#in the current timeline all his friend's are gone to natural circumstances.

[slymanner]

hurt my heart why dontcha.

#adventure time #fionna and cake #fionna and cake spoilers #simon petrikov #BMO #this is seriously fucked up u cant do this to me im so sadSNSSN #IMAGINE BEING BMO #just one day finn and jake say they'll brb and they're going on a important mission... #and BMO after this and them being gone for awhile just see's the world go into peril #death everywhere. no sign of his friends expect remnant's of the past.. #and the only survivor is them... #no other's expect the thing who released hell upon this once lively and colorful world in the first place. #and BMO just accept's this...tells themselves that they're still around...cosplay's as they're old friend's...this is fucked up #in the current timeline all his friend's are gone to natural circumstances. #but for this one? it was too early. too sudden. atleast in this one BMO will remember they're name's but...man. #this poor lil robo cant get a BREAK. #AND THEY FUCKING DIE IN SACRIFICE AT THE END TOO SHUTUPPPDPDPDPD #and the fact BMO also consider's “jerry” a friend...not knowing...that the same person caused all this. #this is...SO FUCKED UP #WHY MUST THE SHOW WRITERS DO THIS TO MY HEART.

[daniel306gaming]

¿What if Peter Parker asked Wanda for help in Spider-Man No Way Home?

To: Tom Holland, Elizabeth Olsen, Jon Watts, Kevin Feige and Marvel Studios

                                                        Intro

¿What if events went differently in the MCU? ¿What if Peter asked Wanda for help in Spider-Man No Way Home? In today’s fan fiction we’re going to be exploring what would have happened if Peter Parker would ask Wanda for help in erasing everyone’s knowledge of his identity as Spider-Man instead of Doctor Strange in No Way Home. ¿How can this affect the multiverse going forward? This is my own take of events taking inspiration from the 2007-08 One More Day and 2014-15 Spider-Verse story arcs with elements from the 2010 One Moment in Time comic while following the mythology of Spider-Man and Scarlet Witch and the timeline of the MCU. Without wasting anymore time sit back and relax and enjoy this dark fan fiction.

                                                      Prologue

There are several parallel universes each separated by a certain occurrence in the mainstream of time. These universes come together to form the multiverse in which each one of them is unique for its own specific event. In the end it is only I the Watcher who oversees the happenings of all these worlds but I must not intervene as the principles of my existence will put the multiverse at risk. In our universe there existed a certain name. A kid named Peter Parker. The young man had spent a great deal of his life being a vigilante famously known as Spider-Man. But the burden of saving a populated world proves difficult for one child to bear. This became very evident when Peter was outed as the Spider-Man by the villain known as Mysterio. To fix the mistake he had caused Peter had met with the former Sorcerer Supreme to erase the recent happenings and grant him the peaceful life he had wanted. However, this fractured the multiverse itself. Nevertheless today’s story will take a very different format  as we will explore a world where Peter met another to help him undo his evident damage. A woman whose only darkened her soul. I am the Watcher. I am ur guide to these vast new realities. Follow me and pounder the question. What If…

                                                           Story

The events of No Way Home were playing out the same as in our universe. Peter sat in his house biting his lip as he looked out the window. He could not believe that he was outed as Spider-Man. He could not believe that he was an infamous superhero. Now of course his pasts deeds of heroism had brought him into the spotlight. However, a certain villain named Mysterio had ensured the opposite happened when he framed Peter for his death. He had previously gone to Ned and MJ hoping they had gotten acceptance letters into their colleges. However, just like him they had been rejected. It was evident that this rejection was a result of their affiliations with Spider-Man. Peter knew that he needed to change everything. He would be able to endure everything that happened to him but he would not be able to endure the pain and the circumstances inflicted on his friends. Now it was time to meet a friend. He spotted Strange cleaning up the snow filled Sanctum with Wong. Peter instantly hoped that his prayers were now answered. He smiled as he approached the former Sorcerer Supreme requesting a favor from him. Or course this favor was a huge one as Strange had to cast a forbidden spell erasing the memories of everyone who knew Peter Parker as Spider-Man. It was a spell that even Wong advised against. It was a surprising turn of events. Strange looked into Peter’s eyes and told him that he would be unable to cast the spell as he now respected the laws of nature and balance. Peter would have to find another way to salvage his current predicament. A frustrated Peter walked out of the tower cursing beneath her breath. Wanda sat on her chair with her eyes buried into the deep mess of the Darkhold. She could feel her magic expanding as red expressions of energy shadowed the entire room. She knew what she needed and that was the power of the multiverse. With this power she would find a world her children were alive in and be with them but she could not find the power she sought. A situation frustrated her even more as her mind wandered in the deep trenches of the Darkhold. She began to sense feelings of frustration digging deeper. She realized that she had felt these feelings before coming from a certain young man who she had once befriended. A man who fought against her when she assisted Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes. She would have to find Peter Parker and would have to render assistance to him. Peter then sat on his couch hoping his door was locked properly. He would not have another person coming to see and comfort him. Aunt May had down her very best but she could see that it was not working. Nothing could change the truth. Peter had ruined the lives of his friends. If only Peter knew he would ruin the lives of several others. There was a knock on the door and May opened it surprised to see it was a red-haired woman stepping into the building. She had a wonderful smile and some gorgeous eyes. She also had a cake in her hand. May knew she had seen this woman before. Then it hit her. “¿You’re the woman who blew up that building in Lagos right?” May asked. Wanda smiled ensuring she kept her magic in check. If she wanted to win Peter’s trust she would have to play nice. Wanda responded positively saying that she had assisted Peter in the fight against Thanos. She added that she had seen the news and wanted to make sure if Peter was alright. May smiled and pointed her hands at Peter’s room but May felt that something was amiss. She could not place it as the human heart is as weak as it is confused in some circumstances. Peter was surprised to see his door opened and Wanda stepped in smiling. As she approached him he jerked up from his bed embarrassed as he only had her underwear on. With a flicker of her fingers Peter found himself fully dressed. Wanda immediately asked him how he was feeling as she had heard the news. A frustrated Peter went ahead to spell out the recent events allowing his mind to be opened to Wanda. She could see the fear and guilt he had in his heart. He was susceptible enough for her. Before Peter could realize that he had talked too much he had noted the fact that he had gone to obtain assistance from Doctor Strange which Wanda chuckled to Peter. Peter seemed surprised to see that Wanda possessed no type of anger at his last concluded act. Then it hit him. He could ask her for assistance as she was sort of a sorcerer too. If only he knew that she was counting on his desperation. Of course Wanda tried to play the safe way. Knowing that performing a spell would be too dangerous and she did not want her powers to get out of hand. Peter responded by telling her that there was no need for her to worry ensuring that he included every possible expectation he needed to do. All Wanda needed was the spell to perform and he had to get it for her. Peter knew that he would have to steal it from Strange himself. Peter arrived at the Sanctum Sanctorum pleased that Strange was nowhere in sight. He hoped that he would be able to access the library that he had spotted earlier and get that spell from Wanda. As he moved he was quietly surprised to bump into Wong. “¿What are you doing here?” He asked stuttering. Peter said that he came to apologize to Strange for his earlier actions and that he really needed a friend to talk to him saying that it was something about what he said. This made Wong smile and Wong moved to get them a drink so that they could talk. Of course Peter used the moment to access the library when Wanda inquired on why Peter returned so late. He appealed that they shouldn’t talk about it which seemed fine by her. Peter handed over the pages to her which was engraved in a rather old piece of paper. Wanda collected the spell smiling to herself as she prepared to perform her magic. “¿Are u ready for this?” she wandered. A hint of concern showed instantly in her eyes. Peter noted that he would do anything to help MJ and Ned. Wanda smiled and began to cast the spell. Fortunately Peter was no sorcerer. He would not know the changes she had made to the spell and she made neigh changes to shatter the fabric of space and time. Strange sat in his chamber closing his eyes while he let his mind to wander. He was engaged in a meditation exercise that the Ancient One once taught him before she passed away. Suddenly, he felt chills go up his spine as he opened his eyes in shock. At that moment he knew something was wrong. The first name popped into as he heaved a frustrating sigh. “¿Peter, what have u done?” He said in his head. Ned and MJ could not believe her ears as Peter narrated everything to them including how Wanda had successfully made everyone in the entire universe forget that he was Spider-Man except the expectations he had mentioned to her. Ned made a comment about getting married to this Wanda eventually and Peter replied that she was not her type. As Peter turned to MJ he could not help but notice that MJ was definitely uncomfortable with the situation. “¿Are u okay?” He asked her hoping she was indeed alright. MJ noted that while she was glad at the extent of the sacrifice he made. She would have preferred he had met with the colleague administrators. Peter stopped her mid-sentence and promised that everything would be alright now and that everyone had forgotten about the events with Mysterio. However, MJ was not finished. Apparently she had already contacted the college and after a few favors the administrator agreed to put them on the consideration list. Shocked at MJ’s lack of trust in him Peter looked at Ned and realized that Ned was fully aware of MJ’s plans. Hurt by his friends he stepped out of the restaurant only to be knocked out by a large tentacle. Before Peter could recover from his brutal attack the tentacle came again striking him down with force. Then the tentacle grabbed and lifted him up. Apparently he applied a lot of force crushing his bones. Only then did Peter have a good look at his attacker. This was a man who had a lot of machines attached to his body. He seemed dangerous and moreover ready to kill Parker. The surrounding civilians had already fled with MJ and Ned taking a hiding position. As the tentacled man prepared to strike again a piece of metal flung towards his neck. The metal had made contact with that soft spot causing the being to fall crashing down. Ned and MJ looked in shock as the famous Wanda Maximoff came out of a corner and carried Peter’s unconscious body away. Strange could not hide his surprise when his attempt to teleport the madman who has attacked the restaurant and civilians including Spider-Man himself ended up bringing 2 high school kids to him. They had coming with the already deceased man appearing in the Sanctum with him. Strange listened in shock as he heard everything. The kids said that if Wanda had taken Peter then there was something very wrong truly. He intended to sent these beings back to their dimensions but right now they had a priority which was to bring Peter home but as he thought about Wanda he knew that he couldn’t be too careful with the kind of magic he possessed. He was going to have to bring backup. He closed his eyes and began to chant. Wanda smiled as she let her magic flow out of her system. With the multiverse now broken thanks to the spell that Peter had given to her she could manipulate this to get what she wanted but inside she knew she would need another source of power and she would do everything possible to find that power and use it to her advantage. For now she celebrated as the broken multiverse only made it much easier for her. Then, she began to sense a strange presence in her room. She lifted herself up as she was preparing herself for battle. The former sorcerer supreme came to have a little chat. Seeing her fighting stance Strange assured Wanda that he was just here to talk. Wanda laughed as she knew that their conversation would most likely end in more than just a talk. When Strange asked her why she casted the spell for Peter she said that she did it for a personal reason and he would not understand as he was too busy protecting the balance of the multiverse. Strange assured her that whatever was the issue that they could fix it together. However, what did she gain in casting the spell and abducting Parker. Wanda chuckled and noted that she had met Doctor Octopus a few minutes after he appeared in their world. Using her magic she spelled him to attack Peter ensuring he was weakened enough. Of course Peter would think she tried to save him and after the amount of anger that he just read from her mind it made the spell that she could cast a lot easier. Strange was shocked to see a red-eyed Peter step out of the shadows. He looked vile and ready to kill. At that moment Strange placed himself in a fighting stance. To Wanda’s shock she saw 2 new Spider-Men drop aside Strange. Strange noted that Wanda was not the only one who could ignore the rules of the space-time continuum to suit her agenda. Wanda snapped her fingers forcing Peter to attack his fellow counterparts. Peter-Two and Three shot webs at Parker occasionally eventually hoping to circle and put him down for good. However, Peter seemed like he was stronger and faster than the both of them combined. Of course he had been boosted by Wanda’s dark magic. Strange on the other hand battled Wanda and they fought viciously until Wanda used her magic to pin him to the ground. Wanda turned around to see that Peter-Two and Three were having a hard time with her minion. With a smile she waved her hands and pinned the 2 Spider-Men to the floor as well. She smiled to Peter and he smiled back with his red eyes still glowing. As Strange laid on the floor he casted one more spell. There was a pin drop of silence. Aunt May’s voice echoed in the chamber mentioning that Peter had more than enough goodness to fight off Wanda’s spell. He was a hero no matter what the world tried to think of him and it was time he started acting like one. He had a responsibility that he had to fulfill and he had to save his friends. Peter’s eyes hit wet as a teardrop fell. Aunt May had always known the right things to say. Wanda was mad as she turned to Peter. She was shocked when the young man shot a web flying towards her. In response she used her magic to fling him across the room. Peter landed on a sharp piece of metal crying out in the process. Wanda yelled in frustration with Peter injured. The spell that would shattered the multiverse had been broken. She quickly used her magic to fly anyways. Strange got up from the floor and rushed towards Peter. He looked up at Strange and apologized for everything. He should have trusted his friends more indeed. MJ kneeled beside Peter’s grave. Her eyes showed no emotion. She had been like this for the past 2 hours and she had no intentions of leaving. Strange stood beside her and she held her breath. She was going to avenge Peter’s death. She would join Strange and they would start searching for the Scarlet Witch…

    To be continued in ¿What if Another Multiversal War happened in the MCU?

                                                     THE END!

And that is going to be it for what if Peter asked Wanda for help in Spider-Man No Way Home. Now this could setup a possible part 2 but I’m gonna leave that cliffhanger to u guys as you’ll will decide what will happen next and see how this could lead to an alternate version of Multiverse of Madness. ¿Will they be able to defeat the Scarlet Witch and avenge Peter or become Wanda’s next victims? Be on the lookout for more what ifs coming soon. Take care guys and have a fantastic day. Peace out!

#marvel studios #multiverse saga

[fortes-fortuna-iogurtum]

I still think it is really a shame that we don’t have more content with Romana III/Trey in the Big Finish version of things.

I want to know more about her, what makes her unique and special from the other two Romanas. Obviously she’s a lot more emotionally open compared to the other two, more outright human-acting in many ways, and I think we can infer that this is at least partially due to the amount of time she spent around Leela and Ace and other human friends. But in what ways is she still undeniably a Time Lord? How does she act when put in different circumstances? Is the warmth and sensitivity she usually displays completely natural to her, or is it a persona she’s embraced that slips away sometimes to reveal the same coldness of her previous incarnations? The novel version of Romana III could be almost cruel at times, “The War Queen,” so is this version of Trey the same in that respect?

Supposedly Leela “betrayed” her, and we assume that had to do with the events on the Time Ship that led to Romana II’s regeneration (which Braxiatel averted, supposedly at Trey’s request), but I can’t help but feel there’s more to that story. Is she hiding some details of what led Leela to leave Gallifrey? Does she know where Leela is now, or is her best friend long gone?

Narvin often seems uncomfortable around her in Intervention Earth; his abiding loyalty to Romana as his President remains fervent as usual, and occasionally you see slivers of his personal attachment to her as well, but their friendship seems strained. Is this because of what happened with Leela? Have they just fallen back into the rhythm of their individual jobs since returning to their Gallifrey, and the demand of those positions as well as the natural tensions between the President’s office and the CIA has caused them to drift apart? Is it simply a natural clashing of personalities that happens sometimes?

What does Trey think of Brax? Is she sympathetic to him still, or has she completely broken free from his influence? How does he feel towards her? Is he as enamored (obsessed?) with her as he was her previous incarnation? Is she more open to his personal (romantic?) feelings towards her, given her more emotional nature?

Are we 100% sure that she actually instructed Brax to go back and stop Romana II from regenerating and bringing Trey’s timeline to be? We only have Brax’s word on that, and we all know Brax’s word is doubtful at best...

How does she interact with the Doctor? Does she miss him and still consider him a close friend, or has she moved on after he seemingly rejected her in Neverland/Zagreus?

In her presidential decisions, is she colder? softer? more likely to be moved in compassion or even more of a pragmatist than her previous self? What does her personal moral code look like? Has she come to terms with the “Destroyer of Worlds” identity, or does she still fight against it? Does she have any lingering effects from Pandora’s influence, or is all that far behind her now?

How does she react when angry? when threatened? when completely at ease and interacting with the people she’s most comfortable around? who are those people? where is she most likely to let down her guard and in what circumstances does she feel most relaxed? does she view her friends from her previous life the same as she did before regeneration, or has she pushed them to an arms’ length despite her seeming approachability?  We get all of one full-length story with Trey in the Gallifrey canon (I don’t count the stories in Gallifrey 6 because I don’t think her personality there is an accurate representation of the actual Romana III—due both to unknowns in the Matrix and Romana II’s deliberate programming), and most of that takes place on Gallifrey, in her position as President, and she really only interacts with Narvin, Ace, and a few other Time Lords. We don’t get to see her having adventures, being thrown new situations to deal with, being faced with intensely tough character-determining decisions or moments of life-or-death peril. We don’t know much about her Presidential decisions—she continues to work for a more inclusive Gallifrey and seems to be Ace’s champion as she heads towards becoming a fully-fledged CIA operative and the human equivalent of a Time Lord. But in her daily interactions with other politicians and allies and rivals and enemies? There’s so very little.

I’m actually totally fine with Trey never becoming the next Romana in the current Gallifrey timeline. If Romana never regenerates, or if she does, and the next incarnation is a completely different person than Trey was. (I’d personally love to see an incarnation based Romana’s fourth self who appears for one brief scene in the end of one novel.) But the fact remains that the character does exist, even if only in an aborted timeline, and I desperately wish we got to know her better. As it stands, I’m actually pretty neutral on how I feel about her. I actively disliked her when she appeared in earlier seasons of Gallifrey, until the truth of what she was there was revealed. Then I was intrigued to learn more about her in Intervention Earth, and I remain so now, given how little we actually got to know her in that story. I feel like I could really love her. But as it stands, there’s so little content that I feel like I can’t get a solid grasp on the character or my opinions on her, and I want to know her better. 

#big finish gallifrey #gallifrey intervention earth #trey romana #braxiatel #leela #romana iii #narvin #gurt says stuff #gurt is off on her gallifrey nonsense again #lots of words #this is. A Lot. #I apologize 😅 #I just got started thinking about this today and figured I’d share my thoughts to see if anyone else agreed with them #and all this happened 😅 #ive read some really good fic with Trey that I enjoyed a lot #i just wish there was more canon content with her #and ftr if this wasn’t clear from all that ^ #i do consider Trey in the audios to be a different person than Romana III in the novels #i know they’re more or less supposed to be the same general character #and both are the third incarnation of Romana #but from what I know #shes written very differently in the novels to how she is in the audios #and seeing as how the two canons don’t reconcile especially well #its easier for me to consider them two completely separate alternate versions of Romana II (at least until unequivocally told otherwise) #tbh there’s a part of me that really wants to try cosplaying Trey #i might actually do it sometime #the occasions that I actually want to cosplay female characters are v rare so when I do actually have the desire to do so #its really gotta be something special XD

[hahanoiwont]

1. What kind of relationship does WT Frisk have with Nightmare & co? Is it family-like or is it friendship-like? Does WT Frisk get along with all the bad sanses?

2. What if WT Frisk met Ink and Dream first? What would their relationship with Frisk be like?

3. I know that in your fanfic Whither then, Frisk has some kinda nonchalant attitude about dying again and again. What kinda of reactions would the skeleton bros have when finding out that Frisk has died so many times to point of Frisk becoming numb to dying?

4. I know I’m asking a lot of questions, so sorry about. But I love your fanfics and they make me happy and sad when reading them. If Frisk agreed with Red to stay immortal and stop aging, would all the multiverse sanses and Papyruses be happy about that?

Thank you so much for answering my long winded questions. 😆

oh no this was buried in my askbox, I am sorry for losing it for so long! So without further ado:

1. Does WT Frisk get along with all the bad sanses?

Yeah! I'd say in the bad sanses au (mostly readable here) Frisk gets on well with mostly everyone--those of them with specifically Frisk/Chara-related trauma might take a while to adjust, but most of them have already met Frisk before they even get to Nightmare's place. This is after Frisk and Dust have been traveling together for a while, so of course they get along. They actually have to work more on the idea of being separated sometimes, when Dust goes on missions and Frisk isn't constantly with him. They've been traveling together for several universes, and while Frisk is an independent kid, Dust has been about 3 feet from them, max, for much of that time. Mostly because he doesn't actually have any means of traveling through the multiverse himself, besides just catching on Frisk's shoulder as they go. If they'd happened to go and leave him behind, he'd be stranded. Thus, the two of them were more or less attached at the hip, especially towards the end of any given run. I think that habit would be hard to break, even when they're rooming with several new people and Dust has a sorta-kinda real job.

Likely, this starts out with Frisk just hanging out with Horror, and Dust coming with them as a matter of course while they do things he's not particularly interested in. So, Dust and Horror reach a comfortable mutual tolerance fairly quickly, mostly because Dust is apathetic and Horror is busy enjoying the reunion. But I imagine the first mission they go on is a whole stressfest for everyone involved, given Horror's abandonment issues, Frisk's abandonment issues, and Dust's discomfort with addressing social situations without Frisk to run interference. So, that would be a Time.

2. What if WT Frisk met Ink and Dream first?

Hmm. Let's say it's maybe a sort of Outertale situation, where Ink and Dream happen to be in a world that they're monitoring for Shenanigans when, lo and behold, a Shenanigan drops in their laps!

This is never covered in Outertale bc Comet doesn't know about it, but the general outcode community deals with people not being where they belong by trying to find some place they can belong in. Being as it's pretty unsustainable to try sending Frisk back to UF, they'd likely try to set them up with an AU that's expressly for homeless universe-wanderers. That way, Frisk isn't wandering through AUs that aren't supposed to have an outcode presence in them, and there's a minimum of interference. So...I think that lands Frisk in some place like the omega timeline, or haventale?

I think somewhere like that would be pretty good for them, actually--they're surrounded by people who have all also lost their homes, and loved ones, and who are also trying to build a new life after all of that. Somehow, I see them making friends with a post-genocide version of one of the swap bros? Or. actually. Disbelief!Papyrus. To my understanding that's Classic Papyrus as the survivor of a genocide run in which Sans was killed before the Judgement Hall, so Papyrus is the one to wait in the Hall and confront the human for murdering his brother. I think that Papyrus would have a lot to say about Sans as a flawed but beloved individual who is now gone forever, which Frisk would be able to empathize with after their experience with Red. I think after some initial wariness, they could be dear friends to one another.

3. What kinda of reactions would the skeleton bros have when finding out that Frisk has died so many times to point of Frisk becoming numb to dying?

Well! Not best pleased, of course--learning that a loved one has died, even if they're back to being alive now, can't be easy. Of course, the Sanses generally know, or suspect--Red absolutely knows they've died, and has some specific deaths that he deduced in fairly accurate detail from Frisk's reactions and his own nightmares/deja vu moments. Ironically, he also has some nightmares about deaths that didn't happen, and assumes that those are also real. Blue, if you recall, thought he'd killed them in a past genocide run; Black and Slim were both aware of the possibility that they could time travel but ultimately dismissed their suspicions when Frisk proved to be able to REFUSE instead. US!Papyrus has learned that they can time travel and has done his best to take it in stride, but has avoided thinking too hard about the implications of that. Shy was also intellectually aware of the possibility, but he decided he didn't want to know.

However, in terms of new information, I think Fell would take it the hardest. He would see it as an absolutely crushing failure--not only did he not keep them safe from their own brother, he didn't keep them safe at all. He would seriously start to question whether he's of any use to them at all--which, given his ideas about attachment, would lead him to feel he doesn't have a place in their life. He would definitely take it personally that they died so much when he was purportedly protecting them.

I think his ultimate decision, reached without discussing the matter with anyone else, would be that he's Definitely Failed as a brother, both to Red and to Frisk, and he's just not capable of keeping anyone safe. Clearly he is simply not meant to experience love. He can save his world from itself but he can never keep a single person from suffering. I think at this point US!Papyrus would step in, because clearly someone has to, and remind Fell that he's still extremely violent and paranoid. If it came down to a duel to the death to keep their respective siblings safe, Fell would win by a landslide. This would actually make Fell feel better. Surely, if US!Papyrus is worthy of love despite being totally unable to kill a dozen people in an afternoon, Fell must be fine. He will just do Better from now on. No One Will Ever Die Again. Which is good, considering that murder is illegal now due to Fell's extensive efforts.

4. If Frisk agreed with Red to stay immortal and stop aging, would all the multiverse sanses and Papyruses be happy about that?

Well, I think that depends on exactly how they come to be immortal...I think the easy answer would be to absorb a boss monster's soul, since boss monsters don't naturally age, and go from there. Which would be an unpopular plan, generally. Especially since Frisk is quite young currently, and not at immediate risk of dying, barring unusual circumstances. It would just seem like a drastic move for a time that's so far away.

I think it would also depend on Frisk's attitude on it--if it's something that they're relieved about, or something they were pushed into, or even something they approached Red about in the first place.

Exceptions exist--Red would be both smug (he did a Good Thing. no one else even thought of it but he did) and quietly relieved; Fell would disapprove of Red being a bad influence on Frisk if the method were particularly violent but would notably not obstruct the process and not let anyone else stop it, either; Slim would be all for as long as Frisk was alright with it; and Black would insist that it's their choice and his approval or disapproval isn't what's important here. Though he would be likely to corner Red later and convey his gratitude through terrifying and questionable means.

Sfrisks would think that all of these people are insane.

Hoo boy this got long, but,, thank you for sending in these asks! I love answering these questions, even if it takes me a while to actually get to the answering bit. I appreciate it!

#whither then fic #should i be putting the bad sanses au on ao3?? #i mean i'm not gonna write it into prose anytime soon #so it would be weirdly formatted #eh worries for tomorrow me #hope everyone is having a good night!

[otherworldly-healer]

Raine sat down at her office desk warily examining the envelope that held her name on it. She had placed it there earlier after checking the mailbox. Taking a shower and getting into clean clothes after trekking through the forest all day was a more pressing matter. Then dinner, lesson plans, and a few chores stole her attention. After everyone else had returned to their rooms for the night she finally got around to investigating the letter. 

She noted it didn’t have a return address. It was rare if ever that she got mail that wasn’t some sort of advertisement for a business or an announcement of activities at the University or other community hub. Most correspondence was much easier on the telephone or meeting in person, so whatever it was it must have been formal. She unfolded her reading glasses and turned on the lamp to begin reading.

Professor Raine Sage,

I've been told I'm better at expressing myself in written word than spoken, and I'm inclined to agree. Even so, I'm not looking forward to writing this; I haven't written a letter in some years, and our relationship is complicated enough in normal circumstances.

I'm writing several letters now as a contingency. In the event I should disappear from the island before I find the courage to say these things aloud, I've given instructions for them to be delivered. If you're reading this, then I am no longer in Spirale. I suppose it's possible that you're reading this letter while I'm still here, but as I've entrusted these letters to one of my dearest and most reliable friends, I won't bother entertaining the thought.

A part of me is grateful that I won't have to deal with the fallout when these letters are first opened. For that, and for everything, I am sorry. On the other hand, it's entirely possible that I will return tomorrow and have to face the immediate consequences. But there's no way to predict what will happen, and I'd rather have those difficult conversations than leave, potentially for good, without a word.

Out of all of Spirale's victims from our world, I chose to write to you because I trust you are the most capable of understanding my intentions.

In my wake, I've left a path of devastation almost as wide as Yggdrasill's. I can't excuse the things I have done, nor would I want to; to try would be an insult to every life sacrificed, and despite what you may think of me, I cannot accept such callousness.

And yet, I must try to convince myself that there is a way to atone - that I am not irredeemable. I must believe that I can make a difference. It's naive - childish, even - but if I consider my current actions as useless, what hope can I have to actually make a change?

If I can't undo the past, I will do what I can to better the future. That is what I believe. It has taken me six years since my arrival to put it into words, but I believe I have felt that way deep down for a long time.

Unfortunately, I won't be able to act on that belief in Spirale, at least for some time. And that brings me to the point of this letter: I want you to remind me of this.

When people leave and return, their memories are sometimes altered or erased. I believe it due to the nature of the differing timelines between the island and its targeted worlds, but that's all I can say. Ironically, I can't remember if I ever told you this. It's a very real possibility that, should I return at all, I will not remember any of the experiences here that have shaped me.

I can remember who I was when I first arrived. The thought of being like that again scares me.

That isn't to say I expect you to restore my memories, nor do I expect you to try. If I do return as the bitter, apathetic person I was before, I doubt you would be able to convince me anyway. I simply ask that you tell me what I have said here - that no matter how hopeless it must seem, I must try.

I won't burden you with any other messages, though you are free to tell the others what I've written here. I pray that we get the chance to meet again, even if it is while I am someone else.

Take care, Yuan Ka-Fai

She had to reread the contents a few times before fully processing what was written. Even then she felt a rush of conflicting emotion that she couldn’t quite describe. He was really gone? Just like that?

She couldn’t understand him. He would write to her because he felt she was the most responsible one? He didn’t say that he trusted her personally, just that he trusted that she could understand his intentions. It made some sense, admittedly, rather than burdening one of the younger members of the group. Still, she couldn’t help but feel weighed down by this task that he had given her. To always have to be the mature voice, to be composed and weigh all perspectives, felt a bit unfair. Yet she had never been one to ever vocalize that she was being overwhelmed. Yuan and her weren’t close. Would this task not be better served to someone else? Was she just a last-case scenario, in case others had disappeared as well? Surely that must be all.

She had had little reason to keep checking her phone during these eclipses. Ever since Genis had arrived, she had little reason to keep obsessing over who had come and gone from this island. And while she felt a stinging loneliness when Colette and a melancholy when Six had disappeared, they had come back the same people. In her experience it seemed to happen more often than not. She knew from prior conversations with Yuan himself that it was possible for people to come here differently—Mithos had once been from four thousand years ago, and many of her companions such as Sheena had come from different times in their Journey. 

Of course it was possible. But she didn’t want to think about it. If she allowed herself to, that bubble of optimism that she’d been trying to build would surely burst again-- as fragile as it already was. She wanted to enjoy her time here to just be herself. She wanted to have a home and not have to be a historical figure, a leader for her race. Despite setbacks she was happy here; at times more content than she had ever been in her entire life. But time and time again the reality of this place threatened to take that all away. How long would it be before someone she was closer with would be spirited away back to their home plane? What if they came back, but had no recollection of ever meeting her? 

No. No. No. I’m so damn tired of starting over! That’s all my life has been! Hit a dead end, regroup, turn on my heel, and set off again. Pretend that it doesn’t hurt. Pretend that it is inevitable. Right when I’d been foolish enough to begin to feel comfortable in this city.

Yuan had done it again. What a frustratingly cowardly man. Even going so far as to say he’d be glad that he wasn’t there to deal with the fallout of the letters. He would speak with her briefly and leave her with some worrying information while having no answers for what to do with said information. No plan of action. Just a looming threat to be wary of. Raine could feel anger welling up as she ran her hand through her bangs. Her fist pounded the table, rattling the cup set next to her on a coaster. 

Of course after four thousand years he had never had answers before, why should she expect it to be any different now? A man of inaction. Indifference. And yet he still insisted that he had changed. Waver had insisted that his past didn’t matter in this place, but she couldn’t agree. Experiences and memories formed who people were. Yuan had admitted to his mistakes but she hadn’t known him well enough to tell if he had really devoted himself to changing. Besides her, how many of her companions had he approached and expressed his desire to atone? To build that better future?

She still had so much to say to him. So much to ask him. She hadn’t had enough time. As infuriating as it was, Yuan had been incredibly helpful with acclimating herself to the city. He was a straightforward voice that helped dispel confusion. She wanted to understand him better, but to the professor it felt like he was always trying to hide from her and the rest. Complicated was right. She had respect for him. She hated his guts. They shared more commonalities as half-elves that she cared to admit. Raine could never forgive how he hardened his heart to overlook the damage he caused through negligence. How turning into an angel had tainted him and his view of mortals as expendable. She was conflicted. In another time and place, she could have even seen them as friends with their common interests. It was just too hard to divorce him from his past actions in her mind. Not completely.

Yet…she had to admit there was a heart there somewhere deep down. She’d seen it, briefly, on more than one occasion. The one time that Yuan had let a glimmer of his emotions show. That one argument they had at the club. He was desperate to make amends. He repeated that wish here in the letter. To acknowledge how much of a hand he had in perpetuating the cycle of violence and hatred in Aselia. Even if those things could not be forgiven, at least he was not running from them. That alone proved that he had changed. 

She didn’t want to believe that it was too late for anyone. 

She needed to have hope that people could change if they wanted to. 

She refused to ever let go of that plea.

In her eyes he wasn’t irredeemable. However, she couldn’t shake the feeling that he was still too scared to actually face any of them. Meetings were always sporadic, and they had spent a fair share of their time working in the same place avoiding one another. She’d said it time and again…adults were troublesome creatures, stubborn and often stuck in their ways. Deeply complex and entangled in their own doubts and fears. Her included. She had to have compassion for that.

“You better believe that I will hold you to that, Yuan,” she whispered. Raine let the letter rest on her desk, pinching the bridge of her nose. Her eyes stung as if forcing back tears.

No, I refuse to be upset by this!

...though it was much too late.

 The half-elf closed her eyes and took a deep breath, leaning back in her chair and staring at the ceiling. Her hands curled around the sides of the letter, causing the page to wrinkle. “To write me of all people a last message. What are you thinking? It sounds almost like a will.” She reached over to her phone to check the contact list and…sure enough, Yuan’s name had vanished.

“If you come back with all of your memories intact, you’ll truly be sorry.” She folded the letter back into its envelope and took her glasses off. 

“Whatever happens next, don’t ever stop trying. You’ve gotten too far to give up now.” But she was merely talking to herself. Her words would no longer reach him. Hopefully someday in the future she would have the opportunity to say that to his face.

#stormswake #wow pain!

[inkandpen22]

Time is Irrelevant (5/?):

Pairing: Eleventh Doctor x reader 

Warnings: None

Word Count: 3.8k

Part Summary: Y/N and The Doctor arrive in their new destination, Philadelphia, 1778

Masterlist

When I open my eyes, my head is pounding, the feeling is all too familiar. My body rolls over and I feel the plush grass beneath me. A warm gust of airbrushes over me like a silky blanket. It’s warm on my face, the season must be summer or late spring. I hear someone moving about around me over old leaves and sticks. My eyes fly open and I swing legs to rock over whomever is walking around. I watch as The Doctor falls onto the grass with me. 

“Ouch!” He hisses, “what was that for?”

He rubs his tailbone like a pansy. I hardly knocked him down that hard, he’s being melodramatic.

“You couldn’t give me a warning before we poofed?!” I bark at him, rising to my feet, a tad wobbly. My head is still rattled.

“We couldn’t be seen!” He argues.“Besides, what difference would it make? You’d end up here anyway!” 

He stands and brushes off the leaves and dirt from his outfit. “Put these on,” he tosses a pile of clothes at me. 

I peer down and it appears to be corset and colonial dress, yet again. “Well don’t I get some privacy?” 

“Oh! Yes! Right!” The Doctor nervously turns his back to me. 

I huff, building up the energy to get ready. “I must say, I much prefer this attire over the French. At least I don’t have to wear a pannier skirt. That thing was dreadful! I can tolerate these heels for a decent color.”

Doctor finds humor in my bitter complaints. “My apologizes, they don’t have your usual sneakers in the 18th century.” 

“Where are we anyway?” I ask him as I spin in a circle to scan our surroundings. There’s simply woods for as far as the eye can see. A woods is just a woods to me, no matter the year.

“Just outside Philadelphia, June 5th, 1778.”

“Yes, thank God,” I release a sigh of relief. “Finally on American soil again! Well, soon to be America.”

Pondering over the information, location, and date, I narrow down the possible reasons we would need to land in Philadelphia during the American Revolution.

Especially, so early in the war. Then, it hits me. The lightbulb above my head switches on. It’s clear as the day. I squeal once I realize the answer. and Doctor is at a loss.

“Philadelphia! In June!” I jump up and down.

The Doctor nods his head slowly, still facing the opposite direction. “Yes… we are… why? What’s so significant about Philadelphia?”

I continue my celebration as I bop about like Tigger. “It’s Valley Forge! Hello!”

I finish getting ready and making sure everything is in its place. “Okay, all set!” 

The Doctor spins on his heels to face me and clasps his hands together. “Yes! Excellent!” He gestures toward a direction, I assume toward town. “This way to the road,” he explains.

We begin our hike. I first kick off my heels, can’t walk through mud in heels. The doctor does the same, one flaw of the colonial era, constant heels. There are many more but that one is the current dilemma. We come to a path after what seems like forever and Doctor appears to know exactly where we’re headed.

“Washington’s Army is at Washington’s home until the end of the month. They stayed there for the winter as headquarters. However, the conditions were terrible! About 2,000 men died this past winter.” I break the silence.

There’s a comfortable pause that falls between us. I can tell without having to look that the wheels in his head are turning.

His brows scrunch, together. “We’re in 1778 colonial America to visit a sad military campsite? Why would we need to come here?” 

I stifle my laughter. “No, no, it’s more than that! The Continental Army has just formed an alliance with France in May. This is a huge win for them! Marquis de Lafayette, a French officer, is a huge asset to Washington. If it weren’t the Franco-American alliance, the colonies would’ve lost the war. It’s a pivotal few months for the revolution,” I enthusiastically describe. “They just had major victories and this past winter has thus far been their greatest defeat. Of course, from the ashes rises a greater and stronger army. The suffering motivates the men more to fight for their independence.”

I glance over at Doctor and he expresses an admiring gaze with a grin. I cower out of shyness, warmth coats my cheeks.

“What?” I inquire, “what is it?”

He shakes his head, grinning wider “nothing, just looking.”

I direct my attention ahead but I can feel his stare blasting into my side. My cheeks only redden more under his stare. I’m not into him or anything, I just despise being the center of attention. Promise.

We continue down the path toward the city, the sun is beginning to set the breeze is becoming a bit nippy. The Doctor shakes to remove his coat and places it over my shoulders. He rubs his palms up and down my arms to warm me up.

“Thank you,” I say, wrapping the coat around me.

“No problem,” he assures me as he keeps an arm around me to radiate some warmth. I lean into his side, embracing the natural heat he gives off.

“I… I… I’m sorry about what happened in France,” he manages to get out. “I’m not entirely sure what occurred between you and the King but I’m sorry that you two didn’t have any time to say goodbye.”

I remain quiet, listening to he speak and feeling his chest vibrate as he does.

“I did read the book on the French Revolution, by the way. I read about what happens to King Louis and all of them. I understand why it was so hard for you to let go considering the circumstances. The most important thing to remember while we travel Y/N is we can’t fix history. Things happen for a reason and we can’t change that… will you be okay?”

Bringing in the crisp winter air, I hum. “I understand the importance of maintaining the timeline. I feel sorry for Louis but as you said, things happen for a reason and we can’t change that. What happened between Louis and I was merely an understanding for one another. If my time was 1778, he and I would’ve had a great friendship but the universe doesn’t work in our favor. We can’t manipulate time so there’s no point discussing the topic any further.” I declare, finding it too hard to speak of it.

I could have saved a life and walk away. I could save all of them and I did nothing. The doctor can tell me repeatedly that none of what will or has happened will be my fault but the guilt will never disappear. I rest my head on his shoulder and he rests his over mine. I glance up at the sky, the sun is fully set and the stars make their first appearance. When I look up at the stars, I see and think of only him.

“When he shall die, Take him and cut him out in little stars. And he will make the face of heaven so fine That all the world will be in love with night And pay no worship to the garish sun,” I whisper Shakespeare into the air.

The doctor rubs his hand up and down my back “what was that?”

“Nothing,” I reply simply and admire the stars for their beauty.

We went further back in time but there isn’t a doubt in my mind that Louis looked at the stars. He may not know it yet but someday looking up at the stars will have a meaning.

An hour later and we’re sat in a tavern that smells of stale beer, burning wood in the fireplace, tobacco, and unshowered men. The owner's wife slams the mugs of beer on our table and some spills over-explain the stickiness. I must seem uncomfortable because The Doctor laughs at me.

“You stand out when you do that,” he waves his finger at me.

“What do you mean?” I question defensively. 

“You're as stiff as a board! Relax a little,” he rolls his shoulders to demonstrate. 

I huff, finding the task impossible. “How do you like it here? It’s unsanitary and has a hundred different smells!”

He chugs half of his beer to finish it.  “I’ve been in worse holes in the wall. Be thankful that the floor is actually a floor and not dirt. Also that the beer is semi-decent and not sour wine.”

Taking in my surroundings, I notice the owner going through a back door leading out to an alleyway. He rolls in a new barrel of this liquid bread. In the distance, church bells signal the clock striking the hour. I steal a sip from my mug and it makes Natural Light taste high-end.

“I need to go.” The Doctor tosses back the remainder of his drink and pushes back his chair.

“Wait, what? You’re leaving?! To go where?!” I hate it when he does this! It’s like leaving me in a foreign country and I can’t speak the language. 

He waves the owner’s wife to our table. “Yes, I need to gather a few things. Stay here!” He orders, strangely searching the tavern frantically.

“So basically you’re going to steal again? Is that what all our so-called “trips” are about, you stealing historical artifacts? If so, I’ll have nothing to do with it! You’re always preaching about not altering history yet here you are doing just that!”

He rolls his eyes as the owner’s wife comes up to our table with some pitchers of ale.

“What can I getcha?” Her thick Scottish accent catches my attention more than her question. The doctor ignores her and addresses me again.

“Stay here, don’t go anywhere and do anything reckless like last time,” he demands, referring to my close encounter with Louis. He heads to the door of the dim-lit tavern, ready to leave me alone with a swarm of men. He stops to look over his shoulder before departing.

“And no,” he says with a melancholy expression, “that’s not what this is all about.”

In a blink of an eye, he disappears into the night to who knows where. Disapproving of his behavior but unable to do much about it, I simply chug the rest of my nasty beer. Slamming it down onto the table, I order another from the woman.

“Coming right up Miss.” She goes back to the bar to fill her pitchers.

The time alone is rare. I suppose I should be thankful. I’ve been gone for nearly a week now. I wonder how my family and friends must be feeling. I fell off the face of the earth practically. Granted, I could simply go back to when I was with Doctor at dinner and all would be as though nothing happened. What if I’m gone for a year? What if I went for longer, so long that’ll look older? How would I explain that? Then there’s the idea of altering history. What if my very presence in this tavern is changing something? For all I know, the smallest actions I make could change the course of time.

“Here ya are,” the woman slides me my new drink.

I thank her, expressing a faint smile. As she walks off, my attention is stolen by two men seated at a small table in the corner. One, the older, is an average man based on his appearance. The other, however, is a colonial officer. They’re huddled over the table, whispering to each other rather harshly. I lean forward slowly, attempting to eavesdrop on what’s so crucial for them to be so serious.

“You need to be more careful!” The older man warns. “These are dark times and you’re playing with fire!”

“It’s all under control!” The officer argues, “Washington has it under control. You’d be fine! So will I! We all will be! You need to trust-”

The older man slams his hand on the table. His face becomes red with rage.

“Ben, listen to me! Half the men have already been arrested from that idiotic riot last week! It was a mere two years ago the poor Hale lad got himself hanged! We must remain in the shadows!”

The two men are interrupted by the owner’s wife filling their mugs. Suddenly, the door to the tavern swings open and slams to the wall with a bang. The people in the room went dead quiet, watching as the men march in. Five redcoats total emerge with their heads held high. ‘Egotistical and empathetic lobsterbacks’ as some American history texts describes them.

The circus leader announces to the colonists in the tavern. “We’re looking for a man who goes by the name John Bolton!”

Who? I peer around the room. Waiting for one of these guys to drunkenly raise their hand and turn themselves over. The moment never comes. Instead, I notice the two men exchange hushed words. The officer appears frazzled but not obviously. He has this anxious look about it but then again I would too if I was an officer of the Continental Army and a bunch of red coats just strolled in. Yet, something is telling me that something is going on here. If I can prevent a fight, arrest, or anything relating to the officer I’ll do it, why? Because for all I know that officer could be someone worth protecting.

“He isn’t here!”  

Before I have the chance to process what I blurted out, I already have the entire tavern staring me down. At some point I must’ve blacked out because I’m standing up, when did that happen? My first thought is Doctor is going to kill me for getting involved.

“He left about an hour ago,” I add to sound more convincing though my voice is a tad shaky. “He likes spending time by the docks, perhaps you could find him there.”

The leader of the pack closes in on me as I maintain the fakest smile. He examines my face, deciphering my authenticity. I swallow hard, the last thing I want is to see the inside of an 18th-century prison cell.

“Describe the man, so that we can identify him,” he requests. 

The man hardly any space between us. It’s now that I regret my irrational action of intervening. I only hope that officer is worth covering for. I glance behind the red coat toward the duo in the corner. The officer has his focus locked on me. His eyes are narrow, studying me intensely. That’s when it hits me. John Bolton, that’s the alias Ben Tallmadge used during the war. The officer is Major Ben Tallmadge, at least I hope it is and I didn’t just imprison myself. If it is, he’s without a doubt worth saving.

“Light, seashell, gold hair,” I lie to the Englishman before me. “He’s thin, a stick really, and has very little muscle. I would go as far as to call him scrawny. As for height, he’s rather short. I would say around 5’4”.”

Every piece of description I give is the opposite of the real Ben. I guess I pass the soldier’s test of trust because he doesn’t question me further.

“Let’s go gentlemen!” He commands, stepping toward the door with his men following on his coat tail.

I can finally breathe again, falling into my chair with a sigh of relief. My lying to the soldier could’ve ended in the worst possible outcome. I definitely dodged a bullet. Strong fingers wrap around my forearm and I’m dragged over to a dark corner in the back of the tavern. I’m forced against the wall and am tossed about like a rag doll. I’m about to be interrogated, yet again. Twice in one night, that’s a lot for someone who’s never been interrogated before. I brush down my skirt and my eyes are met with Ben Tallmadge himself.

“Who are you?!” He barks.

Similar to the red coat, he invades my space to intimidate me. I suppose if I was a woman of this era it would but being from the 21st century it’ll take a lot more than a few growls. Usually, these men’s barks are worse than their bites. Nevertheless, I raise my eyebrows, I send him a look of warning. If we’re going to communicate he needs to calm down.

“I’m the friend,” I reply bitterly calmly. “I take it a simple ‘thank you’ is too much to ask?”

My sass takes him by surprise. I’m not shaken by his macho-man persona, shocker. He visibly settles and takes a step back. Whether he believes me or not, I’m not entirely sure. Either way, perhaps now we can have a civil conversation that doesn’t involve so much grabbing, dragging, and growling.

“Thank you,” he stammers, “uh Miss…”

A name, I need a last name. Quick Y/N, think of a name!

“Reynolds,” I rush out.

Seriously! I come up with Reynolds. Oh well, it’ll have to do. Hamilton doesn’t meet Maria Reynolds for another four years so there shouldn’t be any coincidences but I’m still hitting too close to home.

“Miss Reynolds…” Ben repeats slyly. “Is that your real name or are you a spy for good ole Georgie across the pond?”

The hint of space that he once granted me slips from me again. He presses me harder into the wall, not taking any chances for me to escape. I huff, offended by his accusation and for his lack of courtesy.

“I am no such thing, Sir!” I hiss at him. “When I say I’m a friend, I’m a friend!”

I hear the door to the tavern hit the wall again as it’s swung open. Once the red coats don’t find a little blonde man by the docks they’ll likely come back. I have to get Ben out of here before then.

“We’ve wasted enough time as it is, you need to get out of here!” I warn him, urging him to go as I press my palm to his chest. “Otherwise, the soldiers will come back looking for you!”

Ben grabs my wrist and removes my hand from him but keeps hold of it. I struggle to yank it free but it’s no use, he’s too strong.

“Why are you helping me?” He questions, furrowing his brows.

This man is impossible. Though, I can’t blame him for being paranoid. Trust runs thin these days.

“Let’s just say we believe in the same cause,” I reply swiftly, growing aggravated by his lack of ability to see my honesty as truth.

He’s a wanted man and he’s drinking out in a tavern filled with people, not quite a genius. Why isn’t he at Valley Forge with the others? He should be with Washington, not here. My answer doesn’t seem to satisfy his curiosity.

“Who do you work for?”

“No one!” I shoot down the idea, practically pushing him toward the door with my free hand.

He then takes my free hand as well, restricting me completely.

“Then how do you know so much? Why are you risking your freedom by giving me aid? What do you gain?”

His tone is less fierce, more worrisome. He’s stuck between a rock and a hard place naturally. Should he trust me? Should he take the word of a stranger when it feels as though the world is against him? His grip on my wrists softens slightly and I take the opportunity to free myself.

“You sure ask a lot of questions,” I tease, snickering lightly.

Abruptly, the door to the tavern is kicked in causing gasps to fall across the building. The same five soldiers enter with more men, fuming more than fifteen minutes ago. Ben whips around to see what all the commotion is about. I could run now. I don’t know why I’m not exactly. I suppose it’s because I won’t leave with him. I have to make sure Ben gets out alive.

The leader yells at the top of his lungs, “where are Bolton and that woman?!”

In a swift motion, I grab Ben’s hand. He peers down at me but I keep a close eye on the soldiers behind him.

“There’s a door over there,” I inform him. It’s the same door Doctor left from. “If we step back slowly without much noise, they won’t notice us.”

He nods, joining me in walking back to the exit. I’ll have to part from him soon. Once we’re out of the tavern we must go our separate ways because the red coats know my face. For all, they know John Bolton could be anyone. My presence puts Ben in more danger. However, I can’t allow them to get Ben either. If they do, who knows what may happen. My distracting thoughts are interrupted by shouting.

“She’s over there! Right here!” A soldier shouts as he points in our direction.

All of their heads snap to us and I decide we better start running.

“Time to go!” I tug on his arm and he sprints to the door.

“Get them!” The leader commands and the tavern breaks out into utter chaos.

Ben frees the door and a breeze of warm June air slaps me in the face. We run down the stone alley together, hand in hand. I don’t recommend running in heels altogether, let alone on an uneven cobblestone road. Ben turns the corner and guides me down the sidewalk toward the center of town.

“I have a horse a just down this way! We’ll have to hurry!”

We weave between people, trying to stay out of sight and get to point B as soon as possible.

“This way!” A voice shouts from up the road and a clump of jogging redcoat with muskets approaches us.

Ben cuts around the corner into an unlit alley and blocks me against the wall. Deep into the darkness, we hide undetected. He positions himself between me and the road to block me from sight.

Soon, marching boots slip by the alley without hesitation. The soldiers must’ve passed us. My chest falls as I release a breath I hadn’t released I was holding.

“Keep your face out of sight. Focus on the ground and I’ll get us out of here,” he promises me in a hushed tone.

I hum, nodding my head frantically. I would be lying if I said I’m not genuinely scared.

He takes my hand before slipping back into the light. He checks the general area for any red coats. When he decides the coast is clear, we run down the road to a horse tied to a post. Ben helps me once he’s secured himself on the animal. Then, we ride off into the night. I have no idea where he’s taking nor do I have any way of telling Doctor where I’m going. All I can do is keep going and stay alive. Hopefully, if I’m lucky, I’ll make it back to the tavern when it’s safe and he’ll be there. 

_______________________________________

Masterlist

#eleventh doctor #eleventh doctor x reader #eleventh doctor x you #doctor x reader #doctor who

[infantbluee]

title: count to eight

summary: in another timeline, maka is killed on the moon and the world descends into madness. five years later, a reclusive soul stumbles across a girl who claims to be his dead best friend. 

pairing: soul/maka

rating: explicit

warnings: angst, smut, canon-typical violence, sort of love triangle (though not really because it’s just between maka and two souls) 

links: ao3 // ffn

—

oh my gosh, this is my second resbang fic ever and i still can’t believe i got so lucky! this year i was paired with the amazing, brilliant, hilarious, and adorable @ochako999 and @maevenneverland who had a full-time job making me laugh-cry over their shenanigans while also making GORGEOUS art for my fic. (links can be found here and here respectively.) please excuse me while i sob over their talent for the next 84 years because they are perfect.  

even more hugs to my ridiculous discord family for keeping me insane, as well as all the other wonderful people i’ve met on tumblr, twitter, and even just by exchanging reviews on fanfics! there’s a reason i’ve been so glad i joined this fandom and it’s because of every single one of you that make it so warm <3

please enjoy the short excerpt below! 

—

It’s surprisingly cold this year.

Soul blows into his hands, rubbing his palms together to retain warmth. Normally he can escape Kid’s annual Christmas party and hide out in the gardens without any sort of penalty, but apparently Mother Nature decided she was bored this holiday season and wanted to take a turn punishing the antisocial hermit.

That, or she’s calling him a coward.

It’s probably that last one.

“Hiding already?” a familiar voice calls. “This must be a record.”

Holding back a grimace, Soul maintains a blank expression as he turns his head to see his girlfriend approach him along the cobblestone path.

She’s too pretty to be real in this setting, surrounded by glazed tree branches and the twinkling lights strung all over to make up for the blackened moon. Wearing a dress like that with her hair so long and loose, she might as well have “serenade me, you coward” plastered all over her forehead.

“Idiot, you’re going to get frostbite,” he scolds instead, already scowling as he shrugs off his suit jacket to drape over her shoulders. “What are you thinking, coming out here without a coat on?”

Maka smiles sweetly. “I was thinking my weapon always takes care of me.”

Stupid. He thinks the word twice, both times so pathetically filled with affection. “Did Kid send you to hunt me down?” he asks. “I swear I was gonna go back inside. Continue wooing those foreign emissaries or whatever the hell he expects me to do. I just needed a break.”

“Nah, it’s fine. It’s Christmas; he doesn’t expect you to spend the whole time working.” Her eyes twinkle. “Besides, I already handled it. The dignitaries love me.”

He snorts. “Of course they do.”

“Hey, one of us has to be doing our jobs right,” she teases.

“Suck-up.”

“I prefer the term eager to please.”

Soul is incredulous. “How the hell did you manage to find the one phrase that’s dirtier than suck-up?”

Her smile is angelic. “It’s a talent.”

He responds with a growl as he nuzzles his face against her skin, his hands sliding under the jacket he covered her with to trace the artfully exposed curves underneath.

“Soul, stop!” she giggles. “We can’t do it out here. It’s cold.”

“So keep me warm then,” he grumbles. “And anyway, is that really the first thing you worry about when I’m trying to cop a feel? Not ‘oh, someone might catch us’ or ‘what if your dick shrunk too much in this weather for me to feel it?’”

This time when she laughs, he hides his own smile against her skin. She doesn’t stop him, letting her head fall back with a sigh as he presses kisses along the base of her neck. Even when it’s this cold, she’s so soft. It’s really unfair. He’s seen her moisturizing routine. She hasn’t done anything to deserve this level of silky perfection.

“Soul,” she gasps when he nips particularly hard at her throat. Her hands grip at his shirt, desperate, and he decides that maybe getting a little dirty on a garden bench wouldn’t be the worst thing after all.

But then the lights flicker.

That in itself wouldn’t have been enough to tear his mouth away from her skin, except that it’s accompanied by a deep tremble beneath the earth which causes Soul to stumble into his meister. She catches him, always so impressively steady on her size-five-hidden-by-giant-boots feet, and the speed at which she goes from horny girlfriend to calculating meister is seriously impressive.

And hot. Really hot.

Soul’s never been as adept at switching off his hunger as she is.

“A pre-kishin attack?” she asks with a frown as they rush back towards the party. It’s been a long time since they’ve encountered a pre-k without actively hunting one, and even longer since one has existed within the walls of their city.

“Maybe a demon,” Soul guesses. They’re also rare these days, but they still exist. Though the Witch Treaty has significantly put a damper on their confidence.

As they approach the mansion, they can already hear a commotion brewing. Plenty of shouts, glass shattering. A horrifying, almost unearthly slithering sound as fluid shadows spill out of the windows like overflowing bath water. They pick up their pace.

When they finally burst into the room, they’re horrified by the sight in front of them.

“Kid!” Maka cries.

The chandelier is history, now scattered around the dancefloor in a million tiny little pieces. The decorations are torn; the tables cracked and thrown about. The civilian guests have all been ushered to the sides of the room as several witches hold up a barrier to keep them safe, but the real terror is the enormous entity in the middle of the room that seems to have no problem fending off the advances of half a dozen meisters.

It’s like nothing Soul’s ever seen before, even during the worst of the war. A giant, oozing ball of shadowy flesh with these sharp, jerking limbs that regenerate and extend from its body whenever someone tries to attack it.

Accompanying it is this smell, putrid and awful—but even worse are the low, chittering moans coming from its repulsive form, over and over and over again, filling the room like a sickening hum.

“Maakaa. Maaaaaaaakaaaa.”

Soul feels his blood run cold.

Kid, who is currently trying to hold back several of its limbs from further attacking the civilian barrier, jerks his head up at her call for him, his face flashing with horror. It’s obvious how long the creature must’ve been moaning her name by the intensity of the reaper’s panic.

“Maka, get back!” he screams.

In the same moment, she gasps as Soul tackles her to the side just in time to avoid getting pierced by a flurry of sword-like limbs. He then rolls and grabs her hand, jerking her to her feet as he starts off in a sprint, squeezing to get her attention. “Maka!”

“R-right!”

He shifts into weapon form just in time for her to swing him in defense. She manages to block two of them, slicing off three more, before being forced to jump back as another wave rushes at her. The monster seems to have forgotten about the others completely now that it has her in its sight, its several dozen eyes turning to train directly on her.

“I don’t understand,” she says as she blocks more of its attacks. “Why does it keep coming for me?”

“Doesn’t matter,” growls Soul. “I’ll die before I let it take you. The only priority now is to kill it.”

“But how?”

“To your left!”

She twists to the side, barely dodging the next stream of violent hands as they scrape off Soul’s blade. But instead of relief, he can feel her horror, because those same regenerative limbs that had just tried to rip into her heart somehow jerk to the side with enough force to shatter one of the barriers protecting the guests.

He hears Angela among the screams.

“Maka, no!” he cries out.

Too late. She flips over one of the creature’s arms to run against it, slicing at the others with a ferocity that would impress him in any other circumstance. At the end of her sprint, Maka dives, pushing Angela out of the way from an attack and twisting in a way that cushions the young girl’s fall.

Through their bond, Soul can feel the pain shoot up Maka’s spine and he cries out for her, demanding to know if she’s hurt.

She forces a smile as she sits up. “I’m fine,” she lies terribly. She glances down at the young witch and looks relieved that she’s unharmed.

Before she can say anything else, she’s yanked away so quickly that Soul is literally whipped from her grip and clatters to the floor. He shifts back to human form in an instant, scrambling for her with a cry, but it’s too late.

The monster has Maka dangling by her ankle over its main form, the rest of its extensions retreating as well. Black Star and Kid both try to charge at it only to be swatted away like flies and held back with the pressure of mutated shadow limbs.

Then it does the worst thing possible.

It drops her.

“NO!” Soul screams.

It’s like a detonator is pressed. The moment Maka’s body is absorbed into its inky flesh, the creature begins to twitch a jerk violently, pulsing and moving so rapidly that even the meisters have no choice but to back up.

With a horrifying screech, it’s sucked into the earth through an invisible exit, like some sort of oversized blob of goo being sucked through a vacuum or forced down a drain. The whole fleshy monstrosity continues to be pulled through that tiny unseen gateway until it has completely disappeared from the ballroom. Gone.

And Maka along with it.

[ read more on ao3 or ffn! ]

#soul eater #soul x maka #soma #soul eater evans #maka albarn #resbang 2019 #chloe writes #this was the most stressful forty-eight hours of my life and i am so glad we made it T___T

[sxvethelastdance]

Sleep When We’re Dead

Fire God Liu Kang/Johnny Cage

Broken Timeline

 A direct sequel/companion piece to I’m on Fire Again by my lovely friend over @puttingfingerstokeys

Do be warned: This here fic is first-person POV and about as artful it gets for someone who embraces the ‘patching half formed thoughts together like it’s going out of fashion’ lifestyle.  

I am me, and not. It is a paradox that would have given me a headache, were I still human. The experience, the being of godhood. It is a conundrum no more solved by this sudden ascension than it is, had I deliberated on it as the Liu Kang of past and present. 

He does not hear me enter the room. Rather, he sees me touch down upon the ground with more grandeur than I’d thought I had any right to after the portal has closed.

Everyone has gone off to battle. War. That is what we must call it, because that is what the circumstances demand of us, sacrifice and retaliation. We are defined by our battles. The ones we win, the ones we lose, and the ones we cannot fight. I know that my friend feels confined by these definitions, forced to watch his daughter go off without him and let go of his love a second time. It burns at him like it burns at me, knowing that I cannot stop what comes next. Only that we must deal in the aftermath.

“Liu... You’re. Holy fu-” I put my finger to his lips and let out a ‘shhh’, noting the questions that fill his face. We must keep it down, lest the late Grandmaster’s students come running. My presence is intentional, but I would rather not deal with the effects of my interference outside of our reunion. He knows that I am here, and somehow… I think he knows that this is my final stop before I join the others. What I hope is left of them when all is said and done. One cannot predict Shang Tsung’s machinations, only the inevitability of his betrayal. 

“I try to keep my promises when I can.” I look into his eyes and I see hurt and a fire that matches mine. I see his incomprehension and interest, and I find that the fire that envelops me is not in the literal. 

“I’m uh. Diggin’ the mop-top.” Or it is, and the cause is Johnny himself. That is more likely. My hands are at his arms, the same way his had been on mine all those years ago. He jokes, something about a “role reversal” and Reptile having been some variation of a “demon scaly” and I laugh. I am not above that, I will never be above that. Nor do I see myself above him outside of the most literal of contexts here. 

I want to make up for lost time, but with so few hours (minutes, moments. They are all one in the same) until my presence is required at the hourglass, I know that I cannot close the wound that I have opened. But there is time. Enough for one a last kiss. Because no matter what happens at the dawn of time, the things that have come to pass under my eye, they cannot stand. 

I do not lie. 

I did not lie. 

I lied.

What else can I do, when faced with enemies who have lied and slaughtered their way through the best of us? Who fight tooth and nail for the undoing, even if it is their own? It is madness, and perhaps that is what is required this time. Madness. 

I think no more on the subject when his lips are on mine, and that phantom flame ignites in my chest. I haven’t seen him in 25 years, and yet I saw him hours ago. Another paradox, another longing. He moves with purpose, as do I. We are both desperate and lonely in our own way. Our paths, crafted as they were by the mad titan were ours to walk. And walk we did until the time where we met again. I wrap my hand in his, still clutching the headband bestowed upon him by my other self, and he presses himself to me as if I’ll dissolve like the sands that dictate our lives. 

“You know the deal, kicky longstockings.” Johnny says, a watery laugh escaping him. I find beauty in it the same way that I find beauty in the creases of his face, the mark of his survival. No longer am I bitter about this, that I died young, no longer do I mourn for the man I never got to be. I have made peace with that, I have let go. I do not let go of him, my other hand squeezing tight enough to deepen the bruises that color him from what I assume are the previous night’s encounters. I know the deal, so I seal his mouth with mine again, and we take what comfort we can from this, my fingers wiping away at what tears have gathered at the corner of his eyes. 

He brushes the hair from my face (what I have left out in my ascension) and I feel sparks, both phantom and real dance upon my skin. The way that Johnny shakes out his hand gives me pause, but he’s having none of that. 

“I’m good, I’m good- Just...Whoa.” 

‘Whoa’ indeed. Fire is natural for me, but Lord Raiden’s gifts… I am unsure of how to describe it. They amplify the powers that I possess, but I am not completely unaware of the nature of these forces combined. This is another thought that loses itself in the hands that had found their way to my chest somewhere along my deliberation, a smirk planted firm on Johnny’s face. I may be a God, but the heat that washes over me is just as I felt it when I was alive. I am alive, death does not feel like this. My hands are hot on his skin, flushed red with delight. He knows what this does to me; and I know what I am going to do about it.

Some things never change.

This makes climbing atop him less an impulse and more an inevitability, though I am mindful of his leg. His current state of undress makes this endeavor a small undertaking, even if he is anything but. And much to my disappointment he has removed his hands from where they are in favor of my pants. Though I cannot stay mad for long with where his hands are. His neck is a sufficient target for my frustrations. 

We try to take our time, but I have mourned him once and he has mourned me twice, all to prepare himself for the unanticipated third time around. I cannot help the way my hands pull him to me anymore than he can help the way that his fingernails dig into my shoulder blades, welts in their wake. Sinking into him ignites a flame that not even my hottest strikes can compare to, and kissing him is just as I remember it. Better in some ways, even. The value of time comes full circle here, and it makes my heart beat without mercy. I know he feels the same, if not for the rapid-fire teasing, then for the hitch of his breath when I bear down upon him.

“Still have it in you, old timer?” He breathes deep through his nose, sweat gathering on his skin. It’s more tantalizing than it has any right to be. But what is Johnny, if not someone known to break the rules of what he can and cannot have. 

“If the ‘it’ is you, then sure thing, turbo.” He grins fiercely, and we are at odds again. If there’s anything else to be said here, it is that Johnny Cage has a talent for pushing just where he needs to for what he wants. I can also say that i shamelessly rise to the task, teeth and tongue to put that mouth to rest. 

One of the most fearsome aspects of godhood is the idea that I could go on for what would be eternity to a human. There is a satisfying ache in my bones, but I feel no real exhaustion, tangled up in him. His scent, that insatiable wit, the sunglasses that catch what little light that enters the room, characterized by their lack of presence on his face. It’s strange to see the man without them. But I find that I do not mind, having spent more time than I could ever bring myself to admit peering behind them. Putting together the pieces of a man with a deceptive wit and a need to be understood for more than an image. A well-crafted one, but an image nonetheless. 

This realization does not ‘hit’ me so much as it spreads. In my heart, in my lungs, in my veins. I see someone I understand. Someone I never had the chance to fully know, but someone I understand. That is what makes it so hard to part from him. Unlike my other self, it is daylight, and I cannot spare him the pain of watching me go. I can tell him that he has done well, that I am proud, and he can scold me for being so formal, something so uniquely Johnny to say. The air is tense, and I know what I must do. We both know  that it’s time.

I had moved to open the portal when he stopped me, resistance keeping me from slipping forward through the time stream. He hasn’t let go of my hand. Nor I of his. 

It seems we are both having trouble here. 

“Liu?” 

“Yes, Johnny?” He looked at me with a fondness that dissolved my tension and I squeezed his hand, my heart beating. 

“Kick the old lizard’s ass for me. Maybe slap baldy on the dome if she’s still up and tickin.” There’s humor in his voice, but I am aware of what this communicates. He is saying “do not forget me.” And how could I ever do such a thing? Johnny Cage is unlike any man I have met, and for this I feel that the blessing was not the gifts which bring me above my mortality, but the chance to meet someone so bright and blinding. There is much room in my heart for him, I have missed him and I cannot find the words to tell him this, I wish I could. But I cannot. I can, however, bring his hand to my lips. His eyes, blue as the dawn of time (I have seen it, felt it. I know now.) are wide. He hadn’t expected that. But even I am known to have the element of surprise every now and again.

“I will tell them who it’s from.” And then we are laughing again. I cannot help but pull him into another kiss. There’s a certain delight in the way his stubble, what little of it there is, scratches my cheeks. This feels less like goodbye, and more like “until we meet again.”

In another time and place, I know that we will. 

#Caged Heat #Liu Kang #Johnny Cage #Aged heat #Dance Break! #ficlets #( Will come up with a fic tag at a later date ) #( Better bring your cobs cause there's some corn up in this shit #my fics

[rhodanum]

COVID-19 roller-coaster

Despite its personal nature, I'm making this entry public, since it may be of aid to others as well, in these circumstances. Particularly for people who might end up having highly atypical symptoms like I did.

Long story short, I've been scarce from most forms of social-media for over a month because I caught COVID-19 some time before my country instituted lockdown measures. I was in hospital from the start to the middle of April (roughly two weeks) and started showing symptoms as early as March 18 (runny nose, sneezing, that I ascribed to a common cold, since at that time they weren't considered something that could present in the case of COVID-19). It took me well over a week and a half of battling symptoms at home and calling four ambulances in that time-frame, always getting dismissed on account of my symptoms not matching up with the standards presentation (aside for the runny nose and sneezing, the vast majority of my symptoms have been gastrointestinal, neurological and renal in nature, not pulmonary) before I was finally tested (on April 1st) and admitted to hospital the following day, when the test came back positive.

My timeline of events has been the following (and I'm still currently symptomatic + showed one new COVID-specific symptom even after two negative tests and discharge from hospital):

March 18 - March 23 -- constantly runny nose, post-nasal drip, sneezing all the time, a light cough. Nothing too bothersome, I dismissed it as a seasonal cold. At this point I started burping heavily, out of nowhere, for seemingly no reason.

March 24 -- woke up with a terrible back-pain, roughly in the area of both kidneys. The pain lessened as the day went on. In the evening, I had my first very clear neurological symptom -- my eyesight filled with a sort of black static (like a TV without cable signal), to the point where I could no longer read letters, discern my own features in the mirror or tell how many fingers my father was holding up. Thinking I was having a stroke or hell knows what else, I called an ambulance. The static-like effect lasted around 20 minutes and was completely gone by the time an ambulance crew arrived. They checked my blood-pressure and it was high due to the panic (174/109), so they dismissed the static as a result of the high BP and gave me an ACE-inhibitor pill to lower it.

March 25 -- started feeling kind of grotty around lunch-time. At around five in the afternoon, I vomited up all of my lunch completely undigested. An hour later, the true wave arrived. I went to the toilet with explosive, orange-colored, watery diarrhea, massive urination (wasn't drinking more fluids than usual) and vomiting, all at the exact same time. I'm not joking in the slightest when I say that I had my head in the sink, to puke and my ass in the toilet, to pee and shit out orange water, all three at the same time. The puking subsided, but the diarrhea and the urination kept up and, for the next two hours, I went to the toilet to shit and pee every fifteen minutes. By this point I was getting dangerously dehydrated, so we called our GP. She, suspecting it might be Norovirus, told me that the diarrhea needs to be stopped ASAP and my father went to buy me the necessary medicine.

March 26 -- the diarrhea was relatively under control due to the medication, but I was still pissing buckets and having to constantly drink tea to stay hydrated, with how fast my kidneys were clearing fluids. The light cough that started on March 18 got a bit worse, but not by much. I had no appetite whatsoever and attempted to eat a little at lunch, but only ended up puking again. I was worried enough about the whole thing that I called an ambulance again. The doctors claimed it couldn't be COVID-19 (by this point I was reading reports of diarrhea as a common early symptom). He listened to my lungs and said they're clear. Then he gave me an anti-emetic shot in the bum (so I wouldn't keep throwing up) and tapped my kidneys a few times. When I flinched, he said it might be a urinary tract infection and prescribed me a list of medication, with the antibiotic Ciprofloxacin at the front of it (keep this one in mind, it's very relevant for what happened next). I didn't actually have any pain when I urinated and the urine itself wasn't dark, but rather almost as colorless as water. I was just peeing far too much and the area round my kidneys was tender.

March 27 -- woke up with a persistent cough early in the morning and a sensation of  tickling in the throat, which made the cough worse. This morphed into a  very specific kind of migraine, starting from the very back of the skull  and radiating to the front, to the point where the backs of my eyes  hurt terribly as well. Still peeing a ton and drinking tea and water to stay hydrated. General state of malaise, as if there was something terribly toxic in my body, leeching all the strength and vitality out of it. Started taking the UTI antibiotic (Ciprofloxacin). My eyelids were twitching involuntarily and I had an up-and-down sensation, with some parts of the day being slightly better (able to sit at my desk and watch an episode of a show) and others, just one or two hours later, making me feel so horrid that all I could do was lie motionless in bed. Still had no appetite and force myself to eat a bit of vegetable broth Dad made for me.

March 28 -- horrendous night between the 27th and the 28th. A sensation like a knot developed in my throat and got worse and worse. To the point where, at around three in the morning, I could no longer swallow my own saliva. I could still breathe perfectly fine, no shortness of breath of anything else like that, but the feeling was as if my esophagus went and swelled shut. I had to gather up a large quantity of saliva in my mouth, tip my head back and struggle for several dozen seconds, to be able to swallow. I very nearly choked when trying to take my medication in the morning, after a sleepless night. The inability to swallow subsided, but the sensation of a knot in the throat remained. Feeling of malaise and weakness grew worse. A sensation of brain-fog came on and I could no longer focus on anything. I attempted to read fic on my phone and just ended up reading the same chapter three dozen times, because my brain could no longer process the words. Difficulty speaking and articulating my thoughts. I could still think well enough, but translating said thoughts to words or writing was incredibly difficult. I spent a whole minute just trying to get the word 'insulin' out through my mouth. I knew it, I remembered it, I just couldn't transform it from a thought into a word without a great deal of effort.

March 29 -- another nightmarish night. Not due to problems swallowing, but inability to actually fall asleep. All attempts went the exact same way:

closed eyes and attempted to fall asleep

started hearing a loud, constant and almost nonsensical monologue in my head, in my own voice, often jumping from one language to the other (English, Romanian, Italian, etc all languages I knew). It's difficult for me to describe the contents now, since they barely made any sense, but they were almost everything from a recitation of a shopping list all the way to narratives that didn't make any sense ("and then, get this, the clock bashed his face in!")

started seeing images behind my eyelids, almost as nonsensical as the words -- parades of wild color, me falling through Salvador Dali-like landscapes, images shifting hundreds of times per minute

None of these were dreams, everything was happening while I was still awake and struggling to fall asleep. I'd close my eyes, struggle mightily to empty my head and go the fuck to sleep... and within seconds, the cavalcade of words and disjointed images would erupt again, with me having almost no control over it. After a few minutes I always found the strength to jerk up and open my eyes, which silenced the voice and ended the images... but then I'd have to try closing my eyes again and the circus would repeat again. This happened hundreds of times over the entire night, before I was finally able to fall asleep for a few hours, at six on the morning.

Woke up absolutely soaked in incredibly foul-smelling sweat. So much of it that my bedsheets were wet as well, not just my pajamas.Used what little strength I had to strip the bed, take a shower and change my pajamas. By lunch I was feeling the worst I'd ever felt, shaking convulsively without having any kind of fever and begging 112 (our emergency number) for help. Several friends were worried I might be going into some kind of shock. Our ambulance service was swamped and Dad used his connections to get a hazmat-equipped team to come home and test me for COVID-19. The hazmat team claimed, like the previous ambulance crew, that I couldn't have COVID-19 since I didn't have a fever and wasn't coughing my head off. I pressed to get taken to the hospital and tested, but between them berating me for taking the risk and Dad looking petrified at the idea of me going to a hospital (and getting exposed, at this time he was still convinced I just had a strange flu), I caved and remained home. They said I was probably having an anxiety attack and left.

March 30 -- yet another sleepless night with visual and auditory hallucinations whenever I attempted to fall asleep. Utterly desperate and frantic, I spent the night scouring the Internet for links between COVID-19 and other viral illnesses and hallucinations. In the end, while reading the prospects for all the pills I was taking, I found the culprit -- the goddamn Ciprofloxacin, the antibiotic for the presumed UTI (the area around my kidneys still kept hurting, but the urination continued to be painless, clear and frequent). Hallucinations and psychotic episodes were listed as one of its 'rare side-effects'. Not so rare in my case and other researchers are now taking a hard look at it and other antibiotics in its family, since the numbers of people who end up hallucinating while on the things is apparently larger than previously suspected.  

I immediately contacted my GP, who was shocked at what reaction my body ended up having to Cipro. Nevertheless, she immediately switched me over to another antibiotic we had in the house -- Augmentin, a more broad-spectrum one, but one I'd taken in the past for bacterial infections and responded well to. Urinating slightly less and able to eat a bit more, but the pain in the kidney area was getting worse.  

March 31 -- night hallucinations continued, but at a slightly reduced intensity, once off Cipro. Woke up completely covered in horrible-smelling sweat once again. Left arm numb and then painful, a reaction I was left with after a long bout of the monster-flu two years ago left me with peripheral nerve-damage due to the immune system going completely bonkers and attacking the nerves. This symptom appearing again made it clear that I was experiencing autoimmune issues once again, as a result of my immune system fighting against the SARS-CoV2 virus.

The pain in the kidney-area was growing worse and worse, even with the Augmentin treatment. By evening, I'd called a fourth ambulance in roughly seven days. The paramedics were even more dismissive than the last crew, said I just had some sand or maybe a small kidney-stone and to wait it out at home. They completely refused to take me to the hospital, claiming that I ran the risk of a COVID-19 infection over a small issue.

April 1 -- a slightly better night of sleep, the hallucinations reduced to 10% of their previous intensity, so clearly an effect of the Cipro. The brain-fog was still presence and further research pointed to it as a possible effect of COVID-19, rather than the antibiotic. Woke up drenched in sweat once again, with my cervical area hurting horribly, my kidneys in pain as well and my left arm numb once more. Completely furious and utterly fed-up, I said "fuck the ambulance service!" and begged Dad to take me to the nearest ER by car. By this point I was fearing for my kidneys and feeling so horrid that I was 100% willing to take the chance of COVID-19 infection, if I didn't have it, just to figure out what the bleeding fuck what happening to my body. He refused initially, fearing I would be infected, but was left with no choice in the matter when I threatened to walk to the hospital by myself if he wasn't willing to help.

At the ER closest to our apartment, a hazmat-equipped doctor working triage had me sit down and fill up a questionnaire of symptoms. Even without fever or difficulty breathing or persistent cough (my cough came only in the morning and lasted just a few minutes each day), everything else was enough to make him note "possible COVID-19" and give me a paper to present to our national institute of infectious diseases, so I could get tested. So Dad and me left the ER and drove to Matei Bals Institute, where the doctors were rather puzzled by me, coming in without a fever  and not coughing my lungs out. The chest x-ray turning out perfect (nothing in the lungs) only seemed to increase their skepticism, but they nevertheless tested me, before sending me home and telling me I'd receive the result in 24 hours. Their only recommendation was to talk to a nephrologist on the phone, re: the kidneys.

April 2 -- felt slightly better, though still under heavy malaise and the kidneys were more painful than ever. At about nine in the evening I got a phone call from our local public health authorities, who told me that my RT-PCR test for COVID-19 was positive. Honestly? Instead of being frightened, I was relieved. After almost two weeks of the strangest collection of symptoms I'd ever had, I finally had an explanation as to what on earth was causing them and was vindicated re: the four ambulance crews that dismissed me. The authorities sent an ambulance that picked me up, right along with Dad (quite unwillingly in his case, he only had some sniffles and a minor indigestion, despite having nursed me for well over a week). We got taken back to Matei Bals Institute, where Dad was tested and sent back home (since he didn't have much in the way of symptoms and they had no reason to keep him) and I was admitted into one of the wards. The time was roughly two in the morning.

April 3 -- barely slept due to the noise and light in the ward. Had blood drawn, for blood-work. Malaise as terrible as ever. Started treatment with HCQ (Plaquenil), the anti-malaria drug. The rest of my ward-mates were absolute sweethearts, but I was much too weak to do much other than get out of bed to trudge to the communal bathroom down the hall. Urination (which had slowly reduced in frequency from March 25) still a bit more frequent than usual. Begged the doctor for something to let me sleep and was given a few metallic-tasting, oily drops to drink in the evening. Had the first good night of sleep in well over a week.  

April 4 -- at this point, the kidney pain got so bad that I could barely walk to the bathroom and would grit my teeth in pain whenever I sat down in the bed. Asked one of the nurses for help, with no visible result. The pain was getting worse and I could no longer get out of bed, just lying there in a listless lump. Several of the other people in the beds next to me went to pound on the door separating the 'red zone' from the 'green zone' and demanded that the nurses or doctor see to me. In the end, a young nurse came and struggled for almost thirty minutes to get an IV in me. She was inexperienced and, coupled with having to wear three pairs of gloves and a visor on her face, she could barely see or feel my veins. The result was that she ended up blowing thee of my veins (two on the right hand, one on the left) before she finally managed to get the IV needle in and secured it. Then I got put on a heavy-duty regimen of IV Ceftriaxone (antibiotic), hydration fluids and painkillers, for the next few days.

April 5 - 7 -- slowly got better on the IV regimen. Gained a bit more strength, the pain in the kidney area subsided and I could walk again. Gave urine samples twice and they came back clean (no bacterial infection in the kidneys or urinary tract). On April 6 we were told that the whole lot of us (the seven of us crowded in that ward and everyone else in the same wing of the Institute) would be transferred the next day to Colentina Hospital, just a stone's throw away, which had been officially designated as a COVID-19 support unit. The reasoning was that we'd be placed in smaller wards and the Matei Bals Institute could focus on the critical and very difficult cases, that required everything from oxygen support to full intubation. My IV needle was removed on April 7 and we, dragging our luggage after us, walked from our wing at Matei Bals to the entrance to Colentina, just two hundred meters away. We were dispersed all over the Internal Medicine wing and I got lucky enough to be placed in a room with just two beds, sharing with a lovely 81 year-old lady, who was COVID-19 positive, but utterly asymptomatic. Got blood drawn again and also had an EKG done (no cardiac abnormalities). Also had another x-ray, lungs still entirely clear. Got tested for COVID-19 once again, but the result came back 'inconclusive' the next day. The treatment with Plaquenil was ceased and I received no further medication, save for what I requested to handle inconsistent stools.  

April 8 - 9 -- kept getting stronger and stronger, able to sit out of bed and walk for extensive periods of time. Bowels still somewhat disturbed and shifting between constipation and diarrhea and then back again,with the stool always being a bright, sun-yellow. Otherwise no pains or other malaise present. Got tested for COVID-19 once more on April 9.  

April 10 -- some of the first ever symptoms I had, in middle March (runny nose, sneezing, stomach constantly full of air and always burping) came back at this point, along with noticeable muscle soreness in my upper arms and shoulders, even though I'd never made any great physical effort. The test taken on April 9 came back 'negative', so the doctors ignored me when I told them that I was having old symptoms come in for an encore. Tested once again.

April 11 -- the burping and stomach-distention due to air grew worse. The 'knot in throat' symptom returned. The test from April 10 came back 'negative' as well and since I fulfilled the criteria of two negatives in 24 hours, I was discharged and had Dad come and pick me up. The Colentina doctors, completely inexperienced re: COVID-19, claimed that my gastro symptoms were likely caused by something else.

April 12 - 16 -- uncertain period, with the typical 'up and down' pattern making a return. One day I was feeling fine and had energy, the other way I was wiped out and could barely get out of bed. Frequent urination (once every twenty minutes) decided to make a return as well and I broke down in tears. Also got a brand-new symptom -- pink-eye straight out of nowhere, which has also been associated with COVID-19 infection.

April 17 -- worst day since the first ones in hospital. Completely exhausted and dealing with a horrible pain at the base of my skull, that was pulsing slowly, radiating down the spinal column and up into the skull. Doesn't respond to Paracetamol and I didn't want to risk taking Ibuprofen. Getting dehydrated due to the constant urination once more, so I started drinking water with electrolytes whenever I could. Fell down on my way to the bathroom, when a veil of darkness passed over my eyes for a few seconds. Everything was spinning and I felt as if I was disassociating and floating away from my own body. Felt better only after more water with electrolytes.

April 18 - 20 -- still felt crappy, but marginally better than on the 17th. Pumped myself full of vitamin C, vitamin D (have a long-standing deficiency there), magnesium and potassium from bananas, kale, spinach, probiotics from yogurt with live cultures in it, to re-balance my likely ravaged gut flora. My appetite, decent in the hospital and shot to pieces again on the 17th, was slowly making a comeback once more. Still burping and full of air no matter what I ate, still pissing frequently. One of the things with COVID-19 was that it made my GERD flare up about ten times worse than usual. Started treating it with a proton-pump inhibitor (Omez) which handled the extra acidity and the heartburn, but not the burping and trapped air. Kidney region started hurting again and at this point I didn't know if it even was the kidneys themselves (both urine samples and blood-work in the hospital showed no problem whatsoever with the kidney function, in spite of the weird symptoms) or just nerve-pain in the area of the kidneys.

April 21 - 23 -- slowly gained strength once more, able to get out of bed and work at my PC. Pain in the kidney region came and went, urination slowly started to reduce in frequency once again. Still drinking water with electrolytes, taking vitamins, eating as varied as I can.

April 24 -- best day so far today (hope I don't bloody jinx it). Energy levels almost back to my baseline, though still left with burping, constant air in stomach and general laziness in digestion. Stool of normal frequency, color and texture after the probiotic regimen. Left with lingering nerve-pain in the cervical area, the shoulders, the lower left ribs in the front and the lower back. Urination frequency reducing to more normal levels once again, feeling less like a constantly dehydrated prune.

It's been... almost five weeks since the first symptoms. A long and exhausting ride and I still don't know what might pop up again. But still far preferable to those poor souls who end up unable to breathe and in full-blown ARDS, needing to be sent straight into the ICU.

Why did I have another flare-up, after two negative tests? Your guess is as good as mine, right now. I have a few theories:

consistent with those articles coming out of South Korea, false negative results might be more widespread than we suspect, in some cases. Either because the virus might be able to hide in the central nervous system and pop back up again for another tangle with one's immunity or because the immune response can lower viral concentration in the body enough for a test to come back negative, without the virus actually being defeated for good.

the test results are correct, the virus is gone from my body and all of what I'm still dealing with are a the result of post-viral systemic inflammation. Not an unlikely thing, since I have a short history of dealing with autoimmune bullshit after that flu two years ago left me with enough nerve-damage that I was unable to walk for a whole month and took six months to recover fully + still wake up with the left side of the body temporarily numb and huge pain in the spinal column if I ever sleep on a shitty mattress, that doesn't offer decent back support.

I want to do more blood-work, see if markers for autoimmune activity show up, but unfortunately, that's pretty difficult to do now, with most hospitals up to their eyeballs in COVID-19 and private clinics charging an eye-watering price for such tests. Dad is almost broke until pay-day, due to how much money he spent in the last month on medicine for me, so it will have to wait or we'll figure something out if my situation worsens again and it becomes imperative to get treatment against autoimmune response. Taking this thing one day at a time.

An overview of my COVID-19 symptoms, good to keep an eye out for:

Gastrointestinal:

explosive, orange, foul-smelling diarrhea

excessive flatulence

vomiting

aggressive flare-up of GERD

excessive burping

swollen, painful stomach due to constantly trapped air

difficulty swallowing

feeling of knot stuck in throat

lack of appetite

Neurological:

temporarily failing vision due to static-like images over the eye's perception

twitching eyelids

nerve-pain in the cervical area

migraine starting at the back of the head and radiating to the backs of the eyes

nerve-pain in all sorts of odd places, coming and going (the left ankle, the left front rib, the right back rib, the kidney area)

dizziness

brain-fog and temporary difficulty with focusing / with coherent speech

Renal:

very frequent urination, though blood-work indicated no disfunctionality with the kidneys

Upper respiratory:

runny nose, post-nasal drip

sneezing

light cough, early in the morning, accompanied by a ticking in the throat sensation that set it off

Unsure how to categorize:

foul-smelling night-sweats, intense enough to soak through clothes and sheets

pink-eye

No shortness of breath, no fever, no lung involvement in my case. This is a virus that the human body responds to in ridiculously varied ways, from that cute little old lady at Colentina, who was totally asymptomatic, to me, where it manifested almost like bloody cholera (the violent diarrhea, vomiting and pissing at the same time, like something was trying to squeeze all of the water out of my body), to one of my ward-mates at Matei Bals, who had developed pneumonia and required moderate oxygen support and was well on the mend when we got dispersed, to the unfortunate souls who end up in ICU with ARDS.

Take care of yourselves, be vigilant and stay safe.

#rho rambles #covid #covid19

[ziracona]

I know you mentioned that Bill wasn't included in ILM because you didn't know much about his personality. Out of curiosity though, if you had included him in the fic, how would you have integrated his history of being in the middle of a zombie apocalypse that couldn't have happened for the other characters? Or like, what approach would you have gone with?

Oh this is kind of a tough one! I don’t know Bill well, because I haven’t played Left 4 Dead, but that actually wasn’t why he isn’t in the fic. I stopped including survivors after Jane Romero, because DbD updates so much that I hit a point it was either add more characters but know you won’t have time to develop them and give them the character arcs they deserve because you’re nearing the end, or stop adding people, and it’s always better to whole-ass less then half-ass more—especially with characters that are awesome and really deserve some due diligence. While Bill is actually one of the earliest survivors released for DbD (he was...siiixth or something? Like right after Ace? Or Nea?), that’s only for PC. On PS4 and Xbox, he wasn’t added until much later, and I play DbD on PS4. So, for me as a player, Bill wasn’t actually released until after Ash was. When I started writing, I was kind of vaguely aware he existed on PC? But I had 0 personal experience with him, and so I went with my own/console experience when it came to writing.

As for what I’d have done, that’s a dang good question, and I’m not entirely sure— I’d definitely have thought about it longer if I had included him, but I’ll give you what I think I would have done? Obviously, Bill’s not from the world the rest of the survivors are. While almost any of the stories can coexist with minimal changes (NOES 2010, Halloween, Stranger Things, even Ash are more or less fairly easily compatible), zombie apocalypse—couple things I know they’re bound to notice, ya know? Still, I stand by multiverse being both unnecessary and not the best decision for the story I want to tell, so what I think I’d have done is this: (under the cut bc it’s gonna be long af--get ready for some quantum theory lol)

Okay, so the Entity canonically can operate outside of natural time. Meaning it can take survivors from earlier or later, and isn’t on the same space-time fixed relationship the world is. Now, time travel is tricky. Or anything with a complex portrayal of time. But there are three basic setups for time travel potential that actually make sense. They are as follows:

Anything that will happen, has happened (or the Artemis Fowl timetheory). This one is pretty straightforward. Sure, you can travel through time, but the universe you live in right now where you are choosing to go back is the result of the past you caused. The change you’re causing is past-tense already, and the only real agency you have is in causing the circumstances leading up to where you already are. This still allows for some fancy manuvering (for example: want to save a friend’s life? No problem. You can’t remove the motivation to go back, so you in the past still have to believe they die, but so long as you didn’t like, hold their severed head—if it’s a situation like say, you saw them blow up, you can save that person—you just have to make sure your past self still sees them “die” in the explosion and thus chooses, as you did/are, to go back.) This is my personal least favorite theory of space-time, but it’s a solid one.

The second is the The Future is not Set (or the Back to the Future timetheory). This one says time is flexible. You can go back and kill your father before you’re born, and the future will change. How ripple effects happen are varried—for example in strict timeline variations of this theory such as those in Frequency or Back to the Future, if you cause yourself not to be born, time will catch up with you, and while the impact you left on the world remains, you, as you no longer are born, will vanish from existence as the time stream corrects itself. However, more lenient time streams such as the versions in Continuum or Futurama exist as well, where even if your effects on the world prevent you from being born, the version of you currently alive continues to exist as an anomaly. This is by far, in my opinion, the most enjoyable solid timetheory.

And last (unless you count Time Travel is Impossible as a solid theory which I guess technically you can??), theory three (or the Doctor Who timetheory). This theory portrays time as possible to change and allowing for alternatives to be taken, but not in all places and ways. It presents very hard limits on what can change, and offers a much more inflexible time continuum than theory 2, as well as much higher consequences for causing alterations. Rather than direct cause-effect consequences, like vanishing because you caused yourself not to be born, usually the result of tampering and causing a change of large size is that you will create time paradoxes, which the time stream itself desperately will try to destroy/fix, usually horribly and with massive and brutal force. Things like Life is Strange fall into this theory as well, with Dr. Who being on the lenient end of this spectrum and LIS the strict. It offers the technicality of a changeable future, but none of the true and almost wild freedom offered by variations of theory 2. Basically, any large scale or personal change you cause will rip holes in the universe, and either you will give in to fate and re-allow the loved one you saved to die, or you push on through and accept massive time-space damage and casualties for the choice. I’ve got mixed feelings on this one myself, as I’ve seen it handled super well and made a thing that can be fun, but it also is the theory that pisses me off the most when written poorly haha.

Anyway, massive time theory talk over, in Dead by Daylight, the Entity can traverse time canonically. In ILM, the survivors only talk briefly, after meeting Jane, about theories for how that works, but here is what I would say if ILM had included Bill. To preface, there are two timelines that each follow the same set of basic rules, but have a little freedom in how they effect each other (not so much in how they effect themselves): the Survivor’s world/reality timeline, and the Entity’s pocket dimension timeline. Neither timeline can contradict itself and create paradoxes within its own space. So. Bill is from the same universe as anyone else. At one point, the early 2000s followed the narrative of Left 4 Dead, and the Entity grabbed Bill where & when he “dies” in canon. Only, some time after grabbing Bill, the Entity took another person which (completely unintentionally on the Entity’s part) triggered a massive Buttery Effect on the world, and greatly altered reality, causing not only the Left 4 Dead apocalypse to no longer occur, but causing Bill himself to never be born. Bill however was already outside of the world and in the Entity’s pocket dimension at the time, and thus was not there to be “erased” and exists as an anomaly. While he is paradoxical in his own world, he does not at all contradict the Entity’s established timeline—he adheres to it. While the memory of survivors is effected and updated by changes made in reality by the Entity, because there is no version of “Bill” in the world anymore, he did not have his memories altered (there was no “Bill” for the timestream to update at all, as he is entirely an anomaly now, so it would have no reason to try). The world they exist in has a time continuum that operates off a variation somewhere between theory 3 and theory 2 (the future is not set, but also there are fix points—however, these almost exclusively exist in regard to one’s own past. The big rule is that personally making the act of altering your own past intentionally by nature also alters your motivations for acting in the first place, and thus negates the possibility of you doing so. While you can change other people’s pasts, or accidentally effect your own, you physically cannot change your own intentionally, because you’d create either a paradox or a time loop, and it would rip you apart).

Dwight is more or less correct when he hypothesizes that they might have all remembered a world with Jane Romero still in it until an hour ago. However, all of ILM itself is that version of time/reality (ie the “last” or “final” version, as it were/the version that came into being when Jane was taken). Her loss butterfly affect updated people, and so they remember her being missing. While the Entity could hypothetically someday accidentally do things that make it so survivors aren’t born in the external reality, it cannot do so intentionally or accidentally-on-purpose, because it is bound by the rules of its own personal history/timeline, and it can neither intentionally nor accidentally do a damn thing to prevent what has transpired inside itself from happening. Similarly, since the survivors are established as existing inside it, even if they were erased at birth, they would still exit it intact in November of 2019 with all their memories. The Entity thus has no real way to hurt them even in revenge, unless it is willing to risk taking them again from a later point in time. Most small decisions do not have buttery effects that are very large at all, and in general time attempts to smooth out with the least possible changes. What happened to Bill was a one in a billion fortunate/unfortunate chance thing, and was such an unlikely thing to happen in the first place, the chances of a thing like it happening again are astronomically small, and almost completely certainly would not to occur. In some ways it would be nice for him though, because he could escape back to a peaceful reality where many people he lost are still happy & living. While they don’t remember him, people would still have the echos of their past inside them (feelings of deja vu, memories in dreams, attachment and familiarity with people you never “met”) and he could reconnect with them if he wanted and live happily with old Left 4 Dead crew and his new survivor family. : )

#ask #anonymous #writing #In Living Memory #In Living Memory (fic) #dead by daylight #for the record I'd spend /way/ more time fleshing out a time-space theory before /actually/ writing it in a story #but this seemed like a pretty solid take for an 'along these lines' answer

[ablackmoonrises]

Introduction

Ok so a bit of explanation just so some of the things here would make sense to someone looking from the outside.

We are a disabled queer couple who use roleplaying and creating fanart as a means of therapy. Through our characters we get to experience emotions and express ourselves in ways we otherwise have a hard time doing.

Currently, we are doing about a million AUs and a million iterations of Sirius and Remus, meeting in different worlds just to fall in love over and over again.

In our version, the timelines, events and circumstances vary vastly, but the two characters remain largely the same in appearance and personality, albeit a bit shaped and changed by their respective histories in the given universe.

The world these stories take place in is loosely based on the wizarding world of JKR, and both the characters and the story have been altered to a point of non-recognition. This is a choice we made because through these characters we are telling our own stories, dealing with issues that are relevant or parallel to our own life challenges, and because we don't necessarily want to cater to any particular audience other than ourselves.

A word of warning. Since we are a couple and sexual intimacy is part of our relationship, this is also somewhat true to our characters. There will be explicit sex scenes in both our writings and visual art, and even though Tumblr doesn't allow this type of content anymore, we are going to link to images and stories that do contain explicitly sexual content. We are going to attempt to appropriately tag all sexual content, but we won't remove posts or stop posting these. Please, be advised.

--------------------------

Sirius is strong, firm, reassuring, a well-meaning buffoon, a bit thick in the head and thick in the ass. He is haunted by his family's legacy and in some worlds, the loss of his brother. Sometimes a pervert, sometimes a sex worker, often a queer biker wet dream... He's funny, and charming if you can see past the absolute cluelessness and the speak-first-think-never attitude. He might pretend that he's all that but deep down he's convinced that he's just not Good Enough for Perfect-Beautiful Remus. He's a lovesick puppy but he can pack a hard bite. He's the first to jump to catch Remus and hold him, steady him, ground him and help him come back from the edge of a breakdown, but more often than not, he's also the one that ends up crying on his boyfriend's lap.

He's a natural top, although he definitely is bottom-curious (albeit massively embarrassed about it). People assumes he sleeps around but in fact in most worlds he's a total virgin.

Visually, he's a gorgeous hunk with a dark complexion, ethnically ambiguous, but certain features of him point to native American origins. He has long hair, dark eyes, a hawk nose and a mass of tattoos, mostly commemorating his fellow marauders.

Remus is a quintessential cinnamon bun. He's a ball of guilt and angst, but he also carries himself with immense dignity and he's proud to a point of self-destruction. He wants to be seen and recognised and held and taken care of, but at the same time he's unable to receive the love and compassion of his peers... Except, maybe, for Sirius. He cares deeply about the injustice of the world, he's bookish and brooding, with stormy moods and fancies. He has a tendency to always jump to the worst conclusions, which can barely be balanced by Sirius' easy-going always look on the bright side-attitude. He has terrible self-esteem issues and he's given up on any chance of romantic connection due to his condition... That is, until he hasn't.

Secretly, Remus is a huge perv with very particular, very kinky fantasies, he's a power bottom who doesn't shy away from shamelessly going for what he wants. He's openly gay and a huge proponent of transparent communication, which is definitely definitely needed to compensate for Sirius' utter inability to verbalise feelings or desires.

Visually, he's the opposite of Sirius. He has a slight build and a frail frame. He's pale-skinned, brown-eyed, freckled and lean. He also has long hair, originally auburn, but by his early twenties, he's gone completely grey.

-----------------------

About the world.

Generally speaking, most of the stories take place in the characters' late teens and twenties. Regardless of the specific AU, we've established a world where neither Voldemort nor Harry has ever happened, and instead the story focuses on the characters' personal development, life events, etc. Furthermore, the Marauders include Lily as well, while Peter slowly drifts away from the group by the end of their time in Hogwarts. They don't part on bad terms, but they mutually let the friendship fade away.

Further Characters:

James Potter - he's a black transman with ADHD and a family who just doesn't have it in them to really care about him. It's not that they disapprove of him as much as they are just too busy making the family fortune.

Lily Evans (Potter) - a spunky redhead punk with a huge heart. She started dating James before he came out and helped him through the rough of transitioning. She is an amazing friend and a vicious advocate for social justice and equality. Her family is overly supportive, almost annoyingly so, and while they can be overly enthusiastic and miss the beat sometimes, they have also taken care of James as if he was their own son.

In some of the dark AUs James and Lily plan to have a baby and undergo fertility treatments, but Lily miscarries the baby.

Severa Snape - Zhe is a non-binary nerd with a beautiful redemption arc behind hir back. Zhe started out as a pure-blood supremacist but later came around and today zhe is a strong ally to the marginalised minorities. Regardless, Sirius hates hir and he can't get past some of their earlier confrontations over Severa's treatment of James and Regulus, while he's also deeply ashamed of his own treatment of hir.

Regulus Black - They are a gorgeous sunshine child with a larger than life personality. Originally planning to become a professional dancer, their life comes tumbling down when an accident leaves them in a wheelchair. Instead of crashing and burning though, Regulus decides to channel their energy into finding another artistic pursuit and showing the world how nothing can ever bring them down.

In some of the dark AUs Regulus dies in the accident that crippled them.

#character intro #world intro #death // #sex // #readme #long post #severe injuries // #miscarriage // #racism //

[goodmythicalshipping]

As Much of Me as I Am of You (2/3)

Hello again, folks! I hope y’all enjoyed the first installation of my first-ever fanfic yesterday morning! As promised, here is part two. :) The final chapter goes up tomorrow!

Summary: Hours before they’re supposed to embark on the first date of their live tour, Link finds himself coming to terms with his newfound adoration toward his lifelong best friend. The next morning, the two simultaneously discover the real meaning of having an “out of body” experience.

<< Chapter One / Chapter Three >>

After cramming all of their belongings into Link’s car, the pair drove off in the direction of their tour bus parked on the other side of town. The drive was replete with debate about how they would carry on with the tour, as well as their personal lives, after experiencing the newfound obstacle of swapping bodies. There were suggestions of postponing or cancelling the whole tour, or even going to a psychic or a hospital for help, none of which sounded particularly satisfactory. As Rhett continued to try and cool Link down, Link couldn’t help but worry about what would happen to them.

How would this affect their performance tonight, and every other night of the tour? They didn’t have much time to try and figure something else out after rehearsing for so many days. How long would they be stuck like this? Would they even be able to change back at all? Link tried his best to recall the timeline of events that occurred in Freaky Friday, which he had watched with his daughter Lily at home about a week prior. He had little faith that the Disney flick would provide him with any real-life insight, but he had to do something. He suddenly remembered something about “selfless love,” which made him nauseous. They hadn’t argued about anything recently, so that must mean…

Great. Not only did they have to find a way to switch back into their own bodies, but that way might involve Link confessing his feelings to his best friend of three and a half decades. He tried to see any other way around the problem, but that was the only thing that made any logical sense to him in these completely illogical circumstances. Rhett must’ve noticed the puzzled look on Link’s face, because he swiftly spoke up.

“Y’alright, bo?” Rhett asked, sporting a concerned look on his face. Link had to admit: although it was technically his own face he was looking at, Rhett still looked adorable with his eyebrows knitted like that.

“Yeah, as alright as I can be in this mess, I guess,” Link replied honestly.

“We’ll find a way out of this,” Rhett reassured him. “We always do. We’ve made our way out of some pretty tough situations in the past there, buddy roll.”

“As tough as trading bodies?” Link snickered.

“Okay, maybe not that tough, but y’know what I mean. We’ll get through this,” Rhett smiled at him. Link felt his belly do a somersault at that, feeling his face getting warmer. Crap, he really had it bad, didn’t he? They had to figure out something fast, not just for the fans but for Link’s own sake as well. The two of them kept up their cordial conversation as they exited off the highway.

--

“Just act natural,” Rhett warned Link, making a point to punch every word he spoke as they approached the bus with their belongings in hand.

The two greeted their crew members, who were waiting for them in the parking lot. Regretfully, they decided to lie to the group, explaining that Link had a sore throat and Rhett had somehow injured his hand while packing the night before, thus rendering them both unable to perform. Therefore, they collectively decided that they would perform their songs with backing tracks, at least just for the night. It wasn’t what they wanted to do, but what other choice did they have? Link couldn’t play guitar or piano, despite being in Rhett’s body, and the same applied for Rhett on recorder. At the very least, it would bide the pair some more time while they figured out a plan of action.

“So what’re we gonna do about th-,“ Link said to Rhett, before Rhett clasped a hand over his mouth, silencing him.

“Shhh! D’ya want the whole neighborhood to hear ya?” Rhett exclaimed as they boarded the bus, looking over his shoulder to make sure no one was listening. Luckily, no one was close by enough to overhear. Link spoke muffled words into his hand, batting it away once they sat down.

“Geez, man. Sorry I care,” Link provoked. “S’gonna be about a five-hour drive to Vegas. Y’wanna do anything to pass the time?”

Rhett looked around the bus, searching for things to keep them busy. If he was being honest with himself, the idea of being stuck in an enclosed space with Link for the next few hours was a bit daunting to him. Sure, they had spent their entire lives together up until this point, but something struck a chord in him recently that he couldn’t avoid, even if he tried. He suddenly found himself inexplicably thinking about his bespectacled friend more often, usually when he was left alone with his thoughts. Rhett guessed it made sense that this might happen, having known each other for their entire lives. He felt this burning sensation within him to be with Link all the time, being near Link, holding Link… kissing Li-

Rhett found himself being abruptly shaken out of his reverie by the man sat next to him.

“Hello? Earth to Rhett!” Link stated, quickly going wide-eyed and covering his mouth once he realized what he just said. He hoped no one in the main cabin of the bus was able to hear them behind the closed doors of the back lounge.

“Careful, man!” Rhett warned. “If we’re gonna get through this smoothly, we can’t have any slip-ups! This is between you and me and nobody else. Y’have to be as much of me as I am of you to bypass any conflict, got it?”

“Pretty sure that didn’t make grammatical sense, but I got it,” Link joked, earning a playful shove from Rhett. “As long as I don’t call ya by your name again, we’ll be in the clear. I know ya like the back of my hand.”

“Isn’t ‘Call You by Your Name’ that French movie or something?” Rhett asked.

“I think so,” Link laughed. “Never seen it. Speaking of movies that we’ve never seen… wanna watch Freaky Friday?”

Rhett then smacked Link in the face with the nearest pillow, reaping even more laughs that made Rhett’s body tingle all over with devotion for his friend. Nonetheless, he agreed and the two found themselves leaning into each other’s sides as they scrolled through Netflix and tuned into the movie on the back lounge TV.

--

He didn’t know exactly when they had fallen asleep, but Rhett awoke to a combination of the film’s ending credits song and Link snoring on his shoulder next to him. As he turned his head to look down at his friend, being ever so careful not to wake him, he couldn’t help but notice the cute expression Link had displayed on his face. It was also a bit odd, considering he was really staring at his own face, but Link had a very distinctive “asleep” face that he was somehow able to convey even while he was stuck in another person’s body. He watched the younger man sleep, observing how his chest expanded and sank with each breath.

Rhett continued to stare at his agape mouth for a few minutes more, feeling a blush creep onto his cheeks. If he wasn’t currently in possession of Link’s body, he would lean down and kiss him right in that moment. Rhett would be lying if he said he didn’t notice himself trying everything to get closer to the other man at every instance he could in recent months. It had just become a natural event at this point. He had always thought Link was pretty since childhood, but never thought of him as more than a friend until they began filming this past season of GMM. It frightened him to no end, not only because it made him question his sexuality but because this was his best friend – he couldn’t risk everything they had created together over the last 30+ years just to appease his own self-indulgent desires.

Suddenly, Link sprung awake, startling both himself and Rhett. Rhett looked at him bewitchingly as Link yawned, stretching his arms over his head.

“What time is it?” Link asked sleepily, making Rhett’s face redden.

“S’about noon,” Rhett replied.

“Am I still you?”

“Afraid so,” Rhett lamented, to which Link grumbled. “We should probably join the others in the main area before they think we’re dead.”

Before Link could answer him, the lounge door slid open to reveal Stevie standing on the other side.

“Mornin’, sleepyheads,” she teased. “…am I interrupting something?”

Both men flushed at this statement, not-so-subtly scooting apart from each other, which made the blonde girl chuckle.

“Fancy some lunch? I think one of the guys packed us some sandwiches,” she continued.

“Sounds good,” Rhett finally replied. “We’ll be there in a second.”

Stevie nodded, sliding the door shut behind her. Once she was gone, the two men stared at each other for a brief moment, neither sure of what to do next. As the faint shades of scarlet became more apparent on each of their faces, Rhett shot up out of his seat, much to Link’s disappointment.

“In the wise words of Stevie, d’ya fancy a sandwich… Rhett?” Rhett quipped, drawing out his own name for emphasis and extending a hand out to Link, hoping to distract him from the rather awkward moment they just shared.

“Let’s give ‘em a show,” Link japed, taking his hand and making their way toward the kitchen.

(To be continued)

#things are heating UP #rhink #randl #Rhett and Link #Rhett & Link #AMOMAIAOY #as much of me as i am of you #rhett mclaughlin #link neal #fluff #fanfiction #confessions #first kiss #body swap #switching bodies #gmm #Good Mythical Morning #tour of mythicality #stevie wynne levine #youtube #R&L #mythical #Rhett and Link: Live in Concert #good mythical shipping

[victorluvsalice]

AU Thursday: Londerland Bloodlines -- Pre-Game Timeline!

So, I believe I've mentioned I'm replaying Bloodlines currently to determine what the timeline of the game is for my "Londerland Bloodlines" AU (now having been upgraded to an official story!). But when I started working on the opening chapter, I realized something -- I also needed to shore up the timeline for what happened before the events of the game! After all, even if I'm starting with Alice getting Embraced, knowing just how events in her and everyone else's lives happened is important -- if only because my characters are going to be telling each other their histories at some point. :p

So! Under the readmore is my current pre-game timeline for these versions of Alice, Victor, Victoria, Emily, Lizzie, and Bonejangles. I focused mainly on figuring out how Corpse Bride and American McGee's Alice/Alice: Madness Returns would go down, though I added some other notes explaining Alice's relationship to Wonderland in this world (since, obviously, she's not the Alice from the books!), and setting up how Emily, Lizzie, and Bonejangles ended up in the Giovanni Crypts. I may be tweaking things here and there as time and the story goes on, but this serves as a good first draft, anyway. Enjoy!

May 4th, 1984: Alice Pleasance Liddell is born to Arthur and Lorina Liddell – their second daughter after ten-year-old Lizzie (November 22nd, 1974).

June 9th, 1984: Victor Fitzwilliam Van Dort is born to William and Nell Van Dort, their only child. He grows up privileged but rather neglected, and becomes a rather shy young man.

November 5th, 1992: Angus Bumby, one of Arthur's psychology undergraduates at Oxford University who'd developed an obsession with Lizzie, breaks into the Liddell house, rapes and kills Lizzie, then sets the house on fire to cover his tracks. Arthur and Lorina die in the blaze, but a badly-burned Alice is able to escape through her bedroom window and is taken to hospital. She remains in the burn unit for a year, recovering – her body heals remarkably well, according to the doctors, but her mind doesn't. Unknown to anyone, a furious Lizzie's spirit refuses to go to the Underworld as a result of her horrific death, and remains at the site of the Liddell house, haunting it with vigor (namely throwing things at any male visitor).

November 11th, 1993: Alice is then taken to Rutledge Psychiatric Institute, as she's gone catatonic from survivor's guilt and won't respond to any stimuli. It's not as horrific an experience as her Victorian counterpart experienced, but Rutledge is still underfunded and contains Pris Witless and the Monroe twins, so it's not great either. During this time, Bumby manages to deflect all suspicion off himself for starting the fire by setting it up so it looks like the family cat, Dinah, knocked some still-burning kindling out of the fireplace, and sets up his Houndsditch Home for Wayward Youth – an orphanage for disadvantaged children looking for new homes and mental health.

September 7th, 2002: Alice shows her first sign of conscious life in years by drawing a picture of a rather more twisted Cheshire Cat than normal, as her subconscious gets tired of her laying around and plunges her into a mental fight for her life and sanity in a ruined Wonderland. Alice proceeds to battle her way across the various domains over the next year, and successfully wrests her sanity back from her corrupted counterpart, the Queen of Hearts.

November 1st, 2003: Having recovered enough to warrant living outside a care facility like Rutledge, Alice is released into the custody of one Angus Bumby, whose methods of memory management are applauded and derided in equal measure. Alice is only too eager to submit to his decree to forget the fire, but her subconscious doesn't make it easy – especially since she keeps thinking he looks familiar. . .

January 27th, 2004: Victor, taking a gap year between high school and college (to delay having to major in business like his father wants) is "strongly encouraged" to start dating his across-the-square neighbor, Victoria Everglot, daughter of viscounts Maudeline and Finis Everglot. Victor's parents think it'll be an excellent way to earn some more social status (they're millionaires many times over from the Van Dort canned fish empire, but their nouveau riche manners haven't earned them many actual friends among the elite), while the Everglots are only allowing this because they've been running on the ragged edge of "broke" for a while now and William is hinting some loans might be a side effect of letting their children date. Neither Victor nor Victoria is thrilled to be pushed into dating a near-stranger. . .but once they properly meet, they find their personalities mesh nicely, and they decide to keep seeing each other on their own terms.

May 28th, 2004: Victor and Victoria have been dating for a few months by this point, enjoying themselves and growing closer. The Everglots are growing less-thrilled with the arrangement by the minute and are constantly pushing potential alternate suitors onto Victoria – Victor assures her that he won't mind if she goes out with a couple just to shut them up, but Victoria is doing her best not to give in just so they won't believe they can run her life. On the Van Dort side, though, Nell's grown impatient with the two just dating, and manages to get Pastor Galswells to crash their date at the local coffee shop to (very reluctantly) extol the virtues of marriage. Victor is mortified and bolts – Victoria follows him, and assures him that she's willing to wait for a commitment. They manage to recover the date, even getting a prize from a little arcade game outside the laundromat – a cheap plastic ring. Victor goes on a walk afterwards in the local woods to clear his head, and ponders if he's ready to get more serious with Victoria or not. In the process, he ends up doing a mock proposal to what he thinks is a bunch of hand-like roots by an old oak, reciting the town's founder's vows and slipping the ring onto a finger.

Turns out it's actually a root-like skeletal hand, which promptly seizes Victor's wrist and tries to pull him into the dirt. Victor fights free, only for a half-rotted corpse bride to rise from the earth. He flees for the bridge – she follows and catches up before he can make it back to town. Victor faints as she goes to kiss him, and wakes in a strange and colorful world that he is informed is the Land of the Dead. Apparently everyone thinks he and the corpse – Emily – are married thanks to him speaking the vows. Victor blurts out that it was a joke – then, seeing Emily well up, clarifies he had no idea she was even there. He asks who she is and how she even came to rise – her friend Bonejangles steps in, explaining through song that she's a murdered bride, killed by the man who promised to elope with her, who vowed to wait under that tree for her true love to set her free. Victor feels awful for giving her false hope, and asks if they can talk more privately. Emily leads him to one of her favorite lookout spots, where they run into Victor's old dog Scraps (now just a skeleton). Victor apologizes for the misunderstanding, and Emily apologizes for frightening him – she was just so excited about finally being married. They talk a bit about Upstairs versus Downstairs, and Emily admits that she misses the living world and would love to see it again. Victor decides that maybe this is the least he can do for her and asks if he can take her up on a pseudo-date (after clearing it with Victoria first). Emily is all for this, and they head over to Elder Gutknecht's, the local magician, who provides them with a spell to return to the Land of the Living after sunset and stay there all night – once dawn breaks, Victor will remain, and Emily return Downstairs. They spend the time until nightfall touring the Land of the Dead – Victor finds he quite likes it and Emily, and tells her that, even if the circumstances aren't the best, he's glad he met her. She is too.

Finally, night comes, and the two return to the Living world. Emily pulls Victor into an impromptu dance in the moonlight, then Victor asks her to wait in the woods while he gets Victoria and brings her around to explain. He heads over to the Everglots. . .only to find the police there, and the Lord and Lady in a tizzy. Turns out, while he was in the woods, the elder Everglots finally talked Victoria into meeting one of their chosen men – one Lord Barkis Bittern, a newcomer to town who's been sweet-talking them. Victoria went to meet him at the coffee shop – and now they've gotten a note from Barkis saying that they'll never see her alive again unless they pony up fifty thousand pounds – a sum of money they just don't have. A horrified Victor checks in with his parents to let them know he's all right (there was some worry that he'd gotten kidnapped too), then sprints back to Emily to give her the news. Emily is equally horrified – and a little concerned, as the man who murdered her was named Edward Barkis. Victor gives her the description he got from the Everglots, in case he spotted the guy – yup, that's the bastard who killed her! Emily's certain that, even if Barkis does get the money, he'll probably kill Victoria anyway, so time is of the essence in finding her. They use the "emergency escape clause" in the spell to head back Downstairs, and explain things to Gutknecht, who agrees to help. Victor gives Gutknecht a flower Victoria gave him earlier in the day to help him track down her location, while Emily rounds up a bunch of her dead friends to storm the place and rescue her. Gutknecht finds Victoria in, of all places, the church – the gang descends on it, and finds both Galswells and Victoria tied up, with Barkis standing guard. He's – naturally a little shocked to see a bunch of walking corpses demanding he free his captives, but manages to regain his wits in time to steal General Bonesaparte's sword and duel Victor (who gets a barbecue fork from Ms. Plum that he uses rather well). Emily saves Victor from a fatal stabbing after Barkis disarms him, and a sneaky call to the police from Bonejangles summons them to save Victoria and Galswells. Barkis is brought in, Victor and Victoria are reunited, and the dead prepare to head back down Below. Victor introduces Victoria to Emily, and they thank her for her part in saving her. Emily thanks them in return, saying she was happy to spare Victoria a variation on her own fate and that she's thrilled to see her murderer finally brought to justice. She says that she'll probably be moving on for real to whatever's next soon, now that that's no longer hanging over her head, but that she'll keep them close in her heart. They say a heartfelt goodbye, and Victor and Victoria head home.

May 29th, 2004: The next day, Victoria apologies to Victor, but says the whole experience has badly rattled her and she'd like to take a break from dating while she processes it all. (In fact, she plans to take a break from the whole village, having talked her parents into reopening an abandoned summer home that they were never able to sell for a couple of months.) Victor understands – his parents do not, and he ends up on their shit list for supposedly letting her slip through his fingers. Even worse, Galswells immediately starts accusing Victor of dark sorcery because of the walking dead (never mind that they helped save his life). Few people take Galswells seriously, but even those who don't blame Victor for apparently driving the man out of his mind, and he becomes a figure of mockery and derision in the village.

July 4th, 2004: Alice, having endured about half a year of only semi-effective therapy from Bumby in the Houndsditch Home, suffers another psychotic break while visiting Pris Witless (who took to blackmailing her about a comment she made while not really with it that suggests she might have some responsibility for her family's death) and tumbles back into a freshly-corrupted Wonderland. This time, the source of her troubles isn't the Queen, but some sort of terrible Infernal Train built in the factories of Hatter's Domain, which flies across the landscape spewing a horrible black goo called Ruin everywhere. Alice battles her away across various domains trying to track down who commissioned the Train and how to stop the Ruin, while in reality she wanders in a hallucinatory daze across London over the course of about two months. During her travels, she almost drowns in the Thames after falling in; narrowly escapes a fire at her old nanny's bar (and secret brothel), set by said nanny's ex-pimp; runs afoul of the police by causing a scene at her old family lawyer's house looking for her beloved toy rabbit; and ends up briefly back at Rutledge when the local cops decide she's too much of a danger to herself to roam unsupervised. She goes catatonic again for a bit as she braves the last of her domains, and awakens with the terrible knowledge that Bumby killed her family – and worse, his activities at Houndsditch are a front for child prostitution. He isn't removing the painful memories of the children under his care – he's wiping their minds entirely and selling them to unsavory sorts! She tries to convince the staff of Rutledge of this, but none except Dr. Wilson and Nurse Darling are willing to listen to her – and even they can't do anything without proof. Superintendent Monroe forces her to return with Bumby when he comes to pick her up. . .

September 7th, 2004: So Alice confronts Bumby herself about his wrongdoings shortly afterward, cornering him in the Moorgate Underground during a quiet moment. Bumby smugly admits that she's right, claiming he's giving the children under his care a "new purpose" – and that Lizzie deserved what she got. Alice realizes that the key he uses to hypnotize people is in fact her sister's room key, and reclaims it, furiously telling him she'll go to the police with it. Bumby tells her no one will ever believe her – Alice points out the security camera, but Bumby tells her it hasn't worked for months (he made sure of that, since he uses this station to drop off kids sometimes) and that the key isn't enough to reopen her case. She can either storm off in a huff and return to the asylum, or submit to his care as the "tasty bit" he'd hoped to make her.

Alice takes a third option and pushes him in front of an oncoming train.

Fortunately, she's able to spin the incident as an accident (Bumby falling in front of the train) and – after a search of Houndsditch reveals his private journal, with the ledger for his less-savory activities – no one's much inclined to look too much into his death. Alice still thinks that it might be a good idea to get out of the country, though, just in case. Besides, after all that's happened, she craves a fresh start in a new world. She gets the help of Dr. Wilson (now the director of Houndsditch) to track down her rabbit, and prepares to go as far from London as possible – Los Angeles, California.

September 10th, 2004: Around the same time, Victor finally snaps when he receives a letter from Victoria, telling him her parents have decided not to move back to Burtonsville as they don't want to confront the memory of Barkis – or the Van Dorts. Without the hope that they'll be reunited and possibly resume their relationship, Victor decides to leave Burtonsville himself, concocting a story for his parents about wanting to go to college overseas. He too eventually decides that Los Angeles, California is the perfect place to go and starts making plans.

October 1st, 2004: Emily, having finished up what she wanted in the Underworld and said goodbye to all her friends, prepares to move on to whatever comes next. With Elder Gutknecht's help, she moves Upstairs for one final look at the moonlight before releasing her soul. . .

Only to have said soul snagged and bottled by a mysterious stranger. Trapped and only vaguely aware of what's happening to her, Emily is taken back to the Giovanni mansion, where she becomes part of a strange ritual. To her shock, the ritual restores to her a – well, semi-alive body; she's basically a very well put-together and sentient zombie. The resident Giovanni are impressed with her construction, but displeased she won't follow orders (they were expecting a servant), and lock her in the basement of their mansion for further experiments.

October 7th, 2004: Emily gains a cellmate – Lizzie Liddell! Turns out her soul was snagged by another Giovanni around the same time Emily's was, and she too was subject to the same ritual – with the same result. The two girls quickly bond over their shared backstory of "a rotten man plundered and murdered me" (if in two different ways), and their worries about their living friends (Victor and Victoria) and family (Alice).

October 10th, 2004: Getting frustrated with the failure of their latest necromantic ritual, the Giovanni try just yanking a soul straight out of the Underworld at random. By sheer chance (or perhaps the table still being contaminated with a bit of Emily's hair), they get Bonejangles, who is very surprised at going from a skeleton the Ball & Socket pub to sort-of-living man on a cold slab in a mansion in L.A. He's thrown in the basement too when he won't play ball – Emily is equal parts shocked, thrilled, and horrified to see him. Lizzie takes a little time to warm up to him, but his extremely different demeanor from Bumby and the other Oxford toadies wins her over, and soon the three are planning escape attempts and wondering just what the world outside is like. . .

October 14th, 2004: Alice arrives in Los Angeles, having reclaimed her bunny and said her goodbyes to her family's graves. She manages to snag a room at a rather crappy motel at the edges of the city, and starts looking for work and a better place to live. Unfortunately, her presence is noted by one Fish, a 7th Generation Malkavian, who sees her madness and decides that she must be brought into the clan. And what better way to lure her in than putting an ad in the paper, claiming he has an apartment for rent. . .

October 20th, 2004: Victor arrives in Los Angeles – or, more specifically, Santa Monica. He snags a rather nicer hotel room and starts trying to figure out what exactly he wants to do with himself while he's here.

Three days later, the question is answered when a drunk driver plows into him, and he ends up in the local clinic. . .

#londerland bloodlines #timeline #yeah I started on the story #and then I thought 'you know I really should figure out how exactly CB and AMA and A:MR all went down FIRST' #so here we are #I think it came out pretty well! #I might do a bit of fiddling with dates still #but yeah as a description of events before the game starts #October 21st 2004 btw #...hang on a second OCTOBER 21ST WHY DID THAT NOT REGISTER WITH ME BEFORE?? #Holy crap this game was CRYING OUT for a BTTF crossover #not even getting into the fact I recently discovered there a very minor character named MCFLY in it. . . #anyway yes this works and I am happy with it #queued

[allysartstuff]

Note: This has been drawn as a reference guide which is free to use if you wish to draw this character. However, please do not repost or claim as your own, thank you.

Finally, more Next Gen! Here's the ninth born and the eldest of The Young Five. Lucky Bug

Personality: Inquisitive, sarcastic, excitable, nervous, smart, easily embarrassed.

Likes: Insects, singing, wild adventures, camping, pretty things (and mares).

Dislikes: Discord’s interest in his love life, his eyes and horns, ponies staring, getting wound up.

Story;

Lucky Bug is the eldest son and second born of Fluttershy and Discord. He is the middle child, younger brother to Upsy Daisy and older brother to Hullabaloo.

Lucky was born out of unusual circumstances. He wasn't conceived inside the womb like Daisy was. In fact, Fluttershy and Discord were very careful not to have any more ‘accidents’ again. However, that was not meant to be. For a long time, Discord kept experiencing terrible stomach aches. According to the doctors, though, he was perfectly healthy. They were completely baffled as to where the source of the pain was coming from. It had gotten so bad that Discord sometimes couldn't get out of bed. Fluttershy tried her best to help her husband but nothing seemed to ease his pain. One day, the family were having breakfast when suddenly, Discord doubled over in pain, twitching and writhing until finally, he fainted. On the chair where he was now sat a large green and red dragon-like egg. Fluttershy, shocked and in a tizzy, rushed to get the vet, doctor and Twilight over while Daisy attended to her exhausted father. Nopony could explain why or how Discord developed an egg and laid it, not even Discord himself.

Nevertheless, once it was revealed that there was a Pegasus embryo inside, the pair made preparations for a new baby, despite their exasperation at another accident and Daisy’s confusion as to where babies actually come from. The egg was placed in an incubator and kept a close eye on for several months.

And in those several months, a lot happened. Eight year old Daisy was kidnapped and tortured for a week and even after she was rescued, she developed bad PTSD and other mental health problems and anxieties that would stay with her for the rest of her life. Starting a day after her rescue, Daisy hid in a kitchen cupboard for a month. She only came out once she realised the egg was beginning to hatch but it was struggling to do so. She helped the egg hatch properly and out popped a wailing green baby pegasus with pink hair. It was only after that did Daisy begin to get better mentally and went outside to see her friends. Baby Lucky didn’t know it, but he just about saved Daisy’s life.

Despite his unusual beginnings, Lucky enjoyed life as any ordinary pony would. He became best friends with the children of his parents’ friends, Berry Bubblegum, Lickety-Split, Opal and Forelle. As a foal, he was teased relentlessly by the local bullies about his red and yellow eyes and the fact that his coat was slowly turning yellow. This did unfortunately cause him to be very image conscious about these small things he couldn’t control but he always relied on his best friend Lickety-Split to chase those bullies away.

Lucky is the least chaotic out of the Fluttercord children. He had chaotic powers, sure, but rarely needed to use them and was a relatively well behaved kid. He only every got into serious trouble once. Like his mother, Lucky can talk to animals but he seem to only use this ability to communicate with insects. Fascinated by what he learned from the insects, he poured himself into learning everything and anything he could. To say he was utterly obsessed was an understatement and his bedroom became a safe haven for all things creepy crawly. When Lucky was ten, he went of exploring to find more bugs, both to observe their natural behaviours and to add to his collection. He was gone for two days, sleeping in the woods with no shelter and feeding of wild berries and mushrooms, yet he loved every minute of it. However, he didn’t tell his parents before he left. Discord and Fluttershy were beside themselves in panic, fearing he had been taken as well. Discord’s magic didn’t work on his children so he couldn’t locate him. They were hugely relieved when Lucky walked through the front door, smiling with mud in his coat, twigs in his hair, carrying his various bugs and a brand new cutie mark of a ladybug on a leaf on his flank. He was also super grounded once he told them where he had been.

His early teenage years were challenging. Despite hating his eyes and horns, Lucky was (and still is) considered to be very handsome by many mares at school. Some even find his eyes and horns attractive in an edgy way, even though, personality-wise, he is far from that. However, he did develop a liking to pretty mares but was far too shy to ask them out himself, prompting Split to literally shove him into his crushes just to get him to talk to them. Lickety-Split wasn’t always the best wingman but it was far better than Lucky’s own father. Once Discord caught Lucky staring dreamily at Opal, Rarity’s daughter. He immediately made it his new life mission to set them up, pushing him to talk to her, magically conjuring gifts for Lucky to give her and setting up this most romantic dates ever. Each attempt embarrassed and irritated Lucky more and more. Discord even got Upsy Daisy roped into it, but only because she saw this as another opportunity to wind up Lucky.

Thankfully, Opal didn’t mind too much. She actually did develop feelings for Lucky during the two dranconequis’ meddling and she really wanted a nice guy after being treated like dirt by the rich famous jerks in Canterlot. After another one of Discord and Daisy’s date set ups, the pair managed to sneak away. They had their own ‘not-really-a-date’, exploring the forests around Ponyville on a midsummer night. It wasn’t long before they confessed their mutual feelings to each other and began dating. Discord still takes full credit for the success, much to Lucky and Fluttershy’s annoyance.

In the current timeline, Lucky is eighteen and in his last year of school. He would like to study insects and bugs as a career and plans to go to university once he is done with school. He is still dating Opal. Unfortunately, Discord has yet to stop pestering Lucky about that.

Bits and Pieces

The reason for Lucky’s existence didn't come to fruition until many years after he hatched. Twilight found a very old scroll on dragonequi, which explained a very rare instance of reproduction in the species. If a dragonequus feels the deepest and truest of love for another, it begins to create an egg made of that love, regardless of gender or if the other is a different species. Otherwise, dragonequi make babies the normal way. Discord didn't know about it as he hadn't been around his own kind for a very long time. After learning this, both Daisy and Lucky were afraid of the same thing happening to them when they were in their own relationships but luckily that never happened.

Lucky and Daisy care for each other very much, especially since Daisy considers Lucky to be her life saver. However, Lucky is just far to easy to annoy and Daisy finds it very funny.

Lucky wasn’t born with horns. One day, he complained about having a terrible headache all day, which got worse after bedtime. In the morning, a sleep deprived Lucky, trudged into the kitchen with his family staring at him. He had literally sprung up two identical goat horns overnight. Mortified at the thought to going to school like this, he begged Discord and Daisy to remove them when his attempts failed. But no matter how many times they made them disappear, the horns grew right back immediately. Like his eyes, he has since learned to live with them but that didn’t stop an embarrassing day at school with everyone staring and giggling at him.

Lucky has a draconequus from but he prefers his pony image.

As a baby, Upsy Daisy was quiet and never fussed at night. Lucky was the opposite. Every night, he would scream so loud, Discord had to soundproof the cottage as to not wake all of Ponyville again and brake every single window. Both parents had very restless night in those early days.

Lucky uses his chaos powers for his bug research, such as shrinking down to an ant’s size to interact with a colony.

Lucky was born green, like his grandfather and uncle, but the green gradually faded to yellow as he got older.

Like his mother, Lucky has a beautiful singing voice, though he is more comfortable singing in front of others. He and Fluttershy like to sing together a lot. When Opal has had a bad day, she asks Lucky to sing for her and it soothes her every time.

Lucky’s godmother is Treehugger. While Treezy loves to hang out with her little dude of a godchild, Lucky is a little uneasy about her. Sure, she loved nature just as much as he did but she was all about spirit, embracing, chakras and other strange things while he was into studying nature and insects for research. Not that he hated her, she was just too...odd for him (ironic considering his family).

Lucky’s romance with Opal is ridiculously sugary sweet and playful. Despite their differing interests, they adore spending time together, teasing and flirting with each other while taking picnics together. However, unlike Opal’s brother Ace Dany and his boyfriend Bramble, they strictly keep their flirtiness private.

Lucky is terrified of Fluttershy’s stare, something that’s impervious to Daisy and Hullabaloo.

Lucky Bug © Me

My Little Pony © Hasbro

#my little pony friendship is magic #My Little Pony #Next Gen #mlp next gen #lucky bug #ocs #original characters #Fan Characters #Fanart #fluttershy #fluttercord #discord mlp #digital art #MLP: FiM #mlp next generation #Upsy Daisy Verse

[calliecat93]

RvB17 Episode 2 Review: Everwhen

Do you ever hear about how some say that some characters just cannot work as the main? Like ‘this character is too ridiculous’, or ‘this one is too dark and brooding to like’. Or, as I hear it, being lazy. Yeah, that's what that excuse is: laziness. Any character CAN work if you put time and effort into making it work. Like when Kishimoto admitted that Sakura was not suited to be the lead female in Naruto, all I hear is “I didn't want to put in the effort in making this character good so I didn’t, my bad!”. It's a stupid, stupid excuse. But that being said, there are certainly some characters that are hard to envision as the central focus. Like IDK how many people would take RWBY seriously if Zwei was the main character... actually I'd watch it.

Despite RvB being... RvB, it's not immune to this. It's probably easier to but say... Carolina as a lead over someone like Jax, for example. So having Donut as the main character in this season... is likely going to tilt some heads. Donut? The innuendo spouting, eternally optimistic character that no one listens to and is missing every other season? That character, of all characters, is going to be our main character this season? How is THAT going to work? Well... how about we find out?

Overview

We begin in what I guess we can now officially call the Everwhen. Donut's still falling through, but it doesn't take long for him to figure out how it works. He can recall different memories, and he'll be shown them. He tests this for a few seconds before deciding to focus to actually get into a specific point in time. The point in time he ends up at? The tail-end of Season 7. Where, if you recall, Wash shot him... yeah... worst? He repeats this about three times. Sheesh. Ugh... at least he knows that Simmons was concerned now? Right?

Okay, anyways, Donut's finally able to get out of the memory and into a new one, though the pain still persists for a bit. He ends up back in S15... I want to say Episode 9. Been a while since I rewatched (the ONE SEASON I fella sleep through during that 30-hour livestream last week),  but I think it was Doc's re-intro form the setup. Oh and Doc is in this episode, whoo. Anyways, once he's got himself collected, Donut tires to tell Tucker and Simmons to round up the others... except Tucker refuses. Why? Because he assumes that it's just going to be a tirade of innuendos, and he's not in the mood for it. Donut is confused as he tries to explain that they're reaching an explosive climax... which only makes them less willing to listen. Fed up, Donut leaves for another memory, leaving his past self acting like nothing happened.

We now go back to S10 where Grif reveals that he still has The Meta's Bruteshot... err, Grifshot. First, Microsoft let him have it back. Second, Donut again tries to get the others to listen. Yeah, three guesses son how well that goes. They end up more concerned about Sarge forgetting his speech, Wash trying to encourage him to remember it. Tbf it IS an epic speech that I too would like to hear again. Naturally, Donut is peeved that not only is he bring ignored, but he's being ignored over the guy who... you know, shot him. So he leaves again, this time going back even further... kinda.

We now end up in S3 during that whole 'we got blasted into the future' mess that I'm not going to even try to recall. It's during the play that Donut wrote to explain to Tucker about their circumstances. Donut lays everything out about everything. About being from the future, about technically being made by Chrovos, about Chrovos' current status, and how they're all stuck without being able to recall anything. Naturally, no one is listening, Simmons, in particular, being too annoyed that Donut took his role. Well... actually one person DOES believe it: Grif. Yeah, he says that it sounds familiar somehow and that crazy shit has happened to them before. You know, like being blasted into the future. Now Grif DOES get sidetracked seconds later by Sarge reminding him about who he's listening to, but at least SOMEONE listened.

But yeah, as I said Sarge calls bull and everyone continues to not believe it. Sarge even outright tells Donut to shut up forever repeatedly, no matter how much the poor guy begs him to hear him out. As a result, Donut gives up and returns to Chrovos' domain. In contrast to Donut being a mix of disappointed and annoyed, Chrovos is cheery and happy. Why? Well, their prison is cracking more and more, but after being locked up for an eon, having anything happen is enlightening to them. They also point out what they continued to point out to Donut last season: the guys have never listened to him, and are never going to listen to him. They even tell him to go ahead and stop as they don't like seeing him suffer like this. Still talking like Donut is their 'child' and in that nurturing father... err, motherly type of way.

Donut, not being that kind of stupid, refuses to buy into this again and is still determined to try and prevent Chrovos from destroying everything. Chrovos protests that it'll be painless, and at this point, they might as well since the paradox has caused pure chaos... backward. Yeah, backward. Donut picks up on this, asking about what happened after the paradox. Chrovos tries to pull back, saying that there's just two timelines: one where Wash was shot and one where he wasn't. But Donut points out something: that there's a third. A place out of time, like they themselves are. And aside from him, who else from the Reds and Blues weren't caught in the paradox? Wash.

With this little revelation, Donut gets the discarded time gun and leaves. Chrovos, due to the barrier, can do nothing to stop him. Donut arrives at a canyon on Chorus, assuming that it is where Wash would go. Wash isn't there, which means that our wide-eyed hero is going to have to go through the entire planet in hopes of finding him. Let's just hope that he won't bring up the repeated shootings when he finds him, haha...

Review

Okay! Good episode! So the first thing that I've noticed so far is the pacing. Much as I loved Joe's seasons, the biggest issue I had with both 15 and 16 was the pacing. 15 was rushed and 16 had this bizarre trend of having a lot of having things happen, but taking too long to get to anything significant. IDK if this is due to Jason taking over or because we're in the second half of this arc they can go faster, but things have been going very quickly so far. And I mean that in a good way. We get into things, have a fun little romp with it for an episode, and get back to the point. Both this and last week's episode did that very well, and I like that. Mind you I am concerned about things going too fast, especially since we only get 12 episodes this season, but so far it's been good.

This episode was essentially about showing us how the Everwhen works and Donut's struggles along it. It works simple enough, you can go through the memories of your choosing and possess yourself int hat period. IDK if that's how it goes for Genkins since he possesses AI-figured people, but it makes sense for Donut. It luckily doesn't take him long to figure out how to make it work, so we get a nice laugh when he gets stuck getting shot... and then feel bad for laughing... but my point is, we don't waste time on having Donut figuring out how it works. Again, very fast but the episode doesn't waste our time as a result. It does what it has to do, and moves on to the next thing.

So... Donut. He's freakin' great here. As I said above, there are some characters that are hard to envision as the main character, and even harder to figure out how to execute it. When I started this show two years ago, I would have never, ever, ever, EVEEEEER been able to imagine Donut as the focus character. Ever. Back then, I saw Donut as funny, but utterly pointless compared to everyone else. He'd been gone for various points so he missed out on many events, didn't do much during Chrous or S15,  and his double entendre/flamboyant jokes had gotten stale very fast, at least to me. It was gonna take work to pull off Protagonist Donut... and they did. S16 did a VERY good job of helping Donut flesh out as a character and making us sympathize with him. It pointed out how Donut is constantly ignored, belittled, and treated like a joke by his peers, which makes him falling for Chrovos' manipulation all the easier to buy and keep him likable despite obviously doing the wrong thing. Which makes him choosing his friends and the subsequent fight against O'Malley all the stronger. Not just because it was a badass fight and finale all around, but because Donut came in and out of it a much stronger, much better character.

It is because of this that Donut in this episode was so good. First, we do get to see that he IS competent. We all kinda forget that sometimes, but Donut is an overall very capable soldier when he focuses. After all, who grenaded Tex in S1 again? But yeah, he's able to quickly figure out how the Everwhen works and also pieces together that time, to some extent, is still intact after Chrovos' slip-up. The boy is... well I can't say he's not dumb, but it's RvB, everyone is at least a little dumb. But the boy IS capable when he's given the chance to be. He also remains sympathetic throughout as the memories continue to make clear that yes, Donut is constantly ignored and belittled by his “friends”. Chrovos isn't wrong about that. Yeah, they DO care about him. Simmons didn't get upset about Donut being shot for no reason, after all. But they're so horrible at showing that, not just to Donut but amongst themselves,s but Donut's probably the one who gets it the worst. Even when Grif actually listened, it died the second that Sarge reminded him of who he was listening to. And none of them make any attempts to hide it either.

It's clear throughout that Donut is getting tired of this. It was what got him to fall for Chrovos' manipulation prior, after all, and even he pointed all of this out in the S16 finale. The fact that despite it he's still determined to save them all is something that should be applauded. It's time for the guys to start recognizing how far Donut actually goes for them and to be at least a little bit more respectful. They can still be annoyed at the innuendos, which I'm SO glad that my headcanon of Donut having never realized what he was doing is confirmed, but it won't kill them to be nicer. They've all slowly been coming better people, so... yeah.

...did I just write three paragraphs worth of a Donut analysis? Damn, me two years ago would have NEVER seen that coming. But it makes my point I think. Any character, even a ridiculous one, can be done well if the effort is put into it. S16 did a solid job of building up Donut’s character and essentially preparing him and us for this season. As such, because of the character development and the particular situation, he works very well as the focus character and I am loving every second of it. Anyways, moving on!

Chrovos continues to be a fantastic villain. Jason has done such a good job on characterizing the Cosmic Powers (speaking of, when are they coming back? I need more ProZD in my life dang it!). Not only does Chrovos have a ton of personality, including some incompetent traits akin to his son Atlus, but I... almost felt bad for them. When they expressed being so happy to have anything happening after billions of years in isolation, you can hear their pure joy and relief. Mind you they're going to eradicate time as we know it to shape it into their image, but it's good to have that there. It makes Chrovos a more three-dimensional character who we want to see more of, even if they are the bad guy. And them realizing that they fucked up by telling Donut about the paradox effects and failing to stop him from leaving? That was some funny shit. Move aside Mercs, at this rate I may have a new favorite villain very, very soon.

What else can I comment on? Well... it was nice seeing some of the moments again, namely S10 and the S3 skit. I also liked how Grif is the one who believed Donut. Sure he got thrown off, but with this and him being the one who mainly got deja vu last episode and in the finale, I think we've got some strong hints that chances are, he's going to remember first. Which means my fear that he's going to be shown what happened to Huggins, which he's NOT going to take well, grows closer... but hey at least we got one person who listened, brief as it was. Oh, and joking about Wash having shot Donut throughout? Are we finally touching on this? THANK YOU! Even if it's just for this episode, THANK YOU. Now if we can have Wash apologize at some point...

Speaking of Wash, so... we finally got the answer to what I've been wondering for a while now. Wash wasn't caught in the paradox, so his fate was left wide open. Well, now we can confirm that he, like Donut, is in an out of time period. Now we know from last season that he went back to Chorus, my guess is to confront Dr. Grey about his brain damage. Which means that... yeah, he's likely not going to be in the best state when we see him. We're probably also going to see how the regular timeline is doing with the paradox breaking things as Donut searches for him. So... well... next week should be fun, right?!

Final Thoughts

Great episode! It wasn't too long, but it did what it needed to do. It established the Everwhen, gave us a fun romp of Donut's adventures through RvB history, did some character stuff for our main hero and villain, and perfectly set up for next week. I have no complaints that I can think of aside from my fears about the pacing, but again that so far hasn't been an issue. So what will Episode 3 have in store for us? IDK, but I'm going to work on getting my heart ripped out so that I won't be in pain. So gonna go take care of that, and I'll catch you all next week!

#rvb #rvb17 #rvb spoilers #rvb reviews #callie reviews

[majoraop]

Dressrosa dream

(plus some Doflamingo character analysis because why not?) A few days ago, I dreamed that I was in Dressrosa (as myself, not as another character) with someone else: I don’t remember who he/she was, anyway I wasn’t alone. I and this other person came from the real world and we already knew what would happen in the island in the near future. We were quite worried and talked about what we could do to avoid getting to the point we see in the manga: Doflamingo destroying most of the cities, basically (I don’t think anyone but that person shot by Baby 5 actually died in the end). Even if we knew about the future “plot” though, we absolutely had no idea how to stop him. We didn’t want to kill him (or anyone for that matter), and we also knew his good side of course. Please keep in mind that I like the character of Doflamingo a lot (if you hadn’t noticed already  ^^’  ). Basically, I like all of him except the fact that he is so emotionally damaged that he doesn’t care about anything and anyone anymore–his family excluded. I don’t like that he traded slaves and weapons either, and I don’t like when he uses his (physical) strength on much weaker people (Bellamy deserved it a bit though  :P  ). That said, I know why he’s written that way and I have absolutely no problem about how Oda depicted him, from his childhood to his early years as a pirate and up to the current timeline. To me, his development and characterization is perfect so far. I like Doflamingo since I totally understand (rationally, more than emotionally) where he comes from: he personally witnessed by being also a victim himself that people are all the same, and that they can even harm/kill children in some circumstances. It’s a generalization, I know, but in Doflamingo and Roci’s flashback we see desperate people, people who lost they loved ones, people who had nothing left and were so desperate that they became cruel themselves. When really pushed or desensitized most people can do evil acts, and that “normality” is the scariest thing about it. Doflamingo saw that (the cruelness lingering in every human being), and was old enough to understand (unlike Roci). And, well, you know the rest. What do I wish for him as a character, though? Basically, I would like to see him become stronger (mentally and emotionally, which to me is real strength) and overcome his fear. It pains me to see such a great character being so damaged that he can’t be a better person, and instead keeps hurting others in a spiral of hatred that’s difficult to stop. But back to my dream. I remember that at one point we saw Doflamingo organizing a sort of hospital/ambulatory to heal injured people (thanks to Mansherry’s dandelions of course). He did that to look like a good king to the eyes of the people of Dressrosa, of course, but it was clear that such decision had obvious positive effects too–and he was aware of that and wanted that positive outcome too, and not simply manipulate people. So, even if in the dream we saw Doflamingo’s manipulating side, it was more complicated than that: he used people but still wanted them to be in good health and even happy if achieving that didn’t collide with his own plans. Of course, that only applied to the “winners” of Dressrosa, and not to the “losers” (the one turned into toys and the Colosseum fighters). He knew that saving everyone is impossible, so why bother to threat people equally? But is it really impossible? Well, in the current political/social system we see in the OP world it is. At that point, once can either live with it (and even take advantage of it), or try to change it. So far, Doflamingo did the former--even if there are a few exceptions here and there (but the post would become too long to discuss those too). In the dream, we also heard Doflamingo’s speaking: his voice was similar to the one in the anime (the Japanese version), but... more normal? Like an actual person’s voice, and I remember it sounding calm, a bit deep but not too much. It definitively was a beautiful voice, which boosted his overall charisma. At the same time though, listening to him was scary since we knew what he could do if put with his back against the wall or simply enraged. I don’t remember what he was speaking about, but I do remember that what he was saying made sense and that’s not surprising since it’s the same in the manga too (Doflamingo’s has some of the best speeches).

It definitely was a strange dream, and a dream that made me think a lot. I found myself in a really difficult position: I knew who Doflamingo was and what he would do in the near future, but I had no means to stop him. First of all, because he wasn’t alone. I think someone like him may be persuaded to take a different path if someone gave him a viable alternative, but someone like Trebol probably wants just power (from what we saw so far at least, but with Oda you never know). Furthermore, Doflamingo is always on the defensive (and for good reasons, considering the assassins sent after him). Taking into account where he came from, how he was treated as a child, and how he grew up, it’s easy to imagine that it would be really difficult to persuade him to choose a different path--even if probably not impossible. Actually, I think it’s more than that: I believe Doflamingo is right, that the world in which he lives should be destroyed–only, I would try to do that as the revolutionary are planning to do: I would try to change the whole system, not simply destroy everything… Or at least, I would side with the people who are trying to change things for the better. But I was also put before a moral dilemma: I’m against death penalty, and would only do something as drastic as killing in self-defence or to save someone I love (and I’m not even sure: I never found myself in such a dangerous situation to have to take such decision, so I don’t really know if I would do it in the end). Still, my alter ego in the dream absolutely wanted to do something to stop Doflamingo before things turned for the worst... I probably felt a bit like Rocinante, minus his personal connection with his brother of course (which surely made things even harder for him). I hadn’t enough time in the dream to think about a strategy anyway since I woke up too soon for that, but the interesting part is that I realized that even if we know what happens next, sometimes it’s simply hard (if not impossible) to interfere with large-scale events. Sometimes, despite our best intentions, it may be impossible to really make a difference. Maybe what holds us back in such circumstances is simply fear, which is natural and understandable. Luffy is a great protagonist because nobody or nothing can hold him back: sometimes he takes a pause (the time-skip is an example of that), but he will always fight back against people trying to take freedom away from him or his friends. Luffy’s line in his final confrontation with Doflamingo in Dressrosa his great for that reason: Doflamingo is so self-centred, so closed in himself in order to protect his own life and the lives of the few people he chose as his new family, that he told Luffy he was interfering with his plans. Luffy, though, turned that argument against him: it was Doflamingo that was interfering with Luffy’s plans (or better, with his very right to be free). If Doflamingo will change, I bet Luffy’s words were what started the process. Maybe, for the first time in Doflamingo’s life, someone told him something that was, to use Doffy’s words, a “fact”. And the best part is that Luffy did that not to make him change his mind or anything but just to point out the obvious: Luffy wanted to be free, he wanted his friends to be free, but Doflamingo wasn’t allowing them to be just that. The king is naked. And yet, Doflamingo still put his glasses back after his defeat. He put his mask on again. But later, while talking with Tsuru, he started to consider “if”s too--something that he usually didn’t do. He started to consider different possibilities, different outcomes. Maybe, he started to think that he could have done something differently, too? Could he start feeling remorse, if he hadn’t already (or maybe had just buried that feeling away until now)? If Doflamingo will take his glasses off by himself before the end of the manga I’ll forever love Oda and I don’t care if I’m sounding cheesy here, because that gesture alone would be a huge character development for Doffy and I can only imagine few way to represent it as effectively as with a symbolic scene like that. Back to my dream, another problem I had to face in it was that, as I explained, I hope Doflamingo will have a change of heart later in the story. More like a change of mind in his case, actually, since I’m not sure his heart is in the wrong place to begin with: he has “simply” been afraid his whole life, without a place to call home anymore. People around him either couldn’t handle and guide him properly (his father) or used him to reach fame, power, and wealth since they weren’t strong enough to do that by themselves (Trebol and the older members of Doffy’s family). And his brother never talked to him (which is understandable and believable, but still sad if you think about it). In my dream I should have gone totally Otohime on Doflamingo, but I’m sure he would have killed me on the spot!  XD  Or maybe he would have listened, who knows? Did anyone even properly talked to him? Only Tsuru, probably. Interesting relationship between them, from the little we saw. (Otohime is one of the best character in the manga and I’ll never repeat that enough: in ONE SINGLE WEEK she opened Mjosgard’s eyes and made him a new man–actually, made him human.) But even if I had realized that talking to him was the best option, would I have had the courage to do that to begin with? To be honest, I think I would probably be too scared to talk to someone like Doflamingo, to try to make him change for the better (and not just for others’ sake--but for his own too). Since I don’t like to fight or to use weapons (and wouldn’t have a chance anyway) though, if a found myself in a situation in which I was forced to face him I would definitely try to talk to him. But I wouldn’t do as king Riku: he basically didn’t negotiate, and simply saying “yes” when someone asks you to do something unacceptable isn’t a way to solve problems. I think that, as much as Rocinante is a positive character generally and another top favourite of mine (and a character I hope is still alive every single day--yes, I’m obsessed like that), one of the mistakes he made was not trying to talk to his brother. However, at the same time I can understand Roci being afraid of him, even if I didn’t go through his same trauma of Doflamingo killing their father before his eyes of course. They are such complex characters that they almost seem alive, and I need Oda to go back to them in a way or another before the end of the manga. Please do it, Odacchi!

#opspoilers #dressrosa #dressrosa arc #doflamingo #donquixote doflamingo #donquixote brothers #donquixotebrothers #opdream #opdreams #opheadcanon #opheadcanons #opanalysis #onepiece #one piece #majoraop #(I included most of these themes in my OP Big Bang fanfic--I can't wait to publish it! ^^ )