#wip spotlight | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

runawaycatwalker · 10 months

Text

Part 22. A Best Friend's Interrogative Prerogative

<< First | < Previous | Next >

Description below the cut

Bonus: Alternate version shot in NinoVision:

In black and white, Nino pulls on the brim of his cap as he watches Catwalker uses his baton to leap around the buildings of Paris.

Nino (voiceover): The name's Lahiffe. Detective Lahiffe. The foxiest gal in the world, Alya Césaire, called me for a favor: Sniff around the new hero who'd sauntered into Paris.

The image of Catwalker holding his hands up in confusion by a picture of Adrien being sad and a question mark.

Nino (voiceover): I'd met this smooth cat once before. I assumed he was naïve and oblivious. He wasn't.

Cut back to Nino hiding behind a wall as Catwalker continues to leap above the rooftops.

Nino (voiceover): According to Alya, the charming kittyboy was secretly involved in the departure of my closest bro, Adrien. She wasn't sure how the guy had managed to act under all our noses or why, but I am determined to find out. I'll need to draw upon all my knowledge of the greatest detectives as I stake him out and gather enough clues to—

The panel abruptly switches to color as Catwalker drops in behind Nino, making the latter leap back and hold his hands in front of his face, thoroughly startled.

Catwalker: Are you following me?

Nino: Aaah! No! Why would I be following you?

Catwalker holds up a courteous hand.

Catwalker: Perhaps you wanted an autograph?

Nino: No! That's not...

The panel swiftly switches back to grayscale as Nino pushes up his glasses in a serious manner.

Nino (internally): Get it together, Detective! Interrogate him!

Nino (aloud): I was just curious if you'd managed to get any info about Adrien Agreste.

Catwalker places a hand on his chest with a look of sympathy.

Catwalker: You're a friend of his, I presume? My condolences for your loss. It must be hard not knowing what happened to someone you care about. Unfortunately, my efforts in searching for Adrien have been fruitless thus far, but I assure you that I will be keeping my eyes open if he turns up.

The grayscale bleeds away back into color as we see a close-up of Nino’s eye, rage bubbling inside him.

Nino (internally): I can't believe this guy! Acting like he's all innocent! Screw the subtle approach, this slimeball needs to have the truth forced out of him.

Nino flares his hands out to either side indignantly.

Nino: You can't lie to me, Catwalker! I know you were behind Adrien's disappearance!

Catwalker’s pupils narrow in shock.

Catwalker: Who told you that?

Nino rebuffs with folded arms.

Nino: A little birdie. It doesn't matter.

Catwalker holds up a hand, expression now severe.

Catwalker: Your 'little birdie' could be the real reason Adrien had to go into hiding in the first place, so: Yes. It. Does.

Nino fumes, waving his arms above his head.

Nino: She would never do that!

Catwalker: 'She' wouldn't happen to be affiliated with a girl named Marinette Dupain-Cheng, would she?

Nino: Even if she is, that's none of your business!

Nino points an accusatory finger, his other hand starting to clench up as if ready to start tearing someone apart.

Nino: You're the one who needs to explain yourself! What did you do to Adrien? Where is he now? What did his father do to him that made him so terrified of anyone knowing where he is?

Catwalker looks down stiffly at his own fists.

Catwalker: Your 'birdie' should already know that I can't provide answers to those questions.

Nino: You have to know something! Spill!

Catwalker is exasperated as he rubs half of his face.

Catwalker: Please understand. The nature of Adrien's situation is extremely precarious, so much so that I cannot share what I know with anyone.

Nino: I'm not just 'anyone'!

Nino places both hands on his chest with a look of defiance as tears start to stream down his face.

Nino: I'm Adrien's best friend! I know everything about him! I'm the only person he contacted the night he ran away! So if anybody deserves the truth, it's me!

Catwalker folds his arms and looks away with regret.

Catwalker: If the fallout of his disappearance had gone how Adrien expected it to, you'd know that he's kept an entire part of his life a secret from everyone. Even you. Some things are too important to share, even with your best friend.

Nino puts his head in his hands in exasperation.

Nino: But why would Adrien tell you of all people? He can't possibly trust you more than his friends! Did you get inside his head? Gaslight him? Blackmail him? Torture him until he did what you wanted?

Nino has now sunk to the ground, hands still grasping at his head, as he weeps. Catwalker squats about a meter in front of him with a look of restrained beseeching.

Catwalker: Adrien told you as much as he thought he could get away with. He does care about you. But he didn't expect that you'd be able to keep whatever he told you quiet for very long. I'm no friend to Adrien, but he trusted me with his escape. He knows that I can keep his secrets safe indefinitely. And I can only consider entrusting you with some of the answers I have if I am certain that you won't tell anyone—especially not the person who asked you to investigate me. It is vital that you tell me who that person is so I can deal with her.

Nino yells at Catwalker as an akuma starts to fly in behind him.

Nino: Screw you!

Nino’s teeth clench as he is absorbed by his crying rage, right as Catwalker reaches out a Cataclysm-powered hand to touch the akuma, mere inches past Nino’s head.

Nino: You can go—

Catwalker: Cataclysm.

Seen from below, Catwalker looks imposing as he holds the akuma in his hand as it crumbles away, bitter tears starting to fall down his conflicted face.

Catwalker: I'm sorry. I never wanted this. Please, for Adrien's sake, let your investigation go.

Catwalker turns away as the remnants of crushed butterfly fall from his fist.

Catwalker: And Nino? You should be more careful about who you confide in. You never know who might be your enemy.

["Alternate "NinoVision" version is recolored to be all in greenish sepia, with Catwalker's expressions recolored to be opaque and distorted: no green in his eyes, just the black mask and a misplaced line of gold]

Below is the same image as above, only without text:

#runaway catwalker #catwalker #cat walker #nino lahiffe #shoutout to flightfoot (Keyseeker) for getting more of your eyeballs on Runaway Catwalker #shes been highly supportive of this comic for a while and her spotlight here on tumblr two weeks ago brought an influx of new followers #extremely grateful for her and her willingness to engage with and signal boost fan creators #and to everyone new here: welcome!#i promise that i can give adrien and nino nice things #just not this adrien and this nino at this moment #ill try to put more fluffiness for them in my other main wip to make up for it

87 notes · View notes

writerfae · 5 months

Text

@bunnymermaidsblog here it is! A scene between little Henry and baby Aiden. It’s from Ranva’s POV, so that’s best too! The ending is a bit abrupt but that’s since I never really finished the scene

When Aiden was born, it wasn’t certain if he would make it. He was born too early, was weak and small.

But he was so warm and his eyes so bright that when Ranva held him in her arms and looked at him she knew, her youngest would survive.

He was a strong little soul, a fighter.

And survive he did.

Despite the circumstances, Aiden grew stronger with each passing day. He was eating more and developed just fine.

It was almost like a miracle, her husband said.

Still, Ranva couldn’t help but to be anxious, never taking her eyes off of the little one, always holding him close.

He was still such a fragile thing in her eyes, she didn’t want anything to happen to him.

For the first days after his birth, she rarely slept and if she did, then only with her baby nearby.

It was exhausting, so it wasn’t a surprise that one day, after bringing Aiden to bed for his nap, Ranva fell asleep next to him, too, lulled to sleep by his steady breathing.

Her husband was out on a hunt, their older son Henry napping in the living room, so she allowed herself a few minutes of blissful rest.

When she woke up, Aiden wasn’t lying next to her anymore.

Her heart skipped a beat. She sat up, looking around. Worry pooled in her stomach. She made her way out of the room in a hurry, entering the living room.

“Milan?” she called.

Maybe he had returned earlier and took Aiden with him when he came home. But there was no reply.

Instead, someone shushed her.

Surprised, Ranva looked to the direction the sound came from. Her eyes softened as she took in the sight before her, her worry washing away.

It wasn’t Milan who had shushed her, it was Henry.

Her eldest son sat in one of the arm chairs near the fire place, rocking a little bundle in his arms: Aiden.

The baby was vast asleep, one little hand clutching his older brother’s finger, while Henry quietly hummed the lullaby Ranva keeps singing to her boys every night.

It made her heart melt.

Carefully, Ranva made her way over to the boys, kneeling in front of the arm chair.

She smiled fondly, caressing Henry’s cheek.

“Hello my little crow,” she whispered. “I see you’re taking care of your brother.”

The young boy looked up to his mother and nodded.

“Aiden was crying when I woke up. And you were sleeping, and father isn’t around, so I tried to calm him down.”

Ranva looked down on Aiden’s sleeping form. He looked so peaceful in his brother’s arms.

“You really did a good job it seems,” she told Henry.

She leaned forward to kiss his temple, brushing aside messy black hair. “Thank you.”

Henry smiled. Then he looked down to his baby brother, frowning slightly.

“I don’t like it when he cries. I don’t want him to be sad.”

Ranva laughed softly. “It’s okay, babies cry sometimes. That doesn’t always mean they’re sad.”

Aiden stirred slightly in his sleep. But Henry tightened his grip around the baby and he stilled again. Ranva watched it with a smile.

“And even if he gets sad sometimes,” she said, patting Henry’s arm. “That’s okay.

After all, he has a great big brother. One who will always comfort him.”

#this was actually supposed to be for the Aiden character spotlight but I never even close to finished it so it never got uploaded #I still think it’s cute tho #writer speaks #writeblr #wip: the knights of the alder #writing #my writing

38 notes · View notes

batpham-discord-highlights · 8 months

Text

Wip Wednesday

It's Wip Wednesday :D This piece is a writing excerpt but remember that art wips are encouraged too!!!

Today's Piece:

"I'm sorry Damian," his friend mumbled lowly, so that he could feel the apology vibrate in his bones. "It's my fault you're here. If I had known somebody was going to be put into that thing, somebody not apart of these assholes I would've-" "You would've been powerless to try," Damian interrupted. "My grandfather has been around for a very long time, and for as long as I can remember he has seen the Lazarus pits as a perfect panacea; the key to unlimited power and eternal life. He had always thought of ways to turn that outwards, so that he could have the perfect weapon under his control. That he found you was a coincidence. That he used you was inevitable. There was nothing you could have done to stop this, so do not try to apologize for something you could not control." A small wet plat echoed in Damian's cell, and it took him a few moments to realise that his eyes had begun to glow. Damian reached up, not entirely surprised to feel wet streaks as he brushed his cheek. He didn't know why he was crying, but there was an emptiness swallowing him and it felt like the only emotion he could feel right now to cope with it was sadness. Here, in this dark cell miles below ground, Damian let himself cry. Both for his death and the treatment of his friend. It was only after his eyes had dried and he'd laid back down that his friend spoke again. "Thank you."

Creator's Socials

tumblr - @half-dead-ham

ao3 - Half-dead Ham

A little about the project :D

An as-of-yet unnamed fic about Damian becoming a halfa through an experiment performed by Ra's. He and Danny are trapped together and must reach Damian about his new ghostly aspects while trying to undermine Ra's and escape.

Interested in showing off your current wip? All submission are taken in server, so send an ask to the blog and get your link 💗🥳

#wip wednesday #dpxdc #creator spotlight #fic spotlight #batpham server

50 notes · View notes

mochamoth · 11 months

Text

Wip!!

I'm attempting to draw all the dragons in Skylanders 😭 wish me luck/hj

(Sorry the anatomy is a lil wonky btw, I don't have the motivation to adjust it 💀)

79 notes · View notes

alistonjdrake · 4 months

Text

Through Ice & Terror: AKA The Project June Hopes to Outline this Year

one girlfailure black/bi protag + my geniune love and defense of love triangles/messy romantic situations + a gilded age America-inspired fantasy setting + a drop of an ice age + fantasy of manners = the wip I hope to fully outline this year!

Her dangerously charming ex-husband, her loyal childhood friend, her beguiling former fiancé, and a mysterious politician in need of a wife all threaten to upend the slight peace of Naomi Nettles' existence. Born without the gift of Insight, the ability to see the monsters that plague the world outside the cities in the Frost Wastes, and a trait ruefully abundant in her family, Naomi is treated as little more than expendable. An embarrassment to her family and peers and seemingly with little social standing in a stifling community, when her mother calls her home to introduce her to one Vivian Quinlan -An upstart politician from the capital desperate enough to marry the last single Nettles daughter - Naomi finally believes things are looking up. That is until one of her former romantic prospects winds up dead and Naomi finds herself firmly in the middle of a murderous conspiracy between several factions that could threaten to undo the fragile alliances between the cities among the Frost Wastes and what little normalcy remains in Naomi's life.

This is a less a wip intro and more so the beginning of what I hope will serve as a year-long accountability thread as I flesh out my ideas, characters, and get a concrete hold on the story before I officially start it (but, as I am myself, some stuff is already written and I'm really doing this to feel out interest)

#june trash #writing progress #wip stuff #wip intro #writing accountability #I once again have decided to post something without thinking of a tag for it #also yes this is the character you helped name #I still will likely use all the other names because I gave her a lot of family members #before then I was just calling her the divorcee #snowtrainwip #there that is my tag for it because my husband named the map and thought the trains would play a huge story role #I just find early train settings interesting I don't believe the trains will have a huge spotlight

21 notes · View notes

tideswept · 8 months

Text

WIP Wednesday

My brain is yelling at me that I already did this for WIPW even though I don't remember/can't find it in my tags, and then I realized it was for an ask game. Brain, why are you like this??

Obikin AU! Anakin is trying to start a camboy side gig. (It's not going well.)

He closed his eyes and extended his hand for the bottle of lube on the nightstand. Next to it was a slim glass wand. It wasn’t the most impressive toy, but he wasn’t ready to fuck himself with anything bigger. Padmé was the only person he’d ever slept with, and she’d been happy to use her fingers on him, but they’d broken up before they could try something more adventurous than that.

And Anakin just… hadn’t been willing to date anyone else since then. Not when he was constantly comparing them to Padmé and Obi-Wan and seeing how far they fell short.

It really sucked that he'd fallen for the most amazing people in the world before he could even legally buy alcohol. At least Padmé had been willing to give it a go. But Obi-Wan? Obi-Wan had made his stance abundantly clear the day Anakin turned eighteen.

That was the day Anakin almost didn't notice the engagement ring glinting on Satine's finger when she stopped by to congratulate him. He almost didn’t see the grimace as Obi-Wan read the yearning that Anakin couldn’t quite cover up fast enough, and he almost missed the pointed head shake.

Almost. Was there another word out there that could feel more like the slow grind of a knife in the gut than almost?

Prickliness welled up behind his eyes. He hesitated only for a moment before decisively clicking the OFF button, then snapped his laptop shut. His chest heaved and fell as if he'd just sprinted a marathon. He felt like a giant, aching bruise of a human being.

Okay, note to self; think less depressing things when trying to do porn. Anakin rubbed his eyes to wipe away all traces of wetness. It’s a real fucking downer.

#wip wednesday #obikin #fanfiction #gonna be a REBEL and do another one #because other ships deserve the spotlight too #star wars #berryfic

30 notes · View notes

kazamajun · 2 months

Text

#personal #wip #imagine being so down bad that your memories shine a literal spotlight on someone when you're talking and reminiscing about them #this is another part of that thing i haven't finished but ok to reblog if u want!

16 notes · View notes

exquisiteagony · 6 months

Text

fuck it here’s what i’ve been working on for the past day or so. it’s 2912 words long

Free periods sucked, regardless of whether there was work to be done or not. They called for extra creativity to alleviate boredom, and they were even worse right after lunch, when they were all full enough they didn’t want to think. Half the time, they’d sit around coming up with stupid dares or bets, especially if the day had been dull, too lazy to come up with anything more interesting and less troublesome.

Joel picked at the vinyl covering the flat surface of the table in the rejectory, yawning and staring longingly at his too-hot coffee. He, Joonas, and Niko always had first class as free periods on Wednesdays, but that didn’t mean their parents let them enjoy lie-ins. Instead, all three of them made their ways to their nearest bus stops, yawning and bleary eyed, and tried not to fall asleep before they could get off and stumble past the school gates. Then it was a short zombie-like shuffle to the rejectory, Joel trying hard not to let he brisk cold wind wake him up properly, and five minutes later he’d be seated at a table with the rest of the gang, tearing apart a blueberry muffin as he waited for his coffee to cool to drinking temperatures. Somehow, he was always the last one to arrive.

Tommi was always first. By the time Joel arrived he was always sipping his drink leisurely - protein shake if he had first period free to go to the gym and coffee when it was regular class - patiently helping Olli with some last-minute homework so his maths teacher didn’t direct him to after school detention again.

Niko was always second to arrive. He was the newest to their little group, and therefore he was still a bit self conscious of his place amongst them, so he’d be chewing on a hash brown like he still thought he might be kicked off their table and pointed in the direction of the music students he’d hung out with only a year ago.

Joonas was third. He was always peppy and cheerful in the mornings, like the sun to Joel’s moon, and Joel never knew how to not be jealous of him for it. Joel didn’t know how to not feel guilty over that, too.

But he did guilt and jealousy well, knew how to wear them like a second skin.

Olli made it just minutes before Joel did, always in a rush to get his beloved coffee and crack open a textbook so he could just skate by the deadline of his various assignments. Joel never knew how he managed to get anything done in the constant drone of voices, but then again it took Joel medication to even have the chance of keeping up, so he chose not to think about it.

Joel was last. He liked it that way. The others had their designated seats they liked on their table facing the little terrace, and they always let him have the same seat, one facing the wall instead of facing the rest of the rejectory, so he wasn’t tempted to glance up at the radio booth looming above them, where Aleksi Fucking Kaunisvesi presided like a bored god as he read out school notices.

Once it became clear that the vinyl on the table wasn’t going to budge despite Joel’s best efforts, he sighed, turning his attention to his blueberry muffin.

There hadn’t been any when he’d come in, too late to get anything sweet and halfway decent, but Joonas had swiped one for him as he usually did and had handed it over with a conspiratorial wink. Guilt stirred itself within Joel, so he’d put off picking at it, stomach clenching and unclenching. Joonas was always going out of his way to do such things for him, and each one stacked up like a debt Joel didn’t know how to repay. But now he was hungry, stomach growling because he hadn’t bothered to eat back home, so he couldn’t ignore the muffin any longer. He picked at the top of it, peeling off the little greasy crust studded with chunks of fruit like he was peeling off the seal of a can of pringles but with less violence. Once it was torn free of the rest of the muffin, still encased in a cheerful yellow cupcake case, he poked the individual blueberry chunks out, letting them fall onto the table so he could devour the plain muffin.

He reached for his coffee, but it was still too hot. Dejectedly, he set it down again and carried on picking away at the muffin, drowning out the conversation around him. Tommi was still explaining algebra to Olli, and Joel was determined to not accidentally learn anything.

Niko caught his eye, his smile a little bit shy. Joel returned it, then started picking the visible blueberry chunks out of the remainder of his muffin. Niko reached across the table to take one, slipping it into his mouth. Joel let him, then reached across to Niko’s plate to swipe a leftover crumb of his hash browns. Then he went back to his methodical muffin demolition.

He was about halfway through his task when Joonas let out the vilest burp from across the table, next to Niko. It was loud enough that a couple of people on the table next to them turned round in disgust, but Joonas looked more proud of himself than anything. Joel screwed his face up and flicked a soggy chunk of blueberry at him.

Once he’d excavated the whole muffin, leaving blueberries in one wet pile and plain muffin in another dryer one, he began to eat the blueberries one by one. It wasn’t a particularly interesting task, but it passed the time amply enough as he waited for his coffee to cool down, and that was about as much as he could hope for.

The school’s PA system crackled to life not a minute later. Joel glanced at the clock on the wall as Olli swore and began to pack his textbooks and pencil case away. 8:55 AM. Olli had five minutes to get to his maths class.

Olli was serenaded by the rush of other students in similar predicaments and the cheesy jingle of Oulu High Radio. Tommi was more leisurely, simply passing Olli the pen he’d forgotten to pack away before he picked up his rucksack, standing. Joel grimaced, but that was more directed at the PA than it was by them.

The new school year had brought many things, but the biggest change had been the announcement that Oulu High School was combining with Oulu College, the high school aimed at setting its students on the high road to world-rated universities so they could be snobby assholes in worldwide leadership positions. Something about structural damage or frailties to the old college building across the city meaning the academy full of chronic overachievers had to find another location, and Oulu High had the space to accommodate them and the excuse they’d been waiting for to upgrade the science department and the sports building. They even had a swimming pool now, though Joel had aged out of mandatory swimming classes so he’d never used it.

Most of the differences were relatively small. Slightly bigger classes, and less empty classrooms. New teachers who were used to bright-eyed nerds, not disinterested class clowns. A phased lunchtime complete with an extra half hour so those on last lunch didn’t have to miss out on a post-lunch break. A better library that Joel avoided like the plague. The renaming of the cafeteria to the refectory, a change that had had Joonas snort and promptly christen it the ‘rejectory’. That sort of thing.

And a radio station.

Thing was, Joel had tried out for it. Since his basketball dreams had gone down the toilet he’d found himself with more free time, and as his mom had told him, it would look good on his university application.

How she hadn’t lost faith in that dream despite his best efforts, he didn’t know. Music and gym class produced the best grades, but even a music course would be unwilling to take anyone with grades like his. They preferred their students to be more rounded.

Still, he’d tried anyway, and found he actually wanted to do it. He could do it, he was sure, and hey, if his music career followed his basketball one then he’d have something to fall back on. So he’d gathered in the principal's office with twenty or so other hopefuls, reading out notices about the various sports teams and the chess club - something else that was new - into an unplugged mic.

He’d wanted it, but in the end, he hadn’t got it. No one had. The whole thing had been the idea of Aleksi Kaunisvesi - the snooty kid from the college whose dad was some kinda bigwig in the music industry. The tryout had been just for show, and now the whole school was forced to listen to Aleksi’s lofty voice every morning and lunchtime, reading out various notices as if he thought he was above it all.

It’s probably to pad out his university application, Joonas had said when Joel announced his loss with gritted teeth.

As if he needs it, Tommi had snorted. He’s the captain of the debate society, and he’s a prefect.

Don’t forget the school council, Niko had added glumly. He’d tried out for that, curious, but Kaunisvesi had snatched the last spot.

Bet his dad bribed the school, Joonas said, unnaturally acerbic for once.

Does he need to? Olli asked. Aleksi is the eldest of six. That’s the promise of a lot of school fees.

Sure enough, Aleksi’s snooty tones began reading out notices. Joel felt his breakfast turn to stone in his stomach.

Niko saw the look on his face and shot him a rueful smile. Joonas pulled a face like he was constipated and echoed Aleksi’s reminder about the importance of punctuality in a near-perfect imitation. It buoyed Joel’s mood a little, and a smile tugged at the corners of his own mouth.

It died with the arrival of two more students at the rejectory’s food station, always under the hawk eye of a dinner lady.

Aleksi, you see, was pretty much untouchable. He had no friends, as far as Joel could tell, and he was the perfect little teacher’s pet, but he was never harassed or picked on. He just skated on with his head firmly lodged up the principal’s ass, and everyone seemed resigned to the fact.

Apart from in Joel’s lit class. Then he was constantly going head to head with Robin Packalen, another former College student who headed the book club. They always seemed to arrive early, sat at the front of the classroom so Joel would always have to squeeze by them as the late bell chimed, trying to ignore whatever topic was the flavour of the week. The arguments were always fraught with underlying tension, and Joel got the feeling like they weren’t really arguing about Milton or Shakespeare or whatever. It made watching the arguments feel painfully voyeuristic, and Joel found himself idly sympathising with their poor teacher as she waited to begin the class.

With a jolt, Joel realised that he’d seen Robin at the radio tryouts. His stomach twisted. Yeah, there was something between him and Aleksi.

Right now, though, Robin was calm and collected as he selected a water bottle from the refrigerated cabinet. With him was his boyfriend, Joonas Parkkonen - or Johnny, to his friends and pretty much everyone apart from Aleksi. Johnny was in Joel’s gym class, and he seemed to live and breathe for the sports department. He was the head of the hockey team and the basketball team, something that made Joel so jealous he felt sick, and he had started a little tennis club.

He was, of course, from the College, not Oulu High.

Not that Oulu High was bad or anything. It was fine. Average. Comfortably so, to the point where Joel hadn’t ever felt especially self conscious about his subpar grades. But then the amalgamation happened, and Joel hated it all.

Niko followed his gaze. “Good luck with that,” he said, clapping Joel across the shoulder. Joel flicked a blueberry at him then went back to sourly ogling Robin and Johnny.

The pair chose a table for two fairly near the food station. Neither of them must have a class first period, which was a weird thought. Robin was the exact sort of nerd Joel thought lived in the library, and Johnny seemed like he should be in the gym, not sipping an apparently expensive protein shake from his water bottle as he waited for Robin to eat his apple.

Something tepid and soggy landed on Joel’s hand, drawing him from his reverie. He turned and scowled at Joonas, then licked up the bit of blueberry. The sweetness exploded on his tongue, and he washed it down with his coffee, finally drinkable.

“Johnny’s in my gym class,” he said eventually. “I don’t want to go against him in track again.” He’d lost, and badly, and it was like all the individual failures of his sports ability had come together to snowball into one big neon sign, blinking failure at him.

“And you’ve got your front row seat to the Aleksi-Robin wars in lit,” Joonas said lightly. Niko shrugged like it didn’t matter. But he only had art class with Robin, and he seemed to outshine him. He wasn’t in Joel’s lost and bewildered shoes.

“Ugh, don’t remind me,” Joel grumbled. On the PA, Aleksi read out a notice about last night’s rain waterlogging the grass too badly for the evening’s football practice to go ahead. A couple of boos sounded out from the other side of the rejectory, and then Aleksi told them all that that was all. The trite jingle rang out, and then afterwards clanged the school bell. Nine AM, and class was beginning. Joel sighed.

Silence reigned for a few minutes. Joonas was staring out of the window, fiddling with the keyring on his rucksack, and Niko was still trying to skin the surface of the table. Joel sipped his coffee and ate the individual bits of his muffin before he decided that enough was enough and tipped the final remnants into his coffee dregs. He stole Tommi’s abandoned plastic spoon to mix the muffin and coffee into a sludgy mess, fighting the urge to yawn.

“What if we gave it a go?” Joonas said abruptly not long later.

Joel jumped, meeting Niko’s eye. He’d been enjoying the quiet. It felt like the calm before the storm of lit class, where he’d be doodling on his desk and staring glumly ahead as Robin and Aleksi snipped and sniped at each other in the bored tones of know-it-alls. “You what?” he grunted. Opposite him, Niko stopped his peeling.

Joonas gave the room a once over before leaning in, eyes feverish with something that looked horrible like gope. “Give Kaunisvesi a run for his money.”

Niko screwed his face up in confusion to match Joel’s. “You want to start a pirate radio station, even though Järvy’s got such a stick up his ass he’d suspend us on the spot for it?” Principal Järvinen had always been a hardass, like he would much rather run a military operation than a school, but since the amalgamation he’d become fanatical. Joel had spent the semester so far barely avoiding detention, if only to keep up the thinnest veneer of his mother’s hopes for him. Her hope was based on a foundation as fragile as the first hints of winter ice on a lake, and suspension would destroy her wistful thinking like a misplaced football. Joel really didn’t want to do that to her.

Joonas screwed his face up in thought for a few moments. “We can have nicknames and use a voice modulator or something,” he said. “And we can do it from my dad’s old warehouse, so we’re not disturbing our families or whatever.”

Niko caught Joel’s eye for the second time in fifteen minutes, cautious amusement on his face. Joel knew what he was thinking. This is a dumb idea. This is just a fantasy that Joonas will forget by lunchtime. It’s not going to happen.

Except Joel realised he did want it. Oulu High Radio had been a glittering, tantalising thing, even if it had always been empty, and Joel had wanted it, like he never usually wanted any such extracurricular activity. This could be real, and it would be fun, even if it didn’t last. “Let’s speak to Tommi and Olli about it before we do anything,” he said. “But we could give it a go.”

Traitor, Niko mouthed, but there was no heat to it. Joel shrugged. He wasn’t sorry.

Joonas kicked him under the table to get his attention and beamed. “It’ll be fine. It’ll be more than fine,” he said. “Everyone thinks Aleksi’s a twat anyway, so we’ll do so well!”

His enthusiasm proved to be infectious. Niko cracked a smile, and Joel found himself almost giddy at the prospect.

And, he reflected as Joonas changed the subject to the fact that his sister had detention for being caught with her boyfriend in a cleaning supplies closet by an unimpressed janitor, if it all goes to shit, at least it won’t be my fault.

#i speak!#wip #extract #blind channel fanfiction #fun fact! my college (uk college not uni) called the cafeteria the refectory #and one our first day the girl i sat next to in psychology named it the rejectory #there was also a seating area three times bigger next to the theatre called the spotlight. so of course we called it the spotshite

16 notes · View notes