#Protection - new things to see or feel - maybe he'd even have something of a capacity to be appreciative that'd be nice | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

kemihaydeestantonva · 19 days

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I'm just going to word vomit my season 2B predictions for Helluva Boss here so I can come back later and see how close I was to anything!! I find this speculation game really fun.

OKAY

Predictions! The full moon starts out with the duet, apparently, so my guess is - Blitzø has been doing a lot of opening up lately so I think he is actually going to try and make this full moon more intimate (with Fizz's help) meanwhile Stolas is freaking out and preparing to have a serious talk with him. Blitzø pulls out all the stops (omg that giant ass candle lmaooo) Stolas gives him the crystal and shatters Blitzø's plans. He takes it as a HUGE rejection, the talk escalates to a fight, they break up.

Apology tour is Stolas and Verosika somehow teaming up, she makes the tour all about shitting on Blitzø and maybe Stolas initially goes along with it or maybe he interrupts and finally publicly stands up for him. Blitzø makes amends with Verosika in some capacity, takes the first steps in being accountable for his past actions towards them both.

Ghostfuckers is the ghost busters one, and that creepy blonde guy is Leviathan - he lures them in as an unassuming bellhop with the ghost hunting thing, then traps him and Millie. I'm assuming he has some sort of possession powers, and being the embodiment of envy he forces them to face what they envy about each other, intense fight ensues. We get backstory on Millie, who she was before IMP, how she joined, ect.

Mastermind is the episode with the agents and the cherubs, I have no idea how that is going to play out but it does look like they figured out a way to open a portal to hell. From the picture we got of agents one and two dressed in IMP cosplay I'm still desperately hoping that a furry convention setting might happen because I think it'd be hilarious

Sinmas is the one with all the Goetia family gathered, along with the sins. Looks like some sort of big shindig. All the apple and snake architecture tells me it'll be in the pride ring but I doubt there will be any Lucifer cameo (I don't think they could legally even if they wanted to). I'm guessing that the scary Zestial looking guy is Satan, and I think he's going to be bad news (I think when Mammon told Oz he'd "regret" admitting his love for Fizz that he was going to go over his head and plot something nasty with Satan. Or maybe Mammon teams up with Leviathan and the sin stuff is tied to the ghostfucker episode not this one, but the episode title hints otherwise)

I think Stella is going to turn Via against Stolas over these episodes, he's going to spend this entire time grappling with his breakup and figuring out how to move on, it's a prime time for Via to feel neglected and for Stella to make a move - and the gathering is going to be like, a public reckoning scenario resulting in Andrealphus fighting Stolas, and Blitzø will swoop in and protect him! No idea where this will ultimately leave their relationship but one I hope it starts to mend by the last episode. (I also don't get major bad vibes from Vassago so maybe Stolas won't be entirely friendless at this gathering??)

Anyway that's what I got so far, see y'all at the full moon

#helluva boss spoilers #helluva boss

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noblechaton · 11 months

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so ultimately I really enjoyed season 5 as a whole and think it might be my new favorite season of ml in general since most episode were bangers and the finale eps weren't really any different lmao

but there's two elements that - like other folks I've seen - are kinda bugging me and bog it down a good bit I feel and I kinda wanna ramble about em. ml spoilers below (no salt tho I am complaining somewhat)

the first thing was something I'd caught a glimpse of just before I passed out last night thanks to some lovely blogging from a few mutuals and that I caught onto midway thru the second part of the finale and that is of course the weird attempt at seemingly redeeming? Gabriel in some capacity

now of course he's not at all redeemed to us, the audience, and it doesn't feel like a redemption so much as like. absolving him? but either way like....why at all? 5 seasons (2 specials and a video game too) across like 8 years I feel sorta showed that the guy legit could not be redeemed, especially S5 itself with multiple instances of him doing just. unforgivably heinous things to everyone including that son of his he kept talking about protecting and like for a time in the show maybe I could have seen that path where he was genuinely doing this to improve Adrien's life but that was tossed a long time ago lmao, he's actively tormented Adrien more than anything and that's without factoring in his beatings of Chat Noir, threats towards Marinette, etc.

Gabriel sacrificing himself at the end was something I sorta always knew was coming bc nothing else really made sense. no way he'd go to jail, he couldn't just be absolved of all he'd done and there was no real other option and yet they tried to absolve him anyway?? not to mention how little sense I feel it makes for Adrien to believe this in the least after even just the last few episodes, let alone the season and then some

Paris in general treating Gabriel like a hero sucks - most of the class at least should know better - and while I think there's a chance it'll lead to some juicy drama between Marinette knowing the truth and Lila knowing what she knows, one of them feels bound to take it to Adrien, I'm concerned it'll just be a flat point never to be addressed again

now I've often felt the show is more clever than ppl give it credit for but idk. something about it just feels weird and wrong and not just bc of what it is on the surface - Marinette building a lie into her relationship with Adrien is fascinating and it should absolutely come up in the future, but I'm worried it won't

and the reason I'm worried is bc of how Adrien was handled in the finale - in that he wasn't really handled at all

I understand that the story had him locked up in a cube, I get that he was purposefully tossed aside by that same father he supposedly believes is heroic now but like....why did we get nothing from him past him forfeiting the ring? why did he give up so easily? why was he a total nonentity in the finale of what is, essentially, his arc? in this story that has the most bearing on Adrien, Adrien himself was just....gone for most of it, arguably all of it

I feel like it flies counter to a lot of what the show's been doing especially lately with him in how Adrien is basically stripped of any and all agency by the end of the finale and honestly I hate it lol. him having no say on anything, no knowledge of anything or any real reaction to....anything that happened. we don't see him really react to the lie of what his father did, to Nathalie being returned to health or to the mysterious blonde woman at the pool who may or may not be his actual mom (the storyboards and deleted scene apparently confirm it was, at least, at some point), we don't even see him get his ring back. like I wasn't expecting a reveal at this point - I don't think we're gonna get one tbh - but....nothing??

which is part of why I feel the stuff at the end with him and Marinette in the garden - while very nice and cathartic after 8 years of watching - felt so off, almost hollow. Adrien didn't really get to be a character in the finale and just sort of reappears to finally kiss Marinette again? that's it? he's all smiles and sunshine again after being genuinely, undeniably tortured by his father that he again somehow believes is heroic in some manner? huh??

I think I'd feel better about things if we at least got his reaction to things - if he somehow rolled up on his destroyed house or found Nathalie walking around under her own power or w/e but there's just nothing. like he's an action figure that got lost under the bed for a bit. and again there's a chance we get some of that next season but like, not only do I think we shouldn't have to but I also see it as less likely than the Gabe stuff proving to be a plotline since that feels much more like a lingering presence that sorta needs to be dealt with and honestly Tomoe needs to be dealt with too idk how Kagami could ever go back to her after this

which really has me excited about season 6 more than I was - I admittedly kinda groaned when they revealed there'd be more seasons since I knew about the 5 season arc (especially since main villain Lila did not interest me in the least at the time lol, and still kinda doesn't tbh) but if I'd sorta softened on the decision across the last few years, I've fully turned around with this - so long as they address some of this stuff going forward at least bc I feel like if nothing else there's some really juicy drama and story potential in the Gabriel lie coming undone

ultimately again I loved this season and felt the finale was appropriately crazy - the kwamis in their ultimate forms, Gimmi's appearance, Bug Noir and the fight across the mansion, it all worked really well imo and there was a lot of payoff still in the finale even if I feel they didn't really stick the landing with a couple of rough edges and odds and ends hanging out

I also wanna say that I kinda like the ideas I've seen floating around about how the epilogue might not be what it seems - that Gabriel's wish wasn't so pure in nature, it kinda fits him to warp reality in just such a way after all but idk if that's what's going on here for sure yet. think it'd make a really cool twist if that evil AU special thingy came straight off of this tho, or if we got midway thru S6 and it's like, oh dang we're living a total fabrication!! I love stuff like that lol

also also ngl I am not excited about the whole team being back at all in any capacity lol. think a smaller team - which would now be Ladybug, Chat, Carapace, Rena, Ryuko and Argos maybe - just works better

also also also - addendum that ties into the Adrien stuff - it feels really weird that Chat Noir wasn't present at all during Monarch's defeat right? like. idk that just doesn't sit well with me, like he should have had some impact there, some role. maybe he could have broken out and given Ladybug the ring himself (albeit in a mask or something) or done literally anything. idk. really weird

#noble ml catchup 2k23 #not gonna tag this as spoilers so as to not clog the tag too hard but like. ml spoilers #just me kinda talkin for a bit

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vickyvicarious · 2 years

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For the AU mashup game: Marriage of Convenience & It's Not You, It's My Enemies

Okay, so at first I was considering like a historical AU or something, but, um... Well, actually I could imagine a verse where this works for modern-day Ace Attorney. It's a much longer fic than I'll ever write (so if anyone sees this and they want to have a go at the idea, feel free!), but I think it works really well for Miego!

In this AU we build off of Kurain emphasis on matrilineal succession and the whole thing Maya mentions where they often have trouble with men leaving. Maybe there's still an emphasis on legal marriages despite this, and with the main and branch family so small some kind of bylaws come into play.

Misty Fey is still technically the Master. But she's been gone for so long already, and Morgan has very little spiritual power, not enough to channel anyone or at least to do it well. Maya and Pearl both have enough power, but they're too young/inexperienced to continue the tradition as yet. They're still in training. When Mia, who is an excellent spirit channeler, finally tells Morgan that she wants to leave the village, she's met with heavy resistance. She is the only one really keeping their way of life afloat at the moment - and she's currently the primary hope for a new generation to follow this one.

Morgan, backed by whatever elders the village has, gives Mia an ultimatum: she can leave and study law only if she finds a husband within a set amount of time and can get him to take her family name. And, of course, prove that he is willing to provide her with children to inherit the power that will keep the village alive. She also has to regularly return to continue channeling spirits in a limited capacity in the meantime until she has a gifted daughter, or Maya/Pearl are able to take over the jobs. If she refuses to do this, she won't be allowed to leave at all.

Now, Mia absolutely could just leave regardless. But that would mean entirely cutting ties with her home. And while she has no interest in becoming the next Master or anything, she knows Maya wants to be a spirit channeler. Maya has already lost so much - Mia doesn't want to leave her behind entirely any more than she wants to put her in the position of having to leave her village, family, and future career behind. She might choose Mia, if it comes down to it - but Mia will protect her sister from that choice. She agrees to the bargain.

(This is a surprise to Morgan, who knows how little Mia wants to be involved in Kurain affairs, and assumed she'd refuse. She hoped to use it as a method to cast Mia out permanently, thus removing an obstacle between Pearl and the Master title down the line. If she played things right, maybe Maya would leave too, or at least her reputation would be tainted by Mia's departure and she could make a stronger case to shove her aside in favor of Pearl.

Still, there's a time limit, and she alters her plans in the hopes of Mia failing to find a husband who will take her name, failing to show any signs of trying for a child. She'll just blackball her then.)

So Mia is off at law school by this point, and she's actively looking around not only for a firm to join, but for someone who will agree to marry her in name only to fulfill this agreement. She dates Lana for a while, but the partner has to be a man according to the agreement, so she's still looking.

Enter Diego Armando, who works at the Grossberg Law Firm. Mia interns there for a while, and eventually gets an offer to join the firm as a lawyer once she passes the bar. At some point, she overhears or is involved in a conversation about Diego's desire to get permanent residency. He's Argentinian and currently living in the country on a work visa, but it's a long process and he's annoyed at how long it will take/wants to be sure that even if he left the firm he'd not be forced to leave the country. (I know very little about immigration laws, so I'd have to do some research on this or just make up Japanifornia rules).

Mia sees a win-win situation. She approaches him with an offer to get platonically married for several years. Long enough for him to become a permanent resident, which means at least two years if not a little longer so as to seem more realistic for visa purposes. She plans to have defeated Redd White and found her mother by then, at which point it won't matter if she gets a divorce, since she's certain Misty won't deny Mia access to her sister once she's returned. In the meantime, all he has to do is take her name legally (he can still use his name for work) and they might have to lie every so often that they're trying for a child.

Diego agrees, and they have a simple ceremony shortly after Mia passes her bar exam. She moves in with him, but it's pretty much just a roommates and coworkers situation; at the time, she's possibly even still dating Lana (who knows about the circumstances and is cool with everything). He meets Aunt Morgan and, while not exactly charming her, is at least able to pass muster enough for her and the elders to reluctantly agree that he fits all their conditions. He befriends Maya and Pearl both, neither of whom know about said conditions (Maya knows about the visa thing, because Mia didn't want to lie to her that much, but also didn't want to burden her with the Fey drama; Pearl doesn't know the marriage is fake at all and looks up to them as her new ideal of romance).

Over time, he mentors her more at work, they hang out more at home, and they become good friends. Mia breaks up with Lana eventually, if she were still dating her by this point, and slowly, the two of them start falling for one another. Diego much faster - but, by the time Mia's first trial goes so horribly wrong, they're both well into pining for one another. He holds off on trying to confess his feelings because he doesn't want to make her face any more big changes just yet... but he does try to go talk with Dahlia and see if he can get any evidence against her. She poisons him as in canon; as in canon, he goes into a coma and they don't know if he will survive.

Mia has it rough for a while. She's mourning the husband she never admitted to loving, paying for his hospital bills while trying to start her own law firm, and fending off all Morgan's attempts to shut her out of the family if she doesn't divorce him in favor of someone else. Not to mention, she's starting to close in on Redd White and beginning to realize just how dangerous a man he is. Phoenix is a bright spot in an otherwise pretty bleak time, and his belief in her/eagerness to work with her helps her a lot.

She eventually reworks her agreement with Morgan to divorce Diego if he doesn't wake up in a set amount of time. She has no real intention of doing so - romantic feelings aside, she knows he doesn't have any other family and she doesn't want to leave him alone to deal with being deported or anything if he ever does wake up. She kind of suspects he won't, though.

But then he does. Much earlier than in canon - just around the time Phoenix is officially hired on to the firm, in fact. He wakes up and while he's disabled for life now, he's still Diego, he's back and he doesn't want to waste any more time. As he's recovering and doing all his physical therapy and getting his mask developed, etc., he finally tells Mia that he loves her. That he wants to be with her for real.

She was already helping to take care of him. He moved back in with her, she'd promised him a job at her firm if he wanted it as soon as he's well enough to work... but even though for a moment (or heck, maybe a night) this is everything she wants to hear, a second later (or the morning after) she shuts him down and tells him they need a divorce.

She tries to couch it in Fey excuses, that Morgan is worried about his ability to father a child after his poisoning. But he offers to get whatever testing necessary to appease her. He even says that if she doesn't feel the same he's okay with that, he doesn't want to pressure her into anything, least of all out of pity. But he doesn't want to get a divorce that will just leave her worrying about Maya again, and finally she's forced to admit that it isn't his feelings for her. It's Redd White.

Diego has already paid the price once, and she can't bear the thought of putting him in danger again. She wants to divorce him so that he won't be an obvious target for revenge against her. She refuses to date him for the same reason, and won't let him convince her otherwise.

...Mia holds firm, despite all his best arguments, and their divorce gets underway. Diego is extremely frustrated because he doesn't want her to protect him at the cost of putting herself in danger, and denying something he knows they both want. When we intersect with canon again, he's at the office on the day Redd White tries to kill her. Maybe he arrives partway into the fight, and jumps in to help her. In the end, Mia still gets injured, and maybe even goes into a brief medically-induced coma after some surgery. Redd White gets away, but no one dies.

Diego's mask was knocked off his head in the struggle, so he was fighting blind and can't really testify as to the identity of the attacker. Since the trials are so accelerated, no one waits for Mia to be awake/coherent enough to give her own account. Maya gets arrested, and Phoenix is still the one to defend her/eventually himself, because Diego hasn't gotten his badge back yet. Instead, he acts as co-counsel when he can.

In the end, Mia recovers. And when she wakes up, Diego is waiting by her bedside. With Redd White taken care of, and proof that none of them are ever going to be entirely safe anyway, she finally lets him in and admits to her own feelings as well. They call off the divorce.

(Morgan is extremely irritated by all this, and would cause problems down the line... but for now, it's a happy ending.)

#ace attorney #aa fic #miego #fic ideas #my fic #thepreciousthing #replies #inbox games #mia fey #diego armando #godot

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the-coffee-story · 3 years

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Rise of the Forest God

Chapter 17 - Professor Tally Winchester

Winchester Hall was a beautiful, dark Victorian mansion á lá Addams Family that rested proudly upon the tallest hill around. The windows, grey with age and dust were tall and skinny and a rusted iron gate, with weathered carvings now indistinguishable rested half swallowed by dirt and uncut blades of long dry grass. The whole thing blended rather well with the crawling forest behind it.

The team was waiting by the gate, curious and giddy with half-numbed nervousness.

"Well, now I'm definitely interested," Walther commented, peeking through the towering, rusted gate. "This looks like it's haunted by at least three ghosts who died a horrible death. They never found the heads."

October laughed.

"Seriously October, imagine the Addams Family's mansion, now scale it down a little."

He raised an eyebrow. "Can't wait for Morticia to pop out."

"Well, Morticia was definitely not on the phone," Violet noted.

Suddenly, the carved, dark-oak door that rested comfortably in the centre of the home's front opened, and a young man peeked out, adjusting his glasses as he took a moment to assess the situation. After a few moments passed, he noticed the team waiting by the gate, waved to wordlessly grab their attention, and quickly scuttled over.

Tally Winchester was a medium-heighted, slender and bald individual with large, wildly blue eyes behind thick glasses and a countless amount of scattered silver piercings dotted in and around his earlobe. Despite the fact that it was it had just dawned early spring, his skin was sunburnt and tanned, as if he spent most of his days somewhere lost outside. He walked with a noticable limp, and Walther didn't need to wait long for an explanation, when a prosthetic briefly appeared between his worn brown converse sneakers and faded jeans.

"Hi!" He flashed a toothy smiled at the group and opened the gate. "Great to see you, I'm Professor Tally Winchester!" He shook everyone's hands as they trickled past. The sleeves of his petrol flannel were rolled up, revealing a rather out-of-place, faded tattoo of a crawling lizard and a bunch of old scars. "You can call me Tally though."

Violet held out her hand. "Hi, I'm Violet, we talked on the phone."

"Great to meet you all!" He grinned. "Are you coming inside?"

***

"Before anyone asks, I inherited the house," Tally explained while leading them upstairs. "It's rotten and I hate it and the bills are a naked horror but I doubt I can find anything that has more capacities for a library." He opened a door. "Intrate, everyone."

"Remarkable," Doc commented.

Remarkable was indeed an understatemt. The room they'd entered was a library- with a beautiful brick fireplace and huge windows that let in the sparse afternoon sun, bookshelves brushed against the webbed ceiling and sunk into every wall. The floor was carpeted, through incredibly uncomfortable to walk on, and the furniture antique. One wall was plastered with photographs and notes.

"Nice," Walther mumbled, taking the second to once again soak in their surroundings.

Tally grinned, idly brushing aside pages and old notes compromised of incomprehensible scribbles and drawings. His teeth were somewhat crooked. "I didn't replace any of the furniture, but I did sell a chunk of the old books. There was just no space for mine." He closed the door behind them. "So anyway, you wanted to know about the cult?"

"There's been a bunch of murders in Forest Lane that were eerily similar to what it did, so yeah." Thasfield shrugged his broad shoulders. "We suspect the cult might be involved."

"Oh, I heard about that on the news!" Tally sorted the files on the table until he found what he was looking for. Then he looked up. His face was serious now. "At this point I'd like to admit I have a slightly selfish motivation in this."

"What is it?", Violet asked.

"You see..." Tally leaned against the table. "For context, I'm a history professor, but my focus is on cryptids and modern legends. Historical context, potential explanations, yada yada. A few years ago I stumbled across the legend of the Forest God."

Walther's face lit up. "Oh, I remember that story, my parents used to tell it to me when I was a kid! This one guy got lost in the woods, was found dead and after his funeral his reanimated corpse came home and his wife who loved him very, very much-" They side-eyed Violet and Coffee, who in turn glared back. "-couldn't accept that maybe it's not exactly normal that your husband's corpse is vibing around, then after a while he started killing people, then he killed her and then the neighbours buried him in an iron casket in the woods so he would stop randomly murdering people. Right?"

"You summed it up." Tally nodded.

"But who believes in that?!" Violet frowned. "I mean... it's just a legend, right? Somebody finally snapped, had a rough week or something, and people straight up believe his bullshit?"

"He came back from the dead and started murdering people, Violet," Doc commented.

She shrugged dismissively. "We've all been there."

"I don't want to meet you after a bad week," Tally remarked with mild discomfort, absentmindedly flipping through pages of notes and nonsense. "The existence of the man who allegedly became the Forest God is proven. His name was Eustace Wyndham and if you ask me he had rabies and some things were added for drama. But that's not even relevant, because the cult came almost a hundred years later." He slid around the table and opened another scattered file. "1969 they started to worship the Forest God. At first it was nothing special, you know, just the average college student nonsense." He held up an old photograph, subtle wonder in his eyes as he stared into it, before handing it to Walther. "Here, you can take a look at this! That's the entire cult. The guy in purple with the long hair is one of the founders. The other founder left in 1970 after getting a bad feeling about the whole thing. I caught him for an interview five years ago. Lovely guy, sadly died of cancer shortly after. It's a shame. You can pass the photo around! Notice how they're all wearing cow parsley wreaths. That was the flower associated with the Forest God and the flower scattered all over their murder victim's body, or rather what was left of it."

"All the victims had cow parsley in their mouth," Doc realized, dragging a hand up to rest in his soft ginger curls, staring blankly into the distance, thinking.

Tally nodded hastily. "Exactly! And now please look at what I found on my windowsill this morning!"

He limped over to the tallboy, half relying on the nearby furniture for support. Leaning down and throwing open a drawer, after a short while of sifting through papers and photographs, he took out something else. Then he held it up.

It was a wreath of cow parsley.

"That's....not good," Walther murmured after a long moment of stunned silence.

Tally nodded, twirling the flowers between his thumb and forefinger. "You get it. You know..." He leaned heavily against a dusty, worn table and heaved a small sigh. "When Wilhelm called me at first I was very sceptical of it all. I'm not a group project person, if you know what I mean. But this is just the tip of the ice berg and I have a feeling that I might be next, so I decided to work with you." He shrugged his shoulders.

While he'd been talking, Coffee had been furiously typing. He handed Tally his phone and Tally read it out loud.

" 'How about we use you as a bait?' Um... Can you...can you please explain what exactly you mean? That doesn't sound particularly safe-!"

He handed Coffee's phone back to him, paranoid he might accidentally drop it, and the detective started typing an answer, this time with significantly more determination.

Hear me out. So my idea was basically that tonight we let the killer come, but were going to be prepared. In other words, we gather a big group that's going to protect you, and we're going to arrest the murderer once he's here. What do you think?

Tally hesitated for a short moment and chewed his lip, opening his mouth to reply, then closing it again.. "I mean... I guess you have a point, sooner or later he's going to get me either way."

"I mean, let's be real, you can't run forever," Thasfield said, leaning forwards. "Even if you move, it's still going to take a while, and judging by what we know you're being pretty actively stalked, so it's quite possible he'll just follow you and then you'll be killed by a Forest God in a hotel room in Central Graytown. Which probably makes for an interesting plotline in a noir film, but we're talking real life here and I highly doubt you're so keen on landing in the morgue anytime soon. Although the Doctor is an expert at autopsies."

Doc smirked.

".........yeah," Tally admitted. He sat down on the table and scratched the back of his head. "Yeah, that sounds...icky but realistic." He closed his eyes took a deep breath. "Alright. Who's gonna be on this team?"

Doc's phone's rang loudly to shake up their newfound confidence, and he excused himself, stepping back into the dusty hallway to take the call.

"I mean, most of us for starters," Violet said. "But I was also thinking of grabbing Gary Fox and Wilhelm. Strength in number, you know?"

Doc eventually came back to the group. His weathered face was stricken with subtle anxiety. "Bad news."

"What is it?", Walther asked.

"Alice found her mailman by the stables."

Walther frowned. "Okay, and what's so special about that?"

"His left arm was by the stables. The rest of him was scattered across the field."

"Dear God, is he okay?"

"He's okay, but he's dead." Doc turned to Tally, lowering his voice just enough. "Can we settle on tonight?"

Tally nodded. His sunburnt face had notably paled, turning his skin a somewhat pasty yellow. "Sure. What time are y'all coming?"

"Is five o'clock alright with you?"

Tally shrugged his shoulders. "Sure."

#reviews are welcome ;)#remember to listen to the song #the coffee story #rise of the forest god

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nuclear-reactions · 6 years

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Hi! I love your writing so much! I don't know if I submitted this ask. So sorry if I did and forgot. Given Shaun somehow is able to "age" or progress as a person, could you write the different kinds of childhoods he'd have and what type of person he'd become based on the companion Sole raises him with. (And could I pretty please have a bonus where he's raised a little by everyone?)

(Thank you! Andyou’re fine, as long as you don’t spam me with a bunch of requestsyou don’t have to worry about resubmitting the occasional ask.Dogmeat and Codsworth excluded in the solo reactions)

It takes a villageto raise a child; Sole and their compatriots take this phrase maybe atad literally. On the bright side, Shaun has a deep, deep pool ofaunts and uncles to draw knowledge from on subjects he isn’t familiarwith. Danse and MacCready often fight over who should teach him toshoot (“I can hit a bloatfly from two miles out, I think I canteach a kid how to handle a gun.” “If he doesn’t plan on scoutingout sniper nests for a hour before every altercation, he’ll learnfrom me!”). Strong is the cause of his first broken bone when Shauntries to have an arm wrestling match. Curie is the one to set it andscold Strong. Cait and Hancock sneak him his first tastes of alcohol,each thinking they’re the only ones who do so. Cait in particular,after an intense round of day drinking, gives him an impromptu sex edlesson, and it’s an almost too honest -and descriptive- answer toShaun’s question of what sex was, not to mention quite different thanthe diagrams Curie showed him on reproductive organs. Piper isundoubtedly his best aunt, or at least, the closest thing to awell-rounded adult figure in his life. She’s usually the one he comesto with problems, and also dispels many of the myths Deacon handsdown (“No, you do not become a werebear if you eat charred yao guaimeat.”) Nick is more of the grandfather that knows card tricks.Codsworth is Codsworth, remaining the same mildly overbearing nannybot he’s always been. Preston never really gets the hang of him. Hetreats him a lot younger, being unsure what kids Shaun’s age are “into”. X6 isn’t the most helpful when it comes to rearing kids, andShaun only really turns to him when he wants brutal honesty.

Between the lot ofthem, Shaun ends up fairly well-rounded, with an…eclectic set ofskills, to say the least. He’s taught a little of everything. When itcomes time for him to leave the settlement, he leaves on dozens ofhandshakes and more than a few proud tears.

Danse- With Danse, he is groomed intothe picture of an army brat. It goes without saying that hisupbringing is strict, sometimes even a little harsh, but loving andfull of happy memories as well. Danse is not entirely warm, but then,he’s not entirely cold either. Sole never lets Danse treat Shaun toomuch like a Brotherhood initiate. They have to remind him now andthen that they’re not going to shoehorn their son into a militarycareer when he’s instructing him on the meticulous way a soldiershould make his bed in the mornings. He does learn a lot onmaintaining power armor and firearms, and leans more into becoming amechanic when he starts working. That, or following his father’sfootsteps into the Brotherhood (though he’s not popular, consideringDanse’s history with them). Making his father proud is tantamount inShaun’s mind, he pursues any life that would do just that. Danseraises him to be brave in the face of doubt, do what feels right, andto never let others decide your fate.

Hancock- Despitehis laz a fair approach to his own life, he does try to set Shaun ona better path than the one he ended up going down. He cleans up alittle, weans himself from the harder chems, and if he does keep afew habits, he doesn’t do them around the kid. He’s very much the “goask Sole” type of father, and Shaun gets away with a lot aroundhim. Just enough to be considered a mischievous kid and not adelinquent. He gets his first taste of beer early, his ownswitchblade, his own tricorn hat when he’s old enough it doesn’tslough off to one side of his head. Shaun adopts a lot of Hancock’svirtues, his self-confidence, loyalty, leadership skills, charm, butis taught to avoid many of his vices (which is mostly Sole’s doing).If he doesn’t end up taking up Hancock’s mantle of mayor, he likelyends up leader of a group like the Minutemen, leaving a string ofbroken hearts along the way of whatever path he treads. He’s acharmer, quick witted, and is taught to use his head above all- whichalso consists of keeping it clean. He doesn’t take up the casual chemuse that Hancock suffers from.

Deacon- Littlewhite lies are all Shaun is really allowed, yet he makes the best ofthem, and he develops a good poker face early on. Deacon is morehonest with Sole than anyone else, but first and foremost, he is apathological liar, prone to wild stories, and Shaun adopts that alittle too well. He impresses his school mates with all the storiesof his heroism, like the time he took down a radstag single-handed with nothing but a hunting knife. His tall tales either earn him agullible flock of followers or a beating from the kids smart enoughto see through his bravado. But he doesn’t just learn lying fromDeacon- he also learns compassion, fighting for what you think isright, protecting the people who are most vulnerable. And he is thesingle hardest kid to trick. He sees through deception just as easilyas he carries it out, so he quickly unravels most of the stories kidsget told (Sole has a nightmare of a time trying to convince him ofSanta Claus). His tendency towards “exaggeration” places him inthe position of a salesman later in life, hyping up his wares justenough that they seem shiny and appealing. If not that, then he’dfind himself with the Railroad, helping in whatever cause they followwhen the Institute is gone. Learning from Deacon’s mistakes, hebecomes an honest liar, easy going, and fights for the marginalized.

Piper- Havingmostly raised her little sister on her own, Piper sidles prettyeasily into the role of a mother, and his childhood is earnestlyclose to “normal” with her and Sole as parents. As normal asthings ever really got in the Commonwealth. He does, however, getinto scrapes in search of stories for Piper to cover. Being aninvestigative journalist is on par with being a spy in his mind-keeping your eyes and ears open, finding contacts, meeting in secret.He mostly grows out of this, but Piper still instills in him a loveof the written word and a desire to educate the Wastes on thingsbeyond the farms and cities they relegate themselves to. He takes totraveling at a young age, writing of his experiences in theCommonwealth and eventually, the rest of the ruins of the UnitedStates. If he doesn’t become a writer, he likely goes into lawenforcement, making sure (like Piper always taught him) that justicecomes to those who wrong others. He’s as silver tongued,compassionate, and as worldly as the woman who helps raise him.

Curie- She’slearning how to act human as much as Shaun is, so she mostly goeswith whatever Sole says when it comes to raising him. They knowbetter than she would; despite knowing how to keep kids healthy, shehad little experience with their emotional needs. Still, she does herbest. She reads him stories, partakes in nightly rituals like tuckinghim in and humming him to sleep, and when he’s too old for all that,she giddily encourages him in his studies. He learns more from herthan anything taught in school. She teaches him not only how to treatdisease, but passes on a genuine compassion and desire to help, tolearn, to make the Wastes a little better in some small capacity.When the time comes for him to strike out on his own, he travelsfurther than Curie ever has in search of knowledge, and exchanges theknowledge he brought from the Commowealth. He saves lives, being akind and caring figure all the while. He becomes everything Fathercould have been before he was twisted by the Institute.

Nick- Having arobot detective as a father is probably the coolest thing a childcould experience, and Shaun is in near constant awe of Nick. Nickhimself takes easily to being a dad and enjoys it. Shaun is his son,and really, with them both being synths cast from similar molds, itnever once felt like he wasn’t family. Having someone he could passthings on to… it was more than Nick had ever really hoped for. Hespends much of his childhood in the glow of the heart-shaped signoutside Valentine’s Detective Agency, reading through old case files,picking over evidence from new case files, and each case is a puzzlefor him to piece together. He grows up sharp and inquisitive, eagleeyed with a nose for lies. He also learns as much about synth’s innerworkings as he does humans. Nick needs the occasional tuneup whenSole isn’t around, so he helps now and then with the screws andpanels he can’t reach on his own. With this knowledge, if he doesn’tend up taking over the agency, he goes out to help runaway synthsstill wandering the Commonwealth, confused and with heads full ofmemories that aren’t their own. He grows to be perceptive, a naturalproblem solver, and sets the wrong things right wherever he goes.

Cait- Her biggestfear, besides sliding back into old habits, is becoming her parents.She does her damn best to be a good parent almost entirely out ofspite. Shaun is absolutely spoiled rotten. If Sole won’t give himsomething, he asks Caits, and nine times out of ten he gets what hewants. She’s as short tempered as she’s always been, yet for him, shekeeps it together. For him, she does better. She’s also wildlyprotective, and unsurprisingly, teaches him most problems can besolved with his fists. He’s reared knowing how to stick up forhimself, and the two of them spar a few times a week until he’s oldand skilled enough to actually beat her in a fight. By the time he’sready to leave home, there is no doubt in anyone’s minds that he’sbeen raised to take care of himself, whatever is thrown at him.Strength and fighting skills usually don’t amount to much more thanfalling in with a gang of raiders, but Shaun knows that’s not thelife either of his parents want, and the thrashing he would get ifCait knew he even considered it, so he goes into work as a bountyhunter, a body guard; anything that lets him both use his skills andsleep with an easy conscience. He’s a little wilder, a little louder,and grows up to be a fighter.

MacCready- Havingsome experience raising kids, he takes in Shaun without secondthought. Duncan has a big brother when he arrives in theCommonwealth, the two of them taking to each other almost right away.There’s hardly a day they’re separated, playing catch and shooting BBguns with their father. Shaun is protective and immensely proud ofhis younger sibling, and MacCready can finally loosen the tight griphe’d kept on his youngest son. He still keeps a watchful eye over thetwo of them, but he feels like, finally, there was someone he trustedimplicitly to keep Duncan safe. Of course, the more he gains, themore he fears losing, and he can sometimes be a bit harsh if eitherone of them do something dangerous. He couldn’t take losing them.This drives Shaun to leave at a fairly young age, learningMacCready’s stubbornness and the bravado of his youth, and Duncan isquick to follow. The two, having been taught to shoot guns beforethey could read (as well as stay out of the thick of fights) endup becoming a formidable pair of snipers. They know better than tojoin up with the Gunners or other mercenary gangs, instead becomingguns for hire. Freelance killers with a bit stricter moral codes thantheir father. If only a bit. He’s cunning, careful, and a hell of agood shot.

Preston- Being asyoung and new to parenthood as he is, he isn’t entirely prepared toraise a child who came to them fully formed. He’s anxious, alwaysconcerned he’s doing something wrong, but he does the things hisfather did for him. Teaches Shaun to shoot, the importance of a goodbook, that being kind is a reward in itself. He also teaches him thethings he had to learn for himself; that it’s fine to cry, to not beokay, to rely on others for strength when you feel like your own isfailing. Shaun’s childhood is as bumpy as any child’s is in theCommonwealth, but with Preston, there’s light even in the darkesttimes. He carries this indomitable sense of good and rightness withhim even when he’s grown, and if he doesn’t settle into a simplerlife in a settlement, he joins the Minutemen, carrying on the valueshe’s been taught. Preston teaches him the strength in community, thathope and mercy are not weakness, and to always lend a hand, whateverhe does.

X6-88- He hasspent more time with Shaun (this version and technically, the humanShaun as well) than Sole ever has, only, just not in any kind of parentalrole. He ferried him back and forth from the Institute and theCommonwealth and their relationship never went far past that. It wasstrange, suddenly being a role model for someone. Siblings, parents,family, they weren’t really an option for synths in the Institute.For Coursers, even less so. The first few years, he’s more of abodyguard than a parental figure. Learning to let go of the deathgrip he has on Institute protocol and the image of synths as tools,that takes awhile. Shaun helps. He loves him, which meant a synthlike X6 was capable of that. It was a comforting thought that one dayhe’d feel for Shaun what Shaun felt for him. He relies more on Solefor getting through the emotional turmoil of youth, as most of X6’sresponses to trivial things like school and first loves is fairlycold indifference. Not like he really understood it, he’d been madewithout thought for such things. He was still navigating some things(like first love) himself. What he does instruct Shaun in mostlypertains to combat, though he does teach him a skill that helped X6survive in the Institute- masking your true emotions. He’d have beenreprogrammed a long time ago if he hadn’t picked up that talent.Shaun grows up somewhat cold with him, making a habit of keepingthose pesky feelings to himself early on, to the point not even Solecan really coax them out of him. Not fully. As X6 learns how to bemore human, Shaun learns to be more machine. His nature andintelligence veer him, oddly enough, into politics. From X6 he learnscold calculation, the importance of keeping your cards close to yourchest, and that there’s little use for remorse.

Strong- Childhoodwith Strong being a co-parent is… weird. To say the least. Soledoes everything they can to keep him from feeding the kid human meat, eventhough he insists it will help Shaun grow big and strong, but now andthen there are a few bits of mystery meat sneaking their way into hismeals whose origins Sole couldn’t quite suss out. Regardless of hispotential foray into cannibalism, Shaun does, surprisingly, learn athing or two from his Super Mutant guardian. Mostly the things a mancan say that will make their fellow man spontaneously shitthemselves. More than a few scrapes with older children ends withShaun bellowing in his closest approximation of Strong; “THIS ISWHAT DEATH LOOKS LIKE UP CLOSE!” Despite Sole’s best efforts, Shauntakes after him, even beyond shouting his throat raw.Many arguments with him end in headbutts. He grows into a young manwho takes no shit from anyone, who understands brutality can be anecessity, and who fights with the feral tenacity of a mutie. Ignoring family protests, he goes into raiding (ever the lucrative business)and is renowned for his uncanny ability to shout down Super Mutantsbands that encroach on his band’s territory. That, or he’s a respectedfighter in the nearest Thorn. Sole might have more influence on hismorals, but Strong passes on the knowledge of Super Mutants. Whichisn’t much beyond violence and shouting. He grows up pretty confused.

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