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cryingcow · 3 years

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Character Story - Someya [RGGO]

Between Someya and Ono Michio, I very much misjudged who had the more ridiculous story XD For tonight’s story we have Someya, aka “naked wet guy who showed his bare ass in Y6″. Not to be confused with Katsuya in Y5, Kiryu in Y0, and Ryoma and Saigo in Ishin :D

Story: Someya deals with a . . . somewhat unusual kidnapping - and - hostage situation during the Christmas-New Years holidays.

Someya, beating someone’s face in: “How dare you disrespect the Care Bears!!!”

Note: The item’s name is “くま太” or Kumadai (Kuma Futoshi?). I went with the English translation because I like alliterations :D also, “New Year holidays” seems to refer to the whole Christmas to New Year period.

CHAPTER 1

|December 2013—3 years before Kiryu and Someya met in the open space in front of the Tojo Clan Headquarters . . .|

Someya Family Member A: “Oh, thank you for your hard work around the area.”

Someya Family Member B: “Really . . . even though it’s already the New Year holidays . . . I didn’t think yakuza would be so busy.”

Someya Family Member A: “Don’t be stupid . . . the New Year holidays doesn’t matter in Kamurocho. Isn’t it an inviolable rule of collections to take what you can as long as the city is alive?”

Someya Family Member B: “I know that . . . a lot of work in a bustling city . . .”

Someya Family Member A: “Anyway, was anything late today? Did any store hesitate to pay?”

Someya Family Member B: “No, but I had a bit of a run-in with the Wakaba Family . . .”

Someya Family Member A: “Oi oi, not again . . . we already beat them badly before. They’re really persistent . . .”

Someya Family Member B: “Every time I see them, I beat them up and drive them away, but there has to be a less messier method . . . Rumor has it they’re trying to gain power and get back at us. I think it’s better to prepare for that—”

Someya: “Hm . . . you don’t have to prepare for their comeback. We can easily crush them when they attack. Rather, have you secured the thing yet?”

Someya Family Member A: “Th-That’s . . . it’s a special item, so it’s hard to find . . .”

Someya: “Oi oi, what day do you think it is today? Don’t you understand? That it’s already tomorrow?!”

Someya Family Member A: “Apologies, Boss . . . I’m having the footsoldiers scour Kamurocho right now . . .”

Someya: “Securing the thing is of utmost importance . . . If we fail this year, it would affect my reliability. Last year was really bad . . . you understand we can’t afford to fail anymore . . .”

Someya Family Member A: “Y-Yes . . . we will find it . . .”

Someya: “Apart from that, how are preparations going? Are things going our way?”

Someya Family Member B: “Ye-Yeah, it’s ready. There won’t be any problem tonight or tomorrow!!”

Someya: “I see . . . then the problem is the thing . . . it’s over if someone takes it before me . . .”

Someya Family Member A: “Understood! We will work with the youth to search all over Kamurocho!! We’ll definitely obtain it!!”

Someya: “Yeah, get going.”

{The Someya Family members run out.}

TV Voice: “Sawamura Haruka, an idol who had an electrifying retirement at the end of last year, became a hot topic when she was witnessed at an orphanage in Okinawa—”

Someya: “’A daughter raised by a yakuza’ . . . Children cannot choose their parents. That child shouldn’t be held responsible . . . Oh, should I also go out looking for the thing in question? It would be a hassle to get caught up with another group while looking for something like that . . .”

----

Someya: “Damn it . . . I’ve been searching for it but it’s nowhere to be found . . . I won’t make it by tomorrow night . . .”

{Someya’s phone rings.}

Someya: “What is it? Did you find it?!”

Someya Family Member A: “Yes! I managed to find it!! I’m holding the thing right now!!”

Someya: “Well done. Despite seeming impossible . . . Where are you now? I’ll be there soon—”

Suspicious Man: “Yo, Someya . . . I wasn’t able to take care of you the other day . . .”

Someya: “Are you . . . from Wakaba Family? What do you want with me?”

Wakaba Family Executive: “We, the Wakaba Family, want to give our thanks to the Someya Family . . . Were you researching a lot on an item of yours? Have you been frantically looking for something the past few days? Giving the whole family a hard time . . . But thanks to that, you’re alone without any entourage. Will you properly receive our thanks today?”

Someya: “Don’t you know? I don’t have time to deal with you. I’m sorry, but can you come back another time?”

Wakaba Family Executive: “Shut up!! We won’t let this opportunity of you being without your minions slip by!! This time I’ll make you pay!! Let’s go, you guys!! He’s alone, let’s kill him!!!!”

{Someya kicks their butts.}

Wakaba Family Executive: “Damn it . . . Strong . . .”

Someya: “You’re all talk . . . the result is the same no matter how many times you try. Give up.”

Wakaba Family Executive: “Tch . . . you’re certainly strong, you bastard, but what about your minions? By this time my elite should be attacking them . . .”

Someya: “What did you say?!”

Wakaba Family Executive: “The best you can do is pray for their safety!!”

{The Wakaba Family runs away.}

Someya: “Oi, wait!! . . . Damn, those guys run fast . . . For now, I’m worried about the thing. I should get in contact with the family . . .”

----

Someya Family Member A: “I’m glad we managed to find it . . .”

Someya Family Member B: “Yeah, if we couldn’t obtain the thing, that person would definitely be in a bad mood . . .”

Someya Family Member A: “This will finally reassure our Boss—”

Suspicious Man: “Haw . . . It seems that important thing you’re holding is what the Someya Family has been frantically looking for . . .”

Someya Family Member A: “Who are you guys?!”

Wakaba Family Elite: “We’re from the Wakaba Family that you dealt with before. We came to return the favor . . . We’ll take that while we crush you. That would surely inconvenience you!!”

Someya Family Member B: “This is important to our Boss . . . we won’t be handing it over to you or the others!!”

Wakaba Family Elite: “Heh . . . Then we’ll take it away by force. Our original job was to beat you guys up anyway!!”

{The Wakaba Family defeats the Someya Family members.}

Someya Family Member A: “Da-Damn it . . . I didn’t think there’d be anyone this strong in the Wakaba Family . . .”

Wakaba Family Elite: “Well then I’ll be keeping this, okay?”

Someya Family Member A: “W-Wait!! Give that back!!”

Wakaba Family Elite: “Shut up!! Get it back then if you want to repent!!”

{The Wakaba Family elite punches the other yakuza and makes him collapse.}

Wakaba Family Elite: “Based on what I’ve heard, could this be tribute for those at the top? The up-and-coming Someya Family is in a good mood . . . the receiver is upper management of the Tojo Clan . . . could it be for the Majima Family?”

{The Wakaba Family elite opens the wrapped gift.}

Wakaba Family Elite: “What’s this?! Isn’t this just a blue stuffed bear?!”

-END-

CHAPTER 2

Wakaba Family Elite: “You were frantically searching for a stuffed toy like this even though you’re yakuza?!”

Someya Family Member B: “Kuh . . . si-since that’s all, give that back . . .”

Wakaba Family Elite: “. . . I see, is it hidden? Is there a secret to this stuffed toy? I don’t know what this secret is, but with that desperation, there’s no doubt this stuffed toy is important. This will make a good souvenir for my boss . . . bye.”

{The Wakaba Family elites leave.}

Someya Family Member A: “Uugh . . . B-Boss . . . sorry . . . there was nothing we could do . . .”

----

Someya Family Member A: “I’m sorry, Boss . . . the thing was stolen by the Wakaba Family . . .”

Someya: “Damn it . . . just when we’ve finally found it, no way they’re taking it away . . . They’re trying to look inside the stuffed toy, it’s all over if it gets dismembered . . . Before that happens, we’re getting it back!! Tell everyone in the family to prepare for a raid!!”

Someya Family Member A: “Y-Yes!!”

Someya Family Member B: “B-Boss!! The Wakaba Family leader wants to talk to you . . .”

Someya: “What did you say? Give me the handset. . . . Wakaba. What do you want from me?”

Wakaba: “Aah, Someya-san. Thank you very much for your help the other day . . . I’m sorry I wasn’t there to receive it. However, it seems that my underling made a mistake and accidentally brought in that important item . . .”

Someya: “Made a mistake? Heh . . . of course you’d say that . . . was it not forcibly taken from my men? Is the thing you stole from us safe?”

Wakaba: “Yeah, and as long as the secret of this stuffed toy hasn’t been revealed, it would be a waste to do something bad and reduce its value.”

Someya: “Aren’t you impertinent. Now why don’t you return it immediately? Before my whole family mobilizes to crush you . . .”

Wakaba: “Please calm down, Someya-san. If you do that, what’ll happen to this stuffed toy?”

Someya: “. . . Shit. You . . . what do you want with that? Just get this over with already!!”

Wakaba: “Heh . . . this stuffed toy seems very important to you . . . If it’s so important, then I’ll give it back. But I can’t say I’ll do it for free . . . So then . . . give us 100 million.”

Someya: “100 million? You want me to pay such a large sum of money to get back what you stole?”

Wakaba: “Yeah, if it’s not possible then I will burn this stuffed toy here.”

Someya: “Shit . . . fine, I’ll prepare the 100 million. There’s not a single scratch on it?”

Wakaba: “Then with an attaché case filled with 100 million in cash, please come to the abandoned building on Senryo Avenue. I will return this stuffed toy once I have that 100 million.”

Someya: “Understood. An abandoned building on Senryo Avenue?”

Wakaba: “Yeah, we look forward to welcoming you alone. See you later.”

{The phone call ends.}

Someya Family Member B: “Boss, do you really have 100 million? To buy back something like this?!”

Someya: “I know that. And I’m sure they have an ambush ready with all their members . . . But that’s the only way to get it back. If I refuse, they will definitely burn it. Prepare 100 million now. As soon as I’m ready, I’m taking it alone.”

Someya Family Member B: “B-But . . .”

Someya: “It’s okay, just do as I say!!”

Someya Family Member B: “Y-Yes!! Understood!!”

----

Someya: “As told, I came alone. Why don’t you come out of hiding?”

Someya: “No understanding of courtesy, greeting guests with such a dirty place.”

Wakaba: “To think you’d actually come alone . . . that stuffed toy must be quite important . . .”

Someya: “The promised 100 million. Take it. Where’s the thing you promised to exchange with this?”

Wakaba: “Oi, check the contents.”

Wakaba Family Elite: “Yes sir.”

{The Wakaba Family elite takes the attaché case from Someya and opens it.}

Wakaba Family Elite: “Boss, the contents are definitely the 100 million.”

Wakaba: “I see . . . Someya-san, I definitely received your 100 million . . .”

Someya: “Then will you please give me the thing over there?”

Wakaba: “I will return it properly in due time . . . but before that, I would like to ask you one question.”

Someya: “A question? Don’t play around!! Hand over the thing already!!”

Wakaba: “What’s the secret behind this stuffed toy that you’re desperately trying to get back? I don’t think it’s sane to pay 100 million for a stuffed toy. Is there an important secret?”

Someya: “Doing something like this, I’ll teach you to have a sense of honor. I gave you the money, why don’t you keep your end of the bargain?!”

Wakaba: “Think it’ll be easy just because you asked? . . . Okay. Take the stuffed toy as you like . . . Well, if you could reach it past this many people!!”

Someya: “Tch . . . so this is how it goes after all . . . fine. I’ll beat it into your skull not to break promises!!”

Wakaba: “Let’s get started! We’ll carve some etiquette thoroughly into your body!!!!”

{Someya defeats almost all the Wakaba Family members.}

Wakaba Family Elite: “S-Strong . . .”

Wakaba: “Kuh . . . to think even for my elite are unable to compete against him . . .”

Someya: “Now, will you return the item quietly?”

Wakaba: “Kuh . . . it’s come to this!! Oi!! Bring the stuffed toy!!”

{A Wakaba Family elite hands Wakaba the bear.}

Wakaba: “Someya, if you move a single finger . . . I’ll blow a hole in this stuffed toy’s head, you hear?”

Someya: “Wakaba! You bastard . . .”

Wakaba: “Heh . . . it’s an effective technique . . . That Someya can’t move a finger because of this . . .”

Someya: “Don’t touch that with your dirty hands . . .”

Wakaba: “As long as you don’t move, no harm will come to this stuffed toy . . .”

Someya: “Kuh . . .”

Wakaba: “You guys, take him down so he can’t rampage about!!”

Wakaba Family Elite: “Yes sir!!”

{The two elites grab Someya by the arms.}

Wakaba: “The situation has reversed, Someya . . . Can you move if you are held down by a few people?”

Someya: “Wakaba . . . you bastard . . . you coward!!”

Wakaba: “Someya . . . please receive our thanks. Once this is done, the stuffed toy will be returned as promised . . . Well, if you’re still alive at the end . . . now bestow him our gratitude to your heart’s content!!”

Wakaba Family Elite: “Yes sir!!”

{The Wakaba Family elites start punching Someya repeatedly.}

Someya: “Uguh?! Gah?! Gahaa!!”

Wakaba: “Heh . . . Someya, I wonder how much you can endure . . .”

{The Wakaba Family elites keep punching Someya repeatedly.}

Someya: “Guuh?! Gohah?! Guaah!!”

-END-

CHAPTER 3

Wakaba: “Making a fool out of me! You can’t die yet! Take this! And this!!”

{Wakaba punches the immobilized Someya repeatedly.}

Someya: “Fuguh?! Uugh?! Gahaa!!”

Wakaba: “Well? Do you feel like talking about the secret of this stuffed toy? Huh?!”

Someya: “. . . Haa . . . Haa . . . and who are you? . . .”

Wakaba: “Tch . . . you still have such cheeky eyes? In that case, I’ll hurt you more!! Eat this!!”

{Wakaba punches the immobilized Someya repeatedly again.}

Someya: “Guh?! Fuh?! Gehoo!!”

Wakaba: “You’ve lasted this long . . . there’s no reason . . . What is it?! Say it!! The secret of this stuffed toy!! Is it worth over 100 million?! Huh?!”

{Wakaba punches the immobilized Someya repeatedly again.}

Someya: “Gah?! Uguh?! Gahaa!! . . . O-Okay . . . now give it back . . .”

Wakaba: “Shit . . . this bastard . . . the hand I’m using to hit is starting to hurt . . . Oi! Bring me a wooden sword!!”

Wakaba Family Elite: “Y-Yes sir!! Here.”

Wakaba: “Al~right, now I’ll hit you with this from now on. Spit out the secret immediately before you die!!”

{Wakaba beats Someya repeatedly with the wooden sword.}

Someya: “Guah?! Gaha?! Guhaa!!”

Wakaba: “Anyway, this bastard and his minions are ruthless, aren’t they? Their Head doesn’t come back, but they don’t come to help . . . Will the guys from our family come to my aid if that were me right now? Huh?”

Wakaba Family Elite: “Y-Yes sir!! Of course!!”

Wakaba: “As expected. I feel sorry for you . . .”

{Wakaba beats Someya repeatedly with the wooden sword again.}

Someya: “Guh?! Uguh?! Gahaa!! Cough cough . . . Haa . . . haa . . . say . . .”

{A cellphone rings.}

Wakaba: “Hm? Whose cellphone is ringing at such a time? . . . Heh, hey Someya . . . could that be your phone? Do we check?”

{Wakaba takes Someya’s phone and steps away.}

Wakaba: “Speak of the devil, apparently it’s from your ruthless minions . . . Yeah, hello? I’m sorry for taking the call . . . your Head is already bloody . . . Shut up, stop making a ruckus!! I was about to kill him . . . A pleasant memory to carry into the next world. Since your cute little minion went to the effort of contacting you, I’ll let you talk to him in your final moments. I made it hands-free, so it’s time to say your goodbyes . . .”

Someya Family Member A: “Boss!! Can you hear me, Boss!!”

Someya: “. . . Yeah, I can hear you. Good grief, what’s this about?”

Someya Family Member A: “That’s good . . . please listen, Boss!! The stuffed toy gift for your daughter . . . we contacted the distributor and obtained another one!! So there’s no need to be compliant with those guys anymore—"

Wakaba: “What did you say?! This is a gift for your daughter?! This is really just a stuffed toy?!”

Someya: “Oi oi, is it okay for you to be distracted by someone else? Would I miss such a chance?”

{The two elites holding Someya collapse.}

Wakaba: “Someya?! Damn it!! If you don’t stand down, this stuffed toy—"

Someya: “Heh . . . Sorry, but will you return it now?”

{Someya hits Wakaba in the face, and snatches back the bear.}

Wakaba: “Gahaa?!”

Someya: “Oops . . . waving around an important trump card like this, it’s easy to take away . . .”

Wakaba: “Is it really just a stuffed toy?!”

Someya: “Of course it’s not just a stuffed toy. It’s a super rare item produced in limited quantity . . . A stuffed toy of the mascot ‘Big Bear’ from the anime ‘Dokidoki Princess’, which is popular with children . . .”

Wakaba: “Wh-Who is Big Bear?! Don’t be foolish!! Isn’t there a secret that’s worth big money?!”

Someya: “Hm . . . When did I say that? Did you perhaps misunderstand me?”

Wakaba: “Then why? For an item like that . . . Why did you prepare 100 million and do something so unreasonable?!”

Someya: “Yeah, see . . . For me, this guy . . . shelling out 100 million isn’t even enough . . .”

Wakaba: “I-Idiot . . . doing something like that . . .”

Someya: “Now, Wakaba . . . I wonder if you’re ready? If you had returned this guy, I would have let you pass this time, but . . . you broke your promise and did as you wanted . . . so I guess I’ll have to take my due compensation?”

Wakaba: “Kuh . . . Wh-What are you doing!! You’re already in bad shape!! You were surrounded by everyone and beaten like a punching bag!!!!”

Someya: “This is a good handicap for you guys . . . I have a lot of plans from here on out, I don’t have time to spend on you!!”

Wakaba {to his remaining minions}: “Do something!! Bring weapons!! Just kill him!!!! Get started!!!!”

{Someya defeats the rest of the Wakaba Family and they all collapse.}

Someya: “Haa . . . haa . . .”

Someya Family Member A: “Boss!! Boss!! Are you safe?! The whole family is now inside the building—”

Someya: “Shut up, I’m fine . . . I got back the item.”

Someya Family Member A: “I’m glad you’re safe!! But then . . . this stuffed toy is wasted . . . Oh, no, maybe it’s good you got it back!! If you look closely, this bear may be a fake because the color is different from the previous one . . .”

Someya: “. . . ?! A different color? Oi, what color is that bear?”

Someya Family Member A: “It’s pink. The previous one was blue, so is it a fake?”

Someya: “No, you did well. That stuffed toy won’t go to waste . . . I’m heading back to the office. I’ll leave it to you to clean up here . . . please move some of those guys out of the way.”

Someya Family Member A: “Y-Yes!! Understood!! You can leave right away!!”

Someya: “Yeah, I’m counting on you to handle this.”

Someya: “. . . It’s not easy being Santa at all . . .”

----

|Morning of December 25--|

Hiromi: “Oyassan look, look! Santa gave me 2 presents this year!! It’s amazing!! Big Bear and Bear Beauty from ‘Dokidoki Princess’!! Santa brought them both together!!”

Someya: “I’m sure Santa sent out another gift to apologize for the mistake last year . . .”

Hiromi: “I also met Santa! He came to see me because I’m a good kid!! It’s not a lie! I really met him!!”

Someya: “Yeah, of course Oyassan believes Hiromi’s story. I’m sure Hiromi was a good kid . . .”

Someya: (Really, to have obtained Bear Beauty afterwards . . . it was a good surprise, albeit by chance . . . For this child, I’ll seize anything to give them complete happiness . . .)

-END-

Masterlist

#Someya: 'Anyway I'm gonna go lie down and pretend half my ribs aren't broken and my liver isn't punctured okay'#The implication is that either Someya or one of his men dressed as Santa #and I know which one I prefer sgdgdhs #next story: the most famous chimera in the RGG series!#rgg online #rggo lore #rggo #rgg #Ryu ga Gotoku #yakuza #someya takumi #takumi someya

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pokeverse-amethyst · 3 years

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Sooooo… this is gonna be a long one, strap in. What follows is a metric ton of HCs about every single evil team and how they have worked themselves into every aspect of daily life, as to make them way more difficult to get rid off than just with a couple of arrests. Timeline wonkiness when trying to explain what likely happened first is to be expected, I’m playing fast and loose with all of this stuff. I might be way off topic in some regards but HECK HERE GOES. ~~~

TEAM ROCKET: This is pretty much of a no-brainer. What we have here is a classical mafia structure, and you just need to look at countries with extensive mafia presence to know that they are baked into every single fucking thing. Giovanni has worked years upon years to cement himself straight into Kanto and Johto, consequently making it impossible for any of the other teams to even THINK about gaining a foothold there. No further explanations necessary. ~~~ TEAM AQUA / TEAM MAGMA: This one is a bit of a more difficult one. But then again, let’s presume that most of the teams recruit a mixture of people who fully believe in the team’s message, who misunderstand the team’s message, and who see themselves in the team, but not necessarily in the message (so just looking for somewhere to belong and to gain some kind of direction). Oh, and monetary gain. Can’t forget that. So in the case of both Aqua and Magma? I like to believe it started out with Maxie and Archie working together on a plan to give nature back to Pokémon. Like, with trying to get more protected zones established, kinda like Fiore has them? But they were hitting resistance too often. Now I’m not saying that they were on the wrong track from the start or developed into what is basically eco-terrorists, but… they probably saw way too much bad shit happening to Pokémon around them. Maybe they heard what Team Rocket was doing to Pokémon in Johto and Kanto. Maybe they heard rumors about what Cyrus nearly accomplished, what Lysandre almost triggered, what Ghetsis managed to fuck up with his whole power play madness (TWICE, too!), what the Aether foundation might have had triggered if not for the intervention of a Legendary, what Rose made possible in the GALAR REGION of all places… Suffice to say, they probably felt like they needed to seriously up their game… to make sure that the other teams didn’t fuck up the world beyond repair before THEY could make the world a better place. The only thing that finally broke Archie and Maxie up though, was an inability to settle on what would be better. More landmass, more sea? What would be the gentler way of resetting humanity? Suffice to say, their vision might have attracted way too many who nudged them along. So TLDR: Archie and Maxie mostly reacted to what the other Team Bosses were doing and were helped along by Grunts/Admins that were way too into the whole “we will be the only humans deserving this new, shiny world”. They were numerous enough and determined enough to turn into a slightly terroristic group, but until the ultimate use of Kyogre/Groudon, they never really registered that much on Interpol’s radar. And when Interpol learned of them stealing a whole ass sub? It was already too late stopping them in their tracks in time. After all, Interpol had all the other regions to monitor as well… ~~~ TEAM GALACTIC: So. Charon doesn’t need much of a head canon fuckery. He just did it for the money, that much he stated openly. And Jupiter, Mars and Saturn? They all admitted openly to being along for the ride because they believed in Cyrus and the world being fucked up beyond repair, thus needing a good ol’ divine intervention from the whole-ass creation trio. But I don’t think any single one of them fully understood what Cyrus’s goal was. The commanders (that are not Charon) squarely fall into the category of “misunderstanding the ultimate purpose of the team”, as do all the Grunts. And as mentioned above with Team Aqua and Magma, Galactic probably saw some of the stuff that was happening around them and ultimately decided (and this is mostly for the Grunts and the Commanders) that Cyrus probably wasn’t so far off with the human spirit being incomplete. But they made one crucial mistake (pretty much the whole team, even Charon). They thought that Cyrus’s assertion over the incomplete nature of the human spirit was a reason for the man to believe in a world that should be made whole, not in wiping the whole fucking slate clean and going Tabula Rasa on the whole of creation. Much to the annoyance of everyone involved (and with that I mean the Creation Trio and the big boss of them), he actually went far enough to step on everything just to gain the power to control the legendaries. Also, time to unearth an already yoinked HC of mine that Giratina mostly retreated into the Distortion World to get some good alone time in, only to be disrupted by Cyrus bursting in. On that point also: time not really working all that clearly in the Distortion World. Kinda like Narnia rules, in as there is no fixed constant for time moving forward in either one or the other extreme. Sometimes, time will move forward extremely fast, other times, you spend years and years in the Distortion World and only a few seconds passed. After all, everything gets a bit… wobbly in there. But around the time Cyrus entered, Distortion World time became… more orderly. And that was what prompted Giratina to go VERY UNAMUSED ON HIS ASS. Think of it as time being influenced by what is thrown into the Distortion World. BACK to the Team, though. Galactic honest to Arceus believed that what they were doing would give the world a much needed boost… and were unpleasantly surprised when they were later on all shown that Cyrus wanted to go destruction and rebirth on the world. But that is not to say everyone was unhappy about this revelation. ~~~ TEAM PLASMA & NEO PLASMA: What easier time to convince disparate beliefs than with the apparent reason that they were just helping Pokémon that would have been unhappy in the care of their trainers? Wether the Grunts believed that the Pokémon should then consequently be released back into the wild or that they THEMSELVES deserved the Pokémon way more than others? What easier way to convince them of Plasma’s ideals? And there was no real discussion amongst the Grunts over this dichotomy. Sure, a few were disputing the one or the other stance, but most were still agreeing that the trainers they took the Pokémon from did NOT deserve them. No matter how pure their reasoning was. No matter how reality really looked like. Sure, they were removing Pokémon from some really nasty trainers? But on the greater scale of things, they mostly took Pokémon from trainers who they loved being with. And Ghetsis had his thumb on this a lot. See, Ghetsis didn’t want N to sway too much, before he finally met the protagonist. So Ghetsis made sure that only obviously abused Pokémon removed from trainers were brought to N. …why, no, this doesn’t mean at all that they were usually just from the outside. Ya think Ghetsis only had his main team? Dream on. ~~~ TEAM FLARE: What is there to say about Team Flare? They are basically a mix of the worst of the self-viewed elite of the region. There is entitlement to being viewed as the best of the best (and you can’t tell ‘em otherwise), there is doomsday fans who would do the whole shit with bunkering down and then fighting in an apocalyptic wasteland and fancying themselves new leaders in that changed world, there’s the ones who just think they will be able to surpass even Lysandre… What about the Admins of Flare? They half share Lysandre’s views of beauty. But mostly, they are in too deep to quit, and also half about relishing the fact that they get to work on something truly unique and devastating. They want this whole power thing to work out for them because some time in their lives, they might have felt like they were owed power and didn’t receive it. They were owed recognition and didn’t receive it. They want to be the new top of Kalos without working TOO hard for it. Without anything laying rocks in their path. Without any obstacles telling them that, no. They fucked up. ~~~ AETHER FOUNDATION: The moment Lusamine found out about the Ultra Dimension, she ostensibly was lost to her goal of getting her hands on the power to change the face of the world. And to preserve beauty. In many ways, her goal was similar to Lysandre… to a degree. The Aether Foundation is half staffed by people who truly believe that conservation work is the most important factor in the Pokémon World, to preserve some of the more endangered species around the world, and half staffed by people who truly believe that the Ultra Dimension holds answers to problems humanity might not even have recognized as such. This latter half was unpleasantly surprised when they started to learn the truth from the Ultra Dimension researchers. Finding out that Necrozma had destroyed the natural light of that world and was now the only source of more light for the city? That was a shock. But that didn’t necessarily mean that the Aether Foundation would have been broken up by that. Because honestly? The part of the conservation enthusiasts who were not deterred by the Ultra Dimension incident made the Foundation bloom beyond what it was possible to become. So in short: this foundation survived its leader far better than many others, and actually managed to get accepted. ~~~ MACRO COSMOS: This is the team that shocked their region with just how far their influence had gone. And that is to say that they existed at all, right under the noses of the region. Rose’s whole deal is a big part why Leon would later be plunged into a crisis of conscience, despite everyone assuring him that he had no way of knowing just how far Rose was willing to go to show the region how wrong it was to not immediately acquiesce to all that he envisioned for the future. The mere fact Rose was UNWILLING to wait what would at most have been half a day for Leon, to celebrate with the others after another big Champion Tournament? That was what sat so ill with many in the region. It wasn’t so much the message that Rose felt everyone had missed (that was actually just his version of events - most of the Macro Cosmos Grunts were attached to him solely for the reason of having privileges that none other had, and when they saw how he was acting, only the most dedicated few could ignore what was going on). So we are dealing with another team that was shocked how far the leader would go, but even more so than the Aether Foundation, the members scattered when Rose enacted the Darkest Day right out of nowhere. There is still worries that remains of Macro Cosmos could be out there, trying to bust Oleana and Rose out of prison and actually finding another way with which to scare Galar into complicity. How well that would even go is a whole different question… because the new champ is even stronger than Leon, and THAT is real fucking bad news for anyone who would want to establish themselves.

#Big whopping HC post incoming #Dash Commentary: Musings in Primorvia #Primorvia's Voice [Mun]#The Mountains Hold Many Paths to Secrets [Headcanon]#This went on for longer than I expected #I have no idea where even half of this came from #If I accidentally rephrased something someone else HC'd before I'M SORRY I KINDA LOST TRACK WHERE WHAT MIGHT HAVE COME FROM #Anywho have an oggle at almost 2k words of RAMBLE

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schmidtchristmasmarket · 3 years

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This holiday season, many Americans will tour historic mansions in the Southern United States that are beautifully decked out in traditional wreaths, garlands and mistletoe for Christmas.

At Mount Vernon, George Washington’s Virginia mansion, tourists are promised candlelit tours and a “festive evening” of refreshments, 18th-century dancing and more. Visitors can even meet a re-enactor playing Martha Washington, America’s First Lady.

At the state-run Hofwyl-Broadfield Plantation Historic Site in Brunswick, Georgia, promoters promise attendees a “magical experience” during the holiday event, learning how “Christmas was celebrated on a Southern rice plantation during the 1850s.”

What these tours teach is how rich white Southerners once celebrated Christmas: singing Christmas carols, dancing, drinking the cider brew wassail and enjoying refreshments or formal meals.

Few make a serious effort to tell what Christmas was like for the enslaved workers at these plantations before the American Civil War.

What’s missing?

When the black historian Brandon Byrd visited Belle Meade, a mansion in Nashville, Tennessee, for its Christmas tour a few years ago, he was shocked that the slave community and their harsh realities were barely mentioned. Instead, he reported, the tour guide mostly related “stories about the white men, women and children who woke up to Christmas in the mansion’s plush bedrooms.”

By the American Civil War, nearly four million slaves in all toiled in the southern states, and about a million lived as servants in mansions and as field hands on large plantations with 50 slaves or more. They did almost all the grueling household and field labor that kept these places going, often sleeping and cooking in primitive cabins and working in unhealthy conditions under the threat of the whip.

In fact, the historic mansions hosting Christmas tourists never would have been built without the profits generated by slave labor. The grand Nottoway Plantation and resort in Louisiana, which traditionally puts on a Christmas event, was constructed just before the Civil War by some 155 slave workers.

Fictional tales and memoirs

In researching my 2019 book “Yuletide in Dixie,” I discovered that many historic plantation and mansion sites are reluctant to talk about slavery at their Christmas events. This is partly because administrators want to avoid topics that might make paying guests angry or uncomfortable.

But the omission of black southerners from these holiday tales also stems from pervasive myths about slave life at southern plantations before the Civil War.

For a long time, many people got their ideas about slavery at these places from memoirs, novels and short stories written by white southerners after the Civil War. These stories, now outrageous for their racial stereotypes, not only justified the institution of slavery, they also made it seem like all enslaved people had fun on a southern plantation at holiday time, dancing, singing, laughing and feasting for the holiday season, just as their masters did.

Susan Dabney Smedes, a white girl who grew up on a Mississippi plantation, published a memoir in 1887 called “Memorials of a Southern Planter” that made slave Christmases sound like wonderful times. Smedes wrote about how slaves wore their best clothes for Christmas, played a word game called “Christmas Gif’” with their white enslavers and drank eggnog their master made for them.

In a fictional tale published in the “Century Magazine” in 1911, an enslaved carpenter named Jerry even turns down the freedom that his master offers him on Christmas because he likes his life as a slave so much, and especially the Christmas present his master specially picks out for him each year.

Many of these memoirs and preposterous short stories and novels about happy slave Christmas experiences were so popular that they were republished in new editions over and over again from the late 1800s and early 1900s until, in some cases, the present.

Smedes’s “Memorials of a Southern Planter” was regularly republished for a century after its first appearance.

Many Americans got falsely pleasant images of slavery and especially slave Christmases from reading these works, and these wrongful impressions not only affected how the public thought and still thinks about slavery but, more specifically, how site administrators at southern historic mansions and plantations planned their Christmas programs.

Whipped and sold on Christmas

I read many documents to find out how slaves actually spent their Christmases. The truth is deeply disturbing.

On the one hand, the majority of enslaved people did get some them time off from work during Christmas, as well as feasts and presents. Some got to travel or to get married, privileges that they didn’t get at other times of the year. But these privileges could be withdrawn for any reason at all and many slaves never got them at all.

Slavery was a brutal system of forced labor to enrich those same owners. Even over the holiday, masters kept the power to punish slaves. A photo taken during the Civil War shows a man who was whipped at Christmas. His back was covered with scars, showing that when masters punished the people they held in bondage, they often did so brutally.

There were other cruel forms of punishment. On one South Carolina plantation, a master angry at an enslaved woman he suspected of miscarrying her pregnancy on purpose locked her up for the Christmas holiday.

Masters sometimes forced enslaved workers to get drunk even if they did not want to drink, or wrestle with each other on Christmas simply for the amusement of the master’s family.

ikewise, I learned in my research, slaveholders bought and sold plenty of people over the holiday, keeping slave traders busy during Christmas week.

Escapes and panics over slave rebellions

It is revealing that many enslaved black southerners also chose Christmas as the time to try to escape to freedom, despite the difficulties of traveling in cold weather with few supplies.

The famous black liberator Harriet Tubman, for example, helped her three brothers enslaved in Maryland to escape bondage over Christmas in 1854. Obviously, slaves like the Tubman brothers greatly resented their enslavement, or they would not have agreed to leave.

Evidence shows that many slaveholders knew their slaves hated their condition. Although the U.S. never had a major Christmas slave rebellion, southern whites frequently panicked over frequent rumors that their slaves planned to revolt over the holiday. They armed themselves, conducted extra patrols, banned black people from the streets of cities and executed or whipped slaves whose behavior they thought was suspicious.

Panics over Christmas rebellions took place frequently. They were, at times, confined to a state as in Charleston, South Carolina – then a British colony – in 1765. Or, they could spread in the entire American South, as one did in 1856. As I found in my research, Christmas revolt panics continued all the way through the Civil War.

These panics made Christmas a bad time for many slaves, who passed their Christmases in great fear that they would be rounded up and killed.

What’s changing

Some southern historic plantations and mansions are beginning to include a more accurate history of slavery in their presentations of the past.

Montpelier, the Virginia plantation of U.S. president James Madison and Monticello, the famed mansion and plantation of Thomas Jefferson, for example, have been making efforts for several years now to work more accurate presentations.

Yet another onetime slave-owning president’s preserved site, James Monroe’s Highland, likewise is striving to provide a far more comprehensive look at the enslaved people who once lived there and the conditions they experienced.

There are signs that such changes are taking place elsewhere too. In 2013, for example, the Ben Lomond plantation in Virginia featured in its holiday programming the tale of how enslaved people murdered the place’s owner over Christmas. That same year, Montpelier, once home to President James Madison, asked its interpretors at Christmas to explain to visitors that whites living nearby were afraid of violence by Madison’s slaves.

Christmas programming, however, is changing more slowly than programming at other times of the year. That is because many would like the holiday event to be a fun one.

But a public acknowledgment that slavery was immoral, horrific and resisted by its victims in the form of more sensitive and informative Christmas events at historic mansions and plantations might just be a step toward racial reconciliation in the U.S.

Read more of A Christmas Blog or Shop Now at Schmidt Christmas Market

Licensed from https://brewminate.com/slave-lifes-harsh-realities-erased-in-christmas-tours-of-southern-plantations/

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chocolate-parfait · 4 years

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(1) Hello, I saw you were accepting match ups and I jumped in your ask box :) So I am a Gemini INTJ, creative, ambitious, honest and thoughtful. I can come off as cold as I am mostly neutral in my expression, but I am very loyal and caring towards my friends and generally compassionate. My passions are writing, reading, ballet and learning new things (criminology, literature, history, sociology, psychology, sciences, philosophy), I am kind of a master of all trades. I also stand up for feminism

Here ya go, luv!

(+you didnt specify pronouns so i hope you're okay with she/her! If not please let me know and I will change them~)

I match you up with... Napoleon!

When you first meet (a proper meeting, not him trying to get you out of a mansion full of vampires), he is not fazed in the slightest by your neutral expression. If being in a such important position has taught him anything, that'd be not judging a book by its cover; you never know what people are hiding just beneath the surface. The same way, you want to witness and judge with your own two eyes the man's qualities and faults before running after him because "omg napoleon bonaparte-senpai!! >\\\<", and this is something that doesn't go unnoticed

Despite the fact that you don't throw yourself in his arms at the sight of his interest in you, one could say that your relationship started off on the right foot. You are straightforward and honest, and on multiple occasions you directly tell him that you want to see who he is for yourself instead of blindly believing rumors and legends

By now Cupid has already hit him with his arrow, and it's clear as day that his feelings will only grow from then onwards. All he can do is show you his true colors and hope that you'll like the view

Though he won't tell you so at the beginning of your friendship, he feels immense pleasure whenever you turn down Arthur's (or any man's) advances. And when, as your feelings develop into something stronger, he sees you walking to him with indescribable and genuine love in your eyes, he feels his heart bursting in his chest. Seeing how the most important person to him gifts him with unwavering loyalty, something that he had learned not to take for granted, it really makes him realize how much of an amazing person you are

Though on the overall you're pretty independent and can hold your own on most occasions, he'd like it if you relied on him more. From morning to dusk you're like a train running at full speed on neverending rails, so sometimes he has to run after you and snatch you away to force you take a break. Overtime he has learned to read every sign your body has to offer, no matter how subtle. He knows when you can still keep going and when you're a inch away from snapping, in which case he'll gently hold your hands and press a solemn yet soft kiss to your cheek, whispering words of encouragement in your ears

He particularly loves seeing the fire in your eyes whenever you talk to him about all the causes you support so firmly. He carefully listens everything you have to say, posing insightful questions as the will to share your ideals burns deep in his resolve. It's one of the reasons he realized he became so utterly whipped. You both share strong convictions that are able to fire you up fiercely in mere seconds, and to share such passion and conception with someone else makes him feel like he came back for an actual reason

Second choice: Leonardo

The moment he lays his eyes upon you, he already knows that there's much more about you than you let on, great minds (or storms in Leo's case) think alike and are bound to recognize each other. He's immediately drawn to you and being as curious as he can be, he immediately takes a liking to you and starts trailing behind you like a lost puppy, though unfortunately for you he plans on endlessly teasing you until he's satisfied with the results of his newfound research

It doesn't take much time for his interest to be rewarded with the first fruits of knowledge as you show him both your passion and skills. The vast variety of topics you cover with your knowledge make you an extremely great partner for all kinds of conversations, especially for someone as cultured as him. Your creativity matches perfectly with his spontaneous personality and oftentimes you find yourselves lost in deep and long conversations, considering and discussing all kinds of ideas and projects

You're also caring and considerate, and it's one of the aspect of your personality he finds liking a lot pretty quickly. You don't overstep boundaries nor ask him questions he'd rather not answer to, and you're genuinely concerned for whatever may bring him harm despite his inhuman resistance. While there isn't anything strong enough to physically bring him down forever, it feels nice having someone fussing over your bruises, tending to your wounds and checking your temperature; it's a completely new feeling for someone without a real family like him, and knowing he can completely trust you with anything is what ultimately wins his heart over

As the days pass by he gets to know you better, and just when he thinks you couldn't surprise him more than what you had done already, he discovers a new side of you, passionate and vigorous. You were out on a date walk in the city, going around and giving a hand to whoever needed it, when suddenly a couple started arguing in the street. It was a man harshly gripping a woman, probably his lover, by her wrist while yelling all types of misogynist insults as she tried to break free. The argument was rather one sided, and Leonardo could clearly see how hard you were staring at the scene in front of you, fists tight with rage and repugnance. As you went to tell him off, the pureblood followed you ready to back you up any moment. In the end everything was solved with just a punch in the face of the man and comforting words to the woman. As the two of you started walking away, Leo asked you about how you were feeling about the whole situation, interested and worried at the same time; that's when you finally explained about how you were an activist and fought against injustices, describing how situation was back in your time and how things developed through the years. Seeing your eyes light up with fire and finally understanding how deeply you cared about equality, he feels his heart flutter in adoration against his chest. You're truly one of a kind, and he can't help but want to support with everything he has.

Your relationship developed pretty fast as he found falling for you almost immediately, and being the flirty little tease he is, nothing changes much even after you start being a thing. He becomes more openly affectionate, that's true, but it comes so naturally to him that it's as if you've always been a couple

Most of your dates involve either philosophical conversations or happen in the library. You take naps together, or he gives you books he read that he knows you'll like. It kinda became your favorite meeting spot, and everyone in the mansion prefers keeping a certain distance from the room whenever you're in it, not wanting to be the third wheel or walk in on something embarassing

#matchups #300 followers special #answered

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doctorjeremyxvandamme · 4 years

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“Yesterday, upon the stair, / I met a man who wasn't t h e r e! / He wasn't there again today. / Oh how I wish he'd go away!”

Below the cut, you can find Jeremy’s basic info, key story points, full bio, and a handful of possible connections, although I am open to most plots! Triggers include death mentions, blood mentions, and a handful of horror elements. Please do feel free to reach out if I can provide context without mention of those topics.

basics

Name: Dr. Jeremy van Damme

Gender/Pronouns: Cismale | He/Him

Date of Birth: January 22, 1981

Age: 39

Hometown: Jersey City, NJ

Length of time in Crescent Harbor: 5 Years

Neighborhood: Hemlock Docks

Occupation: Professor of Anthropology at Crescent College

Faceclaim: Matthias Schoenaerts

key points

An only child, the son of a Belgian-born painter of some renown, but primarily among art types with an interest in niche work

Has a doctorate in anthropology from New York University and now teaches the discipline at Crescent College. Completed his undergrad education in Washington

Devotes most of his research to modern folklore, urban legends, and what he calls ritualistic play: games like Bloody Mary or Charlie Charlie, the latest variation of Juego de la Lapicera, meant to summon something, communicate with something, or achieve specific ends through strict adherence to pre-determined rules or conditions

A history buff. Knows much about the origins of Crescent Harbor and is now actively involved in historical preservation efforts. His interests encompass the periods both prior to and following the actual founding of the town.

Something of a pack-rat. Collects oddities and antiques and allows visitors to poke around his overcrowded house.

full bio (tw: death, blood, horror elements)

If he angled his neck just right, face pressed against the glass, held there by tiny, marker-covered hands, he could just barely see the monster from his bedroom window. The gangling, wide-eyed thing, all teeth and blackened pupils, was caught in an eternal snarl by the glint of the corner street lamp (which had been broken for some time and blinked erratically every few minutes). The light has stay on because the light keeps it there, he would think. So long as the light stays on, it has to stay there and cannot come here. For as long as the boy could remember, though, this massive graffiti creature, the handiwork of some unknown artist or another, had been spray-painted there, overseeing its domain from the red brick facade of an already defunct paper packaging warehouse. And it certainly had not escaped yet. But this particular piece of street art had long frightened the young Jeremy van Damme, who would spend his nights watching it from the safety of his heightened perch.

At that time, he lived with his father (a native of Flanders and painter of some niche surrealist renown) and mother (a full-time college dean and part-time muse to her artiste husband) in a tall brown apartment building that swayed with the wind. The groaning of the foundation, the creaking of the pipes, and the unpleasant damp sweetness, an almost bloody smell, that occasionally wafted out an uncovered vent after a storm, instilled in the boy an early sense of fantastic terror. More often than not, Jeremy van Damme was afraid. At the age of six, he discovered in a forgotten photo album a picture of himself he could not recall taking. And there, he abruptly decided some other Jeremy, a doppelganger or double or mimic, not only existed, but was waiting for the opportunity to strike and swallow him whole. At the age of seven, he got it into his head that a family of venomous lizards had taken up residence in the basement washing machine; he could hear them hissing if he listened closely. And at the age of eight, the death of the elderly woman down the hall gave birth to a new series of existential horrors, of the terrible uncertainty of the afterlife, of restless ghosts, and of white-haired specters that stalked hallways by night in search of little boys to do whatever it is ghosts do.

Nevertheless, the apartment was not vacant for long, and in the weeks that followed, Jeremy struck up a new friendship with a girl his age who had moved into the building with her family. And with how cheery they had painted the place, one could almost forget what happened to poor old Mrs. Hansen there. It was through this new companion, however, that Jeremy himself, albeit wide-eyed and screaming, was introduced to the sort of ritualistic play that would eventually guide his career. With nothing but a pack of stolen matches and the misguided goal of “putting the spirit to rest,” the pair of them locked themselves in her bathroom to chant into the mirror, spin in circles, and search for faces in the glass. And while they never found them, these games did instill in the young Jeremy a new sense of bravery and morbid curiosity. After all, if a ghost could be banished away by something as simple as blowing out a match, maybe they were not so frightening after all.

Still, he had always been curious. His mother was, after all, a career academic, and to that end, Jeremy had little hope of genuinely shirking his homework. He did well in school and read often. Small and eager to be helpful, he was even, in some ways, a natural teacher’s pet, eager to spend more time among the adults than the playground bullies. Eventually, Jeremy attended a nearby “all boys” Catholic high school, and while the AV Club was already dying by that time, he and a few friends began borrowing their camera equipment to “record psychic phenomena,” which largely consisted of them trying to unsuccessfully move rubber balls with their minds.

At sixteen, however, one of the boys got his own car, and the unlikely group was able to finally take part in a bit of local legend that involved circling an abandoned house several times, honking one’s horn, and then flashing one’s headlights. The result was the ghost of “Clarice” appearing in an upper story window to chase the intruders away. Every time they did this ritual, someone in the vehicle would shout that they had seen her (although it was never more than one person at a time). Following one such excursion, one boy disappeared from school with the flu for a week, and there was, at least, a successful rumor he had been spirited away. That was sort of fun.

Upon graduating, near but not quite at the top of his class, Jeremy ultimately attended the University of Washington, eager to spread his wings to the West Coast although Stanford had rejected him. While he began his higher education as a History major, he eventually shifted his focus to cultural anthropology, in which he earned his Bachelor’s degree. Graduate School, a Master’s degree, and a Doctorate from New York University eventually followed, and Jeremy began focusing his field of study more specifically on the role of folklore and legend in the modern world. His first and only full-length book, a small academic piece, entitled Creating Clarice: An Anthropological Case Study on the Invention of a Ghost, sprung to life when he, upon digging through an academic database, discovered the phantom woman he had tried so vehemently to conjure as a teenager had never actually existed.

Combining local interviews, in-depth real estate research, historical records, and a dive into the roots of ritualistic children’s games themselves, he tried, with varying levels of success, to trace the story to its source and frame it in the context of the community that had created it. This research, while mostly published for classroom use, did eventually earn him a position at Crescent College, where he still teaches today.

In his five years in town, Jeremy has since become something of an undisputed expert in local history, collecting trivia in the same way others might collect stamps. That said, Jeremy remains, to this day, a collector in the most traditional sense. His small home, an old building near the docks, has its charms and is known to be full of oddities, antiques, and other things that have caught the owner’s fancy. Most are of local interest, and Jeremy has rather seriously involved himself in town preservation efforts.

possible connections

The Student - Jeremy is a professor at Crescent College and teaches a variety of anthropology courses for all skill levels. This person is either a former or current student. Perhaps Jeremy mentors them, or perhaps they were an eternal thorn in his side.

The Curious - Jeremy collects all sorts of odd objects he finds. From 19th century tea sets, to old letters and photographs, to “haunted” mirrors and dolls, he welcomes this person regularly to poke around the antiques and maybe even goes shopping with them.

The Adventurous - Jeremy’s primary areas of expertise are modern folklore and ritualistic play. He and this person team up to test out the latest spooky games and legends, from trying to summon up a mirror ghost or see if they can get someone from beyond the grave talk with them through a disconnected telephone.

The Historian - Jeremy is well-versed in the history of the town and its founding families. Perhaps this person wants or needs to learn more about some obscure local topic, and the professor is here to help.

#crescent:intro #intro #about #bio #tw: death #tw: blood

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mothman-clarice-2 · 4 years

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Since you is a fan of Catherine and know a lot of knowledge of her.What’s your opinion about“St. Bartholomew's Day massacre”?

Oh yes, this is always a tough topic whenever I talk about Catherine.

This is the event that Catherine is most known for and for good reason. It was a brutal and horrific event that shocked both Protestants and Catholics at the time. It is a great example of how tense the rivalry was between protestantism and Catholicism.

My general opinion on Catherine's role in the massacre is that she indirectly caused it.

This will take a while to explain because there is a lot of stuff and a lot of people involved in the massacre. Please remember that I am not a professional historian. I have a very basic understanding of the history and politics behind the event but I am definitely not an expert.

The massacre was caused by many different things that I will try to summarize as good as I can. Remember that I have to greatly over-simplify this stuff because I am not going to write a thousand page long essay on this. This topic is incredibly diverse and I could write an entire doctoral thesis on it.

The people that you need to remember are Catherine (obviously), Catherine's son King Charles, Henry of Navarre, Gaspard de Coligny, and The Guise family.

Catherine was the queen of France but the laws at the time said that women could not make decisions like kings could. The way she gained power was because all her sons were very young when they became kings so she made decisions for them.

Charles was very young at the time of the massacre and did not know politics well. He was also very sick and mentally ill. This is important to remember when talking about his role in the massacre.

Henry of Navarre was the son of the Protestant leader Jeanne d'Albret. Gaspard de Coligny (who I will call Coligny for the rest of this post) was another important leader of the Protestants.

The Guise family was a very powerful catholic family in France.

At this time, Catholics and protestants in France were fighting a lot. Protestants thought the catholic church was corrupt and Catholics felt threatened by the protestants.

Catherine was catholic but she liked protestantism and would have become a protestant but that would have enraged Catholics in France. Catherine wanted to make peace between the religions and did two things that are important to the massacre. She helped pass a peace treaty called the "Peace of Saint-Germain-en-Laye" which ended the third war of religion in France. Catholics refused to accept this peace and were outraged when Catherine allowed Coligny (a protestant) to join the french council.

Catherine wanted to help tensions by marrying her catholic daughter to protestant Henry of Navarre as a symbol of peace between the religions. This did nothing to help and people just got more angry.

There were also things outside of politics that were causing the french people to be angry. The harvest was bad that year so people were hungrier. Taxes had also increased so people were obviously mad about that. Given these things, people would be more angry than usual and more likely to be violent. I am not saying these are the main reasons the massacre happened, but they are important for context.

Another important event that happened was that Coligny was almost killed by an assassin. He was wounded but he did not die. There are rumors about who sent the assassin to kill him but the main choices are The Guise family, the Duke of Alba (He was a spanish diplomat), and Catherine. I believe Catherine or the Guises are the most likely choices.

The Guise family were very catholic and hated that the Protestant Coligny was part of the council. They did not want protestants to have any political power so it would make sense for them to try to kill him.

Catherine had been concerned that Coligny was influencing Charles too much. Coligny and Charles had been good friends and Catherine felt that Coligny was using his authority to make Charles believe everything he told him. Charles had become more hateful towards the Catholics and the Guise family and it is believed that this hate was caused by Coligny. There are other concerns that Catherine had about Coligny but I do not feel like explaining them here, this is already a very long post.

I have one concern with the theory about Catherine. She did not like using murder to deal with people she did not like. I think immediately deciding to kill Coligny just because she had concerns makes no sense. Catherine almost never relied on impulse, she always thought about her plans thoroughly.

The attempted assassination of Coligny enraged the protestants and started a crisis that would lead to the massacre.

One night, Catherine and Charles had a private meeting to decide what should be done about the crisis. No records of this meeting have survived but apparently they agreed to assassinate some protestant leaders. Soon some authorities were ordered to shut the city gates to prevent a protestant revolt. They then sent swiss mercenaries to gather some protestant nobles and kill them in the streets. Coligny was killed as well.

It is important to note that the protestants had become very angry towards the monarchy and there was concern that they would try to overthrow them. This was a main concern to Charles.

As you can expect, these murders are what began the massacre. Charles and Catherine never expected or intended to cause such violence and tried to stop the massacres many times. All they could do was prepare for a fourth civil war and hope that it ended quickly.

There is much more to this event but this post is already extremely long so I am going to summarize and end it here. I think Catherine unintentionally caused the massacre. If she intended to cause it then she would not have tried to stop and avoid it. Catherine ultimately wanted peace between the religions and she knew a massacre would not help with that goal. I am not completely sure why they decided to kill protestant nobles and leaders but I probably need to do more research on that.

I adore Catherine, I think she was extremely ahead of her time and was incredibly smart. She knew how to manipulate a sexist system to gain the same power as a king and made many revolutionary additions to French culture and the modern world. She went through so much death and tragedy that it is shocking she did not break down under the pressure. Despite how much I admire her, that does not mean I cannot see her flaws. She made many decisions that were well-meaning but led to terrible situations. She sometimes let her emotions take control of her and impact her political decisions. She was often disconnected from many parts of french politics because she was not born in France and just did not understand it. There are many flaws with Catherine just like every other person. Despite my adoration for her, it is important that I recognize her flaws and the bad things she has done. Of course, it is undeniably difficult to recognize that your idol may have caused one of the deadliest massacres in french history but it is still necessary to come to terms with it.

#civ 6 #civ vi #civilization 6 #civilization vi #civilized company #civ vi gathering storm #history #civilization #french history

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a-certain-academy-city · 4 years

Text

Toaru Kagaku no Academy City: Operation Handcuffs - Retrospection

In the end, things had always been this way, weren’t they?

From the moment Accelerator took the position of Board Chairman, he made declaration of war to the Dark Side of Academy City. And it was from that point on that he used the resources he had at his disposal to ensure that the city’s darkness was completely purged.

He had even went as far as reassembling GROUP with a few new faces to help with the clean up operation. He used Espers like Musujime Awaki, Mugino Shizuri, and even level 0s like Hamazura Shiage. If they were still here, he probably would have ended up using Kamijou Touma and Misaka Mikoto as well in some way.

But then the Cosmic Side came knocking in the doors of the City he was trying to reform, interrupting his effort he could name a number of events that would give him reason to start a war with the Cosmic Side; it could have been when Zayane of the Right was tampering around with Academy City’s espers, particularly level 5s like himself. It could have been when Gaelion started his campaign which actually destroyed Academy City. It could have been when that Vacosian refugee group had decided to turn the planet into a super weapon and had manipulated the Aura users into causing havoc. Or it could have been way back when the Machine Empress and other beings invaded from Lawain, before Accelerator was even the Board chairman.

Anyone of these incidents would have made the perfect trigger, but he believed it all hit him during the Gaelion warpath,

He became aware of just how chaotic and unpredictable the Cosmic Side was and had decided to make preparations for a possible conflict with them, on top of dealing with the remnants of the Dark side who weren’t intent on going quietly.

He figured that all of these threats would be better off gone, which was why he used everything, from his positions as the leader of the science side and Academy City’s #1 to dispose of his opposition.

But when he thought about it, Accelerator had not changed a single bit. He still used bloody methods to solve problems, made espers and others be his underlings in his plans, and had even gone out and dealt with several issues himself.

Even at some point, he had became obsessed with crushing the Cosmic side, up to the point where he almost lost himself.

In the end, he was no different than he was a year ago, and now, he was becoming no better than Aleister himself when he was still around.

He had came to this realization when he had gone out and took out a certain depraved wizard.

Accelerator knew that guy would not be missed. No one would shed a tear for him, and many would praise his end. Even his own subordinates resented him which said enough. That guy needed to disappear for good.

But the fact remained that Accelerator still chose a brutal method to resolve the incident.

And he used people, even his own girlfriend to assure his end. Thinking about it more made Accelerator sick at how much he was becoming Aleister. He used people like pieces in a chess game and when he deemed that said chess pieces would be unable to handle it, Accelerator went out and crushed the problem himself.

Like a monster.

“You must have known what this meant from the beginning, Yomikawa. Idealism is powerless against reality, so if you try to force your ideals onto reality, there is bound to be a fierce backlash.”

Accelerator spoke to someone on his smartphone.

It was a person whom he had little time to visit since his ascendancy to his current position, but still kept in contact with for official matters.

In a way, this matter was both official and private at the same time. Accelerator was alone in the dark windowless room that was his office, with only the dim light of his holographic monitor lighting the room. It was late at night too, so not many people were around.

“The people who are more comfortable in the corrupt darkness were bound to attack there first. If they can’t make any headway through official channels or backchannels, they only have one option left: take someone I care about hostage and use that to negotiate.”

Accelerator wanted to end the cycle of violence and darkness perpetuated in this city. there was no other reason why the white monster had called Anti-Skill Officer Yomikawa Aiho in the first place.

Yes.

“Send me to the prosecutors and have me indicted.”

“Kh.”

“Why do you think I’m doing this? This is your job, Yomikawa. You’re the only one I know who can handle the rest of this.”

He spoke as if declaring a matter of fact. It was obvious what Accelerator was trying to do, but the Anti-Skill officer was still having trouble believing it.

The stage was not yet set.

No one was in agreement, so there was bound to be backlash once the confusion set in.

“I will rid Academy City of its dark side and I can’t leave any exceptions. I asked you to write up a charge sheet, didn’t I? I’ve killed more than 10,000 living humans, even if they were clones. And after that, I irresponsibly stayed in the dark side and fired guns all throughout this peaceful city while claiming to be helping. Someone like that can never be allowed out on the streets again. I must be placed behind bars no matter who tries to stop it.”

“The Board Chairman has complete control over Academy City. The 12 Directors below you are only for show. And whatever we might like to think, the rules never say the Chairman has to be a good person. I’ve never heard of someone that powerful just turning themselves in.”

“So what? That just means the system has always been broken. …Don’t make me laugh. If the rules differ from what everyone wants, then you’ve clearly found yourself a problem in the rules needing fixing.”

Who had been at fault? The answer was obviously Accelerator.

A Kihara had developed his powers and old Board Chairman Aleister had guided that monster down the path of murder for his own purposes, but it was still Accelerator who had actually done it.

But the #1 had been involved in far too much of the darkness.

How many people’s hands would be cuffed from this one boy’s testimony?

Of course people would be coming out of the woodwork to prevent this from happening.

Not because they were his good friends; because they had to protect their own future.

“You will never again leave prison.”

“I am aware of that.”

“Even if your sentence is reduced for cooperation with our investigations!! It just isn’t enough. The computer has already run some preliminary calculations. At this rate, your sentence will be for 11,000 years!!”

“Way too short. Around a year per murder? What kind of joke is that?”

“Why?” Yomikawa muttered under her breath.

The #1 did not look away.

“Didn’t I tell you? I can’t leave any exceptions. I’m the #1 and the Board Chairman, so I have to lead by example.”

Yomikawa Aiho was supposed to be a protector of the law.

But when she handcuffed an esper run amok, it was so they could be rehabilitated and have a second chance. That was why she would never aim a gun at a child. No matter how dangerous an esper they were, she had to create a situation where she could hear them out.

However, Accelerator would have no future.

This might be the right thing to do, but then who would save him?

“What about the clones?” she asked. “Once this is all investigated, their existence will come to light. That’s around 10,000 people who violate international treaties. Society might not accept them.”

Did clones have human rights or not?

Academy City had once answered no and repeated cruel experiments using them. And Accelerator was the one who had dirtied his hands there at the insistence of the researchers. They were undoubtedly the victims there, but the people in the outside world might not see it the same way.

If they too answered no and even saw the clones as a threat, they could be “disposed of”.

However…

“That’s why I have to make sure they’re safe.”

“What do you mean?”

“Do you think they’re safe now? If they’re discovered, then that’s the end for them. How is that safe? I need to correct that unnatural balance and make sure they have solid footing to stand on. They were victims in all this, so why do they have to continue keeping their heads down and hiding? Unlike me, they deserve a free life out in the open.”

Accelerator had only one hope of accomplishing that.

The white monster pointed his thumb back at his own chest.

“I’ll be the villain.”

That was the natural result.

In fact, it was unnatural for it to have not happened yet.

“I’ll gather all the attention of the media and the scientific society and accept all of the criticism myself. I’m the ridiculous genius, I’ve got all the political power now, and I’ve even got money too. That’s exactly the kind of asshole people will just love to see go down in flames. All the news will be focused on me and they’ve only got so much space for info in their articles. They’ll aim for impact and focus on the guy who went around murdering clones instead of the clones themselves. And who cares about the people spreading rumors? A lot of time will have passed before the media is sick of attacking me. And then it’ll be like a flat soda. Focusing on the clones after that won’t move the masses to action. People jump on these bandwagons because they’re bored with their own lives. These are the people who find themselves bored even with all the excitement out there to find, so they’re experts at living boring lives. Once they grow tired of a topic, their interest in it is forever dead.”

“...She won’t be happy when she hears this. Both of them.”

“I know.“

That was why he could not cheat the system.

He could not use his special authority as Board Chairman to pardon himself after being found guilty and he could not live behind bars but emerge as a heroic Board Chairman whenever there was a problem needing solving.

There could be no exceptions.

The person most deserving of punishment had to be appropriately punished and that had to be shown off to both Academy City and the rest of the world.

They had to show that true justice existed here.

They had to show that they had moved past the absurd age where the evil laughed and the good were left in tears.

Otherwise, nothing would change.

So he made a definitive statement that rang throughout the walls of that dark office.

“It all starts here,”

whispered Accelerator. It may not have been obvious without paying close attention, but the #1 and new Board Chairman was clenching his back teeth.

“This is also an issue of how much I can trust Academy City. If I get worried, can’t bear it anymore, and break through that wall to go save that brat, then it’s all over. That would create an exception and those shitheads from the dark side could have their way. So I have to trust that the giant system of Academy City will save that brat without me creating an exception.”

He was indeed a monster, so there was a violent part of him that would wild inside him. It told him the rules did not matter and he should break loose right this instant. Villains would always betray you in the end. Some eloquent speech about being reformed was not even worth listening to. He needed to pin them down, crush them, tear them apart, and grasp safety for himself. Even the greatest villain could not betray you if they were a corpse. And what other choice did he have if he was going to protect that young life? What could make a more beautiful story than dirtying his hands to allow someone he cared for to live their life out in the open?

But.

Even so.

“I will trust it.”

said Academy City’s #1 and new Board Chairman. That incarnation of slaughter turned fearsome dictator spoke the words like he was suppressing bubbling magma within himself.

“I will trust this city. I will trust that it is worth throwing out the rest of my life to protect. If I can’t trust the city I rule, then I don’t deserve to rule it in the first place.”

Someone had once told him that he had changed.

But it was this monster who had said they were one of the ones who had changed him.

Which was why this monster had retaken a human form and could continue to fight like this.

Even if it meant clenching his teeth and bearing with it all alone.

#Toaru Kagaku no Academy City (Main Verse)#First Ranked Level 5 & general Superintendent of Academy City ; Accelerator #The Story As It Is Told ; (Drabble)

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purrpickle · 4 years

Text

Random Pezberry Thought of the Day #353

A/N: This is another long @thedeadflag and me headcanon waterfall/exercise/ramble (at least on my part). It’s full of FEELS and I think worth sharing.

(And if you STILL haven’t read thedeadflag’s stuff, do it! Do it now! Here’s a handy dandy link: thedeadflag’s AO3. You won’t be disappointed. She’s amazing!)

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purrpickle sent a post Person A an...

otp-imagines-cult:

Person A and Person B break up. One day, months after this, Person A goes out and sees person B wearing an article of clothing A got them on the last birthday they spent together.

This made my heart hurt. ...And then I immediately thought of you. What does that say about our headcanoning/discussions? XD But seriously! This hurts, and makes my fic mind spin.

thedeadflag

Being more than a little tactile and always complaining about needing someone warm under her, Rachel gets Santana a big super comfy and warm scarf (one that could double as a blanket in a pinch) that she agonized and spent weeks researching, knowing Santana was picky about her clothes (not to mention Rachel being super unsure regarding her fashion sense when it comes to Santana, because of their history around that particular topic, even despite Santana's reassurances since shortly before getting together that Rachel no longer dressed herself like the wet fantasy of a creepy Japanese business man with a very specific fetish). They spend the last part of Santana's birthday with that scarf splayed around them, among other blankets, and it more or less becomes something Santana wears when she's cold and missing Rachel, a turn of events that just completely makes Rachel's heart sing at the sentimentality (she pens a song about it that Santana wishes wasn't hideously disastrous, but she indulges Rachel regardless whenever the diva wants to sing it to her so long as it's in private).

Flash forward two years later, about a year after they've parted ways, and Rachel's reading a tabloid on Saturday between her matinee and night-time performances on stage when she spots an article full of pap photos of celebs in New York after a major cold front rolled through the city in the winter. Her heart climbs up her throat at the sight of Santana. Santana, freshly broken up with some up-and-coming singer in a rock band, not that she paid an aching level of attention to her ex girlfriend, ex-best friend, and current distant friend who always seems to be busy, and who is only ever really available for brief FaceTime or Skype calls.

Santana, who is walking through Central Park in the photo, on the same path they'd spent much of their first date on. Santana, who is weARING HER SCARF

purrpickle

And god, nausea just pushes up her throat - the kind like her throat's strangling and her stomach's rolling because of the sheer visceral reaction to seeing something incredibly life rocking - and she has to pour over the picture, convince herself that it IS the same scarf, not just a similar one, and she sits back, suddenly numb, limbs heavy. It had to have been deliberate, didn't it? Their first date, THEIR scarf... Rachel scrubs her hand over her face, truly confused, a mixture of old, buried bewilderment of how things had gone so wrong and hurt and awareness and something she'd long thought had unkindled out of her - a spark of yearning, what-ifs pounding through her head, racing, her hands trembling a little as she pulls her warmed mug of coffee, previously too hot to touch but now her fingers didn't care - it felt good and the slight plain anchored her - close.

Staring at Santana's face, scrutinizing her neutral expression for ANYTHING, but getting no answers, she's only snapped out of her fog by her first alarm, alerting her she needed to start getting ready if she didn't want to be late for her habitual arrival an hour before she needed to be ready, and she decides, taking a deep, deep breath, forcing herself to close the magazine so it wouldn't blare out of her like a beacon each time she glanced in the table's direction, that she'll figure out how to feel later. And even if she had a decision to make in the first place.

*shares Katy Perry’s song Save as Draft*

thedeadflag

:O i know that song! And it definitely fits that AU and now I'm riding a wave of angst

purrpickle

You're welcome.

It's the lines: I still have the same phone number and we've both grown but I don't know (paraphrasing, of course) that really get to me and that AU.

thedeadflag

absolutely. Like, the fact that so much has changed, but that same line of communication remains as when you were together...makes it all that much easier to remember back, to succumb to the urge to reconnect, to feet the same waves of emotions you felt when things broke off, etc.

purrpickle

Also, like, Rachel doesn't want to make the attempt to reach out, rekindle things... And have Santana practically laugh in her face. That's the worst feeling of all.

So her number's the same, always has been, so if Santana really wanted to reach out, like that photo suggests, why didn't she?

thedeadflag

mmhmm

Meanwhile, it's so similar with Santana. She's been just mowing through women since Rachel, and none of them hold a candle to the diva. And she just keeps trying, desperate to find someone who could make her feel like Rachel did, but there's just been heartache after heartache. But she's scared to reach out after their final big fight when things ended. Even though she knows with 99% certainty that one of Rachel's throwaway remarks about her being heartless was just a heat of the moment, slightly alcohol fueled remark from the diva, she can't help but call into question whether Rachel really thought that was true the whole time, whether Rachel hadn't really felt or believed her love for her. And Rachel's seemed so happy lately, so upbeat, and she's been miserable, and reaching out only to have those fears confirmed would be devastating.

purrpickle

My heartttttttt.

And, like, maybe that day Santana had been walking that stretch of Central Park INDULGING that heart ache, having only just happened to brush her hand across that scarf she can't ever put away, even if a relationship gets semi-serious (before breaking almost immediately). She'd stared at it, hands helplessly feeling how soft and warm it was, Santana's eyes sliding towards her bedroom window to see how cold and blustery it looked outside. And maybe she'd wrapped it around her neck, heart skipping a beat as she smelled the faintest hint of what Rachel had always smelled like, and maybe, the scarf so noticeable around her neck, she'd, for the first time in years since traveling that path almost religiously for months after they'd broken up, just HOPING that she'd run into Rachel and they could have... maybe... worked things out..., taken the turn after meeting for lunch with her assistant. She'd tried to school her face impassible, tightening the scarf around her as the wind blew, almost laughing bitterly at herself for forgetting her gloves again, shoving her hands deep into her pockets as she remembered how Rachel used to chide her about that, taking Santana's hands in hers or pulling Santana's hand into her own coat pocket, gloved hand squeezing her tightly.

thedeadflag

*gif of Emma Stone crying and eating ice cream*

purrpickle

She hadn't even noticed the paparazzi that day, trying desperately not to show what it felt like to know the bench where she and Rachel had had their first kiss at was coming up.

thedeadflag

Yep, definitely too deep in her "conceal" mode and her memories to realize anyone was following/watching her, for sure. Just thinking with every stinging heartbeat that this was a mistake, this was a mistake, this was a mistake. Because Rachel wasn't there, and the weather outside couldn't begin to compete with the bitter chill of loneliness and longing her walk down memory lane brought her

And for the rest of the week, she's haunted by the songs Rachel would softly sing when they'd get in from the cold and make their way up to the loft. And it's like whiplash, all those happy, loving memories with the renewed doubts that any of it was as real as she thought it was, as she felt it was back then.

purrpickle

Her footsteps had started to slow as she approached the bench... But with a sharp shake of her head she'd sped up and left it behind, telling herself she was stronger than she had been after the breakup when she'd sit at the bench and cry behind a magazine, hoping against hope that Rachel's warm, smaller body would settle down next to her, arms sliding around her and pulling her head to her chest.

It probably doesn't help that Rachel had been in a high profile, supposedly very serious and romantic, happy relationship for almost two years about a year after their breakup, with rumors that he was going to propose any time now until they had suddenly broken up. Santana didn't like to listen to rumors, knowing her own got out of hand, but it had still hurt. Because she'd been thinking about a wedding in the future - had ALWAYS been thinking a wedding was in the future once their relationship had settled and grown and became real, more REAL than any other relationship Santana had had. And the grapevine had said it was Rachel's boyfriend who had broken up with her, so it probably meant that Rachel had been ready and capable, definitely capable, of moving on. Sure, Rachel wasn't dating anyone currently, only casually here and there, and it had been a while since that serious relationship, but Santana couldn't help worrying that... That she wasn't needed. That Rachel had completely released her from her mind.

thedeadflag

i'm dying here !!! Ugh, the feels

purrpickle

Really, this is a LOT of feels. It's so gooood while it hurts, too. XD

(You know, I was thinking, and it's okay if your addition contradicts this, I just wanted to get it down, but: what if Rachel was actually the one who broke up with her boyfriend and let him say he was the one who did? Because she was happy, but she wasn't AS happy as she knew she could have been. And maybe he DID actually propose, but she turned him down, and that's what led to their breakup.)

(She's never told anyone.)

(Not even her closest friends. The only person she DID almost tell, who she WANTED to tell, was Santana. But she didn't.)

(It hurt too much. And they were over, weren't they?)

(She didn't tell anyone because she didn't want to admit who it was she still thought of. Too vulnerable. Too easy to hurt.)

thedeadflag

that's actually pretty much what I was going to add on, that Rachel was the one that couldn't go through with a bigger relationship commitment after Santana, because it never felt right, felt like enough. But she'd feel guilty enough to let the guy save face and say he dumped her. And she'd struggle with the urge to run to Santana to vent about the whole situation, because it was simply too much for her to handle reasonably well on her own, but she couldn't. Not when Santana had been the benchmark she'd measured him against, not when she and Santana were long since over with, not when they'd lost that best friends-style emotional intimacy long ago after their break-up. Even if Santana was the only one she would feel comfortable telling in theory, she couldn't, not when it was already super uncomfortable and exhausting and distressing to confront that she still thought of Santana. Not with all the distance carved between them since they'd split. Distance they pretended wasn't there, but was clear to anyone who cared to look.

purrpickle

What if... What if this is the first time other than directly succeeding their break up that they're both single at the same time again? Not even truly casually dating anyone.

thedeadflag

I could definitely see that

purrpickle

Like, absolutely single. Not talking single for two weeks or whatever or already forward towards the next relationship.

((("Did you truly think I was heartless?" Silence. Then, deep inhale. "No, Santana. I've always known you feel... Care too much.")))

Ohh, what if they start communicating through paparazzi pics? First Santana wearing that scarf in that part of Central Park, then Rachel fishes out one of Santana's shirts Rachel had found mixed into her things after the breakup and never given back.

thedeadflag

And they're both anxious messes, entirely on edge between pictures, trying to figure out if this is happening or if it's just coincidence, or if their foolish hope is blinding them to other messages at play.

But then Rachel decides to be brave and lures the paps to Central Park, getting them to take a picture of her sitting on their bench, with a vegan ice cream cone in her hand. They hadn't had ice cream on their first date, or their fifth. It was later, on one of their routine walks in the park, after getting ice cream in the dead of winter for reasons that baffled Santana, that they'd found their way to the bench. And she'd been midway through licking her cone when Santana had leaned up against her, all taut and breathless, confessing she loved Rachel.

And so there Santana is, years later, just staring through tears at the photo of Rachel in the park, cone in hand, head tilted towards where she'd been way back then. And maybe it wasn't a rekindling of the flames they once had, but it was...finally, for goddamn once...a clear sign that Rachel missed her. That she hadn't just been a stepping stone, an afterthought, a warm body. That Rachel really had seen her, known her.

purrpickle

*gif of crying anime girl*

I think Santana loses some of her nerve, finally deciding that she's going to reach out - because it's definitely in her court now, after that pic - to Rachel through text. She writes everything out, hundreds of times, erasing and rewriting and erasing again. Finally, exhausted mentally and physically, she settles on, "Do you have time for coffee?"

thedeadflag

Was gonna respond in a bit to this when I had more time but YES

Santana being all "aaaaaaAAAAAAAAAA fuck my life whatever I'll just...fuck it, let's just see if she wants coffee" *send* Marches away and paces for fifteen minutes to work off her anxiousness

And she's just so exhausted, and worn down, and every minute that passes feels like an eternity, and brings a wealth of new doubts and second-guessing,

But then her phone buzzes

Rachel had been sitting on her bed when Santana's text rolled in. She'd done a double take, hoping she wasn't dreaming, and then left the room for a moment to come back just to confirm that fact. Santana wanted coffee. And not coffee-coffee-wink-wink-nudge-nudge like some use it as shorthand for a more explicit invitation, because Santana was not the sort to beat around the bush when it came to that... but coffee. Coffee.

And Rachel's mind immediately jumped to Stumptown, and Ground Central, and Third Rail, and Intelligentsia, all their old coffee hangouts across Manhattan, and the Bushwick favorites like Hearts, or Brooklyn Whiskers, and Mixtape Bushwick. All places with histories, but old histories. And as much as she yearned for Santana, and loved so much of their time together, she knew she'd grown as a person since they'd split, and that Santana almost assuredly had too, so she needed a new home away from home where they could feel each other out. A new place, a new tradition. A new them.

It took her twelve minutes to scour google for a place with good reviews that seemed to have the aesthetic that could fit them, and before she could overthink, she sent a name off. Abraço

And then quickly followed it up with an explanation and a flurry of potential times and dates she was available, because of course Santana wouldn't understand what the word meant on its own

purrpickle

I think Rachel's also struck at how it's worded. It's completely up to Rachel, how she'll respond. Rachel might have expected some demanding or direct request, but the Santana she had gotten to know... It did make sense. And it also spoke a lot to her because Santana was respecting her time.

And Santana, having frowned down at the random word when she'd snatched it up almost before it was done vibrating, felt so much relief like heat pool through her body, almost making her limbs numb. But as she read over the times and dates, Santana felt her heart sink, along with her smile. She was busy. Each day. She'd forgotten that she was headed for LA that Monday, for two weeks, as well as not figured that, it being currently a Wednesday, Rachel would be busy with her shows through that week and weekend.

Santana's shoulders dropped, her eyes burning. She hoped that this wasn't a sign. And the fact that Rachel had responded at ALL was a positive. But Santana didn't WANT to send back what could be construed as backpedaling, or having changed her mind. But it was true she just... Couldn't make it. Still, fingers trembling as she typed out something she hoped wouldn't stop everything, her heart pained, she sent it, and hoped it would be okay.

“God, I'm sorry. I totally forgot I'm going to be in LA for two weeks starting Monday. This isn't an excuse not to meet. I'm sorry. Maybe after I come back?”

(My thought being they could start texting slowly again, getting to know each other again before coming face to face. And they're adults, with busy lives, and, I think, it almost makes it mean more if it doesn't go smoothly.)

thedeadflag

!!! absolutely!

purrpickle

It also goes to show how impulsive and exhausted Santana was, completely forgetting that.

thedeadflag

I could definitely see it happen. Sometimes in her excitement/determination, she can get impulsive and not think things completely through

purrpickle

Okay, delete the second I'm sorry in the text. I was thinking I'd forgotten to put one in. And that way, when Rachel gets the first text, she DOES feel let down, but then Santana can quickly send another text with another I'm sorry in it. (Or is that too cliche? XD)

thedeadflag

Nah, they're awkward messes. They've already fumbled their way through communicating via pap pictures. What's a little fumbling through texting?

purrpickle

OH GOD. Though I'm not done exploring this adorable awkward mess of Rachel dealing with the high and abrupt low - while Santana's in LA, all the magazines and tabloids are talking about are her romantic lunch and dinner dates (with her producer or something), no matter where Rachel looks. Like, she and Santana are communicating, and she knows not to trust tabloids, but Santana looks so HAPPY in the pictures, with the smile on her face that always made Rachel's heart pound.

Like, it's not a big thing between them, but it does stick in the back of Rachel's mind.

I was thinking earlier that both women make a concrete decision to not rush things - or, let's be real, even discuss what's happening with each other because both are terrified the other isn't after trying again - and just hang out as friends for a long time. Sure, there's awkward moments and in drawn breaths when they accidentally brush against each other, but they just get coffee together, then more coffee, then maybe lunch or brunch, then Santana inviting Rachel round to watch some sort of television show together or something. They try very hard to rebuild up the friendship they lost.

And there are missteps. From both.

thedeadflag

Oh for sure. They've been so out of sync for so long that they're going to bring some friction, and fumble around. And some old habits will resurface that are (or at least feel) a bit too intimate for that stage in the relationship, and that'll throw them off their games, and have them retreating, and yeah. I definitely think that's likely

purrpickle

Oh yes. Definitely. Good point. It kinda stops them cold when they realize what's happening. And yeah, they retreat. It's them, after all.

It's like, is all this awkwardness, hyper focus of NOT to do the wrong thing, even worth it?

Somehow, Rachel and Santana manage to get coffee and talk and spend together for about two months before people start to catch on, or take pictures of it. Immediately, the tabloids clamor about "Old flames igniting" and "Rachel had never given up on Santana" and "Santana turning to Rachel to repair her scandalous reputation", etc. etc.

It's not long before Quinn is calling up Santana, not wanting her old friend to be hurt again, while Tina and Mercedes show up on Rachel's doorstep, demanding a girls' night out/in - and Rachel, who had had plans to see Santana that evening has to cancel them, awkwardly starting, like, "Tina and Mercedes are in town..." and "Yeah, I get it," Santana answers, "Tell Wheezy and Chang One I's talk to them later." Both don't get too good of a night's sleep.

thedeadflag

And maybe they manage to sneak off to a coffee shop late the next morning, all bleary eyed and grumbly, and proceed to pass out against each other in a shared booth seat. They wouldn't mean, to, of course. It's the one place that has someone deliver coffee too their tables, but it takes longer than they expect (or, than Rachel expects, given Santana knows how complex Rachel's order always is) and they're both just so tired from being up all night thinking about how to navigate the situation with their friends when it'd been hard enough to navigate on their own without the interventions and interrogations.

purrpickle

It's Santana who wakes up first when the barista comes over, and she groans, nodding at the guy to just leave the coffees. She shifts a little, heart squeezing as Rachel's head rubs against her shoulder, the other woman protesting at getting moved, and Santana lightly nudges her shoulder. Her heart is beating hard, her brain telling her not to move her, to take the opportunity to feel her against her again, and breathe in the scent that had always been RACHEL... And her fingers hover over Rachel's cheek, aching to smooth her bangs from her eyes. They've gotten close again, but... Not close enough for that. And they - still - hadn't really talked about where they heading.

Exhaling, her eyes averting as they threaten to water, Santana nudges Rachel's shoulder again, harder. "Coffee's here," she shrugs casually when Rachel sits up, blinking at her blearily. Rachel's scent and warmth is gone, and Santana takes a sip of her coffee to cover herself.

"Oh, thank you. I... Was I sleeping on you?" Rachel almost stutters, blushing. She can't believe herself.

(There was a song I was listening to [on repeat when I couldn't find the case to swap out the CD] on my drive back up that very much reminded me of this story. Let me see if I can find the relevant lyrics.)

(We used to be inseparable, I used to think that I was irreplaceable We lit the whole world up, before we blew it up, I still don't know just how we screwed it up)

-Selena Gomez, Love Will Remember

thedeadflag

this angst has me wishing lesbian life alert was a real thing because I think I'm gonna need it if this keeps escalating XD

purrpickle

At least in this 'verse they're rebuilding and getting each other back. :D

thedeadflag

this is true :P

purrpickle

(But honestly, it screams angsty Pezberry to me.)

Who breaks and moves in for a kiss first?

thedeadflag

I think Rachel. It's the slow build-up of past memories and feelings alongside all the fantasies and ideas and hopes her overactive imagination and inner passion drum up over the months of playing it cool and feeling each other out. Rachel does her best to keep composure, to play it safe with her heart, but she's absolutely not a "bend, don't break" girl, she's composed and strong and willful until she's suddenly not, and it's in one of those moments of weakness where she just straight up finds herself moving in for a kiss before she can catch herself. She's always wanted anything and everything in her life too damn much, and after so long just dancing around with Santana in this pseudo relationship, she just gets overcome by a rush of need, and...well, she wouldn't be Rachel Berry if she wasn't driven to excel in everything she does

at least, that's my take

purrpickle

And Santana registers what Rachel's doing as she's moving in, Rachel's hand tight in the sleeve of Santana's coat, and god, she's shocked still, lips parted as Rachel, hesitating only a second, own lips trembling, presses into her. It's not a long kiss, Santana's hands rising to cup Rachel's sides, Rachel already leaning back even as Santana gently puts more and more weight on her as if to push her; but then Santana wavers, and with a breathy, needy exhale, she's closing the distance, her own lips molding back over Rachel's. It's not an exceedingly passionate kiss, this one, just lips pressing against lips, hearts jumping and chests heaving with bodies prickling, but both women are slightly dizzy from the sheer RELEASE and CONSTRICTION it blossoms inside of them. Release, because it means both are on the same page, but also constriction from the sheer anxiety and fear inside each other that is this right? Even if they want this so much, should they TRULY try it?

(But Santana's not strong enough to pretend she doesn't want this.)

But they take it slow. Don't fall into bed. Don't even have a hot and heavy macking session. They just kiss once, twice, then pull back, staring at each other. Then they talk. They talk a LOT. Things waterfall out. And then Santana goes home for the night, maybe even the one to suggest it, that they should take the time and think and make sure that if they agree to actually try again, it's with time away and it's not the rush of just how amazing their physical connection has always been.

thedeadflag

Yep. Maybe if it was their first time entering into a relationship, they would have fallen into each other and their passion, but they're older, more cautious, with greater willpower. As much as Rachel might want to give in completely, she knows they have to get it right this time if they do it at all. And that means patience, time, and lots of talking. And while she's only comfortable with the last of those three things, Santana's worth the effort.

(and yeah, I can see Santana suggesting heading home...as much as Rachel is a fantastic planner, she's more reactive than cerebral in the moment, at least compared to Santana, not quite as quick at plotting out the smoothest, safest way to handle this new revelation after they've talked enough about it and what it means for them. Rachel would ask a lot of important and detailed questions, but Santana would be steering that particular ship and figuring out for the both of them when they need to call it a night)

purrpickle

Right. Santana wants to protect her heart - and part of her still can't help but want to protect Rachel's, too - and she knows when she needs to step away, to process, and especially knows when Rachel needs that too. She needs to know that when they meet up again the same feelings will be there - from BOTH of them. And she's scared. She's honest to god scared. Kissing Rachel scared her - because it was real, because it illustrated that the physical feelings are still there, and because Rachel hurt her before. She knows, logically, that they've been working towards this, that obviously they set out with the resuming of their relationship in mind, but if it's actually starting to happen... No one, aside from Brittany during high school and the time afterwards, has meant so much to Santana. And she doesn't want to squander this, knows her particular role to play in this, and NEEDS to see Rachel reach out and meet her. And part of that is slowing them, if just to feel like there truly IS a way she can control this, feel in control.

That the EMOTIONAL part of during the kiss was still there, too.

She's vulnerable, but what she's learned over the years they were apart and her trying to move on, is that they can't fall back together in their old love. They need to fall in love again, in their new lives.

thedeadflag

^^^ This is hitting me right in my fluffy angst feels

purrpickle

Me tooooo.

I thought it was very important, this part: they can't fall back together in their old love. They need to fall in love again, in their new lives. Because it's SO TRUE they could fall into the old trap of just picking up from where they were, bury themselves and hide in it. When what they really need to do is TRULY start over, MAKE new love and let it be them, not the echo of what it once was.

Basically, they can't live on the dying energy of a supernova. They need to live on the new world built from its stardust.

thedeadflag

Yep. They aren't who they used to be. They can't fall in love with the ghosts of who they were...they can appreciate the good times they shared back then, and the love they had for each other, but they're different people now. They need to completely explore each other's depths again, and and find out if they're compatible again, if they can fall in love with these new versions of each other. Just because they fell in love once, and were a good fit once, doesn't mean they would again. After all, they fell apart because they stopped being a good fit. Something changed, or at least something didn't fit where they thought it did, and that hurt more than anything. So they need to get it right. They need to be careful. They need to figure out if they really fit together instead of just hoping they will and ignoring the details, because neither of them want to get hurt again, or to hurt each other. They know they deserve love. It's whether or not each other is the right one to share it with is the question they need answering, and Santana's absolutely going to figure out if the people they built themselves into after the wreckage of their relationship are compatible pieces of their life's puzzle, or if they're just better off friends

purrpickle

Oh god my heart just died. And honestly, they're both so scared that they'll only fit as friends. Because the way they feel about each other, they can't see a future where just friends would be enough. And yeah, you should always be friends with your lover, but could they ever be friends if they weren't lovers? Would they be able to grow into that.

And honestly, I just saw a heartbreaking scene where Rachel's crying, sobbing, because she's so terrified Santana's going to say they won't fit, they won't work, and she's mature enough to realize that she shouldn't, wouldn't be able to MOLD herself into fitting together, or "changing" Santana to fit her inside herself either. Because if Santana says friends, that's it, and she'd abide by it, even as her heart's breaking. But she's crying, admitting to Santana that she wouldn't be happy, that she's terrified they won't/can't try again.

She's not trying to put Santana on the spot, but she can't help how she feels.

thedeadflag

She wouldn't be Rachel if she could

*help how she feels, that is. She's always been particularly vulnerable to her emotions pulling her all over the place. Again, she's always wanted things too much

purrpickle

I mean, that makes it sound like Santana's the gatekeeper for their relationship, but I kind of imagine, in this case, she is.

Rachel's not another rushed into high profile fling. But also, Santana does drag this on a bit too long. Maybe not entirely knowingly, but I can see Rachel finally pointing it out to Santana, quietly, forcibly stoically.

thedeadflag

and as much as she heard Rachel's words, as much as it all clicks together with perfect sense, it only lays her fears bare for all to see. She's always been cautious, calculating, and one of the few times she wasn't, she got her heart annihilated. She's terrified of that happening again. Even if everything points to them being a good fit, she second guesses herself, and though she realizes that a little late into their new attempt, she can't help it. She's scared. Because as much as she can see a vivid future together, she can still remember exactly how each one of the many breakdowns felt after she and Rachel fell apart the first time.

But it's a good thing, it's exactly the kind of kick in the ass she needs, because she's been patient, she's been cautious, she's been so focused on them and how they fit, and she just hasn't let herself put all the pieces of their mosaic together in her mind yet because she's been terrified they won't fit, not just because she knows it'd break Rachel's heart for them to not be able to be friends, knowing it wouldn't be enough for Rachel, and that it also wouldn't be enough for her after everything. Not with how she feels. But also because she's terrified that they will fit, but that she's missed something, like last time (because of course Santana blames herself, regardless), and that they'll end up repeating past mistakes.

But they're not the same people. Not anymore. And she goes over the differences between who they were when they started the first time with Rachel, and who they were when they ended. And the fact that Rachel isn't on-the-fly creating a powerpoint to visualize the differences as they brainstorm and reassess what they've learned over the past months...maybe it's a little absurd to focus on, but it's something that she uses to keep herself focused and faithful on the notion that it really isn't too good to be true, that maybe they really could work together. That in the years that have passed, they've grown and changed and the flaws that condemned their past relationship aren't there anymore. And at the end of the two and a half hour conversation, their coffees cold on the table, the sun long since set, Santana asks what they do now? (maybe? I don't know, is that the right sort of direction?)

purrpickle

(I'm not sure what you're asking?)

thedeadflag

like, I don't know, my mind's been a little foggy all day, so I'm not sure if I'm missing anything important in my on-the-fly stream of consciousness rambling/brainstorming

purrpickle

Hey, you're making more sense than my word deluge seems to make to me. Is this two and a half hour talk happening after Rachel tells Santana she's drawing things out?

thedeadflag

yeah, that's what I figured. Like, maybe Rachel says it, warns Santana, and plans on leaving directly after to let Santana think, but Santana reels Rachel back in, because okay, yeah, she HAS drawn this out too long, and if they need to get down to it and make the call, figure out if they're 100% in or out, then they do it right now. So it's two and a half hours of arguments and counter arguments and pros and cons and drudging up painful past memories yet again, and contrasting with what they've recently learned, and maybe some more info they share that seems innocuous but the other finds interesting or surprising, and it's all exhausting, and lasts much longer than expected, but by the end...every negative counterpoint, every con, has been dealt with or they're explicitly aware of it and have discussed how to work through that. And they're left with...all signs pointing to yes, pointing to "Pezberry: The Sequel" as Kurt and Quinn would call it. And as scared as she is, Santana's in. And Rachel, Rachel's overwhelmed and relieved, and frazzled, but she's in. But then they have to figure out where they go from there, and Santana's just blanking, because how do you ask a woman on an official date-date after you've spent 2 and a half hours going through an emotional gauntlet together?

purrpickle

You know, I think Rachel steps forward at this moment. She's scared, exhausted, too, but she can see how scared and exhausted Santana is, too. And Rachel carries a lot of the guilt inside herself, too. She reaches out, palm trembling, to cup Santana's cheek, pulling her to look at her. "We both want this," she whispers, "And we've talked enough that even I feel that anything more at this moment won't say anything more." Rachel laughs lightly, biting her lower lip, smiling as Santana's lips curl up, her dimples starting to show as her dark eyes meet Rachel's, "Why don't we..." Rachel licks her lips, heart starting to trip in her chest, gasping as Santana's hand finds her free one, almost shyly curling around it - just to feel Rachel's hand in hers, not let her lace their fingers together. "Why don't we do this? Go on a date. I... I want to. Tomorrow. Or... The next day. Yes, the next day." Rachel lets her hand fall, curling it around Santana's around hers. "We... We can talk in the meantime, but truly 'START' there."

And they do start out slow. Hold hands, sit next to each other, closer than they had before, but not cuddling yet, and short, light kisses when they get done with their dates or go home for the night.

Oh god. The first time they have an argument (like all couples do). Both are vibrating and scared that the other will say something that will break them, or bring up the past, so each are preemptively trying to protect themselves and prickling the other.

thedeadflag

Absolutely, it's like they almost expect something to go horribly wrong, like a veil being lifted to realize it was never real, they never had a chance, their past heartbreak was too much to overcome, that they'd be defined by their past actions yet again

and they don't even realize they're doing it at first, but they're throwing barbs in a sort of self-destructive "it was never going to work, so at least by creating its destruction, I was in control of it, I could minimize the pain" sort of way, and it's just leading down and down, and Santana realizes it first after a particularly pointed remark that sounds so much like her high school self that it's jarring. And it reminds her that this is exactly what she used to do in high school, to herself, at almost every opportunity for happiness.

purrpickle

((Okay, so I came up with this, but I don't know if it really, truly fits? Like, yes, it's vulnerable enough, but I'm not sure they'd really be able to stop the argument in such this way. What's your opinion?))

Finally, after a sharp word, Santana notices that Rachel's... shaking? Her heart squeezes, her own tension in her body suddenly more noticeable. "Rache?" she barks, it coming out more angry than she means it to, still riding high on frustration and fear, "You're... You're trembling?" She still wants to continue the argument, the self destructive part of her wanting to "win" the row, but the self sacrificing part of herself wants to just hug Rachel. It's only a stupid argument, not, hopefully, she yearns, the true end of their relationship. And Rachel's not even looking at her now, inhaling, as if to ignore Santana's question and shout out another painful jab... But she's trembling. And Santana realizes she's trembling too.

thedeadflag

it makes sense. Santana does love to win, and is terribly stubborn, but she's shown a willingness to shift away from those parts of herself (at least temporarily) to focus on more emotional matters. (example: arguing with Rachel over the disposed pregnancy test, pulling Rachel close and comforting her instead of continuing the argument when Rachel tells Santana she 'had no right' and subsequently breaks down)

purrpickle

*nods* I also see it as kind of an unconscious trade off... Rachel made the first move to ask Santana out (after forcing the conversation), and Santana's the first to stop this spiraling maelstrom. Obviously, both don't want all of their arguments or tiffs to end up in sabotage, so they talk, again, promise to try and not doom them before they truly have a chance. They're worth it... They have to be.

Ugh... So I'm feeling extremely fluffy right now. The first night they stay the night with each other, like in the same bed, as both have ended up crashing at the others' place before in a guest bed - no sex, not even taking off clothes, just in pajamas - but definitely touching each other, and waking up tangled together.

Touching each other as in lying next to each other or holding hands or even Santana opening her arms and letting Rachel snuggle into her.

thedeadflag

you know I'm a total sucker for soft, simple intimacy !!! Especially involving beds and snuggling !!

purrpickle

In the early morning hours, it's the special time of day where vulnerable, true things can be whispered without repercussions or second thoughts. It's the close, soft, warm moments, where Rachel can bury her face into Santana's chest and say, so softly, that she's missed this. That no one's arms around her has ever felt so good. And Santana nuzzles the top of her head, and admits, just as softly, voice as emotionally naked, that she agrees. That it's like they were meant to be. That, and she swallows, pressing her lips to Rachel's hair, that maybe everything had to happen so they could have this.

#pezberry #rachel berry #santana lopez #thedeadflag #thought = headcanon = almost complete fic/drabble inspiration = if i had energy to flesh it out more #rptotd #353 #given brief formatting and editing #ugh ugh ugh #i remember being so wrapped up in this 'verse for a while #so angsty #fluffy angsty #the best kind i think

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luvknow · 5 years

Text

heroine addict | yang jeongin

genre: journalism student!jeongin x heroine!reader | superhero au ; college au summary: yang jeongin is failing his journalism classes and needs an article of the century to bring his grade up. when the city’s heroine saves his life, he thinks a biography about you is just the topic to save him from failing. when you don’t agree to an interview, jeongin ends up risking his life daily just so he can see you. one of these days you’ll say yes to him (you do). wc: 8k a/n: happy super belated jeongin day!! i love you ; ~ ; enjoy!

It’s midday as you’re sitting on top of the city’s tallest building with your legs dangling over the edge, bored out of your mind. The view from above isn’t as beautiful compared to the night since the sun is so blinding - mostly because you can’t see anything, period. Why your boss insisted on you taking a day shift, you’ll never know why. Nothing cool ever happens during the day anyways, so what was the point?

“Since your class got cancelled, I figured you’d want something to do,” Woojin explained through your earpiece. “Don’t you like getting paid?”

“But I’m so bored ~” you whined for the hundredth time. “You don’t have any leads? A drug bust? A planned robbery? Anything???”

“Not at this time. Just watch for some dumb kid who isn’t paying attention while crossing the street. There’s plenty of those, especially around the college campuses.”

“You know from personal experience?” you teased.

“Don’t make me disable your suit.”

You ignored Woojin’s threats and followed his orders, continuing to watch over the boring city. It was fun to tease him all the time, but you always obeyed his orders whenever he gave them because he always knew what was best. Whether he told you to go ahead and attack with full force or to hold back and be cautious, you never questioned his orders. You’re not sure what it is about Woojin, but you trusted that man with your whole life, for God only knows why.

You remember the exact day and time when he approached you for his little project. It was a Monday, of all days, at 7:15 PM where you two shared barbecue over a hot grill and a whole pitcher of beer. You’ve known that studious man for a long time and you never took him for someone who would drink on a Monday but when he said it was his treat, who were you to complain and be suspicious?

But that was his plan all along - to treat you out for good food, get you a little tipsy and bam! He pitched you his project at your peak giggliness when your face was all pink and warm.

“Did you say you wanted me to try out your supersuit?” you snorted.

“Yup.”

“A supersuit like for superheroes?”

“That’s right.”

“You’re kidding, right?”

“I am one hundred percent serious.”

“You know I’m like, athletically challenged.”

“That’s exactly why I think you’d be the perfect test subject! I know exactly how fast you can run, how much you can lift, how flexible you are - all of it will be maxed out with this suit.”

“Wha - have you been watching me!?”

“Don’t be mad, but I kind of stole your physical records from high school,” Woojin snickered.

“What the hell, dude!”

“You’re surprisingly good at stretching, if you ask me.”

“You’re so weird…”

“So you’ll do it or what?” he begged, giving you his cute little pout and puppy eyes he knew you could never resist.

“... Fine, you weirdo Edna Mode impersonator.”

“Jokes on you, I take that as the highest form of a compliment.”

From then on, you agreed to whatever testing would follow. You’ve tried and tested nearly a dozen suits since your partnership, but none were perfect enough for the perfectionist engineer Woojin. The latest model - the one that you were currently wearing - is the closest he thinks he can get to said perfection, at least for now. Rumor has it that he’s already got another suit in the making for you.

Even through the uncomfortably intimate suit fittings, rigorous physical conditioning, and the life threatening crimes you saved the city from, you honestly wouldn’t trade this for anything else. You’ve tasted the rush, tasted the fame, and now you’re addicted and there was no going back.

For the next couple of hours until your next class, you stayed on top of the tallest building in the city overlooking the people and talking to Woojin about his day.

It was late afternoon when Jeongin left his class with a solemn look on his incredibly pale face. In his hands, he held his quarterly assignment that had a huge fat F in red at the top of the page. After talking with his professor, they said there was still a chance for him to bring up his grade with the other three assignments still left, but how the hell was he supposed to do that when he genuinely thought his article about the local pet shelter was good!?

Maybe this major isn’t for me, he thought negatively. Maybe I should just switch�� But to what? Everything else is so boring.

Jeongin was in his own little world as he walked from the campus to the hustle and bustle of the city. He wasn’t really paying attention to his surroundings as he mapped out his future with different majors he thought about switching to. With wide eyes and a dazed look on his face, he walked through crowds and crossed streets mindlessly - so mindlessly that people moved out of the way for him so as to not bump into him.

At one of the busiest intersections in the city, Jeongin crossed the street on a red light. The taxi horn honking at him seemed to fade in and by the time he realized what was happening, it was too late for him to react.

This is it. He patiently waited for the taxi to hit, but it never came.

Loud gasps and camera clicks were what brought a dazy Jeongin back to reality. Everything was loud as it should be and that’s when he knew he was no longer daydreaming and that the taxi missed him.

Or rather the taxi didn’t get the chance to hit him.

There you were with both hands on the taxi and deep dents beneath them, indicating your method of stopping the taxi from hitting the poor boy. Jeongin stared at you with wide eyes, mentally pinching himself so he knew he wasn’t dreaming. He couldn’t believe it! You, the city’s fallen angel who graced them with your powers to protect the people, were right in front of him! You’re the city’s local celebrity - you’re all the news reporters ever talk about -

News… Oh shit, he was going to be on the news! Well, this was his ultimate career goal, wasn't it? Plus it’ll look good on his resume... But wait, if he gets a picture, maybe he could use you for his next assignment and -

“Are you alright?” you asked carefully, waving a hand in front of the boy’s shocked face. He hadn’t moved since you stopped the taxi and you were beginning to worry that he was frozen from fear.

The boy cleared his throat and nodded his head vigorously. Your eyes were so big and bright beneath your mask, staring so intensely at him, that he had a hard time looking at you. How cute, you made him nervous!

“Y-Yes, I’m good! Great, actually!” he stuttered.

“That’s good,” you giggled. Your laugh was sweet like sugar to everyone’s ears and onlookers wondered how Jeongin was able to compose himself when you were so close to him. Truth be told, he forgot how to breathe, so that helped. “You should be more careful, especially during the rush hour.”

Way to look like an idiot. Jeongin cleared his throat. “Of course! I’m sorry for the trouble.”

“No trouble at all. I’m just happy you’re safe.”

The cute boy burned a dark red from your smile for everyone to see. Before he could ask for a picture, you jumped high up in the air and in the blink of an eye, you were gone as fast as you arrived. As the crowd dispersed with their eyes glued to their phones, it seemed that everyone got a picture or a video of you except him! So not only did Jeongin completely make a fool of himself in front of you and the entire city for not reading the street lights, he was a fool who lost the opportunity for the best student article in his university’s history!

But that’s ok because he’ll catch you next time. He’ll make sure of it. Even if it means walking in front of a taxi again.

“You’re such a flirt,” Woojin teased through the bluetooth.

“I am not!” you pouted, hopping from building to building away from the scene.

“Please, ‘no trouble at all, I’m just happy you’re safe ~’ Who says that?”

“Superheroes, Woojin… Superheroes say that.”

“Yeah, but not like THAT.”

“Whatever! He’s cute!”

“I knew it.”

You spent the rest of the day thinking about how cute his blushing face was.

The deadline for the next assignment was approaching quickly and to his bad luck, Jeongin hadn’t seen you since you saved him from the taxi. Until he’d meet you again, he took this time to research everything and anything about you, but sadly, there wasn’t much for him to work with. All he could come up with was your guestimated age, your height, and who you work for. He thought he’d be able to dig deeper when he found out you were associated with KimTech, but there was nothing.

But this was good! Really good! This meant that if he could interview you, then he’d be the first to know all about you. He’d be the very first reporter to get the scoop on the city’s one and only heroine. But this wasn’t going to be easy - from the handful of interviews he’s watched, it didn’t look like you liked people knowing things about you. You kept your interviews short and sweet - practically one-liners. You were a complete mystery, and that only attracted Jeongin more to you. He would have to find a way to work around this.

That is if he ever met you again.

The same time everyday after that same journalism class, he went to the same intersection and took a step on the crosswalk at the red light. He thought that maybe recreating the scene would bring you out of the shadows again, but it didn’t work. Maybe he wasn’t in danger enough? But was Jeongin really about to risk his life just for a school assignment?

Hell yeah, he was.

Day-by-day, Jeongin tried risking his life a little more at a time. From taking steps at a red light, to standing too close to the edge of the train stations, to even standing on the rooftops on campus buildings, he tried his all to get your attention but for some reason it wasn’t working. Didn’t you have like, a radar or something? Or like some KimTech device that let you know when people were in danger? Jeongin was fake trying to die here and it was like you were ignoring him!

He had to go bigger.

There was a hotel smack in the center of the city. It was the tallest, most glamorous boutique hotel where only celebrities and international business people stayed. It was a privilege in itself to step foot on the marble tiles and Jeongin knew all too well how that felt. He wasn’t a stranger to the hotel and especially not the rooftop. No one ever questioned him whenever he walked in because they all assumed he was a busboy for the banquet hall and he never corrected anyone for situations just like this. So using his privilege, Jeongin took the elevator straight to the empty rooftop. Usually, the roof would be closed for private events, but tonight was the only night this week when it wasn’t booked. Lucky him, huh?

The view up there was absolutely stunning. He couldn’t really see the stars, but the lights from the city twinkled just as beautifully. And most of all, it was quiet. Quiet and peaceful. Maybe he should come up here more often when he wasn’t trying to attract the city’s heroine.

Jeongin hopped up on the ledge that was made to protect tipsy celebrities from falling to their death. The tips of his sneakers peaked over the corner and never before had he felt so alive! For a moment, distracted by the warm glow of the city lights, he forgot the whole reason why he was up here. He closed his eyes and breathed in the cool air. If only he could fly.

A hand grabbed onto his and yanked him backwards, causing him to fall hard on his ass on the concrete rooftop.

“Ow! What the -!!”

“Are you crazy!?”

Hovering over his cowering form was just the girl he was looking for. He was surprised how upset you seemed, with your eyes so big and your brows furrowed. What were you so upset about? Didn’t you go through stuff like this everyday?

“Hello,” Jeongin greeted sheepishly. “Can I help you?”

“I know you,” you said, pointing an accusing finger. When you recognized him, your face softened and Jeongin could breathe a sigh of relief. “You’re the cute boy who almost got ran over by a taxi.”

“You remember me, huh?” he blushed. “Wait, cute?”

“What do you think you’re doing up here?” You asked, ignoring his question.

“Getting some fresh air…?”

“While standing on the ledge!?”

“I live life on the ledge. Get it? Life on the ledge?” When you didn’t look the slightest amused, Jeongin cleared his throat, stood up, and dusted himself off. “I’m sorry.”

“You’re not very smart, are you?”

“Sometimes I can be.”

“Will you pretend to be smart and stay off the ledge then? I’d like a peaceful, bloodless night, thank you.” As you were saying this, you were already drifting away from him.

Wait, he still had to interview you! “If I say I won’t, will you stay?”

You raised a curious brow. Was this his way of asking you to stay? “And then what, I’ll babysit you?”

“I prefer the term ‘supervise’.”

“Hm, babysitting or saving the city?” you sang, weighing your options. The right answer was obvious, but the wrong answer was quite tempting if you were being honest. This boy may have some adrenaline high or he was just really stupid, but that’s what made him interesting. You can’t remember the last time someone popped up on the radar this often, either. It was almost like he was trying to get your attention, but why?

“The city can hold off their addiction to their heroine for a little while, right?”

His dimpled grin was almost too cute to resist. Almost. “Maybe some other time. Gotta save the city from people like you, y’know?”

“Wait -!”

You disappeared again, but that wouldn’t stop Jeongin this time. This time he was going to follow you. How, you ask? Social media was his powerful weapon.

Jeongin ran between alleys, hopped on different trains, hell he even ordered a taxi just so he could keep up with you. He got closer and closer each time trying to catch you (thanks to an accurate update Twitter account), but every time he arrived to the scene of the crime, you were already gone. The people who witnessed your act of vigilance were kind enough to point him in the direction you flew off to, but even with that help, he could barely keep up. After nearly three hours of running around the city and harboring the defeat, he decided that he’d just risk his life for you some other time.

Whether you were hiding in the shadows or up on rooftops, you watched the cute boy run to all of your locations. So he was following you. He was determined and you’re still unsure why, but the effort didn’t go unnoticed. If he tried to catch your attention again, then maybe you’ll entertain him a little bit.

“Poor kid,” Woojin snickered in your ear. “Why are you making it so hard for him?”

“I don’t know what he wants from me. He could be trying to trick me for all we know.”

“He looks harmless ~”

“Maybe he’s just a good actor.”

“Wouldn’t count on that.”

“You’re suggesting I should see what he wants?”

“Why not? I’m bored with all these misdemeanors. The taxi thing was the most exciting thing you’ve done in a long time thanks to him. Besides, you could use some friends.”

“I have friends!”

“New friends.”

“Just say you’re bored of me, it’ll hurt less,” you muttered. “Fine, I’ll see what he wants, but only if he shows up on the radar again.”

“I’ll keep you posted.”

Jeongin showed up on your radar every single day this week. Sometimes only once a day, often times twice, and way more frequently when the weekend came around.

The first time was the day after you caught him on the hotel rooftop. That day, you found yourself back to the scene of the crime.

“Again with the ledge, huh?” you scolded while hovering over him. “Too lazy to pick some other building?”

Yesterday you caught him when the skies were as black as the parts on your suit. Today the sun was shining brightly and this was the first time Jeongin got a really good look at you. Your suit was primarily black and white with accents and stitching in what he assumed was your favorite color. Your mask was black too, but they shaped your eyes and made them pop in the prettiest way. Your hair was everywhere like it had no sense of gravity, but somehow it stayed untangled.

You were beautiful. Quite possibly the most beautiful heroine he’d ever seen, but definitely the most beautiful heroine he risked his life for to corner for an interview for a project so he wouldn’t flunk out of college.

“If it’s not broken, don’t fix it, right?” he replied while rubbing his butt. “Can you please be more gentle next time? I bruise like a banana.”

“Next time? There’s a next time?”

“If you say no, there will be.”

“No to what?”

“A one-on-one interview with me.”

You moved far away from Jeongin and he was afraid you were going to fly away again, but you stayed hovering past the edge so that he couldn’t reach you. He couldn’t read your face but if he had to guess, you weren’t too thrilled about the idea.

“Is this what the tabloid companies have you reporters doing these days? Risking your lives just for one interview? Ha!” you scoffed harshly. “You guys are really a pain in the ass.”

“No, you don’t understand -”

“Oh, I understand. You know, it’s wonder how I’m able to keep my identity hidden without you rats all up in my business everyday! You’re everywhere and every single one of you is so distracting that I almost miss my targets! You’re the real crime of the city I could never get rid of. Put that in your article.”

“Wait - !!”

But you were gone again, with your cheeks so red from anger being the only thing Jeongin could think about that day.

Way to go, idiot, now she’ll never say yes to you.

The next day, Jeongin tried again, but chose a different rooftop so you wouldn’t be suspicious. He hoped your high tech radar detection thingy didn’t show his face otherwise this plan wouldn’t work anymore. Jeongin patiently sat on the edge, waiting and hoping to see you fly to him somewhere off in the distance. To his luck, he guessed your radar majig didn’t have facial recognition by the way your face twisted in disgust upon seeing him.

“You’re only further proving my point,” you said. With your abnormally strong pointer finger, you pushed the boy off from the edge. Jeongin didn’t think you’d actually be more gentle trying to get him down this time.

He didn’t even get a word out before you flew away again.

Ok, now he was tired of your stubborn childishness. You wouldn’t even allow him to explain that he wasn’t working for the tabloids! He was a simple-minded college student who only wanted to pass this class. In reality, he probably still could if he chose another subject, but the Yangs were not quitters! Jeongin would see this through and no matter how long or what it took, he would get you to listen to his explanation and get his one-on-one interview with you.

The following three days was a battle between you and the cute boy who wouldn’t leave you alone. You flew across the city to different corners only to end up in front of him yet again. It was your own personal tour of the city. You’ll admit this game of cat and mouse was a little fun, but you had to remember what his intentions were. You couldn’t escape him. The boy was like the plague.

“Don’t you have caller ID on that thing?” you asked Woojin at your latest encounter, referring to his radar thinga-ma-bob. Jeongin waited patiently as you spoke like he wasn’t right in front of you.

“It often only reports where there’s suspicious activity, not who’s causing it.”

“Well, fix it.”

“Can you hear me out finally?” the boy interrupted. To Jeongin’s surprise, you stayed to listen to what he had to say, though he saw you hesitate. “Look, I don’t work for the tabloids.”

“Pfft.”

“No, really!”

“Then what do you need an interview for!?”

“I’m a journalism student.”

“Oh, I see now. You’re not working for the tabloids yet is what you’re saying. This is like a little teaser?”

“People who work for the tabloids are people who don’t have lives and prey upon those who do because theirs are so dull and idiotic!” he spat. God, did Jeongin hate being associated with such vermon! He saw your surprised expression at his sudden outburst. That was a good sign, right? “I’m trying to write a real article about you. So please, let me write about you, earnestly and honestly, before anyone can taint your name.”

“Just so we’re clear, you wouldn’t really be saving my name if it’s just for a school assignment.”

“Well no, but that should convince you even more, right?” he grinned cheekily while batting his eyelashes at you.

His grin didn’t falter even after you were done contemplating the idea for five whole minutes. The huge, overly-exaggerated sigh that left your lips let Jeongin know you were totally down for an interview. Finally, he got you to crack! But it wasn’t fair, he used his cuteness to his advantage.

“Do you have any past works I could look at?” you asked, feet landing on the rooftop.

“H-Huh?” he stuttered.

“Any past articles you’ve written? Or a portfolio maybe? I’d like to know how you’d be writing about me, of course.”

“Ah, I have one, but not on me, so we’ll just skip that -”

“What was it about?”

“Um… An animal shelter.”

“Oh, cute.”

“Buuuut I got an F on it.”

“Oh, no,” you groaned, pinching the skin between your eyes in frustration.

“But that was my first one! That was like a trial assignment, you know, like it doesn’t count.”

“Ugh!!!” you screamed into the clouds. That wasn’t the worst reaction to his failure Jeongin had in mind. “You’re totally going to ruin me!”

“No I won’t, I promise! I wasn’t passionate about that topic like I am with this one!”

“Are you saying you’re passionate about me?” you teased.

“I… Well, no, but… That’s not fair, you worded that funny.”

“I can’t believe I’m going to say this but… fine.”

“Wait, so you’ll let me do my assignment on you? You’ll really let me interview you?” You nodded shamefully. “Sweet! You won’t be disappointed!”

“Don’t fuck it up.”

“We can start tomorrow! Say, after my class on the original rooftop?”

For the first time in a week, Jeongin saw you smile the slightest bit. He liked you better this way. “Works for me.”

“Then it’s a date.”

Before you could correct his wording, it was his turn to leave without letting you get a word out. Now you were the one stuck in your spot while Jeongin was the one being smug over how he made you blush.

“Unbelievable…” you muttered.

Jeongin spent the whole night writing up questions to ask you. Since practically no one knew anything about you, he could get away with a few basic questions like what your favorite food or animal was. He’d later delve into the deeper questions, hoping they weren’t too personal to scare you off. He simply wanted to know the inner workings of the city’s local heroine, that’s all. Jeongin lost a lot of sleep last night specifically preparing for today. He got a brand new notepad, a new pen, and a fully charged camera - he was ready to pass his class.

It didn’t occur to him until now what you’d look like today. Would you be in your full outfit, suit and mask and all? Ah, but of course you had to be. There’s no way you’d be wearing your civilian clothes, right?

But what if you did? He wondered what kind of clothes you liked to wear. Were you a jeans and t-shirt type of person? Or maybe dresses and skirts? Whatever you wore on your down time, he was sure you’d look stunning regardless and he hoped he’d get to see you in them. Probably not today, or even the next time, but he hoped he’d see the normal you one day. The real you.

“Daydreaming on a rooftop isn’t very safe, you know.”

You snuck up behind him, causing him to jump and turn around. He was a bit disappointed but not surprised when he saw you in your suit. You looked exactly as he’d always seen you except you didn’t hold a scowl on your lips.

“I live life on the edge, remember?”

“Life on the ledge if I remember correctly.”

This rooftop was a lot fancier than you remembered. Then again, you didn’t focus on the furniture and decorations whenever you found him up here. He even had snacks and refreshments laid out on the table.

“Why aren’t you dressed normal?” the cute boy pouted.

“This is normal.”

“You know what I mean.”

“I can’t let the enemy know who I really am.” You saw him quickly scribble down what you said onto his fresh notepad. “Wait, are you writing that down?”

“Of course! I need to write down as much detail about you as possible! That way I have more to work with to write the perfect article.”

You really shouldn’t be trusting his words so easily. “If you say so.”

“Ok, first question: what is your name?”

“Seriously? That’s your first question?”

“You can’t blame me when you never gave yourself a superhero name! Personally, I think this is a great way to start off your biography.”

“I thought this was just an interview!?”

“Same thing.”

He was right, though - you didn’t have a superhero name. Not because you were trying to be cool and remain slightly anonymous, it was that you nor Woojin couldn’t think of anything that suited you. But it was kind of cool that you didn’t go by any name.

You told Jeongin your name. “My real name is _____.”

“You’re ok with telling me that?”

You simply shrugged. “It’s just my first name.”

“I thought I’d take months - years, even - for me to know your real name.”

“Don’t be so dramatic.”

“_____, huh? I like it. It suits you.” His dimpled grin yet again did wonders on your sensitive heart. Why were cute boys your kryptonite? “What do you do when you’re not out here saving us from taxis or drug pushers?”

Jeongin was able to get a giggle out of you and his ego couldn’t have been higher. That’s a good sign you were liking the interview so far, right? “I’m a student just like you.”

“Really!?” he screeched. “You don’t seem like the academic type.”

“That’s funny coming from someone who had to risk their life to save their grade.”

“Ah, I didn’t mean it like that! I meant it like… Like how do you even have the time to do both?”

“I have to pay for college somehow, right?”

Jeongin took note of how tired your smile looked. It must be exhausting trying to pass your classes and then flying around saving idiots like himself from crosswalks. You probably slept like four hours a night or something. He started to regret all the times he had you chasing him all over the city. Maybe he could make it up to you.

“Do you even like school? Why not just work for KimTech as a full time heroine?”

“Do you know how much insurance costs for heroes? A lot! Benefits from a career would make my life much easier.”

For the duration of the interview, Jeongin asked you the basic surface questions. Some were more personal than others, but this would be a good introductory type of article instead of one big one that dug deep into your life. Who knows, maybe he could use you again for this other assignments and dig deeper each time.

Initially, you were terrified going into this blindly. He could have been lying that he was a student the whole time, and he still could be! But somehow you knew he wasn’t. He didn’t interview you like you were the first celebrity he could catch on the street. He talked to you like he was getting to know a new friend. He made you feel at ease and comfortable and you just let your answers flow out. Something about that smile of his made it so easy.

“Wow, it’s already late. You don’t have to save anyone tonight?” Jeongin asked after two hours had passed.

You shook your head. “I don’t think so… Woojin hasn’t said anything today, so…”

“Woojin? Is that your boyfriend…?”

“Oh God, no, he’s one of the head engineers for KimTech. He made my suit.”

“Ah, I see.”

“Yeah, so there’s no need to get jealous.”

“That’s not why I asked ~” he whined.

“Is the interview over?”

“Technically yes, but I didn’t manage to ask all of my questions. I stopped after number three and we kind of went on a tangent and just kept on talking. Time flew right past us, I guess.”

“Oh. Did you want to reschedule for another time?”

“Like for another interview? Really?”

Would he really be able to see you again? The boy’s wide eyes sparkled cutely, so how could you say no to him? “Sure. You have to finish this some time, right?”

“I’d really like that,” he grinned. “Tomorrow?”

“Same time, same place.”

“Awesome! It’s a date! Stay safe while saving the city, ok?”

“Quit calling it a date!” you blushed, but the sneaky boy was already running away cackling. “He’s so weird…”

Yes, he’s weird, but that’s why you liked him.

“This wasn’t what I had in mind when I asked about wearing your normal clothes…”

Jeongin raised a questioning brow at you as he said that. You had a hoodie on with one of those popular logos spread across the chest but you wore your supersuit and eye mask just underneath it. It was kind of adorable, but it looked like you were just really bad at trying to disguise yourself.

“Think of it as a compromise, hm? It’s a bit chilly today, anyways.”

You watched the boy take out a his notebook that was already flipped to where you left off yesterday. Though you only answered three questions, it took up the entire page. He literally wrote down everything you said, word for word.

“Can I take a look?” you asked, gesturing to his notebook.

“Sure. Sorry if it’s all over the place. I tried to think of every possible cool question there was and I wrote them down whenever I could.”

He was right, the notebook was a total mess. The questions were written out of the lines, in the margins, and at the top by the header. But the best part about his notebook were the little doodles he had of you. Your mask, the suit design, even your silhouette was doodled all throughout his notebook. Up until now, you thought this whole chasing you around thing and finally catching an interview were innocent, but was he really this interested in you? Or maybe he was infatuated?

“Nice doodles,” you teased with a smirk.

Jeongin panicked and yanked the notebook away from your hands. SHIT, he completely forgot about those!

“On the days I waited for you to come find me, sometimes I’d get bored, so I doodled…”

“Ha! Cute ~”

There you go again, using that word! Was he cute? Were his doodles cute? Were all superheroes this flirty, or was it just the superheroines?

“Before we start, can I ask you something?” you began. “What’s your name?”

“My name? Have I really not told you yet?”

“I think I would have remembered if you told me.”

“It’s Jeongin. Yang Jeongin.”

“You’ve got an unforgettable name, Jeongin.”

“Ah, why do you keep doing that!?”

With a raised brow, you watched Jeongin ruffle his hair roughly. “Doing what?”

“Saying things like I’m cute and that I’m unforgettable and-and you keep smiling all weird!”

“Sorry, I thought I was just being nice ~ Should I stop?”

“I mean… You don’t have to… It’s actually kind of nice hearing those things once in a while.”

“You’re telling me people don’t walk up to you everyday and tell you how cute you are?” you teased.

“Surprising, right?” he said sarcastically. “I can barely get anyone to even look at me, let alone say stuff like that to me.”

“Then I’ll be the one to tell you that stuff everyday. Well, for as long as you’re interviewing me.”

“Ah, you don’t have to do that…”

“What if I said I want to?”

“But why…?” You shrugged, only worsening his confusion. He figured he’d leave it at that though - he’s only known you for a short time, but from the time he’s spent with you, he knows you enough that you probably wouldn’t elaborate. “You’re an interesting one, _____.”

“Ooh, make sure to write that in your article!”

The interview flew by faster than you could count. Jeongin made sure that you both stayed on topic this time around and he was finally able to get you to answer all of his stupid questions. Now he had enough information to write the best article about you! He’d get an A on this project, pass his class, and get you to smile from all the things he said about you.

“Your questions weren’t stupid,” you reassured him as he finished packing up. “No one’s ever asked me stuff like that before.”

“No one’s ever asked you about your favorite superhero? Or your childhood? Your favorite food?” he asked in disbelief.

You shook your head. “I don’t hang out with my college friends very often to be asked stuff like this. Busy life, you know?”

“Isn’t that lonely?”

“Yeah, sometimes. I guess having someone like Woojin makes up for it.”

“Ah, I see…” Jeongin muttered, lowering his head a bit.

“And you too, of course.”

“Me? You consider me a friend? After all the trouble I put you through just for my benefit?”

“Of course! We’ve spent a lot of time together playing cat and mouse. And you know almost TOO much about me.”

“Cheers to a new friendship then, hm?”

“Cheers. Unless you fail this assignment, then we’re not friends.”

“I’m so happy that you have my back…” he pouted. “What are you going to do now?”

You take a peek behind the boy and noticed that the sun was reaching its golden hours, which were the hours just before the sun set below the horizon. It was rare that you’d ever get to witness a sunset, let alone on a rooftop, so you think you’ll stay for a bit.

“I’m going to chill for a bit and enjoy the sunset. How about you?”

“I was going to go home and start the article, but can I join you instead?” he asked shyly.

“I would want nothing more.”

Both you and Jeongin reached the edge of the rooftop and watched the sunbeams bounce off of the mirrored windows on all the buildings, creating a golden overlay throughout the entire city. It was an incredible sight to see, but Jeongin only looked at you because God, this was great lighting for your portrait.

You heard a camera click beside you.

“You need pictures, too?” you whined. “I didn’t consent to this!”

“Of course I need pictures. I’d just have a pictureless article.” Jeongin noticed your uneasy expression and immediately regretted taking the picture. If you hated being interviewed on live television, he should have figured you didn’t like having your picture taken, either. “But if you really don’t like it, I’ll delete it -”

“No, that’s ok. If this means you’ll get a higher grade, then so be it.”

The cute boy hid his wide grin behind his fancy camera. “Thank you. You won’t regret these, I promise.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah. You look so pretty.”

Now it was your turn to try and hide your grin and blush. You buried your face in your hands so that only your smiling eyes were seen. Jeongin needed to capture you. The click of the shutter was heard quickly after.

“Got it!” he exclaimed. “That shot was perfect.”

“Is this how you felt when I kept on calling you cute?”

“Exactly. Now you can taste your own medicine.”

Did he call you pretty for the perfect portrait shot or did he mean it? You’ll never know.

After capturing your adorable grin, there was a long silence as you both watched the sun setting. It got dark quite quickly in your city and sooner rather than later, all of the streetlights and neon signs were turning on to light the city. Being up here when it was dark reminded you of when you first met Jeongin up here just a few of days ago. It was crazy when you realized how shortly you knew each other, yet you were already quite comfortable around him. It must have been his invasive interview questions that you had to answer. Even so, Jeongin couldn’t help but feel the same way.

“If I jumped over right now, would you catch me?” he asked, breaking you away from your thoughts.

Almost immediately, you replied, “Of course I would. Do you think I want blood on my hands?”

Jeongin must have thought he was so funny because after you said that, he began to climb over the short wall ready to jump. You grabbed his hand and pulled him back so you could scold his dumb ass.

“Are you crazy!?” you shrieked, tightening your hold on his hand. “Why!? WHY would you do that!?”

“Sometimes I think I’m funny.”

“Oh, you’re fucking hilarious!”

Jeongin laughed loudly while you squint your eyes at him and judged his horrible sense of humor. He thought he messed up big time because it really looked like you weren’t having it, but you were really bad at hiding your smile. Just as you were about to let go of his hand, he reciprocated your grip and didn’t allow you to let go. He didn’t explain himself and you didn’t ask him to. You liked the way his hand felt in yours. You both watched over the city together, fingers laced together.

“You should be doing something like this with someone normal, don’t you think?” you told him.

“But you are normal. A normal student just like me, right?”

“You know what I mean.”

“Normal is boring. I mean, what constitutes as normal, anyways? What society thinks is normal?” he scoffed dramatically.

“As a journalism student, aren’t you kind of like, the spokesperson for society? Don’t you constitute what’s normal?”

“That’s what teen magazine editors do, not an intellectual journalist like myself.”

“You just like holding a stranger’s hand.”

“You’re not a stranger.”

“You don’t even know what I look like!”

“Yeah, about that. Will I ever get to see the real you?”

That question was one you were afraid to answer. There’s nothing you want more than to spend time with Jeongin just like this, but without your whole get-up. You’d truly be just a normal person hanging out with their new friend. But would he still call you pretty? Would he still blush at your flirty words when he saw what you really looked like? Would he still hold your hand like this?

“Soon,” you replied.

“Not soon enough.”

“If you get an A+, then I’ll consider it.”

“B-”

“A-, final offer.”

“Challenge accepted,” he grinned evilly. “Wanna grab something to eat?”

“Yes, please!”

Jeongin wasn’t used to all the staring and gawking as you two walked down the street. He was amazed that you were unbothered by it, but he figured you must be an expert at blocking then out. He followed closely behind you, shyly hiding as you walked with your head held high.

“What are you hiding from?” you giggled.

“I’m usually the annoying onlooker, not the center of attention.”

“How does it feel?”

“I hate it!”

“Now you know how I feel everyday.”

Jeongin led you to an area packed with street vendors lined up for blocks as far as the eye could see. There wasn’t any lag between street carts as you plucked skewers of grilled meat and veggies like they were flowers. The boy struggled to to keep up with the payments you owed.

“Can you at least grab some for me, too? And why am I the one paying!?”

“Heroes don’t pay, silly,” you scoffed while handing him a meat skewer.

For a while, you and Jeongin just walked, enjoying the food, the atmosphere, and each other’s company. Despite being in your get-up, you felt so normal and you can’t recall the last time you had someone that wasn’t Jeongin beside you enjoying the simple things in life. It was probably Woojin, but all he ever talked about was work. Now that Jeongin was done interviewing you, was today the last time you’d hang out with him?

“What are you thinking about?” he asked innocently.

You shrugged, suddenly feeling too shy to answer. “Just wondering if I’d see you again after today.”

He stopped in his tracks, causing you to turn back and look at him questioningly. He wore a frown. “Of course we’ll see each other again. Why would you doubt that?”

“I don’t know… I was afraid you’d be someone who’d become a stranger as soon as you got what you wanted from me.”

He couldn’t blame you for thinking like that. He’d just have to prove you wrong. “I have to show you my A+ project and see your face, remember? I won’t stop bothering you until I see it.”

“What comes after I show you?”

“After? The same thing, no? Why, do you wanna go on a real date?” he teased.

“Shut up,” you said, shoving a churro in his mouth.

“I’m down if you’re down!”

A text vibrated your phone and you can only guess that it’s Woojin crying for help. The text read, ‘Hey, I have a suit update. Come over ASAP.’

“Duty calls?” Jeongin asked quietly.

“Yeah… I’ll see you soon, right?”

“Of course you will. Maybe with an A+ in my hands, too.” He paused before continuing on as if his next words were too risky. “Be careful out there, _____.”

“Aw, you’re worried about me?”

“The city’s scary at night, you know.”

Swiftly, in a blink of an eye, you kiss his cheek. Before he could scold you, you’re already gone and the feeling of your lips was left on his cheek the entire night. He held his hand to his cheek and a grin on his lips until he fell asleep.

He couldn’t wait to see you again.

You hadn’t seen him since. You couldn’t even remember how long it’s been. You were so caught up with the steady increase in crime rate and you suspected Jeongin was busy finishing his project on you, but when your day ended without running into him, your heart sank bit by bit.

You may not have seen him in a while, but it was so easy for him to keep tabs on you. You were all over the local news, social media, online articles, you name it. They were all the same superficial stuff. He couldn’t wait to publish the only written piece out there that showed all of your layers.

He never paid attention to the superficial stuff. He’d just mute out whomever’s recording and watch you carefully instead. It was like watching an action movie where he was rooting for the protagonist to win against the enemy every time. Sure, your tasks were never that action-packed, but watching you kept him at the edge of his seat, especially when there were weapons involved. Jeongin would find himself screaming at his phone or the television for you to play it safe, but God, of course you never did! You were so reckless every time, leaving with scars and bruises and noticeable stains of blood. He’d have to scold you for that later.

Jeongin kept his distance from you while he finished your article. He hadn’t stood on rooftops or cliffs or ledges for a long time. He wanted to focus completely and solely on it so he could finish without any errors. From the looks of it, it seemed like you had your hands full, anyways.

That much was true, but Jeongin could never bother you. You’d scold him of course, but as the nights became longer and the crimes were getting quite dangerous, seeing Jeongin was all you hoped for whenever you flew to a new location. But he was never there.

You were afraid. You were afraid, exhausted, and lonely. It was hard going through all of this alone and you wished that cute boy with the wide grin and wide eyes would come and save you from saving the city once in a while.

You hoped his project would end sooner rather than later.

“Hey, there’s suspicious activity by the river,” Woojin said into your earpiece.

“Can I pass?” you groaned tiredly.

“Last one for tonight, I promise.”

You flew down by the river where all the couples spent hand-in-hand walking along the sidewalk. What a cruel location for suspicious activity! You had to walk on ice here, so as to not endanger all the lovely couples.

The exact location Woojin sent you led you to a boy rocking on his feet at the very edge, like he was ready to jump in at any second.

You poke him lightly, causing him to stumble forward.

Then you grabbed him by the hand.

Jeongin’s feet are at the corner of the edge and you holding on to him was the only reason why he wasn’t soaked yet.

“Th-That’s not funny!!” the boy whined. But seeing that it was you, he couldn’t help but grin.

He missed you.

With his free hand, he held up a printed version of his project with a bug red 95 on it. “I got an A,” he said.

With your free hand, you took off your mask, revealing your pretty face in its entirety. You saw sparkles glow in Jeongin’s big eyes.

“Happy?” you asked.

“I will be when you pull me up from this position ~”

“Oh, right.”

You’re surprisingly strong when you pulled him up with your one hand. Your hair was loose and framed your maskless face perfectly. You were so, so pretty - just as he expected. It was a wonder that no one who knew you in real life recognized you with your mask on since it didn’t do much to hide your identity. He watched the blush rise to your cheeks adoringly.

“Stop staring,” you demanded.

“Ah, sorry. You’re just so pretty… I can’t help it.” Jeongin handed you his grade-A project. “Are you free to critique for me?”

“Pay me in street food?”

“Only if I can hold your hand.”

“You’re so corny... It’s a date,” you grinned. Now it was Jeongin’s turn to blush. “Let me change really quick.”

You were a jeans and t-shirt type of person.

#jeongin #yang jeongin #skz #stray kids #skz jeongin #stray kids jeongin #skz i.n #stray kids i.n #skz scenarios #skz imagines #bro jeongin is so hard to write for for me aklsjdlakjdlkajdlahflakhfal #i hope this was ok askjdlkajdlkajd ://////////////////////////////////////

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blooddrop-palace · 4 years

Text

Open Doors [1/2]

[Alternate tagline: Sera, that’s probably not a safe idea, but you did it anyway.]

Here’s another set of snippets of things bouncing in my head all day while I was at work. Except when things involve Vergil, it looks like I can’t keep it simple. This became longer than I thought. Guess this is part 1 of 2.

—

“I don’t care if you just like to do charity demon-slaying or whatever it is you’re here for, but it’s rude to leave in the middle of someone talking to you! And we need to talk!”

He knew he could easily out-maneuver the human woman, but it was at risk of her witnessing the clearly inhuman skills he possessed. However, the plan wouldn’t change from the last two times: he needs to run just far enough out of sight, find a safe target zone, and teleport away.

But really, the situation would have been better if that blasted female knight was never in the vincinity to witness him dispatch a small hoard of stalking demons to begin with.

—

“You have me very vexed, good sir.”

“And you, I. What will it take for you to leave me in peace?” He ground out in response, clearly irked at the knight who had climbed three stories up to the balcony that he thought was safely out of her reach and out of her view. She somehow knew other ways up here that he didn’t immediately see at first.

“You want me to leave you in peace? Did you know that word has gotten around about a foreigner in the city limits who has a peculiar demeanor about him? Doesn’t look or act like a tourist. Asks about history as if he’s hunting for something. And...” She paused to pull herself over the railing, catching her breath briefly. He noticed clever wire spools and snap hooks at her belt, no doubt tools that helped her climb. “And he doesn’t blend in by being overly concealed, and there is no record of someone matching his description having checked in to any of the few existing inns in this isolated island-city... leaving up to all sorts of imagination and gossip of where he could be camping out at—”

“It sounds like you have more pressing matters to tend to, then. I’ll leave you to that...”

“Oh, no you don’t! You’re not going to play the fool with me!” She cut him off, and then cut to the chase with a frustrated sigh: “Ugh, look, sir, this isn’t what you think. I’m hoping to not have to chase you down because the Order asked for your arrest or something. In fact, this wasn’t my original intention. By this point, it’s the fact that you have evaded me the first time, and then yet again a second time, when I had wanted to thank you properly for both occasions of...” She waved her hand in a nonchalant gesture in the air, “saving me the trouble of having to call for backup against demon ambushes in backroads that clearly needed more patrols—”

That wasn’t the case; the roads probably had enough patrols in the past. It was his presence that drew the demons to break their usual patterns. But she didn’t need to know that so he wasn’t going to tell.

The knight’s words dissolved into grumbling as she buried her face into her hands, trying to wrap up her explanation.

He was hoping if she got whatever damn idea of gratitude out of her head, she’d leave him alone from then on. So he lingered while mentally vowing to double check for anyone else’s presence from now on, before “accidentally” helping anyone fight off demons, again.

“This got more complicated than it needed to be.” She finally looked up from her hands and scrutinized what she could observe of him under his cloak. Not that the coverage mattered anymore. He knew she saw him without it in a fight already. “I got carried away; upset, even... because how did you manage to scale up places like this better than I could? I used to make sport of evading the knights by scaling the walls and such before I managed into the Order myself. And now someone is going to beat me at my own game?” She huffed, adjusted her stance to be more relaxed, and raised a brow at him.

“...Get to the point, so that we can leave each other be.” He was not going to show amusement at her sense of competition. What was human competition going to matter for him?

The knight took a deep breath, palms pressed together and fingertips at her lips as she carefully thought about what she was going to say next: “You either need to leave the island soon before the day comes that the entire Order tries to force you out, or you be a little less mysterious and stop allowing all these restless rumors about you float around. So give me as simple of an answer as you wish, so long as it’s an answer. What are you here for?”

“Why would what the masses think about a stranger matter to you?”

“Personal history and boredom.” She immediately answered with deadpan seriousness. “And the answer for my question?”

He thought briefly before slowly responding: “Research.”

“Okay. Nothing you need to hurt anyone for, would you?”

“I’m not going to stand here and be interrogated.” He turned to leave.

“Humor me. I’ll tell you right now that the worst case scenario is me leaving you alone with no more questions and no more games of tag. But depending on your answers, I might be willing help you stop being the hottest gossip topic of the entire city.”

He hated having to weigh his options on what was clearly a bargaining attempt from a human being. But this island that might contain answers to his quest for power was proving inconvenient with how xenophobic they were. With the slow rate his research was going, it would be...more than just mildly inconvenient if the city became too restless at his presence.

“Very well. I’ll... humor you. And to answer your second question, it would be counterproductive to cause a scene by means of assault.” He wasn’t making promises, though.

Thankfully, she didn’t ask for one on that.

“Let’s get down from this balcony first, before someone spots us.”

—

“Demon Hunter?”

“When I need the money.”

“On the road a lot?”

“...I don’t plan to stay longer than I need to, if that answers your question.”

“Name?”

“At the moment, we will remain as strangers.”

A sigh.

“Okay. I’ll accept that. Last question. Need a place to stay?”

Pause.

—

“I have questions for you.”

“I admit it’s only fair.”

“Why the offer?”

“I have extra night patrols because of your presence. People don’t like things that go bump in the night, which, to many, includes strangers.”

...?

“Wouldn’t your problem be solved by reporting my presence as non-threatening? That would seem like an easier solution to me.”

“I know protocol. Protocol would demand suspicious foreigners that apparently sleep in unknown places of the city be brought in. Stop holding the rest of your cloak so close to you. That fancy getup you have underneath isn’t as much of a problem as you think. You’re too cagey, and that’s what’s making you stand out. Just keep the hood on and relax. If someone’s asks about that sword, I have working answers.”

“Hmm. Protocol, you say? Is this place to stay going to be a jail cell, then?”

Yet, at the moment, they stood in front of an apartment door, and she was inserting a key.

“You? In a jail cell? I watched you slay demons like they were made of paper. Not only would a jail cell not contain you, but I’d have to get you into one, first. You tell me if that’s going to happen.”

As she opened the door to her apartment, he graced her with a brief chuckle.

“No. But I have more to ask. What deal are you meaning to strike up from this? I’d be a fool to think you are offering me help without ulterior motive.”

“Motive? I love my home city but I don’t love its hostile attitude towards strangers. My father wasn’t from this place. Causes me some grief. But I know you don’t care about that and I don’t need to share.”

“...I don’t need your charity.”

“Not charity. Gratitude and mutual benefit. Here’s the deal: I have a lot of thoughts on how foreigners at least deserve respect. You respect me, and I respect you. Sound acceptable?”

“I understand you mean to say that if I slight you, then there is no deal.”

“...and the opposite holds true, smartass. I’m not trying to lord anything over you. But if you want to get your research thing done and leave the city on your own terms, you’re going to need to get as much of Fortuna’s distrust off your back as possible. I’m not asking you to sign a contract. Just mutual agreements.”

“That’s a lot of trouble just to get yourself out of night patrols.”

—

“Good morning. The couch wasn’t too terrible, was it?”

“I’ve slept in worst places.”

“...I should have surmised. You’ve been up reading for a while?”

“Not too long. I believe I’ll be heading out soon to continue my research.”

“All right. I’m sure you’ve seen where the main library is. Tell them you’re Seraphina Valkyrie’s guest, and if there are problems, they can contact me. My story is going to be plain and simple. You’re a friend from mainland whom I came in contact with while I tried to solve the mystery of where my late amnesiac father may have come from. No headway there, by the way. The rest is, as they should know, no one else’s business but mine. Breakfast?”

“Acceptable reasons, and breakfast would be agreeable.”

“Assistance in breakfast would also be agreeable.”

—

“Am I correct in assuming you wish to barter help from me in solving the mystery about your father in return?”

“I actually don’t care. Family’s been dead since I was twelve. That was long enough ago. I got over it.”

“My condolences.”

The topic wasn’t pursued that day. It wouldn’t have been a good dinner table conversation anyway.

—

Five days later, he’s found some leads both into research and into reconnaissance about the Order’s goals.

He’s also found that, by “rules of being a respectable guest,” he somehow allowed himself to be roped into certain chores. Namely with assistance in the kitchen.

She also allowed him the guest bedroom after the first night’s stay.

—

Day seven. He still refused to tell her his name. She took it upon herself to call him something, taking an idea from the re-bound leather cover of his prized possession: the book of William Blake’s poetry collection.

He never corrected her, and now she called him “V”.

#devil may cry #vergil #oc #concept setup #fan writing

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thewonderousworldwelivein-blog · 4 years

Text

Happy 420

Legalizing Marijuana for Recreational Use

In life there are many choices and what I chose to do may not be something that you want to do and that is just great, but we still should be able to choose for ourselves. Marijuana should be legal for medical and recreational use and I believe it should be legal nationwide. People are allowed to drink themselves to literal death and they are allowed to purchase and smoke cigarettes and people die daily from cancer caused by smoking cigarettes. So why shouldn’t I be able to go buy some marijuana and partake of it in any way I chose from my home?

In fact, one of our forefathers and our first president of the United States George Washington, grew hemp in an abundance on a plot of land he called Muddy Hole, rumor has it that he grew a different strain for smoking but there is no actual evidence to prove this. Hemp was one of the biggest farm product plant being grown, they used hemp to make a variety of commercial and industrial products, including rope, textiles, clothing, shoes, food, paper, bioplastics, insulation, and biofuel. Hemp that was used for industrial purposes barely contained any THC, usually less than 0.3%. The strains of cannabis that produce the euphoric effects are much higher in THC content. Marijuana contains some other psychoactive substances such as CBD, we need more research to see if and what kind of medicinal benefits would come from those.

In all honesty I think they should legalize all drugs but for right now I am just talking about marijuana. Marijuana has been around for as long as man has, I am sure and regardless of laws people are always going to smoke on some “wacky tobacy” In fact it was legal until the early 20th century. Then everyone started to look down on marijuana and laws against it were made. Marijuana has been around since ancient China back to around 2700 B.C. there are many uses for it including: chronic pain, peripheral neuropathy, spinal cord injury, HIV and cancer patients, muscle and joint problems, rheumatoid arthritis, multiple sclerosis, insomnia, depression, anxiety and PTSD among many others.

In 2012 Colorado and Washington legalized marijuana and since then have made millions of dollars from the profit of it, many states have legalized it for medical and many states have de-criminalized it. Colorado used the revenue from Marijuana for roads and the school systems. Right now, it is legal for medical use in 33 states and legal for recreational use in adults older than 21 in 11 states, so we are progressing and hopefully in the future it will be legal in every city, county, state, country, everywhere.

Could you imagine a place where everyone could just smoke a little pot? I can’t help but to think of what a happier place this world would be if we could all just smoke a little pot. That sounds wonderful to me, people are too uptight and need to relax a little bit. If instead of going to the bar and having a few drinks or maybe additionally you could smoke a couple of joints and enhance your enjoyment. One should be able to do that if you would like. I think this would help our society because I think for many years people have associated marijuana with drugs such as cocaine and heroin (that’s what marijuana is scheduled with) when it’s just not true. Marijuana is not a harmful drug and you do not go crazy or lose your mind because of smoking weed or grass and some call it. People smoke marijuana and don’t want to do anything but sit on the couch and eat because they have the “munchies” but it really all depends on the strain and type of marijuana and the person because some it affects differently.

There is this whole stigma with smoking marijuana and it has for years because the Mexicans brought it with them when they would come here and work and they would smoke it and that was associated with being dirty, and they kind of changed it into this whole cultural class and society frowned upon it; so I think if we could just get rid of the whole stigma around marijuana and how it actually is, people would have a different perception of it all and we might be able to see that a lot of good comes with this plant. I have seen that there is research being done about marijuana and cancer and imagine what might happen if we could go above and beyond and explore possible treatments.

With it being legal you have guidelines that people would have to follow to make sure their product is up to par and anyone who lacks that would be dealt with accordingly. I think the benefits outweigh the cons when it comes to this subject and I really believe if we could just do our research and stand up for what we believe in we might have a fighting chance of getting this somewhere. Should we be able to grow our own marijuana? I for one think this would be great of course they will have to put some restrictions on it since everyone cannot be growing all the plants they want. I can almost see it now and oh it sounds like an opportunity to learn, grow, teach and experience so much from it and to be part of an evolution in something so great would be wonderful.

This would also help our country to eliminate all the side businesses of drugs like the drug cartel in Mexico, if it was legal here and we did not have to rely on other countries we could limit our involvement with big gangs and corrupt drug lords of marijuana, we would be less likely to be involved with questionable acts this way, the cartel is very dangerous and numerous amounts of lives have been lost because of these people. I think the legalizing of marijuana will help to keep our borders safe.

There will be many people that do not agree with legalizing marijuana, thinking that people will be just walking around stoned out of their minds and I believe that many doctors will be opposed to this because if marijuana was legal they might not be able to prescribe as many narcotic pills and will therefore lack the kickbacks that the pharmaceutical companies give to the doctors. Which also means there would be less people addicted to opiates and other narcotics and therefore probably less deaths because of it and so essentially we would be saving lives by legalizing marijuana. There has only been one person that died from too much THC and they think that maybe she was vaping it too hot and she died and there not any other factors that could have possibly caused death. Doctors are arguing about this though because there has never been any cases of that with all the billions of people that use marijuana.

Think of all the room in our jails and prisons it would free up for people not being in there due to a marijuana offense, growing, selling, or just possessing marijuana or paraphernalia. Between 2001 and 2010 there were 8.2 million arrests for marijuana and of those 88% were for simple possession. More that half of drug convictions in the United States are marijuana convictions. 67% of all Americans believe that marijuana should be legalized, people born between 1928-1945 continue to be the least supportive of legalization. We could better use the taxpayer’s money than feeding and housing inmates from marijuana convictions.

I am no business major or anything like that, but it seems to me that if we were to grow marijuana and legalize it, this would produce a number of jobs across the nation and therefore getting more Americans to work and helping our economy boost, as I look at this there seems to be a lot more pros to this topic than cons and I truly believe that this would help many out in many ways.

I find it a little ironic that I sit here on 4/20/2020 and write a paper on legalizing marijuana, I wish I could say it was 4:20 pm but it is now 5:15 pm so of all days today is the day that everyone should just take a break and smoke a little pot, many different ways so choose whatever fits you best, rather it be a pipe, an apple, a classical joint, a bong, these days it can go so much further than that but I will just stick to what I know, and enjoy, relax, let loose a little if you will and have some fun but not too much, because this is not legal yet and I do not want to be a criminal because I choose my medicine in my home that suits me best, this is all just make belief of course. My husband wrote a song called Green Buds and it a couple of lines in it says why I am is such a mother lovin’ criminal all I do is sit around and smoke some weed, a beautiful song about a beautiful plant.

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whoishisaribi · 5 years

Text

Neon witch

@stetermonthlyprompts July 2019, witch

Work Title: Neon witch

Rating: Mature

Archive Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply

Category: Slash, gen

Fandoms: Teen Wolf (TV)

Relationships: Peter Hale/Stiles Stilinski; Peter Hale & Stiles Stilinski

Characters: Peter Hale; Stiles Stilinski

Additional Tags: Witch Stiles Stilinski, Dream Sex, Ambiguous Slash, Alternate Universe - No Hale Fire (Teen Wolf), Lawyer Peter Hale, The Steter Network Monthly Prompts

Language: English

Words: 2573

Summary: The neon lighting and the darkness of the night made a lot of things apparent. There was something disturbingly wrong with Sheriff's son.

Read on AO3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19773526

The neon lighting and the darkness of the night made a lot of things apparent. It may seem weird for some people because one may think only the light of the sun on a clear day could expose evil and wrongness. Unfortunately, it left way too much of halftones to see clearly.

It was bright blue and pink lighting of this rundown ‘motel California’ signboard, that really made Peter pause that one time. He was up for some kinky sex with Corinne, she felt dangerous, edgy, just the person Peter wanted at his seventeen. But in that lighting she felt just outright monstrous, so Peter stepped back and run.

He wasn't the one to be scared of the danger, but his guts told him, he might not survive the consequences of that one night.

Next time it was a bar almost on the edge of Beacon Hills, it had neon lighting inside. It tried to fit some sort of eighteenth feeling, even though this hole of the town would do great with anything. Peter was here with his friends when he overheard some blonde woman talking to completely drunk Harris. This idiot was happily telling all the things you shouldn't really use the chemistry for if you didn’t want to end up in jail.

The woman was outright murderous and psychopathic in this green and blue light. So Peter did his research and it prevented his family from being burnt alive by Kate Argent.

This time it happened in the middle of the town. There was this diner, right in front of the administration. For whatever reason, its name was misspelled as 'dinner', and both 'n' and 'r' always stopped working at some point. So the red lighting coming off the signboard hugged rare silhouettes with the burning intensity.

Neon lighting didn't leave any halftones. There were only red light and the darkness of the night. Everything became eerie and lucid.

There was something disturbingly wrong with Sheriff's son, Peter couldn’t put a name on before. The guy stood still, even though he was all motion and flailing in the day. His eyes seemed to be pitch black, they didn't even reflect the light. Like he was dead.

The worst thing was that he looked directly at Peter, and his gaze seemed just empty. It was kind of ironic, that Peter worked with sheriff department and criminals and never felt anything akin to anxiety next to them, but the kid in the bright hoodie gave him chills.

He was the prey in the middle of the empty main street, and nobody would rescue him.

The door to the diner opened, some clumsy teen looked at Stiles and asked what took him so long. Even the small amount of more natural lighting brought halftones back, and so Stiles once again became the usual – the lanky young adult just off the college with a lot of movement and the loud voice. He went inside, and his lively voice drowned in the music.

Peter felt like he could finally breathe again.

Even though the air felt way too cold and wet. The mist would hug the town in less than an hour, and Peter preferred to be back home by that time.

He would close all windows, shutters, and doors. Maybe, he would drink, just to forget the emptiness he felt.

The lack of something scared him more than the presence of anything concrete. He didn’t have clearance on the topic of how Stiles could be dangerous to him, his pack or the city, but there was something. Something they could possibly not survive this time.

Neon lighting never lied.

***

Night dreams were cold and filthy. It was full of neon. The lithe male body on top of Peter, moving with the broken music. It sounded from everywhere outside the room, humming noise with something else. Peter couldn’t listen to it for too long, it hurt his ears.

Slim fingers creased along his chest, down and down. They left black goo and Peter couldn’t see the face of a guy. Neon lighting from the window and half-open door didn’t show anything certain. Maybe he didn’t have a face at all. Just a formless mass, dripping down his shoulders and chest.

But it never felt so good with anyone else in his life.

Peter woke up in a cold sweat on a spine and wet pants. He was too old for these.

***

Whatever supernatural Stiles had, he definitely got it from Stilinskis bloodline. Peter wasn’t sure what exactly – the umbrella term for all creatures like him was ‘supernatural humans’. Witches, voids, banshees, druids, et alii, sometimes boundaries between one another were too blurry to distinguish.

Sheriff Stilinski didn’t really smell of anything, but something told Peter – he was just old and knew how to hide marks. Stiles’s scent was of magic and nothingness. It seemed to be mutually exclusive, and somehow it fit what Peter saw in neon lighting along with what he saw in the daylight.

“Mr. Hale,” the voice made him stop on his track when he almost left the sheriff station.

It was late evening, so the darkness outside hugged streets. It seemed like even lights were a bit dimmed, like the world outside the station didn’t exist. It felt like something was coming, and this time it would be hard to save his skin.

Stiles called him, that shouldn’t be surprising. He leant over the reception desk. Deputy Parrish, who was supposed to sit here, was absent for whatever reason. Peter had a feeling, it was somehow staged.

“Stiles,” Peter said and smiled. He seemed completely normal in the light of a lamp, maybe a bit pale. Plaid shirt made him a bit off in this place. Eyes still too dark for the comfort. “Do you need anything, or just want to be the delight in my otherwise deadly boring day?”

Stiles huffed and tapped his fingers on the reception desk. Uneven rhythm sent chills down Peter’s spine. “Flattery won’t get you far, wolf.”

Ah, right, that’s what Stiles saw in the neon light. Or maybe it was this perceptiveness that he showed a lot, just with the supernatural knowledge. Peter only smiled.

“Well, then,” once over. Stiles didn’t pose a threat, but the scent was too ambiguous to get right, “not becoming the delight of the day, that’s a shame. You are finally not a minor anymore, and only want to talk business, aren’t you?”

“I doubt I’ll ever become the delight of anyone’s life.” He was serious and his heart didn’t miss a beat. Ouch. “But you are right, I’m an adult now, and so I’ll deal with my coven’s problems from now on.”

Coven. Of course, supernatural humans tended to stuck together at some point in their life, like packs. But they had it easier, it happened naturally, they just gravitated toward each other. They weren’t territorial like werewolf packs were, easily let people in and let them go. They probably had some sort of an alpha, and now Stiles became the one.

“Do you want to meet my alpha?”

He probably already knew it was Talia. So Peter wondered why he came to him.

“That’s useless, your emissary,” the amount of bitterness in Stiles’ voice was astonishing, “won’t allow us to do anything. I came to propose a deal. We kill both him and your alpha, you become one, and we take care of the clusterfuck they left behind.”

Peter had amazing self-control, so his face didn’t even flinch. They were under the cameras, so it must be staged. Peter didn’t know if this one had the sound, probably, it didn’t. The light flickered, and Peter got a glimpse of that person, he saw in the neon lighting. Cold, calculating and a bit amused.

“Aren’t you too cocky to talk murders in sheriff station?”

“You didn’t answer,” he shrugged. “I’ll find you tomorrow, you just need to decide.” Stiles took the manila folder laid on the reception desk and gave it to Peter. “There is an answer to why we want to do it. We may just take the Hale alpha spark and give it back to the void.”

Coven, but not a witch coven. That’s interesting. Though, Peter didn’t really know a lot about witches. He also needed to research this void thing. There was a rumor, some supernaturals believed all magic came from nothingness and would go there again. He took the folder and waved it. It felt heavy but didn’t smell of any magic.

“Aren’t you afraid I tell my alpha?”

Stiles made this ridiculous thing with his face and body, either asking ‘will you’, ‘go for it’ and ‘do I look sane enough to be afraid of something like that’. Deputy Parrish came back and Stiles began talking to him, obviously fond of him.

Peter came to his car and looked through the folder. On the surface level, it was neatly organized – obviously not what Stiles would do, he seemed to be too messy – divided by date and severity of Hale pack misdoings. It also had a few paragraphs on why they are willing to leave alpha spark in the Hale bloodline and also how they are planning to make everything work once it’s over. The last page was more interesting. It was certainly signed by Stiles with some message like ‘still wanna expose us to your alpha?’ and a freaking smiley face.

Peter rolled his eyes and ignited the car. He would read at home. Somewhere, where it wasn’t that dark.

***

Dreams were bright. Neon lighting was everywhere. That night it didn’t just come from the window or the door, it just was. At the same time, there was the darkness that couldn’t let go of the room’s corners. It was some run-down motel, too low for current Peter’s standards.

The sound. Stiles tapped this rhythm earlier.

The guy sat on his knees in front of him, licking and sucking him. This time the lithe body also had a lower part of his face. Cupid bow lips and moles.

Peter blinked, and when he looked up, the black goo was flowing down the walls, resonating with his bones. Something was very wrong, and he didn’t know what to make of it.

Once again, he woke up in a cold sweat and wet pants. The open manila folder was on the bed next to him.

***

Stiles did find him the very next morning. The coffee-shop next to the court, where Peter usually bought his coffee. Now he was pretty sure Theo, the usual barista, was some sort of supernatural human.

“So, what’s your decision?” Stiles sat next to Peter, lulling the cup.

“Not even a good morning?” Just to tease.

“Good morning. What did you decide?” He seemed sleepy and groggy. Well, he was what, twenty-one? And so not the morning person. It seemed amusing how the lack of darkness and neon along with a soft light changed him.

“Why act now?”

Stiles didn’t answer for some time, thoughtfully looking ahead. The morning was misty and grey, the lighting inside almost nonexistent as well. Dimmed would be the right word.

“When my father moved here, he couldn’t find or create a coven, because of how your emissary acted. Every nemeton needs a healthy supernatural society. Werewolf pack and righteous druid aren’t enough to sustain it.”

“That’s what you or whoever wrote in the folder.”

“And that’s the only reason we have,” Stiles huffed and waved his hands.

“Why now, Stiles.”

“And why not?” He half-smiled.

“Right,” Peter shook his head and took a sip. “The pack wouldn’t be happy, though.”

“Wouldn’t they?” Stiles tilted his head and narrowed his eyes. “Cora, who practically run away as soon as she could? Or Derek, who just wanted to date this darach girl? All other pack-members, who run away? Do I need to remind you of the Paige situation?”

Well, the coven did their homework. Peter watched over Stiles, also not leaving his eyes from Theo who leaned toward red hair girl about their age. She gave off the vibe of a person, who wasn’t exactly human as well.

“In court, you are more self-confident, Mr. Hale.”

“That’s not the lack of my ego that makes me reluctant to say yes right away, Stiles.” Now that he thought of it, he had no idea what’s his real name was. “But more like my self-preservation instincts.”

“Do you still believe the alpha who messed with your memory?”

And yet, Stiles somehow made his way in Peter’s dream. They were too short sequences, but looking at his moles and lips now Peter became quite sure. Probably because the memory of those lips on him was too fresh.

The redhead girl started tapping the same rhythm he heard in dreams. Certainly one of the coven. Peter wondered how many supernatural humans he missed out. And how did they affect him to get their way.

“We are against the idea of emissaries, by the way,” Stiles said. “Whatever the pack does, that’s only their business. We will provide any necessary information, though.”

Deaton certainly was an eyesore. He changed Talia, and also affected Laura. Peter also knew the coven couldn’t just remove him, and leave the vacant place.

“Do you plan to hurt Laura?” She was too much of mother’s daughter to let it go so easily. She would fight, and probably would try and hurt Peter for the alpha spark.

“Only if she attacks us. If she attacks you – she’s your problem. But I doubt she will.” Stiles sounded way too sure. Peter wondered if that had something to do with Deputy Parrish scent on her lately. Maybe he also was the part of a coven.

“Deal.”

Stiles smiled coldly. “You won’t regret it. You also won’t have to do anything, we’ll take care of it.”

“Sounds too good to be true.”

Stiles didn’t answer and went directly to the redhead. Peter finally put down what she was: a banshee. And Theo smelled somehow like a wolf, but not a werewolf. Warlock, probably. Peter would have to do his own homework eventually and learn just how many supernatural humans lived in Beacon Hills.

***

This was the first dream they weren’t in the room. Peter laid on the great stump. The Nemeton. The song was humming with power and danger. The rhythm was resonating in the core of Peter’s being.

This time he saw Stiles’ face clearly. He was on top of them, naked, black veins and red marks. His mouth was half-open, fingers slowly making its way down his cheeks, neck, and torso. The neon halo of the red moon seemed to circle around his head.

They weren’t alone. About a dozen people were around. Naked. Both old and young. Faces – a mere black mass that was waiving like they were underwater. Trees a few steps behind colored in red and covered in black human figures were muddy, barely there.

Peter raised his hand and tried to touch Stiles. For the first time in a very long time, he had a chance to move before he woke up. Slim and bloody fingers intertwined his own.

Stiles looked at him, and his eyes reflected the neon circle, that was supposed to be behind his head, high in the sky.

Neon lighting never lied. And Stiles held neon lighting inside.

Peter woke up alone, wet and cold. He knew his eyes burned red.

#Steter #Peter Hale #stiles stilinski #teen wolf #fanfiction

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darks-ink · 5 years

Text

What A Nice Surprise CH.6

Tumblr is still living that sweet no-linebreaks life so I would strongly recommend checking this chapter on either AO3 or FFnet via the mirror links down below. As for the chapter itself... well, it’s not as fluffy as previous ones, sorry!

First Chapter - Previous Chapter - Next Chapter AO3 - FFnet

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Danny laid back on his bed, staring at the blank ceiling above him. Not that he was really taking it in. He was too occupied with his thoughts. Thinking about his life, about his parents and their relationship with Phantom… All of the recent events, really.

Because the relationship between his parents and Phantom was mending. And that was good, right? He had come by a couple times so far, tried to visit every weekend to encourage this. To have them look at him with pride and love and… well, like a son.

But between the way they looked at Phantom and the way they looked at him… The way they talked about their own son instead of the ghost they hated so much…

It was starting to feel like maybe he was getting ignored. Falling away. And it wasn’t his parents’ fault, of course – it was him who kept choosing to spend time with them only as Phantom. Who hid himself away, afraid of…

Of what, really?

Not of getting revealed as a ghost, not really. If they could be so nice to Phantom, they would be the same to him – whether they discovered he was Phantom or not.

And that wasn’t it either. Sure, he was still trying to avoid being outed as Phantom, but not because he was afraid of them. He was afraid for them. That they would limit him, distract him, try to help and endanger themselves…

But neither of those were good reason to explain why Danny Fenton kept avoiding his parents. Was it because of the way they looked at him, wistfully? Knowing what could be, if he wasn’t in his room so much? If his grades would pick up further, his attendance not as bad?

Of the way they treated Phantom like their son because their real son refused to spend time with them?

He groaned before rolling over onto his stomach. Buried his head into his pillow and groaned again, muffled. Why was his life such a mess?

Already he was regretting his decision not to visit as Phantom today. He’d had planned to spend time with them as Fenton instead, but… but what if something came up? If a ghost attacked?

Phantom could leave easily – it was what he was expected to do. Danny, however, would have to come up with an excuse. And a good one, more than likely. And boy was he a bad liar, despite his years of practice.

That, and he couldn’t think of a good way to breach the subject. It felt awkward, to just walk to his parents and tell them he wanted to spend his Saturday with them.

What if they asked him why now? What if they asked him what changed? Why he wanted to be with them now and not before?

He didn’t know the answer to that. Well, he did, but he didn’t know what to tell them. It wasn’t like he could tell them that he was spending so much time with them as a ghost that he was starting to feel like his normal life was getting neglected. That wouldn’t go over well, truce with Phantom or not.

Burying his face even deeper into the pillow, Danny groaned a third time. What he wouldn’t give for an excuse to get out of this stupid loop in his thoughts.

The doorbell rang, and he jolted up. Who on Earth rang the Fenton’s doorbell? The only person who has, recently, was Phantom. But he was Phantom, so that couldn’t be it.

He was already out of his room and in the hallway upstairs when he heard his dad open the door.

“Vlad?” the man asked, voice tinged with confusion and a hint of fading exuberance. He’d been expecting Phantom, of course. Danny would enjoy the fact that his dad was happier about seeing him than Vlad more if he hadn’t been feeling so conflicted about it earlier.

“Vlad, how nice to see you!” Maddie said, now also appearing from the kitchen. “What’s the occasion?”

“Must I have a reason to visit my friends?” Vlad stepped inside, leering at Maddie. “Can I not come visit just because I want to?”

The frown on Maddie’s face suggested that she certainly didn’t feel so, but she didn’t protest. Instead she led them further inside, where the three of them sat down. Maddie, tactfully, sat down in the armchair so Vlad couldn’t take a seat next to her.

Seeing that no one had noticed him, Danny ducked back inside his room. He wanted to keep an eye on them, but he had no desire to interact with Vlad if he didn’t have to. There was absolutely no doubt in his mind that Vlad was here for a reason. And knowing the man like he did, that reason either involved him, his mom, or both.

Danny let the cold power of his ghost form wash over him, glad that there were no ghost sensors in the house anymore. There had been, for a while, until his parents (and him, and Jazz) got tired of them all responding to Danny.

Sometimes he really wondered how no one had figured out he was Phantom. Besides Vlad, that is.

He turned himself invisible and intangible, then sunk through the floor. In the living room, the three adults were still talking about nothing in particular – still small talk, it seemed. Not that Danny had been out of earshot for long, but you never knew with Vlad.

Taking position behind and above the couch, he let go of his intangibility. No one would notice him as long as he was invisible, and he only needed his intangibility to prevent the breeze he caused while flying. Both his parents and Vlad were around invisible ghosts enough to tell when one was present, otherwise.

The small talk lasted for a bit longer, although Danny tuned out most of it. He had to, really – if he heard another word of Vlad attempting to woo his mom he would puke and blow his cover.

And then finally, finally, Vlad brought up the topic he had wanted to talk about – or so Danny assumed.

“Say, I’ve heard the most ridiculous rumor about you two lately…” Vlad shifted, folding his hands together in his lap. “People are saying that you two are working with Phantom – that you three have a truce. Unbelievable, the kind of things people come up with.”

Jack and Maddie shared an uncertain glance, then Jack cleared his throat. “Well, actually. We kind of do have a truce with Phantom.” He scratched his cheek, an uncomfortable and shaky smile on his face. “We’ve been working with him for a couple weeks. He helps us with our research, we help him with ghost hunting, you know?”

Vlad’s face fell. “You’re… what? You are working together with– with–”

“With Phantom, yes.” Maddie’s eyes narrowed. “That is not a problem for you, surely? As the mayor, you must realize how much Phantom helps this town. If it wasn’t for him, human hunters would have to be hired – and paid. Meanwhile Phantom does it for free, at any time of day.”

“Yes, well.” Vlad shifted, clearly uncomfortable. Danny wasn’t sure where Vlad had heard of his new alliance with his parents, but he clearly hadn’t believed the stories. Whether one of the ghosts had told him, or Valerie had, or maybe he really had heard rumors about it in the city… Vlad obviously hadn’t thought that the Fentons would ever willingly join forces with Phantom. Ha! Joke’s on him.

“I am simply… surprised,” he finally managed. “The two of you were so… strongly against him. What made you change your mind?” A glance over to Jack, then a quick correction. “Minds, I mean.”

Oh. Oh. He probably thought that Danny’s parents had discovered his secret, and that that was why they were working together now. That… made a lot of sense.

“I suppose we just saw a different side of him,” Maddie said, slowly. Picking her words with care. “And we came to realize that he was… not who we thought he was.”

“Yes, exactly.” Jack nodded energetically. “The kid’s got power, but he needs guidance. Help. And we’re perfect for the role, right Mads?”

Vlad’s face twisted in a complicated mess of emotions. Quite honestly, it was beyond Danny’s ability to decipher. “I see.”

Then he suddenly stood up, wiping imaginary dirt off of his clothes. “Well, I’m sorry to say that that was all the time I had today. I simply must be going.”

Danny watched the man storm out, a little surprised. He figured that Vlad would’ve been annoyed to discover that his parents no longer disliked Phantom, but this seemed a little… extreme.

Should he… Should he follow Vlad? Sure, the man caused trouble a lot, but if he hadn’t been expecting this twist he wouldn’t have a plan yet. Right?

Yeah. Yeah, that seemed about right. For now, Danny knew enough about Vlad and what he was working on. There was nothing to be gained from further reconnaissance except a potential fight.

Having thus made up his mind, Danny moved back to his room. He sat down on his bed, legs hanging off of the side, and switched back to human form. Holding invisibility for longer stretches of time was, unfortunately, still tiring. Maybe his parents had been right about regularly training his powers… Building more stamina and endurance certainly couldn’t hurt.

Before he could put too much thought into the matter, however, his core stirred to life. Energy flooded through his system and cold air forced itself out via his mouth – his ghost sense.

Danny cursed, pressing his hands on his eyes. “Jinxed it,” he muttered under his breath. Of course Vlad wouldn’t leave it at this. More than likely he had left for the nearest hiding spot to swap to Plasmius.

Briefly, he considered the option of simply… not going. Vlad’s ecto-signature wasn’t one he could recognize, but the strength and timing checked out perfectly. And Vlad was here just for him, probably.

But if Danny didn’t come, Vlad would cause trouble and force him to come, more than likely. The man didn’t like to be ignored. So it was safer – and better for the town and his reputation – if he went.

That didn’t mean that he had to like it, though.

Light washed over him as he shifted back into Phantom, and Danny flew out of his window. Invisibly, of course.

Tracking down Vlad was easy – his ghost sense allowed him to hone in on other ghosts as long as they were within reach.

Plasmius hovered over a mostly empty street, glaring up a storm. Pink ectoplasm sparked around his hands, but it seemed more like an extension of his angrily flickering aura than an actual attempt at an attack. At least he was high enough that no one would be able to overhear them.

Having released his invisibly on the way there, Danny flew into Vlad’s view, fists clenched.

“Vlad! Haven’t you caused enough trouble yet?” he taunted, knowing how much Vlad hated his quips.

“Daniel, how nice of you to finally show up.” Despite the smooth purr in his voice, Vlad’s flaring aura showed that he was still more than a little angry. “Perhaps you could do me a pleasure, my dear boy, and tell me what on Earth you were thinking. Giving away your secret to your parents?”

He snarled, baring his fangs. “Risking my secret as well?! What about our deal, you buffoon!”

Danny’s aura flickered brighter in response, his fingers digging deeper into his palms. “Our deal?! Oh, because you’ve done such a great job of following that as well, huh?” He blew out a breath, loudly, then continued with a calmer – but still forced – tone. “But you don’t have to worry about our secret, jeez. My parents don’t know – they don’t even know that Phantom is only half ghost, only that he’s weird.”

“Oh, don’t try to trick me, Daniel.” Vlad balled his fists as well, the pink sparks swirling into lit balls of ectoplasm. His voice had dropped into more of a hiss than the purr he normally spoke with. “Like your parents would go against decades of hatred for any reason beside their oh-so precious family.”

“I’m serious!” Danny protested, or tried to. He barely got the words out before a blast of pink hit him in the chest, blowing him several feet away – and toppling him head over heels.

One hand still smoking, Vlad raised his other and aimed it at Danny. “You won’t fool me, boy.”

He underlined the statement by firing his other shot. Legs melting into a tail, Danny barely managed to dodge it.

“Come on!” he shouted back, forming a heated ball of ectoplasm himself. “I’m telling you, it’s the–”

A blast of heat against his back, pushing him downwards. He hit the street with a crash and a groan. Man, he hoped he hadn’t broken any bones. It was rare, these days, but such a frigging pain.

Danny pushed himself out of the crater, hovering just above street level. Vlad was lowering himself slowly, his cape spread wide in the wind. Dramatic bastard.

“Have you learned your lesson yet, little badger?” he sneered, his aura still spiking around him like flames. “That you are nothing without me?!”

Vlad opened his mouth to say more, but a white-hot blast of ectoplasm hit him right in the cheek. His mouth snapped shut, head whirling around to glare at the point of origin. Danny, too, turned to look – he hadn’t been the one to fire.

And there stood his mom, hands wrapped around an ecto-gun with its end still smoking. Her hood was down, her red goggles glinting in the light. Behind her was the massive bulk of his dad, holding an equally enormous ecto-bazooka.

“Sorry to interrupt,” his mom said, not sounding sorry in the slightest, “But I’m afraid I don’t quite agree.”

Vlad’s eyes narrowed, flicking between Danny and his parents. His aura flared, almost impossibly, even brighter. “Is that so?” he asked, voice a low hiss. “What makes you think you can intervene? It’s not like you’re his parents, are you?”

“No,” Jack said, so simply that Danny could almost see the pain it caused Vlad. “But we are his allies. And if you want to get to him, you’ll have to go through us.” For extra emphasis, he pressed down on the trigger at the last word, making the gun hum as it prepared a shot.

Danny took the distraction for what it was and moved closer to his parents. Whether Vlad would go for him or them, he didn’t know – but he couldn’t risk it either way.

He couldn’t help but notice the onlookers, however. The few people that had been in the street were now watching the spectacle, wide-eyed. The cat was out of the hat, he supposed. After today, all of Amity Park would know about the fact that he was working with the Fentons.

The smoke around Vlad’s hands thickened into ecto-fire again as the man eyed up his targets. Danny took position in front of his parents – but kept enough space for both of them to fire around him if necessary.

Apparently they posed enough of a threat, because Vlad extinguished his hands again.

“Fine,” he huffed, his aura dimming only slightly. “Fine, have it your way. But know this, little badger. You might’ve won the battle, but you won’t win the war.”

And with that only slightly dramatic speech, he grabbed the edge of his cape. Swept it over himself in a grand display and faded into pink smoke as he teleported away. To his mansion, probably. Didn’t matter much to Danny, anyhow.

He lowered his hands, knowing that Vlad had left entirely – no traces of energy which indicated duplicates. Then he turned to his parents, raising a hand to rub the back of his neck.

“Thanks for, um, protecting me.” He grinned, a little awkward. “I really appreciate it.”

“Of course kiddo!” Jack let go of his weapon with one hand, clapping it on Danny’s shoulder instead. “We said we would help you, didn’t we?”

“And I’ve been waiting for a chance to tell him what’s what since you told us about him,” his mom confessed, also lowering her weapon. “Not to mention for the times he has threatened me or Jack.”

Danny glanced over at the crowd, but they remained distant. Still, he lowered his voice a little so they couldn’t overhear. “Sorry that I didn’t drop by today. I’ve been… busy.”

The massive hand on his shoulder lifted again, and Jack shot him a friendly smile. When he spoke, he also dropped his volume – as much as Jack Fenton can, that is. “Don’t worry about it, Phantom. We enjoy your visits, but they are in no way a mandatory event.”

“I know, I know.” He shrugged, loosely. “But it became a bit of a habit, to visit on Saturdays. And I didn’t want you to worry if I didn’t show up, but I also didn’t want to just zip by because I would’ve wanted to stay when I couldn’t and…” he trailed off into silence, shooting them a faltering and lopsided grin. “Y’know?”

“It’s fine, honey.” His mom holstered her gun, then uncertainly balled her fist like she had to force herself not to touch him – comfort him. “You’re allowed to have your own life, even if you’re not longer among the living. Just… Come by when you’re not as busy anymore, please? We really do enjoy your company.”

“I will.” Danny nodded. “I, uh. I should really get going again – busy, you know? – but um. I’ll try to come by again this week, if that’s okay? Next weekend, for sure.”

“We’ll look forward to it.” His mom smiled as well as she pulled down the hood. “See you soon, Phantom.”

“Yes, indeed. Stay safe, Phantom.” Jack raised a hand to wave him goodbye, and with a grin Danny returned the gesture.

As he zipped away and towards his home again, he ran over the events in his head. After today, everyone would know about the truce – the alliance – between Phantom and the Fentons. What kind of consequences would that have?

Knowing how things tended to turn out for him… nothing good, probably.

---

When his mom called for dinner, Danny was still feeling kind of guilty about lying to his parents. He hadn’t been busy at all, unless you count moping about life and how difficult relationships were. Not romantic relationships, but the strange familial ones he had with his parents.

It was just… It was just weird. And hard. He didn’t want them to know about him being Phantom, about what he did and how much danger he regularly put himself in. Didn’t want them to risk themselves trying to protect him.

But wouldn’t they anyway? Weren’t they getting so close to Phantom that they would throw themselves in front of an angry ghost just to keep him safe, even if he wasn’t their actual son?

Would it be better if he stopped doing this? If he stopped getting so close to them as a ghost, stopped pretending to be their son when he was Phantom and started being their son again as Fenton?

That. That would probably be a good idea regardless. If he could get closer again without them questioning him too much, without them trying to dig into his secrets again.

He sighed and rolled off his bed, trudging downstairs. Jazz had already gone – he had heard her skitter by while he was still, for the lack of a better word, brooding.

“Hey kiddo,” his dad greeted him cheerfully when he entered the kitchen. “You wouldn’t believe who came by to visit today!”

Danny sat down in his usual chair, quirking a brow at his dad. Pretended not to know the answer already. “Was it Vlad or Phantom?”

Jazz looked up from her book, intrigued. Right. She had been in the library all day, she wouldn’t have known that either had come by.

“Vlad came by to visit, but we talked with Phantom as well.” Maddie placed the steaming pan of mac and cheese on the table in front of them. “Apparently he was too busy to visit this weekend, but he said he would drop by later.”

“He was busy?” Jazz repeated, half incredulous and half intrigued. “I wonder with what? Do you think that he finally told his parents – or his friends – about who he used to be?”

No, it was just a dumb lie. And how dearly he regretted ever telling it – count on Jazz to start psycho-analyzing a ghost she barely knew based on a single shoddy lie.

To distract himself Danny started spooning some food onto his plate. It was steaming hot still, but whatever. He would just have to wait a little longer before he could start eating it as a form of distraction.

“I don’t think so sweetie,” his mom said, enthusiastically continuing the conversation. “He didn’t seem emotionally affected. But a while back a few ghosts were talking about figuring out a way to get mobile phones working in the Ghost Zone, and Phantom expressed an interest in helping with that. Maybe he was busy doing that, instead.”

“But if he was in the Zone, how did he show up so quickly?” His dad leaned forward, leaning his massive weight on a single arm on the table. “Supposedly Plasmius hadn’t been around for too long before Phantom showed up. And he can detect ghosts, sure, but not while in another dimension.”

“Unless another ghost saw Plasmius and warned Phantom,” Maddie suggested, now scooping some dinner onto her own plate. “We don’t know how Plasmius arrived here, but if he came from the Ghost Zone a ghost might’ve spotted him.”

Danny blew on a bite of macaroni before sticking it into his mouth. Why were they still talking about this? Surely he wasn’t that interesting?

“I suppose that that’s possible,” Jazz agreed with a nod. She moved to scoop some food on her plate as well. “Still, I hope he tells his loved ones sooner rather than later. It would be good for both sides, I think, to have that resolution.”

“Hopefully we helped mend their opinion today.” Jack took the pot and emptied the rest of it onto his plate. “Now that people know that we’re working with Phantom, maybe his parents will take that as a sign that he’s not that bad. And then he won’t be afraid to tell them!”

Oh yeah, that was why he still hadn’t told them. Uh huh. It definitely didn’t have anything to do with him worrying about them stopping him from helping or anything.

“What do you think, Danny-boy?”

Danny snapped out of his thoughts, fork lifted halfway to his mouth. “Huh?” he asked, eloquently.

“What do you think, Danny? About Phantom telling his parents about who he used to be when he was alive?” his dad helpfully repeated.

“Oh, um.” Danny put the fork down again. Jeez, what a loaded topic. Wasn’t dinner conversation supposed to be lighthearted? “I guess… it would be good? If he told them, I mean. A secret like that, you can’t hide forever. Better to tell it on his own than wait for them to discover it in some horrible way, right?” Not that would stop him from hiding it for the next eternity, but still.

Jazz nodded energetically, swallowing a bite of her mac and cheese. “Yes, exactly! His parents – and his friends – deserve to know what has become of him. And Phantom himself could really use the support of his loved ones. I can’t imagine the strain it puts on him, knowing that his parents hate him.”

Danny could imagine it very easily, actually. But, thankfully, it was no longer a thing he had to worry about. No, nowadays his only worries about revealing his identity was that his parents would get even more smothering.

To distract himself from those thoughts he scooped another bite of food into his mouth. Then he hissed, spluttering – he forgot to blow on it to cool it down.

“Danny!” his mom scolded, her tone worried. “Be careful!”

“Srry,” he said, sticking out his tongue to cool it. Oh, how he wished that he could use his ice powers without making his eyes glow. “F’got to blow.”

She rolled her eyes, exasperated. “Then don’t eat so quickly. Why are you always in such a hurry, Danny? It’s like you never want to spend time with us.”

Uh oh. Now that was a dangerous topic. He pulled his tongue back into his mouth so he could talk properly. “That’s not it, I swear! It’s just– I’m just–” He shrugged, at a loss for words. “Just being a teenager, you know?”

Maddie’s eyes trailed over to Jazz, who sat primly as she forked away her own dinner. Jack, too, was spooning away his dinner at a remarkable speed – clearly trying to stay out of the conversation.

Once her eyes returned to him, they had softened. But Danny could still see the fire lingering in them. “I’m just worried about you, Danny. Your grades and attendance have been so poor for the last two years, and you hardly spend any time with us anymore.”

He shrugged again, eyeing his dinner. But there was no way he could get out of this conversation by just stubbornly turning back to his dinner – not without risking what remained of his relationship with his parents. “I know. But it’s just…”

A heavy sigh as he put down the fork again. He looked up, looked her right in the eye – and then turned to do the same with his dad. “There’s nothing wrong, okay? Don’t worry about me. I love you guys, and I know you love me too. I’m just… you know.”

“Some teenagers just need space,” Jazz supplied, finally coming to his rescue. Imagine the good she could do if she knew about him being Phantom. And imagine how much she would chew him out if she found out – yikes. “Being anti-social is just part of the deal sometimes. The best we can do is be supportive.”

Danny nodded his agreement. “Yes, exactly. It’s not that I don’t love you, because I do. But I just want to spend time alone or with my friends.”

“And that’s fine.” Maddie glanced over to Jack, clearly hoping for some support, but the man just shoved another forkful of food into his mouth and smiled apologetically. She rolled her eyes and turned back to Danny. “But parents worry, and a mother especially. And I suppose… Seeing Phantom as we do now, it reminds me of how things could be.”

Stiffening slightly – and hopefully unnoticeably – Danny swallowed the bite of food in his mouth. “How so?”

She sighed, weary and sad. “It’s just hard to see him without imaging you in his shoes. You’re the same age, I think, and… It could’ve been you. A dead teen with family and friends living in Amity Park, hated by his own parents for becoming a ghost?”

Well, um, oof. “But it’s not me,” he tried, despite it being a bare-faced lie. It fitted so perfectly because it was him. “So you don’t have to worry, Mom. And I know… I know that you would always love me, ghost or not. So I would– I would tell you, if that ever happened to me.” Wow, another dirty lie. Good going, Fenton.

“But it won’t.” His dad gently gripped his mom’s shoulder. “He’s a Fenton, Mads! Nothing will happen to him.”

“I know.” The corner of her mouth quirked up a little, the barest hint of a smile. “But a mother worries.”

Jazz put down her fork with a clink, her plate cleared. “And that’s perfectly normal, mom. But Danny’ll be okay. No ghostliness for him, right Danny?”

He swallowed, grinned hesitantly. “Yeah, right. I’m perfectly fine. Nothing to worry about.”

#danny phantom #dp fanfic #phanfic #phanfiction #dp fanfiction #fanfiction #dark writes #what a nice surprise #danny fenton #vlad masters #jack fenton #maddie fenton #vlad plasmius #jazz fenton

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