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incorrect-wow-quotes1 · 3 years

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Banshee Movie

Narrator: According to all known laws of aviation, there is no way that a banshee should be able to fly. Its tendrils are too small to get its fat tits off the ground. The banshee, of course, flies anyway because banshees don't care what the living think is impossible.

*Cut to Undercity*

Sylvanas: Purple, black. Purple, black. Purple, black. Purple, black. Ooh, black and purple! Yeah, let's shake it up a little.

Banshee Lireesa: Sylvanas! Breakfast is ready!

Sylvanas: Coming!

Val'kyr: *Starts vibrating*

Sylvanas: Oh, hang on a second.

Sylvanas: *Slaps Val'kyr's ass*

Sylvanas: Hello?

Val'kyr: *Opens mouth, causing Velonara's voice to pour forth*

Velonara: Sylvanas?

Sylvanas: Velonara?

Velonara: Can you believe this is happening?

Sylvanas: I can't believe it! I'll pick you up.

Sylvanas: *Slaps Val'kyr's ass again to hang up*

Sylvanas: *Sharpens claws*

Sylvanas: Lookin' sharp.

Sylvanas: *Flies downstairs*

Lireesa: Sylvanas, why don't you use the stairs? Your other mom paid good money for those.

Sylvanas: Sorry. I'm excited!

Lireesa but in a player 2 color scheme: Here's the graduate. We're very proud of you, comrade. And a perfect report card, all B's.

Lireesa 1: Very proud. *Touches Sylvanas' hair*

Sylvanas: Ma! I got a thing going here.

Lireesa: And you've got some lint in your hair.

Sylvanas: OW! That's me!

Lireesa 2: Wave to us! We'll be in row 118,000.

Sylvanas: Bye! *Flies off* Sylvanas: Hey Velonara! Velonara: Hey Sylvanas! Is that hair gel? Sylvanas: A little. It's a special day, finally graduating. Velonara: Never thought I’d make it. Sylvanas: Yeah, three centuries grade school, three centuries high school. Velonara: Those were so awkward... Sylvanas: Three centuries college. I'm glad I took off one century in the middle and just hitchhiked around the Undercity. Velonara: You did come back different. *A banshee calls out as they fly past* Banshee: Hi, Sylvanas. Sylvanas: Hey Anya. Shaving your head? Looks good. Velonara: Hey did you hear about Aeriel? Sylvanas: Yeah. Velonara: You going to her funeral? Sylvanas: No, I'm not goin' to her funeral. Everybody knows you sting someone, you die. You don't waste it on a squirrel. She was such a hothead. Velonara: Yeah, I guess she could have just gotten out of the way. Sylvanas and Velonara: *Both make banshee screams as they turn a corner* S and V: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!! Velonara: I love this incorporating an amusement park right into our regular day.

Sylvanas: I guess that’s why they say we don’t need a vacation. Sylvanas: Boy, quite a bit of pomp... under the circumstances. Sylvanas: Well Velonara, today, we are Dark Rangers. Velonara: We are! Sylvanas: Banshee Dark Rangers. Velonara: *Starts banshee screaming again* Sylvanas: *Joins in* Announcer: Students, faculty, distinguished banshees, please welcome Dean Blightcaller. Nathanos, the normal human: Welcome, New Hive City graduating class of... 9:15! That concludes graduation ceremonies. Nathanos: And begins your career at Plaguex Industries! Sylvanas: Are we gonna pick our jobs today? Velonara: I heard it’s just orientation. Sylvanas: Huh. Woah! Heads up, here we go! Announcer: Keep your hands and tendrils inside the vehicle at all times. Mantenga sus manos y zarcillos dentro del tranvía en todo momento. Sylvanas: Wonder what it's going to be like? Velonara: A little scary. Sylvanas: *Starts banshee screaming again* Velonara: *Joins in* Banshee Vereesa, the tour guide: Welcome to Plaguex, a division of Plagusco and a part of the Geneva Group. Sylvanas: This is it! Velonara: Wow! Sylvanas: Wow! Vereesa: We know that you, as a banshee, have worked your whole unlife to get to the point where you can work for your whole unlife. Plague begins when our valiant apothecary cucks bring the slime to the Undercity. Our top-secret formula is automatically color-corrected, scent-adjusted and bubble-contoured into this soothing sweet syrup with its distinctive green glow you know as... Everyone: Plague! Velonara: That girl was hot. Sylvanas: She’s my sister! Velonara: Really? Sylvanas: Yes, we’re all sisters. Velonara: Right, you’re right. Vereesa: At Plaguex, we also constantly strive to improve every aspect of banshee existence. These banshees are stress-testing a new hood technology. Velonara: Ooh what do you think she makes? Sylvanas: Not enough. Vereesa: And here we have our latest advancement, the Krelmann! Sylvanas: Wow, what does that do? Vereesa: Catches that little strand of plague that hangs after you pour it. Saves us millions. Velonara: Uh, uh, can anyone work on the Krelmann? Vereesa: Of course. Most banshee jobs are small ones. But banshees know that every small job, if it's done well, means a lot. But choose carefully because you'll stay in the job that you pick for the rest of your unlife. Sylvanas: The same job for the rest of your unlife? I didn’t know that. Velonara: What’s the difference? Sylvanas: Huh? Vereesa: And you'll be happy to know that banshees, as a species, haven't had one day off in 27 million years. Wooh! Sylvanas: So you’ll just work us to true death? Vereesa: We’ll sure try! Everyone: *Laughs, which quickly descends into banshee screams* Velonara: Wow! That blew my mind? Sylvanas: "What's the difference?" Velonara, how could you say that? One job forever? That's an insane choice to have to make. Velonara: Well, I'm relieved. Now we only have to make one decision in life. Sylvanas: But how could they never have told us that? Velonara: Sylvanas, why would you question anything? We're banshees. We're the most perfectly functioning society on Azeroth. Sylvanas: Yeah, but Velonara, you ever think maybe things work a little too well around here? Velonara: Like what? Give me one example. Sylvanas: I don't know. But you know what I'm talking about. Announcer: Please clear the gate. Royal Apothecary Society on approach. Royal Apothecary Society on approach. Sylvanas: Wait a second. Check it out. Hey, those are apothecary cucks! Velonara: Wow. I’ve never seen them this close. Sylvanas: They know what it’s like outside the Undercity. Velonara: Yeah, but some of them don't come back. Really roided up apothecary: You guys did great! You're monsters! You're surface freaks! I love it! I love it! Sylvanas: I wonder where those guys have just been. Velonara: I don’t know. Sylvanas: Their day's not planned. Outside the Undercity, running around who knows where, doing who knows what. Velonara: You can't just decide one day to be an Apothecary Cuck. You have to be bred for that. Sylvanas: Right. Sylvanas: Look at that. That's more slime than you and I will ever see in a lifetime. Velonara: It's just a status symbol. I think banshees make too big a deal out of it. Sylvanas: Perhaps. Unless you're wearing it and the ladies see you wearing it. Ladies in the distance: *Banshee scream* Velonara: Those ladies? Aren't they our sisters too? Sylvanas: Distant. Distant. Lilian Voss: Look at these two. Lilian with a player 2 color scheme: A couple of City Sallies. Lilian 1: Let’s have some fun with them. Lady: It must be so dangerous being an apothecary cuck. Sylvanas: Oh, yeah. One time a worgen had me pinned up against a mushroom! He had one paw on my throat, and with the other, he was slapping me back and forth across the face! Lady: Oh my! Sylvanas: I never thought I’d knock him out! Lady, to Velonara: And what were you doing during all this? Velonara: Obviously, I was trying to alert the authorities. Sylvanas: I can autograph that if you want. Lilian: A little gusty out there today, wasn't it, comrades? Sylvanas: Yeah. Gusty. Lilian: Yeah, we're gonna hit a sunflower patch about six miles from here tomorrow. Sylvanas: Six miles, huh? Velonara: Sylvanas! Sylvanas: It's a puddle jump for us, but, uh, maybe you're not up for it. Sylvanas: Maybe I am! Velonara: You are not. Lilian: We're going 0900 at the northern elevator. Velonara: Woah! Lilian: What do you think, screamer? Are you banshee enough? Sylvanas: I might be. It all depends on what 0900 means. *Later* Sylvanas: *Watches city from balcony* Lireesa 2: Hey, Plaguex! Sylvanas: Oh! Mom. You surprised me. Lireesa: Have you decided what you're interested in, comrade? Sylvanas: Well there’s a lot of choices. Lireesa: But you only get one. Sylvanas: Mom, do you ever get bored doing the same job every day? Lireesa: Comrade, let me tell you about stirring. You grab that stick, and you just move it around, and you stir it around. You get yourself into a rhythm. It's a beautiful thing. Sylvanas: You know, mom, the more I think about it, the more I realize the plague field just isn’t right for me. Lireesa: And you were thinking of what, making balloon animals? That's a bad job for a girl with tendrils. Sylvanas: Well, no... Lireesa: Lireesa! Your comrade’s not sure she wants to go into plague! Lireesa 1: Oh Sylvanas, you are so funny sometimes! Sylvanas: I’m not trying to be funny. Lireesa 2: You're not funny! You're going into plague. Our comrade, the stirrer! Lireesa 1: You're gonna be a stirrer? Lireesa 2: Wait til you see the sticks I have for you! Sylvanas: I could say anything right now. Sylvanas: I’m gonna get an Alliance tattoo! Lireesa 1: Oh, let's open some fresh plague and celebrate! Sylvanas: Maybe I’ll pierce my tongue. Lireesa 2: To plague! Sylvanas: Shave my head. Lireesa 1: So funny. Sylvanas: Shack up with a gnome. Get a gold tooth and start call everybody "dawg"! Lireesa 2: I’m so proud. *The next day* Velonara: I can't believe we're starting work today! Sylvanas: Today’s the day. Velonara: Come on! All the good jobs will be gone. Sylvanas: Yeah. Right. Nathanos the normal human: Slime counting, stunt banshee, pouring, stirrer, front desk, hair removal... Alina: Is it still available? Nathanos: Hang on. Two left! And ... one of them's yours! Congratulations! son, Step to the side, please. Alina: Yeah! Velonara: What’d you get? Alina: Picking the bones out! Velonara: Woah. Alina: That is stellar! Velonara: Wow! Nathanos: Couple of newbies? Velonara: Yes, sir! Our first day! And we are ready! Nathanos: Well, step up and make your choice. Velonara: Do you wanna go first? Sylvanas: Uh, no, you go. Velonara: Oh, my. What's available? Nathanos: Restroom attendant’s always taken, by me. Velonara: Any chance of getting on to the Krelmann, sir? Nathanos: Sure, you're on. Nathanos: Oh, I'm sorry, the Krelmann just closed out. Velonara: Oh. Nathanos: Wax monkey's always open. And the Krelmann just opened up again. Velonara: What happened? Nathanos: Well, whenever a banshee dies, that's an opening. See that? She's dead, dead, another dead one, deady, deadified, two more dead. Dead from the neck up, dead from the neck down. But, that's unlife! Velonara: Oh, this is so hard! Heating, cooling, stunt bee, pourer, stirrer, humming, inspector number seven, lint coordinator, stripe supervisor, antenna ball polisher, mite wrangler.... Sylvanas, what do you think I should... Sylvanas? Sylvanas! Lilian with a player 3 color scheme: All right, we've got the sunflower patch in quadrant nine. Geranium window box on outside the Scarlet Monastery... Val’kyr: *Vibrates* Sylvanas: *Slaps its ass* Velonara: What happened to you? Where are you? Sylvanas: I’m going out. Velonara: Out? Out where? Sylvanas: Out there! Velonara: Oh no. Sylvanas: I have to, before I go to work for the rest of my life. Velonara: You're gonna die! You're crazy! Hello? Sylvanas: Oh, another call coming in. Sylvanas: *Slaps val’kyr’s ass* Lilian 3: If anyone's feeling brave, there’s a Worgen outpost that gets some roses today. Sylvanas: Hey, guys. Lilian 1: Well look at that. Lilian 3: Hold it, comrade. Elevator’s restricted. Lilian 2: It's okay, Lilian. We're gonna take her up. Lilian with a player 4 color scheme: Yeah. Lilian 3: Really. Feeling lucky, are you? Crew banshee: Sign here, here. Just initial that. Thank you. Lilian 3: Okay, you got a rain advisory today, and as you all know, forsaken cannot run around in rain. So be careful. As always, watch your brooms, hockey sticks, dogs, birds, bears and bats. Also, I got a couple of reports of root beer being thrown at us. Lilian's in a home because of it, just babbling like a goblin! Sylvanas: That’s awful. Lilian 3: And a reminder for you rookies, forsaken law number one, absolutely no talking to the living! All right, positions! *Everyone just, goes to stand on the elevator* Lilian 1: You ready for this, hot shot? Sylvanas: Yeah, yeah. Bring it on. Varok: YOU HAVE NO HONOR!!!!!!!!!!!! Varok: *Runs in and smashes up the movie set* Sylvanas: Oh for the love of... Great everyone, Undercity’s first ever movie production, and this happens! Sylvanas: I’ll be in my trailer. Varok, in the background: HONOR!!!!!! *smashes more stuff* Sylvanas: I should’ve stayed a night elf.

#read the ending #if nothing else #happy april fools #source: bee movie #sylvanas windrunner #dark ranger velonara #vereesa windrunner #lireesa windrunner #lilian voss #Nathanos Blightcaller #varok saurfang

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soveryanon · 4 years

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Reviewing time for MAG169 (nice)~

- So, no cookie for guessing Desolation with this one, but big kudos to those who guessed that the episode would be reminiscent of the Grenfell Tower fire. Oh boy, what a domain it was ;; Desolation episodes have always felt extremely cruel and this one went veeerrry harsh on the torture and despair, even before the physical pain of it (as Jon said, “Some fears don’t need to be intensified; only manifested”). I really felt the nightmare-logic in this one, the feeling of being trapped and discovering/realising the rules and parameters as they became relevant; a little scenario that felt repeated, again and again, beginning badly (home as a prison, a toxic place that one cannot help but love because it’s familiar and theirs) and only getting worse, with Sabina losing everything (parents, possessions, physical safety), while at the same time… everything was rooted in something very concrete, very logical, very relatable, laced with poverty and the loss of agency.

- The edge in Jon’s voice for this one was terrifying (and so was the soundscaping, expressing what was being said), and it seemed… on point for The Desolation. Jude directly called him out about the fact that he himself was enjoying the fear but, even before that, the way Jon narrated Sabina’s nightmare really hammered in the cruelty and sadistic glee of the domain feeding on her ;; The mentions of the “landlord” were especially chilling, given a rhythmic, almost casually fatalistic c’est-la-vie tone to the whole ordeal (… while no, clearly, it wasn’t, and even if the fire had been accidental, there should have been ways and options to make it out… but no, due to an accumulation of negligence/neglect turning into something criminal):

(MAG169) ARCHIVIST: “But the door latch never really aligned properly, you see; the landlord always said he was going to get it fixed and… it refuses to open. […] The window frame never really opened properly, you see; the landlord always said he was going to get it fixed. […] But the fire escape was always really rusty, you see; the landlord always said he was going to replace it. […] Falling back into the inferno that is now her home, Sabina dashes over to the laughably small fire extinguisher the landlord begrudgingly provided; it is sputtering, and empty.”

(… Jon impersonating the parents’ screams sadly took me out of it on first listen, because the “We’re BURNING” immediately made me think of Jonny-playing-Galahad in HNOC’s “Hellfire” and the “We’re FALLING into the flames”, which was a bit of a mood-whiplash x”) It worked better on second listen, and again, WHAT is Jon currently feeding to the tape recorders…)

- Same as in other domains, memories were clearly rewritten or only made accessible to serve the dominant Fear at stake:

(MAG163) ARCHIVIST: “Next to him, Charlie saw Ryan, who he’d known since childhood – though the other details were hazy. Ryan gave him a thumbs-up and an encouraging smile – before his face exploded inwards to a sniper’s bullet, peppering the boat with shards of bone and gore.”

(MAG164) ARCHIVIST: “There was never a time before the disease, no matter what the old bastards tell you. It has always been in the village, always festered in the dark corners where nobody could stomach to check, where good neighbours wouldn’t dream to speculate.”

(MAG165) ARCHIVIST: “Its pace remaining as it ever was, it does not care for coming pains as you are torn. Doesn’t it know who you are? No… And soon… neither will you. […] You will be someone again, someday. […] “I’m still Hannah!” you try to scream, but are you? No. Perhaps there’s some Veronica as fragments there, or Julian, or Anya, but… no. You feel the last of names and “who” you might have been be torn away and borne towards new bodies. New pages, blank; determined to be people.”

(MAG166) ARCHIVIST: “When had the crushing pressure in his chest become literal? When had the empty promise of the horizon finally vanished completely, replaced by the pitch darkness of this “forever wall of earth”? Sam did not know. Time had no meaning here. […] His existence was static, and eternal. Immutable. “Sleep” was only a memory, because even the prospect of unconsciousness might have made his present state slightly more bearable. Food as well, he knew, must be a thing, for he could feel the hunger, but his imagination failed to picture it. The only smell he knew was the damp, and the dirt.”

(MAG169) ARCHIVIST: “How long as she lived here? How long have these cramped, dingy rooms in the back of this sprawling rundown tenement been the place her heart calls home? She cannot recall, but long enough for her to grow into love for it, to cherish every rusted appliance, every crumbling piece of plasterboard, every – flickering – lightbulb. […] Sabina cannot… picture their faces, but knows that should they wake to see the state of the place… their anger would be blistering. […] What floor was her flat on again? Surely, it can’t be this high. […] Limping and desperate, she turns to see her furniture in flames, the bookshelves full of memories, that she can’t quite place [STATIC RISES] but knows are precious to her, curl and float away as ash. The photos on the wall of her family whose faces seem indistinct but she knows that she loves, begin to blacken, as the glass pops out of the frame.”

For Sabina, memories were only useful to represent what she would lose. (;; It’s one of the things that still makes me the most uneasy with this season: the fact that regular people are deprived of who they used to be, the memories of who they were… while Jon&Martin are beaming with their Uniqueness. People are trapped in these nightmares but, by comparison, it feels a bit like they’re already “dead” and interchangeable, only allowed to remember things and be reshaped to better fear and feed the Powers…)

- I was wondering what would be the point of avatars in this new world (if they would still feed their patrons, or be absolutely superfluous, etc.). The fact that Jude’s death apparently didn’t perturb the Desolation domain very much tends to prove that they aren’t necessary, so it really seems like the keyword was what Oliver said last episode:

(MAG168) ARCHIVIST: “Sometimes, for some small variety, I will allow Danika to brush against another root: the final fate of someone she loves. […] And with each one, she knows her steps forward bring closer not only her own end, but all of theirs. Time walks forward with her, but she has not the strength to stop it. Her fate draws ever-nearer, filling me with the joy of watchful fear, but also my own concerns.”

(MAG169) ARCHIVIST: It’s a maze in there, deliberately so. People running, desperately struggling for fire escapes only to find them blocked. … We won’t get lost, though. I know the route. […] “Do you smell smoke? Do you smell… the creeping ruin of a life, a stalking creature of unmaintained electricals, of cheap insulation, of cut-corners and missing fire alarms and unenforced safety regulations? Do you see it creeping under the door to your bedroom as you sleep, the burning coals of its eyes, regarding you in the supposed safety on your home; not indifferent, but hungry, eager to take everything from you, to burn down your life in any sense it can reach? Can you hear the crackling promise of kindled despair, that it whispers into your uneasy, dreaming ear?”

“Variety”? Creativity? Diversifying people’s suffering for the Powers’ enjoyment, and above all The Eye’s? I… wonder what that would mean regarding Jon, as The Eye’s favourite, right now… ;;

- I got genuinely surprised that Jon mentioned Arthur Nolan as still alive, because I thought he had been done for since March 2014 and the events recalled by Jordan Kennedy:

(MAG145) GERTRUDE: So. Now, Diego has taken over… Where does that leave you? ARTHUR: [SNORT] Slumlording over a nest. GERTRUDE: Oh. A nest of… what? ARTHUR: Found a mass of the Crawling Rot growing, a while back. Managed to get a hold of the property before it became too big. Gotta wait ‘til it blossoms before we can properly burn it. So until then… just playing landlord.

(MAG055) JORDAN: Time seemed to move slowly as he reached for the ashtray on the arm of the chair and picked up a pack of matches. He struck one and without even looking at me, he gently pressed the small flame to the centre of the scar. His flesh caught fire, immediately, the flames spreading across his body like rippling water. The armchair caught, then the floor, and then I was running out of the building before the rolling inferno could come at me as well.

(MAG169) MARTIN: Right… I just assumed this would be… Who was that landlord guy? ARCHIVIST: Arthur Nolan. He’s here, he has a… part of it, but it’s… huge. Bigger than you could believe. There’s so much fear in there…

It had felt odd to die from self-immolation, for a Desolation avatar, but we hadn’t seen him since then, and he had lived his time – given how Eugene Vanderstock was aware that he wouldn’t last forever (MAG139: “So, me? I was born in ‘36 – I know, I don’t look seventy. But burning the candle at all ends does have a few advantages. Until you burn out entirely, at least. It’s hard to say how much I’ve got left in me; how much longer my sacrifices can buy me. But when I go… you better believe I’m going big – and it is going to hurt.”), I had assumed that Arthur setting himself on fire was because his time has reached its limit and/or that his life had been tied to The Hive’s nest somehow by Gertrude, and that Jane becoming The Hive meant his final demise or something? But apparently, no, he was still around. I wonder what he was doing during the following four years? (If it was a matter of Desolation avatars respawning in the domain, I’d have expected for Agnes to be mentioned, but she wasn’t, so…)

- Speaking of Arthur, it’s hilarious how much this statement hammered in the confluence of Corruption/Desolation when it comes to one’s life crumbling, getting devastated:

(MAG169) ARCHIVIST: “Maybe the dirt and grime builds up to such a degree that the stench begins to infect your soul, or an infestation of moths or ants or bed bugs stretches itself throughout the very structure of your home, until it feels like your skin is squirming with them. […] How long as she lived here? How long have these cramped, dingy rooms in the back of this sprawling rundown tenement been the place her heart calls home? She cannot recall, but long enough for her to grow into love for it, to cherish every rusted appliance, every crumbling piece of plasterboard, every – flickering – lightbulb. Even as the widening cracks and spreading mould fill her heart with dread, they gently, slowly, inch by inch, approach the mildewed room where her parents lie sleeping.”

… Given Arthur’s utter disdain for the idea that The Lightless Flame could be assimilated to anything Corruption-adjacent:

(MAG145) ARTHUR: Not like I can vent to the others about what a prat Diego is! Got a lot of funny ideas. Still calls The Lightless Flame “Asag”, like he was when he was first researching it. I just want to tell him to get over it – I mean, [FASTER AND FASTER] Asag was traditionally a force of destruction, sure, but as a church, we very much settled on burning in terms of the… face we worship, and some… fish-boiling Sumerian demon doesn’t really match up, does it?! Plus, there’s a lot of disease imagery with Asag that I’ll reckon is… way too close to Filth for my taste, but, but no, he read it in some ~ancient tome~, so that’s that– GERTRUDE: Well, I can’t say I– ARTHUR: –reckons he always knows best, ‘cause he’s read a few books, well. Big. Deal! Way I see it, if a writer can’t even save themselves, they probably don’t have a lot worth knowing! Find me one so-called “expert” on all of this who didn’t end up regretting all of it!

I hope your ego and convictions are shattering and that this is your personal hell, Arthur. Diego was RIGHT.

- Regarding Jon and Martin’s own domains, Jon raised the possibility that they were metaphorically trapped in their own quest, and it follows the comments about how they were outside of the box:

(MAG164) MARTIN: Are we safe, traveling like this? ARCHIVIST: Yes… Yes, sort of, we’re… I don’t know how to phrase it, we’re… something between a pilgrim and a moth. We can walk through these little worlds of terror, watching them; separate, and untouched. MARTIN: [NERVOUS CHUCKLING] That’s not as comforting as you might think. ARCHIVIST: I like it better than the alternative…!

(MAG165) MARTIN: But. You said we needed to go through these places. … Is that even going to work here? ARCHIVIST: Uh… [EXHALE] We need to go through them… metaphorically. MARTIN: Mm… ! ARCHIVIST: Psychologically, we need to… “experience” them. […] MARTIN: Jon, what are you talking about? NOT!SASHA: [FURIOUS SNARLS] ARCHIVIST: She can’t touch us. We’re so far beyond her now. NOT!SASHA: [FURIOUS SNARLS] ARCHIVIST: She’s just like everything else here, rules by The Eye.

(MAG169) ARCHIVIST: Like I said, I can’t see the future. It wouldn’t free them, if that’s what you’re asking. “Free” doesn’t really exist in this place. MARTIN: Apart from us. ARCHIVIST: I suppose. I–in a sense, though… [CHUCKLING] how much of that is because we are trapped in our own quest to– MARTIN: Okay, let’s, let’s not dive into another… ontological debate right now, not here.

… and 1°) they’re still technically under The Eye – the whole world is its domain right now; 2°) Obligatory “WHAT IS MARTIN’S DOMAIN” (a fixed place? Web, Lonely? The Institute-Panopticon too? Jon as “the Archive”, having ~trapped~ Martin?), 3°) … big Oouft because if they were to consider their quest as the “domain” trapping them… a quest is made around a goal. Jon presented it as a “doomed quest” which was already worrisome, Oliver highlighted that the current system would ultimately collapse on its own, The Buried’s domain taunted its victims with constant hope, so… if the goal kept being unreachable, but still “almost” out of reach, Jon and Martin could be trapped a bit more literally than just on an ontological plane.

- ;w; Martin is afraid of fire…

(MAG169) ARCHIVIST: … You said you were onboard. MARTIN: I was! I am; I just… thought… ARCHIVIST: It wouldn’t hurt? MARTIN: … That we’d be safe. ARCHIVIST: I never said– MARTIN: I know! I know, okay, I just… [SOMETHING SHATTERS] Look, I j–, I just don’t want to get burned, alright? It’s, it’s like my least favourite pain ever. ARCHIVIST: Is that… a joke? MARTIN: No, no! Okay? I… I legitimately hate burns, alright, they’re–they’re awful, and they scar horribly, and they just, it– It–it just makes me sick, I–I hate it. Hate it!

* Is it related to the fact that he had to care for his mom from a very young age, and that accidents happened…? That makes his decision to burn statements in MAG117-MAG118 even braver – fire that he could control on his terms, but still, in close proximity to him.

* … Actually, Elias implanting in his mind the truth of how his mother saw him, while Martin had just burned a few statements and was threatening to keep doing it, and when the smell of the fire might have still be floating around at that moment miiiight have added fuel (ha) to Martin’s own fear. Associating bad things and pain to fire.

* Wooft that he hates burns and what they leave, when he’s probably been walking kilometres holding Jon’s all-burned-to-fuck hand.

* YEAH ALSO, that line about how pain can leave a scar even if there is no physical mark to show for it? Is valid on its own but, given Martin’s past, resonates even more when keeping in mind his relationship with his mother and the way Elias inflicted his powers on him and Melanie (MAG118: “Do you want to know what she sees when she looks at you?”). It’s really not empty words, he knows from experience.

* … Same thing as the contrast between MAG117 (“This way I finally get to do something. It’s gonna hurt, but… I’m ready. And I want to. Also, I get to burn some stuff, so that cool!”) and MAG118 (“Don’t. burn. any more. statements.”) around fire: reality not as great as when plans were made, when it comes to the “smiting”, uh.

* … Obligatory “This Is How Web!Martin Can Still Win” since The Desolation and The Web were extremely at odds, and Martin… really was uncomfortable and panicking in this zone, when he had been keeping it together in previous ones (he got very afraid in the Slaughter’s, but it was the first and Martin was discovering the rules):

(MAG139, Eugene Vanderstock) “The compromise we came to… was Hill Top Road. We knew it was a stronghold of The Web, full of other children Agnes’s age. We would supervise from a distance, but were confident she would be in no danger. The Mother of Puppets has always suffered at our hand – all the manipulation and subtle venom in the world means nothing against a pure and unrestrained force of destruction and ruin.”

(Though to be fair: Martin presented himself as a “luxury smörgåsbord” for Fears in MAG117 since he was “just afraid all the time”, was always the Assistant Of Many Fears throughout the series, so it doesn’t have to be significatively a Web indicator – it’s mostly that, well, alright, so Martin can still feel specific, personal fears.)

- … And meanwhile: we went from Jon really casually forgetting that he was using his powers and knew more than he mundanely should have (the beginning of MAG167) to taking a moment to remember that Martin is not omniscient nor a mind-reader, not processing that pain (even temporary and without long-lasting damage) is a genuine factor, and admitting blankly that he’s feeding from this world, which, oops:

(MAG167) [STATIC RISES] ARCHIVIST: Help us with what? MARTIN: ‘xcuse me? ARCHIVIST: Annabelle, help us with “what”? Our–our, our journey, killing Elias, vanishing the Entities – what? [FOOTSTEPS STOP] MARTIN: Please don’t do that. ARCHIVIST: Do what…? Oh! Oh. Right, I, I see, yes. [STATIC FADES] Well, I– … [FOOTSTEPS RESUME] Sorry. MARTIN: It doesn’t… feel great, having someone looking inside your head…! […] I mean, I don’t want to keep secrets from you, but– ARCHIVIST: You should at least… be able to. MARTIN: Basically, yeah…! ARCHIVIST: I–I suppose that’s fair. MARTIN: It’s just… It’s weird, knowing that you can… know literally everything I think and feel– ARCHIVIST: Right… MARTIN: –especially since you’re not exactly the most open of people. Emotionally, I mean.

(MAG169) MARTIN: … Seriously? You don’t– … It’s on fire, Jon, it’s– ARCHIVIST: Yeah, uh… MARTIN: It’s a burning building! ARCHIVIST: Yes, it is. MARTIN: That’s on fire! ARCHIVIST: Yes. MARTIN: … Right. You are aware that traditionally, wading into a flaming inferno is actually considered bad for your health? ARCHIVIST: Yes, Martin. It will be fine. MARTIN: Alright. I just wanted to check. So. Okay. We’re planning to go through… all this, so I’m guessing the fire can’t… actually burn us! Right? Jon? ARCHIVIST: Hum… MARTIN: … Jon? ARCHIVIST: Hum… Mm… MARTIN: Jon. ARCHIVIST: I–it’s complicated. MARTIN: Well, if you want me to go in there with you, then I suggest you find a way to make it simple. “Yes” or “no”, can that fire hurt us? ARCHIVIST: Define “hurt”. MARTIN: Will the fire feel hot to me? ARCHIVIST: Yes. MARTIN: Will it cause me lots of pain, if I touch it? ARCHIVIST: Yes, though not as much as– MARTIN: [SHAKILY BUT STRONG] Will it burn me alive, and kill me dead? ARCHIVIST: … No. It can’t do us any permanent harm; once we’re out, we’ll be fine. MARTIN: You are aware that intense pain can do you loads of harm, even if there’s no any physical injury! […] ARCHIVIST: I should have told you before, so… I leave the decision to you. You know my feelings on the matter. MARTIN: I do? ARCHIVIST: I… Oh, right. I–I want revenge on Jude Perry. I want to… “smite” her. Make her feel what… [SIGH] what all her victims have felt. But I’m not willing to force you to suffer for it. […] JUDE: Yeah, but you like seeing their pain, don’t you? Their fear? ARCHIVIST: … Yes.

His relation to pain is understandable as someone who got “used” to the concept of hurting himself by repeatedly getting harmed, getting marked, and accepting more injuries to reach his goals and protect/save people who were close to him (and it’s very ironic that Martin used to be portrayed as the one “always setting himself on fire to keep others warm” while Jon… selectively did and does that too). The fact he’s feeding from this world is not a new thing: Jonah had announced that Jon would be tailored for this world, Jon himself pointed it out in the trailer, Helen toyed with him by being implicit about it – what is new is the… reverence? with which Jon seemed to marvel at the Desolation domain, the glee during the statement, the deadpanness when Jude called him out on it. It felt like at the beginning of the season, Jon was expressing more guilt, more uneasiness when it came to his enjoyment of this world… and in this episode, those were absent. So is it that he’s gradually accepting it? Or that he was trying to make a point to Martin about himself, about the fact that he is also (objectively) a monster and needs Martin to keep him in check if he doesn’t want to turn out like the others? No idea, but I feel like something is happening and building up about it;;

(… Was Jon feeding from Martin, in the Desolation domain? Martin who was miserable and afraid, coughing and in pain?)

- I LOVED the effect of Jon being in his small “bubble” of pouring out the statement, only for Martin to fight his way to get him out of it:

(MAG169) ARCHIVIST: “Limping and desperate, she turns to see her furniture in flames, the bookshelves full of memories, that she can’t quite place [STATIC RISES] but knows are precious to her, curl and float away as ash. The photos on the wall of her family–” MARTIN: [MUFFLED, DISTANT] Jon! [STATIC INCREASES] ARCHIVIST: “–whose faces seem indistinct but she knows–” MARTIN: [MUFFLED, DISTANT] Jon! ARCHIVIST: “–that she loves, begin to blacken, as the glass–” MARTIN: [MUFFLED, DISTANT] Jon! [COUGHS] ARCHIVIST: “–pops out of the frame.” MARTIN: [MUFFLED, DISTANT] Jon, she’s here! ARCHIVIST: “Her home is being eaten alive by–” MARTIN: [CLOSER] Please come back! ARCHIVIST: “–this devouring Desolation–” MARTIN: JON! ARCHIVIST: “–and she–” [RESOUNDING SLAP] [STATIC FADES] MARTIN: She’s here! [COUGHS]

* … So, interestingly, Martin could actually get him out of it this time, while he had mentioned in MAG167 that he couldn’t stop Jon. Was it because the “statement” was different: given by the Desolation domain in this one vs. Jon giving a statement through his “knowing” in MAG167? Is it because Martin was outside of the statement mode, not listening to it (so able to break it, since he wasn’t enthralled by it)? Or is it because Martin has been becoming stronger by getting in contact with the domains? Or because he actually could have stopped Jon in MAG167… but didn’t, because he was curious, too, and preferred to think and say that he was entirely caught in the statement?

(* With MAG160, that’s the SECOND time Martin slapped Jon to “get him back” in some way. Gotta love how Jon shaking him off from The Lonely was by breaking out the violins and making an emotional confession and baring his soul to him vs. Martin, getting Jon back into focus by screaming and slapping him. Different kind of powers when there is an emergency.)

* … I’m very interested in the fact that the tape recorder was with Jon in that tiny statement bubble, while Martin was heard muffled from the outside. It wasn’t only Jon’s POV: it was, above all, the tape recorder’s, hearing the statement more distinctly than Martin. It illustrated the situation very well (Jon being unreachable and following the story, and the outside having trouble interacting with him), but I wonder what caused the bubble to exist in the first place: the Desolation domain contaminating Jon with his story? Beholding, focusing its attention on Jon because he was acting as a vessel while narrating Sabina’s story? Or the tape recorder, since Jon was feeding it?

- It’s noteworthy that so far, avatars have all been able to identify Jon as the one having provoked this apocalypse, and not “just” as an avatar beneficiating from it the most since The Eye is his patron:

(MAG164) HELEN: What would I have to gloat about? Much as I am delighted by this brave new world in which we find ourselves, I can take no credit for it. This was all… you!

(MAG168) ARCHIVIST: “This report is being sent to: [STATIC FADES] The Great Eye, that watches all who linger in terror, and gorges itself on the sufferings of those under its unrelenting, stuporous gaze! And its Archive, which draws knowledge of this suffering unto itself. […] Perhaps once it might have horrified me, or given me some sense of pursuing the ultimate release of the world that you have damned.”

(MAG169) ARCHIVIST: Hello, Jude. JUDE: Fancy seeing you both here. To what, exactly, do I owe the pleasure, the honour, of being graced by the great and powerful Archivist, harbinger of this new world, and his, uh… valet…? […] Sure, I moan about The Eye, who doesn’t? But, we’ve won! Both of us. And… that’s great!

Seems like they got a special knowledge or are able to feel his status in the new world? It’s still cracking me up that nobody ever mentions Jonah and his participation, and that he’s absolutely irrelevant (while he was the one to scheme and pushe and engineer this apocalypse in the first place).

- Gigantic dread as soon as Jon mentioned Jude, because y i k e s: technically, we heard about avatars who felt extremely ruthless and cruel, such as John Amherst or Arthur Nolan, but those had belonged more to Gertrude’s era. Jude Perry was the one who felt the most gratuitous and deliberate in her cruelty, in Jon’s era? And despite that, was mostly staying in her lane – Jon had to look her up to find her in MAG089, she never went after him? So the idea that he was trying to confront her and bringing Martin with him (… without warning him at first), that he sought her out and was planning to kill her, felt dangerous and worrisome.

- Gotta love, about the “valet”-thing, how:

(MAG169) JUDE: Fancy seeing you both here. To what, exactly, do I owe the pleasure, the honour, of being graced by the great and powerful Archivist, harbinger of this new world, and his, uh… valet…?

* It’s payback for Jon’s “I just… er, you were a friend of Agnes Montague, correct?” (MAG089). Opposite of mlm/wlw solidarity.

* ONCE AGAIN, after Elias, after Peter, after maybe Helen currently?, it’s an avatar underestimating Martin on sight.

- It felt to me like Jon was mostly seeking answers or a form of peace of mind than genuinely getting revenge, or helping Jude’s victims? He insisted on his questions all through their confrontation:

(MAG169) ARCHIVIST: I have a question for you. I’ve been wondering. MARTIN: [COUGHS] ARCHIVIST: Did you know what you were doing? JUDE: Excuse me? ARCHIVIST: When you burned me. Marked me with… Did you know it would lead to… all of this? [CRUMBLING] JUDE: You came all this way just to ask that? ARCHIVIST: Answer the question. MARTIN: [COUGHS] JUDE: If you want to know so badly, why don’t you just reach into my head and pull it out? ARCHIVIST: Because I want to hear you say it. Willingly. JUDE: What difference does it make if it’s– ARCHIVIST: Just answer the damn question…! JUDE: … No. I had no idea. ARCHIVIST: So why did you do it? JUDE: Why do you think? Because I wanted to hurt you. MARTIN: [COUGHS] JUDE: Because you were annoying, and I didn’t like you! So I hurt you. ARCHIVIST: And if you had? JUDE: But I didn’t. Look. I don’t care, okay? MARTIN: [COUGHS] JUDE: I just… I don’t. Raking over the past like it matters, like it means anything… The past is dead, Archivist; ashes in the wind. We’re – here – now. And that’s it! ARCHIVIST: … I suppose you’re right…!

And this time, it wasn’t a tug-o’-war of question/answer resulting in one’s death (Peter), or an impulsive murder (Not!Sasha). It was planned and controlled, and deliberate. And it didn’t feel good at all: it was really a horrible scene, with Martin coughing and coughing in the background (… and Jon not paying it any attention), the execution dragging out and taking time, because Jon was processing slowly and not… giving the final blow. I really wondered if he was going to just stop, or if it wouldn’t work, or if Martin would ask him to stop – but no, quite the contrary, it’s Martin who yelled for it to be done:

(MAG169) MARTIN: [COUGHS] [STATIC RISING: LOW AND SPIRALLING, PRESSURING] JUDE: Uh! Listen… Listen… [BREATHLESS CHUCKLING] You’re enjoying this, right? ‘Course you are! You want to use those powers of yours to hurt people, you want to murder everybody who can’t fight back at you now? I can help you…! [DIGITAL GLITCHING SOUNDS] MARTIN: Just DIE already!! JUDE: You’re… not… better… than… me! [SCREAMS] [DIGITAL BURSTING, RIPPING SOUNDS] [STATIC DECREASES AND FADES] MARTIN: [COUGH] [PANTING] Is it…? ARCHIVIST: It’s over. … She’s gone.

;; There was something very… child-like, in Martin’s scream? You know, the kind of absolute rejection because he’s hurt and because in his mind there is no other way than for the other person to disappear for him to feel good ever again? I hadn’t paid much attention with Not!Sasha, but technically, the distorted, glitching sounds before and during the ripping of both the Not!Them and Jude sounded very close to Peter’s own static (and Martin’s, when he disappeared in front of Georgie): is it possible that he might have contributed in both cases, or amplified it? Or was it “only” Jon all through it?

- There is something very fitting in the fate of avatars, lately: the Not!Them was forced to “know” the suffering of its victims before getting ripped away from existence; Oliver was not rejecting death and knew it would come from him at some point, and Jon fittingly decided to spare him (although he was aware of the irony); Helen-the-Distortion is an ambivalent case (Jon can threaten her, but they can talk, it’s a bit of an unstable relationship the balance of which could shift at any time); Jude was inflected the suffering of her victims (and desolated herself in a way). It’s kinda fitting, for The Stranger, The End, The Spiral and The Desolation? I wonder how much the Domains are influencing Jon’s behaviour towards their agents, regardless of his personal feelings about them…

- Regarding Jon&Martin, it’s really heartbreaking that they are trying to navigate around and with each other’s feelings, trying to find the “right” decision regarding choices and boundaries… and that it backfired so badly due to the circumstances and the fact that, right now, they can’t really make an ideal, non-harming decision:

(MAG169) MARTIN: Jon, is there another way? ARCHIVIST: I mean… sort of? M–maybe? [SILENCE] MARTIN: That turn…! You, you took a hard turn after the roots back there. I knew that was a thing! Why are we here? ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] It’s just… [INHALE] When you said… [SIGH] MARTIN: Jon, why have you taken us here? ARCHIVIST: Jude Perry. … This is where Jude Perry rules. […] You said you were onboard. MARTIN: I was! I am; I just… thought… ARCHIVIST: It wouldn’t hurt? MARTIN: … That we’d be safe. ARCHIVIST: I never said– MARTIN: I know! I know, okay, I just… […] ARCHIVIST: … Alright. If you really don’t want to do this, we, we can go another way. MARTIN: Really…? ARCHIVIST: Really. My revenge… [SIGH] Well, let’s just say you’re more important. […] So are we going in, or not? MARTIN: You’re– … I, you’re asking me? ARCHIVIST: I should have told you before, so… I leave the decision to you. You know my feelings on the matter. MARTIN: I do? ARCHIVIST: I… Oh, right. I–I want revenge on Jude Perry. I want to… “smite” her. Make her feel what… [SIGH] what all her victims have felt. But I’m not willing to force you to suffer for it. MARTIN: Okay, so it’s… I have to choose, do I? ARCHIVIST: Or we could sit here. [SILENCE] [DISTANT SOUND OF SOMETHING COLLAPSING] MARTIN: … No. No, I–I’m not going to choose, I d–I don’t think that’s a fair decision to put on me. It’s your revenge; your choice, not mine. [SILENCE] ARCHIVIST: … Fine. We go in. [DISTANT SOUND OF SOMETHING COLLAPSING] MARTIN: [SHAKY INHALE] Al–alright then…! ARCHIVIST: We’ll be fine. MARTIN: J– Lead the way. [BAG JOSTLING]

It was good of Jon to admit that he should ask Martin, and expressed reluctance at the idea of putting him in an uncomfortable position for his own revenge! It was good of Martin, to establish once again that he didn’t want to bear the burden of deciding for both of them (MAG154: “Don’t do this.” “Do what?” “Make it my decision.”), while it was explicitly about what Jon wanted! … But it also feels like Jon would have needed Martin to decide agree to go for him if the goal was for Jon to find some peace of mind with his revenge, and that Martin would have needed Jon to say that no, definitely not, his revenge wasn’t worth endangering and harming Martin.

(Though, I feel like Martin was the most hurt of them both, this time around ;; He sounded absolutely miserable at the end of the episode, and he had been the one to begrudgingly agree to follow Jon after making it clear that he wouldn’t like the experience… I’m really surprised that Jon stuck to the “revenge” concept while he knew what was at stake for Martin. Really hoping that they will talk about it soon ;;)

- ;; Technically, Jude made a lot of valid points regarding Jon-as-an-avatar:

(MAG169) JUDE: You’re not scared, though, are you, Archivist? ARCHIVIST: … I can feel the pain of every person you have trapped here. My own isn’t all that different. JUDE: Yeah, but you like seeing their pain, don’t you? Their fear? ARCHIVIST: … Yes. JUDE: You and that stupid Eye, god, you make me sick! Lording it over everybody like you own the place? You’re just leeches, voyeurs, parasites on the real monsters. […] Oooh, I see! I get it. You finally get a sniff of power, and the first thing you do is try to settle some old scores. MARTIN: [LOUDER COUGHS] JUDE: Play the big man, get off on good old-fashioned petty revenge~! […] I’m happy in this world. I belong here. And so do you. MARTIN: [COUGHS] [STATIC RISING: LOW AND SPIRALLING, PRESSURING] JUDE: Uh! Listen… Listen… [BREATHLESS CHUCKLING] You’re enjoying this, right? ‘Course you are! You want to use those powers of yours to hurt people, you want to murder everybody who can’t fight back at you now? I can help you…! [DIGITAL GLITCHING SOUNDS] MARTIN: Just DIE already!! JUDE: You’re… not… better… than… me! [SCREAMS]

He presented it to Martin as “revenge”. He went out of his way to find Jude, first hiding it from Martin and then deliberately making the decision of going after her after he learned that Martin would be terrorised by the domain (but ready to follow him if Jon really wanted to go). Jude’s execution also exists in contrast to Oliver, whom Jon had decided to spare because he had “helped” him (… to wake up as an avatar), while knowing full well that Oliver had killed people too (MAG121) and that he was currently torturing victims in his domains (in creative, cruel ways for “VARIETY”…). Jude’s smiting didn’t feel like an application of justice, or as something fair; it just felt like personal retribution, because Jon has the power to do it. There is something reassuring in the fact that the whole scene didn’t bring any catharsis, felt so extremely anti-climatic and miserable (Martin was in pain and on the verge of tears, wanted to leave the place; Jon wasn’t triumphant), because Jon behaved as the plaintiff, the legislature, the judge and the executioner – it is terrifying in itself that he has the power to establish who would have the “right” to die or to keep torturing people following whether or not they’ve served his interests.

(MAG168) ARCHIVIST: I just, I don’t think he’s… [SIGH] I don’t know, I don’t think he’s evil. MARTIN: Oh, yeah, sure, he’s probably a really kind, benevolent ruler of a hellish fear prison…! ARCHIVIST: It’s just… He helped me. Wh–when I was… He woke me up. […] But I’m not going to… seek him out. At the very least, he’s earned not having me hunt him down. MARTIN: Fine. I suppose that’s… reasonable. […] ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] No. If Oliver will not seek me out, then… I will leave him be. [TINY CHUCKLES] The avatar of Death… shall live. Martin’s going to be thrilled…! [SIGH]

(MAG169) MARTIN: [COUGH] [PANTING] Is it…? ARCHIVIST: It’s over. … She’s gone. MARTIN: [PAINED] The fires are still here. Doesn’t look like much has changed. ARCHIVIST: … No. I suppose not. [CRUMBLING SOUND] MARTIN: [SHAKILY] … Let’s just get out of here.

Jude was indeed that one avatar we wanted to see disappear (since the was gleeful about hurting, that she chose to get involved in the cult and didn’t join it to escape another horrible fate, that she admitted she didn’t regret this world nor the hurt she had to Jon himself); but her accusations had some truth in them precisely because Jon had just decided to spare Oliver given their own relationship – while Oliver, too, had admitted that he was torturing and enjoying people for the fun of it. Jon’s judgement… doesn’t work. And since nothing changed in the domain, it just proved that avatars themselves weren’t the real problem at the root – the Fear-system is still in place, still working, with or without them, still hurting and feeding from people.

(… And it also highlights that, indeed, right now, Jon is “made” for this world, as Jonah had hypothesised in MAG160. He’s been shown grieving the old world, being eaten by guilt, refusing to embrace the fact that the Fears around him feel “right” at the beginning of the season. But he’s currently feeding from this world and still enjoying victims’ pain on some level – what would happen, if Jon&Martin managed to successfully revert the world back in some way? Would Jon still be able to survive?)

- We’ll see if Jon and Martin talk about it soon, but it sure feels like a conversation regarding the “smiting” is needed. Martin seems to have experienced first-hand that it’s nnooooot as good in practice as in theory (he was miserable, in pain, coughing his lungs out, witnessed Jon choose to willingly bring him into a discomforting, potentially triggering place in the name of it), but I’m not sure it will be enough for him to reconsider the idea, or to point out that… he had been wrong about it, and that the logic of killing avatars as an easy, evident, helpful thing… is actually not that simple, since it didn’t change anything. (Probably because they have to aim higher.)

I’m really not sure about their future stances regarding other avatars, because, really, who could feel as “deserving” as Jude? Jon might want his rib back, but he technically gave it to Jared as part of an agreement (and Jared honoured his half of the deal!); Daisy would “at best” represent an attempt at mercy-killing if Jon were to try anything (and it certainly wouldn’t feel good); Julia&Trevor… indeed caused the chaos in MAG158, which also led to Daisy snapping, but would it be enough to want to “smite” them? (Meanwhile, if Jon meets Simon: same as Oliver, given his relationship to his patron, he would probably just embrace his own death.)

Plus, if Jude’s execution felt unsatisfying now, I really doubt that doing anything to Jonah would feel satisfying either? It… wouldn’t solve anything or fix the world back.

- I really wonder what’s happening in Jon’s head right now, if everything was a conscious decision that more or less backfired (ha), or if there are once again influences at stake… Did he really go after Jude because, like Martin suggested, Jon thought it could free or at least relieve the people imprisoned in that domain? Jon can’t see the future, but he could have “known” what had happened to the Not!Them’s carousel to get an indication of what happens in those cases; it… didn’t sound like a genuine reason. Same thing with the concept of revenge: Jon was scared of it just a few episodes ago (MAG166: “Because I’m ashamed, Martin. […] Yes! Ashamed of the fact that I… destroyed the world and have been rewarded for it; the fact that… I can walk safe through all this horror I’ve created like a fucking tourist, destroying whoever I please; the fact that I… enjoyed it, and… the fact that there are… so many others, that I still want to revenge myself on!”), and if it had been only about revenge, he wouldn’t have needed to ask Jude all these questions and to delay the moment when he would actually end her. Was it because he hoped that Jude would regret, would have behaved differently if she had known that it would lead to the apocalypse? Was it because he wanted to check with himself whether “smiting” her deliberately would feel good, fair and right? Was it because he thought that trusting Martin’s judgement and killing avatars would indeed be the best course of action? Was it because he wanted to prove a point to Martin – that he’s a monster too, and/or that killing doesn’t feel as great in practice as on the paper?

… His behaviour in this episode reminded me so much of MAG141, however, and how coldly rational he had sounded about what he was doing to Floyd, as if it was a logical and implacable course of action; so I can’t help but wonder if there is Eye-related influence at play. Pushing him to hurt other avatars for The Eye’s entertainment, to feed from the ones who are usually feared? For “variety”, too?

- … Regarding Jon’s powers, I had briefly wondered whether Jon was still able to compel, given what Oliver had mentioned, but mMMMmmm…

(MAG168) ARCHIVIST: “Please, Jon, do not interpret this report as a “plea for mercy” or a “call to action”. I would have offered it willingly, of course, but to do so is no longer an option. You cannot ask; you may only take.”

(MAG169) JUDE: You came all this way just to ask that? ARCHIVIST: Answer the question. MARTIN: [COUGHS] JUDE: If you want to know so badly, why don’t you just reach into my head and pull it out? ARCHIVIST: Because I want to hear you say it. Willingly. JUDE: What difference does it make if it’s– ARCHIVIST: Just answer the damn question…! JUDE: … No. I had no idea.

Since compelling Peter to death, Jon has never been shown forcing an answer out of someone again. He has been shown “knowing” things with alarming ability, being almost entirely omniscient at this point (MAG164: “Okay. So… how much can you see? What else do you know?” “Uh… Maybe everything…!”), whether it’s prompted by someone’s questions (as Martin demonstrated) or Jon just knowing things on his own accord. He has demonstrated a new way to deal with “statements”: getting filled with the Fears suffusing his surroundings, and having to “pour out” these statements into the tape recorder (MAG162: “This cabin. It’s not right. And, when I thought that, I–I felt… It, it all poured out of me down… into the tape.”). He has manifested his new Eye-related ability to turn the Feared into the Fearful, eradicating monsters and avatars (MAG166: “But The Eye still rules. All this fear is being performed for its benefit. And so, there are now exactly two roles available in this new world of ours: the watcher, and the watched. Subject, and object. Those who are feared, and those who are afraid. And Jon, well… he is part of The Eye; a very important part. And he’s able to, shall we say… shift its focus. Turn the one into the other.”). But compulsion as the act of asking a question and forcing an answer out of someone? Nothing since the beginning of the season. It might be nothing, but Oliver has always known so much about Jon and his situation, and Jude directly made a reference to that power when Jon didn’t use it, so… it could indeed be a thing.

(Or it’s also possible that, after Peter resisted compulsion to the point of dying, Jon fears that ability and what it could do, and purposefully stopped using it?)

MAG170’s title is… MmMMmm. If this an episode regarding a territory, I would say Spiral or Flesh (… and Jared in particular). It could also be about things outside of a domain, like what happened with “Curiosity” – and then, I’d see ways for it to be an outside POV (Jonah? Annabelle?) and/or other characters coming back (Georgie&Melanie? Basira? … stumbling upon/finding Daisy…?). And/or Martin talking about himself – we know so little about his pre-Archives life, I feel ;; (Same for Basira…) There could also be a way to connect with something mentioned about Agnes in MAG067…

(… It’s also making me think of Albrecht’s library / the Black Forest crypt and what Jonah did of the books…)

#mag169 #tma liveblog #tma season 4 #tma spoilers/#long post/#the magnus archives

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snowbreeze64 · 4 years

Text

i call this one: proof i’m going insane

anyways here’s a list of all times webs/and or spiders have been mentioned in 167 episodes of the magnus archives bc i haven’t listened to 168 yet.

spoilers through tma episode 167 because, yeah

UP TO DATE THROUGH EPISODE 167

CONFIRMED WEBISODES (Rusty Quill Youtube Playlist)

#8 Burned Out *

#16 Arachnophobia

#56 Children of the Night

#59 Recluse *

#67 Burning Desire *

#69 (nice) Thought for the Day

#81 A Guest For Mr. Spider

#100 I Guess You Had To Be There

#110 Creature Feature

#114 Cracked Foundation *

#123 Web Development

#136 The Puppeteer

#147 The Weaver

#167 Curiosity

* = Hill Top Road Related

And now, to channel my S2 Jon energy, which is also just BDG

ALL MENTIONS OF SPIDERS AND/OR WEBS IN NON-WEBISODES

#3 Across the Street - the Table is introduced

#9 A Father’s Love - “As far as I was concerned, the sturdy wooden structure was just the home of spiders’ nests and the rusted garden tools my parents would use once a year to attack the overgrown wilderness that was our back garden.” (Julia Montauk about their shed)

#11 Dreamer - “Looking down I could see a web of dark tendrils criss-crossing the streets and crawling up the buildings.” (Oliver Banks about the death tendril things)

#12 First Aid - Hill Top Road relation (Diego Molina)

#19 Confession/#20 Desecrated Host - Hill Top Road related

#22 Colony - Martin investigates Carlos Vittery’s house, finds lots of spiderwebs.

#32 Hive - “Was it the spiders? There were webs in the corners, around the entryway into the attic. I would watch them scurry and disappear in between the wooden boards. ‘Where are you going, little spiders?’ I would think. ‘What are you seeing in the dark? Is it food? Prey? Predators?’ I wondered if it was the spiders that made the gentle buzzing song. It was not. Webs have a song as well, of course, but it is not the song of the hive.” (Jane Prentiss)

#35 Old Passages - “I have the vaguest memories: flashes of a pile of paper, completely covered in cobweb…” (Harold Silvana about the tunnels)

#36 Taken Ill - “Just a sort of spider web design on the front.” (Jon about his lighter)

#37 Burnt Offering - Hill Top Road related

#38 Lost and Found - Jon attacks a spider and somehow makes a hole in the wall, and now there are worms

#39 Infestation - “No, no… it’s just that whatever web these statements have caught you in, well, I’m there too. We all are, I think.” (Martin)

#40 Human Remains - “Yes. She was sat in a wooden chair in the middle of the room. No worms. No cobwebs. Just… an old corpse.” (Martin about Gertrude’s corpse) (Does the sudden absence of spiders count as spiders?)

#43 Section 31 - “The most I could get out of her was that she was originally sectioned for something she referred to as “spider husks”.” (Basira about Daisy getting sectioned)

#44 Tightrope - “Why did she begin recording them? And why stop? If she’d been doing so right up until her death, she would’ve likely gotten through much of the archive, and… moreover I wouldn’t have had to find this tape player tucked away in the storage room, covered in dust and cobwebs.” (Jon about the tape player) (it’s covered in cobwebs! Suspicious! What do you mean old things get covered in cobwebs naturally?)

#46 Literary Heights - “I did go down there to see if I could find anything, but it seems much as it did last time. The only difference now is… all the spiderwebs. They seem to have spread down there. I think I saw some of the larger specimens actually eating the remains of the worms.” (Jon about the tunnels under the archives)

#51 High Pressure - “No… No, it isn’t. I’ve always seen it more like a web?” (Not!Sasha about the Table)

#63 The End of the Tunnel - “We’ve had something of a spectrum from him and his ilk: cobwebs entombing, difficulty in navigation, and now a violent, murderous dark.” (Jon about Robert Smirke)

#65 Binary - “Statement of Tessa Winters, regarding a strange computer program she downloaded from the Deep Web three months ago.” (What? It’s a web!)

#67 Burning Desire - “I looked up and noticed within the corner of the room, where there had been a spider’s web this morning, there was just a faint wisp of smoke.” and “Another held a bag that seemed to be full of candles, while a third had a clear plastic container filled with hundreds of tiny spiders.” (Jack Barnabas about his date with Agnes and the people in front of her flat) (this was already listed in webisodes but i just thought it was interesting)

#68 The Tale of a Field Hospital - “There were a couple of spiders, so I changed routes and found, I think it’s a gas main.” (Jon about exploring the tunnels) (also that gas main *eyes eyes eyes*)

#78 Distant Cousin - “Wrapped around it were thick strands of what I think was spider’s web, stretching back into the table, which I now saw pulsed along its carved channels with a sickly light.” (Laurence Moore about Adelard Dekker trapping the Not!Them in the table) and “Hollow. Just cobwebs and dust.” (Jon, breaking the table)

#79 Hide and Seek - “Of course the table was binding it. The table is webs and spiders. Spiders are something else. They don’t help each other, they oppose, they… they weaken. It was caught in a web, and I…” (Jon about the table...and perhaps Beholding something about the entities?)

#87 The Uncanny Valley - Jude Perry working with the Stranger, so Hill Top Road related?

#89 Twice as Bright - Statement of Jude Perry, Hill Top Road related

#90 Body Builder - “As you’d expect, most of the listings just pointed me towards the their websites, but I spotted a small, square ad box in the lower left corner.” (Ross Davenport, about finding his new gym) (yes i KNOW this is a stretch but the word website has the word web in it so…)

#91 The Coming Storm - “One lighter, gold, spiderweb design.” (Daisy going through Jon’s stuff)

#111 Family Business - Jon and Gerry discuss the entities, including the Web

#112 Thrill of the Chase - “We all met through one of those meetup websites, I-I forget which one.” (Lisa Carmel, about Murder Club) (listen it’s a WEBSITE so it has the word WEB in it and besides THE SPIDERS CONTROL THE WORLD WIDE WEB)

#114 Cracked Foundation - “It was warmer down there, warmer every step, and I found myself brushing cobwebs from my face as I got further down, until at last there I was - stood in the cellar of Hill Top Road.” (Anya Villette about Hill Top Road)

#117 Testament - “I know, I know it’s not exactly intricate, but it felt good leaving my own little web. Oh, oh, Christ, I hope John doesn’t actually listen to these. “Good lord, is Martin becoming some sort of spider person?” No, John, it’s an expression, chill out!” (Martin about his plan.) (also, I’ve been called out by Martin.)

#118 The Masquerade - “DAISY: Shut. Up. It’s just cobwebs. ARCHIVIST: There’s no such thing as just cobwebs.” (Jon walking into some cobwebs while planting C4) (also he’s RIGHT, DAISY)

#121 Far Away - “Just a second of them webbed over the face of a drunk old man stumbling into his car.” (Oliver about seeing the death tendrils in the waking world) and “Honestly, I’m still not exactly sure why I’m here. But you know better than anyone how the spiders can get into your head. Easier to just do what she asks.” (Oliver about why he’s visiting Jon)

#135 Civilian Casualties - “In the last week I’ve seen two different people wearing symbols for the People’s Church of the Divine Host, and it’s rare I go anywhere without cobwebs, anymore.” (Jon about the Institute being watched)

#128 Heavy Goods - “We had some luggage, once, a thrumming silk-wrapped thing of the spider, hiding away in an old steamer trunk.” and “The Spider’s always an easy job, no fuss, no complications, everything planned and prepared. It knows too much to truly be a stranger, but hides its knowing well enough to endure.” (Breekon about his and Hope’s deliveries)

#130 Meat - “I found this tape tucked in a corner of my desk drawer (sigh) covered in cobwebs. I suppose subtlety has gone out the window a bit, and the question is now simply… how much I trust the Spider to have my best interests at heart.” (Jon about the statement he just played. Also the Spider giving him the idea to use a flesh-anchor???)

#134 Time of Revelation - “There are two powers that, to my knowledge, have never attempted to fully manifest. Never had followers set them up for a ritual. Mother of Puppets, and Terminus. The Web and the End. The Web, I’ve never really been sure about. If I were to guess, I would say it actually prefers the world as is: playing everyone against each other. And so on.” (Peter Lukas about the entities)

#137 Nemesis - “Still, the anticlimax is fascinating. I can only assume they were supposed to be bombed at the height of the ritual - maybe by Japanese aircraft, maybe Allied, maybe both. I wonder what stopped it. A Japanese radar filled with spiderwebs, a US destroyer finding itself suddenly alone in the open ocean? Heh. We’ll probably never know.” (Gertrude about the Slaughter’s failed dance party)

#139 Chosen - Statement about Agnes, Hill Top Road related

#145 Infectious Doubts - “Ah. That’s a fair enough question. It was the Web. I didn’t know it at the time, of course, and I would call it an accident, but it never is, with them. It’s only after the fact that you can see all the subtle manipulations.” (Gertrude about the ritual binding her and Agnes)

#146 Threshold - “There is something wrong with Hill Top Road. You know it as well as I do. Some strange scar on reality at the center of - whatever it is that the Spider is spinning.” (Helen about Hill Top Road) and “What a delightful thought. (short pause) I don’t believe so, no. But the Spider’s strings are subtle, so I suppose it’s not impossible. Why?” (Helen about being controlled by the web to eat Marcus McKenzie (door guy)) Also throughout this episode Jon is wondering whether Annabelle is controlling him

#148 Extended Surveillance - “Or that we were being stalked by some freaky spider woman? Don’t tell me you didn’t know about that.” (Basira while beating up Elias) “Look, look - I’ve been doing this a long time now, and if there’s one thing I’ve learned about the Web, it’s that it plays its own game. All you can really do is hope it doesn’t get in the way of whatever your plan is. Because the Spider usually wins.” (Elias about the Web)

#150 Cul-de-Sac - “The Lonely is possibly the most insidious of the powers, I believe. Certainly it is the one that most delights and having you do its work for it, even the spiders seem to have a hard time matching it for sheer seductiveness.” (Jon about the Lonely). Also during this episode he and Melanie argue about whether her therapist is Web.

#157 Rotten Core - “Or Annabelle Cane is trying to manipulate me into thinking it’s one of the other scenarios. Previously, the spiders have made their presence clear when they’ve sent me… hints… but I can’t take that for granted.” (Jon about the Adelard statement left on his desk) (hey wait a minute if the statements refuse to record digitally how did Adelard send his on an e-mail-)

#160 The Eye Opens - “I’ll admit, my options were somewhat limited, but My God, when you came to me already marked by the Web, I knew it had to be you. I even held out some small hope you had been sent by the Spider as some sort of implicit blessing on the whole project, and, do you know what, I think it was.” (Douchard about Jon)

#163 In the Trenches - Annabelle calls Martin, Martin doesn’t pick up

#164 The Sick Village - “That’s - weird; I - I know the Web was wrapped around that phone, but, but I can’t - see her. A, At all.” (Jon about Annabelle)

#166 The Worms - Annabelle calls Martin to neg him over the phone.

Why did I spend over an hour doing this? Hell if I know. Am I any closer to finding out what the spiders want? Nope. So they’ve been helping Jon figure stuff out and got him appointed to the Institute in the first place, presumably so Elias would carry out his ritual, but why if they’ve never attempted a ritual before? They can’t be happy being ruled over by the Eye. What does Annabelle want with Martin? What the hell is going on at Hill Top Road?? WHAT IS UP WITH JON’S LIGHTER?????

#the magnus archives #tma spoilers #tma the web #WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN #annabelle cane #jonathan sims #martin blackwood #tma #long post

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kurtty-drabbles · 4 years

Text

The Wrong Nightcrawler au (3/3)

N/A: The final part of this au and well, fuck the canon, and how Kurt was resurrected.

@dannybagpipesarecalling @djinmer4 @bamfoftheundead @muninandhugin

"Is to be expected" Death speaks once one of her Heralds did offer the news- by the way the information was given is clear the Herald is still new and getting the ropes about the work and Death has patience for those cases- and she waves her hand dismissing the inexperienced and let Kurt Wagner enter in her court already knowing what he´ll say and ask.

"Death, I want to go back" Kurt is simple and no need to put more pomp in his request in regards to coming back- why use dramatic ways to speak with Death who is the simplest part of life? Not life, but an essential part of everyone?- and Death is pondering or maybe, just pretending to ponder as she´s even off-handed how some X-men were sent back.

"Won´t originate utterance about this. Just tell me, Kurt Wagner, do you don´t like heaven? Your brother was forgiving. Once it was proved those killings are not made by his free will but by a Demon called Hive, aren´t you happy to see him?" Death asked briefly and her tone is not as scary to match to her skeleton face.

Kurt nods- and gulps as he wants to cry but doesn´t want to cry in front of the personification of Death- and speaks once he can trust his own voice. "It was good to clear some misunderstanding about each other and it helps me to understand what I´m...and what I should avoid...but, I want to go back..I´m an X-men"

Death´s skeleton face doesn´t express much emotion-maybe, that´s the thing about Death itself, you won´t learn a thing about her, but, oh she knows lots about you- and she speaks again. "You´d have unfinished business down there ...and You, X-men, seem to be the 1%. OK, I shall let you go back...but, two things, 1) you won´t come back to Heaven until you have finished your deals and the bamfs will be there with you, for you. 2) And finally, I want you to send a message to someone..." and Kurt nods knowing full well what this entitles.

____________________________________________________________________________________________

Ariel and Rogue were talking-Ariel won´t lie and say how the relationship of Magneto and Rogue seems to be odd, but, then again, what works for Rogue and makes her happy is more than enough- as they have completed their tasks for the day. "Do you know the gender of the baby now?" Ariel asked looking at Rogue´s belly. Her second child is coming -not in a literal sense, but, her belly is evident- and Rogue is radiant at this little fact.

"Uhm, Ah wanted to be surprised...but, Erik doesn´t believe in such things...so, yes...is a girl and I was thinking in named her Anya...you to know, to honor his first daughter" Rogue explained putting a hand on her belly smiling proudly.

"That´s a pretty name and gesture. Erik agrees with the name?"

"If I tell you ...he cried, would you believe?"

"Yes, but that doesn´t make him any less Magneto, you can tell him that!" she jokes and Rogue nods in agreement - maybe, Rogue would share an embarrassing story about Magneto to make Ariel laugh, but, as both comcons activated with big news- the two women have to put the conversation to another day.

"Speaking of the devil..."

"Aren´t we speaking about Magneto?"

_____________________________________________________________________________________________

Kitty Pryde manages to get a confession out of Kurt Darkholme- it was uncharitable of Kurt Darkholme to show his scar but still have the same face of Kurt W, so similar, but, his sneer is proof enough he´s someone else- the SoulSword is still in her possession. "So you´re another Kurt...what do you want with the X-men?" Kitty has to take the leading role.

She recognizes Logan is missing Kurt Wagner enough to want craft, so to speak, Kurt Darkholme into his new Kurt and Kitty, still missing the real one very much and dearly, can testify how this is not a healthy mindset. "I want to know how you, X-men, defeat Apocalypse! In my timeline, Apocalypse ruled Earth until we, the X-men, finally killed him...Prof X was killed before he could help us" is all Kurt Darkholme states and Logan and Scott are exchanged glances-Logan can forget his obsession with Jean Grey for a few minutes and think about this situation with new eyes- The other students are waiting for something.

"If that´s all you want..." Kitty states and notices the sneer on his face as Emma tried to read his mind-Kitty manages to call off and Emma follows her instruction...for now-. "You´ll be disappointed...We didn´t defeat him...we only put him to sleep again"

"Really? Man...Ariel going to bite my head off for this!" He mutters and Kitty wonders who is Ariel- the name makes her remember of her earlier days- and Kurt Darkholme is not here to talk about his life.

_______________________________________________________________________________________

Wade was reading the newspaper - another Ad of a certain Outer God wanting a Herald and Wade is considering...again- when someone knocks his door and Wade opens only to stare at Kurt Wagner with a somewhat bemused expression.

"Hi, Wade...Death sends hello!"

A bamf cloud later, Kurt is gone and Wade thinks being the Herald of that Outer God is not a great move anymore. _____________________________________________________________________________________________

"Don´t worry, we can open the portal in less than 3 minutes..." Magneto promised and Ariel and Rogue are sharing the same anticipation.

________________________________________________________________________________________

And when Kurt Wagner finally arrives at the mansion-inside his head, Kurt is cracking some jokes about Jean´s resurrections in the past, but, has the common sense to not utter those jokes out loud- only to be meet with questions if he´s the real Kurt Wagner by Logan who has his claws pop and ready and Scott is only watching as if expecting Kurt to grow a second head and try to eat kids. (not a welcome feeling nor reunion)

"Logan, I´m me!"

"Prove it!" Logan urges and Kurt blinks and tells a very embarrassing story involving Logan and Jean where the red hair rejected Logan and burns his ego at the same time- maybe, it was a pun intended- and this makes the claws back in. "Only the real Kurt knows this story...is you!"

Scott is either laughing at this exchange or maybe at the story of how Jean rejected him- maybe, Kurt reasoned, is a bit of both-walking to the mansion feels nostalgic to confusing as he sees a version of himself with a red scar on his right eye, a grimace on his face and most important, Kitty talking with him with big eyes- hope is a feeling and expression he knows very well- and Kurt is not entirely sure of what to feel about this.

"Hi, I´m Kurt Wagner. Who are you?"

"Hi, I´m Kurt Darkholme. I pretend to be you...No one here defeated Apocalypse?"

Kitty wants to be professional, yet, Emma wanting to be kind or useful told offhand that she can take the lead now and Kitty, never going to forgive Emma completely, tackles Kurt Wagner into a hug.

It was a good and strange day. It can´t be any odder, right?

__________________________________________________________________________________________

Ariel is the one to travel the portal, Rogue stay home as the baby´s health is important "Bring him back...Ariel, drag him by his tail if you must", and traveling the portal was not an experience unpleasant as she believed. The 616 dimension is not completely different from her own. At least, not yet.

"Kurt!" Ariel shouts and when two heads arrive to see her. She blinks. "My Kurt, please"

"Ariel, don´t be mad...but, uhm...they never defeat Apocalypse...only put him to sleep"

"Don´t say it" and the two hugs each other, banter a little ("told you, it was a bad idea" "I know, I know") and finally, a kiss was given. The couple can ignore the curious pair of eyes for one minute.

Kurt Wagner and Kitty Pryde watch the scene with a myriad of emotions. If Kurt Darkholme is in a relationship with his Kitty...does that mean...is possible to repeat here?

Do I have hope?

Kurt asks something. "How you noticed he wasn´t me?"

"He is a Nightcrawler, but, not my Nightcrawler. It was pretty easy!"

Kurt smiles and Kitty gives another minute before she goes break the happy couple, after all, those two still have lots of things to explain.

#The Wrong Nightcrawler au #Kurt Darkholme #Kurt Wagner #Kitty Pryde #AoA Kitty Pryde #Yeah Rogue x Magneto is a thing here #not a fan through

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lockewrites · 4 years

Text

Welcome

Where It Wasn’t Supposed to Be: Chapter 3

Brynjolf x F!OC || SFW || 1466 words AO3 & FF

Anya successfully joins the guild and is assigned her next job.

The harsh jangle of a coin purse landing on the wooden table made Anya smile after she dropped it in front of Brynjolf; it was a satisfying sound, even if it wasn’t money she was keeping for herself.

“Well, well,” Brynjolf began, looking up at Anya, “color me impressed, lass.”

She pulled her mask down from her face and let her hood fall back as she took the seat across from Brynjolf. Kicking one leg over the other, she leaned back in her chair and watched Brynjolf dump the coin purse.

“Did you think I’d take the money and run?” she asked, raising a brow.

“Of course not,” he said, though his tone didn’t quite match his words.

He waved to the bar before starting to count out the coin, and after a few moments, the barkeep, Vekel, came over with a drink in hand.

“Here, Bryn,” Vekel said. He placed it in front of Brynjolf before turning back around.

Anya watched him return to the bar; he certainly was more attractive than his the other men in the Flagon, save for Brynjolf, but being the face of the guild, that was expected. She looked back at Brynjolf and the coin in front of him; he’d quickly stacked them in several columns and was grinning.

“It’s all here,” he said, genuinely impressed.

He reached for his cup, but Anya snatched the drink from Brynjolf. She held it to her mouth, pausing when the scent reached her nose; whatever Vekel gave him smelled sour yet sickly sweet. With a slight grimace, she took a swig, surprised that it didn’t taste as strange as it smelled… though it was far from good.

“I’m a bit insulted you’d think otherwise,” she remarked with a smirk, tilting her head slightly. “First you think I’d skip town, then you think I’d swipe off the stack?” She clicked her tongue a few times. “No trust.”

Leaning forward, she put the drink back in front of him and rested her upper body on her elbows. Brynjolf mirrored her smirk and took back his drink, something bouncing in the green of his eyes, something she couldn’t place.

“So, Bryn,” Anya began, “am I done being tested?”

Brynjolf smiled. “No violence, no bloodshed,” he said. “I’d say you’ve done more than proven yourself.”

“You had me watched.”

“Aye,” he admitted. “I needed an honest recount of how you handled the shopkeepers.”

“You could’ve asked,” Anya said. “I can be honest.”

He raised an eyebrow before taking a drink of the off-flavored swill, keeping his gaze on her.

“Regardless of my believing that,” he said, “we need people like you in our outfit. And, before I forget…”

He took half the coins from one of the stacks and held them out to Anya. She grabbed them greedily.

“I think you’ll fit in just fine around here,” he said with a chuckle.

“Just keep in mind why I’m here,” Anya reminded him. “I don’t plan on making friends. I just need the guild’s reach.”

He pursed his lips slightly and shrugged. “Either way, you’ll be more than useful.“

“I’m nothing if not useful,” she remarked, reaching out again to take the cup from his hand.

Brynjolf handed it to her, chuckling. “Just take the rest,” he said, standing from his chair.

She downed the rest in a single gulp and stood with him, leaving the cup on the table.

“Come on,” he said with a short wave. “I’ll show you what we’re all about.”

Brynjolf led her to a nook past the bar; he stopped at the cabinet set in the stone arch and gave her a smug smile. He opened the doors, revealing an empty closet. Giving the back pane a push, it popped out of the place, and he slid it into a gap in the stone wall.

“What do you think?” he asked.

“I grew up in an old castle,” she remarked, shrugging. “There were hidden passages everywhere.”

He chuckled. “You’re hard to impress, lass.”

“I’ve been around a while,” she replied.

She ignored his questioning look and walked passed him into the hidden hallway, brushing against him in the tight space. The hall veered to the left and led to a plain-looking door; she could hear water and voices from behind the rotting wood. Without waiting for permission, Anya opened the door and stepped into another large, dome-shaped room.

People were spread throughout, practicing their archery, chatting, sharpening weapons. In the center was a stone platform, and next to one of the branching walkways was an authoritative desk with an equally authoritative man leaning over it. At the sound of Brynjolf closing the door behind them, the man at the desk looked up and walked toward the platform. She followed alongside Brynjolf as he did the same.

“Mercer,” Brynjolf greeted. “This is Anya. Anya, Mercer.”

Anya looked Mercer up and down, immediately put off by the scowl that, judging by the harsh lines in his face, was permanent. He crossed his arms over his chest, looking entirely unimpressed.

“This better not be another waste of the guild’s resources, Brynjolf,” Mercer spat.

“She won’t be,” he promised. “She was trained by Ophira.”

At the mention of Ophira, Mercer stiffened, and an even deeper frown crossed his face, and though it left as quickly as it came, Anya took notice.

“Well, you certainly have a lot to live up to,” Mercer remarked. “She might’ve abandoned the guild, but she was one of the best. I’ll expect nothing less than what she gave.”

Mirroring his stance, Anya smirked and said, “I’ll try my very best.”

Her sarcastic tone made Mercer’s glower deepen.

“Then I think we’ll put your very best to the test,” he said.

“Wait a moment,” Brynjolf said. “You’re not talking about Goldenglow, are you? Even our little Vex couldn’t get in.”

“You claim she’d been trained by Ophira,” Mercer replied with a flip of his hand. “Let’s see how well the lessons stuck.”

“I’m sure I’ll be fine,” she said, smirking at Mercer. “What’s Goldenglow?”

“Goldenglow Estate is critically important to one of our largest clients,” Mercer explained. “However, the owner has suddenly decided to take matters into his own hands and shut us out. He needs to be taught a lesson.”

He turned to leave, saying with his back to them, “Brynjolf will provide you with the details.”

“Mercer,” Brynjolf said, “aren’t you forgetting something?”

Mercer stopped. “Right,” he said looking over his shoulder. “Welcome to the Thieves Guild.”

As he returned to his desk, Anya and Brynjolf remained in the center of the cistern. Anya kept her eyes on Mercer, watching as he shuffled through the papers on his desk, a bit of frantic energy filling his movements.

Brynjolf placed a hand on her shoulder, pulling her attention to him.

“Welcome to the family, lass,” he said. “I’m expecting you to make us a lot of coin, so don’t disappoint me.”

“Oh, don’t start this out on such a dim note,” she said. “How about you buy me a drink and tell me about this job?”

He chuckled and headed back toward the Ragged Flagon.

They returned to the table they were at earlier, and Brynjolf made sure Anya had her own drink this time. The others in the tavern talked among themselves, though conversation quieted considerably when Brynjolf began speaking about Goldenglow.

“It’s a bee farm,” he explained. “They raise the wretched little things for honey. It’s owned by some smart-mouthed wood elf named Aringoth. We need you to teach him a lesson by burning down three of the estate’s hives and clearing out the safe in the main house.”

“So what makes this so difficult?” she asked.

“You can’t burn the whole place to the ground,” he said. “Our client would be furious if you did.”

“Who’s the client?”

“Maven Black-Briar.”

Anya curled her lip. “Great.”

Maven had been a major player in the underground for most of Anya’s criminal career, and she was never pleasant to work with. Figures, she thought. She shouldn’t have been surprised to learn Maven had her thumb pressed on the guild.

“How do you want Aringoth handled?” she asked. “Beaten? Killed? Embarrassed?”

“Embarrassed?”

“Left stranded in the middle of Riften in nothing but his small clothes,” she suggested. “Secret affairs exposed. Secret affair fabricated. The possibilities are endless.”

He rolled his eyes. “You don’t have to do anything to Aringoth, lass. Just burn those hives and clean out the safe.”

“Fine, fine,” she said, waving her hand.

“But if he gets in your way,” Brynjolf began, his tone suddenly far more serious than before, “kill him.”

“My, my,” she said. “I thought the guild kept their blades clean.”

“We have more important things riding on this than the life of a bastard beekeeper.”

#brynjolf #skyrim #brynjolf x oc #tes #the elder scrolls #skyrim fanfiction #tes fanfiction #fic: where it wasn't supposed to be #ship: caught in our silence #tesv #anya #alxxiis actually wrote something

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unaligned-valkyrie · 5 years

Note

Prompt if you like! Lexa is a flight paramedic, Clarke the new trauma surgeon on staff. Lexa’s giving report on a critical patient when Clarke walks in, sees Lexa, and stops and stares, not hearing a single world Lexa is saying about the patient. The 2 meet briefly over sick patients for the next few months until Lexa starts a convo with Clarke, perhaps about the outcome of a patient. Maybe Lexa shows Clarke her favorite spot in the roof next to the helicopter...Lexa looks hot in a flight suit..

A lot of people figured that Clarke would go into some kind ofmedicine when she grew up, as her mother was one of the top traumasurgeons in the country it only made sense. Clarke herself had triedto fight it, but ended up following her mother into the medicalfield, following the exact same path her mother had, even ending upworking in the same hospital now that she had finished med school. Inher first couple of days there she had proved that she got the jobdue to her own abilities rather than who her mother was, though therewere still whispers about her getting the job because she was AbbyGriffin’s daughter.

She had been sitting in the break room when the call came over thespeakers about an incoming emergency arrival, there had been a pileup on the free way. Clarke quickly stood up, sent a longing look tothe coffee that she had just made, before rushing out of the room.The hallways were awash with activity, as they always were when itwas an ‘all hands on deck’ kind of situation.

“Where do they need me?” Clarke asked as she passed Niylah.

“Trauma… 3.” Niylah replied, her eyes scanning down the listthat she had.

“Thank you.” Clarke said, making her way to trauma 3.

As soon as she walked into the room, which was a hive of activity,she could hear the trauma paramedic who had been on the helicoptergiving her mother a run down of everything that she needed to knowabout the patient. The paramedics eyes flicked to Clarke as soon asshe walked into the room, and Clarke found herself immediatelydistracted. If she hadn’t been a surgeon, Clarke’s ideal careerwould have been as an artist, and that was the part of her that wastrying to decide just what colour green the paramedics eyes were.There were obviously more important things to be thinking about atthat very moment in time.

The paramedic finished up with the important information and headedtowards the door, flashing Clarke a smile as she did.

“Good luck.” the paramedic said before leaving the room.

“Did you get all that?” Abby asked, turning to her daughter.

“Er… not really.” Clarke said, blinking to clear her mind, “I…er… walked in part way through.”

Clarke shook her head as she walked over to where her mother was,Abby telling her everything that she needed to know.

x-x-x-x

The next time Clarke saw the helicopter paramedic it was obviously insimilar circumstances again, this time Clarke had no choice but tolisten to every word out of her mouth as she was the lead on thatpatient. Didn’t stop Clarke thinking about her eyes again, andthose lips.

It continued on like that for a few months, she found out that theparamedic was called Lexa, and she had been a trauma medic in thearmy before returning to civilian life. Even though the onlyconversations they’d had were over the current patient that Lexawas dropping off, Clarke found the paramedic creeping into herthoughts more and more.

After a particularly difficult patient, a young girl who had beenflown in yet again by Lexa, a patient that Clarke thought they werereally going to lose, she walked out of the operating room. To sayshe was surprised to find Lexa sitting on one of the waiting roomchairs would be an understatement.

“How’s she doing?” Lexa asked as she stood up.

“It was touch and go for a while,” Clarke replied with a nod,“but I think she’s going to be okay.”

“Are you doing okay?” Lexa said, concern evident in her voice.

“That was hard…” Clarke said, taking a deep breath and lettingit out slowly, “she’s so young…”

“Can you take a break?” Lexa asked, “we could grab a coffee orsomething.”

“I’m really not in the mood to go to the break room right now.”Clarke said, “it’ll be full of people and…”

“I know just the place.” Lexa said with a smile.

“I don’t know…” Clarke replied.

“Trust me.” Lexa said, “please.”

There was a look in Lexa’s eyes that Clarke just couldn’t sayokay.

“Okay.” Clarke said, rolling her eyes as Lexa flashed her a grin.

x-x-x-x

“This is…” Clarke said as they sat on the edge of thehelicopter landing pad, their legs hanging over the side of thebuilding.

The sun had long since set over the city, though Clarke knew that thestreets below them would be teaming with people going home from workor going out for drinks it was so quiet where they were.

“I love it up here.” Lexa said, glancing at Clarke, a soft smileon her lips, “it just seems so far away from everything.”

“This was a good idea.” Clarke said with a nod.

“I know,” Lexa replied, “it was my idea, I don’t have badideas.”

“Is that so?” Clarke asked with the huff of a laugh, she couldn’tfault Lexa’s confidence that’s for sure.

“Yep,” Lexa said with a nod, yet another smile tugging at herlips as she looked at Clarke, “pretty well known fact actually,you’ll figure it out the more time we spend together.”

“So we’ll be doing this again then?” Clarke asked, wantingnothing more to do this again.

“I can pretty much guarantee it.” Lexa said.

“You’re pretty cocky aren’t you.” Clarke said with anotherlaugh.

“I’m glad it comes across that way because…” Lexa started tosay, looking around them before leaning towards Clarke like she hadsome kind of secret to tell her, Clarke decided to play along, “Iget really nervous around pretty girls.”

Before Clarke could say anything in response, the door to the roofopened.

“There you are.” Anya, one of the other helicopter paramedics,said.

“That’s my cue to leave.” Lexa said as she moved to stand up.

Clarke watched as Lexa walked over to where Anya was, pretty surethat nobody should look as good in a flight suit as Lexa did.

“Lexa,” Clarke called, the brunette stopping and looking back ather, “thank you.”

“Anytime,” Lexa replied, “see you again, Doctor Griffin.”

With a small smile and a salute, which got her an eye roll and ashake of the head from Anya, Lexa turned back around and left theroof.

#clexa au #clexa #fanfiction #prompt #Commander Lexa #Clarke Griffin #knich94

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incorrectly-quoted-queers · 4 years

Text

Drunk Punch Love: Chapter 9

Pairing: FemShep and Garrus Vakarian (Shakarian)

Rating: PG-13 (with some tossed F-bombs)

Summary: Their awkward, badass journey through saving the galaxy and accidentally falling in love

Chapter 9: 4 AM Stroll

Maybe she was up a little too late. Or too early, depending on whose standards. But Shepard needed a hot drink and she needed to remember that the emptiness in these halls, and the calm across the Galaxy, was very temporary.

She and Garrus had been having a movie marathon in her room, as many James Bond films as they could stomach. There were over 50 movies (the franchise's popularity never quite waned when Bond could just evolve with the times; there was even a turian MI6 agent when the military was trying to improve relations with them). Her dad had only collected so many copies of the movies, though. She was definitely missing a ton of the older ones. But they'd made it about halfway, to one called Spectre (fitting title), when she realized Garrus fell asleep on her couch.

But with Garrus out for the count, Anya stopped the film and decided to get her sleepless ass a drink. Earl Grey tea, a favorite. She sipped it in the mess hall, alone, trying to organize her thoughts, but she was just tired. Sleeping had been harder the past few days. It was hard to ignore the fact that in only a little over a week, and he'd be gone.

She'd lived 29 years with no stubborn turian snipers by her side. So why did it feel so bizarre to think of life without him?

Anyway, it wasn't like she'd never see him. Hell, if he did end up a Spectre, they could run into each other out on missions. It'd be likely, even. They could probably catch up then.

Damn, did that sound more depressing than she meant it to be.

Just as she was about to punch herself in her own tragic sentimentality, she watched Kaidan stumble out of the science office and through the med bay. Her eyebrows were raised the entire time she looked at him. The guy looked pretty flustered, his hair even messier than that awkward Ilos conversation.

Anya couldn't help herself. As he walked out of med bay, she said, "On a 4 am stroll, Alenko?" The second his eyes met hers, they were filled with this existential dread that was partially amusing and another part offensive. Was she really that scary now? Sighing, she dropped the jeering Commander schtick. "I'll stop the taunting there. Could we sit down and talk like adults? Because I think we've both done things we regret the past few weeks."

Kaidan didn't look too thrilled, but he sat down. "Okay, Commander."

"I mean, if you want to leave, it wasn't an order. Granted, I do have Asari-related blackmail on you now if you don't, so I guess make your choice accordingly."

Sitting across from her, he still didn't look too comfortable. But he did have the faintest wisp of a smile on his face. "I'll stay."

"Good." Anya sipped her tea and drummed her fingers on the mug. "Kaidan, I'm sorry I was so tough on you before Ilos. I was stressed and grieving. You have the right to have feelings. I'm just sorry they were for me."

"It's okay, Shepard. I think after Ash, I jumped myself through a lot of mental hoops to feel like I had something real with you."

"You still have something real. I still care about every single member on this team like they're my family. And that includes you."

Kaidan shook his head, chuckled low. It was like stabbing pin needles against her arteries, just begging for her heart to burst. She never wanted to do this to him. "No offense, Commander, but that's easy for you to say when you're the one trying to let someone down easy."

"I've been on the other side. I know it hurts."

"You? Really?"

Shepard laughed, but dread pooled in her stomach. She was going to have to get into that story to make him feel better, wasn't she? "When I was at the Academy, there was another student, Rike. He was from Australia. I hadn't met many people actually born on Earth who grew up there, too. And yeah, give me shit later about how you're like that. But he was breezy and open, where I grew up with my boots laced and my emotions in a locked cage. I was crazy about him. But when I told him how I felt, he wasn't interested." Anya snorted, even though it still kinda stung. "He actually admitted he had an Asari girlfriend and then followed up the rejection by asking me how to propose. Apparently he wasn't the most tactful guy."

"Are you saying at least you didn't ask me for romantic tips?"

"No. I'm saying romance is a mess and everyone gets rejected." Anya ran a hand through her hair and leaned back in her chair. She didn't know why it felt so important to fix things with him, but maybe it had to do with the fact he was the only one left in her new "family" that might actually stay. "It's your call for what you want moving forward. But I guess what I'm saying is that I'm not embarrassed or mad with you. I just want to be your friend. And you don't have to be, and you can take all the time away from the Normandy that you need. This doesn't have to go one specific, uncomfortable, embarrassing way. But if you want it, you can still be the best damn Alliance soldier on the Normandy."

Kaidan's smile grew then, looking down into his palms. "When we hit the Citadel, I do think I'll take some time. But you're right, we're a good team. I'll stay, as long as you never bring up the fact I tried to kiss you ever again."

"Deal." Anya tried to ignore it, she really did, but the fact his shirt was on inside out was really starting to kill her. "So, you and Liara...?"

"Also don't mention that."

"Fair." Looking down into her own glass, she couldn't help but add, "But I'm happy whenever my officers are happy." Kaidan didn't seem to have an answer to that, but speaking of officer's happiness... "I should tell you that you that avoiding me has been putting our pilot on the fritz. Just start doing target practice with us again, okay? Joker's not used to so much attention. It gives him hives."

"I figured that he never really got himself all the way down to the storage bay."

"Absolutely not, it has some steep stairs and the door jams. Dude would break something just trying to get in."

Kaidan chuckled and said, "Yeah, fine. I'll be there tomorrow to get the old assault rifle tuned." Then he looked at her, and it was nice to see him look at her without shame or lust. Didn't mean his raised eyebrow didn't perplex her. "What are you doing up in the first place, though?"

"Trouble sleeping."

"Does it have anything to do with the fact that you want me to stay? And don't worry, I know you meant it in a platonic way."

Anya was used to throwing double meanings, doing her officers' questions about her motives, but it was like Kaidan saw right through her and she didn't know what to say. It didn't make her love him, but it did make her respect him more. Maybe he did have his head further out of his ass than she expected. Rubbing her neck, she admitted, "Everyone's leaving. And more than I'd like to admit, as much as I've inspired everyone, I didn't want any of them to leave. But now it's just you and me and despite all our bullshit I don't want to lose you, too."

"That was refreshingly honest."

Laughing, Anya didn't realize how much she'd missed talking to him like a friend. Before he got those obvious puppy dog eyes, he was one of her favorite people on the ship. Like a good old fashioned soldier but somehow, still different. "I hope this doesn't sting too much, but I'm really happy you're my friend, Kaidan."

"I'm happy to be yours, too, Commander. But now I'm going to bed." He stood up from his chair and, even though his smile was still a little awkward and things between them still had a long way to go, it was something.

Shepard waved in his direction as he walked off, waiting until he was out of sight to down her own tea. Then the embarrassing, asshole teenage smirking came. She needed to talk to someone, and she only really had one option. But he probably was the only person she'd want to tell anyway.

Walking a little too brisk back to her room, she opened it to see Garrus curled up like a damn kitten on her couch. But she couldn't keep her mouth shut, so the man was going to wake up whether he liked it or not.

Tossing a polar bear plush from Joker at his face, he stiff armed the thing and nearly fell off the couch. "Wha-"

Anya interrupted him as fast as she could. "Kaidan and Liara hooked up."

He sat up and scratched his head. "May I repeat: what?"

Looking at Garrus, Anya didn't really care if he was all that awake. "I just caught Kaidan doing the walk of shame out of Liara's room."

"Huh. So when you turned down both of them, they turned to each other?"

"I have been waiting all mission to report somebody was hooking up with somebody and it finally happened. And even better, it wasn't me!"

Garrus snorted, still rubbing away some sleepiness from his eyes. "You're being an absolute child. Why are you so excited?"

"Because I just won the dating pool."

The slow realization that fell over his face was priceless. He smiled at her with bewilderment, but still threw the polar bear back at her head. "Shepard, you hated that pool."

"And I voted Kaidan and Liara as a joke, but guess who was right after all? The second they go public, I get to laugh at everyone else who was trying to say I'd get with them. And like 1,000 credits." She sniggered, probably a little too much, but the entire thing was absolutely priceless. "Oh, but don't tell Kaidan I told you. I said I wouldn't talk about it."

"Some days I think the galaxy needs to save you, not the other way around."

"And some days you're probably right." Anya flopped down onto the couch and leaned into his shoulder. She wanted to say: I never want this week to be over. But she couldn't say that, not when she knew that if he thought she needed him, he would stay. He was too good a guy for that. So instead, Anya said, "Now where were we?"

Garrus growled at her, "Sleeping."

"We can sleep when we're dead."

"Fine, but you better keep it interesting." Before she could answer, he leaned into the side of the couch, adjusting to her weight on his side, and shoved the pillow he once was sleeping on into her face. "Who am I kidding? I'll be lucky if you ever let me die in the first place."

"You're stuck with me forever, Vakarian... Or at least until next week."

Things between them got silent for a little while, but then he put his arm around her shoulder. She was starting to love when he did that, because it always was when he was about to say something that made her feel warm and fuzzy inside. And battle-ready commanders didn't get to feel fuzzy too often. It made everything that was eating out her about the next week feel a lot less overwhelming. "Don't worry. No matter where I go, I'll be stuck with you. Forever."

///

I hope you guys enjoy my awkward Anya and Garrus just as much as I do <3 So many more chapters to come! On AO3, this story is at 20+ chapters, so we’re catching up slowly but surely.

Thanks so much for reading, and double thanks to my lovely patrons:

Danyell Jones

Amy Connolly

If you'd like to support the story, please go check out my bio for more info :) All proceeds will be going towards a gaming desktop so my lovely sass can game on Twitch with fans (also read/write new fanfics or original stories!)

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#Drunk Punch Love #Shakarian #femshep x garrus #Garrus Vakarian #Anya Shepard #Kaidan x Liara #Kaidan Alenko #Normandy fluff #Mass Effect fanfiction #bioware romances #fanfiction #drama

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barbieliberationarmy · 6 years

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(I’ll Follow You) Into the Dark

Chapter 3

Lexa was prowling restlessly outside Sickbay when Anya walked up. At the sight of the Captain, she stopped pacing and inclined her chin in greeting. “Captain.”

“Lieutenant. What can you tell me?”

“We had a stroke of good fortune in rescuing the Arkadia’s medical officer, Dr. Griffin. As instructed, I avoided mentioning where and when we are, but I believe Clarke—Dr. Griffin—was aware that I was keeping her in the dark.” Lexa’s cheeks colored at the inadvertent use of the doctor’s name. “She didn’t tell me much, but whether she couldn’t or wouldn’t is hard to say. She might just be in shock from the attack, or she might be being deliberately tight-lipped.” Given the mutinous set of Clarke’s—the doctor’s—jaw (why did she keep making that mistake?), Lexa would have put money on the latter, but she knew that she couldn’t base her report to her Captain on the suspicious glint in a pair of blue eyes. “She wasn’t happy that I insisted she be transported to the Polis for evaluation, she wanted to get right to work treating her crew. She’s feisty,” Lexa remarked, not quite able to control the twitch at the corner of her lips or keep the note of admiration from her voice. “I didn’t want to leave her in sickbay unattended for fear she might try to beam back to the Arkadia.”

Anya studied her subordinate thoughtfully, but her expression gave nothing away. “Dr. Douglas says Captain Kane should be awake soon, too. Let’s see what they have to say.” She walked briskly into sickbay.

Lexa fell into step behind her. She felt strangely off-kilter and found herself wishing she’d had a chance to freshen up before she came face-to-face with the Arkadia’s doctor again. She’d tucked her flyaway hair back into its neat bun, and she’d taken a moment to wipe the dirt off her face. But her maroon-and-black jumpsuit was stained with dirt and sweat and grease, and she was sure she probably smelled. She snuck a surreptitious sniff of herself, gratified that at least she didn’t detect any overtly rank odor. It didn’t occur to her to consider why she wanted to look presentable for the good doctor, yet her appearance when briefing her own Captain hadn’t crossed her mind.

Sickbay was a hive of activity. With the Arkadia’s crew receiving treatment, it was far busier than usual. Nearly every bed was full, and nurses and orderlies bustled to and fro with hyposprays and tricorders at the ready.

Nyko met them just inside the door. “Captain, I’m glad you’re here.” He motioned for them to follow him over to one of the beds. “Captain Kane is out of surgery and regaining consciousness. He’s been asking for you. Well, for the Captain,” he amended.

Captain Kane lay half-propped in his bed. His eyes were closed and there were dark circles under them, but Lexa was relieved to see that his color looked far better than when she’d seen him on the Arkadia. She spared him only a cursory glance, though, because Dr. Griffin was standing at the foot of the bed paging through the patient’s chart on a padd. Since Lexa had escorted her to Sickbay, she’d corralled her disheveled hair back with two tiny braids. Her head wound was dressed with a neat bandage. Her uniform was still a shredded mess, but she’d scrubbed the grime from her face and hands, and Lexa realized that her first impression had been all too accurate: Clarke was stunning. Despite the Captain at her elbow and the whirl of controlled chaos all around her, Lexa found it difficult to focus on anyone else. She unconsciously straightened her posture.

Read the rest on AO3

#clexa fanfiction #clexa AU #clexa star trek AU

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gillywulf · 7 years

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Axial Tilt

I’m aware this is bad, have it anyway.

AO3

Summary: The Mountain Men get to them first.

~~~

From the moment you woke up on the dropship, everything is different. Wells is at your side for the first time in almost a year, you are out of solitary, and you are strapped into a massive machine hurtling towards Earth that could explode in the air, on impact, or maybe once you hit the atmosphere.

Like most change in your life, this isn’t a good one.

Any moment now your whole life could end as a flaming pancake.

And your former best friend who was the reason you are here would be right next to you.

Pancake and on fire just the same.

You’re not a pancake and neither is Wells. No one is. A few kids die on impact, but that was from their own stupidity. If you unbuckle your seatbelt in a hunk of metal careening towards Earth before impact, you deserve what you get.

The hundred of you gather near the door and debate for a long moment about going out. You are decidedly against it; the impact is one thing but the ground isn’t survivable yet, but Bellamy Blake and his sister Octavia laugh and then you’re outside and it’s beautiful.

It’s very likely that you’ve drawn the ground as you’ve imagined it more than one hundred times and clearly you’ve never gotten it quite right. The real thing is that much more colorful, that much more full and wild, and that much more unpredictable, if the hissing canisters thrown into the clearing are any indication.

No one remembers what happens next.

The room you wake up to is stark white. You feel entirely disoriented, because this doesn’t feel as foreign as it should, but you’re on the ground. You frown because, well, you thought you were. There’s a painting on the wall that you once saw on a tablet and everything goes a little off-filter. How could that have survived the bombs, but the rest of society didn’t?

A knock on the door startles you. You quickly find something - a blunt object - and have it ready. There’s an old man’s face in the door’s porthole that attempts to look kind and approachable. You find a sharpness that you don’t trust.

“Hello,” he greets as he carefully opens the door, “I’m President Dante Wallace. What’s your name?” He’s wearing a really old suit that’s covered in sweat lines which only add to your ill feeling of him. You don’t lower the - you glance to your hands - lamp as you answer him.

“Clarke Griffin. Where am I? Where’s everyone else?” Your grip on the lamp tightens as his smile softens (mechanically, you think).

“It is an absolute pleasure to meet you, Ms. Griffin. All of your friends are in rooms exactly like this, finishing their decontamination, just like you. Welcome to Mount Weather” Mount Weather. You...made it? Mount Weather was just a point on a map, maybe containing some old irradiated supplies. There weren’t supposed to be people living inside. You don’t know what to say. “Please excuse me, but there are a lot of you and I have to continue meeting your people. Maya will be in shortly with some clothes for you. Make yourself at home” Dante smiles again and bows out of the door.

Why does this make your stomach turn?

///

The next few weeks are...weird. You and the rest of the hundred come to live in a dorm with beds stacked high on top of one another, in clothes marked by 100 of stains, and too-rich food that your stomach can’t handle. The people are eager to make friends and bring you into their society. Even your own people jump right in. A boy named Jasper takes a liking to Maya (which you get, because Maya is pretty and the nicest person).

Finn - who you slowly became friends with - shares your sentiment. He’s gotten some weird questions from random people about his blood type and he got hives from bumping into Cage Wallace, Dante’s son, on one occasion.

Things only got weirder at the breach.

A bunch of the hundred were attending a class with natives when the teacher stopped mid word and started choking. A bunch of students followed suit and yet, none of the hundred were affected. Wells had been there, and though your truce is shaky, he doesn’t hesitate to explain the effects of radiation poisoning.

But the next day, you look up from your breakfast and there’s one of the kids who was definitely in that class, perfectly fine and already chowing down on his food. Finn and Wells look equally confused and alarmed. So you go to the source.

“Dante,” he looks up from his computer with that same calm expression you’d love to kick, “how did those people heal so quick?” you demand.

“Unfortunately, we who live in the Mountain are susceptible to radiation. Thankfully, we’ve had years and decades to develop a way to help us survive. It is very advanced science that I’m not sure even I follow” He almost looks sincere.

“I’m immune, I’d like to leave” His smile gets sharper and he closes the computer.

“I’m afraid I can’t let you. That would require opening airlocks that can only be used to supply gathering and especially with the savages outside, I wouldn’t feel comfortable with your safety at such a risk” That was new information.

“‘Savages’? There are people out there?” He nods solemnly.

“Yes, people - though, it’s hard to really call them people - who became deranged from radiation and who spend their days killing one another. That is one of the reasons Mount Weather is a fortress. We cannot allow them to hurt us, especially since they are likely too wild to know what they are doing” You smell the bullshit again.

“In that case, thank you for taking us in before they could get to us” His grin grows ever sharper.

“Our pleasure” If that doesn’t make your status as prisoners definitive, you don’t know what does.

////

Monty, maybe the nicest boy on the entire dropship, tugs at your sleeve on the way back to the dorm after dinner. He doesn’t make eye contact.

“The transfusion IVs led up into the ceiling” he says before stepping up his pace and matching Miller’s speed a few feet ahead. It’s a baffling interaction, sure, but you get the message. You slip off to a restricted area and take the elevator as high up as it will go.

The absolute last thing you expect to see when the doors open is a near-naked woman hanging limply by her feet.

Her heart monitor beeps infrequently but proves she’s still alive. You lose your head for a half second and swat at the lever to lower her to the floor. Her back tattoo curves more and more the lower she gets. You drop to your knees and try to remember everything your mom taught you about dealing with unconscious people.

Dull eyes stare back at you and you’re breathless. The woman’s face is sharp and you can already see her gearing up for an offensive, so you lean back on your heels away from her and raise your hands defensively.

“Hey, hey, I’m not going to hurt you. I’m a prisoner here just like you” Her eyes narrow and glance down at herself, then back to you.

“Just like me?” she scoffs.

“Why are you up here like this? Did you have some sort of crime?” You carefully reach out and help prop her back up against the wall. She laughs.

“My crime is being born outside of these walls. All of us are” Only then do you realize that there’s more to this room than the bleeding post. There are countless cages as far back as you can see and each of them has a person stripped and crammed inside. Your heart clenches painfully in your chest.

“How can I help you?” She frowns and stares at you for a long moment. She seems to be considering you, deciding if you’re worthy. She must find something because she straightens a little.

“What is your name?” she asks.

“Clarke Griffin. You?”

“I am Anya. To help me and everyone here, I need to get to the Commander. I need to get out and it must be me” You nod.

“Stay alive for a half hour, I’ll be right back”

/////

You’re not...completely sure how you managed to get out. You know you fidgeted in the elevator the whole ride down fearing you’d get caught and that Monty slipped you some kind of communication device along with a promise to help you any way he can.

Finn and Wells look baffled as you beg them for some kind of internal diversion, that is until Wells shrugs and slugs Finn across the face. You think you see them both give you a thumbs up from the bottom of the guard pile that you know will only get crowded from the rest of the hundred, but you’re not sure, and you have other things to worry about.

There’s definitely a part where you and Anya are being chased and there’s a waterfall and then she’s ripping something out of her arm with her teeth. A lot happens in a short space so you don’t give yourself a hard time that you don’t remember everything.

So naturally it’s completely understandable that you never see the rock Anya smashes into your head.

//////

You wake up with your arms and legs tied and Anya’s shoulder in your stomach. Before you can do much about it, you pass out again.

///////

The sun is low in the sky by the time you’re fully conscious and able to stay that way. Every one of Anya’s steps is labored and you’ve suggested she let you walk more than once, after all you’re not going to run away, you need to see the Commander too. She merely growls and you don’t offer again.

For a long time, you let yourself do what you never had time to when you first landed, you take in the ground (discounting the fact that it’s all you can see). You immediately love the way it smells. It has a freshness that you’ve never smelled with the cleanliness of rain, the tanginess of the leaves releasing all kinds of chemicals you looked at in earth studies, and the leaves Anya churns up with her shuffling steps also kick up the faint musk of decay. You’re addicted.

Eventually, your ‘captor’ stumbles, crashing you both to the ground. The groans that follow are loud, but neither of you really make any attempt to shift, from exhaustion and disorientation. The voice - when it speaks - shocks you.

“Chit osir gada hir in?” a man said suddenly. You start and do your best to flip over, but Anya only groans again.

“Shof op” she mumbles. The man is tall, dark, and handsome. His mohawk is cut low making his (again) sharp eyes stand out more, but the bottom half of his face is obscured by a bandana. His clothes are an eclectic mix of things, but still make the statement of ‘warm and protected’, though, the sword strapped to his back helps with that too.

“Who are you?” you can’t help but ask. Those eyes find you and you freeze. They’re much sharper when they’re pinned on you.

“Everyone here who needs to know who I am does, but who are you?” He crouches beside your head, eyes blazing with curiosity.

“I’m Clarke Griffin. Me and one hundred other kids were in the giant metal thing that fell from the sky and now all of my people and many of yours’ are trapped in Mount Weather” His face goes tight at the mention of the mountain and he glances back to Anya for a moment.

“This is the truth?” he asks. You’re not sure who he’s asking, but you nod anyway. After a moment of deliberation, he nods as well. “Well Clarke Griffin, since you brought my friend back to the world of the living, my name is Lincoln” He slashes easily at the vine the binds your feet and lifts Anya into his arms like it’s nothing. You follow because what else are you going to do?

////////

It’s a grounder village. An honest-to-god village with people like Anya and Lincoln who aren’t hopelessly deformed or violent like you half expected. Everyone is mostly normal and they all stare at you with an open mix of horror, fear, and fascination. The buildings are clear remnants of a time long gone crossed with far more primitive looking building design, but it’s charming in a way you’d never experienced. You want to sketch it all.

Lincoln walks through the entirety of the village unbothered, Anya attempting to look scary and unapproachable while being carried by (what you assume is) her friend. The three of you clear the village into (what you assume is) a war camp. Hefty men and gnarly women glare at you, their weapons gleaming. You follow Lincoln’s example and try to look as unbothered as possible. It’s a lie though, you’re very bothered.

He stops just outside the largest tent in the camp and an even larger man with a face tattoo and a bushy beard stands before him.

“Heda will want to see Anya before the healer. And she will want to see the girl” he announces confidently. The man frowns at you before nodding and stepping aside. The minute you step inside the tent, your whole world tilts on its axis.

The girl sitting on the large intimidating throne is as young as you are, but her face is smeared with black warpaint and there is a knife in her hand and a sword at her side. Her face is set with a seriousness you could never match.

And yet, all you can think about is how beautiful she is. There’s something delicate about her, easily missed but impossible to forget. You think then that she’s ruined you for women. Possibly for anyone.

Lincoln falls to his knee, setting Anya carefully down on the ground just as the girl springs to her feet, eyes wide at the sight of the pimp woman. She doesn’t move to touch her.

“I have returned from the dead to fulfill my duty to the Commander” Anya declares with a fist to her heart. or a breath, the girl seems stunned. Then, gorgeously, she grins, before choking it back to a thin lipped smile.

“Your Commander thanks you. Once I received word that you’d been lost to the Mountain, I-” she stops, breathes, “I was worried. I’m glad to see my mentor whole and returned” Anya shrugs.

“Mostly whole, thanks to her” she jerks her head in your direction and you feel your world tilt just a little more. Her eyes are green. They swallow you whole and feast of the way your heart stutters relentlessly in your chest. She must know, she must be able to see the way she’s just changed everything for you. She folds her hands behind her back.

“And you are?” Her voice is heavy and carries a weight across the small space, when before it was light, almost gentle in the way she greeted her friend.

“Clarke. Clarke Griffin. The Mountain has my people too” Her eyebrow twitches up in surprise.

“Your people? Who might they be?” You can hear the challenge, you’re not stupid. Your spine straightens almost involuntarily and you stiffen your jaw.

“My people are a bunch of kids who’ve never known anything but the whir of engines. My people were born in the stars. My people were scared when they were stuffed into a rocket and launched down to the ground with no expectation of survival. We were barely on the ground for a full minute before were all knocked out and told we were guests when we were really prisoners” Your own conviction surprises you, but it’s not as if what you said was a lie. The hundred, whether they said it or not, were scared. The girl looks mildly impressed.

“Well then Clarke kom Skaikru, what do you want?”

/////////

You’ve drawn the maps to the best of your ability and Anya’s added her own bits of information. Monty even came through by responding to her radio call and getting information she’d missed. The Commander - Lexa, Anya mentioned - is nothing if not thorough.

She asks question after question, interspersed by the silence of careful consideration. She demands clarification for every line drawn and every approximate distance. She is relentless.

And you love it.

You love the way her eyes shine in her single-mindedness. You love the way she listens to the words of her advisors and alters her plans accordingly. You love how still she stands, like she doesn’t have the energy to spare for fidgeting over brainpower. You love the way you can only tell she hates an idea when she closes her eyes slightly too long for a blink.

You think Anya notices with the way she watches you like a hawk. She’s responsible for what happens to you after all, they’ll need someone to blame if it turns out you’re a spy. Honestly, you get it. But you don’t need Anya to nudge you with her foot every time she catches you staring. You don’t need it.

It’s also incredibly distracting (which, the nudging or the Commander? the world may never know), so you greedily take the time to look at the maps and plans on your own after dinner. The silence is comforting. On the Ark, there was a constant hum, clank, or tapping telling you the ship was still trying to keep you alive. There is none of that on the ground and your heart could burst with how much that makes you feel.

But so could the presence of the Commander as she quietly slips into the tent. She seems softer with her face clean of warpaint and her shoulders free of most armor and weapons. You want to touch her, to feel the difference between the Commander and the girl underneath.

“Good evening” she says gently as she approaches the table.

“Hi” She comes to a stop beside you and you realize just how bizarre this is. No one is 100 percent sold on the fact that you’re not a spy yet, so the fact that she decided to enter a space alone with you is indicative to the fact that she has decided. You hope the lack of weapons means she’s decided you’re not.

“You should get some rest. We have done as much planning as can be achieved tonight. There will be more to do tomorrow and you must be in peak condition for it” she smiles softly at you and there goes your heart again. You clear your throat awkwardly.

“I will, I just want to make sure I’m not misremembering something. It could get someone killed” You re-measure a passageway and nod when you find it correct. She hums beside you and lays her hand on top of yours to still it.

“Yes, but if you do it while you are exhausted, you will certainly make a mistake” She is very close. Close enough that you wonder if she feels the ground shifting beneath her feet too. If she thinks the sky is a slightly different shade of blue as well.

Her hand squeezes yours.

//////////

The next week is nothing but debates, worry, staring at Lexa from across the room, and then finding yourself somehow alone with her. The gentle touches keep happening and it’s so easy to get lost in the way her eyes fond yours. Even when she catches herself , frowns, and shakes herself out of the affection, you know that what she feels for you is deeper than she’s letting herself feel.

It makes the tips of your toes and fingers tingle.

However, while it may be a constant in your mind, it is also constantly in the background. Monty tries to report in every day and things are getting worse. Your people have fully realized their status and things are growing more tense with the discovery that some of them have gone missing. The whole war room tenses at that and you chance a look to Anya, knowing exactly where it is they likely went.

Lexa lifts her chin and makes eye contact with everyone there, eyes steely. Then, she nods. You double down.

///////////

“Excuse me” Lexa barely announces herself before entering your small tent. You’re just about to pull on the last of your new armor and you’re glad she didn’t come in ten minutes ago when you were still mostly naked.

“Come in” you tell her, grabbing the shoulder guard.

“Are you ready?” Lexa’s hands are latched together behind her back as her eyes roam the small tent.

“Nearly,” you answer, “I’m just getting the last few pieces on” You pull the strap tight across your chest and move the latch into place. Now just the grieves.

“I was referring to your mental state” Lexa says as she reaches out for your second grieve. You pull the first tight and she gestures for you to hold our your free arm. As she laces it to your wrist, you have a free moment to just stare at the long lines of her face. Even now, after a week, you can’t help but be awed by her beauty.

“I’m about to go lay siege to a mountain fortress. How ready can I be?” She laughs and looks up.

“Well, I must say, you certainly look the part” She barely skims the rest of you before settling on your eyes. Something feels fundamentally different about this conversation. Every other time you’ve spoken, she’s shaken herself from the look she’s giving you now. The fact that she’s letting herself be here now eliminates any kind of mind-to-body filter and you reach out to pull her close by the back of her neck.

The kiss is still until she fully registers what you’ve done, and then she dives in, her hands clutching your waist and your jaw. The impending battle looks over you and the kiss reflects it, a hint of bite and desperation in each slide of lips or soft moan. You feel her tongue and you can’t help but hold her tighter because frankly, you may never have this again, and as unacceptable as that is, you almost expect it.

She carefully detaches from you, leaving her hands where they are, but allowing her thumb to gently brush the baby hairs away from your hairline. You revel in it. She kisses you again, barely there, but memorable in a different way than your first.

And then you march to war.

////////////

Like leaving Mount Weather, you barely remember breaking in, just that you do and everything is in chaos. You know you find Monty and there’s Octavia fighting alongside Lincoln (how neat is that?) and you find a way upstairs to free the caged grounders who all immediately join in the fight, despite their weakened states.

It’s a bloodbath. The Mountain Men never really stood a chance.

The swords and radiation make for a truly lethal combination that you and Lexa could only have dreamed of. Somehow, the entire plan goes off without a hitch and Dante and Cage Wallace are on their knees in front of Lexa. They clearly have no interest in working with her, the grounders, or the hundred (down a few, but you’ll have to do a headcount at a more convenient time). So she gives them a leaders’ death.

Their heads roll on the ground moments after she whips her sword from the scabbard.

/////////////

The war camp seems much more - well, is - crowded than before. There is an influx of more than one hundred and fifty people and there is not really enough space for everyone. The village - Ton DC, you’d come to learn - helps in every way it possibly can, but there is only such many people they can support.

You hear some of the grounders who were in cages talk excitedly about going home, about the lives they were stolen from and even though you keep thinking about the people you killed and the loose heads of the Wallaces, your heart feels lighter.

Lexa finds you watching the fire after the celebratory feast and sits silently next to you. It’s been almost ten minutes and you’re beginning to wonder if she’s actually going to to talk at all when she finally opens her mouth.

“You did well today. Thank you for bringing Anya back to me. She was my mentor when I was a child, I see her as an older sister and losing her would have been-” she swallows, “-distressing” You take her hand in yours, damn the people around you.

“I get it. I’m glad we could help all these people” Lexa smiles and nods.

“Yes. It was a good thing, even if it was hard” You squeeze lightly and the two of you get lost in the flickering fire. You watch it rise and fall, swallowing whole the pieces of wood that are tossed in to keep it alive. It’s captivating and you think you’d be content to sit here with Lexa for the foreseeable future. “What do you and your people plan on doing?” She breaks the silence much easier than you do. You shrug.

“Stay here? Assimilate? Most of us don’t have trades” Lexa nods slowly as she considers your answer.

“Are you set on staying here?”

“I don’t know anywhere else” you admit. You were on the dropship, then you were in Mount Weather, and then Anya carried you to Ton DC. You never saw the bits in between.

“Come to Polis with me. It’s our capitol. I live there. I feel that you will really be able to learn about my people there. Her eyes shift from your eyes, to your lips, and then back up to your eyes. Her hand feels tight and tense in yours, so you massage it, careful to find any knots and smooth them out.

“I think I could be open to that” She grins and your world tilts on its axis just a bit more.

#clexa #fanfiction #the 1oo #mine

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