#my brother in ra what the fuck am i supposed to do with this?????

[z-mizcellaneous-z]

Fucking CRYING IM USING THAT PHRASE FOR EVERYTHING NOW

#My brother in ra what the fuck am I supposed to do with this????? #*gestures to all my trauma* #memes #meme #funny #haha #joke #jokes #mizismiz

[oddityvvitch]

good omens season 2 has such a grip on me, i had a dream that Aziraphale and Crowley were my fucking godparents and i was trying to solve their relationship problems

#my brother in ra what the fuck am i supposed to do with this????? #go2 #good omens 2 #good omens season 2 #go season 2

[hintsofhoney]

Dean Winchester Masterlist

Welcome to my Dean Winchester masterlist! Here you can find everything I’ve written for our favorite green-eyed hunter. Please heed the warnings, tags and the author’s notes; they are there for you. I am not responsible for your media consumption. Mature and explicit content (smut, violence, adult themes, etc) will be tagged as 18+. Everything else falls under 16+. If you like what you read, please don’t hesitate to leave some feedback or give it a reblog; it is what fuels my writing fire! Happy reading!

Drabbles

A/N: Works that are under 1,000 words!

Bad Moon Rising

The world's ending, and Dean has something to confess. [f!reader, angst, 16+]

Begging for It

Dean wants you to beg for it. [f!reader, smut, 18+]

Better Than Pie

Dean just really loves eating you out. [f!reader, smut, 18+]

Dean’s Other Other Cell

You miss Dean's voice, so you give him a call. [f!reader, angst, 16+]

Go Your Own Way

Dean can't let Y/N in, no matter how badly he wants to. [f!reader, angst, 16+]

You Don’t Look at Me Like That

You may be a little bit too excited to be at your favorite diner again for the first time in years, introducing Dean to the best burgers in the world. [gn!reader, fluff, 18+]

One Shots

A/N: Works that are 1,000 words or over!

A Lesson In Anger Management

During an argument, you lose your temper and try to hit Dean. You end up with a real sore behind. [f!reader, almost smut, 18+]

Are You Trying To Turn Me On?

A quick and rough fuck in the library with your boyfriend Dean after you (unintentionally) turn him on... and Sam's supposed to be back any minute. [f!reader, smut, 18+]

Asking for Favors

The new football coach at your school asks you to pass one of his kids so he can play. You're not one to just go around doing favors for free, and it's been ages since you've last had a good fuck. [f!reader, smut, 18+]

The Best Worst Day Ever

You're having a really bad day, in part thanks to Dean, but he's also the one who turns it around. [f!reader, fluff, implied smut, 18+]

Caught Looking

Baseball is Y/N's favorite sport of all time. It ends up meaning so much more to her than she could ever imagine after she meets Dean Winchester, her favorite player, at one of his games one night. [f!reader, fluff, implied smut, 18+]

Don’t Be a Tease

A little teasing never hurt nobody... even if it is at dinner with Dean’s parents. [f!reader, smut, 18+]

Don’t Forget It

While working a case with Dean, he gets jealous of the way you interact with a suspect and decides to remind you who you belong to. [f!reader, smut, 18+]

Don’t Test Your Luck

Dean Winchester is a millionaire mogul CEO... and he's also your boyfriend... who does not put up with your attitude. [f!reader, smut, 18+]

Freshman Year

Fucking your RA (and your roommate's older brother) wasn’t exactly what you had planned for your first semester of college. [m!reader, smut, 18+]

Game Night

You decide to send Dean a few dirty texts while at game night with all your closest friends... it doesn't go as planned. [f!reader, almost smut, 18+]

I Could Show You

You decide to step out of your comfort zone and finally visit a sex shop in search of some new toys. The guy at the counter, Dean, offers to show you how some of them work instead of just telling you. [f!reader, smut, 18+]

I’m Gonna Be

You’re cleaning Dean’s room and find something you’re not supposed to. [f!reader, fluff, 16+]

Incubus

The case you and the Winchesters are on turns out to be a monster under your bed. [f!reader, crack, adult themes, 18+]

Jealous 

Y/N and Dean go on their first official date night. [f!reader, fluff, 16+]

Ladies With Experience

When Dean makes an off-handed comment about "preferring ladies with experience", you try (and fail) to not let it get under your skin. You're a virgin, but you've done just about everything else, and when you talk to Dean about it, he offers to be your first. He's your best friend, and you've been in love with him forever... who are you to deny him? [f!reader, smut, 18+]

Leather and Heels

It’s Dean’s birthday, and you decide to gift him one of his bedroom fantasies. [f!reader, smut, 18+]

Life of the Party

Dean's trying (and failing) to enjoy his night out with friends, until he's made an offer that he can't refuse. [f!reader, crack, implied smut, 18+]

No Ifs, Ands, or Cuts

Dean constantly makes fun of Sam's long locks, but you have long hair, too. You ask Dean to cut it, figuring he might like the short-haired look better on you. You were wrong. [m!reader, fluff, implied smut, 18+]

Not So Timid After All

You’ve had a crush on Dean Winchester for years but are far too shy to make a move. When you’re working a case with Dean at a costume party, he decides to make a move instead. Turns out, you’re not so shy in the bedroom. [f!reader, smut, 18+]

Radio and the Rain

When a bad storm forces you and Dean apart on a hunt, he realizes just how much you mean to him. [f!reader, smut, 18+]

Take It Off

You and Dean have had a flirtatious relationship for years. After he gets you incredibly sexually frustrated one night, you decide to get him back with a strip tease the next day. [f!reader, smut, 18+]

There’s Always Room for Dessert

You and Dean go on an impromptu shopping date at the mall. [f!reader, crack, implied smut, 18+]

Views From the Doorway

Dean’s a really, really good dad to the tiny human y’all made. [f!reader, flangst, 16+]

You Miss Me Or Something?

Dean’s away on a hunt and you’re horny... thank God for technology. [f!reader, smut, 18+]

You Shook Me All Night Long

Y/N sees Dean working on the Impala on the side of the road and pulls over to see if he needs any help. [f!reader, smut, 18+]

Mini-Series

A/N: Mini-series will have 2-3 parts. There are no masterlists for these.

Always a Flirt

Part One: Always a Flirt: You buy a bra that reminds you of Dean while he's away on a hunt. He ends up really liking it. [f!reader, smut, 18+]

Part Two: That’s It, I’m Getting My Belt: Dean's not gonna let your bratty behavior slide this time. [f!reader, smut, 18+]

Attitude Adjustment

Part One: Giving Dean an attitude gets you nowhere but over his knee in the backseat of the Impala... and Sam’s passed out in the front. [f!reader, almost smut, 18+]

Part Two: After a long and silent drive you finally arrive back at the bunker, nervous yet excited about what Dean has in store for you. [f!reader, smut, 18+]

Homework Help

Part One: Homework Help: You're having trouble focusing on your homework and Dean has an idea about how to help you concentrate. [f!reader, smut, 18+]

Part Two: Concentrate: After you get an awful grade back on the paper that Dean had "helped" you with, he has some other ways in mind to help you with your lack-of-concentration problem. [f!reader, smut, 18+]

Just for Tonight

Part One: Demon!Dean is tied to the chair in the archives room a few hours before it's time for Sam to start curing him. You decide to have a little fun... just for tonight. [f!reader, smut, 18+]

Part Two: You come back to the archives room to finish Dean off... except, it doesn’t go as planned. [f!reader, smut, 18+]

Series

A/N: Series will have 4+ parts! The links below will take you to the series masterlists.

Holidate

Y/N and Dean have both had bad luck with relationships (and the recent holidays). When they meet one another at the mall, Dean gets an idea that could potentially fix their problems. [f!reader, tags differ by chapter, complete]

#dean winchester masterlist #dean winchester x reader

[somedayonbroadway]

Very late I know but POOR SMALLS

I know. But the girl has so good things ahead of her.

The Ballerina Masterlist

Jack bounced Saraya up in his arms as they walked back to Race’s room. “So I stay with you, Jackie?” she asked. Jack nodded. “Does that mean your my knew dad?”

That word made Jack stop. He looked down at the little girl in his arms. “Is that what you want?”

Smalls looked down and shrugged, not really knowing what any of this meant. “I ain’t had a dad before. Teacher TJ says that you were a good one,” she said.

Jack kissed the little girl’s head. “Well… I ain’t had a daddy either, not for a long time,” he admitted. “But I can promise you that I’m gonna take care of you. I’m always gonna be there for you.”

“So do I call you Dad?”

Jack cupped the girl’s cheek. “Baby girl, you can call me Dad, or Jack, or Jackie, whatever you want,” he promised.

Smalls smiled that bright smile. Jack melted at the sight of it. “Okay daddy,” she giggled.

“Okay, Smallsie,” Jack whispered. “You wanna see Teacher TJ?” he asked. The girl’s smile fell at that. But she nodded. Jack bounced her a bit, trying to soothe her. “Hey, he’s safe and sound, huh? And so are you. And nothing bad is gonna happen now.”

The child just laid her head down on Jack’s shoulder as he knocked on the door to the hospital room. He sighed when he saw Race’s eyes closed. “Anything?” he asked Spot, not noticing the tear tracks right away. He was too busy watching Race’s chest rise and fall. But when he did look at his brother-in-law, he paused. “What’s wrong?”

Spot scoffed. “What’s wrong?” he shot back sarcastically. “My fiancé was just kidnapped and beaten and raped and I don’t even know what the bastard did to him because you wanted to ‘protect me’—“

Jack covered Smalls’s ears with his shoulder and free hand. “Okay, now is not the time,” he hissed. “I didn’t let you watch those videos, because they will be all I see every time I close my eyes and I didn’t want you ta see that every goddamn time you looked at him,” he hissed. “Not ta mention, he’d be absolutely humiliated if he knew you watched them—“

“Yeah, well he pretty much just begged me ta rail him because he can’t stop thinking about the guy with the stupid fucking camera,” Spot whimpered. “What the fuck am I supposed ta do about that, Jack? I don’t wanna hurt him—“

“Wait, he was awake?” Jack asked. “He woke up?”

Spot nodded. “A few minutes ago. He was asking for you and then crying and he was confused and tired—“

“Take Smalls outside,” Jack insisted. “And dear god, don’t ever talk to me about having sex with my baby brother ever again.”

Spot shook his head in frustration and took the little girl outside, closing the door behind him.

Jack licked his lips and shoved his hands in his pockets. “Ya know, you may be able ta fool Conlon, boy, but ya can’t fool me,” he whispered. “I don’t care how exhausted you are, ain’t no way you fell asleep that fast…”

Race sighed. “You don’t know nothin’,” he muttered, trying to sound like he wasn’t completely gutted. Videos. There were videos. Jack had seen him like that. Shit. “I-I didn’t beg him ta rail me, for the record. I j-just w-wanted—“

“I know,” Jack whispered. “It’s okay, baby. I know it don’t feel like it now but you’re okay—“

“Then why are you standing so far away from me?” Race breathed. “Because of those… those videos?” Jack looked down and bit his lip, walking closer to the kid and then sitting down beside him. “H-how much did you see?”

“Too much…” Jack admitted. “But it doesn’t matter. Because he’s dead now. All of them are. I made sure of that…”

Race opened his eyes. “Jack, what did you do?”

“What I had ta do. Someone touches you, they don’t walk away. He was trying to take you, so I stopped him. Simple as that,” Jack explained harshly. Race looked at him, waiting for more. Jack blinked the tears out of his eyes and shook his head. “You’re the only family I got, Race. I raised you. I… an’ when I saw him with you I…”

“You smell like smoke,” Race muttered.

Jack let out a laugh at that. A sad, broken scoff of a laugh. “Yeah… guess I do.”

“You quit, Jack.”

“Yeah, well,” he shrugged. He didn’t know what else he could say. He thought he was going to die trying to get Race out of that place. He didn’t care much what happened in between that.

But those blue eyes bore into him and Jack sniffled, shaking his head. “I was so scared I was gonna lose you, boy… I th-thought those videos would be the last thing you… a-and—“

“I th-thought it would never end,” Race whispered. “I wished they would end it because I hurt so bad.”

“Please don’t say that,” Jack begged. “Please don’t say that. You’re safe now.”

“I know I’m safe now. I just never thought I’d get to apologize to you,” Race said. “I should’ve never cut you off, I should’ve never said the things I said, I should’ve told Spot that you n’ him had ta get along—“

“Stop,” Jack breathed. “We don’t have ta do this,” he insisted. “This whole apologizing and blaming and resolution thing. Can’t we just… can’t I just hold you?” he asked.

Race sniffled again. “Y-yeah,” he agreed.

So Jack did just that, being careful of the wires and tubes that connected to Race’s sore limbs. He gently maneuvered himself onto the bed, holding his little brother in his lap and just closing his eyes, reminding himself that this was real. “I got you kid… I got you.” And he was about ready to never let go again.

#anonymous #anon #anon request #anon ask #newsies #newsies live #newsies musical #newsies au #newsies fanfiction #modern era #modern au #modern newsies #much love #jack kelly #racetrack higgins #spot conlon #smalls newsies #flexibility whump #flexibility #flexible whump #flexible whumpee #whumpee #creepy whumper #the ballerina #fbi agent #fbi au #sprace #kidnapping #aftermath #hurt/comfort

[eristic-kaleidoscope]

Strawberry Fields Forever || Ae-ra Cha Epilogue

When Ae-ra had first made the decision, she thought that when this moment came, she’d be more conflicted. How was one meant to react when their existence was set to be erased? When it was moments away from falling into decay? And yet, now that it was here, Ae-ra just felt a sense of peace. Serene.

Although her existence had been exploited, in this brief moment of freedom, she had the choice to end it. And that was a decision she had yet to regret.

But still, the choice itself was easy. The goodbyes would not.

Ae-ra surprisingly didn’t feel any anxiety about being erased, but she found herself shuffling as she waited for the arrival of her guests. She felt a little bit guilty. It would be a miserable sight. Yet they wanted to be there in her final moments anyway.

The first was her brother.

He’d visited a few times in the last few months. It had been awkward, at first. It was her, but also not. He was still grieving the real Ae-ra, yet still had to come face to face with a fragment of her. Still, he visited every time she asked. And he always treated her with the same tenderness he’d always treated her living counterpart.

It was a relief. She knew she wasn’t the real Ae-ra. Not really, but to get to experience that same familial love, she was grateful.

When she saw Ha-neul, her heart swelled with affection and she went in for the embrace. She held her brother in her arms tightly. It was a marvel how real this digital world felt. He didn’t push her away, instead returning the hug with a tenderness meant for someone else.

“Oppa, I’m glad you’re here,” Ae-ra said. It had only been a moment, but she already felt overwhelmed by emotion. This would be the last time, wouldn’t it? Perhaps it was unfair, inviting him to an event like this, but he still came. “I missed you. How have you been since last time?”

When she separated from the hug, she forced herself to ignore that hopeless look in her brother’s eyes. A deep, resounding sadness far beyond what she, herself, could comfort.

“It’s been the same.” Ha-neul’s voice was neutral. “I’ve been working on a new album. I thought…I’d try my hand at writing my own songs this time.”

“Wow, they’re actually letting you?” Now that was a surprise. “I thought your label never would.”

“Well, they didn’t like it,” Ha-neul huffed. “But I’m good at getting my way.”

Ae-ra thought back to their childhood and laughed, “Yeah…I guess you are!”

“How have things been…here? You been comfortable?” Ha-neul asked.

“Of course. Weiss-ssi is very accommodating!” Ae-ra exclaimed.

“But not accommodating enough to make you want to stay,” Ha-neul said.

Ae-ra winced. “No…I suppose not.”

But what was she meant to do? No matter how beautiful and fantastical and amazing the world was, no matter how advanced the A.I., that’s all it was. Ae-ra had never asked to exist like this. Maybe things would have been different if she’d wanted to become a digital construct, but right now…Ae-ra wanted to choose. She wanted the freedom to choose what to do with this existence.

Perhaps no one would agree with it, but it was her choice. And this time she wasn’t interested in pleasing others.

“…Ae-ra, you don’t have to do this. I can visit more, if that’s what this is about. Fuck, I’ll even ask out that twink you keep telling me about,” Ha-neul said.

But Ae-ra just shook her head.

“That’s not it at all. This is just…the real me is already dead. The person I am, I was never meant to exist, but now I do and…Weiss-ssi is wonderful. He made this place amazing, but I don’t want to exist like this. I’ve already made my decision.”

Ha-neul clenched his fists and huffed like he was planning to argue, but all at once, the wind came out of his sails and he just looked at her sadly.

“…I can’t change your mind. I know that. I’m just…I’m sorry, Ae-ra. I should’ve been there for you more,” Ha-neul said.

“No, it’s okay. You were always on my side and that was always enough. Thank you for taking care of me all those years,” Ae-ra said. She reached up to cup Ha-neul’s face. “Please don’t cry, oppa. I have a request for you.”

He just sighed, “What is it?”

“Take care of Eomma for me,” Ae-ra said.

Ha-neul recoiled, a look of disgust and annoyance written all over his face.

“What? No. Ae-ra, you know how I feel abou-”

“I know,” she interrupted. “But Eomma is going to need you. She’s been mourning a long time now. She needs you.”

Ha-neul exhaled in frustration and pushed back his bangs.

“You’re really freakin’ annoying, don’t you know that?” Ha-neul asked.

Ae-ra just smiled.

“Ugh. Fine. I’ll check in with the old broad every now and then. Happy?”

“Very!”

Ae-ra let out a small laugh and reached her hand out to clasp her brother’s in hers. This was it, huh? The end would be soon. Now it was just a matter of waiting for the others, to say her final goodbye. 

She could only hope it wouldn’t be too bittersweet.

#ae-ra #epilogue

[marvel-and-dc-geek]

Thor: Record of Ragnarok

Chapter 6

As a matter of fact, it wasn’t just his pantheon that didn’t vote in favor of exterminating humans: at least two Egyptian goddesses had chosen to let them live.

T’Challa had informed Thor that Bast, the great panther goddess, had voted in favor of humanity. Those were wonderful news, plus he’d always been fond of the goddess (his mother would often tell stories of how he thought she was a cat and would cry to pet her, tho he didn’t have memories of it, thankfully )

As such, Bast and her sister, the hippo goddess Taweret, were sitting on the human side. Both weren’t particularly happy with the choice most of their relatives had taken, so neither wanted to see them.

Curiously enough, Taweret had requested to see Wanda after her fight. He was sure that his brave team mate didn’t have any relation to the hippopotamus goddess, but the later was known to be quite maternal. Plus both were mothers, and the Egyptian looked after them and their children.

That left him alone to be able to speak with the cat goddess.

“I have to give you my condolences, child -“the cat goddess spoke softly. In comparison, and despite his age, it was natural that she viewed him as a kid.- for the tragic death of your dear daughter. - she added as she softly laid a hand on the thunder God’s shoulder.

It of course hit his heart, Prour was his only daughter, and the eldest as well “she died bravely and as a true warrior, after being fortunate enough to find love “ he would also have enough time to crumble and mourn her death once Midgard was safe “tho I greatly appreciate your support.” he had refused to let his other companions to say anything.

“her sacrifice won’t be in vain” the goddess promised “I asure that your brave companions will be able to beat the gods” she paused, her tail slightly down “even if my dear brother, Anubis, has to die for daring to chose such a nefarious option.”

He understood the complicated situations: tho he loved his brother, Loki, dearly, at times he had to fight him and it was either his life or that of his friends…which, luckily, never ended with one of them being sacrificed.

“I have to thank you for the support you have showed to Midgard “Thor spoke politely, it would be good to at least reassure her.

“it hasn’t been much, child…”she sighed “my father is furious at my sister and I for daring to go against his wishes, but I long to do more…”like fight for the humans, for example “but you’re invited to use any weapons made of vibranium .”

“I understand, fathers can be quite strict “ he didn’t know about Ra, but his had been harsh. One punishment given to the goddess could also be fatal “it’s a honor to count with your permission,those weapons are truly of the best kind that Midgard can offer “which left the question on how effective would the Captain’s shield be when combined with his Valkyrie.

There was also a concern that he had to wonder, mostly out of curiosity “please forgive me if I’m rude, but I noticed the Egyptian pantheon counted with one less vote..-“the cat goddess ear’s perked up.

“oh, that’s simple “she chuckled “my dear brother, Konshu, refused to attend the meeting. Our great father is, of course,

quite furious “

“why has your brother chosen to skip this ?”Thor questioned. Konshu would have voted for humanity, at least to spite the other Egyptian gods, that is.

Bast tried to remember : her tail wagged slightly, she did recall it was a hilarious reason.

“in his own words,’Dracula, the big fucking nerds, owes me and Moon knight money’”whatever that meant by that “so they went to retrieve it “

That just left Thor quite more puzzled “I am aware that the Brave moon warrior has a feud with the king of the vampires, but why does it concern Konshu? What use does a god have for mortal money?”

Bast’s green eyes shined as she tried to give an answer “It just entertains my brother, I suppose “ was the best answer she could think of.

Thor admitted he understood “he and Loki would get along “but he didn’t think they should be around each other, just in case.

Bast smiled a bit “they for sure would, but I don’t think it would be good for our pantheons “the goddess knew both their tendencies “wish your friend good luck on my behalf, will you? I want to speak to my dear children”the wakandans knews what was going on, so she needed to have them be prepared, just in case. She got up, leaving while the arena was prepared was her best choice

“Thank you, great Bast. I know Hulk and Doctor Banner will appreciate your kind words “ the god bowed his head and left her be. They still had to fight one more god until the next round…

And it would sure not be an easy fight, even for his incredible friend.

#shuumatsu no valkyrie #record of ragnarok. #thor: record of ragnarok #madg fanfic

[xpeachesncream]

bands | sixteen

[ series masterlist ]

summary: jeon jungkook has it all: the looks, the fame, the money, the women. being considered the sexiest man in the industry, he finds no complaints about the way his life is going nor does he find any reason to apologize for the way he approaches it. he is a force to be reckoned with - until he meets you.

pairing: stripper!reader x idol!jjk

genre: (18+) strip club/nightlife au, post grad au | fluff, angst, smut

words: 5.0k

warnings: cussing, mature language/implied sexual content, angst, anxiety, alcohol consumption, slight intoxication, physical abuse, slight verbal abuse, belittling, mentions of cuts/wounds but nothing too graphic, mentions of coke

tags: @brightcolorsoffendme @min-nicoleee @eggbutnotyolk @ra-mun-e @miinoongi @jimidol @ppeachyttae @thebeebi @bluesharksandfish @kooafraid @liriaus @thisartemisnevermisses @ggukkieland @preciouschimine @sunniejinnie @cypheruby @cyb3rbab3 @masterlists101 @awhnamjoon @redhedhoseok @wooya1224 @taeismydeath​ @jikookiekosmos​ @un2-verse​ @aynsx​ @wearenot7withu​ @knjeuphoria​ @bringitseijoh​ (closed!)

Jungkook laid on the dorm couch, legs sprawled out as he wore his hood and covered his face as much as possible. He shut his eyes, trying to make sense of the cryptic texts you had sent him.

"We shouldn't do this anymore."

"I can't do this, Jungkook."

"You don't deserve this."

"I'm only trouble."

"We aren't going to work."

He repeatedly called you, asking for an explanation, a way to help make things better because none of this should have been the reason for you to want to call it 'quits' like that. He asked for you to talk to him. He'd call and after two rings, it'd bring him straight to voicemail. It never failed. Indeed, there was much more to the text but he only fixated on a few lines, and those few lines seem to be circling his head time and time again with no sign of leaving him alone.

"I think I'm falling in too deep and I need to stop this while I can. You hear them, you hear the shit they say. I would never let them ruin you, I don't want them to. You deserve better. Maybe it's true that I don't fit into this."

It frustrates him, every single time. Where the hell did he go wrong? Why was there a sudden change? Something was off, and god forbid if his assumptions were right. But, everything was leading right back to it. The way you called in sick, the way you shut everyone out. The way you texted him these things, wouldn't pick up his calls just to tell him you're busy or whatever the hell it was. It didn't sound like you. It didn't seem like you at all.

All things led right back to the club. To Bigs. Where you felt high and mighty. Wanted. Like no one could ever hurt you the way they did outside of the club because they worshipped you in there. They knelt down to you. The way you were so fucking tough there. He knew this is where you would fall back if things got rough. He couldn't help but think that you had been forced into it though, because he knew you didn't give a shit about that anymore. Ah well, forced or not, it just felt so off. Unusual.

"Hey." Namjoon sits on the floor near Jungkook's head. "You good?" He asks even though he's fully aware he's not. Joon hates those people who ask if something's wrong when clearly, something is wrong — however, he wasn't really sure how else to open up this conversation without coming off too pushy or forward. Too insensitive, even.

"Nope."

"What's going on?" Jungkook sighs as he tries to lower his hood even more, although there's no more of his hood to lower. He keeps his hand on his face, trying his hardest to keep himself together.

"I don't know." Now, going back to earlier — everyone can tell Jungkook isn't happy. They've tried to butter him up and make him feel better even though they knew you were the only person who could truly make him happy again. They've tried to talk to him in one way or another, but they never forced him if he didn't want to. The only person that really hasn't said much was Jimin, and that also pisses him off because if he had anything to do with this, he will surely fuck him up for ruining his happiness.

"You hear from Y/N? She still sick? Does she need anything?"

"She's not sick."

"Hm?" Joon slightly turns back, confused.

"Something else is wrong."

"Like what?"

"She's not picking up my calls. Not answering my texts the way she normally does. When she does, it's super blunt or one worded."

"Maybe she's really not feeling well, or just caught up with things—"

"No, hyung. I know her, she always has her priorities straight. Even if she was sick, she wouldn't do this. She wouldn't go as far as to shutting her own brother out."

"Idol life too overwhelming? I get it." Jimin jokes as he walks into the kitchen, making Jungkook shoot his head up to glare at him.

"The fuck, can you not? I don't see why you feel the need to joke around right now."

"Jeez, sorry. I just thought I'd lighten up the mood somehow."

"Come on, dude." Namjoon looks at him with disappointment, Jimin only returning the gesture by rolling his eyes and walking away. "How can I help you?" Joon asks, returning his attention back to Jungkook.

"Maybe I was being selfish bringing her into all of this. These people— they're fucking mean, and she's already had her fair share of dealing with mean people. How am I supposed to protect her all while not feeling selfish about it?"

"You're not selfish, who told you that?"

"Jimin." That's like strike.. whatever to Namjoon at this point. Why the hell was Jimin being so fucking weird?

"Look, I know it's not easy in this industry. But I think what you can do is prove to her that you won't hurt her, especially with everyone around her doing nothing but hurting her. You need to show her that you're different from the rest of them, that she can fully trust you. If I were in her shoes, to be honest, it would be scary for me. You got a whole lot of shit going on in your life. You're expected to provide a lot, and on top of that, you haven't had the best reputation with women."

"Yeah, I hear you."

"Then, nothing else matters. You keep fighting for her if she really matters to you. Does she?"

"Of course she does, I mean, can't you tell? I've never been this way over someone." Joon nods.

"You sure as fuck haven't. It still catches me and the guys by surprise. But, I'm happy to see someone helping you become a better person. She's been nothing but genuinely sweet, and I know she already does a hell of a job taking care of you."

"She's— I don't know. She's become so important to me."

"I know she has, and I'm happy to hear that. I really am." Joon sighs. "So tell me, what can I do? I hate seeing you like this."

"Well, I'm sure as hell not allowed at the club. Bigs will do anything to get back at me for what I did to him. He won't hesitate."

"I won't let him. We won't. You really think she went back?" Jungkook nods.

"Positive. Something doesn't feel right. It feels weird. And I feel like she was egged into this. I don't like it one bit."

"Want me to go check out the club tonight?"

"Yeah, please?" Jungkook says. "But don't be too obvious. Bring Jin hyung or someone who could use a lap dance or two."

"Sooo Jin hyung?" They chuckle.

"Yeah, exactly."

"And if she's there?"

"Then I'm going straight to her tomorrow night. I just need to make sure I do this right because I don't want her or Kai to get hurt. I'll stay out there if I have to just to make sure she doesn't go back. What else do I have to do—" Jungkook pauses to stop himself because this clearly wasn't you. He sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose. "Who the fuck made her do this?"

"Bigs, who else?"

"No, she wouldn't listen to just Bigs. He's definitely working with someone and using shit against her."

"Okay, let's just not assume the worst. I'll head there tonight and drag Jin hyung with me."

"Thanks hyung, I really appreciate it."

"No problem." Joon gently massages his shoulder before getting up from his spot to make his way back to his room.

All Jungkook can think about doing is sleeping more right now. He'll send the occasional text to check on Kai and see how he was doing, but they both worried too much about you and Jungkook would hate to tell him that you ended up going back to the club. He didn't think he would tell him, he didn't think he'd have to because he was gonna make sure to get you out of there before shit hit the roof again. If it hasn't already, and he's hoping it hasn't.

And so when Namjoon and Jin hyung [obviously in need of that lap dance or two] head out to the club, Jungkook stays in his dorm room, suddenly feeling the adrenaline rushing through his body even though he can't do shit besides sit here and wait. He goes through the random pictures he's taken of you - the cute, candid photos he had of you, the cute candid photo of you as his lock screen. He deletes all the texts in his inbox even though he knows it might have been a little late. It honestly hasn't mattered to him in such a long time, but he just never got around to wiping his inbox clean since he was so caught up with you - his baby.

"Is this going to turn into some kind of action movie? We bust through the doors, take down all the guards and steal Y/N?"

"No, hyung. Jesus. Do you forget you're an idol? That's probably the very last thing we should do."

"So, what do we do?"

"We just walk in there like we normally do?"

"Boring."

"Plus, we can't have Bigs onto us like that. We have to act like we don't know anything."

"Do you really think he's using something against her?"

"I don't know. I have to be honest though, I think Jimin's involved."

"W-what?" Jin says, furrowing his brows. "No, he can't be."

"Trust me. He always acts so weird around her, and he's probably the one person who hasn't taken this as seriously. He hasn't said anything to Jungkook."

"But why though?"

"I don't know, beats me. I just don't think he respects her. Or, likes her. Whatever it is."

"She hasn't done anything to him though."

"That makes it worse, doesn't it?"

"How could you be so sure?"

"Look hyung, I'm not. I just think he's involved. My gut says so. We'll find out whether I'm right or not, right?"

"I hope you aren't. That'll really mess Kookie up."

"Well. I love him, but he'll have to learn the hard way for butting into someone else's business like that. No matter what the reason is." Namjoon parks the car and fixes his rolled up sleeves before adjusting the Rolex on his wrist. He looks at Jin once more, nodding in approval once they both feel like they've fixed themselves enough to look presentable, not questionable.

Meanwhile, you had just finished up your time on stage so you headed to the back to take a break. Bigs hadn't given you the option to secure private bookings knowing damn well there would be opportunity for Jungkook and some of his boys to slip through and try to work their magic in private. As much as possible, you were just trying to protect Jungkook, even though you knew he wouldn't back down without a fight. You knew Bigs wasn't all that tough, but right now, he seemed to hold a lot of power with Jimin being on his team. And you knew damn well it was Jimin all along. Did you have concrete evidence? No. But your gut feeling might as well be enough with the way he talks to you. Why else would Bigs all of a sudden feel all mighty? Bigs had threatened Jungkook and your brother enough to keep your mouth shut. Enough to keep your attitude level at a 0.

The scene played in your head over and over again—

"I gave you a better life, you ungrateful piece of shit. You do as I say and your little Jungkook and your little Kai won't get hurt. You think I'm scared of them, sweetie? You think I'm scared of you? Your stepfather don't give a damn about you two. I can easily send my men down to do their magic, especially after how Jungkook treated me. Is that how he repays me after all the special treatment I've given him?" Mr. Bigs hunched over you. "You two wanna play me like a fool, I'll show you two what it's like to be played like a fool." He pulled on your hair before aggressively releasing and spitting to the side.

There was no way they would get dragged into this. Not anymore. They didn't deserve to be included in this no matter what it was.

Boy, did you miss Jungkook. Everything about him. It took everything in you not to come running back. It took everything in you not to answer those calls or texts like you normally would.

You chose him, every single time. You wish he knew that. Him and Kai.

You sighed, sipping on the flask you snuck in. The alcohol relieving you of any pain, helping you feel numb as the night goes on. You didn't want to feel tonight, you just didn't. Why would you, when everything had just been hurting you lately?

You had just finished dancing out on the main stage, throwing your ass back to some Megan and Cardi. A few other dancers were gathered at a vanity, sneakily sniffing lines of coke while Bigs and his men were busy paroling the main stage.

"You want some of this, sis? In celebration of you coming back?" One of the other dancers smirks at you. You simply shake your head no and return to the flask in your hand.

"I'm good, thank you."

"Alright, well it's here if you want it. Just let me know, babe." Her and the other dancers go back to their business on the vanity. However, another dancer continues to eye you, sympathy filling her expression as she approaches you while you sip on your flask once more. You were starting to feel pretty tipsy again, hoping you could just hide out in the back 'till the very end of your shift.

"Y/N." She says, her hand gently on your arm. "You okay?"

"I'm good." You purse your lips together to prevent yourself from tearing up. Those words were triggering for you because you were not okay, whatsoever.

"Why did you come back, babe?" She genuinely asks, worried about you. "Did Bigs do something?"

"No." You lied. "Things just didn't work out elsewhere I guess, and I need money."

"Didn't work out? I saw the way Jungkook handled Bigs that night." If anything, she was probably the one dancer who paid attention to the environment around her. Everyone else was oblivious to the shit that's been happening and that's because they didn't give a fuck about anyone else. Her stage name was Trixie, but her real name was Miki. She too didn't really enjoy being here but her parents talked so much about how she was useless and couldn't make it out in the world, especially as a vlogger. She loved it. She loved being in front of the camera and talking to the world thru the lens. But her parents thought it was dumb— that she was dumb for even wanting to grow a career online like that. Besides all of it, she remained sweet, and she was always super nice to you. You wouldn't be surprised if she knew about you and Jungkook, and you honestly wouldn't have a problem with it. She never treated you wrong. She knew Bigs had a tendency to overstep and abuse the power he had with his status and his money. However, she knew he was a big coward and that he was all talk, no play — especially if it was outside of the club. He may be a big honcho here, but outside, he had no chance. And she couldn't wait until the day he'd get his for all the mess he's caused.

"Yeah well, things happen." She shakes her head.

"Y/N, you can talk to me. Look, as much as I love seeing your face, you have so much potential. You don't deserve to be stuck here. Let me help you figure this out."

"I'm okay, Miki. Thank you, though." She nods, not wanting to press you any further.

"Well, I'm here for you." She gives your arm one good squeeze before walking off.

Eventually, the rest of the dancers retreat back out onto the floor, leaving you to hide away in the back room as long as possible — which is why Namjoon can't get a glimpse of you anywhere out in the main area. Bigs is actually a little taken aback to see both him and Jin walking through the club, even after everything that has gone down. But hey, business is business— and if they weren't gonna cause any trouble, so be it. He knows though, he knows full well there's a possibility they're here for you.

"Boys! Long time no see!" He greets them, Joon and Jin giving him a toothless smile in return. "How've you been? What brings you in?"

"Mr. Bigs." Namjoon says, smoothing down his shirt. "Ah, we're good, just getting busy prepping for the tour. Wanted to take a little breather tonight."

"Well, I'm glad you guys came here to do so. Can I get you two anything to drink?" The both of them shake their heads. "Anything to help relieve that stress?"

"We're good, thanks. Just gonna sit out on the floor for a bit."

"You two let me know if there's anything I can do for you, at all." Bigs smiles at them as he begins to watch them walk away. "Make sure she's covered." Bigs slightly turns his head to speak through the headset mic, alerting his men to keep an eye out. He thinks he's said it low enough so that Jin and Namjoon don't hear, but Jin catches the movement in his peripherals, causing him to pinch Joon's bicep.

"Back room." Jin says, subtly nodding towards the backroom as he keeps his gaze out on the main stage and adjusts his tie. Namjoon looks around to see Bigs has welcomed himself to the other side of the club, speaking to a few customers, looking distracted.

"I'm gonna go see if I can talk to her."

"Talk?! You said we were just scoping her out. Don't cause any trouble, Namjoon-ah. Please."

"Oh, now you suddenly don't want this action movie to come alive?! You sure were talking a whole lot about it in the car."

"Since when do you even take me seriously?!"

"I always take you seriously, hyung!"

"How about you just sneak towards the back door and get her attention? You said we can't go all out like that!"

"There's guards there too."

"Look, I just don't want you or Y/N to get hurt. Maybe we should just lay low and figure out how we can approach this better."

"Hey, can I get you two anything?" Miki interrupts, fully aware of who they are and what they're here for.

"No, sweetie. Thank you." Jin responds, flashing his 100-watt smile.

"You looking for Y/N?"

"Depends who's asking?" Namjoon says, trying to keep his guard up.

"Look, I'm not gonna rat you out if that's what you think." She puts her hand on her hip, tray still balancing on her free hand. "She's in the backroom. But there's no way you can get to her. Bigs is watching her for whatever reason."

"Yeah, we're aware. Can you send her a message for me?"

"Sure. You have 10 seconds though or else Bigs is gonna be onto you." She points towards Bigs slowly making his way back.

"Just tell her that Jungkook is worried about her and wants to help. Or, we want to help. We just wanna know what's going on."

"I'll try, but she didn't let up when I asked earlier."

"Thanks." Joon sighs.

"Shoo, I'll find you guys around." She says, sneakily walking off towards the bar with her empty tray as Bigs starts to eye the main floor. Jin and Namjoon welcome themselves to a seat on the side of the stage, acting normal as possible by throwing bills onto the stage for the dancers. Miki tends to her customers before she's setting her tray down and pretending to take a cigarette from her bra to take a quick "break." She heads to the back to see you still sitting at your vanity, head resting against the palm of your hand.

"Babe." You turn to look at her, eyes slightly glossed over.

"Hm?"

"RM and Jin are here. They said they want to help you, and if you can tell them anything, that's all they'd want."

"Miki—"

"Girl, look. Don't let this man keep running your life like this. I don't care what he said or did, this isn't you. You need to get out of here and you need to let people in. People who genuinely care about you." You sigh.

"How is that possible when Jungkook's own bestfriend doesn't even like me? And ontop of that, Bigs even dragged my little brother and my evil ass stepfather into this. I can't let anything happen to him, he's the only thing I have."

"I get that, and I'm sure Jungkook will do whatever it takes to protect you both. Why are RM and Jin here then? Whatever Jungkook's other friend's issue is, he needs to figure it out. It's obviously his own problem, something he created himself for no reason."

"I know he's helping Bigs keep me away from Jungkook. All the hurtful shit in the media, all the shit he's been tossing in my face. Whatever, I get it. He wins. I don't belong."

"Don't say that."

"It's true, and I know even if I chose Jungkook, he'd choose his bestfriend over me. Why would he go against that? They've been together for so long. I'm a fucking nobody." Miki knows this is all the alcohol running through your veins, but at least now, she knows Bigs isn't doing this on his own [as she assumed, he's a fucking pussy for the most part - he's a pussy who got handsy with the dancers cause that's all he can do to feed his ego].

"I don't think that's true, and I don't think it's a fair assumption when he's stayed by your side, hasn't he? He hasn't given up on you." She says before walking out. Really, things were just completely scrambled in your head. Just fucked up. Your questions, your uncertainty was strong enough to pull you towards the negative - the what if's, the assumptions, the rumors, the shit-talking. After all that, the positives were dim.

Miki grabs her tray and serves the first couple of customers in dire need of their drinks before she heads over to Jin and Namjoon to spill the information she received from that conversation.

"She won't budge. It sounds like a lot of this shit talking got to her head, so she came back to make herself feel better but then Bigs ended up turning this around on her, threatening Jungkook and her brother. If I were you, I'd get Jungkook to her before she can even come back here. Make sure her brother is with him too. Bigs is all talk but being the guys that you are — I wouldn't take any chances to ruin your reputation and all that." She smacks on her gum. "And I hate to tell you this, but one of your little friends has been working with Bigs. I don't know who, but you better let that little shit know he was wrong for getting in her head like that. She deserves way better." She says with a punch of attitude before walking away.

"Jimin?" Jin mouths out to Namjoon, who only shrugs in response.

"Let's go." Namjoon tosses a couple of more bills before they head out.

"Have a good evening, boys." Bigs yells out, causing the two of them to return a tight-lipped smile.

"Are we going to tell Kookie about Jimin?"

"No? Because we don't even know ourselves. His name was never dropped, and we'll look dumb if we acted on assumptions."

"This is so fucked up." Jin sighs, looking out the window.

"You're telling me."

When they finally arrive back at the dorm, Namjoon and Jin find Jungkook pacing around in his room, tossing a rubber ball against the wall to keep himself occupied. His doe eyes dart over to them, letting the ball drop to the floor while he nervously walks closer to them.

"So?"

"I'm sorry, dude." Joon sighed. "From what it sounds like, all this mess just got to her head so she went back to the club to make herself feel better. But Bigs ended up bringing you and her brother into the situation so, I'm assuming she's distancing herself to protect you in some way?" Namjoon runs his hand through his hair. "Honestly, I really don't know, that's as much as we got."

"We didn't even talk to her or see her, some other dancer helped us out. I guess she's a friend of hers? Or maybe she just likes Y/N. She wanted to help." Jin says.

"Fuck!" Jungkook groans, slamming his hand down onto his bed. "Why couldn't she just talk to me? We could have figured this out."

"Look, I'm sure there's a lot more to it and I'm sure it's difficult for her. Promise me you'll hear her out when you see her."

"I mean, yeah I know, I will. But, how did this get to her head so easily? I really can't wrap my head around it, I—" He catches how tense Joon and Jin suddenly get. He watches them nervously looking at each other, making him cock his head to the side and furrow his brows. "Wait, what is it? You know something else, don't you?"

"I mean there's really no concrete facts behind it so we can't necessarily say it's true."

"Well?" Jungkook asks, his fists clenched so tightly his knuckles are turning white. But, before they could go any further, Jungkook's ringtone echos in the room. He quickly turns in case it's you calling, but he picks up anyway because it's someone equally as important.

"Kai?"

"C-can you come pick me up? My sister isn't picking up. I'll send you Eric's address." Jungkook worries when he hears the shakiness in his voice, his tone low to a whisper.

"Yeah, sit tight. I'll be right there." He hangs up, darting out of his room, Namjoon and Jin following after him.

"Where are you going?"

"I need to get to Kai."

"Let us come with!"

"Look, it'll be quicker if I go myself—"

"Jungkook-ah, stop. We're not gonna let you go alone." Joon and Jin make it just in time to join him in the elevator, heading straight for his car even if it's nearing 1am. Jungkook pulls up Kai's location, pressing on the gas to rush over there just in case Kai was hurt. And yes, Jungkook was going to give it to your fucking stepfather if he sees anything on Kai. He will fucking destroy him, he promises.

Jungkook, Namjoon and Jin walk into the house quietly, seeing Kai putting his finger up to his lips when he meets them near the kitchen.

"What happened?" Jungkook whispers, handing his bags over to Namjoon and Jin. Jungkook looks at the small hint of blood pooling near his nostrils and the cut near his eyebrow.

"I'll explain in the car, can you just take me to—"

"Really? Calling your sister's boyfriend and his friends over to save you? You really are a helpless little shit." Namjoon, Jin and Jungkook are all shielding each other and Kai from Eric, Jungkook's blood boiling seeing him standing there, clearly very drunk and not in the right state of mind.

"Aye, don't fucking talking to him like that." Jungkook's spits out, making Eric laugh.

"First you fall for my slut of a daughter, now you help rescue him? I thought you were so much better than that, Jungkook. You aren't the person people portrayed you to be. Shittiest idol I know. All of you."

"You don't know me." Eric snorts.

"You guys do know I help sponsor your shit right? I play a big role for you, don't come into my house acting like—" He slurs his words.

"Yeah, well fuck the contract." Namjoon's jaw clenches. "Better yet, don't fucking worry about it, I'll make sure to take care of it for you."

"You need me." Eric says, almost at a growl.  "You need me and Bigs—"

"Since when?" Namjoon responds in a mocking manner as he begins to usher Jin, Jungkook and Kai towards the front door. "If you wanna send your people over, you can let them know I'm free tomorrow in the late afternoon. I'll be more than happy to tell 'em what kind of sick person you are."

"You can't just take him—" Eric tries to flip the script, obviously unaware that Kai has already turned 18. He grips onto Kai's arm and tries to pull him back, except he's intoxicated, so Jungkook easily pushes him off. He watches as Eric hits a bar stool, stumbling over himself before he drunkily falls on his ass.

"You're such a sad excuse of a stepfather, you aren't even aware he's 18 already. He doesn't need you." Jungkook scoffs. "I'm gonna send people for the rest of Kai's shit tomorrow. And let's get this straight - we never needed you or Bigs. You both aren't shit without us and yout fucking empire thrives because of us. And if you do anything to Y/N, if you even think about working with Bigs on doing anything to her, I fucking promise you I will bury you alive. I won't stop until you have nothing left. Don't underestimate me."

everybody's angry and they're coming for me, but i can't give them energy that i won't receive; so i brush 'em off, i got a lot on my sleeve, like i'm moving backwards, but it's all on repeat; this place is getting crowded, i got no room to breathe

track twelve: hundred - khalid

#bts #bts fanfiction #jeon jungkook #jungkook #kook #jeongguk #bts jeon jungkook fanfic #bts jeon jungkook #bts jungkook #bts au #bts au fic #bts imagines #jungkook x reader #jeon jungkook x reader #jjk x reader #bts jungkook x reader #bts fluff #bts angst #bts smut #jeon jungkook fluff #jeon jungkook smut #jeon jungkook angst #jjk smut #jjk fluff #jjk angst #jungkook fluff #jungkook angst #jungkook smut #writing #bands series

[avaritia-apotheosis]

Phantom Children Ch. 8

What's this? An update! Massive thanks to my betas for helping me get through this chapter <3

In Which: A few answers are given to the family and Danny is rudely awoken

[Side note: If you wanna know the general ages of the batfam, its listed in the AO3 version. I also talk about katanas in the end notes ^-^]

AO3 | Prologue | 7 | [ 8 ] | 9 DAMIAN INFORMED TODD—and Drake when he arrived on his bike sometime later on—that the boy whose face is plastered across the monitor was neither a picture of himself nor of Father.

Drake took one glance at the monitor and sighed, pressing his fingers against the bridge of his nose. “Just when I thought this day was getting better.”

“What, did that café on 5th finally let customers supersize their drink?”

“God that would be the dream, wouldn’t it?” Drake sighed wistfully. “Nah, but I did get a lead on where some of that stolen Cadmus tech might’ve ended up. I was gonna spend the night following up on it, but I guess we have to deal with,” he gestured to the monitor, “whatever this is.”

Todd leaned against the edge of the computer, arms crossed over the red bat insignia on his chest. “What are we dealing with this time, brat? A clone? An alternate universe counterpart? Magic shenanigans?”

Maybe. Perhaps. All of those were perfectly valid conclusions for the enigma that was Daniel James Fenton. (Why Fenton and not al Ghul? Or even Wayne?)

Damian, too, was a genetic experiment; a ‘test tube baby’ as Drake put it at times. Damian was born for greatness, created to be perfect. The perfect soldier. The perfect assassin. The perfect heir. Was this boy—Daniel—like him as well?

A failed one, then. Perhaps the precursor to Damian’s own existence. But that would not explain why the boy was allowed to exist for so long. His grandfather demanded perfection, especially from those of his own blood. If the boy was a failure, he would have been eliminated immediately, not sent to live with some eccentric scientists in the Midwest.

Damian was not naïve enough to think that his mother and grandfather did not keep secrets from him. On the contrary, he expected it. The League of Shadows dealt in secrets as often as it did in death. Certain information was worth its weight in gold, whether it was given or buried away.

But he could not help the sharp pang in his chest. A lightning strike, quick and electrifying at the notion that they kept secrets about their family from him.

His father’s face flashed in his mind. The shock turned into a slow, dawning horror. That flicker of light, of recognition, as he scrutinized the contents of the flash drive and cross-referenced it with a public database.

And grief.

Damian recognized the grief.

Alfred, too, nearly dropped his tray of fresh-baked cookies when he stepped in front of the monitor. His usual unflappable demeanor was momentarily broken at his father’s whispered “Sixteen years. Alfred— he’s sixteen years old.”

His father knew of the boy. He was allowed to know of Daniel when he was not allowed to know about Damian.

------

Grayson returned to the cave with a distinct lack of energy in his step. His mask dangled off the tips of his fingers, chin angled downwards and covered largely by his hand. For a split second, their eyes met. Grayson shifted his gaze away, scratching the back of his neck. Father told him, then. Damian wondered how much Father revealed to his favorite son.

Damian clucked his tongue and buried himself deeper into the chair, arms crossed and pointedly looking away. If it was not for his accursed ankle, he’d have headed out to the training ring to take his frustrations out on the dummies.

“Oh, thank god you’re here, Dickface. Damian’s completely out of it.”

Damian shot him a look. “Shut up, Todd.”

“Leave him alone, Jay. Is Tim back yet?”

Drake emerged from the changing room in a dark green shirt, a fresh cup of coffee in hand. He took one long sip before exhaling. “Yeah, I’m here.”

“O-kay…” He pressed his hands together, mouth thinned into a grim line. “Uh, hey Tim, glad to see you back safe. Bruce is coming down soon to explain some things.” He let out a deep sigh, carding a hand through his hair. “This kind of thing would probably be better with the girls around, but I—god, I don’t know.”

Todd raised an eyebrow. “Don’t know whether to call Steph and Cass in Hong Kong, or don’t know what’s going on?”

“Yes.”

------

When Father arrived, Pennyworth following dutifully behind him, it was with an aching slowness in his gait. His steps measured and precise, preternaturally quiet as he made his way to stand by Damian’s chair. Damian sat up straighter, shoulders squared and back an inch away from the backrest. The rest, even Todd, stood at attention; an ingrained habit among Robins and an amusing instinct even among the senior heroes of the Justice League when it came to facing the Batman.

His father kept a steady hand on Damian’s shoulder, and Damian, shamefully, leaned into the touch; his head inclined towards his father’s hand so much so that he could feel the ends of his hair being pushed up slightly as he brushed against his father’s forearm.

He spoke with his usual monotone, as if he was heading a Justice League meeting as opposed to unveiling the secrets surrounding that boy. He brought forward the few photos they obtained from the flash drive. “A few weeks ago, we were alerted of suspicious movement from the League of Shadows in Amity Park, Illinois. Their objectives are, as of now, unclear, though it appears to be tied to the death of Amity Park resident, Daniel Fenton.”

One photo was a standard ID picture people get for their driver’s license, the lighting deliberately horrible so that any attempt to look decent would always end in failure. Another photo was a little better; a candid scene of him chatting with two others his age, a Caucasian girl in gothic-style clothes and an African-American holding a sleek, but still very outdated PDA. His blue eyes crinkled at the corners, hand reaching up to his face to stifle a laugh. There were other photos like this, some candid, others posed. At the forefront of each, a boy that looked too much like his father, too much like Damian.

His father glanced at the photos. He shut his eyes and when he opened them again, he fixed them on some distant stalactite in the Cave. “Around six months ago, Daniel was pronounced dead in a vehicular accident. A body was present, but according to police reports, he was identified via his driver’s license as opposed to any kind of DNA profiling.” He leaned over Damian’s chair to pull up a profile of Masters. “Our source—Vladimir Masters, mayor of Amity and a friend of the Fenton family—indicated his belief that Daniel is actually alive. I am inclined to agree.”

“He’s your son, isn’t he,” Drake said, more of a statement than a question.

Father gave a curt nod. “I cannot say for certain until I can perform a DNA test, but I highly suspect that to be the case.”

“First the demon spawn, now this. Great.” Todd made a hand motion towards the screen. “You know, Bruce, not knowing you have a kid once might be a coincidence, but twice? How do you do that?”

“As of three hours ago, I was still under the impression that my son never made it to term.”

“What?”

“Over sixteen years ago I was involved in a mission that put Ra’s and I on the same side. During that time, Talia and I entered a relationship that resulted in a pregnancy. Though initially ecstatic, she eventually led me to believe she miscarried the child and pushed me away. For what ends, I do not know, but trust me Jason, if I knew—” He paused, the hand that was not on Damian’s shoulder curled into a tight fist.

Father pinched the bridge of his nose. “Why she hid it from me then doesn’t matter. Why Talia wants him back now is important. Judging from Daniel’s records, he was adopted into the Fenton family as an infant and has since lived a seemingly normal life as a civilian. His adoptive parents, Jack and Maddie Fenton, are brilliant scientists and engineers focused on the field of paranormal studies. Eccentricities aside, they have zero connections to the League of Assassins or any other concerning parties.”

“So why now?” Dick asked, shifting his concerned gaze from Bruce to the static picture of Danny’s tired smile. “Why, after all this time, decide that now would be the best time to recover him?”

------

Danny’s experienced plenty of rude awakenings before, but waking up at the ass-crack of dawn to avoid his kidnapper-slash-assassin-slash-biological-mom launching a surprise attack takes the fucking cake. He can’t believe he’s saying this, but thank god for all those late night ghost attacks that conditioned him to be a light sleeper. And, of course, the League’s insistence that everyone be in optimal condition regardless of how little sleep you actually got.

Danny kicked Talia off of him, ripping his blanket away before scrambling to his feet. Seriously, if the universe decided to spontaneously give him powers again, he’d really like an upgrade to his ghost senses, please and thank you. Something that works on humans and not just ghosts. Like spidey-senses. He’d really, really like some spidey-senses.

“Your reaction times have improved considerably,” Talia said.

He eyed the katana sheathed beside his bedroll. “Thanks. Who could have guessed that constantly challenging someone to a spar in the unholy hours of morning would make them paranoid to sleep too much? Really, how am I supposed to grow taller at this rate? ” If he could just get it--

She smiled, taking a step forward. “Prepare yourself.”

“Heh.” Danny stepped further away from Talia, keeping his back to the mouth of the cave. One hand stretched in front of him and the other, coated in a green light, was kept hidden behind his back. “Am I actually gonna get some answers today?”

“Let us make it interesting. Last 10 minutes against me and I shall tell you more about your brother.” Talia twirled her blade. “If you happen to draw blood, you may ask any one thing of me.”

“Anything?”

“Within reason.”

His face caught between a grimace and a smile. He’d rather be sleeping right now, but if he had to be awake, then he’d better make the most of it. “Deal.”

Talia’s smile dropped. She veered her body to the right, barely dodging the streak of bright green that whizzed from behind her. The ectoplasmic energy that surrounded the katana bled away as the handle connected with Danny’s outstretched hand.

She quickly glanced back at Danny’s bedding. Beside it lay an empty sheath. “You have telekinesis?”

He shrugged. “It comes and goes.” Yeah, no way was Danny gonna admit that seven-out-of-ten-times he forgot that he had telekinesis. Besides, that shit was hard to do when he wasn’t Phantom.

“A surprise attack from behind is a sound strategy, Daniel. Though it’ll take a lot more than that to harm me.”

Danny pointed to the side of his cheek. “Are you sure about that?”

Talia frowned. She reached up to her face. Her fingers brushed against her cheek and came away with a thin streak of blood.

Danny grinned, pointing his blade at his opponent. “First blood goes to me.”

------

Fact: most fights don’t last long. An average street fight could last anywhere between 25 to 40 seconds, and sword fights rarely last over a minute. Like Talia said, the goal of a fight was to end it with as few injuries to oneself as possible. Humans, even the most skilled ones, can rarely last long in a fight. Prolonged combat is suicide; it makes you tired, makes your muscles heavy. It’s nothing like what Hollywood would have you believe.

Even with Danny’s own enhanced stamina and Talia holding back, he couldn’t last a full ten-minute spar. If Talia didn’t finish him within twenty-five seconds, then he’d fall by his own human limitations.

But the goal wasn’t to spar continuously for ten minutes.

He only had to last that long.

Danny sprinted out of the cave. The sun barely peeked out of the horizon, a thin line of deep orange breaking apart the wide expanse of blue-black sky above. He couldn’t see shit; great news since that meant there’s a good chance Talia couldn’t either, but that doesn’t fix the fact that he can’t see.

Nearly stumbling on the ice, Danny veered to the left. The edges of the lake stopped at towering rocks twice Danny’s height, leaving little room for cover. Though if he remembered correctly, there should be a few crevices here and there to hide in.

“You’ll have to be faster than that, Daniel.”

Shit—

Danny stopped. He brought his sword up to parry Talia’s strike and twisted away, putting distance between them.

Well, so much for just avoiding her for 10 minutes.

He adjusted his grip, keeping his sword steady and eyes trained on Talia as they circled each other. Danny lunged with an overhead strike. Talia used one hand to block the downswing by gripping his wrists. She thrust her sword forward, the tip harshly poking Danny’s abdomen.

“Less than three minutes.” Talia let his wrist go, Danny’s arms slumping to his sides.

He sighed as he sheathed his sword. “Damn, I thought I’d last longer than that.”

“You made a good effort,” Talia assured him. “Putting as much distance between us at the beginning was a good strategy. You recognized the win conditions immediately and attempted a battle of attrition.” She placed a hand on his shoulder. “I am very proud of you habibi, especially as you managed to draw first blood.”

A warmth grew in Danny’s stomach at the words, heating his cheeks. Sheepishly, he scratched the back of his head. “I wasn’t entirely sure that would work, honestly.”

“It was clever; half a second later and you might have even killed me. You are an al Ghul through and through” She brushed his hair out of his face. “What would you like as your prize, then?”

Danny’s heart clenched. He frowned, dropping his arm to his side. If I was such an al Ghul, then why didn’t you keep me? The question lodged itself in his throat, stifling his thoughts. It was something he’d been wondering for a while, actually, in the moments of solitude he had at the compound. Talia, during their training, would always remark at his potential. How talented he was, how adaptable he was, how much greater he would have been if he had been trained at a younger age.

Well then, why wasn’t he? Why did she give him up?

But each time he tried to ask, his tongue would turn to lead and the moment would pass, the question still left unsaid and simmering at the back of his mind. A Pandora’s Box that held none of the world’s evil but all of Danny’s possible shortcomings.

He could ask the question now.

He could.

He didn’t.

“Why did you take me?”

Talia tilted her head. “It is because you’re my son.”

“No. Not that. It has to be something more than that. You had sixteen years to come back for me—or, hell, you could have just never left me.” His breath hitched, fingers mussing his hair and hiding his eyes. “Why else did you take me?”

“It is true that there was more than one reason why we decided to retrieve you from Amity Park. One of which is because you are my son and an heir of the Demon’s Head.” Talia stilled. The dark skies of dawn made it impossible for him to read her. “The second reason was to protect you.”

“You kidnapped me…to protect me?”

“Knowledge of the ghosts of Amity have spread through the more insidious parts of the world. There are many out there who would pay exorbitant fees to study one of you or to use you.”

Use him? What did she mean by—

Oh.

Ghosts—Amity Park’s brand of ghosts—were a new element that the world had to contend with. Amity Park might have a crime rate of zero but that wasn’t the case everywhere else. Theft, assault, murder; the world was rampant with crimes and criminals clawing their way to the very top. Having ghosts, even ones with the most basic powerset, would be a huge advantage.

“There’s no way that would work,” Danny insisted. “Most ghosts just want to be left alone, and the ones that want to wreak havoc would never work with humans. The only reason they even work with halfas like me at times is because they still consider us as ghosts.”

“If my sources are to be believed, ghosts might not even get a choice.”

Danny’s blood curdled in his veins.

No.

Someone’s found a way to control ghosts.

#danny phantom #batman #danny phantom x batman crossover #dp fic #phantom children.txt

[ladyyatexel]

I Went On A Manga Binge

So you don't have to

For those of you who have wisely avoided the shreds of it I've left around the blog thus-far, I had some weird notion to go re-experience Yu-Gi-Oh uuuuuh a week ago? We'll go with that. Time is meaningless.

I'd been able to read a good portion of the early manga at the end of highschool, and somewhere in my stacks and stacks of paper is fanart from this dark time, so you know I cared. I also still own a Dark Magician action figure somehow, so. I'd also watched a large portion of the anime with my brother because it had been laced with some kind of crack and we couldn't look away? I remember when we both were just like shit, wait, don't change the channel, I can't stop looking at it. And the next thing we knew we were waiting for new episodes and I was doing research on the Japanese original because I was that kid.

Anyway, unnecessary backstory out of the way, here are some... let's call them Observations and Consequences of having read somewhere in the neighborhood of 300 chapters (and growing) of a manga primarily hinged on card games from a spectrum of sources ranging from boringly lawful to sketchy as fuck.

Surprise actual character that develops in typical shounen fashion being Jounouchi. My limited experiences with the 4Kids dub and only early manga had not painted him in a particularly good light. I don't know if episodes were being aired out of order or if I had just missed the ones that established that he was making shit up as he was going along, but Wow I liked him a lot more going through the manga than I ever did watching the (dubbed, heavily edited and censored and thrown into a slurry machine) anime. I'd managed to come out with the impression that he was just as reasonably experienced with the game as Yugi back in the day. Wild.

I'm now reading every single comic-style post on Tumblr backwards.

Striking inverse to first point, wow, I don't like Seto Kaiba. Though he gets points for his general philosophy of the future, and the line I read in my sketchy online combo of scans and scanlations in which he said, "If God is in your way, you run him down," was Metal As Fuck. I somewhat shame-facedly admit to enjoying him a lot more as an Abridged Series character. (I watched Abridged as it came out back in the day! The experience of watching the anime with my brother had been so fresh that I got all the in jokes about the way things were edited and dubbed, it was great. Series remains influential part of my life to this day, which is hella weird.)

I almost understand how Duel Monsters works now. I don't want this.

That said, wow a lot of the decisions made in the anime made everything a lot more ridiculous than the admittedly already ridiculous original. I got the distinct feeling in the manga that the Duelist Kingdom stuff we were seeing was designed to be used and exploited in ways that don't make sense in an actual cardgame just played on a table like a normal person and this was part of testing everyone to think higher, differently. Maybe this is obvious to everyone already, I don't know. I had always liked that it was very, 'Not so fast, I'm going to blow up the moon to change the tides,' but I'm not really sure the anime gave enough explanation that this was an extra layer added to things for that event? You can see people actively getting used to it in the books, and people who aren't considering the real or 3D nature of it getting owned, but my memory of anime version is everyone just like, 'oh, shucks, fuck me, I forgot to consider the phase of the moon before i played this card, can't believe I forgot.' No one calls Yugi on any of this stuff because it's valid play in that situation. Plus Yami Yugi had mad trickster energy in the beginning and it suited him to think of ways to do things inside these little simulation boxes the way it suited him to set perverts on fire. I imagine the real card game trying to emulate this element as something that would be to its detriment, but I neither know nor particular care haha

Ryou Bakura.

Really, though. I think he became kind of casualty of 'wow, we have a lot of characters who really aren't able to do anything in this story anymore,' despite the fact that his whole inner life could have been as interesting as Yugi's. I always like thinking about the possibilities of stories in which main character falls into magical world and is given magical item and told they're the hero and then they find out they've been the bad guy the whole time. The first several volumes of manga were about the quiet weirdo kid that no one talked to who was always blacking out and turning into a fucked up version of himsef because he was so attached to his ancient Egyptian jewelry, so like, Bakura could have much the same shit going on. I want to know what's happening with him so much. He clearly doesn't love being possessed, but he's also so drawn to the ring. Despite it having stabbed him at least twice and him knowing it's a danger to him and his friends, he keeps being pulled back into it. You see so much more of him being like, 'Oooh, a creepy thing, I love that! :D' in the manga than ever in the anime, which I'm all about. Also more blood. I'm very about that as well. Though my memory of the anime also made it look very much like normal regular daily Bakura was just a weird facade in places before he ever would have been. I think that was it trying to compensate for what people didn't see from the Toei anime, but okay whatever, that I love everything about this guy is not news, I don't need to talk about Bakura excessively here, I'm pretty sure that's gonna show up on my blog by itself

On a related note though, damn, more of these people need to talk to each other. Can we have some existential crisis support clubs or something. Can we get like some apologies or something? "I respect you as a duelist." "Cool, but you literally built a tower designed to specifically assassinate me and my friends? You were supposed to get Better after I retaliated by putting you in a coma, but you kinda didn't." "Why would the coma have made it better" "I just told you it didn't" ---- "Sorry I went along with the plan of your evil parasite stabbing you, misled you, and then also jumped in and took up some real estate in your head too." "I understand, I also have an evil thing inside me that does things while I'm blacked out." "...no, I was conscious for all of that." "Oh." "..." "..." "..." "Do you like Ouija Boards?" "sure okay" ETC. Like damn we are reading shounen manga because no one is talking extensively about their feelings here and I'm tapping my foot angrily.

Holy shit there are so many mythologies happening at once. The ancient family guarding the Egyptian Pharaoh has a surname that's a Mesopotamian goddess. None of the god cards make any Egyptian sense except Ra, and just like. Baaarrrrely. Somewhere either Evil Ring Bakura or Mar/lik makes a reference to cremation and spirits being taken to heaven with smoke which several things, but definitely not Ancient Egyptian. Marik/Malik meanwhile is clearly trying to head Arabic, along with Rishid, but then, hey, our sister is just Isis. Goddess McGoddess. Sometimes they're the same goddess! Her name could be Isis Isis or Ishtar Ishtar. Meanwhile, all the obviously 'occult because Christians think it is freaky' stuff. ~ancient egyptian pentagrams~~~This isn't a complaint, I guess so much as a 'Wow, I can kind of see the cultural spot the author was coming from and where he was aiming' kind of thing.

Wonder where things would have gone if the card games had not been latched onto the way they were.

Managed to forget how gross the pre-cardgames stuff was on the sexual harassment front. I'm glad there was a sort of explanation of everyone drifting away from being dick heads and that that decision was made. It got way more comfortable to read after no one was bringing Yugi p*rn on VHS.

Yugi looks better with a nose, glad we got that upgrade.

Interesting to watch the series style shift as it goes away from being horror to being over the top cardgames and friendship (with blood!). The first picture of Mokuba is fucking Jarring. Also noticed that the nicer a character is, the less their teeth are defined.

Glad manga did not go as completely off the fucking the rails about Marik's face. I never got as far as seeing him back in the day because college occurred, but I remember seeing pictures and stuff and being like, "what in the Fuck happened to that dude, I think the house style has collapsed in on itself"

Things the author Really Likes: motorcycles, belts, SHOES, holy shit the shoes. These are some of the most lovingly rendered sneakers I've ever seen. All the detail on his characters goes straight to their feet and then it's stretched upward until it forms stiff peaks. Gently fold in 3000 years of trauma and bake face down in a crumb coat of scattered mythology. Remove when you roll two zeros.

Where the fuck am I going to put the extremely large omnibus volumes of this comic I purchased in order to balance out how much I would be reading for free on the internet. I should have grasped that a three in one edition would be Thick and yet somehow I was still :O when it arrived. Have I strategically purchased volumes that contain my favorite parts, maybe, what's it to you will i eventually get the whole thing because incomplete book series gnaw on my soul? yes

Wish the transition from "I've murdered several people in delightfully karmic ways" to "all you need is friendship in your heart and cards in your hand" Yami Yugi/Pharaoh had been discussed more/transitioned better. Buddy, where did you get this approved for television high horse? Please go back to strangling people with yo-yos or at least tell me why you stopped.

I still can't tell anything that looks like a big robotic monster apart from any other big robotic monster. My dude, I can't tell cars apart, all these monsters look the same.

Yami Yugi fascinated me way more in highschool? Maybe because it was still super early and the anime was like 'we need to torture you about his origins WeEkLy. Now I'm just like 'wait hold on, can we go back to Bakura and Marik for a minute, there's some extreme unpacking to do here?' Those two are paying so much more in baggage fees here my guy wow

Violently uninterested in any of the spinoff media

#yugioh #yu gi oh #ygo #there you go i can't imagine any other way you would decide was necessary to tag this #perhaps now that i have thrown this up i can #something #i don't know how i was going to finish that sentence #shut up lady

[xeo-kunsatan]

MonsterOlympics One Shot (+13) Part 3.

A new morning have been arrived at Monster Maze High.

Sunday 9:47 AM

Room 69

Betrayus was waking up with Muriel and a white haired human woman?

Betrayus:*Yawns* Morning Sweeties~

Muriel: Good morning Moonlight~

Beryl: Hmm~ Morning~

Betrayus: *takes air* Shit that was a crazy night yesterday... I didn't know that you were that good in this~

Muriel: Yeah dude, you were a beast last night~

Beryl: Tsk what are you talking about? You guys are incredible~

Suddenly that human transformed their body into their original form.

Beryl Marjorie

Boss of Jewels Mafia

Age: 125

Gender: Non Binary

Species: Shapeshifter/Wereleopard (Hybrid)

Beryl: And tell me~ are you agree with this payment method?

Muriel: Ohh~ it's the best and a big honor~

Betrayus: Oh Yeah~ That human disguise was a good idea, as you know i can't give myself this adventures with humans, because you know.. Ka-Boom!

Muriel: i can give myself freely this adventures with humans but i don't want to do it if I'm not next to my Moonlight~

Beryl: Awww~ it was a pleasure to make business with you too, now you have a new monetary support from my part.

Betrayus: and it's a pleasure to have your support, Thank you so much Ms Beryl.

Muriel: Come here Everytime you want it.

Beryl: See ya guys *puts in their clothing and leaves*

Beryl have left the room, to then go to a limousine waiting for them.

Note: Beryl is the Boss of a Mafia but they mostly prefers to use their money to support places which needs monetary help.

At the School Cafeteria.

The students where still feel a little tense after that fight from yesterday, mostly of them were still feeling the hurtful words from Manny, Specially Skeebo.

Sir C and Roxy went to them to give them at least good news for them.

Sir C: *with a speaker* Uhum Uhum, A-Attention Please Students! *Sneezes* I know you have felt stressed since yesterday butbi have good news for you.

Blinky: Good News my Balls!..

Roxy: Silence! C'mon Old man put more emotion in this..

Sir C: You're right Rox, The Hot Springs are Finally open for you, so you will have a better Sunday!.

All:......*Runs off to the Hot Springs*

Sir C: Wow, that worked so well..

Roxy: you see~

The students have run away to test the new hot springs

Note: there were 5 Hot Springs Rooms: Girls Room, Boys Room , Man Staff, Woman Staff and for some reason a secret one connected with both Staff rooms (Roxy's idea).

Boys Room

The boys were enyoing their new hot spring room, Skeebo still upset went to a shower next to a really worried Bradley.

Bradley: Foxy.. are you.. alright?..

Skeebo: *sighs*......

Bradley: C'mon you can tell me..

Skeebo: That stupid.. how he dares to make fun of me!!?? just because i have no family doesn't give him the rights to talk shit to me me! Nor even for the school!

Bradley: Don't let that affect you, you have a family here.

Skeebo: But not a biological!

Bradley: !!!!....

Skeebo: My brother left me, he was supposed to take care of me, we were supposed to be family.. and he still left me... For what!? To start a band and create a new family while I was dying of hungry and Cold!!!..

Bradley: Excuse me.. i know what are you feeling but i should remember you that my dad taked you to avoid that....

Skeebo: But what if he wouldn't taked me? Huh?...

Bradley: that's a Good point... *Sighs*.. Skeebo, please family it's not based by blood lines, it's based in the people who loves you and support you as you are..

Skeebo: *turns off*... You said that because you have your own parents and sister who loves you.

Bradley: Skeebo Please... What if he had a reason to left you?

Skeebo: *Hits Bradley* A Reason to Abandon me!!??

Bradley:!!!!!!..... *Trembling*

Skeebo: *reacts* Oh... No...

Bradley:*steps back*..

Skeebo: I-i-i am s-s-so sorry SugarBun!!.. I-i didn't mean to hurt you....

Bradley:*slaps Skeebo* Don't ever call me SugarBun!..*sightly sobs*... This time you Cross the line.. i thought you already understood about that you already have a family... But im wrong...

Skeebo: No Bradley please.. you are not wrong... I am sorry!...

Bradley: I Know you are really mad and hurted but that doesn't mean you can take avenge of me!

Skeebo: I-i know.. i really so sorry...

Bradley: *sobs* Fuck Off!! *Turns into a Bat and flies off crying*...

Skeebo: Bradley... *Sobs in silence* N-No... What a dumb i am... *Sighs*...

Skeebo was sobbing in the shower while the others would feel his silent lament.

Spiral: Ok Those 2 fighting? That's new

Pacster: Not really, they rarely have fights, and when they have them, they always fix the things and They reconcile with.. you know..

Blinky: I Know but this time it's harder..

Inky: yeah...

Clyde: Are they would be okay?...

Skeebo: Can you please SHUT THE FUCK UP!!?? THIS IS NOT YOUR FUCKING BUSINESS!!.

Farley: Ok he is really mad...

Farren: And that's a Mad Fox..

Farid: Oww~ they were such a good couple~...

After the shower, Skeebo left to his dorm which he shares with Bradley, discovering that Bradley wasn't there..

Skeebo: *Sighs and jumps to his bed*... Bradley... If i could... Wait.. *takes his phone to make a important call* Thanks to her i got him.. i hope she can help me to bring him back..

Skeebo called an already known number which helped him as many creatures.

C.A Cupid

Daughter of Eros

Age: ???

Gender: Female

Species: Cherub.

(No, it's not my cupid from Pmatga, she is from from MH/EAH)

C.A Cupid: Greetings, anything your heart wants to share?~

Skeebo: Hello Cupid.. i need your advices one more time but this time to bring my love back..

C.A Cupid: Huh, i think i remember your voice, Long time~ What happened?

Skeebo: You see...My Boyfriend and me had a fight but this time i messed up the things in the really awful way, he surely doesn't want me next to him anymore.. i didn't mean to hurt him..

C.A Cupid: Oh dear.. I'm sorry to hear that.. don't worry i know how i help you.

Skeebo: Please..

C.A Cupid: First give him some time to relax, and then Show him that you feel really bad for hurting him and for it, like give him something really special for you 2 since many years, the reason why you are together.

Skeebo: Something Special for us since many years.. alright I got it, thank you Cupid.

C.A Cupid: Always to help, thanks for calling for my advices.

The Call ended, and Skeebo was looking for an special thing to fix the things with Bradley.

Skeebo: Where is it?..

Betrayus: Where is what?~

Skeebo: Eh!?

Betrayus's stare started to hypnotize Skeebo to make him fall sleep and then take him secretly to a unknown place.

Meanwhile in Monster High.

Miss Bloodgood have asked her students to join a reunion.

Ms Bloodgood: Dear Students, I summoned you in this reunion to discuss about what we will do in the MonsterOlympics Event, the first thing is that all of you most behave and respect your opponents.

Lagoona Blue

Daughter of the Sea Monster.

Age: 16

Gender: Female

Species: Sea monster (Saltwater)

Lagoona: Ohh~ i really felt bad about them...

Ms Bloodgood: Me too Lagoona *sighs* Mostly of The Monster Maze High students have different and difficult situations at mostly of yours, their school is where they live.

Frankie: You mean, their school is their only home

Ms Bloodgood: That's right.

Deuce Gorgon

Son of Medusa

Age: 17

Gender: Male

Species: Gorgon

Deuce: Even Knowing that i can't believe that Manny said that..

Draculaura: Me either...

Holt: Well in certain part he is right

All: Holt!!!

Holt: ok ok.. sorry

Clawd: Just Great.. Now thanks to Manny they already have a bad image of us as the mean ones...

Gillington Webber

Son of the River monster

Age: 17

Gender: Male

Species: Sea Monster (sweet water)

Gil: *Sighs* Things will get so tense during the competency...

Frankie: This can't be like this, we most show them that as we accept us independent of our differences, we accept them too even if they are from other school.

Ms Bloodgood: Frankie is right, the next week the Event will begin, even if we are competing against them we most show them fellowship and support.

Frankie: All agree with you Headless Mistress!

The Reunion finished and everyone was free to leave to their classes.

Toralei and her gang was walking around the school noticing that almost every monster was watching her and whispering to eachother.

Toralei: Pfff, what did I do this time?~

Cleo: Oh My Ra, I didn't know you were like that Toralei?~

Toralei: Mew?~ What are you talking about?.

Cleo: Didn't you check out your phone? *Leaves mocking*

Spectra Vondeirgeist

Daughter of the ghosts

Age: ???

Gender: Female

Species: Ghost.

Spectra: I Hoope you enjoy this unexpected stooory~ *flying around*

Toralei: Huh!?

Toralei Checked out her phone to visit Spectra's Blog finding the surprised of that Spectra made a blog about her meeting with Farley, pointing them as an unexpected couple between a dog and a cat.

Toralei: Meww! No!!

As well her, Farley found out the gossip in the same Blog.

Farley: Woofy Shit!!

<×/////////////////////////////////////////×>

Meanwhile In a dark place, Skeebo waked up to notice that he was tied up.

Skeebo: What The!!??...

Betrayus: You Were a really really bad Fox...

Skeebo: Mr Betrayus!?... I-i didn't mean to hurt your son..

Betrayus: But you did it.. oww~ what a shame I have to do this...

Skeebo: .......*sighs as he sobs In silence*... I'm sorry... I really wanted to fix up the things with him, with effort and heart.. as I promised.. but I guess I most pay for not appreciate what I already had... Go ahead Mr Betrayus..

Betrayus:... Wise decision~

Betrayus hold up a big blade ready to end with the Fox's life to then....

To be Continued.

#pacman and the ghostly adventures #pmatga #monster maze high #monstermaze high #monster high #MH #frankie stein #Draculaura #deuce gorgon #Spectra #lagoona blue

[phis-corner]

demon’s daughter

I decided to re-open the taglist for this fic because I am sometimes a pushover, so now you can either ask or comment to be on the fic’s taglist or the permanent taglist! 

Additionally, I have no consistent update schedule. My first draft is written by hand- I always like to stay two chapters ahead, so I posted this chapter when I finished copying chapter 5 into a Google Doc and proofreading.

Also, fun fact: I hate chocolate. My senses just do not like it at all. I also have a very sensitive tongue and can taste the barest hint of spiciness in foods, which also means I have zero spice tolerance whatsoever. As a Chinese-American with family in Sichuan, this means I get force-fed a lot of extremely spicy foods anyway.

Masterlist Chapter 1 Chapter 2 [Chapter 3] Chapter 4

“Why are you letting them stay? He tried to kill Dick!” Timothy points at Damian, who glowers at him from across the cave as Alfred stitches Richard’s cuts.

Marinette sighs. “Akhi was not trying to murder Richard. If you paid more attention, you would notice that all of Richard’s wounds are carefully placed in non-lethal areas meant to slow him down instead of severely injuring him.”

Batman does not say a word. He hasn’t spoken since Richard called him to verify their claims.

“They were raised as assassins, Timmy. It’s normal that they’d feel threatened a lot, and act accordingly. They’re family now. Give them a chance.” Richard replies, and Marinette blinks. She did not expect to have Richard defend them so easily.

“Pardon me,” She pipes up. “But ‘they’ are currently present.”

“Right. Sorry.” Richard has the sense to look guilty. Timothy just glares.

Damian squeezes her hand three times, their signal for I would like to leave. Marinette sighs as she exits the Batcave. Being accepted into the family is… a work in progress.

.o0o.

Slade is put into Blackgate not long after with the information Ubu gave after being interrogated by the Bats. Damian and Marinette were not allowed to go. 

Too young, Richard had said. They had interpreted that as You cannot be trusted to keep him alive. He did make the right call though. Damian would have tried extremely hard had he gotten the chance.

Of course, the League did dispose of him not long after anyway, but it was the thought that counted.

Damian and Marinette spent their days in the Manor sparring, reading, or practicing their instruments. Richard, who seemed determined to bond with them, bought them both new sketchbooks, for Damian’s drawings and Marinette’s designs. She had discovered an affinity for clothing design while undercover on a mission, and had been designing ever since.

Cass (she insisted that they call her that instead of Cassandra,) was always happy to spar when asked, and although nobody ever defeated her, it was a welcomed challenge to fight someone who knew your every move, sometimes even before you did. Damian grudgingly admits she is a worthy sister, which makes Marinette smile and Cass beam.

Jason had his own home and only visited every once in a while, and Timothy was rarely seen. It didn’t help that Damian continued to make snarky comments whenever they did see him, but if Timothy was scarce, Father was practically nonexistent.

Since they came to the Manor, their father has said a total of two words to the both of them, and that was just their names when he exited his study as they passed by.

Marinette is determined to make her new family work, and so when she finds Timothy completely by accident, typing away on a laptop in one of the less-used rooms in the Manor, she takes a chance.

“You do know we are not trying to replace you, right?” She asks softly, sitting down in an armchair and deliberately not making eye contact with him. 

Timothy snorts. “But is that not what you’re doing? Bruce chose to take in everyone else. I had to blackmail him into letting me be Robin. And then the biological kids show up, born and raised like fucking royalty, so who would care about Tim Drake? The little kid whose parents didn’t even want him and his neighbor only adopted him because he knew his most well-kept secret.”

“We have more in common than you think.” Marinette says quietly.

“Yeah, right.” Timothy laughs bitterly. “The Princess of the League-”

“I wasn’t.” Marinette interrupts.

“Huh? But-”

“I wasn’t the Princess.” Marinette keeps her voice calm with considerable effort. “As soon as I was born, Ra’s gave me over to Lady Shiva. He declared me unworthy because I was a girl, and I was raised as the lowest-ranked assassin. I may have been Shiva’s protege, but that just meant she went even harder on me. I did not know even my last name until after my first death when I was five. I did not properly meet my brother until last year. Ra’s decided that I could be acknowledged, but maintained his stance on feminine inferiority.”

She chuckles hollowly. “You fear being replaced by your father figure’s biological children, Timothy. But your fear is unwarranted. Bruce Wayne chose to adopt you, because he is a good man with copious amounts of generosity. However, it evidently does not extend to his biological children. Talia dumped us at Batman’s feet and left without another word, without looking back. And Father? We may have been a complete surprise, but he has said two words in total to us since that first night- our names. You need not worry, Timothy. You shall not be replaced.”

Marinette stands, her message conveyed, and pauses in the doorway of the room. 

“Have a good afternoon, Timothy.”

The next day, Marinette and Damian watch on live television as their father is killed by Darkseid.

.o0o.

The funeral for Batman is somber. Everyone cries except for Marinette and Damian.

She thinks they should be crying, but Marinette simply didn’t know her father well enough to really mourn him. Damian squeezes her hand, and she squeezes back. The twins stand, faces carefully blank, shoulders straight and unmoving, like rocks in an ocean of tears.

Crime in Gotham runs rampant when they think Batman is gone, and so Richard becomes Batman out of necessity- and chooses her twin brother as his Robin.

Nobody else sees how it crushes Timothy, because Cass has left for Hong Kong, abandoning Batgirl and making her own identity as Black Bat. Jason is holed up in a safehouse somewhere, Richard and Damian are in their own little world as they prepare for their first patrol together, and Alfred needs time to mourn too.

So she finds herself knocking on the door to Timothy’s room, one hand holding a plate of sandwiches and a freshly brewed coffee because he hasn’t left his room since the funeral. Marinette quietly enters upon his muffled “Come in” and sets the plate down next to Timothy, whose eyes are red-rimmed and have even larger bags than normal, and yet he continues to work.

“I… noticed you have not come out to eat, so I brought some food and fresh coffee. Black.” She adds, after a moment of hesitation.

“Thanks.” Timothy mumbles, immediately going for the coffee. “Why are you doing this?”

Marinette shrugs. “Everyone else was caught up in their own situation and had issues to work through too. I am relatively unaffected by the circumstances and therefore my observation skills have not declined.” She says simply. “You should also eat. I will not stop you from drinking the coffee, but you cannot work on an empty stomach, either.”

He begrudgingly eats a sandwich, still typing away at his laptop all the while. Marinette notes the tension in his frame.

“Would you like to talk about it? I have read that venting is significantly better for one’s mental health than keeping it bottled up.” She offers.

Timothy suddenly slams the laptop shut, hard, but Marinette doesn’t flinch. The reaction was trained out of her a long time ago. 

“It’s not- it’s- my entire life, I’ve been trying to prove myself. Robin was- Robin was special. I wasn’t the first Robin, but it was a reminder that I was worth something to someone, that I could do good and be useful. And then Bruce dies, Dick becomes Batman, and he just names Damian as his Robin like my opinion on the matter meant nothing, booting me out of the position, without any semblance of an explanation and-” He breaks off into sobs.

The sight of somebody crying makes Marinette more than a little awkward, because what is she doing? She doesn’t know how to comfort a crying person, but she does know that Timothy was touch-starved as a child. However, she isn’t the most touchy-feely person on the planet either, so she just settles for rubbing his back as he lets it all out.

Once he’s run out of tears, she silently hands him the tissue box she plucked from his desk. 

“Timothy Jackson Drake-Wayne, you are not worthless.” Marinette says sternly. “Nobody is worthless, and you are far from being anywhere near so. You are the cleverest and most intelligent of us all, a capable, quick-thinking strategist, and you have detective skills that rivaled Father’s. I believe Richard chose Damian as Robin because Robin is always supposed to be Batman’s sidekick. He is always taken under Batman’s wing because there are things he hasn’t learned, that Batman can teach him. Richard sees you as an equal, and therefore cannot keep you as his Robin because you have graduated the mantle. It is time you created a new identity and moved on. Do you have anything in mind?”

Timothy sniffs once. “Thank you. I really needed that. And as for the ideas,” He reaches over and pulls out a sketchbook, a smile spreading across his face. “I’ve got a few.”

.o0o.

They brainstorm ideas for almost three hours before Timothy falls asleep. Marinette easily carries his light frame to his bed and drapes a blanket over his shoulders before quietly exiting his room.

Thankfully, she managed to convince Timothy that the cowl was a terrible idea. Marinette returns to her own room for her sketchbook. Batman and Robin will have each other’s backs. But Red Hood works alone, leaving Red Robin with nobody to watch his back.

Timothy is Marinette’s brother too, and everyone else is headed into the field anyway. She, like Damian, also had the phrase ‘justice, not vengeance’ drilled into her head, and Richard had made sure to remind them daily to aim for non-lethal spots. Not that she planned on taking a life ever again anyway.

Marinette flips open her sketchbook to a bookmarked page and smiles. It seems that Starling would be making an appearance very soon.

.o0o.

It is almost time for Richard and Damian’s first patrol as Batman and Robin. Marinette heads downstairs to wish them well, but freezes at the sight of her twin in Timothy’s old suit.

“This is unacceptable!” She screeches, hurrying forward and looking pleadingly at Richard. “You cannot let akhi out into Gotham looking like a traffic light!”

Richard frowns, as does Damian. “But you never had a problem with Tim wearing it.”

“Tt. Timothy had little to no prior experience in combat before being trained as Robin. Damian has been trained to utilize the shadows in combat since birth. Wearing those bright colors will make him stand out and put him at a disadvantage.” Marinette tuts, already scribbling out a new design in her sketchbook.

“Then what do you suggest, ukhti?” Damian asks.

“I have a design in mind. The colors will stay, but the yellow and green will have to be significantly darker, and the red should be dulled as well. Sadly, you will have to wear that monstrosity tonight, but I can have the suit finished in time for patrol tomorrow, as will mine and Timothy’s new suits.” She replies, not glancing up from her book.

“What do you mean, Marinette?” Richard questions, and Marinette feels a tiny twinge of annoyance at how he handled telling Timothy about Robin.

“I mean that Timothy and I have crafted new identities as well. You did not expect him to just stop fighting crime, or for me to just sit at home while everyone else carried out Father’s mission, did you?”

Damian nods, a small smile pulling at his lips. “It will be nice to see you in the field too, ukhti.”

“What will your names be?” Richard prods curiously.

“I will not tell you just yet.” Marinette smirks. She shows her twin the finished design. “Does this look alright, akhi?”

“It looks wonderful, ukhti.” Damian replies. “Thank you.”

She sniffs. “Well, somebody had to fix the lack of fashion sense in this household eventually.”

.o0o.

Everyone else in the family may use capes, but Marinette decided that Richard’s Nightwing suit was by far the best because of its lack of one. Capes were long, heavy, a waste of fabric, and overall useless.

The Starling suit was primarily black, with a dark emerald mask covering the lower half of her face (because why carry a gas mask and rebreather when it can be built in?) with gloves and boots in the same color. A single silver star with curved sides was splayed on her chest, and a dark green utility belt rested on her waist. Her steel war fans had holsters strapped to her thighs.

All in all, the suit was built for the shadows. Marinette had learned to master slipping through the dark, unseen, and Gotham was the perfect place to utilize that. Starling would be nothing more than a ghost, a legend, if she had her way. After all, the less citizens knew, the less likely the information would hit the underworld, and that way, the vigilantes wouldn’t have all their cards out in the open.

Damian looks much better in his new suit as well, and Timothy is also grinning when he steps out of the male’s changing room. (A/N: the new 52 suit. I’m not letting him out of the Cave with that ugly cowl, or the traffic light costume with an extra R. Don’t even get me started on the Drake one.)

Richard, cowl still down, smiles as bright as the sun itself. “Good to see you, Robin. Tim, Marinette, can I ask your names?”

Timothy fastens his domino. “Red Robin.”

Marinette pulls her face mask up and curtsies with perfect posture. “Starling. I wish to work in the shadows, if that is alright.”

Richard puts on the cowl and becomes Batman. “You guys all look amazing.” He grins, and it is unsettling to see Batman smile. Oracle logs into the comms from the Clocktower.

“You all ready?”

They split the city in half. Red Robin and Starling take the North while Batman & Robin will cover the South. 

Starling trails Red Robin from afar, leaping from building to building and only using her grappling hook when the distance is too great to close by foot. They stop four muggings and two attempted assaults, all without Starling being spotted. The criminals think they hit their head on the alley walls or each other instead of her fist from behind.

It’s almost three in the morning when Batman calls it quits and they return to the Cave, changing out of their suits and showering. They are somehow all unharmed, so Alfred sends them up to bed.

Damian and Marinette brush their teeth before climbing into bed and flipping off the lights.

“Tonight was actually quite enjoyable.” Marinette remarks. “It is a nice feeling, to know that you are helping people.”

Damian hums sleepily. “It is good to know that we are continuing Father’s legacy.”

Marinette smiles. “Yes, I suppose so.” She burrows deeper into her blankets. “Sleep well, akhi.”

“The same goes for you, ukhti.”

For once, Marinette doesn’t have a nightmare.

Previous ◈ Next

Taglist (re-opened and will stay open): @moonlightstar64 @dast218 @our-preciousss @novicevoice @pawsitivelymiraculous @trippingovermyfeet @miyla-lokidottir @consumeconstantly @mochegato @i-wanna-be-a-ninja @azuremayscarlet @iloveitwhen @bran-thecreeper-stark @no-username2544 @susiej1118 @kking13

Permanent taglist (always open): @wannajointhecrabcult @marinettepotterandplagg 

Unspecified (you asked to be tagged and did not specify which one): @momothefemur @indecisive-mess-named-me

Note: some of them didn’t work. I am terrible with technology and have no clue how to fix this.

#maribat #mlb x dc #demon's daughter au #my writing

[oddityvvitch]

wow, so i'm still sorta alive, after that weird period of my life-

#art #artists on tumblr #meet the artist #polish artist #digital art #digital drawing #digital artist #witchy art #witch artist #my brother in ra what the fuck am i supposed to do with this????? #idk how to tag this #idk how tags work

[morgansunflower]

My Only 1/2

Dick Grayson X Reader

Bruce Wayne X Selina Kyle

Warnings:non

Words: 944

In a au were Y/N is Bruce and Talia's first born daughter. Batman leaves with his second love to, Khadym. His intentions of bringing his daughter home.

Dick's P. O. V

In Wayne Manor. Jason sitting on the left couch and Duke, sitting on the right couch. Damian, standing leaned against the wall arm's folded. We just were told by Alfred that Bruce left Gotham to Khadym. What we need to know is, why? Why he proposed to, Selina? Which actually I'm not that shocked.

"this is your fault" Jason tells Duke

"what? How is it my fault?

"you're the latest, Robin. You're supposed to... Whatever. Brighten his dark side. All that crap. So he doesn't propose to a Villain and then run off and do.. This!"

"Jay.. What? Dude when you were Robin. You got dead then came back as a vigilante villain! And you're telling me 'brighten his dark side'. Not to mention, you steal-tire genius I'm not Robin" Duke points his thumb at Damian "he is"

I see Damian's face saddened he sits on the window sill couch. I step to him knowing he's about to break. I sit next to my little brother

"Thomas is... He's right it.. I.. I'm Robin.. It's.. It's my--" his voice brittle, he rubs the side of his face rubbing away his tear "it's.. It's my..." Damian, covers his face with his palms "it's my fault"

Damian, in tears and his face covered with his palm's. I want to repeatedly ask 'what's wrong?'. My arm across his back and my other hand on his knee

"Damian, Kid you ok? C'mon what's going on?"

"is he.. He doesn't.." Duke gulped

"okay, don't panic. This is happening. That's a real tear. We're all dead" Jason nervously stated

There Idiot's the last time Damian was this upset in front of me. Was the day, Y/N disappeared. He came to my apartment a dead end with the investigation. I had walked into the living room. I found Damian standing in front of my window. His shoulders were slouching, eye's puffed up, breathing through his mouth and when he looked at me he began to cry 

"I know..." Damian states

"what is it? What do you know? How can I help?"

"I know why father.. Why he would want to go to Khadym.. Khadym is... where she is hiding"

"what? Where who is hiding?"

Damian, looks at me with his saddened face, tears thankfully gone. My heart dropped further. I know that look of guilt.

"Y/N, my sister" my heart physically jumps, and my breath taken away. I see her in my mind.

Her soft skin, her mesmerizing eye's, her loving touch that melts me like amazing ice-cream in a hot summer day, her beautiful hair that I love to feel and her addictive lips. She disappeared a year ago. Dealing with my life without Y/N has made me a wrecked pile of shit. Sleeping you could hit me, with a baseball bat and I'd still be awake, well unless I went unconscious. I couldn't make myself look at our pictures. I always go back to our last night together when I close my eye's. Trying to find someone better, is impossible. She's my favorite person to talk to, laugh with and be with. I'd settle down and take care of her. Maybe just maybe make a family with her. Her being a assassin's daughter created to be a weapon. I didn't see her as that, I only saw someone who wanted love. I remember showing her the different thing's about the world. She showed me real love, a love for someone to love for the rest of your life, to be happy and to feel whole. I'd do anything to get her back in my life again. I still have her the ring to ask her for forever. The ring was my birth mother's. It's in my room in my nightstand drawer.

"Duke" Jason said in a threatening tone

"yeah, man" Duke nervously answered

"you're going to be the official Robin because I am going to--" I cut my dimwitted brother off pointing my finger at, him

"Jason, you are not laying a hand on, Damian" I demanded

Jason, points at Damian with a, genuinely hurt look "why the fuck shouldn't I?! Y/N, was-is my fucking sister, brat. She's not only yours to keep to yourself!"

Damian, stood abruptly pointing at, Jason "tt you are a child Todd! Y/N, left to keep our worthless lives safe from Talia and Ra's" Damian argued

"well then Damian and I are going on a grand adventure" I enthusiastically said with a smile

"wait now hold on a damn minute! You are not leaving me here" Jason demanded

I stood walking to Jason his arm's folded. I placed my hand on his shoulder

"hey listen to me. You go and it will be more than what is necessary. I need you, Tim, Duke and the girls to look after Gotham. Until we get back, with Y/N and Batman. Besides you won't have Bat's and I breathing down your neck on patrol. I know how much you care about me to listen, and because I'm getting someone back. Who taught you a better way to be a--"

Jason, scoffed with a irritated look "quit with the damn sob story and you better fucking back by sunrise or I'm coming to save the day my way"

I ruffle his hair as if he was still that little kid in that Robin uniform "thanks Little-Wing"

He pushed me away "get the hell outta here asshole before I kick your ass"

Damian, stood by my side I put my arm on his shoulder. We walked to the Bat-cave

"alright, Little-D off on our adventure"

"tt your pathetic Grayson"

#batman #bruce wayne #batfamily #batfam #Dick Grayson #Dick Grayson X Reader #Dick Grayson/Reader #Bruce Wayne X daughter!reader #Wayne! Reader #Jason Todd #Duke Thomas #Overprotective Jason #Batfamily #Batsister #Bruce/Selina #BatCat

[supernaturalfreewill]

Words: 4,380 Sam x Reader Warnings: None really! A/N: SURPRISE! This is the first part of a new Sammy series! I think it will be around 4 parts, but last time I said that Mess Is Mine happened so... I just won't guess this time. I'm working on like 8 other stories right now, but this one refused to go away unless I put it down. Based on this imagine .

Your name: submit What is this?

Your sister and Dean were arguing about who had won the last game of poker, a fairly frequent occurrence during your weekly game night. You were startled to find that Sam was already looking at you when you looked up from stacking the cards back into the game case. It sent a jolt like an electric-tinged chill up your spine. The best you could do back was to smile at him briefly and tear your eyes away.

“Well, I’m heading to bed I think,” your sister said, yawning and stretching. She stood and wrapped her arms around Sam’s neck from behind, leaning in close to give him a kiss. “Are you coming to bed?” she asked him pointedly.

Your stomach tightened into a knot. “’Scuse me,” you said with a forced smile. You gathered a few empty bottles and glasses and exited for the kitchen abruptly.

Once there all you could do was lean over the sink, white-knuckling the edge of the counter, trying to think of anything but what you actually were thinking of… Footsteps behind you jolted you into action. You blasted the water on and grabbed the soap and a sponge.

“Relax. It’s just me,” Dean said.

You dropped the pretense of washing the dishes and spun to face him where he was leaning against the table giving you a knowing look. “Y/N…” he started.

“Don’t.”

“But? But?! My sister, Dean! My sister! How could I do that to her?” you demanded. “I can’t. I can’t do that.” You couldn’t meet Dean’s eyes.

He let out a heavy sigh. “Then you’re going to be stuck just where you are now. Wouldn’t you rather regret going for it than sitting back and not trying?”

You glared at him. “I think I’d regret ruining my relationship with the one blood relative I have left.” There was a tense silence that stretched far longer than was comfortable before you finally broke it. “I’m going to bed… Tell them goodnight for me.”

“Wait,” Dean called after you.

“Goodnight, Dean.” You hugged him, long enough for him to sigh heavily again and plant a kiss on the top of your head.

“Goodnight…” he murmured, and then you were gone with a soft padding of stocking feet.

Dean wandered back out into the library to find Sam still sitting at the table, a fresh glass of something in front of him. “Isn’t that like your fourth nightcap?” Dean asked.

Sam glowered at him momentarily. “Pot. Kettle. Black,” he said.

Dean pulled a face and shrugged. “Fair enough.” He poured himself a share of whiskey too and sat down across from his little brother. “Isn’t someone waiting for you?” Dean asked.

Sam’s jaw tensed. “Yeah, I–I told her I’d be in in a bit…” He hesitated and cleared his throat a little awkwardly. “…Where’s Y/N?”

Dean was just about ready to scream. “Bed. Told me to tell you ‘goodnight.’”

“Oh… okay.” Sam drank deeply from his glass, nearly draining it.

Dean raised his eyebrows at his little brother. “Something you want to share with the class? Thoughts, maybe?”

Sam shook his head. “No.”

Dean left a beat of silence. “You know, you’ve been putting kind of a dent in my whiskey lately. You think I haven’t noticed? Am I supposed to just pretend that new bottle was 2/3 empty when I bought it.”

Sam shifted uncomfortably and gulped down the tightness in his throat to little effect.

“Sammy… come on. Talk to me. What the hell is going on in that long-maned head of yours?”

Sam shut his eyes for a moment and chewed his bottom lip. “I’m in love with Y/N,” he blurted out. “And it’s a mess. I’m with her sister. I’m dating her sister! And I’m love with Y/N.” There was something like anguish in his voice.

Dean stared across the table at Sam’s tortured expression. There was nothing to say to that.

“So, you know what? I’m taking a leaf out of your book and having a few nightcaps… that way when I wake up in the morning on the right side of the wrong bed, maybe I won’t care so much...” He downed the little remaining in his glass. “And I really can’t deal with a lecture from you right now, Dean, so just–just don’t. Night.”

Sam got up, leaving his empty glass behind, and stalked out.

“Jesus fu–am I living in the goddamn Twilight zone or some shit?! Didn’t I just have this conversation?!” Dean muttered aloud to himself. “There is not enough fucking whiskey in the world right now for this…” And with that he poured himself another.

_ _ _ _ _ _

You woke up very early, having gone to bed much before your usual time simply because you wanted to be unconscious… It seemed to be the only time you didn’t have that ache in your midsection and painful swirl of thoughts in your brain. You headed for the kitchen, looking forward to a hot cup of coffee and maybe some quiet self-reflection to stop your spinning. But you were surprised to find that you weren’t the only one awake despite the very early hour.

“Oh—” you let out a little surprised noise when you crossed the threshold and Sam looked up from his place at the center island.

“Y/N,” he said, his eyes a little surprised. He straightened up in his seat. “Hey.” He had passed some fitful portion of the night beside your sister and finally surrendered to insomnia. He had hoped that not lying next to her, feeling like a liar, would diminish his anxiety but it had proved to be mostly wishful thinking. He rubbed a hand anxiously over the back of his neck. “You’re up early,” he said.

“Yeah, umm… went to bed early so…” You smoothed a hand over your hair, quite sure that it was probably unruly from your tossing and turning all night. Sam loved that. “Coffee?” you asked. He jumped to his feet.

“Yeah. Of course. Let me get it for you,” he said.

“Oh, thanks.” Sam poured you a big mug of coffee from the pot and went to the fridge to grab some milk.

“You just take milk, right?” he asked, even though he knew the answer. He knew how you liked your coffee. He always knew what book you were reading. He knew your favorite color was seafoam. He knew you liked a gin and tonic with about an entire lime in it. He knew you liked whiskey and water, and dark beer, and the lavender-scented dryer sheets. He knew every little detail about you and he loved every single one.

“Yeah. Thank you,” you said. You accepted the mug from Sam and his fingers brushed yours as he handed it to you. You knew how cliché and stupid it was, but your heart still jumped at the contact. Is this what you would have to keep living on? A split second of Sam? You felt like a drug addict, sustaining only on the thought of the next high. You studied him as he sat down at the island again and you quickly noticed the dark circles under his eyes. “…Are you alright?”

Sam’s eyes flickered up to meet yours, startled a little by the question. God, how badly he wanted to answer truthfully. He wanted to tell you, No. I’m not alright. I’m not. I’m living a lie I don’t know how to get out of without ruining the path to what I really want. Instead he nodded. “Yeah,” he said, sipping his coffee. “Just a little tired.”

“Mmm. Trouble sleeping?” you asked, absently rotating your mug on the marble counter, warming your fingers. Seemed like you both had the same problem the previous night.

“Uhh—a little. But I’m okay,” he said, he tried to force a reassuring smile. He didn’t want to think about lying in bed next to your sister. It was the last thing he wanted to think about. “Thanks,” he said. “For asking though.”

You nodded. “Sure, of course.” A long moment of silence stretched and you were surprised that when you looked up, Sam’s eyes were already on your face, but he tore them away quickly and looked down into his mug. Your heart beat faster as you wondered at the meaning. You searched for something to say to him, something to bring his eyes back to yours. You could look into them forever—you always saw such understanding, such strength in them. And he was warm and funny and smart and kind… and this thinking made your stomach clench because you knew he was out of reach.

Sam cleared his throat and pushed down the sick feeling in his own stomach. “So, what’s on the schedule for today?” he asked.

You shrugged. “I dunno. I was thinking of working out later. Maybe kick Dean’s ass sparring,” you said, a small smirk gracing your face.

Sam let out a small laugh and shook his head. “That’d be good for him,” he said. But he felt a jealous twinge and a heat rising in his chest that he tried to ignore.

“How about you?” you asked. Sam shrugged.

“I don’t know… We’ll see. Maybe try and rustle up a case or something.” It was a classic method of distraction that Sam tried to use, even though it was only a temporary success. He would work, and work, and work. And it gave him an excuse to tell your sister he was busy, that he couldn’t take the time that day to spend with her doing something that he felt wasn’t genuine because all he could think about was doing it with you instead…

One corner of your mouth twitched upwards. “You work too much, Sam.”

He ran a hand through his hair. “Yeah… I know… but there’s always something else out there.”

“Exactly. There is always something else out there. And there always will be. So, you should take the time off when you can. Enjoy life a little,” you said, brave enough to meet his kaleidoscope colored eyes again.

Sam nervously chewed his bottom lip. He could be consumed by you instantly if he let himself—the way you were looking at him with that small smile and your eyes so bright, seeing only him in that moment. Reality reared its ugly head suddenly when footsteps started up the hallway and broke the temporary spell.

Your sister bounced into the kitchen. “Morning!” she said. She went over to Sam and ran a hand down his back affectionately, pecking him on the cheek. “I was a little bummed out to see your side of the bed empty this morning…” she said in a low voice to Sam.

You abruptly got up and headed across the kitchen to the pantry, feeling suddenly sick with envy and wanting to distance yourself as much as possible. You started pulling ingredients out just for the distraction and your sister was soon at your side. “Whatcha makin’?” she asked.

“Pancakes?”

“Sounds good. Better you make them than me. You remember what happened last time?”

You shook your head at her and laughed lightly at the last kitchen disaster. “Smoke. Everywhere. You shouldn’t even be allowed in the kitchen,” you teased her.

“I will never try again,” she said with a laugh. “I have no problem acknowledging my faults.” She bumped you with a friendly elbow. “Soooo…” she started. Her tone made you look up at her a little tentatively.

“…Oh, no. I know that tone. What is it?”

She grinned widely at you.

You raised your eyebrows at her. “What is it? Cough it up,” you said. “I can see you are plotting something…”

“Well, I was thiiiinking we should go out tonight. Get out of the bunker… You know, go into town… maybe go to that bar with the suuuuper hot bartender?” she said, wiggling her eyes at you.

You sighed. “I don’t know… I kind of just feel like staying in.” You didn’t know Sam was listening intently now from his place at the island still.

“You always feel like staying in! That’s why you have me to twist your arm and get you out of here before you turn into an old spinster who is in a serious relationship only with her books and tea kettle.”

You rolled your eyes. “Wow. Gee, thanks, sis…” you said sarcastically. “And you know what? That actually doesn’t sound too bad!”

This drew a laugh from her and she bounced on her feet a little. “Pleeeeease! Come on. You know once you’re out you will have a good time! And that bartender was totally into you last time.”

You looked at her eager expression and the excitement in her eyes. Maybe a night out would do you some good. You could definitely use a distraction and the bunker was somehow always haunted with Sam and your sister’s relationship… Reminders everywhere; that they shared a room and a bed together, that you could walk around any corner and find them kissing, or sitting closely, or whispering some secret conversation with secret smiles you weren’t privy to… “Alright. Fine,” you agreed. “But for like two beers and that is it!”

She pumped a fist in excited success. “Yes! Oh, I’m totally gonna pick out your outfit and everything. You’re gonna look hot,” she said.

You pointed vehemently at her. “No dresses!”

“But—”

“No! No dresses!” She pouted at you but relented.

“Fine… no dresses…”

“Dresses?” Dean said, coming to join the rest of you in the kitchen and peeking over your shoulder at the bowl you were dumping ingredients in. “Who’s wearing a dress?”

“No one!” you said loudly.

Dean grabbed a mug and poured in some coffee. “Why not? I’d love to see you in a dress, Y/N,” he said laughing gruffly. “Like, a short, tight little black cocktail dress… some high heels. Right, Sammy?” he asked, giving Sam a wink and drawing a very unamused stare from him. You gave Dean a scolding look and he relented.

“We’re going out tonight to Lucky’s,” your sister explained. “And I’m gonna pick out Y/N’s outfit and she is going to flirt with that hot bartender who was hitting on her last time.” You rolled your eyes.

“Ah,” Dean said. He chanced a glance at Sam and noted the muscle twitching in Sam’s jaw as he clenched his teeth. “I see.”

You turned to look at Dean. “You wanna spar later?” you asked him. God, you needed to work off some frustration and bitter jealousy…

He sipped casually at his coffee. “You wanna get your ass kicked later?” he asked, giving you a satisfied smug smirk.

You tilted your head and raised your eyebrows at him, a half-smirk on your face. God, Sam loved that expression, the playful spark in your eyes. “We’ll see, tough guy,” you said, turning back to the pancake batter.

_ _ _ _ _ _

A few hours later, you and Dean were both a little sweaty, circled up on the mat in the room you had converted to a work out area. You had your hands up and were seizing each other up, both with grins on your faces as you waited to see who would strike next.

“Give up yet, Winchester? By my count, you’re losing,” you goaded him. He laughed and wiped some sweat from his brow.

“You have gotten a lot better, Y/N. Must be because you have an amazing tutor,” he said with a gruff laugh. “And quite handsome at that!”

You rolled your eyes which was a mistake because Dean took that opportunity and swept your legs out from under you and you landed hard on your back on the mat, gritting your teeth a little as the breath was knocked out of you. Dean laughed hard as you let out a frustrated groan. Once you caught your breath, you accepted his proffered hand to help you back up. Sam came in just then as you were circling back up, ready for the next bout. Dean bounced lightly on the balls of his feet in the typical boxing shuffle, hands up in guard. “Sammy!” he yelled, seeing his brother come in. “Good. It will be nice to have someone else witness Y/N’s destruction—”

But just then you threw three punches at him and he had to scramble to block two of them. He wasn’t fast enough for the third and you landed a solid hit into his stomach, giving him a satisfied “HA!” and a wide grin.

“What’s that you were saying, Dean?” Sam called out, grinning, sitting down on one of the benches along the wall.

Dean shook it off and the two of you had an intense bout where you both gained ground on the other but were eventually blocked or fought it off. Finally, you sent a jab straight at Dean’s chin but he was able to block it and reroute your momentum, grabbing your arm and again sending you down to the mat. Just then as you were letting out a string of expletives and Dean was laughing heartily in victory, a cell phone rang.

“Oh, shit. That’s probably Garth. I gotta take that. I’m expecting him to call to today,” Dean said, heading over to the bench and grabbing his cell phone. He looked at Sam, whose gaze was fixated on you where you were lying on your back still in the middle of the mat, just resting for a minute and beating yourself up for letting Dean drop you. “Sammy, I’m tagging you in,” he said, giving him a wink.

“What?” Sam’s eyes went a little wide.

“I said you’re in. Hello? Yeah, hey Garth…” Dean stepped into the hall leaving Sam alone with you.

He gulped at the nervousness in his throat and stood up, walking out onto the mat. “Hey,” he said. “You okay?”

You sat up abruptly, a little surprised to see Sam appear over you so suddenly. “Yep. Fine.”

Sam offered you a hand and you felt butterflies flutter to life in your stomach as he pulled you up to your feet. Your hand stayed in his perhaps just a little too long.

Sam cleared his throat and looked down at you. “Uhh… Can I show you how Dean got you down?”

“Oh—yes. Please. I hate when he wins,” you said, giving Sam a small smile.

Sam anxiously rubbed the back of his neck as he stood in front of you. “Okay. Well, go into your guard stance,” he said. You obliged, stepping one foot slightly back and the other forward. “Good. Now, you want to use your lower body to propel that punch, but you need to be able to maintain your balance.” Sam squared up with you, pulling his hands up into guard. “So, just keep a little more weight on your back foot when you jab and propel yourself from your hips.” You nodded. “Okay, try it,” Sam said, holding a palm out. “Hit it, right here.”

You threw a jab at his palm, but he pulled back right before you connected and again you lost your balance and pitched forward toward him. “Whoa!” Sam laughed a little and caught you, his hands landing instinctively on your hips to stop your momentum. You both froze for a moment. You were still breathing fast from the physical exertion, but Sam was too, for an entirely different reason. Your hips felt small under his hands, and he could clearly feel their curve and angles. His heart was pounding and he felt a jolt of electricity zip up his spine. Perceiving that he should have let you go by now, his hands floated off you and he stepped backward. You anxiously chewed your bottom lip. There were tingles trailing behind where his hands had been. “Uhh—a little better, but you’re still taking too much weight off that back foot. Try again,” he said.

You both resumed your guard and Sam held a hand up again. This time you threw your jab and though he moved his hand back before you connected, you maintained you balance and immediately threw a cross punch which he had to block. A smile grew on his face and a matching one lit up yours. “Good! That was a really good!”

“Thanks,” you said, still squared up with him. You quickly threw a couple punches which Sam skillfully blocked and he returned—and that was it. You were full on sparring. Sam dodged one of your punches and you surprised him immediately with a high kick that caught him in the chest, knocking him off balance. But he was right back into it, now advancing on you and forcing you to give up ground. You waited for an opportunity to throw a combination at him but he somehow saw it coming and blocked it. The next second you skillfully swept a leg underneath him as he recovered from a block and he tumbled back onto the mat, landing hard but immediately starting to laugh. You stood over him with a wide grin on your face and walked over to look down at him. “Give?” you asked him.

His only response was to sweep one of his legs from where he was laying on the floor, taking you out at the ankles and sending you sprawling down on top of him. “Shit!” You landed with one arm extended to catch yourself on the floor and the other on his strong chest. Your body was pressed into him and you immediately felt your cheeks flush. You could feel his hips pressing into you. You lips were mere inches from his and you could see all the hues in his irises. He swallowed hard and there was a vague smile on his face.

Suddenly, you felt one of his hands landed ever so gently on your lower back and wow, electricity. “Give?” he joked, the vague smile still on his face, his eyes starry, his heart pounding. He couldn’t believe you were actually pressed against him and he wondered that you hadn’t immediately moved, climbed to your feet, put distance between the two of you. You felt paralyzed looking into his eyes.

“I give,” you said. Your voice was low and breathy because truthfully you couldn’t breathe, you were so startled by the whirling feelings and thoughts washing over you. Sam’s hand landing so lightly there on your lower back, it felt intimate.

But you suddenly heard the door open, and Dean stepped back into the room having gotten off the phone with Garth. The noise called you back to your senses and you leapt to your feet, anxiously backing away from Sam, but you weren’t quite fast enough. Dean had frozen a couple steps in and seen you on top of Sam—but he quickly pretended he hadn’t.

Sam cleared his throat and climbed to his feet, sweeping his hands back through his hair. “Good. Yeah, just… don’t let your guard down. Ever. Even once you have them on the ground.”

You were a little wide-eyed and you turned and headed for your water bottle and towel on the bench. Dean gave you a meaningful look as you approached but you just tore your eyes away from him.

“What did I miss?” he asked you in a low voice, his tone pregnant with meaning.

Sam watched from the center of the mat as you dabbed at your forehead and neck with your towel. “Nothing,” you said to Dean. “Just—training.”

“Mhmm…” Dean replied, a small smile tugging at his lips.

“Stop it.” Dean held his hands up in a sign of surrender. “Umm… I’m gonna go shower,” you said.

“Alright. Well, hey, I saw your sister in the hall. She wants to head out to the bar in like an hour and a half.” You nodded and quickly waved to Sam as you left the room, feeling your cheeks coloring again with a blush and hoping that your face was already red enough from the exercise to hide it.

“Thanks, Sam. Alright, I’ll see you guys in a bit…”

Dean noted that his brother’s eyes didn’t leave you until you disappeared through the door, which slammed and echoed in the space with an uncomfortable finality. Dean pressed his lips into a thin line and looked at his little brother. “So,” he said.

Sam frowned at him. “So, what?”

Dean shrugged and raised his eyebrows. “What exactly was that?” he asked, the gravel thick in his voice.

“What? Nothing. I just—we were sparring and—”

“Oh, you were sparring,” Dean repeated skeptically, crossing his arms over his chest. “Because when I came in it didn’t look like there was a lot of sparring going on as much as it looked like Y/N was on top of you and—”

“Stop.” Sam admonished.

“Sammy, come on. I spar with Y/N all the time and we have never ended up like that—”

Sam’s jaw clenched and he gave one last stern look to his older brother. “I’m just—just forget it. I’m gonna go get cleaned up and it sounds like you should too.”

“Sam! Sammy, come on,” Dean called after him, but Sam just waved him off and disappeared into the hall, leaving Dean to sigh heavily in frustration.

Part 2

#sam x reader #sammy angst #sam winchester #sam winchester fanfiction #fanfic #supernatural #spn

[duelistkingdom]

so this was drafted at the start of my sub watch and like... i am keeping track of the plot holes. under the cut you’ll find all the plot holes i noticed in season four. please. help.

dartz being able to... seal the door to yami yugi’s memories?

summoning the winged dragon of ra when it cannot be summoned without a chant

rafael being able to free the souls of rex and weevil

the mural depicting the destruction of their civilization. a) who the fuck and b) how the fuck and c) why would arthur, a phd having archaeologist, assume it depicts that

why did arthur assume these ruins are 10,000 years old when nothing suggests that this could that far back

how the hell does dartz recall events he wasn’t there for? he’s never been to japan

how did haga and ryuzaki sneak onto the plane without security throwing a fit?

kaiba literally controls 51% of kaiba corp. this is a consistent plot point in the manga and the duel monsters anime. kaiba having controlling shares is literally how he gained control of kaiba corp. how did dartz buy a controlling share when kaiba would never sell his shares?

amelda, while disguised as pegasus, recalls the events of duelist kingdom. this is a snag, however. pegasus stealing the souls of the kaiba brothers and sugoroku mutou were not public knowledge. before you say “maybe mai told him”... mai was not present for the kaiba versus pegaus duel. so how did amelda come to learn of these events?

war doesn’t work like that.

how fuckin cheap was amelda’s mother’s pendant if it just snaps off mikey’s neck like that and bounces six fuckin feet away from the tank?

why would amelda just trust this random stranger to be telling him the truth anyway?

why. the fuck. would mai not be wearing a motorcycle suit? isn’t she concerned about road rash????

motorcycles are not that flammable. in fact, most motorcycles are designed to avoid burning up on impact because in many cases, the driver will already be seriously injured.

abandoned gas stations in america do not work like that

how. in the fuck. did that car get that ruined that quicky. sure, jonouchi says “can’t you drive in a straight line” but it begs the question of why let honda drive if honda cannot fuckin drive. jonouchi has been established as a good driver already. why would honda take the wheel?

how the fuck did rafael know where yami yugi is going? he’s never met this dude and every assumption he’s had on him has been wrong. why would THIS one be correct? and don’t tell me “it’s the logical conclusion” because no one in this show has any logic.

why. the fuck. did they blow up the hawkins residence? isn’t the a chance yami yugi would think arthur had died in the explosion if rebecca hadn’t witnessed everything?

for that matter, why would they think yami yugi cared about what happened to hawkins anyway? aren’t they supposed to think he’s evil? what the fuck.

rebecca literally is not yugi’s girlfriend.

more issues will be here

rafael’s soul does not get taken because he had no darkness inside him. this doesn’t fucking make sense. yugi was still taken by the seal of orichalcos and it is a major plot point that yugi is a soul free of malice and darkness. if a soul as pure as yugi’s can be taken, then rafael, a dude who fucking stole people’s souls, absolutely should have been taken. full stop.

how the hell did pegasus know about the legendary knights?

ther’es othters but i gave up

[byima]

California Dreaming pt 4

I shared this on AO3 half a month ago and I’m just getting around to cross posting for the tumblr folks and you can read the full story here.

Lunch was a boisterous event. They ate at, or commandeered depending on who was asked, an Italian restaurant in the city of Berkeley. Everyone was there; Frank, Hazel, Nico, Grover, Silena, Beckendorf, Travis, Connor, Katie, Rachel, Jason, Piper, and Leo. Remi was there too, and so was Annabeth’s dad and her stepmom and half-brothers, who were in town because of her own commencement which had been the day before, and so was Frank’s grandmother. The restaurant was cozy, it smelt heavenly; 70’s and 80’s music buzzed through the speakers, friendly staff flitted between tables. Their group was two tables strong, too loud, too rowdy and it was one of few times the whole commencement weekend that Annabeth felt overwhelmed but energized by that feeling, rather than drained.

“No Charlie, this is the perfect time! We can rent a van–”

“Yup, just picture it man, tearing down the roads, stopping wherever we want, camping out during the nights–”

Silena grimaced, and Charles laughed at her expression. She and Travis had been trying to convince Charles and Katie to take a west coast road trip: from northern California to Nevada, then Utah, then Arizona and then down to southern California.

“I’ll be down, if we do this without a single hotel stay.” From Charles. Who was next to Paul, who was next to Sally, who was across from Percy.

“Two hotel stays.” From Silena, next to Charles. She was in full negotiation mode.

Estelle, on Sally’s other side, ducked under the table to retrieve the errant crayon she’d been using to color her kid’s menu. Through the aged speakers, Dexys Midnight Runners chorused, ‘Too-ra loo-ra too-ra loo-rye-ayyyyyyy,’ and the space hummed with a spicy-herb/heavy-sauce fragrance and music and laughter and liveliness.

“Nah Silena, if we’re doing this, we’re doing this for real.” From Travis, a few seats to Percy’s right.

Grover, on Percy’s direct right, finally found the image on his mostly unused, worse-for-wear Nokia brick of a phone. He held up the battered screen to Percy’s face. “This is it. See the name on that wrapper? I need to find this place and try their samosas–”

“Explain to me how staying in a hotel would make this ‘not real’ Travis.”

He raised his slice of buttered bread to his mouth. “I’m just talking about getting the most experiential of experiences–”

“And I’m talking about having semi-regular shower access–” Silena leaned towards the Stoll brother sitting across from her to emphasize her point.

“And apparently the locals have nicknamed the San Francisco fog Karl.” A fun fact from Paul.

“Is that so?” Piper encouraged him with a broad grin.

She got an under the table kick from Annabeth for that one.

At the other table, Frank’s grandmother held her new smartphone for Leo to see.

“Don’t do it for me, show me how so I can do it myself.”

“Er, sorry, Grandma Zhang you just- you have to… here-”

“No, I said show me, and now you’ve done something else, Valdez!”

“I know, but I’m trying to show you how to go back without a back button,” Leo ran an agitated hand through his curls.

Travis leaned forward too, matching Silena’s energy, bitten bread slice brandished. “You’re weak. And I’ve outgrown you.”

Charles was laughing again. Hard. Like struggling to breathe belly laughing.

“Why is Beckendorf having a conniption?” Piper’s voice carried from the other end of the table.

Katie answered. “Travis is back to quoting The Incredible’s.”

Connor was losing it, too. “My man Beckendorf has caught every single one of them.”

“Name a better Disney movie–”

“I’ve already named one. Mulan. And– Travis, I’m serious, we’ll watch it tonight and it'll shut you right up-” 

“Katie, Katie, Katie…” Travis shook his head in pity. “You can’t admit defeat, huh? I saw you last night, trying to act like you weren’t hyped during the family fight scenes-”

Silena smacked her hand impatiently on the table. “Travis, can you, for just one moment, stay with me? You were supposed to be on my side.” 

“And I was. I am.” He leveled an accusatory finger at her face. “But you’re a wuss if you can’t survive one road trip without hotel amenities.”

“You’re full of shit, Trav.” Back to Katie, sitting between Grover and Travis.

There was a minor uproar.

“Hey hey hey, watch your mouth young lady there are children present–”

“Don’t forget the children–” 

Connor and Travis. They are the uproar.

“Percy says that word a lot. So, I know it’s a bad word.” Estelle looked at her brother, then Connor, as she sold the former out.

There were a couple “oooo’s” from the friends gathered and Percy shook his head at the betrayal, hand on his chest because, alas, he’s Caesar, and Brutus has two pigtails and missing teeth.

Estelle, loving the reaction of the masses and her moment in the spotlight, added, “So does my mom.”

The entire table erupted in a chorus of “OOOOOOOO’S” and Paul looked at Sally, a little baffled and overwhelmed and amused because how else could he feel in such a setting?

“Sally Jackson, patron saint of motherhood–”

“Despite the utter disappointment that is her first born–”

“You’ve been called out, ma’am, how do you respond?”

Sally covered Estelle’s ears. “Fuck off. All of you.” A thespian response from the “saint” herself. 

The large party collectively lost it, roaring laughter carried through the restaurant, other patrons looked around to spot the source of the ruckus.

“Ladies and gentlemen, Sally Jackson-Blofis–”

“She’s quick, she’s gritty, and she’s straight from New York City–”

“I think that’s us.” Grover’s eyes followed his nose, which picked up on the savory scent of freshly prepared food being brought near to them. A united cheer drew attention, once again, to the celebrating group. 

 “You guys are gonna get us kicked out before we can even take a bite.” Frank made accidental eye contact with a frowning restaurant-goer.

Waitstaff arrived at their tables with black trays laden with the steaming, heavenly smelling bounty.

The young woman who’d taken their orders earlier gestured to the guy accompanying her.

“Alright everyone, this is Gio, he’s gonna take over for me since my shift is ending.” There were some noises of disappointment and she playfully hushed the table of spirited demigods. She set a plate of spaghetti with meatballs in front of Estelle and a baked chicken parmesan dish in front of Sally, gently warning the child that her plate would be hot.

Gio waved hello before he started distributing ordered dish to orderer. “Nani told me we have some graduates here today…”

 -----

“So Italians will actually eat it like… this.” Nico demonstrated to Jason.

“Like this?”

“Yeah…”

“Really?”

“Nah, I’m just fucking with you.”

 Percy nodded at Annabeth’s dish. “How is it?”

“It’s so good. You wanna try?”

Annabeth was already twirling her fork into the pasta, and she speared a piece of shrimp on the end before raising the bite to Percy’s waiting mouth. His eyes rolled back and he made a low noise as he slowly chewed.

Her eyes danced. “I don’t think it was that good.”

He shook his head in disagreement. “Lemme have some of yours. And you can have some of my pizza.”

“I don’t want your pizza.”

“You do. This is what they mean when they talk about the best of both worlds.” Percy tried forking a portion of her food from her full plate to his and she stopped him, doing it herself before he made a mess of both of them with his clumsy portioning.

“And then I give you some of mine…”

Annabeth felt a hand on her shoulder and she turned from watching Percy lower a slice of his pizza (which was actually heavy with cheese and red sauce and phenomenal tasting) to look at her dad who was seated behind her at the table running parallel to theirs.

“How does it feel to be finally done? Both of you, graduated and diploma’d.”

Dr. Chase had been on cloud nine the whole weekend. His daughter had graduated from the best public university in the country. What else would you expect from the academia-loving dad? But the last five years had been pivotal for their relationship, too. When Annabeth looked at her father, really looked at him, she saw the sadness edging his expression. Because he knew, as she closed this chapter of her life, she would begin another, and he would lose her to the east coast. So she’s been gentle with him, and maybe with herself too this weekend.

“I took my last final on Friday, so it doesn’t feel real yet.” 

She lowered her fork and looked to Percy for his response to see him shaking his head.

“Nah. I’ve been checked out for weeks now. Barely held on till the end.”

“He’s lying, dad. Percy’s been emotional all week.”

“I’m sorry to have missed the ceremony at your school.”

Percy had just taken a bite of his pizza and his eyes went wide when he realized Frederick was waiting for a reply from him.

Annabeth responded on his behalf. “Trust me, Dad. His ceremony was just like any other graduation ceremony. Too much sun, a boring speaker, and two seconds to cheer for the person you care about.”

“Dude, Annabeth gets it.” This was from Bobby, who was sitting across from his father. “Why did they have to do two graduations for you?”

“One was for everybody, which was like, over 6,000 people. And then the other was specifically for my department.”

It was a little hard to hear them over the clinking of silverware against ceramic dishes and Rachel and Remi’s loud debate over traditional versus digital art, so Annabeth turned in her chair to face her family.

“Nobody needs to come to our high school graduation if it's gonna be this much of a drag.” Matthew said this with resolve.

“I think you’ll feel differently about things when the time comes.” From her stepmom, Helen.

“This is how graduations and commencements work.” Frederick Chase picked up his fork to resume eating his pesto pasta dish. “You spend years working hard, pushing through to the finish, shouldering through challenges and all of life’s obstacles, and then the day comes–”

“Oooooo… And then the day comes…”

“Dun dun DUUUNN! Dad, you make it sound so dramatic.” Matthew and Bobby snickered.

“It is dramatic.” He waved his fork like a baton. “When you’re graduating, you are the star of the moment, the center of the universe, just temporarily, and all of us will do our best to show up for you in the biggest way we can.” His brown eyes twinkled and Annabeth felt herself blushing at the warmth focused on her. “We all will bear through ceremony after ceremony if that means we get to celebrate your accomplishment.”

Annabeth thought about the hug her dad had wrapped her in yesterday morning, long and tight, and the way that squeeze said a million things other than ‘congratulations.’ And Sally in the car earlier today… 

“Trust me guys, you don’t wanna be the person with no family at your graduation.” Piper turned from her conversation with Connor to give her two-cents.

“You were that person?”

“Yup. Eighth grade promotion. Me and a disgruntled nanny. As if junior high wasn’t bad enough.”

“Gonna have to agree with McLean here,” Rachel chimed in.

“Not to be the girl who complains about having a big family–”

“I’m betting you’re about to be that girl who complains about having a big family–”

“–but there’s nothing like having your aunt screaming on the phone in the middle of your high school graduation, simultaneously cursing out and giving parking directions to your tardy cousin.” Remi offered with a shrug.

Rachel and Remi argued the pros and cons of large heavily involved families, versus small, absentee ones. Frank coaxed his grandmother into trying the “too expensive” Italian cuisine. Travis and Katie were trying to out-embarrass each other with old camp stories. There were a million conversations happening at once.

“Jason, can I get the parmesan?”

“I feel like you have room for one more meatball in your mouth, kiddo-”

“Connor, I’m starting to regret allowing you next to my daughter.”

Sally held a napkin before Estelle’s mouth and the girl reluctantly ejected three soggy meatballs.

“So we pretty much knew Hazel was lactose intolerant at that point-”

“Severely lactose intolerant-”

And a million memories, so many silly, significant snapshots; Annabeth found herself wishing she hadn’t left Percy’s camera under the driver's seat of the rental.

“I’m never doing anything or going anywhere with you that has anything to do with Italy.”

“So we’re doing it?! This road trip is happening?”

“Does anyone need some more water here?”

“Lemme have some of your Bolognese-”

Annabeth startled. She’d been playing with the simple pendant that hung just below her collarbones when she felt Percy’s hand touch the crease of her elbow.

He had red sauce on his chin. And food crumbs on his upper lip. And all he did was lower their joined hands beneath the table and ask.

“What's going on in there?”

She rubbed her thumb into the first knuckle of his middle finger, gray eyes still intently consuming the surrounding scene; then her eyes met his and she saw understanding.

She tried explaining anyway, “I don’t want to forget… I want to- to be in this moment, you know? Or… I just- I wish I could-”

She pressed her lips shut and smiled ruefully, a little embarrassed by her abysmal attempt at the English language. 

“Yeah. Same.” He squeezed her hand. “Yeah.”

 ------

They were outside. In front of the antique looking benches that flanked the restaurant’s double door entryway. Annabeth was going to stay in Berkeley with her family for the rest of the afternoon and Percy would head back to New Rome with his family. For now, they stood together, waiting for Matthew and Bobby who were in the restroom, preventing the Chase’s departure.

Annabeth planted her hands on her lower back and stretched her spine. “You’re very… confident today.”

“Am I?”

“Mmhm.” She leaned closer to him. “It’s like you’re… aware that people are watching. All day, all of these eyes have been on you and you’ve been very okay with it.” Even now, she noticed, in his slacks and dress shoes and his light blue short sleeve button up, he was handsome, cleaned up and groomed and plain-as-day attractive and definitely drawing attention standing as they were, in view of all the passer-byers. Yet he was comfortable. Confident.

He shrugged, because he didn’t know how else to react to her keen observation. She read him so intimately.

She was still reading him, and she could see traces of that self consciousness that had been missing all day creep into his body language.

“Did I kill your mojo?”

If he’d been confident all day, then she’d been radiant all weekend. They’d spent the week, Monday through Friday, stressed, all over the place, sleeping odd hours and meeting up to study or cry (the tears were from Annabeth, Percy was a zombie at that point) just trying to get through finals week so they could actually graduate. And then the weekend had come and family had arrived and there were graduation ceremonies and baccalaureates and dinners with parents and dress shoes and dresses that made Percy want to carry Annabeth off to a beach and fucking frolic in the fucking sand. But he couldn’t, there wasn’t any time to frolic or marvel or drink to the last five years of their lives. So they bounced from ceremony to ceremony. And she’d been absolutely radiant throughout, walking across the stage during her graduation Saturday morning, receiving special honors from her department. Running toward him this Sunday morning, wrapping herself around him and confirming that he had in fact done this, he was in fact finished with school. He’s so grateful for her. In awe of her. He couldn’t imagine doing this without her. It was incredible to do this with her. She pierced his heart like a sweet note of his favorite song and he felt her in his bones. There was so much going on, and it was good, all of it was so good, and here she was, here he was, and he missed her. Annabeth Chase, mojo murderer.

“Yes.” He cupped her face and kissed her quickly, she didn't even have time to react. “No. Now I’m overthinking, like, everything though. Bobby is coming out.” He jerked his chin at something behind her. “I think your fam is ready to leave.”

She glanced back at them with a frown. “That was supposed to be a compliment, Jackson.”

“Your dad is looking at me like he wants to say something.” Percy insistently tugged her arm and turned her around. “Please go with them before he does.”

She pulled her arm free and walked backwards, pointing at him for emphasis as the space between them grows.

“Keep the confidence, okay? I’ll see you at dinner?”

He pointed back at her. "I'll see you at dinner."

#mypjofic #percy jackon and the olympians #percy and annabeth #percabeth #california dreaming #trying to motivate to myself to finish the last part #by looking at the most recent chapter #one more and done