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#unnamed narrator
h4mm132l1c3 · 4 months
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Hey everyone! I was the writing mod for @gothamcenzine, a for-charity DC Comics zine dedicated to all things fashion. It was an absolute joy to work with everyone, and pre-orders are open until DECEMBER 15TH, so grab a copy now! Here's a sneak peak at my piece, featuring Terry!
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trashbinbackyard · 4 months
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0 - The fool
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A journal entry of an unknown author, written in code.
I have been thinking. Of time, and we as a people have always been the same. The child from 400 years ago would cling to her mothers hem the same way the children accompanying their parents in the grand bazaar would today. People have felt the overwhelming joy of love, the heartbreak of loss, and keep mementos of their dearest ones. 
Truly, most of my discoveries on dig sites have been little glimpses into the life of the ordinary, the forgettable people who have come before us. Of course, these aren’t considered finds worthy of grand research or public acclaim, and I feel like people outside of my field do not find comfort and appreciation of the ordinary. It is my duty to acknowledge them, and to remember them, so wherever they might be, they shall find comfort that their lives, no matter how small, had meaning.
So, a little prelude to what happened today.
Grand people come few and far between, a single king or queen could define an entire century, and in their shadow, would be the ordinary, toiling away, forgotten.
The many wise men and women before me have given our era of life, the name “Second age” after the astonishing event known as the Rapture, it is believed to be the source of our magic, and its very nature, but nothing beyond that was widely known. That was until I met him. 
To the clergy he was more precious than anything, a relic in his own right. He had accurately called me out for snooping in the archives of the grand temple, under the altar for Sune. At first I didn’t realize who exactly I was speaking to, and frankly I was a little on edge. A tall elven man dressed in all black stood behind me from where I was reading some tomes. I couldn’t really make out details in the dim light.
“You’re an inquisitive one,” I remember him saying, in a tone that I found quite pleasant, not accusatory, nor aggressive, curious, even.
I let my mouth get the better of me and babbled on and on about the many fields of research I’ve dabbled in, and that my current interests lie in the first age, that I was very close to finding out where a great lord used to have a winter estate, and that the according to the historians, he was great patron of arts. Oh to just think of it leaves me giddy, to see all the art collected by someone from that age, what time defining pieces would he have, what they would tell me about the lives of the people, what they appreciate, valued, revered, what they found appealing.
At that point I’m sure I had rambled on for so long, the man had started leaning against a wall with what I assume was his best attempt at a polite look, hiding his boredom. I'm sure he had seen and heard things much more magnificent than an art collection.
He was very gracious in his listening, and In fact offered for me to come meet him at his estate. Which brings me to today.
The estate address I was given was in the Pera district, on the other side the grand river from where I resided, the location quite idyllic, on the tall hill near the shore. The manor itself didn’t stand out, a three story building of light sandstone, no names on the door, nor the street.
I walked in like the man had instructed me to do. A tressym greeted me as I nearly stumbled on the poor thing. It kept vocalizing and rubbing against my legs for a while, which would’ve been the highlight of my day if not for the revelations to come. It hopped up the flight of stairs soon after, looking at me 
Seeing no one else, I assumed I was meant to follow the tressym, so I did. It led me to a terrace between the second and third floor. A tea set had been laid out, three chairs around a circle table. The view on the balcony was one of the best I’ve witnessed in Nia Vasileos.
Turns out I wasn’t the only one admiring the view. The man who had invited me here stood leaning against the balcony railing, his ear twitched at the sound of my footsteps and I knew he had noticed me entering.
He turned to greet me, and now in the broad daylight (which was a beautiful, sunny day), I could see him better, still dressed in all black. His black hair was long and straight, with white roots, a scar crossed his brow, his eyes… an impossible shade of bright orange, like fire burning. I got a little uneasy to be fairly honest. Now, there was an air of something grander, something ancient around us. I was looking history in the eyes.
He was very polite, despite the immense power he held. He had set up an afternoon tea for us, he let me know that he had followed me around for much longer than I would think, that I was an “interesting person” to know. And that I may ask him anything I wanted to know, but he held onto his right to not necessarily answer.
We had the most delightful conversation. I asked him about the first age, how old was he, what were his favorite things from the first age, are there others like him?
He entertained all of my questions, even the silly small ones, in the midst of taking sips of the perfectly brewed black tea. 
The tressym had curled up the third chair, and he would occasionally give it a few scritches, I asked about it, he said it was his partner’s, now, he hadn’t really given me a straight answer when I asked if there’s is any more people… or beings, like him. I would assume someone beyond the reach of time would be… lonely. 
He gave a laugh and shook his head, “oh believe me, it is a lonely existence, but at least I can share it with someone”, he would turn his head to the sea, “I’ll be honest, I’m not sure how many of us there are, the world is a large place after all”.
I followed his gaze to the sea. The scenery, the very moment, was idyllic, the gentle lap of the waves against the cliffside under us, the occasional whistle of the boats passing us by, the cheerful screams of children jumping off the cliffs into the warm water below.
A gentle breeze blew through my hair, through his hair, and I turned to look back at him, waiting if he had anything else to say still.
“A little too large.” He said, with a hint of melancholy in his voice, “But you still have time, enough to see a lot of it, should you wish”.
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Doctor Who Minific / Prompt : Never Alone, Old Girl.
A Companion goes for a midnight stroll through the TARDIS corridors to try and tire themselves out after their memories of latest adventure with the Doctor wake them up with a nightmare, too wired to go back to sleep from all the adrenaline in their system.
They start wandering the corridors.... take a wrong turn on the way to the kitchen... And promptly get lost.
As they wander deeper and deeper into the unused corridors of the TARDIS, each new hallway turns the lights on automatically for them, but are otherwise dark.
Until they finally keep walking and discover a corridor with the lights on.
And voices ahead.
-------------------------
Curious and cautious in equal terms, the Companion creeps around the corner, wondering if some people wandered in and got lost in the TARDIS, if the Doctor has other friends with him that he forgot to mention, or, more worryingly, if an enemy has snuck aboard the TARDIS and is planning a strike from the inside.
The companion comes around the corner and discovers.... Another library.
And it is full of strangers.
Old men in dinner jackets and cravats and bowties and giant scarves are playing what looks to be a 20-level, multiplayer game of 4D chess from Star Trek at the central table.
Around them, older men and women are reading or talking or playing games with a collection of younger people, all of them in a diverse range of hair styles and clothing fashions-- from old fashioned to glamorous to downright bizarre.
One man is wearing what could have been a believable clown costume and cat pins, while another appears to be a walking Progress Pride flag great coat, with different nonbinary flags marking each sleeve and pant leg.
There's dozens and dozens of people in the room, all laughing and joking and interacting, and even as the companion watches more people filter in and out, wandering down other lit corridors as a casual pace, or running in bathing suits, shrieking in laughter as they charge into a room that is scented with sea salt even from far away, ignoring one of the women that shout after them "No running around the pool! You don't want to end up like me, do you?"
"Romana, come now. They can come to no harm, you know that." Another figure with purple sunglasses says, wearing a bright yellow rain jacket that crinkles as -- Xe, the companion notes from their pronoun pin-- lays a hand on Romana's shoulder.
Romana sniffed and crossed her arms. "It's the principal of the matter."
The Companion's jaw is slack, staring at all these people just lounging around and playing as though they own the place.
Who are these people and what on earth are they doing here?
"Well hello there, my young companion, I see you have found my friends." An old-fashioned, enunciated man's voice says from beside the Companion and they whirl around-- to see a figure made of blue light standing beside them.
"Who are you!?" The Companion demands, jerking back, wondering if they need to run from this strange being.
The figure laughs, "Don't you recognize me? Come now, think about it for just a moment..."
The Companion stares at the blue figure and then glances at the room full of people, some of which has turned their gaze in them, smiling in their direction or giving little waves when their eyes make contact.
They... All did seem familiar. In a strange way. As though they were people they had onced loved, and simply forgotten.
There's a presence in their mind, a slight hum that they never really paid attention to, but it was only ever present when in ...
"You're the TARDIS." Companion realizes.
"I am Indeed." The TARDIS agrees, reaching out a hand to shake, which the Companion excepts with a small tingle of static shock. "And do you know who those people are in that room?" The TARDIS asks leadingly, pointing into the room.
The Companion looks at the people again. All the men, women, children, and in between, the ones most oddly dressed all seeming familiar in a strange way.
"They're the Doctor." The Companion realizes. "And their compaions. From the past."
"And Future." The TARDIS says, a smile evident in her voice. "Time, you will find it, is rather transcendental for us TARDISes."
"But why are they here? How?" Compaion wonders. The TARDIS gently shoos them into the room full of Doctors and Companions, and quite a number of them all rush over to greet them, introducing themselves.
"I always program a senti hologram of my current self into the TARDIS databanks in case something ever goes very very wrong." A man with close cropped hair and big ears explained, "That way they can explain what's happening to whatever friends I have with me at the time and the TARDIS will fly herself to their home and time, and can act as a medium between my friends and the TARDIS, since she can't usually communicate directly "
"But...." Companion turns to look at the blue TARDIS figure. "she's talking right now."
"That is because we are much closer to the power left behind by the anti-time Casket of Zagreus."
A beautiful man with long curly hair jogged over, fidgeting with slight abashment with his velvet frock coat as he explained, "Time and Anti-Time meeting like that doesn't just explode once, it is always exploding, and always was. And never did and never was. It's a paradox of the highest order, and it's an incredible source of eternal power, even if the range is rather short." He smiled apologetically.
"Yes, the TARDIS is able to use that power source to manifest the most complete imprints of us that she has, but it's only here, in the deepest depths of the TARDIS that we can form, it doesn't extend far enough for us to go to the main or auxiliary console rooms." A young woman with blonde hair said, standing next to the frock-coated Doctor and grabbing his hand with a smile.
"But..." Companion says slowly, trying not to be tactless, "Don't you... Ever get bored? Stuck in here all day?"
Everyone in earshot laughs.
"My dear child, how could we ever be something as mundane as 'bored'? The power from the Casket is infinite. We have entire universe here for us to explore, all of our loved ones that have ever visited the TARDIS are here, and we have eternity with our loved ones, knowing they will always be safe and here with us." The oldest man there said, where he was seated still at the chess table, "And best of all, no more creaky, old knees." He laughed. "I can give Ian a run for his money now."
"Yes Grandfather, we know. You beat him in a footrace just yesterday, remember?" A young girl with short black hair and black eyes reminded him, giggling at his smug expression, which fell slightly as the girl continued "And Barbara beat both of you!"
Companion looked around at all of the smiling, laughing people, the oddest-dressed amongst them having an odd familiarity to them, as through they were dear old friends, forgotten, just waiting to meet again and make new memories.
"Will I end up here one day?" Companion wondered.
There was a streak of silver and blue light, and Companion watched as a young person in a high-tech wheelchair zoomed through the room led by a robotic dog, and chasing behind them, cheering and laughing, was a large group of young people, all whopping and hollaring--
And amongst the crowd was a voice both familar and alien, uncanny, and Companion got a brief glimpse of their own face amongst the crowd, a little older, a little more confident, and grinning so broadly in joy that Companion's own face hurt in sympathy.
"You always have been." The TARDIS said, an her voice was full of warmth and affection.
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Anyways here's a thingey I did and really like
I turned the corridor, my knees creaking and whirring as I walked, and finally found him. He was sitting at the window with his beaten-up hat in hand, staring off into the void speckled with stars. His grey-streaked hair was pulled back in a simple bun, the hair band barely containing the volume but somehow not breaking. I walked over and sat down, some small amount of steam hissing from my joints as I did so. My repairs were not yet complete- my chassis was bound to do things it shouldn't until I was completely fixed. He must have heard me, but he did not react.
I studied his face, which was partially blocked by shadow. In the darkness of space, there was nothing for light to bounce off of, so the only source of light in the room was a flickering overhead light near the door. His face, as much as I could see, was calm. The scars from countless machinery accidents and the life of a vagabond stretched across his face and neck like strokes of paint- like I could wipe them off with a wet rag and reveal unblemished skin.
"What are you doing?" I asked, looking out of the window.
There was nothing other than the coldness of space. I didn't know what cold was, as I didn't have any temperature receptors that allowed me to feel changes in temperature, but I've seen bodies crystallize into blocks of icy flesh after an incident with the sealing of hatches and the like. If space was hot, people would just burn up.
"I'm looking," He replied, his voice rough with age and whiskey.
I looked out again, surveying each individual star and charting them in my head. It was nothing new or of importance- just the same star system we had been floating about the past few days. I scanned them again for any other ships, any possible reasons to be so interested in what was out there, and found nothing.
"What are you looking at?" I asked, tilting my head toward him with a small whirr of gears, some steam hissing from my neck joint.
He looked out at the darkness, the stars and the void contrasting with his dark, warm skin, and I couldn't help but think how alien he looked, his features both familiar and foreign. Was it possible or proper for a robot to consider other life, even its creator, alien? He spoke, his face still turned away from me but his words carrying the emotions of a thousand years. "The Vast and Free Frontier."
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ellieslaces · 2 months
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i read my year of rest and relaxation in less than 24 hours. that shit is heavy but so good. narrator is a bitch and has no redeeming qualities. it’s reva’s world, we’re just living in it
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klausinamarink · 6 months
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One Kid Gone, Another Up and Vanished (part 7)
Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 next: Part 8
spoilers but a phone call gets through!
“You’re a thousand percent sure?”
Mike groans as he checks down the school halls, “Yes, Lucas. How many times do I gotta tell you that?”
“Well, maybe until I’m positive that we’re not having a collective auditory hallucination or the weirdo isn’t tricking us.” Lucas crosses his arms. Beside Dustin, El mutters “auditory hallucination” to herself with furrowed eyebrows.
“You guys hear that?!” Dustin exclaims too loudly, earning equally loud shushes. “Sorry, but El just said a scientific word without mispronouncing it! She really does have superpowers…”
“Not now, Dustin.” Mike hushes as they finally get to the AV club. He unlocks the door and lets everyone inside after peeking in. He guides El to sit in front of the radio while Lucas and Dustin turn it on.
Dustin won’t lie - he’s super excited to see El use her powers for the radio. He couldn’t believe it when she made Will’s voice come out. Will! Alive and singing!
But he’s still confused over Mike’s news of Will being with someone named Eddie. Eddie who? is their biggest question but El can’t say because she doesn’t know his last name or how to describe him.
“He’s a friend.” She keeps telling them.
Dustin prays it’s not Eddie Tremblay from fifth grade. The little sucker doesn’t deserve to be Will’s new friend after his football landed on their rocket project last month.
“Aaaand we’re in!” He announces, hopping behind El. Mike and Lucas squish against him even though they clearly have much more space.
El closes her eyes and listens to the whining static. Then the static changes through channels, voices quickly overlapping until they get more comprehensive. Then the voices get compressed into six, four, two-
“-Control to Major Tom..”
Dustin shoots his hand forward and grabs one of the speakers. But so does Lucas and Mike and now they’re slapping each other’s hands until Lucas finally takes it and yells, “Will, can you read us? Over!”
“‘Your circuit’s dead, there’s something wrong..’”
At the sound of the second person, Dustin’s first thought is oh thank God, it’s not Tremblay. Then his second thought is hm, this Eddie guy sounds kinda cool. Then his third thought is oh my god, we gotta talk to Will!
“Will! Do you copy? Over!”
“Will, where are you?”
“You feeling a bit better so far?”
“Tell Eddie we’re saying hi! Who is he? Over!”
“I’m getting cold again..”
“Me too. C’mon here.”
“Will! We’re right here!”
“How the hell are they not hearing us?”
“I wish I could go home…”
“So do I…”
El gives out a painful gasp and the radio explodes into flames. Dustin manages to extinguish it before the rest of the room catches, but the fire alarm goes off.
They all stare at the now-ruined transmitter, their only chance of connecting with Will and his mysterious new friend.
Eddie’s definitely missing.
It’s a fact that Jeff grows more sure of every day since Wayne Munson had asked him for Eddie’s secretive hideouts.
He keeps trying to ignore the seed of dread in his stomach, but it’s impossible now with the slightly somber atmosphere in the school after the morning announcement of Will Byers’ death. The fact that Eddie hasn’t shown up for classes or in the cafeteria again today isn’t helping either.
“If Munson’s still gonna be on his bender, he should’ve at least cancelled this week’s session.”
Jeff takes a half-open Skittles bag from Maya’s tray and throws it at Evan, making the two members jump. Maya because those are her Skittles and Evan because the bag hits his chest making more pieces fly out on the table.
“Eddie’s not on a bender.” Jeff hisses at Evan. Across him, Frankie is giving him one of his Don’t-Make-This-Any-Worse looks.
Evan huffs and crosses his arms, “Oh, yeah? Then where the hell is he?”
“Definitely not on a bender of any kind!”
“Gee thanks, that clears things up.”
Jeff’s about to snap back, but Frankie discreetly kicks his leg with a warning glare. It might be a good call because Jeff doesn’t know what to say next. Another defence of Eddie, for sure, but nothing to quench the rest of the club’s antsy-ness.
“Maybe he’s gone to a concert. Like hitchhiked to Indy or Chicago?” Maya asks after picking up her spilled candy.
“But he has a van?” Daniel, the senior member of Hellfire and their current drummer, frowns pointedly.
“What concert could’ve he gone to? Is there even any band playing in this bum state?” Evan raises his eyebrows.
“I dunno, Dio?”
“They’re touring in the UK right now.” Frankie says. Jeff shoots him a bewildered look that’s the equivalent to screaming are you kidding me? Frankie gives him a Play-Along-With-It look.
“Well, that settles it.” Evan raps his knuckles on the table. “Munson’s saved a fucking ticket to the goddamned Iron Lady’s territory and is breeding chicks in Dio’s mosh pit as we speak.”
Jeff stands up, no longer feeling hungry. He throws his half-eaten sandwich at Evan. The other boy gives out a disgusted shriek as the mayonnaise hits and stains his shirt. “Dude! What-”
“Shame on you.” Jeff keeps his voice even, just quiet enough for only Hellfire to hear him. Maybe it would somehow reach Eddie wherever the hell he is right now. “The only good thing about Eddie being absent is that he isn’t ripping the skins off of you and your characters right now. Especially you, Evan.”
He stares Evan down, who visibly gulps. “Eddie took you in the club’s open arms because he saw you were a loner who needed the right people to hang out with or you would’ve been one of the bullies. And this is how you thank him?”
He looks at the rest of the members and points at them accusingly. “When Eddie comes back from whatever he’s doing, I hope that rest of y’all feel guilty for thinking he doesn’t care. Because he absolutely does.” Then he grabs his bag and leaves the cafeteria without a second thought.
Outside is chilly as usual and the breeze helps relax Jeff’s nerves. For a while at least.
He stands at the parking lot, trying to think what he should do when he hears someone running over. He looks up and groans.
“Frankie, leave me alone, man.”
“So you haven’t heard anything from Eddie?” Frankie’s voice isn’t accusing but his look might’ve been.
“No. Not since the band practice days ago.” Jeff walks away but Frankie still follows him. “Then his uncle came and asked if I knew any places Eddie frequents. I told you guys that already.”
“Doesn’t stop Evan’s stupid theories.” Frankie mutters.
“You should’ve shut him up!”
“Are you kidding? You did better than what I could’ve done.”
“Words are stronger than death looks.”
Frankie snorts. He goes quiet as they reach the end of the school parking lot. Then he says, “Are you going to search for Eddie?”
Jeff stops. Turns and stares at him. “Uh, yeah? I mean, from what he said, Wayne’s probably already doing that. So, I dunno, I’m probably gonna do the bare minimum. Like where am I going to look, dude?”
Frankie doesn’t answer. His face is strangely pale and looking at something behind Jeff. He follows his friend’s phase and feels the dread well up in his mouth when he sees a poster on a nearby telephone pole.
He doesn’t need a closer look to recognize the black and white photo of Eddie from two months ago grinning at him or the large word MISSING written in Sharpie above it.
He tries very hard not to notice that it’s stapled right below Will Byers’ already wrinkled poster.
It’s a very strong feeling to see your best friend’s missing poster a few days after you last saw him alive.
Jeff forces to tear his eyes away from Eddie’s captured monochrome cheeriness. “Know what? Fuck it. Let’s find him. Wanna start at the woods?”
There’s something about singing quietly in the nightscape hell mirror version of your bedroom that makes Eddie’s fingers twitch to jolt it down somewhere.
After the meltdown at the house, Will had grew more quiet. Eddie had rocked him until Will complained of motion sickness and then Eddie had held him even when they slept.
After piggybacking the kid and singing “Should I Stay Or Should I Go?” (at least until Eddie admitted death by earworms and convinced a change to “Space Oddity”) on the way back to Forest Hills, Will seemed to be back in his original spirits. Still quiet but no longer on the verge of tears next to Eddie. Although his coughs started to sound more wet and shook his small frame like a leaf.
Eddie prays to god that he can speak to Wayne this time. He hopes his uncle to come up with a cooler code system than Mrs. Byers and maybe get them out somehow.
But the trailer is quiet, save for Will’s whistled breathing as he sleeps in Eddie’s arms, the old itchy quilt cocooning them both. He has to stay up. Keep a lookout for the demogorgon in this hell land and for Wayne in the real world. But he feels so tired. If he can rest his eyes for just a moment…
The sound of muffled crying wakes him up.
The longer Wayne stares at the posters, the bigger the impulse to rip them up grows.
After Hopper left, he had went back inside and started on making the Missing posters for Eddie. The hardest part of it had been trying to find the right photo of his nephew and he had held back tears at how much Eddie had grown. How happier he looks.
He had printed copies at the library, keeping his head down from curious and pitying eyes. Christi Waldon was nice enough not to charge him for the fees.
Then he started putting the posters up and Wayne had felt like he was making a mistake.
Nobody never said anything how difficult it is to go around town again, putting a poster with your child’s face silently begging strangers who may disliked them to find them, and to do all of this without the police helping.
Wayne had printed 100 copies. He only managed to put up 18 of them before it became too much and hurried home.
Now there’s a pile of 82 posters with Eddie’s face staring up at him on the table. Wayne can’t bring himself to rip them up no matter what his mind demands it. He has a new superstition that if he does, Eddie will never be found alive.
He checks the time. Seeing it’s only after six, he sighs heavily and takes out his cigarette. He’s briefly overcome with the memory of catching a fourteen year old Eddie trying to smoke and how his smart cookie of a nephew swallowed the lit cigarette, immediately threw up, and sobbed while Wayne had to sit down so he wouldn’t break his own ass from laughing so far. After they’d both calmed down, Wayne showed him how to smoke properly and said-
He said…
What did he say?
Something erupts from his mouth. He clamps a hand over, suddenly worrying that he just got sick. But there’s no taste of bile. Only wet salt. He takes his hand off and, ah. He’s crying.
Wayne gives a wet laugh. Then it gasps into another sob. He covers his mouth again, unable to hold the tears back.
Above him, the lights flicker.
It feels almost comforting.
Wayne sniffs, watching as the bulbs hang on to its dear life of electricity. Then one of the lamps next to the couch start flickering as well. Slow and rhythmic.
The sadness does go away, but it makes Wayne feel the back of his neck hairs stand up.
Eddie drops his hand from the lights, stomping over to the phone. “Fuck this, now’s the chance.”
Will glances at him from where he’s crouching by the lights, still tired from being jostled awake so soon, “Eddie?”
He turns to him and says, “Little Byers the Vanished, how does one make a landline in the Vale of Shadows?”
“You, uh, just pick it up-”
Eddie does exactly that.
“Wait! It won’t even last-!”
The phone rings with a shrill.
Wayne snaps his head over to it. He’s breathing slowly, watching the landline like it’s his childhood spider.
The atmosphere in his trailer feels suddenly colder. As if there are ghosts present. Waiting.
The phone rings and rings until it gets to voicemail, his gruff message for the last decade. “You’ve reached the Munsons. Leave a message after the beep.”
There’s nothing after the beep.
Wayne looks at the lights again. The ceiling light has stopped but ones over the kitchen and door are flickering this time.
The phone rings again.
He stands up slowly, walking over to the phone. It rings louder to his ears now. He tries to ignore the sudden sense of a presence behind and beside him as he picks the phone up and holds it to his ear.
He hears static as if the caller has a bad connection.
He clears his throat and speaks, “Wayne Munson speakin’.”
The static crackles with some kind of harsh breathing. It’s loud to make Wayne cringe away and hang up-
“..Wayne..”
He freezes. The anxiety vanishes in an instant. “..Eddie?” He chokes out.
“..Wayne!”
“Oh my lord…” Wayne clutches the phone closer. “You’re alive, right? Eddie! Tell me where are you!”
“..I’m-”
The phone bursts into literal shock. He drops it with a yell and it clatters to the ground, dead.
That was him. That was Eddie’s voice.
Breathing raggedly, Wayne’s gaze snaps up to the lamps flashing maniacally. The air around him feels desperate and sinks down upon him. Anxiety comes back as quick as it comes, squashing on the brief spot of hope he felt.
“Nah, fuck this.” He mutters as he swipes his keys and runs out of the door. He can’t deal with more ghosts at this hour.
“Nonono—NO!”
Eddie slams his hands against the lights too hard. The pulsing glass bulbs nearly crack under the pressure.
None of it stops the sound of the truck engine starting.
“Wayne, it’s me! Can’t you hear me?!” Eddie’s throat is already dry from screaming, but he doesn’t care about it. “UNCLE WAYNE! JUST STOP AND LISTEN TO ME!”
He runs outside to the ever barren yard. He tries not to think about Wayne leaving just like how his dad did in his very last visit. How he had tried to chase after his dad’s car until Wayne stopped him. How he had been a crying mess while Wayne told him that both of them will stay together from now on.
“WAYNE, PLEASE! YOU PROMISED TO STAY!”
The truck drives away, farther and farther. If Eddie can catch him-
His lungs constrict themselves again. He stumbles, scraping his knees and palms on the ground. He coughs, gulping in too many shaky breaths that almost tastes like glass shards. He calls out-
“Come back! Come back!”
It comes out as a hoarse whisper.
His throat hurts.
The truck disappears. The sounds of the trailers’ muted everyday life and his own painful wheezing replace it.
Eddie is vaguely aware of Will shuffling up next to him and wrapping his arms around his shaking shoulders.
-
Taglist: @unclewaynemunson @steves-strapcollection @hellion-child @sidekick-hero @mmmmwaffles94 @demolitionjetstar @hbyrde36 @princessstevemunson @sirsnacksalot @tartarusknight @lyriclight @kodaik97 @plsdontdrinkmylavalamp @bookbinderbitch @gutterflower77 @soaringornithopter @angeldreamsoffanfic @panicatthediaz @renaissan-vvitch @manda-panda-monium @newtstabber @little-trash-ghost
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squuote · 9 months
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am i allowed to say the adventure line™ does not end with an arrow or would i get killed for that
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aceredshirt13 · 5 months
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the virgin H. P. Lovecraft comparing a black guy to an animal in his gay necromancer story when being violently racist wasn’t even plot-relevant vs. the Chad Edgar Allen Poe, in his gay detective story eighty years earlier, having Dupin specifically state that the orangutan’s screeches weren’t any African or Asian language in what could otherwise have been the world’s easiest racist allegory
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vivi-scera · 6 months
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hi hi! so i just found your answer to an ask about johndean, and i got immensely surprised when you mentioned about batman and robin, which i assume bruce and dick, not the other batman and robin combination, and im curious about what do you think about them! i quite recently got into comics, and im so fascinated by their mutual codependency and dick's devotion towards bruce, and how bruce sees dick as his peer/partner despite their age differences before growing into a more parental role, and i wanna hear your opinions abt them :D
hey so. come off anon so we can make out.
dick grayson, the first robin and batman's lacanian phallus. ugh many things to say and think about. i wasn't necessarily referring to just bruce and dick— i think all of the subsequent robins have their own neat fucked-up relationships with bruce, in each their own ways. more fucked-up in that they see him as more their father than dick does, like you mentioned. i like thinking about jason-robin's relationship with bruce the most but i like tim as robin best. i think i was mostly thinking bruce/jason since i was talking about johndean but since you asked about bruce/dick i'll expand on them the most.
some may think brudick is the least problematic of all the possible bruce/son pairings since dick doesn't necessarily think of bruce as his father. which is true, he already had a good relationship with his father and didn't need/want a replacement in bruce like the other robins do. but a huge part of his characterization (during his robin years at least) is his insistence on being bruce's equal. you'll see tons of canon material— tv shows, comics, games, etc.— wherein dick insists that he's batman's partner, not his sidekick. many such connotations about the word "partner" as we all know. and there are popular interpretations about the queer subtext in batman comics. guy who cannot be his true self in the public sphere and thus parades around in fetishistic costumery in secrecy. you know how it is. but not only in batman's character— there was a huge outcry about the homoerotic imagery/subtext between batman and dick-robin in the 40's and 50's (see The Seduction of the Innocent), so I'm not pulling this shit out of my ass. not that i'm saying there's canon truth/weight to these interpretations. they are just that. interpretations.
anyway. not only is dick batman's partner, he's also bruce's partner. his lighter, brighter counterpart. bruce sees himself in dick, and also wants to prevent dick from becoming him (see young justice season 1 episode 22 for THE BEST interpretation of batman/dick's relationship. or just young justice in general). no one else is bruce's partner/equal quite like dick is (jason, tim, etc. are more his sons as mentioned. and they also, unlike dick, possess the fault of actually wanting to become batman, or some version of him). just as batman is responsible for robin's creation, so does robin-dick, in turn, shape batman's character. bruce didn't make dick his/a son as much as dick-robin made bruce-batman a dad. just maybe not his own father. fucked-up of dick to be jealous of jason getting bruce's fatherly-attention but not necessarily even wanting it himself. but it's okay, he made him a father! dick himself, in being the first to create robin, might even be the father-mother of bruce's other children and therefore has a higher role as batman's literal partner. one of my favorite developments in comics EVER is dick becoming damian's pseudo-father/batman. the first quasi-son becoming a father figure to his mentor-father's biological son. canonically, dick even wanted to adopt damian. but none of this can/does make dick bruce's true equal (bruce's true equal is batman, and vice-versa). i'm going to be actively problematic and say that bruce sees dick as something less than his partner and something more than his son. i'd LOVE to see a fic that explores dick's drive to become batman's equal/partner and the proverbial wires crossing because of that drive. i think at this point i'm just gonna have to write it myself 😔.
speaking in a meta-narrative sense, dick was introduced as batman's foil. robin (not necessarily dick, just the role) must project an idealized image of that which must be protected. he is representative of the hope that batman has in not only gotham's future, but his own. there is no point in batman if he doesn't believe he can save the future. in batman managing to save robin, he succeeds in saving gotham. but i mean, does that ever really happen? does batman ever really "save" robin/gotham? if the nature of robin is that which must be protected, robin is also a representative role that must be preserved in order to allow batman to save (and fail in order to save) gotham over and over and over again. robin exists/represents a future gotham that doesn't need batman and stands as a reminder to batman what he chooses to fight for, but robin cannot occupy that future himself (since robin is a condition created by batman and can't exist without him. a perfect gotham would neither need robin or batman. the existence of robin implies that there is a gotham that needs saving and that there is a batman that needs to save gotham). so herein lies the paradoxical tragedy of dick grayson. he needs to grow up in order to be batman's equal (and/or to be his partner in the romantic sense), but batman needs robin to justify his existence. robin, the role, by definition cannot grow up in order to meet his own condition for existence— he cannot exist in the future. when the boy behind the mask is killed/grows up, he ceases to be robin and someone else fills in the role. even when dick grayson grows up and becomes batman himself, he still cannot meet bruce-batman as his equal.
there's a great btas episode "the trial" that explores the idea that batman's existence is the condition that creates the very villains he's meant to stop. whether i agree with that statement is another topic. but it's an interesting and valid idea nonetheless. if robin symbolizes all that is at risk of and must be protected from "perversity" (both in the connotative and literal meaning of the word) what does it mean when the birth of batman is representative of gotham's perversion? you can see why i have issues with the statement that batman is the real cause of all evil in gotham. while i think that it's true that batman is a perversion he is just as much a persona created to do good and does succeed in doing good. he is, very much, the john winchester of comics if you'd like to think about it that way.
anyway this totally got too meta-y, sorry. i do think each robin's relationship with bruce brings up some more interesting questions i'd love to explore (and be asked to explore!!!). can batman ever save robin/jason? can robin/tim ever save batman? as damian, son of bruce, what does it mean to be robin, son of batman? thx for the ask <3
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pasdetrois · 3 months
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n0brainjustvibes · 8 months
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always makes me laugh when people are like "wormfic is so bad" because baby I grew up on warrior cats wattpad. I've sunk to lows you couldn't even dream of
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geryone · 1 year
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Can you recommend a book? Not really sure what to read next
Yeah, of course!! Always happy to recommend my favorites!! If you’re up for a dark book I definitely recommend The Dumb House by John Burnside! It’s about a narrator obsessed with a myth about the formation of language who tries to recreate the myth’s experiment with his children with some unfortunate results
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royaltrios · 4 months
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i hate to say it..... why did ep 7 in specific make him look so breedable
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mushroompoisoning · 1 year
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nobody told me wtnv was gonna have some sick musical numbers. wait why are there angels in the grocery store. and the arcade?? they dont exist??? they only tell lies??
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livvywritesworld · 11 months
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A Fist in the Mouth | Overview & Analysis
For those who don’t know, I am a creative writing student in my first year of university. In my introduction to creative writing class this semester, I wrote a short story called ‘A Fist in the Mouth’ for our fiction unit. After a couple rounds of editing, I submitted this piece to my university’s literary magazine and was later accepted for publication.
This is my first ever publication acceptance so of course this story holds such a special place in my heart now, and I thought I might make a post about it just kind of sharing a couple of snippets and some of the inspiration and thought I put behind the story as a whole.
(please let it be known that I retain all rights to my original work and no plagiarism will be tolerated)
excerpts and analysis under the cut
‘A Fist in the Mouth’ began as a way for me to kind of reintroduce myself to short fiction after a period of not having written anything at all due to some health issues. I had all of these ideas for the short fiction piece that I needed to write for class and none of them were working out how I wanted them to while still fitting within the word limit. So, I decided to discovery write something while listening to one of my many Spotify playlists just to kind of get in the groove of writing once more and really just see what would happen.
As I was writing, the song “Modern Girl” by Sleater-Kinney came on shuffle and for those of you who have never heard the song, there’s a repeating lyric, “hunger makes me a modern girl.” This really sparked some inspiration in me and all of a sudden I was writing about a teenage runaway come riot grrrl serial concert goer experiencing the horrors of girlhood and ambition. 
‘A Fist in the Mouth’ begins like this:
There’s a difference between running from and running to. When I left home, I thought I was running towards. I didn’t think of it as me leaving my parents’ oppressive religious household, though that was a fact that I readily acknowledged as a girl. I only ever thought of it as me, freshly eighteen, running full speed at a future I thought I deserved. A future I knew never would have found me if I’d stayed in that town, in that house, with those people, spending my days on my knees praying to a god that didn’t see me as deserving of anything more than I’d already been given.
Now, I think all I was doing was running away from every facet of my life. I didn’t feel the same way about God as the rest of my family, was scared to death of them looking at me one day and suddenly seeing all of me. Back then, I felt like I didn’t have any other choice. And I probably didn’t.
The narrator is kind of inspired by the character Maxine in the film ‘X,’ which I had watched a couple of weeks before writing the story, as well as Ethel Cain’s discography. I really wanted to write from the perspective of a teenage girl fleeing a very religious household (religious trauma for the win) because she wants more out of life than what her parents have laid out for her.
As we move through the story and see how the narrator interacts with the 90s Seattle grunge & punk scene, we are introduced to the narrator’s insatiable hunger (her ambition, queerness, and dedicated yearning). I use a lot of motifs throughout the beginning and middle of the text to try and recreate this feeling for the reader.
I was nineteen and my presence felt both excessive and non-existent. I wasn’t eating as much as I should’ve been, couldn’t really afford three meals a day. Most of my money went towards rent and bills, any real food I got would be leftovers from the diner. The cook was a bit sweet on me, so he’d make me a sandwich every day, free of charge, whatever kind I wanted.
The thing was though, even if I did get enough to eat, I still never felt full. I’d look in the mirror and my mouth would be this gaping cavern, something that didn’t fit on my face. It didn’t matter how old I was, how much life I did or didn’t experience— in the mirror smiling back at me was a gape-toothed girl looking to swallow the whole world if given the chance.
Then, we meet the character of Magdalene Williams, who is the only character in the story that I’ve named. The inspiration for Magdalene was definitely Mary Magdalene— I kind of wanted this holy-like figure to come into the narrator’s life and really give her a taste of the life that she craves for herself.
Magdalene invites the narrator to an all non-men punk show on the edge of Seattle and the narrator feels her hunger clawing up out of her stomach and demanding to go. She is inherently drawn to Magdalene and has no idea why. So she accepts the invitation. 
The story kind of unravels from there, and we end with Magdalene coming onstage with her band and giving The Performance of a Lifetime and generally really disturbing the narrator. The narrator knows that something Is Not Right here, she’s been very active in the scene for the last year and has never heard of Magdalene yet the entire crowd is going wild over her, and once Magdalene starts singing she immediately knows that something is wrong. And yet. She just can’t look away.
In Magdalene, the narrator sees everything that she wants, everything that she is so hungry for, and it terrifies her. She’s also a little jealous, and a little horny but very much in a prophet/faithhealer x devotee kind of way. 
I wrote the entire story in past tense because I really wanted it to have a sort of confessional vibe, to really keep in tone with the religious themes and imagery. My professor suggested after workshop that I might try it in present tense but it just was not working. During our class workshop however, everyone said that they liked the choice of past tense because it was almost like the narrator was telling us, the reader, that she experienced such an intense period of wanting in her life and still made it out in the end.
I don’t know if it’s too much to share on here like word count-wise, but the last few paragraphs of the story are my absolute favorites and I’m so proud of them. They’ve remained mostly unchanged in my various rounds of edits and I’m so impressed with myself for being able to write like this after having literally not written anything substantial in around six months.
Before I left home, my whole life was like a sepia photograph of a sunny day. Over-exposed, parents with smiling faces and sons with square jaws, daughters with ribbons in their hair. Wooden crosses on the walls, simple and unornate because God doesn’t need to be loved in gold foil. Grass stains on white tights, Sunday kitten heels scuffed from being worn so often, deodorant powder refusing to wash off the baby pink dress Mama thought looked so nice with my brown eyes.
There’s a difference between running from and running to. At eighteen, I was running towards something. I’msure of that. I don’t think I ever had an idea of what that something was, or what I even wanted it to be, but I did know that I didn’t want to be some televangelist’s golden daughter proffered up to God like Icarus was to the sun.
I noticed things about myself the way my family noticed things about God and religion and theology. Studied myself in mirrors, in the dark, in the depths of my own mind. I noticed everything and remembered nothing. Blood never started to fill my mouth until I surrounded myself with idolatry of a different kind, the screams sounded too much like mine.
At nineteen, I was running from. That night, hunger attacked every fiber of my being, ate away at my organs, left behind teeth marks and blood. I saw that hunger reflected in Magdalene, her mouth an open wound as she screamed out her lyrics. I wasn’t scared, though. There’s nothing scary about hunger, what’s scary is the response hunger elicits from other people.
This, I noticed. All in real time. Learned it of myself.
I watched the crowd feed Magdalene, and consequently devour her whole. Sanctify her living and alive, right before my eyes. And I never wanted anything more than I did then. I craved it, would’ve let hordes of women and girls crucify me where I stood just to be in Magdalene’s position. She never could’ve been full, not with the way she sang, but at least she was well fed. Oh how I wanted to be kept in excess.
Have learned to become my own number one fan lol
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quinnonimp · 2 years
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thought to test out the "most realistic painting app ever". its pretty ok
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