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universestreasures · 9 months

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@prominenceprison (BECAUSE WE HAVN'T HAD ANY OF THE CHRS IN NOBLES INTERACT WHO AREN'T IN THEIR SERIES SO ITS HIGH TIME WE FIX THAT, HUH?)

This was a risky move. Leaving the Akaba House unexpectedly and without her father's permission was practically a death sentence. He never liked any of his eight children making moves on their own, especially ones that involved escaping the reaches of the estate. However, at this moment, Yuzu doesn't care. For her escapade today was not to escape the horrible life she had been condemned to by a controlling parent, but rather to seek aid in finding the person she held most dear.

Yuya's disappearance was sudden, leaving the entire estate in a stat of chaos. His brothers, in some shape or form, had been dragged into conflict after conflict over these past few weeks. And then out of nowhere, her companion suddenly went missing overnight with no explanation. Yuzu knows Yuya wouldn't escape this place without his brothers or without telling her. So, the only logical conclusion is that he was taken by someone, but...who? No one knew of the true nature of the dragon retainers except for the Akaba Family, meaning no one knew of their true value.

The entire situation was puzzling. No one inside the Akaba House could provide any semblance of information, and...she didn't exactly feel comfortable contacting the Rainsworth or Dragon Star houses for assistance. Doing that would require, most likely, disclosing Yuya's true nature, something she wasn't exactly comfortable with doing with people she didn't know well.

That meant she only had one option, only one person she could turn to in a time like this: her aunt and sister to her mother, Eve.

Her aunt was rather estranged in a sense. Though, Yuzu knows tha'ts not my choice. It's no secret that her father wasn't exactly a fan of the Eden House's head mistress considering his ideals clashed with hers. Eve was always a proponent of helping people and the world around, while Lord Akaba was out for himself and his own ambitions. It was only natural the two would clash.

However, Eve still made sure to at least pay her nieces a visit whenever she could, usually through a public function. During those times, Yuzu and her would bond over a love of flowers and singing. Truly, they were precious memories for the young girl, ones that reminded her of her short-lived time with her mother. If there was anyone she could come to during a time of crisis, it would be Eve.

The young noble stands at the entrance to the Eden House, one that was beautifully surrounded by flowers and hedges. The building wasn't as big as the Akaba House, but that was mainly because her aunt preferred to keep most of the natural beauty of this area intact, only building the building to the size that would be needed for everyone to live and work. Those who admired her didn't call her 'Nature's Protector' for nothing.

Before she could even make it to the grand doors covered in flowers and vines, sapphire blue hues hone in on the sight of a figure approaching her. His rusted hues and turquoise hair were in sharp contrast to the greens that surrounded the place. Even without that difference, however, Yuzu figured out right away who it was. Only one person who lived in the Eden House looked like that, after all.

"C-Cousin Olivier! H-Hi! I-It's been a while, hasn't it?"

Despite speaking to family, Yuzu felt awkward in conversing with him. She doesn't know Olivier that well, other than his reputation as the Eden House's golden child who was loved by children of all the orphanages the house supported. If her father didn't hate her aunt and her ideals so much, there is no doubt that he would have tried to arrange some sort of marriage with Olivier and Ray. That was how notable a figure he had become among the noble houses.

Still, she couldn't forget why she was here. She had a mission, one she promised to herself she'd see through no matter what. Yuya...was counting on her. He was, in all in tense and purposes, her charge. She was the one responsible for him. Thus, it is up to her to bring him back home to where his brothers, his family, was waiting for him.

"I-I know it's very impolite to show up without notice, but...it's an emergency. A very, very dear friend of mine has gone missing, and...I need Auntie's help to find him. She's...the only person I can turn to for this. Can...Can you bring me to her?"

#prominenceprison #💎 Melodious Treasure (Yuzu Hiiragi)#💎 Melodious' Home Of Magical Nobility (Yuzu Nobles Of Nature AU)#tw long post #(ICB WE HAVNT HAD OFFICALLY ANY THREADS OF ANY CROSOSVER ACTION IN THIS GIANT CROSSOVER AU #(I THINK THATS A CRIME SO IM FIXING IT LMFAO #(AND I WAS GONNA DO SOMETHING WITH REN BUT THEN I REMEMEBRED OH YEAH GAILLARD IS CONNECTED TO EVE AND TECH IS YUZU'S COUSIN SO #(I'M ALSO GONNA HAVE PROBABLY A SERENA AND BREAK STARTER FOR YOU TOO ACTUALLY LOL #(I MADE UP SOME RANDOM LORE HERE THAT YOU DONT HAVE TO TAKE JUST LET ME KNOW BUT YEAH #(AND LETS JUST SAY EVE IS IN ONE OF HER MEDCIAL TREATMENTS SO OLIVIER AND YUZU CAN TALK OVER TEA #(I WONDER IF OVER THE CONVERSATION IF SHE REVEALS TO HIM YUYA IS A DRAGON #(HE FINALLY REVEALS HIMSELF TO HER #(PERHAPS THROUGH INTRODUCING HER TO ADAM BECAUSE SHE SAID YUYA'S NAME AKA THE NAME OF ADAM'S MISSING BROTHER #(ALSO IM SORRY THIS BECAME A NOVEL OOPS #(NO NEED TO MATCH

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bloodbenderz · 4 years

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Can I ask what your season 1 Lok reboot looks like?

this is about 3k words i checked lmfao dont say i didnt warn u

a key part of the whole thing is that korra gets way more perspectives and more experiences representative of like, normal people in republic city bc i think something that really defined what a good avatar aang was was how many people he met and got to know and how he didnt exclusively or even mostly associate w cops and bureaucrats and leaders. so mako and bolin. well first of all their backstories are a little more fleshed out and we get a less black and white view of the “triads” (lol) and mako and bolin’s experiences w them. cuz the show very much does the whole thing of like Criminals Bad but dont worry even tho mako and bolin did commit crimes theyre not Criminals!! so just a little more nuance on the alleged gang problem and the poverty in the city

korra does start out very naive w very black and white ideas (ex. “you guys are CRIMINALS?”) i think a really good way of developing her away from her sheltered naive worldview is putting her in whats clearly an incredibly complicated city w an absolute cesspool of political conflicts, ethnic tensions, the lasting effects of colonization, etc and having her try and understand the needs of “the people” in a more complicated way than “i have to save the good guys from the bad guys” ykwim? and i think the absolute WORST way to do that is what they did. bc we get mako and bolin who could contribute genuinely compelling thematic elements to the story: one parent who was indigenous and one who was from a colonizer background in the decades directly following the end of the war, kids who grew up in poverty apparently without any familial support, and who now are trying to be “respectable” members of society (especially mako). and then most of that is pretty much tossed aside bc asami swoops in w her capitalist dad and her piles of money and the class issue is just never talked about again.

so the way i’d fix all that is like. introducing more, like, normal people. some nonbenders, more workers, more immigrants, etc, to show what daily life is actually like for people. because. we dont know! we dont have any context about whether the nonbender oppression thing is actually an issue bc we dont KNOW any nonbenders with normal lives! and spoiler: the nonbender oppression thing is not an issue. bc it doesnt make historical sense. lok is set 7 decades after the end of the war. that is not by ANY stretch of the imagination long enough to heal from the scars of imperialism, ESPECIALLY not when lok is also set in a settler colonial state. like that fact should have featured PROMINENTLY in the political and social setting! realistically, nonbenders arent an oppressed class, earth and water nation people are, regardless of bending status! as in all settler colonial states, the colonizers and their descendants (in this case fire nation people) retain most of the financial and political capital, leaving the colonized and racialized immigrants (in this case earth kingdom and water tribe people respectively) generally impoverished and politically suppressed. like aside from the fact that theres no way toph would have become a cop, it’s so ridiculous to think that an established privileged class of fire nation colonizers would EVER accept being policed by earthbenders!

imagine how much more nuanced and interesting it would be to set republic city as a remnant of a colonial past still fraught w the violence and tension that colonialism and the associated ideology imposed?? instead of some vague ideas of criminal who wear 1920s outfits and harass shopkeepers think about why extralegal and violent groups like that might form! earth kingdom people trying to push for the reclamation of their land? ethnic groups protecting themselves against corrupt cops? ESPECIALLY w the history that the fire nation has of SPECIFICALLY jailing and killing earthbenders and waterbenders BECAUSE of the potential they have to resist against fire nation imperialism like it just makes no sense at all that earthbenders would be privileged on land that, 70 years ago, they would have been imprisoned on! like these various paramilitary groups falling along these different ideological or ethnic lines, fire nation or earth kingdom or water tribe, pro colonization or anti colonization, pro cop or anti cop, pro immigrant or anti immigrant, and then you juxtapose that w depictions of a govt thats failing to keep this all under control w tenzin trying desperately to keep it together despite the fact that it’s becoming increasingly obvious that the state has no interest in taking the conflicts seriously and would rather just point vague fingers at criminals and gangs? and THEN you bring in korra, who has no idea about any of this and thinks that all its gonna take is kicking some ass every couple days, meeting normal people who offer all kinds of different opinions abt the efficacy of the state and the different violent or nonviolent groups and ideologies clashing in the city and the way all this shit is affecting people’s lives and livelihoods and relationships w other citizens??

theres so much good shit there so many incredible things u could do w that like Where do we go after colonial atrocities? is it possible for a settler colonial state to take revolutionary or indigenous ideas seriously? is liberal reform enough in a state like this? and then all the growth that korra could do going from a simple black and white life about mastering the elements to this messy complicated sociopolitical knot of a city? and all the different kinds of characters u could introduce in this city? like why would u EVER think that the most interesting characters that this story has to offer is a police chief a congressman and a billionaire????

but anyways. that’s what the Setting of my idealized version of lok is. as for the actual plot, it is as follows

it starts out similarly as the show. republic city is MUCH more fraught w political tension and violence and korra knows this but assumes that it’s just a matter of throwing a few gang leaders and corrupt officials in jail. tenzin manages to come see them in the south pole and intends give korra real lessons while he’s there but they receive news of a terrorist attack in republic city only a few days after he gets there so his family has to pack up and leave again.

korra stows away to republic city (katara catches her leaving and gives her blessing im a SUCKER for that moment). she does have a hard time adjusting but she doesn’t do what she did in the show lol the first person she meets in the city is this older woman who works on the docks, directs her to a place where she can eat and gives her a roof to sleep under for the first night. so korra’s first exposure to republic city is just about forming connections w ordinary people like ship workers and a family owned restaurant and people practicing their bending in the park. and by the time she reaches air temple island a day or so later her head is spinning w all this new information and the way that nothing is really what she expected it to be. tenzin gives her his own perspective on everything and pema gives her her own perspective on everything and even those two seem wildly different from all the people she’s already met. and so korra starts to get a kind of outline of the conflicts plaguing the city as extremely complex and a lot more influenced by older ideas of fire nation imperialism and earth kingdom land reclamation than she had any idea about.

mako and bolin are still pro benders but not like. super famous like they are in the show. korra’s picked up a couple friends by now and one of them takes her to a gym where a lot of amateur pro bending (is that an oxymoron? lol) matches happen and thats how she meets mako and bolin and joins their pro bending team. Unfortunately for korra, this gym is run by lin beifong, and also has the distinction of being one of the most notoriously anti settler state organizations in the country. lin beifong is NOT a cop but she runs this gym (and the pro bending league) as a way to offer support to local earth kingdom/water tribe youth, teach self defense skills, a center of community organizing, and sometimes to act as a front to hide revolutionary/combat organizing against the pro fire nation paramilitaries/police force. tenzin is DISTRAUGHT that korra does this and this is where the friction btwn them comes from bc (from tenzin’s perspective) she does things like this without thinking or even fully understanding the context behind them and tenzin will have to deal w the political fallout of the avatar openly aligning herself w a very divisive figure in the community and (from korra’s perspective) tenzin is too unwilling to take sides in a conflict that’s claiming lives and when the state is clearly not taking sufficient steps to protect people well then why the hell shouldnt she align herself w lin beifong, who IS taking steps to protect and support people?

as korra more fully integrates herself into the city and learns more abt how different people think abt everything going on this is where the real exposition abt the equalists begins. they’re a paramilitary group w an ideology thats gaining increasing support among middle/upper class fire nation people, esp nonbenders. on the face theyre abt putting checks on “bender oppression” but really it’s an excuse to persecute and surveil earthbenders waterbenders and airbenders, bc fire nation people have all this leftover fear about benders who arent fire nation Rising Up Against them and these people who r using their Savage Excuse for Bending to terrorize good innocent (fire nation) people. theres all too frequent terrorist attacks that the equalists claim credit for mostly against monuments to earth/water/air nation people and earth/water nation community centers (one like it was the event that forced tenzin back to republic city) but also like the govt doesnt take a lot of these seriously or if they do only a couple people are charged without doing damage to the entire organization

this is also around the time that they meet asami and she becomes part of their friend group. asami likes pro bending but her dad HATES it so she sneaks out to watch matches at lin beifong’s gym (korra says ironically like don’t u know how ~divisive~ that is and asami answers that the only reason its Not divisive is that gyms like beifongs are the only place where nobody recognizes her). and asami alongside korra is also kind of developing a more nuanced perspective on the city that she lives in cuz obviously the only worldview she’s ever been exposed to is her father’s right? and she keeps pushing it off making excuses not to bring mako and bolin and korra around to her house or even not to be seen w them in certain neighborhoods until they call her on it and she’s like Well honestly my dad might do something awful to u! and i dont wanna risk it!

and as time goes on we see more abt asami’s home life like her father’s hyper conservative politics and asami keeps these secrets abt her hobbies and her friends from him but she’s still clearly under his influence and mako bolin and korra r getting increasingly worried abt it cuz like...asami seems to tend to make excuses for him so that she wont have to be drawn into conflict and originally they think its just her being privileged and thats def part of it but the more they find out abt it the more they realize what a tight fucking grip he has on her and the way that like. asami sneaking out once or twice a week is the Only thing she does for herself. and it really starts freaking them out how influential this billionaire is and all the information theyre getting from asami abt what a piece of shit he clearly is. and so that whole plot thing comes about and shows us how deeply embedded these “equalist” ideas are in conservative republic city politics and how much influence theyre actually having in policy making and law enforcement.

asami suffers in the aftermath of this like being forced to truly confront the harm her father is doing both to the city and to herself. and she ends up leaving home when this discovery really breaks. but bc of the deep corruption in govt and police sato isn’t really....dealt with? like this big story breaks and everyones like Oh, My God! Hiroshi Sato Is Funding An Illegal Paramilitary Group! and theres all kinds of inane political discourse about it and he’s arrested but he bails himself out immediately and his finances are examined but he maintains control over them and after a few weeks the gang (bc they Have become close among all this w much less interpersonal drama lol) has to admit that this news story hasnt done what they thought it was going to it hasn’t dealt the equalists a real hit its just given them a very high profile ally

and this is when things really start to ramp up in terms of action like up until now korra’s daily activities are mostly like hanging around in the city w her friends (which in part entails doing little avatar stuff that people dont feel comfortable going to police with, like Can you help me my ex husband wont pay child support or Please help i got robbed and i really needed that money for rent next month or Help my son keeps skipping school can you talk to him cuz im worried abt him being safe and doing well in school) and pro bending and airbending lessons (which i know ive neglected this part of the story in terms of her whole spiritual/physical conflict but it’s more of a subtle thing like it’s one of tenzin and korra’s more frequent arguments like tenzin says she needs to focus on spirituality and korra asks why she even needs to bc republic city is a sociopolitical problem not a spiritual one) but now the equalist threat seems to really be looming on every level of society like the storyline of equalists preventing pro bending matches happens here and everyones just at a total loss of what to do next. plus increasing and scary rhetoric about tenzin and his family that destroying the last airbenders is necessary to preserving the integrity of the united republic

and so theres the equalist takeover of the city. the people who are mostly resisting this are lin and ragtag group of people who have been resisting colonial rule for a long time (including suyin, who is part of a communist anti colonial community outside the city, because i said so and i think it would be fun), people who have been visiting her gym for years, members of her amateur pro bending league, plus asami and korra and tenzin. korra and tenzin have a sweet moment (bc they do genuinely care abt each other a lot even if their relationship has been marked w a lot of tension and arguing) where tenzin says like you know i think that ive lost focus on the kind of spirituality that might actually help you. korra says what do you mean? and tenzin kind of gestures to where theyre sitting with people buzzing around organizing to take care of innocents and civilians and to fight the equalists and he says this is a kind of spiritual too, isnt it?

and something something plot plot blah blah i havent decided on the details of the plot climax yet but that’s the climax of korra’s character development and what helps her connect w her spiritual side in order to protect the city: the realization that community is its own kind of spirituality. and it kind of represents the real development that i want her to have going from somebody who thinks that the world is divided into criminals and victims and she has to save the victims Into the kind of avatar who understands the people that she’s bound to serve. she becomes an avatar of the people!

and then happy ending lol korra and asami get together lin and tenzin reconcile after years of being at odds the show ends on a hopeful note that the inhabitants of republic city and the united republic as a whole Can move on from the scars of colonialism by reckoning w the remnants of fire nation colonial ideology and reparations to the earth kingdom people whose land this is and destruction of colonial systems that have maintained and enforced colonial violence all these years

#the ending of this isnt as detailed as the beginning and middle bc ive drafted the first couple chapters but i havent thought out the #logistics and details of the climax lol #asks #lok

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carverhawke · 7 years

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so i just wrote up a short story at 2am to submit to my creative writing class for a workshop/critique thing (i love procrastination) and im scared they’re gonna rip my asshole right open bc theres two hardcore Roasters in that class so could yall maybe....read it to make sure its not TOTAL shit before i submit it to ass-ripping time

every single thing in it is suuuuuper rushed bc we’re not supposed to make this too long bc we all have a bunch of these to read, and if i did everything the way i wanted to this would be 17 pages long and that would just be the most obnoxious dick move. so if u see anything like “wow thats kind of an extreme reaction is there more context for this” or “huh it feels like theres more significance to this but idk what” thats bc shit Is missing lmfao. im gonna edit it a little tomorrow anyway tho just bc. i wrote this at 2am like yikes yall

(tw for like. abuse and mentions of past abuse & murder and shit)

Blackburn Road

Her fist hovered in front of the door for several minutes before she worked up the nerve to knock. The doorbell would be easier, but she knew that he would never fix it.

“You’re being stupid,” she muttered to herself. “Can you stop being stupid?” She had bigger problems than this door, and what was behind it, but right now the door was all of those problems combined.

So, she knocked. Three quick raps, and then she yanked her hand back and pressed it against her chest. Stupid, that’s really stupid. It’s just a door, and you knocked now. That’s what you’re supposed to do with doors.

She sighed heavily and squeezed her brown eyes shut, shaking her head at herself. She crossed and uncrossed her arms, and every time she stopped one foot from tapping, the other started. She was almost about to knock again, when the door flew open in one sharp, fast motion that almost made her flinch.

“Addy,” Ben said, smiling, but it didn’t reach his eyes. They were empty, and dark. Blue like a storm, not like the sky. His hair was naturally blond, but next to his eyes, it seemed too bright. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“I told you not to call me that.”

For a split second, his grin faded to a familiar sneer, but he plastered it back on soon enough. “Addison. To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“You know what I’m here to talk about. I said I’d be coming by.”

He groaned, and slumped against the doorframe. “Right. As if I didn’t hear enough about it from you before. I guess you want to come in?”

Don’t hit him now, Addison. Don’t hit him. He can and will arrest you on the spot. Don’t do it.

“It’s the last thing I want to do, but I’m not having this conversation on your porch.”

He moved aside, and swept an arm out theatrically. He was holding a beer bottle, and she almost brought her arms up to cover her face when he swung his arm back around.

She hadn’t been back in this house since the divorce. Every time she talked to Ben, it was at the station where he worked or somewhere else with a lot of people. She didn’t want to be alone with him in here ever again, told herself she wouldn’t, but. . .

Desperate times, she told herself. That’s a thing people say.

“Well, Addy?”

She looked around almost idly, refusing to meet his icy gaze. The house didn’t look too different, really. She didn’t know what she’d expected. No pictures up anymore, though. And the key rack–

“Find your car yet?” she asked, nodding in its direction. It was empty. He snorted.

“Like I said last time you mentioned this. I kind of have more urgent missing things to worry about. So do you, I’d think.”

“Yeah.” She still didn’t look at him. His lies crawled across her skin. “I’m making small talk. It’s a thing people do.”

“Well, not us. What do you want?”

She pushed black hair behind her ear, and finally met his eyes. “I want to know if you’ve seen him. Or heard from him. Or anything.”

“Addy, you know I haven’t.”

“Well, if he ran away like you’re claiming he did, why didn’t he let at least one of us know he’s alright? Especially with all the posters, and the news, and this rumor that there’s some serial killer running around?”

“You know how he gets. Temperamental, and shit. He’ll turn up. Half of missing kids are runaways anyway, and they do.”

Somehow, she doubted that. “And the other half?”

“You still claim to be a smart woman, don’t you? You tell me.”

“You know what? I don’t know why I came here. I don’t know how anyone can talk to you.

“Usually, they start by not being a frigid bitch, but–”

She put her hands against his chest, one against his ribs and one against his shirt pocket, and pushed him hard. He stumbled, got that familiar burn in his eyes, it almost made them glow, and slapped her in the cheek. She gasped sharply, but didn’t lose her balance. Shoved her hands in her pockets.

“You do that to every frigid bitch, too?”

“You know that’s the Addy special, sweetheart.”

“Fuck you.” She shoved him again, lighter this time, before he could make some smart remark. “Whatever. You’re a liar, anyway. You think I haven’t seen that smirk a million goddamn times?”

“What?” he almost sounded like he was laughing. He smirked, it was like steel, it was so cold. “You think I did it? To my own son? Come on. I’m a stand-up guy. No record, or family troubles, or anything. Why would I go and do a thing like that?”

She knew she’d hit him again if she stuck around, really hit him, and get arrested that time, so she didn’t stick around. She got in her car, slammed the door, and drove off at an annoyingly reasonable speed so he couldn’t bust her on that curb.

She cruised down Death Road. That’s what everyone called it, but for a moment it didn’t feel like Death Road. It didn’t even feel like its real name, or the place where her son had disappeared. It felt like a long, long road that would never end, surrounded and stifled by the waving green trees. She began to laugh.

As if to make sure she had really done it, she pulled the badge out of her pocket and ran her thumb over the bumps and indents, over his name carved into the metal, Benjamin Cooke, fading rays of light bouncing off the gold. Plucked it right from his shirt pocket. Dumb angry bastard didn’t even notice. She could use this to get what she needed. She could finally prove that it was him, him who did this to her son, him all along. She laughed again, and pressed her foot against the gas and the cool metal to the throbbing skin under her eye, right against the criss-cross scar on her left cheek. Tears sprung into her eyes, and she couldn’t quite tell why.

This was worth all the bruises, she thought giddily to herself. Worth the bruises.

---

Leaned back in her chair, arms crossed, one leg over the other, Addison steadily kicked the leg of the table. The whole thing shook with each impact, more and more as the endless time ticked on. Her reflection glowered back at her, dark hair and somehow darker eyes as she glared into the two-way mirror. She swore she could feel someone withering behind it, but maybe that was wishful thinking. She hoped she was annoying them. God, she hoped.

She had only been in a room like this once, after that accident on Death Road. Or Blackburn, rather. The same accident gave it both those names, anyway. She remembered they called her Addy, only Addy. Every single sentence was Addy. Overused it until it didn’t mean anything anymore. Addy Addy Addy Addy. She had felt so utterly alone. She was utterly alone.

She slammed her foot against the table leg, sending the whole thing shifted back. She was tired of this. She had no time.

“You can’t keep me in here forever, assholes! Either come and arrest me, or let me go, because I–”

The door swept open, and in a quick motion a man slid into the room before carefully closing it behind him. She frowned when he turned to face her, and he turned his gaze away.

“Charlie. Well, I know I’m in good hands now.”

His jaw worked slowly, and he walked over to move the table back. He sat on the end of it, body twisted a little to face her, but his head was turned away. She could barely see his full profile. They sat like that, in a pained kind of silence, for a few more moments.

“Well, then? Officer?” He sighed heavily at this, and shook his head just a little.

“We’re not going to arrest you, Addison,” he finally spit out, voice monotone and stilted. This was strange for him, but maybe not given the circumstances. “Given…given everything that’s going on with you right now, and our history with–with you–” he glanced nervously at the two-way mirror– “we’re going to give you a free pass for this. You can walk out of here once we’re done talking.”

“So, what? You’re going to tell me what a big bad crime this was and how I shouldn’t have done it? No shit, man. I’m aware of that.”

“No, but you impersonated an officer to steal surveillance tapes from a gas station! It was a big bad crime, and you shouldn’t have done it. Since you brought it up.”

“A bigger, badder crime than kidnapping? Murder? Because my son is still missing, nothing Ben’s saying is adding up, and I seem to be the only one bringing any of that up!”

“Seriously!”

“He lied about his car! I saw in the tapes–”

“Come on, Addy! This needs to stop, with you and him. You’ve always–”

“Don’t go there,” she snapped. “I’m serious. Don’t.”

He looked again at the mirror, unblinking for several long seconds. In his reflection, she saw his face twisted into something like regret, or sadness, and she watched him slowly smooth it back out. Finally, he turned his head back, but still refused to look at her.

“I’m sorry,” he said, and the robotic professionalism in his voice finally cracked. “We just can’t– nevermind. I’m not here to lecture you. I actually. . .I was going to talk about your son.”

She looked hard into the one eye he was allowing her to see. Dreamy brown and downcast, just a touch lighter than his curly hair, and both very stark against his pale skin. She and him had been good friends, once, and for a good long while. But that was before she realized he valued something else over her, crying as she clung to the doorframe with bruised, shaking fingers with a broken nose and blood pouring out of her split lips. She begged him to just take her to the car, take me to the goddamn car, but when Ben said no he just turned and walked away. That wasn’t the last time, but never looked right at her since then.

“Look at me,” she said coolly. He closed his eyes and she leaned forward. “You’re a coward. Look at me, and say what you have to say.”

“Addy, you know that I. . .” but he trailed off, and slowly, painfully turned to face her. Still, he didn’t look her in the eye. “No one’s supposed to know about this but us. But, with everything. . .and since you’re here, we decided, well, we decided to make an exception with you.”

Something was seizing her throat. There was a big, empty pit in her stomach that seemed to be sucking everything down. She was shivering, a tremble that seemed to begin at her very core. She knew what was coming. She knew what was coming. But maybe if. . .

“We caught a guy. It’s. . .he confessed to a lot of stuff. We thought that maybe, there was a serial killer starting out around here, but he even confessed to more than what we thought he did. Including. . .I’m so sorry, Addy. Including Casey.”

They called it Death Road. It’s taking everything from you, Addison. It’s taking you.

She lowered her head down on to the table.

Endless time ticked on.

---

She and Charlie were done talking. She walked out. For the first time in a while, he walked with her. He didn’t quite have his hand on her back, but she felt it hovering there. It was really the only thing she could feel. She couldn’t feel her own breathing, but she heard it, labored and heaving. She couldn’t feel her own heartbeat, but she heard it with the ringing in her ears. Slow and hollow, like a hole had been seared through it, burning what little was left to a dark crisp.

She was in his car, and he was driving him home.

“Don’t take Blackburn,” she said to him quietly. Some days, she wished her last name was still Cooke. Some days, she didn’t know what was worse. “Don’t take Blackburn Road.”

“Okay.”

It was going to kill her if she took it. The same way it killed her mother, her brothers and sisters, the car twisted around a jagged tree like a cursed ring. Addy crawled out through the broken glass and her blood pooled in the cracks on the road, shiny and slick with rain. That’s why they called it Blackburn Road. The same way it killed her son, reaching up through the cracks and sucking him down with the rest of them. Blackburn Road. It was coming for all of them. She didn’t care if she died, but the thought of dying there too, again at the mercy of its gaping maw, was so terrifying she couldn’t breathe.

“What was his name?” she gasped out, focusing on the road signs, the signs that said anything else, but she couldn’t read right now. Her breath was trembling, and uneven. “The man who. . .”

“James Eden.”

“That’s a bitch name,” she whispered, and closed her eyes. “Fucking Eden.”

“Yeah.”

“Did he say how?”

“Addy. . .”

“I want to know if he suffered.”

Charlie only paused for a second, but that second of silence was the worst thing she had ever heard. She wanted to scream, but something was shackling her breath.

“I really can’t tell you that stuff now,” he muttered.

“What did he say?”

“Come on, Addy.”

“Don’t–”

“I just. . .” Charlie sighed. “Not much I can tell you, okay? We just showed him a picture of Casey, to see if he had any connection, and he confessed. Like that. We can maybe. . .well, he hasn’t given us much on anything, when it comes to. . .finding stuff. But we hope–”

“You showed him?”

“Huh?”

“You showed him a picture first? And told him Case’s name?”

“Uh, yeah. Not me personally. Jane did. You know, Detective Callahan.”

“I know.” Detective Callahan came by her house a lot. Detective Callahan walked away, too. “So he didn’t really. . .he just said. . .”

“Addison.”

“I’m just saying, did he really do it? You needed to show him before–”

“Jesus Christ! Look, I know we fucked up with you and Ben, alright? Constantly! I know Ben is not a fucking stand-up guy! In the least! But if you start up on this–”

“You didn’t see the tapes, Charlie. They showed me the tapes. Ben’s car wasn’t stolen from that parking lot. It was never there.”

“Ben was there.”

“He walked in from the woods.”

“Addy–”

“He walked in from the woods, and he went inside, and he waited there for you to pick him up. Charlie. Please.”

“Maybe he parked somewhere else.”

“But he said it was stolen from–”

“Maybe he was simplifying it, Addison! I mean, Christ! All you have is a bunch of goddamn conspiracy theories here!”

“I don’t! You don’t know him like me. You never have.”

“Addy, even if it’s true, you got those illegally. We can’t use them, can’t get them without probable cause, which, there is none, and we can’t act based on your bad feeling alone!”

She laughed. She couldn’t feel it in her chest or throat, but it bubbled out of her mouth like an overflowing pot. “Let me out here.”

“What?”

“I’ll walk.”

“Addy, come on–”

“I don’t know why I thought you would ever help me. Act on my bad feeling?” she laughed. “You didn’t even act on evidence. How fucking stupid was I, right?”

“It’s not like that. You just. . .you just lost. . .look, you’re not in a good place, okay? I’m trying to help, I just–”

“I know what you just. Let me out of the goddamn car, or I swear to god I’ll climb out this window.”

“Jesus–”

He let her out, of course. Charlie was good at following orders. That was all he was good at. Her walk home was long, and it was dark when she made it back, and she knew, she knew, she knew–

---

She stood in front of the door. She was working up the nerve to knock, breathing deep and steady with her eyes closed, hands hanging loose by her sides. But she wasn’t scared anymore. She didn’t feel anything, really, except for the steady, slow beat of her heart. It was strange, how it beat so well with a hole through the middle.

We can’t help you, Addison. That was all she could think of. The only thing running through her head. It was almost serene. We can’t help. They believed James Eden killed her son the same way they believed Benjamin Cooke never laid a hand on her. Sorry, but we’re not. Can’t help. Well for the last fucking time, she was going to help herself. Good riddance.

She brought her fist do the door, slowly, like a dream, and knocked three times. Then, she moved her hand behind her back. It would be bad if Ben saw the knife before he let her inside. Obviously, it would be bad.

They said James Eden would get death for what he did. The door swung open in a harsh, quick motion.

“Addy,” he said, and he sounded like a snake. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

She felt herself smile. An eye for an eye.

#ohhhhh my god its bad but i need to submit it so maybe getting my ass roasted twice will soften the blow #clood sucks #shit i write #im not looking for ppl to kiss my ass or anything and i know none of my writing is perfect but tbh critique scares me lmfao #not in like a 'im flawless i dont need it way' but in a 'im an oversensitive bitch with low self esteem' way #rip #i named her after 2 fictional characters in case u cant tell #i dont want to say bc then this story will end up in those tags but #at least one of them should be obvious #points at my icon

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