend to be on the other side of the globe. You couldn’t get one of the fierce, warm, patented Philip Hamilton hugs over Skype or text.

Though, in all honestly, some of these paintings were displaying rather more of her best friend than she’d even wanted to see.

“It’s not me!” Pip protested weakly, though his intense blush was giving him away, “It’s the Greek god, Apollo, that’s what Georges said!”

“Oh yeah?” Theo arched her eyebrow, wincing at the nearly wall sized watercolour towering in front of them, “A Puerto Rican Apollo with freckles and curly hair and looking absolutely one hundred per cent like you. Buck ass naked. Painted by your boyfriend.”

Philip looked like he’d want nothing more than to sink into his suit like a turtle, “You can’t really see anything…that bad…”

“Tell that to my burning retinas, dude,” Theo elbowed him lightly, “And I don’t even want to know what that gold stuff dripping all over you is…”

“It’s ichor,” he whined plaintively, pulling his long, puffed out curls down over his face.

“Whatever it is, it’s making me need another glass of champagne,” Theo rolled her eyes, though her rouge painted lips were being tugged against her will into a smile.

It was warming her heart knowing her best friend was so loved, that he had someone willing to paint portraits of him just because he was so beautiful, that the happily ever after he’d crossed a whole ocean for was worth it. Even if that love was really gross.

Speaking of which, Theo suddenly found Pip being plucked from her side by the man of the hour, Georges himself, and being kissed in a way that frankly had no place outside of historic photos from VE Day and cheesy romantic movies. Though she did forgive him when the tall Frenchman resurfaced and pressed a glass of her favourite roséinto her hand. No one knew their wine quite like Georges.

“Theo!” he beamed, giving her a kiss on the cheek too, making her giggle, “I wanted to tell you, my sister, Virginie, she could come after all! She’s over by the bar, you two are acquainted, yes?”

Theo felt a blush bursting across her face and was suddenly very aware of a knowing smirk from Philip where he was hanging off Georges’ arm.

Acquainted was maybe a bit of an understatement…

More accurate would be to say that she’d carried a torch for Virginie de Lafayette for as long as she could remember, one of those crushes that came in youth and was all encompassing, undying, that didn’t care about things like the logistics of there being on ocean between you and the object of the crush. Or the fact that said crush was way out of your league.

Theo had let herself get her hopes up, that summer four years ago, the one where she and Pip had spent six almost dreamlike weeks in France staying with the Lafayette’s. Though that was never how Theo remembered it, she always remembered it as the summer of her first kiss.

It had been shy and sweet and too brief, in her opinion, although no span of time would have been long enough to fully appreciate kissing Ginnie. It had tasted of the wine they’d been illicitly drinking straight from the bottle, the already heady taste made even more rich and full by the fact that they weren’t supposed to be drinking it, Georges had snuck it from the cellar after his parents had gone to bed. It tasted even better on Ginnie’s tongue as a stupid dare had demanded a kiss of the two of them, though Theo couldn’t help but think that she’d been on pins and needles waiting for it ever since she’d arrived. Up close, she’d been able to see how Ginnie’s eyelashes lightened further along their length, how they fanned out so perfectly around eyes that were such a sweet mix of amber and brown, she’d seen how her nose wrinkled a little as she smiled. Theo even saw the things other people would foolishly call imperfections; the few pimples across her cheeks hiding under the artfully applied layer of make up, the way her ears jutted prominently out from amongst the gorgeous falling curtain of braids, the smudge of lipstick on her teeth. All of that only made Ginnie feel more real in a way that made Theo dizzy. This girl actually was real, she was real and she was here and Theo was getting to kiss her.

No matter how short and swift the kiss had been, Theo hadn’t forgotten a single detail of it.

When it had become obvious that Pip and Georges were growing closer and closer over that weekend, trying to hide it by insisting the marks on Pip’s neck were just bruises from wrestling, when they came back from a long midnight walk with the back of Georges’ pants and shirt and the knees of Pip’s jeans covered in grass stains, when they’d tried with blushing faces to insist that the noises emanating from Georges’ room every night were just leaky pipes, Theo had let herself hope. She’d let herself steal glances at Ginnie, more often than she knew she should, thinking…maybe…hoping… They’d spent so much time together, grown so close, she couldn’t help but lie awake at night thinking of the right way to ask her, the most casual way to bring it up. But all of her words had sounded clumsy and thick in her head, stumbling and stupid, in a way that only confirmed what her self consciousness was already screaming at her was true. That there was no way someone like Ginnie would ever want to be with her.

Still, she might have risked it. But then the summer was over and the chance was gone. Theo had tried to shake it off in the years since then, telling herself that it was just a silly summer fancy and it would never come up again. When would she even seeGinnie again?

And yet, here she was. In France. In Paris. Seeing Ginnie again.

She hadn’t changed so much in the few years they’d been reduced to purely text and voice based communications. She was taller, though maybe that was just the impossibly, elegantly tall shoes she was currently striding towards them on. Her braids were still there though now they were streaked with mint green rather than the bright red Theo saw in her dreams ever since that summer; they were swept up in a bun so as not to detract from the glittering golden collar necklace she wore draped effortlessly around her collarbone to accentuate the gold tones in her dress (green, of course, why wouldn’t she match her clothes to her hair dye?).

Even in the startlingly dramatic outfit, with the taller, more toned legs, the more mature form, what was important about Ginnie hadn’t changed one bit. Her bright smile, her kind eyes that made everyone she looked at feel like the most important person in the world, the way she did everything with such enthusiasm and didn’t care if it meant she had to sacrifice a little dignity.

Basically, everything Theo had first fallen for.

Which left her with a frankly pretty embarrassing redness to her cheeks and dry, uncomfortable scratchiness in her throat as Ginnie swept over to the three of them, excitement shining in her eyes along with the golden reflected light arcing off the impressive chandeliers above them. Theo quickly made to turn away a little, to shrink away from the main focus like she always did, to try and gather herself and make herself socially presentable while Ginnie said her other hellos.

But that glow on Ginnie’s face wasn’t for them. It was for Theo.

“Theodosia!” she cried, voice alight with too-gorgeous-to-be-insincere happiness, “How has it been this long, this is a tragedy, I cannot apologise enough!”

Theo made a soft whooshing sound from the force of the hug Gin pulled her into, though she absolutely wasn’t about to start complaining, not when she was getting such an up close and personal introduction to Ginnie’s heavenly perfume.

“Hi…” she squeaked, wishing she could think of something more coherent to say. So much for being the kick ass, collected law school student Philip had been painting her as all night, she was blushing and sweating like a goddamn high schooler, “Yeah, i-it’s been way too long, I missed you…”

“I missed you too!” Ginnie beamed like Theo saying that couldn’t have made her any more delighted, “I kept asking and asking Pip to invite you over so I could see you again and now he finally has, I am officially stealing you away from him, come on, we’re getting drinks.”

Theo blinked, a little caught up in the whirlwind of rapid fire French and the cartoon bluebirds and love hearts she was pretty sure must be dancing around her head. She turned to look at Philip, to say something about meeting back up with them later to head back to his apartment, but that smug, excited look was still on his face, only flustering her more so she flipped him off instead. His giggles followed her and Ginnie over to the elegant, neon lit, white marble bar.

“A martini, please,” Ginnie seemed to somehow just summon a bartender within a second, “And a glass of rose.” She turned to Theo, smiling, “That’s your favourite, right?”

Theo could only nod, her heart feeling like a butterfly trapped under an upturned glass, flittering around within her ribcage.

“I really was so excited you were coming over,” Ginnie pierced a cocktail cherry as she spoke, “I hate how we haven’t had much time to talk recently.”

“Well,” Theo tried for a casual tone, “I’ve had school and your business has been doing so well. Well done on that, by the way. Serious congratulations.”

Ginnie laughed gently, the sound more beautiful to Theo than any of the classical music they’d been playing that night, “And my teachers used to say my doodling dresses on the corner of my schoolwork would get me nowhere, hmm?”

Theo chuckled, taking her glass as it was put in front of her, grateful to have something to do with her hands. She wished there was some kind of switch in her brain she could flick to instantly become one of the effortless, witty, confident people swarming all over this party, the kind of people Ginnie must spend most of her days around. Maybe then she’d have been able to untie her tongue all those summers ago and actually have a chance at asking her-

“Theodosia, would you like to join me for dinner sometime?”

Theo froze for one long, agonising second before she started coughing and hacking, spraying probably very expensive wine all over the place.

Great.

“I’m so sorry!” Ginnie flustered, putting a hand on her back, “I’m sorry, that was so sudden, I just couldn’t think of how to ask like a normal person, I just saw you and you look so pretty and it just kind of spilled out…”

“Wait…wait…” Theo tried to cough up her words, managing to wrestle some kind of control of her lungs back, though her eyes were now streaming and she was pretty damn sure Philip and Georges were laughing their heads off somewhere to the side, “You…you want me…me…?!”

Ginnie looked confused, somehow managing to make even that expression look goddess-like, “Of course? You don’t have to say yes, of course, I just…oh, I just didn’t want to let another chance go by without asking you.”

Theo shook her head, taking Ginnie’s hands in her own. They were so much bigger than hers but their fingers threaded together so easily like they’d been made to be that way.

“Yes,” she breathed, voice still a little wheezy from nearly dying but some of it was due to emotion, “I’d love to go out with you. Honestly, if you wanted to go right now, I’d be completely on board with that.”

Ginnie giggled and beamed. Her nose still wrinkled a little when she smiled…

As Theo was leaving the party, hand in hand with Ginnie, she looked over her shoulder to see Pip grinning his head off, shooting her a little wave she returned with a smile.

There were a lot of things she only did because Philip asked her to.

But she had a hell of a lot to thank him for, too.

#theo burr #virginie de lafayette #starving artists au #for Bailey!#love you honey!#fic #Hamilton

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bluejay73-yt-va · 6 years

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Sleepy Hollow (How to fix this Hellish Mess)

Warning y’all right now that this is gonna be a really long post.

So, the last few weeks, my mom and I have been catching up on Sleepy Hollow all the way from the beginning of Season One. (We had only seen the first two seasons and decided to start from the beginning to refresh our memories) Sleepy Hollow, since I first saw it, has been a favorite show of mine. All the incorporation of different religions and mythologies from around the globe really did a great job of making it feel like the world truly was crashing down all in this small town. I enjoyed the history jokes, the witty banter between Ichabod and Abigail. I loved all the characters really, and felt sad when they were sad, happy when they were happy, etc.

As we all know, the reason Season 4 flopped so bad was because of (spoiler alert by the way, in case that wasn’t clear), Abigail Mill’s death at the end of Season 3. I could go into more detail about how TV Shows and Movies always kill off the non-white and non-straight characters, but honestly, I don’t believe I could contribute anything that hasn’t already been said better by someone else. Now the show has honestly had some sketchy writers on issues of race and minorities, but it has also had some very good writing on those issues as well. One scene that will always stick with me is when Abigail meets Ben Franklin, and he refers to her as the “Embodiment of the American Dream” and as the grandson of a WWII survivor and immigrant, the American Dream is something I think about a lot, and yes, Abigail Mills was a prime example of it.

I will admit the reboot that was Season 4 was hard to get used to, but it did a good job of expanding the world. But something else that stuck out to me, at least based on my interpretations, was that I noticed a lot of Abbie Mills resurrection flags being thrown up, and honestly, I feel the need to go into detail about these:

Pandora’s Box was not broken into pieces, but rather exploded in a ball of light. For all we know it got sent back to the Catacombs. Despite Pandora telling us that Abbie was not in the box, we also know Pandora lied all the time.

The mantle of Witness does not require death in order to be passed on. We see this at the end of Season 4 when Molly loses the mantle to Lora.

Resurrection happens all the damn time, like seriously, if they can find a way to bring Henry Fucking Parish back for what, the fifth damn time, reviving Mills is definitely within the realm of possibility.

More than one horseman of death can exist at once, we saw this with Ichabod and Henry’s connection to War. Why is this important? Well, Abraham’s head is still in the box (presumably) since it was sucked in before being destroyed. So, with the possible return of the box, we could see Abraham again, and his battle to for possession of the Avatar of Death with the new one, or heck, he could even join up with Ichabod and Abbie.

So, if I were to write a theoretical season 5, it would go something like this: Shortly after the defeat of the Kraken shown at the end of Season 4, strange things start happening. A strange change in the flow of magical energies through the lay lines is causing more creatures to appear, including ones previously thought to be defeated. In the process, Lora goes missing, and, like a phoenix, Abigail Mills returns, causing everyone in the FBI to collectively go “What the fuck?”, and after being sealed to Pandora’s box for a while, has awakened more of her witch powers. The two witnesses reunite to face their fourth tribulation, along with help from friends old and new alike.

Honestly, if an amateur like myself can come up with a satisfying way to continue the series, then I don’t see why a team of professionals can’t. But for now, to humor the idea that the series would go on with myself and a team of other amateur writers at the helm, here are some things that I believe the series could use.

More prominent roles for POC Characters, aside from what happened to Irving and Abbie, it always upset me that many of the non-white characters weren’t deemed important enough for the title sequence, not even some of the main antagonists.

LGBT Characters (and given this show’s track record I should add “that don’t die” to the end)

Religious Characters who aren’t Christian. I get that this whole thing revolves around Revelation, but considering how much the show draws from other religions and mythologies, why haven’t we seen things like an Islamic US Soldier who gets sucked into the fight of good against evil when a monster interrupts his daily prayers, or a bad-ass rabbi that goes around killing Nazi Zombies, or maybe a young Baha’i who, while doing research about different mythologies and religions, stumbles across the existence of Agency 355.

Speaking of Nazi Zombies, how about incorporating other times when the war between good and evil was brought to the forefront of the American War Effort, and how those people dealt with not having the witnesses around.

A recovery arc for Irving, because like damn, he and his family deserve to be happy.

Good witches, that actually accurately portray modern Wicca and Witches, (who, I feel the need to add again DON’T DIE)

Honestly someone get Lin Manuel-Miranda on this show so Ichabod can actually come to appreciate the musical because Ichabod and Lin would get along so well, like seriously you could do a whole episode about the actual ghost of Alexander Hamilton giving a message to Crane and Abbie through Lin Manuel-Miranda

Honestly, this show had, and has so much potential that is being held back by racist and backwards-thinking writers, and it deserves to be good again. But I guess there’s nothing I can really do about it, I’m just another angry fan among many.

(To end on a not totally sad, but slightly unrelated note: I absolutely loved the casting choice of have the fucking Kentucky Colonel Sanders play the Devil Himself.)

#sleepy hollow #long post #I guess I could describe this as discourse #sleepy hollow fox

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imgonnabeyourbubblegumwitch · 7 years

Text

I Love You, You Pay My Rent: Chapter One

Previous Chapter (Prologue)

Nico had been officially living with Will Solace, professional rich person and minor celebrity for a grand total of one and a half days. It had, so far and against all expectations, been uneventful. Will hadn't actually been around all that much, though what he during the day Nico wasn't sure because he was pretty convinced Will didn't have an actual, proper job. The only evidence Nico was sharing a very nice apartment with another human being was the leftover pizza that had appeared in the fridge, an empty bottle of vodka that had appeared in the recycling and a memorable 5am rendition of the circle of life followed by a long period of rapping and Will shouting Alexander Hamilton over and over again. Nico hadn't known if Will were coming or going, waking up to go out, or drunk and coming in, and by the time he himself had gotten up several hours later at a far more sociable time Will was nowhere to be found.

Nico heated up the pizza, and tossed the note inviting him to help himself in the trash. He wandered around the apartment as he ate, picking pineapple off his slices as he went. He still couldn't believe he had ended up here, rent free. He was still slightly suspicious about Will's motives. No one let a stranger stay with them rent free. No one. Maybe there was some kind of bet involved. Or maybe Will was running some kind of scam, or was avoiding taxes.

Still even though he might be an unwitting accomplice to a crime, Nico had to admit the benefits of living with Will, for the moment, outweighed the projected cost of a lengthy court case and some time behind bars for misconduct unknown.

It was weird, though, having so much space and time to himself. Nico didn't usually crave human interaction, in fact he usually attempted to keep it at bay with a long stick, dark clothes and a bite-me attitude, but it was odd being on his own. Living with Leo had been living with constant noise. Leo just did not have an off-switch and so Nico had been constantly working to tune out an endless feed of useless chatter. And even in those rare moments when Leo wasn't talking, he was usually hammering at something that didn't look like it should be hammered. That or taking part in dubious DIY tasks that either worked against all odds, or failed spectacularly and required a visit from one of Leo's many and undefined relatives who between them seemed to fulfil the complete home construction spectrum.

Life for Will, aside from the 5am shower concert thing, was apparently going to be quiet.

In an attempt to be a decent housemate Nico washed up the plate he'd used as a morgue for the rejected pineapple and only used two exclamation marks on the note he left for Will on the fridge questioning the inclusion of the topping on pizza. Then he wandered around the living room for the sheer novelty of having enough space to be able to wander around the living room. It had been a long time since he'd been in an apartment this fancy, back before Leo when he'd lived with his father, or more accurately a series of housekeepers and au pairs while his father worked. They hadn't really been home, those apartments, any more than the family mansion they drove to every Christmas. With his father Nico would never have dared wake up at two-thirty in the afternoon, to wander around eating pizza, not even in the school holidays. His father had instilled in him, that there was always work to be done, and more importantly there was always someone watching. He should conduct himself with decorum.

He suddenly felt very self-conscious. He wasn't sure when Will would be coming back and even though Will had insisted he make himself at home, Nico felt strange being in the clothes he'd worn yesterday to move in in. He'd slept in them, curled up on the bare mattress, because he couldn't be bothered to search through his meagre possessions for his pyjamas and sheets. But he didn't want Will to get the impression that he was a slob, however accurate that impression might actually be so he retreated back to his room, not quite running but definitely moving at something quicker than a walk.

The boxes and bags he'd brought with him from his old apartment were stacked in a corner of the room that was now his. He really didn't have much. One bag of laundry he hadn't had time to do before leaving Leo's. A small box of assorted nick nacks, toys and other items he didn't really know what to do with: his mythomagic cards banded together with a corroding rubber band, an old notebook he'd used as a diary for a couple of weeks before he'd gotten bored with the idea of writing every day, other junk. Then lastly there was a black duffle bag which had his clean clo-

He withdrew a bright top he'd never wear, followed by a strange hat and what looked like part of an engine. These weren’t his clothes. This was Leo's bag. Which meant Leo had his clothes, Leo who was now probably half way across the country had his clothes. And Nico had a jacket, the outfit he was wearing and a three quarters full bag of laundry. He didn't even have his bed sheets: he'd shoved them in the bag along with his clothes.

Okay, he thought, it's fine. There was the laundry, he'd just have to do that. That would give him one work outfit, a pair of jeans that had seen better days and a couple of tops. Then there were the clothes he was in. He could wash those too. And, in the meantime, he'd just have to wear -

He looked back at Leo's bag with growing horror. He tipped it all out on his floor and there was a worrying clanking sound. He sorted through all the stuff, moving mechanical devices, screwdrivers and a chocolate bar over to the sell-for-scrap pile (and if Leo was upset about that he should have thought about it before making off with Nico's stuff). That left him with a handful of crumpled t-shirts that were small even for him, and a pair of shorts that were faded, stained and so threadbare it was hard to tell if Leo wore them or used them for cleaning.

It wasn't a great selection but he pulled on one of the bigger t-shirts, and the shorts. The t-shirt was bright yellow with a sunny, tropical picture of a parrot and some fruit. It ended too quickly and was far too tight. The shorts were little better: too low and, since the elastic had gone, worryingly loose around his hips. Now he really prayed that wherever Will was he was planning on staying there a long time.

He scooped up his own clothes and hurried to the washer. He dumped the lot in the machine and scouted around for washing powder. He closed the lid and then had to come to terms with the fact he had absolutely no idea how the washing machine worked. He stared at the control panel for a full minute trying to decipher symbols and pictograms that littered a control panel that looked like it should be controlling the enterprise rather than just washing your clothes. He stabbed a few buttons at random, and hoping he hadn't accidentally summoned a demon, ran back to his room like a skittish rabbit lest Will enter and see his bright yellow t-shirt and shorts of shame.

The washing machine was making comforting washing sounds that Nico could hear even from his room so he let it get on with it and focused on the other box he'd brought with him. Some of the items, like the mythomagic cards or his older sister’s teddy bear, he knew he'd never be able to part with but most of it was trash. Broken toys and memories had been heaped on the pile of useless junk from Leo's bag (he'd claimed the chocolate bar as his own). He was reading through his diary with the self-aware pain that came from reading the things his younger self had found angst-worthy (if only he'd known) when he first noticed that Will's nice wooden floor suddenly felt kind of wet.

Nico swore resolutely and scrambled to his feet. The washing machine was still rumbling happily but was now disgorging oddly tinted water on the floor in torrents. A panicked ten seconds of button mashing yielded no immediate halt to its attempt to flood the place so Nico decided to end it at the source and seek out it's kill switch. That proved to be harder than he'd imagined. He just couldn't find the lead and was beginning to think he'd discovered the world's first washing machine that could run on pure spite alone.

He slapped it since he had the impression this usually worked with computers but that only left him with a sore hand. Grumbling furiously, he ran into his bathroom, discovered he had also managed to forget towels were a necessity, backtracked to Will's. Towels in hand he began trying to limit the progress of the flood with an improvised wall, so that he would be less worried about the concerningly purple water damaging anything expensive, or creating an interesting reaction with anything electronic in the living room before he could subdue the poltergeist residing in the washing machine.

Barrier temporarily holding the flood at bay, he proceeded back to the washing machine with phone in hand.

"You are making me look on forums," he told the washing machine. "I officially hate you."

In response the machine began spitting up heavily fragranced bubbles.

Nico swore again, this time with even more feeling.

Okay, forget forums, it was time to call Leo.

Leo answered on what felt like the nine-hundreth ring. At the exact same time, Nico saw his mythomagic cards floating gently past amid a happy scattering of floral scented bubbles. He vocalised his feelings about this in no uncertain terms that made Leo threaten to clean his mouth out with soap the next time they saw each other.

"You probably won't need to," Nico said darkly as he bent down to pick up one of the cards and ended up with a nose full of bubbles. "Not if this keeps up."

"You're making no sense Nico."

He lunged for another card - Hades, that had a permanent place in all his decks - and slipped. He managed to stay upright but went skidding along on his towel barrier which had pretty much reached the limits of it's effectiveness. In an effort to stop himself from faceplanting the floor and/or banging into anything that looked breakable he threw out his hands and while remembering to keep a firm grip on his childhood cards, forgot about his phone which went flying at the front door.

The front door which was open and framing a very confused Will Solace.

"Oh gods," Nico had time to say before his phone hit Will in the nose.

There was a pause while Nico tried to find the words to explain the water and the bubbles and the cards and - oh hell - his clothes. Will surveyed the chaos with an unreadable expression. And then he burst out laughing.

It was unexpected but it was better than the yelling.

"What happened?" Will asked. "Are those mythomagic cards?"

He too another, longer look at Nico taking in the outfit and Nico's unsuccessful attempts to stand in slippery socks on a sodden floor.

"I like the t-shirt," he commented. "Very subversive. I can see you are really trying to mock -"

He broke off dissolving into laughter.

"I'm sorry," he said between giggles, "you - just - look- "

"Yeah, yeah," Nico grumbled. "Well the bubbles in your hair look ridiculous."

Will put a hand up to his head and as he did Nico threw a handful of bubbles at him. They missed, by a long way, because bubbles weren't a particularly reliable throwing material. Will laughed even harder and tried to throw some back but his aim was even poorer because he was giggling so much. Nico fell down again and he though he tried to stop himself he couldn't help but start giggling too.

Will had left the door open and an older lady with perfectly coiled hair and a fur coat was looking in at them in obvious consternation and disapproval. Nico waved and Will turned.

"Good afternoon Mrs Dodds," Will said. "Lovely weather we're having, isn't it?"

Mrs Dodds scoffed and turned her back on them. Nico began laughing at the stupidness of the situation and his laughter set Will off again. Will looked cute when he laughed: nose (red from where the phone had struck) all scrunched up like a kid he looked less like some unattainable-rock-star-minor-god-model, and more down to earth. Nico felt his heart skip a beat and a few tentative butterflies preparing to take flight in his stomach. The feelings were oddly sobering and he felt the laughter dying in his throat.

"I really am sorry about the mess," he said. "I must be the worst housemate you've ever had."

"Oh, not by a long shot," Will said amiably. "I once had someone who collected dead frogs.”

He tried to lever himself to his feet and after several attempts managed to get to his feet and with an awkward, penguin on ice like shuffle made it to the front door which he shut very firmly.

"How about I order food, we put on some music and have a cleaning up party?" he suggested.

"You don't have to help," Nico said. "I'll do it, I did make the mess."

"I forget to warn you the washing machine can be temperamental," Will said with a shrug. "Though I've never seen it do this before. You've got some quite incredible machine-messing skills, Di Angelo."

Nico grinned. It was an automatic response to Will's light teasing that he didn't have time to think through, or dampen down.

"Gotta be good at something," Nico said. "And for me that something is riling up the demon ghost that resides in your washing machine."

"They should write a film about your exploits," Will commented, completely straight faced. "I bagsie the rights."

"Only if you promise to hire

Will ordered Chinese. He put on some music - something upbeat and poppy that Nico wouldn't usually necessarily enjoy but actually worked pretty well trying to clean up a lilac coloured flood with his new landlord.

Will brought out more towels from the bathroom and tossed some to Nico. Then he paused.

"I don't have a mop," he said as though it had only just occurred to him.

"Why don't you have a mop?" Nico asked.

"Did you have a mop at your old place?" Will demanded.

"Yes!" Nico said. "We weren't heathens! We just didn't have a hoover, or a dishcloth for a long time, or plates for the first few weeks. But a mop! Of course."

"Yeah well I'd offer you a discount on your rent for forgetting such an important life-changing item but you're not actually paying me anything so-"

"You could always start paying me to live here," Nico mused.

Will stuck his tongue out and then sighed.

"One of my neighbours probably has one."

He sloshed his way over to the door.

"Be right back. Wish me luck."

"You're asking to borrow a mop from your neighbours, how much luck can you need?"

Will pulled a face that indicated he had shocking, horrifying knowledge that no mortal should posses.

"You don't want to know," he said in a deep whisper and then darted out, closing the door behind him.

As soon as he was gone, the butterflies that had been previously hesitant and timid took full flight in Nico's stomach. He realised he was smiling and wiped the expression off his face and focused very hard on extracting sodden mythomagic cards and leaving them all lined up on the counter tops to dry.

Will returned some ten minutes later with a mop and a chastised air.

"Nancy was of your view that mops are a basic human right and she could not believe I do not own one."

"See," Nico said. “It’s not just me who thinks you are a heathen.”

Nico was not usually a fan of cleaning but working alongside Will was kind of fun. It may have had something to do with Will, who was in charge of mopping and was utterly distracting. He spent more time dancing with the mop and singing along to whatever song was playing than actually mopping. Nico could hardly drag his eyes away from him, so he pointed out, perfectly reasonably, that it was an inefficient method of mopping and that Will's music choice sucked.

"Alright what would you put on?"

Nico hadn't been expecting that.

"I don't know. The Ramones maybe?"

Will held his gaze while he retrieved his laptop and then changed the song with a slight smirk.

"What you didn't think I'd have the Ramones?"

"I thought it would be all Disney songs and show tunes."

"Disney songs and show tunes?" Will asked sounding like he was trying not to laugh.

"I don't know," Nico admitted, "I have no idea what you like."

"They come on later," Will promised him with a grin.

Ten minutes later they were both jumping up and down to Blitzkrieg Bop and Will was singing and he was actually not all that bad when it wasn't 5am. They were halfway through the second verse when someone began banging on the walls.

"Oh ignore it," Will said. "That's Octavian. He's always complaining about something. Like when I hoover at 3am."

"Why do you -?"

"Because the night before Octavian was grinding breeze blocks and some sheet metal in his blender. I assume that's what he was doing. That's what it sounded like he was doing."

The banging sounded again, on the door this time. Will rolled his eyes but he stormed over and yanked the door open, shutting down the music with a wave of a remote as his did so.

"Hello Octavian," Will said with a forced polite smile. "Is everything alright? If you've come to borrow a mop I'm afraid I'm lacking that basic necessity."

Nico laughed and Octavian cast his sharp eyes over to him. Octavian was pale and thin. His eyes were faint blue and his hair was thin, and almost colourless. The general impression he gave was of a scarecrow that had been modelled on a skeleton. All the right features were there and they were all in the right places but the proportions and the colour scheme was entirely off.

"Can you keep it down?" Octavian asked. "I'm trying to work. Not all of us get money handed to us on a silver platter you know."

Will shrugged at that, but Nico thought that something about the jibe may have hit home because he seemed a little tenser.

"So sorry to interrupt your work. I know it's all you have since you can't seem to keep friends."

"Look who's talking," Octavian sneered. "How many housemates have you gone through now? How long do you think this one will stay?"

He glanced over at Nico again, looked him up and down and then turned away without comment as though he didn't think Nico was worth it.

"We'll try to keep the sounds of us enjoying our lives from disturbing your emptiness," Will snapped and closed the door in Octavian's face. He didn't turn around immediately and Nico got the impression he was trying to force himself back towards cheerfulness.

"To be fair," Will said when he did turn. "We probably were being kind of loud."

He put the music back on but in deference to Octavian it was no longer deafening and could be classed merely as noisy. In deference to the fact that Will hadn't freaked out when he'd come home to a flood, Nico didn't bring up what Octavian had said about the other housemates. It didn't stop him wondering though. Will seemed nice enough but Nico still couldn't get past the no rent thing. It made no sense to him. He couldn't figure out why Will would be so desperate to have someone in his spare room that he'd offer it to them for free.

By the time the food came, the flat was pretty clean. Nico's jeans, now several shades lighter than their once jet black, and other clothes had been shoved in the dryer. The floor was mopped, all of Nico's cards were drying on the counter tops. Order had been restored.

Will put on a movie while they ate. Will had seen it before and Nico was more interested in watching Will out the corner of his eye so he often missed big plot points. Will seemed happy enough but Nico got the impression he was worried from the way he picked at his food rather than just eating it. In the end, Will put it to the side entirely and picked up a fortune cookie gazing at it like an unexploded bomb.

"You know they are mass printed somewhere right?" Nico asked eventually when Will still hadn't cracked it open.

Will gave a rueful smile.

"I know. It's stupid. I usually ask them not to give me fortune cookies though. I don't know what it is, they just always seem to come true."

"Well how bad can that be?" asked Nico. "It's always, you'll find happiness when you least expect it or time waits for no man. Stupid, meaningless stuff."

"I know," Will said again. "Believe me, I know."

But he didn't open the fortune.

"Here I'll do mine," said Nico.

He grabbed his off the table and opened it up.

"Okay," he said unfolding the paper. "Mine reads: help! I'm trapped in a fortune cookie factory!"

Will burst out laughing and reached for it.

"Let me see that!"

"Alright it actually says good news of a long-awaited event will soon arrive. Stupid and meaningless."

Will grinned.

“I guess you’re right.”

But he still didn’t open it, and when Nico went to clean up the food later that night he couldn’t help but notice the cookie was missing.

Next Chapter

#writing #fandom #Will Solace #Nico Di Angelo #will solace/nico di angelo #solangelo #percy jackson and the olympians

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