#Dan will be so confused because in his timeline he never became friends with this other... holy fuck is this another halfa-

[mymadmedleyw]

My sister’s notebook shut off, so we are watching movies on mine. Preparing the place with food and stuff around us, she spotted my screen. It seemed she was in a curious mode, so she asked about my current wallpaper. The conversation went like this:

Her: “so, are they superheroes?”

Me: “uh- no? Actually, he is a bad buy, and the other is his (older) sister*”

(*in our native language we have a different word for older sister and younger sister, same works with brothers)

Her, confused by the obviously not fitting age-difference between the characters, but not saying anything, instead she asked: “when you said ‘Danny’, I imagined him differently”*

(*sometimes, I talk about my story and most of the cases she doesn't listen, but what she knows surely there is a character named Danny...)

Me: “yeah, well… he is Danny, but not that Danny. That Danny is a fourteen-year-old boy, he, here is his older version from another timeline, and you could say, he is evil”

Her: “hmm…”

Me: “yeah, uh- it’s a bit confusing, I know. Actually, there are three Dannys. Jazz, here, is the fourteen-year-old’s (older) sister, Dani – with one ‘n’ and with an ‘i’ – is a twelve-year-old clone of Danny… This guy, here, is called Dan, and unlike the other two, a full ghost, Danny and Dani are half-ghosts, which means Danny is halfway human and halfway ghost, Dani is the same, except that she is a made-up human, a created one, so human, but not a ‘natural’ human, you see.”

Her, visibly lost keeping track: “okay…”

Me: “and there is another half-ghost, a man - though I count him as only part-ghost -, who created Dani and whom is responsible for in that another timeline, in his (pointing to Dan) timeline, why he turned out a full ghost”

Her, horrified, trying to put together, if she heard it right, counting with that, as far as she knows it’s in a kid’s show: “…”

Me, saving her sanity: “Under some unfortunate circumstances. Actually, in that other timeline, in a young age, his (pointing again to Dan) parents and friends died, and he went to this man, because they were the same and he [the man] could understand him, as a similar partly ghost. The man tried to help the boy, but things turned out wrong, and he became a ghost and it messed up his mind, turning evil.”

My great sister, sleep-deprived, after spending a day at a festival a day before, and did not sleep it out yet, my sister, who at that moment couldn’t process properly either a simple question, tried to piece it together, already regretting she asked about it: “…”

Me, who couldn’t shut up if asked: “oh, and actually Danny met with his older version, when he was on to assure things happen the same way as in his case, but a ghost who can manipulate time rewrote it” (here, I searched for a pretty cool picture about Clockwork)

Her, taking a look at my phone screen: “he doesn’t look nice, I don’t trust him”

Me, confused, ‘cause I found on that picture Clockwork actually look sort-of ‘friendly’: “well… he couldn’t be nice, could he? either good or evil, if he watches time and focuses on to make things happen as those supposed to. Consider it, he is on a grey field.”

(here, I started ramble a bit about my current work, summarizing the whole plot in a few sentences, because I know she will never ever read it – partly, because it’s long, partly because that’s in English and I hardly could imagine once she would read willingly something that long on another language than ours – so that part, to avoid spoiler, I cut it, but all in all, she found it interesting – I believe, mostly because I put it into a few simple sentences and she didn’t have to read it…)

I have to add a part, which I founded hilarious within my rambling and her numb listening:

Me: “…so the one, I count as part-ghost, the man, is him, I love this drawing.”

Her, taking a quick not so interested peek at the picture, bored and regretted that she let me talk about my current fixation, but then stops, eyes wide: “oh, hello handsome, he looks very nice...”

(here, I lost it...)

#danny phantom #dan phantom #vlad masters #jazz fenton #dani phantom #and she never ever will ask about it again... #tue #the ultimate enemy #clockwork #i think i would save for another day telling her about danny's parents #and that they hunt their son #or about skulker who wants to scalp danny #or that dan wasted his human half #or that dan is two merged ghost halves... #man i need her freaked out face about those xD #maybe once maybe once...

[azritesx3]

“A Devil’s Love” Chapter 6: I Believe In You

Description: Chloe’s best friend is back, and Lucifer’s charm can’t seem to affect her either. Is she also a miracle child? Or something…more? [Story starts during S2 Ep4, Female Reader Insert]

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AN: Updated March 15, 2020 - Grammer AN: Updated July 21, 2020 - Grammar

Rating: Mature Warning[s]: Swearing, Gore

Show Timeline: Season 2 episode 12 and 13

Spotify Playlist /// AO3 Fanfiction Net Wattpad DeviantArt

Tag List: @ayanna-wild​, @anushay1998, @emiwrites3reads​, @i-am-canada-13​, @heart-of-pots-and-pans​, @tinyybiceps, @jessicarene99​, @lucifersnipnips​, @givemebooksorgivemedeath​, @sailor-earth-1

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A week has passed since you left your "nurse" to heal on your own.

Within the first two days, your body had completely healed. The rest of the five days you spent planning with Alice for the grand opening of the "Circle of Life Veterinary Clinic #2", and also helping out Chloe with any cases since it seems her partner was avoiding her.

When Chloe called you to say she couldn't find any evidence linking Charlotte Richards to the second bomb, thank God, she told you about her "talk" with Lucifer.

Apparently their talk consisted of Chloe explaining how she has been feeling and what made her kiss him, even after he declared all of his flaws to her. Lucifer said nothing, according to Chloe. He just listened intently, and when all was said and done he said he needed to think. Chloe agreed to give him time, but she started expressing her concerns to you after the third day of silence.

Honestly, you couldn't blame Lucifer. You hate talking about emotions too, and Lucifer didn't seem like the kind of guy who easily dealt with this kind of stuff. It's probably why he has a therapist.

However, Lucifer hadn't been completely silent this week. He did text you every day. First, it was just to make sure you were doing well healing, then it just became friendly chatter. You did question him on why he was giving Chloe the silent treatment. You expected him to ignore the question. Instead he shocked you by answering.

What if it's not real?

It looks real to me, Lucifer, and to others.

Yes, well, I'm starting to think that the Detective is no longer immune to me. She has been with me too much and now my charm is coming off on her. She might even be no longer immune to my power...It'll probably happen to you too.

...uh, what? :confusedemoji:

Ah. Never mind, darling. So, not missing my shower, yet? It sure misses you. :devilemoji:

And, that was that. You didn't dare tell Chloe about it, one because she'd be just as confused as you, and two she really didn't need to get the wrong idea about that shower comment.

Today's the day of the grand opening, and everything is going smoothly. Your new workers are happily greeting the pets as well as the owners while handing out coupons, pamphlets on the pet health care, and answering any questions. Alice sits at a booth with a couple of the receptionists taking down new client info and signing up those interested in the insurance. You stand in front of the big red ribbon, talking to the press and answering questions while you wait for the time to tick to 9 am.

Your phone starts ringing Chloe's tone. You excuse yourself and head inside your clinic to answer.

"What's up, Chlo?"

"Hey, Earth. I'm sorry to bother you, but I need you to do something."

You love your BFF, really you do, but you can't cancel this opening. Not only would it be embarrassing, but you were starting to run low on cash, "No problem, so long as I can do it over the phone."

"Don't worry, I know this opening is important to you." You hear her sigh, "This case I'm currently on is...it's bad, Earth. I'm thinking psychopathic bad. Premeditated murder."

Oh shit, "Damn, Chloe. Look if you need me I'll-"

"No no. Focus on your opening today. If I don't get this solved today maybe you can help me tomorrow."

"The opening isn't all day, Chloe. I'll help as soon as it's over."

"You're going to have a lot of first patient paperwork. Take this day for that. Look, I'm calling to ask you to talk to Lucifer."

"He still isn't talking to you?" Yes, you do agree with him needing time because emotions suck, but now it feels like he's stonewalling your friend.

"No. Ella's too busy with this case right now, and I know Lucifer won't even consider listening to Dan. I'm hoping he'll listen to you."

"Alright, Chlo. I'll get your partner back to you."

"Thank you, Earth." You can just feel the tension release from her over the phone, "Tell him to meet me at the Malibu State University so I can catch him up on the case."

"You got it." You hang up and see the time is 8:50 am. You sigh and click on Lucifer's contact number.

Time to come out of hiding you Devil.

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

"Lucifer." Linda looks at her Devil patient like a stern mother rather than his therapist at the moment, "You're stalling."

Lucifer finishes his glass of water and leans back on the couch, "I don't know what you're talking about, Doctor."

"You do, Lucifer." Linda's voice becomes stern and matter of factly, "You and Chloe finally reach a point in your relationship where it can move romantically, but after the kiss, you left. After Chloe confesses to you, you push her away. You won't even talk to her, but instead, talk to someone else."

Lucifer shifts on the couch, slightly uncomfortable with where this conversation was going.

"Lucifer." Linda's able to get his eyes to stay on hers, "Who is Earth to you? How do you feel about her?"

"I don't know what you want me to say, Doctor." Lucifer is agitated now, "K9 is just a human who's fun to be around."

"She's also another human woman who is immune to your charms. Another human who you can't get to reveal their desires." Linda eyes her patient carefully.

Lucifer clearly fidgets on the couch. He doesn't speak. Instead, he looks to the window.

"I want you to tell me how you felt when you first met Chloe, to how you felt meeting Earth." Linda interlaces her fingers and rests them on her crossed knees. She waits patiently for his reply.

"Well, after the first day with the Detective I felt that she was a puzzle to solve." Lucifer looks at his therapist with a little smirk, "The first human woman to be completely immune to my charms and power. She's a puzzle and I feel a...a connection to her. A need to solve her, to watch her and be around her."

"Mhmm," Linda nods, "and Earth?"

"K9?" Lucifer's smirk forms into a smile. He gives a light chuckle, "From day one I thought of her as a sassy minx, didn't even care that she wasn't attracted to me. Truthfully, I would be too focused on making sure I had a comeback ready for whenever we'd pass each other in the precinct." His eyes start to look far away, lost in memories.

"That real estate case was the first time we talked more than just in passing. I found that we both enjoy many of the same things and we share common views on various topics. I just-" Lucifer stops.

Linda urges him on, "You have to continue, Lucifer. How do you feel around her?"

"I feel...comfortable with her. I have fun with her, enjoy spending time with her. She doesn't believe in me being the Devil either, but I feel like she tolerates it better." His mind drifts to how you reacted to seeing his scars.

"Maybe there's a reason as to why…" Lucifer whispers this thought to himself.

"Lucifer, I see these two types of romantic feelings often." Linda didn't hear his comment about you, "There's one where someone claims that they feel a connection with the other, which is usually referred to as 'soulmates'-" Lucifer laughs.

"And," Linda continues, "There's the 'normal'. When two people meet and feel nothing until they get to know each other more. Chloe is your 'connection' and Earth is your 'normal'."

"So, which one is the correct choice?" Lucifer's eyes plead to her, "I don't want to mess this up!"

Linda's heart breaks for him, "I can't answer that for you, Lucifer. What you need to do is find an answer to this question," Linda leans forward:

"If Earth never came back, had never entered the picture, would you still be giving Chloe the cold shoulder?"

Linda Martin has never seen a person look as lost as Lucifer Morningstar right now.

"I…" Lucifer's phone starts playing "Who Let The Dogs Out". It's the ringtone you set for yourself after you showed him how to give everyone their own personal alerts.

"It's K9, Doctor. She doesn't usually call-"

"It's ok, Lucifer." Linda gives him a knowing smile, "Our time is up anyways."

Lucifer nods a farewell to her and leaves her office, "K9! To what do I owe the pleasure of having a phone call from you?" Lucifer's smiling ear to ear as he walks out of the building and to his car.

"Chloe called me. Again." You sound annoyed.

His smile falls, "Oh…"

"Look, Lucifer. I get it ok? Feelings are a pain in the ass to deal with, but enough is enough. You're really starting to hurt my best friend and you know I won't stand for it."

Lucifer sighs, "I understand, K9. I just-"

"Lucifer, this call wasn't about you. Chloe needs her partner back."

Lucifer pauses in his walk hearing the worry in your voice. He stands a few feet away from his corvette, "What's wrong?"

"There's a new case and it," you sigh, "it doesn't sound good, Lucifer. This guy is bad, really bad. I can't be there for her today and I don't want her to get hurt." Lucifer doesn't reply right away, and that worries you.

"Lucifer. Chloe isn't going to ask you about anything, ok? She's too focused on stopping this guy. She can't do it without her partner."

Partner...that's right. I'm the Detective's partner, Lucifer thought.

"Well, I suppose I can't leave my partner hanging," Lucifer smirks and finishes the walk to his car.

"No, you can't." Lucifer can tell you are most likely smirking as well, "Not anymore anyway. It's really a dick move."

"Yes, yes." Lucifer sits in his car and starts it up, "Now, where does my partner need me?"

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

The grand opening was a huge success! The clinic has plenty of clients to start off with, and more would surely come when people learned just how well of a veterinarian you are.

You sent your workers home to relax for the first official workday tomorrow. Currently, you and Alice are organizing all the new client paperwork in their respective folders for your receptionists.

But you're starting to have a really hard time focusing on the task. Chloe has been giving you hourly updates on the case, and each new piece of information was making you more and more concerned.

This is no ordinary killer.

Alice noticed you starting to slow down and told you she could handle the rest. Normally you would disagree with her, but this case was one a Captain of any department shouldn't avoid. You give her thanks in a hug then fly out the door and into your new car, courtesy of the police heads.

As you drive to the precinct you call Chloe to let her know you're free. She tells you that she and Lucifer are heading to a college party where the next poison victim, Ashley, was currently at. She gives you the address of the second victim, Dr. Gwendolyn Scott, and tells you Dan is currently there with her to make sure she doesn't do this guy's bidding.

When you arrive at the precinct you tell your second, Christopher Miller, to round up a small team and three K9's, and that one of the K9's has to be the new pup, Buster, along with his partner, Jessica Blanch. As he left to do as you ask you go into the female locker room and change into your K9 uniform. When you come out you tell your team the situation, and give them the address to Dr. Scott's house. You couldn't send any with Chloe as much as you wanted to. It would blow her cover at that party.

You arrive at the house and station your men and two of the K9's around the outside of the home. You tell Blanch that she and Buster are to guard the inside.

"Hey, Dan." You approach Detective Dan Espinoza, or as you liked to refer to Lucifer's nickname for him "Detective Douche".

"Hey, Earth! I'm glad you could join in. This guy is…"

"Yeah...it was hard for me to focus during the opening knowing that a person like this was out here." You cross your arms to hide the slight shiver that ran through you.

"That's right, your next clinic! Did everything go well?"

"Yup, better than I expected honestly."

"Well believe it or not, I've heard talk around here about the 'amazing Veterinarian Earth on the east coast'." He winks friendly at you.

"Oh really?" You give him a laugh and a sarcastic look.

"Yeah! I'd overhear convos from new K9 recruits about you. The look on their faces when I told them you used to work here was priceless."

"So that's why I got a whole lot of star-struck eyes when I came back." You and him both share light laughter, "So," you didn't want to, but this friendly chatter had to end, "where's Dr. Scott?"

Dan takes a sidestep and motions with his head behind him. You see a clear line of sight of the Doctor sitting in a formal living room. Blanch is introducing herself and asking permission to roam her home. You see Dr. Scott give a warm smile to her and a nod of approval while she scratches Buster's head.

"How's she doing?" You whisper to Dan.

"As good as one can be when they know they're in charge of someone's life." Dan sighs solemnly.

"Yeah…"

Dan's phone rings and he excuses himself. You walk over to Dr. Scott and introduce yourself, "Hello, Dr. Scott. I'm Earth, Captain of the K9 unit." You hold out your hand and she shakes it. Her palms are sweaty from nerves.

"Hello, Captain. One of your crew just told me how well you are at your job." She smiles at you.

"Aw, Blanch is just a suck-up." You give her a wink and she actually manages a laugh, "You doing alright Doc?"

She sighs, "Honestly, no. I just keep thinking...what if I don't do as this guy requests? Would I really be ok knowing that my decision to say no would end a young girl's life?"

"Do you mind if I watch the video ma'am?" She shakes her head and stands to walk to her desk. She pulls up the email with the video and plays it for you as she sits back in her chair.

This guy...with his dumb mask and "superior" tone of voice made your skin crawl. He was telling the Doctor that in order to receive the antidote to cure Miss. Ashley, she had to destroy her right hand.

God...Why do people like this exist?

The video ends as soon as Dan walks into the room, "Detective Decker called me ma'am." He's speaking to Dr. Scott, "Her and her partner found Ashley at the party, but unfortunately it looks as though she's already been poisoned."

You watch as the Doctor visibly slumps in distraught, "What should I do, Detective?"

"Don't do anything, Doctor. Ashley is at the hospital now and the doctors are working on an antidote. I'm sure they'll make it in time."

Dr. Scott forms a look on her face that mimics how you were feeling.

They won't be able to make it.

Dan leaves the room. You shut off the computer.

"Captain, what should I do? What would you do?"

You don't answer.

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

A few hours pass before Dan receives another call from Chloe.

It's not good news.

"She doesn't have much time left, Dan. The Doctors at the hospital can't figure out the antidote."

"Then it is specially made," Dan replies, his face is grim. You stand next to him to hear the conversation.

Unfortunately, Dr. Scott is close enough as well. She heard.

While Dan is still on the phone you hear a rattling noise. You left his side to investigate, and are horrified by the display that's about to happen in the kitchen.

"GWENDOLYN!" You yell the Doctor's name and hold your hands up. When Dan hears you yell he hangs up on Chloe and runs to you, and holds his hands up.

Dr. Gwendolyn Scott stands in front of her kitchen sink. The garbage disposal is running and her right hand is hovering over the opening.

"Dr. Scott, don't do this." Dan pleads with her. You can't speak.

"If I don't do this, Detective, an innocent woman dies. How can I compare my hand to her life."

"Doctor-" Dan starts, but it's too late.

Doctor Gwendolyn Scott shoves her hand into the garbage disposal. You want to vomit as you hear her scream and see blood and bits of flesh erupt from the sink.

Doctor Gwendolyn Scott is a hero.

Dan runs to her, as well as Blanch who hears her screams. You stand still, but find your voice long enough to call for a medic dispatch and Chloe.

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

Chloe and Lucifer arrive shortly after the medics have Dr. Scott on a gurney and finish bandaging her ruined hand. The two of them talk with her, Dan steps outside to get air after that gruesome scene, and you-

You're still standing in the same spot. Your focus entirely on the blood and bits of brown skin that cling to the countertop and sink.

This guy is a monster.

"And I thought you looked fit before, but now." You choke on air as your body jumps out of your skin. You whirl around and see Lucifer standing behind you with a hungry look.

"You look delicious in uniform, K9. You should wear it more often."

"I only wear this on important cases, and did you really have to use the word 'delicious' in this scenario?" You give him dagger eyes. You hold your chest to breathe evenly again.

"Hmm." Lucifer looks at the carnage behind you, "Good point." He smiles down at you, "But at least I got you to stop looking at it."

You look up at him, and can't help the tug at your heart. A corner of your mouth lifts slightly, "Yeah...thanks."

Lucifer just continues to smile at you, but now there's a twinkle in his eye.

"So," you cross your arms and smile fully at him, "How's it feel being back with your partner?"

"It was bloody weird." His sheer bluntness made both your eyebrows go up.

"Only at first though. Thankfully, the Detective seems to be back to her 'normal'." Lucifer plays with his cufflinks and side glances in Chloe's direction.

"What happened?"

"She slapped my bum, made inappropriate jokes over a dead body, and suggested making out in the library."

You burst into laughter.

"It's not funny! It was bloody terrifying!" Lucifer complains.

"She was just trying to be more like you, Lucifer." You manage to choke out in your laughter, "Are you saying you're not attracted to yourself?"

"Not if it's the Detective trying to roleplay as me." He visibly shivers and that makes you laugh even more.

The sound of your K9s barking outside the front door immediately cuts off your laughter. Captain mode takes over and you stride away from Lucifer and out the front door to see what was going on. As you pass by Chloe she rests her hand on her holstered gun and gives you a nod.

Miller has a delivery man stopped on the walkway. When you walk over the man says he has a delivery for Doctor Gwendolyn Scott. You question him on who gave him the package, but the man says it just showed up in his pile of runs.

You take the package from him and tell Miller to take him to the station to get an official statement. You go back inside and hand it over to Chloe.

You stand on the other side of the Doctor's gurney, and Lucifer chooses to stand next to you as Chloe unravels the contents.

She looks up and stares at the three of you.

"It's the antidote."

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

Dan and Chloe drove to the hospital to give Ashley the antidote before it was too late. Lucifer decided to stay with you to "help" you clear out the Doctor's house and wait for the cleaning crew to finish in her kitchen. You noticed Chloe giving him a "look" when he chose to stay behind. You question him about it and he just shrugs saying, "Hospitals are dreadful places."

As soon as the cleaning crew finished Chloe called you saying to come to the precinct ASAP with Lucifer. Her and Dan were able to get a link between Ashley and the first poisoned victim.

"I had a feeling this case would be an all-nighter." You tell Lucifer as you hang up and you both walk to your car.

"No rest for the wicked, darling." Lucifer smiles devilishly at you. You smile back.

As you two walk into the precinct, you give Alice an early morning text update. You tell her you most likely won't be able to make it in the clinic for the first day. Surprising you, she texts back saying "Good thing there are no major surgeries :winkieface:".

You hate not being at your clinic for the first official day. You and Alice interviewed the workers and other veterinarians extensively, but you always like working the first couple of days with them to make sure they were good. Thank God you have Alice, who you trust wholeheartedly.

You and Lucifer walk into Ella's lab where Dan and Chloe are waiting. You notice that look again on Chloe when Lucifer stays near you while Ella explains the new information.

Dan and Chloe were able to find out from Ashley that she had received a flu shot earlier in the day. Ella was able to find out that the first victim also got the flu shot the same day he was poisoned. Thanks to the information Ashley gave and what Ella could dig up, both students received their shots by Dr. Jason Carlisle.

"Dr. Jason Carlisle?" Dan says in shock.

"You know him?" Chloe questions.

"I know of him. Here," Dan goes to the computer in the room and pulls up traffic security footage. You all watch as this Dr. Jason Carlisle crawls out of a turned over vehicle. In the footage, you can see the driver of the vehicle asking the Doctor for help, but instead the Doctor grabs his briefcase and runs away as the vehicle explodes, killing the driver.

"Hmph. Some doctor." You cross your arms and shake your head at the actions on the video.

"Yeah. After this was televised Dr. Carlise lost his medical license and all respect from his peers." Dan replies.

"He's probably the one responsible for creating these poisons and their unique antidotes." Ella points out.

"He's doing this to show people how he felt he had no choice," Chloe says.

Lucifer scoffs, "Everyone has a bloody choice."

"So, how do we find this guy?" You ask the room.

"Attack his ego." Lucifer says and everyone looks at him, "I know his type. Attack his precious ego and he'll make himself known."

"That's the stupidest thing-" Dan starts but Chloe leaves the lab in a flash and sits at her desk. Everyone, but Ella, follows the Detective and sees that she's pulled up an email and is writing to Dr. Carlise.

Dan is trying to get Chloe to stop, but you and Lucifer are encouraging her. Both of you tell her various ego-tripping things to write, and even though Dan tries to stop her, Chloe hits send.

In less than thirty seconds she receives a reply, and it's a video call. She opens it up and all four of you stare at the man with the mask. Chloe tells him we know who he really is and why he's doing this. The Doctor removes his mask and explains his experiment and how the police presence in Doctor Scott's household "made" her choose to destroy her hand.

You call him out on his bullshit, receiving a low high five from Lucifer, and how Dr. Scott was planning on destroying her hand from the start. Dr. Carlise doesn't believe you and pans the camera to show you all how he already has another "experiment" happening as we speak. He explains the circumstance and ends the call.

Chloe and Ella do quick work in tracing the call to a hospital that Dr. Carlise was rivals of. Chloe pulls Lucifer by the arm to get him to follow and after a look from you, he obliges.

She's your partner. Protect her.

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

"This case is now top number one of the worst cases I've been on." Chloe flops down on her couch next to you with a full glass of wine in hand.

Chloe asked you to come to her place to unwind after the hell this case has been. You agreed because you could tell she needed to vent.

She starts talking about the situation that happened over at the hospital Dr. Carlise was holed up in. She talks about how she and Lucifer had to watch helplessly as the Doctor dropped poisonous gas onto the floor, making her and Lucifer unable to just break into the room to save the two students. She talks about her fear of leaving Lucifer alone in that situation in order to catch the Doctor.

She downs her drink quickly after talking about watching the Doctor slit his own throat in front of her. How she watched the life leave his eyes and neck.

But then, without the wine's help, she becomes giddy and warm. She tells you about how happy and relieved and thankful she was when she saw Lucifer step out of the building completely unharmed. She didn't even think to question him about it.

"I immediately hugged him and said how we do make an amazing team." She says with a far off gaze to her empty glass. She then looks at you with a smile and wet eyes, "He said 'This is real, isn't it?", and ...well."

"It's official now?"

"Yeah."

"That's wonderful, Chlo!" You pull your BFF into an immediate hug while ignoring whatever that feeling was in your chest. She laughs while holding back tears, and hugs you back. You two talk about other things for a while, then Chloe excuses herself to the bathroom.

You become concerned after ten minutes of her absence.

"Chloe? You ok?" You get up from the couch and go up to her room. You knock on the open door.

"I...I don't know…Earth!" You push into Chloe's room and into her bathroom at the sound of her voice. She's standing in front of her sink, which has piles of bloody tissues in it.

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

"DETECTIVE!"

Lucifer Morningstar storms into Chloe Decker's apartment furiously. He looks around the kitchen and living room to see she wasn't there. A noise from above gives him a direction.

"DETECTIVE! DID YOU KNOW?!" Lucifer yells as he storms upstairs.

"THIS WHOLE BLOODY TIME, DID YOU KNOW?!" Lucifer stomps into her room and sees the bathroom door open.

"DETEC-" Lucifer stops when he sees you holding Chloe by the shoulders.

You look at him, wide-eyed and terrified, "Lucifer…"

"What-"

"Lucifer," Chloe speaks now in a garbled tone. You allow her to turn around to face her partner.

Lucifer immediately steps into Chloe's personal space at the sight of her red eyes and bloody nose.

Chloe cries, "It won't stop."

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

You stand inside Ella's lab, waiting for the energetic little ball of happiness to come in. You feel bad asking Ella to come in this late at night and after just finishing the last case, but Ella told you not to worry. An emergency is an emergency and it's her job.

Your fingers tap rhythmically on the table in stress. Seeing your BFF being poisoned by something that no one can make an antidote for, except the guy who just committed suicide, really terrifies you. At least, with the help of Lucifer, you were able to convince Chloe to go to the hospital instead of here.

You hear the door open and look up expecting to see Ella. Instead, your heart drops at the sight of Lucifer and the woman who should be in the fucking hospital.

"Why the fuck-"

"Calm down, Earth." Chloe holds up her hands to you, "I told him to bring me here."

"Yes, much to my disapproval," Lucifer mutters.

"Chloe-"

"You know me, Earth! I can't just sit by and do nothing when I know I can help!" Chloe says.

"But for how long?!" You move to stand right in front of her, "Chloe, you exerting yourself could make this thing spread faster! We already only have twenty hours if that!"

"I know, Earth!" Chloe can feel Lucifer's hand on the small of her back. She takes deep breaths to calm herself, "I know. Look, I'll be careful, and if it gets too much I swear I'll go to the hospital. But, I need to do something."

You just cross your arms and head back to the table. Ella shows up and Chloe gives her a rundown on the situation without telling the poor girl who the real victim was. Ella explains how they did find some poison on the Doctor's body, but the antidote that went with it had been destroyed. Chloe, Lucifer, and you all share a look.

Then some man you've never seen before is calling Lucifer's name and Lucifer pulls the man into the interrogation room. Seeing as how Ella and Chloe didn't seem to question the strange commotion, you decide not to say anything. Lucifer is a strange guy after all.

Ella starts listing out all the beginning signs of the poison, which makes Chloe turn paler and paler. To derail the talk of it you ask if anyone else could have access to the antidote formula. Ella didn't believe so, but Chloe pops in with the hope that maybe the guy who smuggled the stuff might know something. She didn't believe the Doctor would trust that stuff to be handled by just anyone.

She leaves the room to get Lucifer, but when you offer your assistance she says she wants you to stay with Ella, and eventually Dan, to help think up an antidote. Your heart felt strange when you saw her and Lucifer leave the building, with him being closer to her than usual.

She's dying. They're together. You told him to protect her.

You wipe the feeling away and turn to Ella. This was Chloe who was dying, and you need everyone to be working at their best.

You tell Ella the truth.

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

Lucifer and Chloe have been gone for about an hour and a half now. Dan showed up not too long after the two left and you, him, and Ella have been working together to try to at least figure out all the ingredients for the antidote.

Lucifer's ringtone starts playing on your phone and you answer it.

"Lucifer-"

"She fainted, K9." He sounds scared. You never imagined hearing Lucifer Morningstar sound scared, "I'm taking her to the hospital now."

"Alright, I'll be right there." You hang up and look up to Dan.

"Dan. Get Trixie."

He didn't even have to ask what for. He was out the door in a flash. Ella told you she'd keep working and to give Chloe her love. You nod and head out the door as fast as Dan did.

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

The early morning sun has now risen. Chloe now only has about ten hours left.

You sit in Chloe's room chatting with her about the situation. When you see Lucifer standing at the window you get up and give Chloe a hug. You leave the room and watch from a distance the two of them talk.

You hear Dan and Trixie sign in at the desk behind you, and Lucifer leaves the room just as the ex-husband and daughter come to the door. You notice Dan give Lucifer a look of disapproval before entering the room, and one of your hand’s balls into a fist in your crossed arms.

One of the reasons I dislike that guy. He always puts the blame on someone else.

"I'm sorry." The sound of Lucifer's distress pulls you from your thoughts. You walk to stand in front of him, arms still crossed.

"What for?"

"I didn't protect her. Couldn't protect her. I thought I had by sending her after him, but-" Lucifer starts spilling out. You unfold your arms and place a strong hand on one of his arms, stopping him.

"Lucifer." You stare up at him, "This wasn't your fault. I don't blame you. I blame the bastard of a Doctor who stabbed her with the needle." You let go of him and step to his side so you could watch the tragic family scene through the window.

"I hope you're right about there being a Hell, and I hope he's being tortured as we speak."

"He is, darling. Trust me." Lucifer turns around to watch the scene with you.

"Good. Wish I was the one torturing him, though." You sigh, shoulders slumped, "I'm going to get one of my K9s and just chill here. If she…" you choke up but swallow it, "I'll be here if you need me." You give Lucifer a pat on the shoulder and turn to leave.

"K9."

You stop a few feet from the exit door. You turn your body to face him and your heart breaks at the emotion on his face.

"I promise you, I will get the antidote." Lucifer's tone was serious, but his eyes looked wet. Yet...you felt drawn to him. You could tell he meant what he said.

He always tells the truth.

Unable to contain it any more, tears fall down your face. You run to him and wrap your arms around his neck. You stand on your tiptoes in order to hug him fully.

You're surprised that he doesn't even hesitate to hug you back. He always hesitates when someone hugs him.

"I trust you, Lucifer." You pull him even closer, and only feel slightly ashamed for probably ruining his suit jacket, "I believe in you."

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

Chloe Decker now only has about three hours left.

And you could do nothing.

Lucifer had promised to save her, to somehow get the antidote formula. You had no clue how he could get it, or why you seemed to trust him. You haven't seen him since you hugged him. You've tried texting him to find out how it was going, but he didn't reply. So now you were concerned for his safety because he always replied.

Dan and Ella were having a hell of a time just trying to get the ingredients. Ella texted you not too long ago saying that they're just missing one more, and she thinks she knows where to get it.

And what are you doing? You're standing outside the doors to the lobby area. If you sit in the lobby you'd be looking too much into Chloe's room window, and from the talk of the doctors that were walking by it didn't sound like she was doing too good.

You can't watch your best friend deteriorate so fast in front of your eyes. Besides that, you feel like you would get in Trixie's way. She hasn't left her mother's side since she arrived.

You hear Buster whine, and you scratch his head absentmindedly. When you left Lucifer you went to the precinct to grab the first K9 you saw. For protection for Chloe, and comfort for you. You love your dogs.

Buster nudges his nose into your palm. You look down at him.

"What is it, bud?"

He whines some more.

Sorry…out…

"It’s not a problem, bud. I could use some fresh air anyways."

You take Buster to the small green area across the street from the hospital. You lean up against a tree and look up to the sky. You take a deep breath in of city air, and can't help but imagine Chloe never taking a breath again. Never growing old or seeing Trixie grow into a wonderfully strong woman. Never playing with possible grandchildren. Never being happy with Lucifer--

You release the breath, "Well, if Heaven's real then she'll be with her dad at least."

You look back to find Buster, "Come on boy." He trots to you and you both walk back across the street and into the hospital.

"Captain!"

You see one of the hospital security guards run to you, "The patient, Chloe Decker, has to move to another room, but there's a man who's blocking the way! He's pushed aside every one of us!"

You nod to the guard and head for the stairwell. You and Buster run up four flights and push through the lobby door.

You watch as two more security guards get tossed aside like dolls back into the lobby. You stride forward, gun aimed and Buster between your legs, "HANDS UP, NOW!"

The man turns around. It's the same man that called for Lucifer in the precinct.

You squint at him suspiciously, "Who are you?!" Buster growls beneath you.

The man looks surprised, "So you're Earth, or well, I guess I should be saying K9."

You grip your gun harder. Buster feels you tense up and walks a bit closer to the man, teeth-baring, "Who the hell are you?!"

It's like he just realized now what kind of predicament he's in, "I'm sorry," he holds his hands up to you, "I'm Amenadiel, Lucifer's brother."

You snort.

"Captain! He won't let me get my patient to a more appropriate room!" The doctor yells from behind Amenadiel.

"Well, as Lucifer's supposed brother, you should know he wouldn't appreciate someone getting in the way of saving Chloe's life." You keep your aim trained on Amenadiel’s chest.

"I do know that, and that's why I can't let Chloe leave this room."

Now you're confused, "Why?"

"Lucifer is getting the formula as we speak, but Chloe needs to stay right here."

"Why?"

Amenadiel shakes his head, "You won't believe me. Look," he puts his hands down and takes a step towards you. You stand your ground and Buster barks at him in warning, "Do you trust Lucifer?"

You’re quiet for a beat. You carefully study this "brother", "I do."

"Then please, do not allow Chloe to leave here." You can hear the pleading in his voice. He wants you to believe him.

You look over his shoulder to see Chloe becoming paler in her bed. She starts to shake from a seizure and the doctor's nurses hold her down.

The doctor looks at you, "Please! She needs help!"

You look between her, Amenadiel, and Chloe.

I trust you, Lucifer. I believe in you.

You release air through your nose and holster your gun. You order Buster to guard the door and not let anyone in or out. You stand next to Amenadiel, "I know she does, Doctor." You cross your arms and stand firm.

Unbeknownst to you, Amenadiel looks at you with interest.

"Chloe Decker is not leaving this room until Lucifer Morningstar returns with the formula."

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

You aren't a rogue cop for long.

You feel somebody grip your shoulder from behind. You whirl around ready to punch whoever it was that got past Buster, but your fists immediately turn into hands of support.

“Lucifer!”

He looks like he just came back from the dead. His clothes are completely disheveled and he's sweating profusely. He holds onto your shoulders tightly and you keep him upright by his underarms with the help of Amenadiel.

He mutters out the formula to the doctor and she runs off to make it with the ingredients Ella dropped off not too long ago. You and Amenadiel move him to a chair in the room, but he refuses to sit and instead leans against the wall. Amenadiel leaves quickly, and you’re left “alone” with Lucifer.

“Lucifer…” You start to choke up again. He looks so awful and it’s breaking you.

What did he do?

“Lucifer.” You can’t stop the tears again. You let them fall free while you use both hands to hold onto his face. You wipe the sweat from his brow and try to straighten his hair, “Are you ok?”

“She’ll be ok now,” he breathes out. He looks over at Chloe, “That’s all that matters.”

“No, Lucifer. That’s not all that matters.” He looks down at you, eyes filled with confusion.

He’s waiting for you to say something, but you’re too choked up on emotion.

I hate emotions, too.

You just wrap your arms around his neck like the first hug, except this one was different. Tighter, different emotions unspoken. He does hesitate on this hug, but eventually his arms find their way around your waist and he holds on tight.

He rests his head on your shoulder, “Earth…” he breathes on your neck.

You remove your head from his shoulder and he does the same from yours. You both stare into each other's eyes deeply. One of his arms snakes it’s way up your back so his hand can hold the back of your head. Your faces start to come closer together, but you can’t tell if he’s doing it or you, or maybe both.

“I have it!” You both blink at each other, seeming to wake up from whatever force was pulling you both. You both look to the side to see the doctor holding a syringe. A nurse puts a tube inside Chloe’s vein and the doctor rushes over. You twist around in Lucifer’s arms so that your back is to him.

You expected him to remove his hands, but instead he keeps one arm around your waist while the other hangs onto the wall. You feel him tug you closer as you two watch Chloe’s vital signs fall back to normal.

“It worked! She’s going to make it!” The doctor says happily. You smile at Chloe as new tears fall from your eyes.

You didn’t see Lucifer’s face turn grim.

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

Lucifer was with Chloe when she first woke up. The two talk briefly before he leaves and tells everyone in the lobby that she’s awake now. He watches as Ella, Dan, Trixie, and you rush into the room. He looks from the window all of you smiling, laughing and hugging Chloe.

He puts his hands in his pockets and stands firm. After one last look at you, he leaves.

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

Three days have passed since Chloe’s poisoning. She had to stay in the hospital for the rest of that day just to ease the doctor's mind that she really was cured. You stayed with her that day along with everyone else.

Except for Lucifer. After you greeted Chloe from waking up you left the room to look for him, but the receptionist said he had left. You thought nothing of it. He had looked to have a rough day after all.

But after twenty-four hours of zero response you started getting worried. Chloe kept asking for him and nobody, including yourself and Maze, seemed to be able to get a hold of him.

In present time you're at your clinic. It's past 9 pm and everyone went home for the day. You stayed behind to lock up and look at patient reports for the day. You finish putting the reports away and counting the money. Just as you lock the front door Chloe’s ringtone went off.

“Chloe, you alright?” You answer as you get into your car.

“He’s gone, Earth.” She’s trying to keep from crying, “I’m at his penthouse and he’s...everything’s covered in sheets.” Chloe can't hold the tears in any longer.

“He’s gone!”

#a devil's love #lucifer netflix #lucifer morningstar #lucifer morningstar x reader #lucifer x reader #lucifer #fanfic #fanfiction #azritesx3 #azookiex3

[shookethbrooketh]

seven days

day two: part one

summary: dan is stuck in the wrong timeline. one day, he kisses phil goodnight. the next morning, he’s completely alone. he doesn’t even recognize where he wakes up, and little details in the world around him have changed. he has no clue what’s happening or where to go next in an effort to fix it; all he knows is that he has to find phil.

genre: sci-fi, a lil bit of angst, happy ending

warnings: none (for now)

fic word count: 4.3k chapter word count: 2.3k

written for the @phandomreversebang ! inspired by the awesome moodboard/edits by @maybeformepersonally ! beta’d (beginning to end) by @i-might-just-leave-soon !

read it on ao3

Sadly, however, there were a few things Dan didn’t know as he dozed off that evening. He didn’t know about the reminder on the phone he’d neglected all day making sure he, or the him that used to live in this timeline, didn’t forget about his first day on the production of Queer Eye. And he surely didn’t know that while he slept, as the clock struck midnight, the world began to change around him. It was like he slept in a protective bubble, holding him in place as the timeline disassembled and reassembled around his body. At 12:01, his entire universe had changed once again. Dan slept through that night in bliss ignorance until he was woken up and his world turned upside down once again. 

“Daniel!”

“Hmm?” Dan blinked his eyes open, and before he had time to rub the sleep out of them, he spasmed into an upright position, hitting his head on the back of the bed frame. 

He found himself in a hotel room with a man in overly done makeup standing over him. Everything from the day before rushed back to him, and it took all he had not to shout out, “Who the hell are you?” 

“You need to start getting ready for VidCon! Your meetup is today!” the man shouted at him. His voice was loud and shrill, and Dan would have given money to not have to hear it. 

“Okay, okay, give me some space!” he moaned, pushing the man back a little bit. 

“Alright, just be ready in an hour,” the man said, leaving through a door into a conjoined room. 

“An hour? Who needs an hour to get ready?” he asked himself, wandering into the bathroom. “Oh, FUCK!” Dan shouted, taking one good look at his face in the mirror. It was caked in makeup, but it had clearly been a bit smudged by sleep. “Oh, no,” he breathed, fear entering his confused mind. He rushed to find a phone back by the bed and ended up seeing an iPhone XR. “Shit, that’s gotta be expensive,” he said, opening it immediately with facial recognition. Immediately he found and opened YouTube and went to his own channel, something he was more than used to doing in his normal life. What he found was exactly what he feared: he was this timeline’s James Charles. 

Dan groaned, rearing his head back to the ceiling. “I don’t know how to do makeup!” he muttered, dragging himself back into the bathroom. On the sink was a collection of at least 15 different types of makeup. “That explains the one-hour wakeup call.” 

His eyes darted back and forth from blush to mascara to eyeliner to foundation as if looking at them each enough would show him what to do with them. Finally, an idea struck him. Unless YouTube was a completely different beast in this timeline, “Daniel Howell makeup tutorial” would be a fruitful search. It only took him a few seconds to find someone to teach him how to do his own makeup routine, and he was on his way. 

It took Dan about half an hour to do the makeup, and he was quite thankful that the Dan whose body he’d woken up in was wearing makeup already because if he hadn’t it would have taken him twice as long or more. He threw on some actually mildly tasteful clothes and grabbed his VidCon badge; at least he knew how to live this person’s life. 

Ready to go with twenty minutes left, Dan sank back into “his” bed and put his head in his hands. “Why the hell am I in another timeline?” he said, stressing a word every now and then just to exasperate his anger. “I’m never gonna find Phil at this rate.” 

He closed his eyes, attempting to hold back tears. He was sure a rich makeup YouTuber would have waterproof makeup, but he wasn’t willing to take that risk. Thousands of separate thoughts were running through his head, each of them desperate, but one stood out over them all: Dan did not want to go to VidCon. 

VidCon was one of his favorite places; it legitimized all his life choices and made him feel as if he was truly valued by the world. However, he’d never been to a VidCon without Phil in his life, and he didn’t particularly want to. He had fantasies about this VidCon--doing a meetup with Phil with both of them out and proud, hugging their fans tight and supporting them the way they supported the two of them--but now that was all gone, and he was left with a pound of makeup on his face and a bunch of people who didn’t even know him for who he truly was. 

His “friend” and apparently manager, whose name he eventually learned was, ironically, James, retrieved him and led him to the venue. He was lucky for that; he obviously hadn’t been told ahead of time where the meet and greet was, and between his height, his makeup, and his assumed fame, he had a feeling it wouldn’t be wise to mingle with the fans to find directions. 

“Aight, you’ve got a few minutes until the meetup; you can hang out here,” said James, leaving him in a sort of a green room. There was a wall in between them, and he could still hear the screaming fans. He’d never met fans alone before, and he was honestly a bit scared, especially without knowing what sort of fanbase the him of this timeline appealed to. He spent an immeasurable amount of time in his own head, searching aimlessly for something to calm his nerves. If only Phil were there with him…

Suddenly, a thought hit Dan. Maybe Phil was there with him. He’d yet to research the Phil of this timeline, so there was nothing telling him that he wasn’t still a YouTuber or that he wasn’t just halfway across the convention center. Dan whipped out the phone in his pocket and searched “Phil Lester” on Twitter for a second tie, and deja vu struck as he once again came up empty handed. 

“Damnit!” he cried out, but he had no time to mourn, for James had just thrown open the door and informed him that it was time for the meetup. Dan, taken by surprise, threw his phone down and jumped up. “Cool, let’s go!” he responded awkwardly. James furrowed his brow for a moment before eventually deciding to ignore Dan’s odd behavior and simply turning on his heel and leaving. Dan took a deep breath and followed, leaving in the opposite direction in which he came in, and he found himself behind a classic meetup photo background. This, at least, was something he was comfortable with. He put on his performer’s smile and stepped out from behind the curtain. 

Dan had certainly endured screaming teenage girls before; after all, he’d done two tours full of them. But this was a completely different animal entirely. It took all of his strength to smile and wave rather than double over with his hands over his ears. At this point, Dan was losing hope that his otherworldly counterpart wasn’t involved in some ridiculous controversy. 

At that moment, it dawned on the theatre kid still dwelling inside him that he probably should have researched his role before stepping out onstage. He was meant to put on a face and pretend to be someone else, and he hadn’t even a clue who he was to be. 

Before he even had enough time to think, the first fans were stepping up to meet him. Now, Dan had done over a hundred meetups, and even on his worst days, he’d always been attentive to each fan and been careful to make each one’s time the best thirty seconds to a minute they’d ever had. This time, however, was a bit different. 

Sure, he tried his best to act normal, but he quite simply wasn’t. He felt as if he was a fraud, given that technically he sort of was. No matter how much effort he put forth, these people were getting cheated out of meeting their idol. Well, hopefully they’d never know the difference. 

As a general rule of thumb, Dan had decided to go through the meetup emotionless. This was a bit difficult, as he and Phil had planned to, in their VidCon meetup, connect more emotionally to their fans, especially their LGBT+ fans, than ever before. But these people weren’t really his fans, and it was difficult for him to emotionally invest himself in speaking to people who didn’t really love HIS videos. Besides, he needed to keep his eyes on the prize: get through this meetup, then go back to looking for Phil. 

As the queue moved closer, he noticed one black-haired head sticking out above the others. His eyes widened, and his eyes focused on the back of a head facing someone else in the line. “Hi!” someone shouted, and his attention was forced back to the fans meeting him at that particular moment. Suddenly it became even more difficult for him to focus on the fans; he had to see the tall, Phil-like man’s face, but every time he looked up the man was facing the other direction. He felt as if the world refused to let them near each other, even though the chances that it was actually Phil were little to none.

Finally, he reached the front of the line, and the girl he’d been engrossed with conversation in poked him. “It’s your turn!” she whisper-screamed, and he jumped. 

“Oh!” he exclaimed, absentmindedly turning forward, and Dan’s heart skipped a beat. Sure enough, the face looking back at him was the face he’d fallen asleep beside every night for nearly nine years. The only difference: the man on the other side was none the wiser. 

“Oh my goodness, hi!” he squealed through a broad smile. Dan was almost taken aback by it; the Phil he knew wasn’t exactly a squealer, and he definitely didn’t have an American accent. He was quite the different Phil, but he certainly was Phil; there was no doubting it. Phil started speaking again, his words slurring together with nerves. “Iknow it’s sorta odd for youta meet afan who’sactually older thanyou but I hope you don’t find me tooweird…” he trailed off, clearly absolutely terrified to be speaking to Dan.

At this point, time seemed to completely stop. Dan had seen Phil like this, sure, but never for something as simple as a meetup. It completely blew his mind to watch Phil absolutely lose it over the chance to meet him. Phil, the man who he’d known for ten years. Phil, the man who he’d kissed countless times. Phil, who was supposed to be standing beside him on the other side of the meetup, was instead sweating through his clothes because he loved Dan so much. Inside his head, Dan chuckled. He had no idea. 

And Dan had no idea how to respond. There was no response to the person you love more than anyone or anything else in the world completely forgetting you. He wasn’t really sure what to do except for what he always did. 

“Hey, hey, it’s okay, I promise,” he said, wrapping his arms around Phil. This wasn’t abnormal, as he’d done it for every fan thus far, but this time, it lingered a little longer, and it started much sooner than it should have. Still, he kept Phil close for more reasons than he could even begin to identify. Just having Phil there comforted his woes from the last day and a half, filled him with the love he’d always felt from Phil, and encited pure fear in him that he’d never see Phil again, all at one time. Finally, after what felt like only a millisecond but was clearly too long to be appropriate for a creator meeting a fan, Dan released Phil, and he was relieved to find that he was smiling. 

“Thanks,” Phil said, taking a deep breath. “I’m Phil, by the way.” It wasn’t until then that Dan really took Phil in; he was wearing his glasses, which brought a grin to Dan’s face; every universe’s Phil should wear his glasses constantly. It’s what everyone who encounters him deserves. He wore an outfit that reminded Dan of something he’d wear to their own meetup. It was interesting, Dan thought, how some fundamental things about Phil refused to change, even in an alternate universe. 

“Do you have something you’d like me to sign?” he asked. Phil nodded and handed over a pride flag. A burst of relief shot through Dan; Phil was still the same Phil. “I-I’d like to give you this, too,” he said, shakily handing over what appeared to be a drawing. As soon as Dan finished signing the flag, he snatched the drawing as if it were the Holy Grail and examined it; it was a picture of Dan, with every intricate detail drawn out. His dimples were deep, and every curl on his head was intentionally placed. He wore science-themed makeup, and Dan wasn’t even exaggerating when he said it was the best fanart he’d ever seen. “I’m a scientist, so…” 

It was like he was falling in love all over again. “Wow, Phil...This is amazing. Absolutely amazing. I had no idea you could draw like this!” 

“Well…” he stammered, “I don’t think you really know me at all.” 

“Oh, yeah, right,” Dan let out, disappointment evident in his voice. At this point, even Phil’s radiating awkwardness had dissipated into pure confusion. Dan had to think fast, and, through some miracle, he did. “Did you post this online? I’d love to show it some love.”

“Oh, yeah!” Phil said, confusion immediately being replaced by excitement. He was clearly still a bit nervous, but he seemed much more comfortable around Dan. That was a start. “I’m on Twitter @AmazingPhil.” Dan almost winced. How dumb could he be? He made a mental note: next time, search the name AND the handle.

“I’ll definitely check that out,” Dan said, beaming. “Thank you for this.” 

“You’re welcome,” Phil said, and the VidCon employees were ushering him on. Dan wanted to yell at them, to keep him there forever, but there was only so much he could do. 

“Have a great day!” Dan shouted as he watched the love of his life walk out of it clueless. He sighed, and muttered under his breath, “I love you.” 

#phanfic #phanfiction #dong and ping #phic stuff #seven days

[phantomphangphucker]

Wes Plays Match Maker - Phic Phight

Prompt Creator: @deredereart Prompt: After meeting Dani and finding out Vlad is a ghost, Wes’ theories about Phantom seem less absurd to Valerie than before. Summary: Valerie steals Wes's binder and has some questions

Warning: mentions of the violence Dan did

Danny Fenton is minding his own business when someone slams an overfilled stripped black and white binder with notes, pictures and papers sticking out of it at odd ends; onto the table. Danny blinks at it a bit before putting down his milkshake and lifting his head up. “Uh, hey Val? What’s with the binder? That’s a little disorganised for you”, Danny can’t help but smile at her. Valerie gives him a soft but silly smile as she sits down. She jabs a finger on the cover of the binder and says, “Phantom, you damn moron”.

Danny coughs a little bit before composing himself, “um what? Either somehow Phantom turned himself into a kind of sad looking binder or I’m really confused”. Valerie laughs while shaking her head, putting a hand over her face “you are scary good at making up shit in the spot, you know that?”. Then after lowering her hand as Danny chuckles a little, “so I was sitting in class today and that Wes kid is going off with his conspiracy again. But you know what, Danny?”. Danny can’t help but groan and shuffle his feet nervously, “that kid is quite the loony handful isn’t he? And what?”. Valerie smirks, “yeah his theories were pretty crazy and him screaming like a madman doesn’t help. He had a giant bell today to draw attention to himself”. By the time Valerie’s done speaking Danny’s head is on the table and he’s laughing his ass off. Functionally killing his nerves. “I could live with that if he stopped trying to dump white paint and flour on me, he’s wrecked almost half my shirts at this point”, Danny is muffled by the table top.

Valerie nods, “yeah that’s pretty extreme, plus it’s kind of a dick move to be trying to out you like that anyways”. Danny chuckles, “yeah tell me about- wait, what?”. Danny lifts his head up off the table and gives her a puzzled look, just barely concealing his worry. Valerie taps on the binder, “I lifted this off Wes, with all this shit I think the only reason no ones realised is because no one thinks it’s possible”.

“Uh”, is all Danny can think of saying at the moment, he really has no clue what in all Wes has on him. Valerie chuckles lightly and leans her face down to Danny’s, which is only a little bit off the table, facing her. “After meeting Dani I saw Vlad do his whole transformation bit. And you know what?”

“Uh, what?”, Danny makes a point to sound completely confused. Valerie rolls her eyes at his fake confusion, “well half ghosts are real, Dani looks like and is the cousin of Phantom. So...”. Danny tried to look even more confused and is completely panicked at this point, “pretty sure Phantom doesn’t have a cousin”. Is all he gives as a response hoping that by not lying he’ll seem more believable. Valerie leans back and shakes her head at him while smiling, “pretty sure you both said you’re cousins and you know you could have just told me you moron. You were right, there’s no way I could fight or kill something that’s even part human. You included”.

Danny sits up right and rubs his neck, “well alright then...”. Valerie laughs loudly, “seriously? How was I supposed to not put it together. Danny, the minute I found out half ghost were a thing it was pretty hard not to wonder about Phantom. And then with Vlad? Who doesn’t bother changing his first name? Come on Danny?”. Danny throws his hands up dramatically but whispers, “I was 14, never claimed to be creative”. Valerie rolls her eyes, “so...”.

Danny smack his head as he clues in that she’s trying to get him to admit to it, “I’m not much of one for secret telling, Val. But yeah, ok, I’m Phantom”. Valerie smiles softly as Danny rubs his neck looking away from her, “finally, and Danny? Fenton, Phantom? Those sound so similar, at least Masters and Plasmius sound wildly different”. Danny shrugs, “I’m a punny man, I couldn’t resist. But you’re not mad?”.

Valerie rolls her eyes, “I’m not happy but no I’m not mad. I wish you had told me on your own, in the beginning I get you lying cause we weren’t friends in any way. But then we dated and the whole truce with Phantom happened, so why?”. Danny shrugs, sipping his drink a bit before responding, “like I said I’m not much of a secret teller, hell I’ve never actually told anyone. All the people who know either knew from the start or stumbled on it on their own”. Valerie looks a little shocked at this but she understands it, “well I would have trusted you once I knew but I do need to know why you attacked my suit. Did you know I wasn’t in there?”. Danny nods at her, “yeah, Technus was.  I knew it wasn’t you Val. I would never fight you full force like that”. Valerie smirks, “good and honestly, I could tell you were never fully trying. I used to take that as an insult”. Danny blinks a couple times before looking sheepish.

Valerie thinks for a second and furrows her brows, “you said from the beginning, earlier, there’s no way you’ve always been half ghost so, like, what the hell Danny?”. Danny raises an eyebrow and laughs, “you’re asking for my superhero origin story?”. Valerie sighs and facepalms, “you can be so awful but yes, yes I am. And I guess you really are, aren’t you?”. Danny shrugs, “well powers, I fight crime, save the city, even the world once or twice. So yeah I’d say superhero fits. Jazz even likes to say I have a hero complex”. Danny shakes his head and chuckles before continuing, “but to put it really simply my parents built a ghost portal, it didn’t work. I went inside it, accidentally turned it on, got half killed. Sam and Tuck where there, lots of screaming”. Valerie looks shocked and a bit disturbed, “that, that was incredibly dumb of you. Also, that sounds horribly painful”. Danny nods frowning, “well the entirety of the ghost zone basically electrocuted me, so yeah. It hurt. I was Phantom when I fell out of the portal, we all thought I was flat out dead till I changed back. And at least I thought the thing didn’t and couldn’t work. Vlad thought the college mini portal would work and yet he still shoved his head in it just as it was turned on”. Valerie facepalms again while grimacing, “ok yeah that’s even more stupid. But that must have been terrifying Danny”.

Danny nods, “once we figured out I wasn’t actually dead, it was sorta ok. More worried about my parents at that point. Now them trying to kill me or dissect me all the time has just become the butt of a joke!” Danny laughs pretty loudly while Valerie looks horrified.

“Danny what! That is so very stupid. I’d say you should tell them but unlike me, I don’t think they’ve ever cooperated with any ghost or half ghost”, Valerie shakes her head as Danny laughs a bit more. Danny sighing, “they’ve cooperated with Phantom once or twice. But even though I know they’ll accept me, I’d rather not deal with them going all scientist on me or trying to “fix me” either”. Valerie nods, totally getting it, “yeah I wouldn’t want my dad trying to change me so I guess I get it. That’s why I was so mad when you revealed me that time, not cool by the way”.

Danny rubs his neck, “yeah, I didn’t really have time to waste and I couldn’t let you take the battle suit. I’m pretty much the only person who could use that thing without dying. Well fully dying”. Valerie responds with an eyebrow raised, “was it really that bad?”.

“Yes, it nearly fully killed me as it was. Any normal human would have died and failed to seal Pairah away again”. Valerie slugs him in the shoulder, “so you almost killed yourself? Christ Danny you dumbass. But I guess there really wasn’t any other way”. Shaking her head, “you’re not all powerful, so maybe ask for help next time?”. Valerie is kind of surprised when Danny starts laughing so hard that he tears up a little, “Val, um you’re kind of wrong on that. If I had wanted to 14 year old me could have destroyed the entire world in the span of 10 years. Hell, that actually happened until I fucked around with the time stream. And that timelines me is actually weaker than I am now, he didn’t even have ice powers”. Valerie is gapping like a fish, “what? You were supposed to destroy the world? What the fuck?”. Danny rubs his neck, “yeah if you want the rundown, because I’m pretty much over the trauma of it at this point. All my family and friends died in an explosion, Vlad adopted me, ripped out my humanity and the ghost me ripped out Vlad’s humanity, the ghost me fused with Vlad’s ghost, murdered human me and then spent the next 10 years mass killing every human and ghost. As well as destroying all the buildings, he threw tanks at people while laughing”. Valerie looks completely freaked out, “what the fuck Danny, that-that is completely awful”. Danny nods looking a little uncomfortable, “yeah and it was a pretty big mind fuck going to that future just as he was trying to destroy Amity. You were there and called young me or me from the past, cute after I saved you from being killed by the evil me. Who’s called Dan by the way”. Valerie shakes her head, “well you are still cute Danny but how the hell did you even stop this future from happening?”. Danny laughs a little, “well Dan came to my, at the time, present and pretended to be me so he could basically murder my friends and family to make sure I became him. But I went and fist fought him, I totally lost but this time ghost saved them and reversed time. He basically pushed restart and thus made it so that I could avoid everyone dying. Dan still exists though, just outside of time having a time out in a thermos”. Valerie shakes her head, “that is ridiculous, well don’t ever go evil”. Danny laughs, “I don’t intend to”.

Valerie shakes herself off, “on a lighter note, you really should look”. Valerie shoves the binder at Danny. While Danny flips through the pages he can’t help but shake his head, “I think Sam and Tuck need costumes or something. At least he’s never caught me mid-transformation”. Valerie chuckles as Danny closes the book, “I know most of it is easy to dismiss but you really should be more careful, you dumbass. Also yeah, costumes is a good idea”. While Valerie’s been talking Danny has gotten an idea, “hey Val? Does he know you have this?”. As Valerie shakes her head Danny grins, sticking his hand in the binder he ectoblasts the contents to smithereens. Valerie jumps a little and glares at him before laughing, “I’m not sure whether that’s smart or just petty Danny”.

After Danny finishes his shake the two go for a walk, “so Danny, now that I know my lifestyle isn’t a danger to you and that you’re being honest. Want to try the whole us thing again?”. Danny grins widely, “absolutely”. Then smirking to himself, “Paulina would totally be jealous”. Valerie shakes her head, “I’m not telling her I’m dating Phantom you moron”. Danny smacks her playfully, “Val think. Valerie and Danny date, Red and Phantom date”. Valerie starts laughing and Danny joins in, Valerie says through her laughter, “Wes is going to have a heart attack”.

“Good!”

End.

#phic phight #phic phight 19 #Danny Phantom #phantom #fan fic #phan phic #mentions of violence #mentions of murder #mentions of mass murder #danny fenton #Valerie gray #wes weston #phantomphangphucker #have a fic suck my dick #team human

[lonely-bored-writer]

Winchester meet the Phantoms Ch. 12

Things started relaxing, the ghosts were mostly spending their time in ghost zone with things getting closer to Christmas. Nothing else that goes bump in the night has popped up, his parents are at a convention in England, and today is the start of winter break. So some would say things were going good for him.

The problem is, he keeps seeing people with wings. Weird, he knows. It first happened when Sam, Tuck, and him were leaving the nasty burger. He held the door open for this elderly man, who Danny could swear had faint white wings behind his back. When he asked Sam and Tuck about it, nether of them had any clue what he was talking about. So, like any other teen, Danny brushed it off as nothing and went on with his day.

How ever the whole week that followed that day, people with wings kept appearing. It kept ranging from kids, to teens, to adults, to the elder, but it was much more prominent in adults. The wings ranged from gold, white, silver and black, along with the fact they started looking more prominent as time passed.

That's why Danny was currently sitting in his bed room, searching his computer for any creatures that had wings like those. The only things he could find were angels, but that couldn't be. He's met an angel before and he didn't have wings. Things were getting more confusing, and he had an idea of who to call.

"Hey Dean, is Sam there? Can you put me on speaker? Okay, so I might have a problem..."

"He's checking in with Cas to see if there's any reason I might be seeing angel wings" Danny sighed, taking a drink from his shake. "I really hope it isn't that big."

"Maybe it has to do with what those people did?" Sam questioned her friend. Danny paused for a moment, realizing his friend might have a point.

"She's got a point." Tucker joined in, taking a bite from his double bacon burger. "Your hearing, sight, and ice powers got a lot stronger. Whose to say you can't see things like that now?"

"You've got a point..." Danny nodded, glancing around the room to make sure no winged people were here. " If that's true, why are angels gathering here?"

"Are any here now?" Sam asked, lowering her voice.

"Not that I can tell..." Danny paused, watching as one entered the nasty burger, eyes trained on him. "Never-mind, don't look. He's watching us" Danny turned his gaze back to his friends. Immediately both his friends got tense.

"What the hell are we supposed to do now?" Tucker asked, trying to keep his eyes trained on his friend. Sam tried to do the same, no wanting to alert the angel anything. "Do they want something bad?

"From what I know, they never want anything good." Danny mumbled. "Considering things, I think they might be after me. I mean, they guys was staring straight at me."

"Okay, lets say that." Sam thought, pausing to think. "What are we going to do? I doubt Tucker and I can keep you safe from angels."

"I'll leave." Danny said, voice seriously. When his friends made a move to protest. "I'll try calling Cas, okay? But I don't want you guys getting hurt."

He walked a few blocks before he was pulled into a alley way. He barely missed the angel blade before it went straight through him. His eyes glowed green, seeing four angels. One with golden wings, two with black, and one with white.

It happened quickly, quicker than ever. The moment the four angels had him circled, a pierce stab of fear and alarm pulsing through him. It happened quicker than he was used to, no words were exchanged. The golden-winged angel made the first move, jumping forward and taking aim for Danny's chest. The move it took to block the attack, and blast his attack with an ecto-blast, pushing the angel gave another the opening it needed.

The pain flaring up from Danny's leg felt like nothing he felt before. Burning almost as much, or even worse, than the weapons the GIW and his parents use. Everything became a blear of angel after angel taking a jab at him, small nicks and bruises forming and the large gash on his leg bled heavily.

He couldn't get the angels to slow down, they moved quickly, almost as if anything wasn't going to slow them down. His didn't do much to delay them and he started loosing hope he could get out of this mess, already panting heavily.

It was a fluke if he was being honest. It was blocking to attacks that lead to one blade burying itself into the golden-winged angel. The flash that filled the area blinded Danny for a moment.

A moment too soon, the felt the slash before his vision came back fully. The pain blossomed across his shoulder, fogging his mind. The two other blades pierced into him, one through his shoulder, the other through his chest. The pain overwhelmed him, nothing like anything he felt before. It reminded him too much of the night his life changed for ever.

On the damp alley way ground, Danny felt himself slipping not being able to so much as keep his eyes opened. He left the footsteps vibrate against the grounds and he knew he wasn't going to make this out in one piece...

At least that's what he thought before he felt the burning light fill the air and corpses hit the ground. He couldn't make it out, but a familiar voice filled the air. But he couldn't hold on, his mind drifted to darkness with one thought in mind.

Sam Winchester was on a search for a new case inside the Winchester's bunker, his brother was off to the side with a beer reading away. They were settled into a comfortable silence, it was on of their more laid back days. Not much to do. So when Castiel appeared in the middle of the room, a body in his arms. It set what the day would be like.

"Dean! Sam!" Castiel's voice pulled them from their stare, having the brothers moving the moment Cas placed Danny's unconscious form on the couch.

"What happened?!" Sam asked, pressing his hand against Danny's throat, sighing in relief when he felt a pulse.

"Angels." Cas spoke, eyes watching the brother's move. "They believe he will grow up to be a king of hell."

"What?" Dean's head snapped up from his spot with the medical kit. "What the hell does that mean?"

"There is a timeline when Danny grows to destroy the world, I believe mentioned this when you first met."

"He said he stopped that version of himself." Sam responded, looking over Danny's wounds when the tattered shirt was removed. "He need's a hospital."

"No." Cas shook his head. "His blood is different, the doctors will notice." At those words, the Winchester brother's noticed it. A soft green glow emitted from the red blood, invisible unless you were really looking.

"Angel's are going to try and kill him now?" Dean asked, his brother and him working quickly to stitch and clean Danny's wounds before the teen lost a lot of blood.

"Yes." Came the curt response from the angel.

"Just because in one timeline he- Dammit Cas!" Dean cut himself off when he heard the sound of fluttering wings were heard, a glance back showed an empty space. His eyes landed on the pale and sweaty face of the teen, worry curling through him. "You better wake up."

When Danny came to, the first thing he thought was why his bed felt so small. Then everything came crashing down. The wings. The angels. Being attack. Being stabbed. Twice. Someone saved him.

Someone saved him.

Jolting up in realization cause a new wave of pain from his injuries. He cried out, wrapping an arm around his torso. "Hey! You'll rip your stitches." Danny's eyes landed on the worried gaze of Sam Winchester. A sigh of relief escaped him, allowing Sam to guide him to a sitting. He accepted the pain relievers and water with a grateful smile.

"What the hell happened?" Dean asked, arms crossed before him, worry clear. "Cas showed up with you a mess." So he's the someone who saved him.

"I-I don't know." Danny sighed, running a hand through his hair. "I noticed one of the angels watching me when I was eating with Sam and Tuck... I didn't want them at risk so I left, I thought they weren't going to do anything when I was so close to my house but I was pulled into an alley way. I didn't hear them! How can you not hear four people!" Dean and Sam shared a look.

"It isn't your fault Danny." Sam offered comfort. "Angel's can be sneaky."

"Did they say anything?"

"No, they just attacked." Danny answered Dean, eyes train in concentration on the floor. "Whatever they used, it felt a lot like the day the accident happened..."

"Wait, so angel's are trying to kill me because in another time I become the king of hell? a demon?" Danny asked, eyes wide in disbelief. Yes, he had feared many times before the he would become Dan. But after two years from the initial date he was supposed to go down that route and never going down it, the fear lessened. "I already took care of that!?"

"Something must have happened to have the angel's freaked again." Sam sighed, watching the teen. Both the Winchesters felt bad for Danny. First it was the crazy demons who wanted to combine two mirror realms, and now they have angel's coming after him.

"How do I stop them?" Danny asked, looking over at the brothers. "I took one down by accident, I'm not even sure what happened."

"They only die from an angel blade, I'll have Cas find you one." Dean responded, sketching something on a spare piece of paper. He held the paper in front of Danny. "That's a sigil. It has be drawn with human blood and you slam your hand on it to activate it. It should work when you're in human form." Danny nodded, musing over the different parts of the sigil.

"Cas can also carve an Enochian guarding spell into your ribs." Sam added in. "It hurts, but it'll keep angels from being able to track you. You'll have to get Cas's number but it is important."

"Holy crap..." Danny trailed, eyes wide as he looked at Castiel's wings. Large black, full wings rested across the angel's back. They were the clearest wings he had seen so far. He felt himself reaching a hand out before pulling eyes shifted to the angel who looked at him with a curious look. "Can I touch them?"

"I do not see why not."

Danny's taking that as a yes. His eyes just seemed to widen more when he felt just how soft Castiel's wings really were. They were so soft to the point it almost felt like there was nothing there, but from the shift of the wings under his hand and the feathers ruffled by his hand, he knew they were there.

"This is weird." Dean mused form his spot next to his brother, who nodded in agreement. Both Winchesters were watching a scene of a curious angel watching a teen boy running his hand in the empty space a bit over the angel's shoulder. If the brothers hadn't know the teen could see angel wings now, they'd think he finally snapped. "As much as we love watching you petting nothing, Cas should put the carvings in."

"Dean's got a point." Sam nodded, giving Danny a smile when the teen pulled his hand back with a blush. "You do have school, and since you wounds are healing surprisingly fast you'll be good to go."

"Yea, I can't miss tomorrow of Lancer's going to call my parents in for another conference." Danny sighed, rubbing his clothed chest. Even with the shirt he could feel the ridged edges of the scars forming from the attack. He found it odd, he rarely ever scarred but these angel blades were able to scar him easily. "Okay, lets get this over with."

#Danny Phantom #danny fenton #IM SORRY DANNY #danny phantom fanfiction #danny sees wings #supernatural #supernatural fanfiction #supernatural writing prompts #superphantom #superphantom au #dean winchester #Sam Winchester #winchesters meet the phantoms

[istheresomebodywhocanimagine]

Tomorrow Never Came PT. 12

Now that you’ve done what you came to do, what comes next? Where do you go? How do you cope?

Read PT. 1 here | Read PT. 2 here | Read PT. 3 here | Read PT. 4 here | Read PT. 5 here | Read PT. 6 here | Read PT. 7 here | Read PT. 8 here | Read PT. 9 here | Read PT. 10 here | Read PT. 10.5 here | Read PT. 11 here

TRIGGER WARNING: BIG SAD. also low quality pic of roger hehe

The last of your measly belongings were packed tightly into that folded up box you’d stuffed into the closet a year ago, the clock reading some time around 2 in the morning as you took a deep, shuddering breath. A few tears escaped your eyes, and you reached up to quickly wipe them away. This was it.

Weston had explained everything from the beginning, pausing only to let you cry it out. He was patient – a bit irritable, but not outwardly, and he always waited until you were calmed down a bit to continue. He was understanding, you thought, as you made your way down the hallway to Roger’s room, which was still empty. Roger wouldn’t be back for a good 6 or 7 hours, leaving you plenty of time to process what Weston had said.

Roger was the universe’s punishment for your involvement in Weston’s creation. He had manifested the time portal, through some sort of quantum physics mumbo-jumbo you hadn’t even pretended to understand. He did it for his childhood friend, a redhead that went by the name of Abigail. She was beautiful, and all the boys chased after her, including Weston. But he had the upper hand as her best friend, and he squandered it away by pining after her silently until it was too late – Abigail was gone, victim to an IRA car bomb that detonated yards from where she was standing, outside of a pub. She was killed at the ripe age of 16, before he could even say goodbye.

“So you made a time machine to save a girl you were obsessed with,” you deadpanned in between crying sessions, Weston’s face twisting up in annoyance and agreement as he struggled to form a comeback.

“Well, when you put it that way…. I guess.”

He’d studied for years, running algorithm after algorithm, test after test, until a successful run in 1993 – he found himself thrust back into the 1970s, at the same exact time, in the same exact place. Roger and Freddie became background characters in his quest to fix what he saw as an error in the timeline, people who just happened to be there every time he came back to try and fix it again.

But that was the problem both of you had – you saw the tragedies as erroneous, but as traumatic as they were, they were not errors. It took Weston years to finally realize there was no way to fix it.

“I spent all of my time from 1993 to 2010 trying to figure out what I was doing wrong,” he’d quietly remarked, tugging on a string that was frayed off of the knee of his baggy jeans. “Turns out, it wasn’t my place to try and change history anyways. Abi wasn’t meant to be with me, as much as I wanted it to be true.”

“I’m sorry,” you whispered, not sure what to say. It was overwhelming, all of it, and an excessive amount of shame and pain washed over you as you realized that you were not the only one chasing something that wasn’t yours, that didn’t belong to you. A small part of you still wanted Roger, but the common sense in you knew it wasn’t in the cards.

Weston was silent as he stared at the floor just past his knees, chewing on the inside of his lip before he stood up and brushed his jeans off absentmindedly. “I spent 2010 and on trying to convince Dan that it wasn’t worth it. He caught me one time, coming out of the closet door. Wouldn’t leave until I explained, shit a brick when I did.”

“But you let him?” you countered, furrowing your eyebrows as you looked up at Weston.

“It’s hard to say no to someone who offers to pay double the rent for an apartment that only offers you pain because of a time portal you can’t get rid of. And I figured he’d get the message eventually. I never imagined….” He trailed off, looking down at you as he tried to find the words to say that wouldn’t offend you. It was clear that he found you incapable of dealing with the consequences, but he didn’t say it. Instead, he cleared his throat and shook his head. “I didn’t think he’d send anyone else.”

“I get it,” you muttered, standing up as well as tears once again threatened to spill out of your eyes. “I’ll just pack up my things.”

And now here you were, standing in the middle of Roger’s room, silently crying as you took one last look. It was a mess, clothes laying across the bed that wasn’t made, an ashtray with an abundance of cigarette butts near the window, and tons of crumpled papers with scrapped songs on them – but it was home to you. You approached the desk, picking one paper up that seemed to be an abandoned love song. Those weren’t typical of Roger, so you folded it up slowly and pushed it into your pocket, sniffling once before grabbing the pen and a discarded paper, writing out a note to your boyfriend. Could you call him a boyfriend now? It was all so confusing.

I did it. I love you forever. Please keep writing music, and don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine – you just keep being the best drummer out there. Queen is going to do numbers, I promise. Gotta go now.

Placing the note on his bed, you walked back out of his room to where Weston was waiting, his arms crossed as he watched you wipe away the last of your tears.

“Ready to go?”

The apartment wasn’t like you remembered it. When you and Weston walked back through, it was an unfamiliar layout, complete with a mirror in front of the door that you nearly broke upon opening the door outward. But Weston shoved through, strolling into the bedroom as if it was his own. Which, you quickly realized, it was. Pictures of him with a strange redhead girl you recognized as Abigail were on the dresser, coupled with some stacks of papers with equations and diagrams that looked like another language to you.

“Wow. Guess you really did do it. Wonder where Dan is,” he remarked, mostly unfazed by the fact that it had returned to his own apartment. He looked around for a moment, then turned to you and nodded. “Uh, sorry about your boyfriend. I know what it’s like, so if you ever need anyone to, uh, talk to-“

“It’s okay,” you cut him off, a bit more sharply than you intended, but the rim of red around your eyes was enough to keep him from being offended. “I’m just going to go.”

He was quiet, just nodding in response and heading for the door so he could open it for you. “Okay. Hope everything works out.”

“Okay.” You took a deep breath, then hurried out of the door with your box of belongings. It felt heavy in your arms, heavier now that you had the weight of the world on your shoulders, but you managed to make your way down to the street, the church’s shadow looming over you like a death sentence as you hailed a cab that took you all the way to your mom’s house. It wasn’t home. Not anymore.

When you arrived at the small house on the other side of the city, you saw the driveway had your car in it, plus an unfamiliar junker that looked like it might fall apart if you shook it a little bit. Furrowing your eyebrows, you eyed the car suspiciously as you paid the cabbie with the pocket money you had left. It wasn’t yours, and it sure as hell wasn’t your father or mother’s, so whose was it?

Stepping out of the car, you shifted the box to your hip and stared up at the house. It seemed dirtier than you remembered, but maybe it was a year without seeing it that stained your eyesight, so you walked up to the door without another thought. Your feet dragged just a bit as you ascended the stairs, the reality of finally seeing your mom again after a whole year hitting you like a freight train. What if she was still an invalid? What if nothing had changed?

“Y/N?”

The front door swung open before you could even get to it, the familiar voice of your mom flooding your ears. But there was something off about it, a slowness to the way she spoke your name that made your ears ring as you looked up to find her standing in the doorway, leaned up against the frame.

Jesus, she was a mess. She looked at least 20 years older than she should have been, her collarbones jutting out of what used to be a healthy, toned body. In fact, all of her bones were sticking out, a sickly pallor discoloring her face and making her seem as if she was a ghost as she smiled lazily at you, her eyes a bit bleary and unfocused as she searched your face.

“Mum?” you asked unsurely, still standing at the top of the stairs as you stared at the woman who had taken care of you for the last 20-something years, a shell of what she’d been when you saw her literally hours ago, young and relatively unscathed.

“Can you go get me some Guinness? I’ll give you the cash.”

Staring blankly at her, you sat the box down on the porch and nodded slowly. She wasn’t drunk. This wasn’t the body of an alcoholic. This was something else you couldn’t put your finger on, something worse. Registering your nod slowly, she shut the door again and left you out on the porch, reeling from the interaction that had just taken place. Seconds later, she came back with a wad of cash, your phone, and your keys. Walking out to you, or rather, wobbling, she gave the handful to you with a shaking hand, then picked up your box and carried it inside without another word.

“What the fuck?” you whispered once she’d shut the door, still shocked from what had just happened. “What the fuck, what the fuck, what the fuck?” you continued anxiously, slowly turning on your heels to walk out to your car that was waiting in the drive. What in the fuck had just happened?

Opening the car door, the familiar peony and cherry car freshener assaulted your nostrils as you dropped in, closing the door behind you and shakily unlocking your phone. It was still March, maybe 30 minutes after you’d went in to the portal, and yet, you felt like it had been forever since you’d been here. There weren’t any notifications, just the time and the date staring you back in the face from your iPhone.

Dan. He would know what’s going on. Opening your phone, you quickly pulled up his contact, calling him and pressing it to your ear as you listened to it ring, ring, ring. But he never answered, eliciting a string of curses out of you as you called him again, refusing to quit. And he finally answered on the third ring, sounding thoroughly annoyed.

“What d’you want?”

The words tumbled out of you before you could even think, pouring out of your mouth like a torrential waterfall of stupidity. You would regret it in a moment. “I did it, I went back and stopped William and Ted, and I thought mum would be alright, but now I’m here again in 2018 and I just-“

“Jesus, what are you on about? Did your mum let you shoot up with her, finally? She let you in on her stash of smack? Fuck, no wonder your dad took off, you’re both so cracked out. You both still owe me.”

“Wha- I-“ You were floored, so many truths attacking you at once you could barely comprehend the situation. “Smack? Owe you?”

“You’re high,” he accused, sounding even more annoyed than before, if that was possible at all. “And you owe me 700 fucking pounds. Remember that? Don’t fucking call back until you got it, you and your fucking thief of a mum. Fuck you.”

The line went dead. Stunned, you stared at your phone as it returned to the home screen, still devoid of notifications, and for some reason, you didn’t cry. You just breathed slowly, almost heavily, a hundred needles poking into your heart while you watched the screen go black after your inactivity. Smack? Your mom was a heroin addict? That explained the sluggishness, the harrowed appearance, but didn’t explain why? What had you done wrong? This wasn’t supposed to be how it happened. You were supposed to come back to a normal family, a normal life, not an addict mother and an uncle that despised you, plus a still-absent father.

No tears came, still. All that overtook you was a need, a desperate one at that. You needed his name to pop up on that phone, to call you and ask you if you were okay, because you weren’t, not anymore.

You needed Roger.

Roger. Roger, fuck, where is he? Scrambling to open up your phone, you opened Chrome and typed in his name faster than you’d ever typed in your life, hitting search even though you misspelled his last name in your haste, and feeling a flood of relief when you saw his Wikipedia page pull up. For a moment, you felt like at least something went right. But, as your luck would have it, you were wrong.

Roger Meddows Taylor was an English musician, singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist, best known as the drummer for the rock band Queen.

Was?

Clicking on the Wikipedia link, you waited a few seconds for the page to load before you were met with a picture of Roger, one that was slightly unfamiliar due to the shorter length of his hair. He looked middle-aged in the photo, the caption indicating it was taken around the mid-90’s, but you didn’t pay attention to it for too long before the death date caught your eye.

August 3, 2000

“No, no, no, no,” you whined, a tear immediately springing forth out of your eye as you scrolled down to the Personal Life section of his Wikipedia. What awaited you there was crushing, and you continually swept tears out of your eyes as you read it, so distraught you couldn’t even make a sound.

Following the 1997 release of No-One but You (Only the Good Die Young) and Deacon’s departure from Queen, Taylor unexpectedly committed himself to an unnamed institute, allegedly in the countryside near London unexpectedly. Remaining Queen member Brian May, speaking about the situation on a talk show later in 2000, cited ‘personal issues related to grieving,’ mentioning Freddie by name. He also briefly mentioned an old girlfriend from the early days of Queen, although this story is unconfirmed and no evidence of this relationship was brought forth upon public doubt. Taylor passed in 2000, leaving behind five children with two ex-wives.

“Oh, fuck me,” you sobbed as the tears finally began to fall in full force, your phone dropping to your lap as you pressed your hands to your face. Roger was dead. Your mom was just as fucked. Dan wanted nothing to do with you. Your dad? Might as well not exist. Everything was somehow worse than before.

Forgetting completely about the Guinness, you curled up in your car and sobbed for a good hour, the sky darkening to the point where you could barely see your hands in front of your face when you finally pulled yourself together, sniffling and wiping your nose on the back of your hand. Locating your phone, you grabbed it and shoved it into your pocket, neglecting to grab the keys out of the ignition before you wobbled back inside, overwhelmed with grief for both of the lives you had lost – one here, and one with Roger.

When the door on the porch opened again and you saw the outline of your mom lit by a single dim hallway light, you cursed yourself silently for completely forgetting what she’d sent you to do.

“Did you get it? Took you long enough.”

Her selfish, stinging words hit you like a slap to the face as you fully stopped in your ascension of the stairs. In her hand, she held the dress from Biba, the one Roger had bought you. “Give me my dress,” you immediately demanded, hopping the rest of the steps in one leap and coming to stand in front of her. She stared at you like an alien, eyes still bleary, probably from shooting up while you were busy mourning all of your mistakes in the car. This was not her fault, but as you stared at her offended expression that was chastising you for what you did, you couldn’t help but feel like it was.

“Where’s the fucking beer?”

“Fuck you!” you spat, snatching the dress from her hands and taking off for your car again as she yelled after you, berating you for being ungrateful and a thief and every nasty name under the moon. But you ignored her, climbing back into your car and starting it before ripping out of the driveway and peeling off down the street. Fuck her.

The dress laid in a pretty pink heap on the passenger seat, tossed over there hastily and taunting you as you drove aimlessly through the London night, not sure where to go. You didn’t even know where your dad was, so that was out of the question. And you were as good as dead to Dan. Maybe your friends? But how would you explain that? Hey, so I went back to 1971 to save my mom, but then I came back and she’s just a fucking druggie now, and my boyfriend from the 70’s is dead, and my uncle hates me, so can I crash on your couch? No. You were officially homeless.

So you went back to Weston’s. Parking on the street outside the building, you stared up at that church, the same one that had been so lofty and imposing in the 70’s now seeming small and pathetic as you examined the cracked brick, the crumbling stairs leading up to it surely being a safety violation. Your hand found the dress blindly, resting on the soft, velvety fabric and giving it a small pet. God, how desperately you could use a hug from Roger right now.

You weren’t sure was propelled you up to Weston’s door, or how you even made it up there, but a few minutes later, you were knocking on his door rapidly, your free hand clutching onto the dress desperately. When he opened the door, he didn’t even look remotely surprised to see you, though his words were polite enough.

“Hey. Back so soon?”

You groaned softly at the greeting, not sure whether to smack him or run away or both, but you shook your head and pressed your palm to your forehead. “I have to undo it. Everything. You were….. you were right.”

“Could have listened to me half a year ago, but okay,” he sighed, opening the door fully and letting you in. You beelined for the bedroom, not even stopping for a moment to explain the situation to him. It had to be done. You had to erase this reality, to start over. Your mom was too important. Roger was too important. Everything was too different. You should have listened.

And so, in you went again, plunging in to the darkness of the closet with only a few pounds and a dress on you, plus an all-too-familiar idea of what came next. As you opened the door to the 70’s décor in the hallway of the building you’d come to adore over the past year, you sighed.

Here we go again.

PT. 1 PT. 2 PT. 3 PT. 4 PT. 5 PT. 6 PT. 7 PT. 8 PT. 9 PT. 10 PT. 10.5 PT. 11

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[aimmyarrowshigh]

@reliand @marysuewhipple -- I was midway through this response when you blocked, but let’s just bear this out after all, because you genuinely an actually seem to be confused on some of your canon and you might, like, want to know, for real, in a not-mean way.

Wow, you really bought into your own fanon and forgot that it literally is FANon, didn’t you.

No one knows what happened after Luke was knocked unconscious except for Kylo and the other students that left with him (presumably who became the Knights of Ren).

We literally see what happened in TFA. Remember? Kylo, and his knights, surrounded by the dead bodies of the other students in the mud. Kylo kills one of them. We saw that happen. We watched him kill them. That was on screen. That was canon.

I mean, you act like he is just plain evil and started training with Luke as an adult[.]

I can’t speak for Dan @raptorific​, but I have never said that Ben’s training STARTED as an adult -- just that his decision to end his training with Luke and his choice to become Kylo Ren happened as an adult. He started training with Luke at ten, as far as canon has said, but canon has also presented two different timelines for Ben’s training with the Jedi because of the changes made to canon between TFA and TLJ.

Granted: in the Road To TFA materials, Ben “Jedi Killer” Solo became Kylo Ren at age 15; in the Road To TLJ materials, starting with Bloodline, this was changed to age 23 -- whether this change is because of actual canon-bearing narrative choices or just because Adam can’t play 15 because he’s 34, IDK, and it ultimately doesn’t matter.

The current canonical age that Ben Solo slaughtered all of his classmates except any who became the KoR -- and we only know for sure that they lived long enough to assist in the massacre, because we’ve only seen them in that singular flashback -- is 23. An adult.

An adult man who man the choice to kill all of his classmates.

That is what is canon.

First, Ben has had Snoke preying on him since he was in his mother’s womb. Keeping him up for days on end as a toddler, and getting into his head nonstop. Snoke has been grooming this kid from day one…

You guys straight-up invented this.

It is not even ALLUDED TO in any actual canon materials. Leia senses the Dark side of the Force while she’s pregnant, but guess what? EVERY Force-sensitive person is equally affected by the Dark side and the Light side. Their choices are what “choose their side.”

She does not sense Snoke, at least as far as any current canon has said, and Pablo Hidalgo -- I know you guys hate him, but he’s still the guardian of the SW bible -- has said that it has not been stated, or alluded, in canon. Will it turn out to be true? Maybe. It’s certainly a popular enough fanon that I could see LF throwing up their hands and surrendering to it.

But guess what else?

Even if Snoke were grooming Ben from the day Han’s sperm met Leia’s egg, it would not excuse Ben’s adult, agential choices.

Actual canon, in the films -- because Kylo and Ben have not appeared older than toddler-age in real-time in the extended canon materials yet -- makes it explicit that Kylo Ren’s actions are his own. He has a choice every time.

At Tuanul, Phasma asks him what to do with/to the villagers. It is Kylo’s directive to kill them all. Not Phasm’as. Not Snoke’s.

When Kylo Ren attacks and kidnaps Rey, he says -- in a defense TO SNOKE, so it clearly was NOT Snoke’s choice -- that it was his choice to take The Girl because she had seen the map rather than continue to search for The Droid. He’s chastised for this choice, sure. But he still made it.

When Kylo Ren murders Han, it is because Han is giving him the option to come home and come back to the Light. Kylo Ren does not want to be saved. He does not want to be loved. He was given the challenge by Snoke to kill Han because Ben Solo’s “greatest test” would be to kill the father he had loved and who loved him -- arguably, with that language, the person Ben Solo had loved most in the world.

Kylo Ren makes the choice to kill Ben Solo once and for all by choosing to reject Han’s offer of continuing love, welcome, belonging, and Light. The choice to remain Kylo Ren, NOT Ben Solo, was 100% Kylo’s agential choice. Snoke needed him to make that choice of his own free will for the Dark side to actually embrace it. He wasn’t controlling Kylo’s hands.

He wasn’t some kind of Kilgrave, Imperius Curse mind-controller. He was your average, run of the mill charismatic sociopath who radicalizes sensitive, smart, gifted, young men from loving families every goddamn day.

That is the metaphor that JJA set up. On purpose. As a writer, who is not an idiot, who wrote things on purpose in the script that he wrote with very unsubtle metaphors that he made on purpose.

The SW villains have always been mirrors of political and social threats in the era of their trilogy’s writing. The OT cast the Empire visually as Nazis, and included the Holocaust-analog event of the genocide of Alderaan, but the villain Lucas was critiquing, particularly through ESB and ROTJ, was the U.S.’ military-industrial complex and the war on Vietnam. (“Back in a 1973 note on “Star Wars,” Lucas made clear which side he was rooting for in the Vietnam War: 'A large technological empire going after a small group of freedom fighters.’”) In 1981, Lucas literally said in a press conference that Palpatine was based on Nixon; he’s held since that his inspiration for the series was less A Space Opera than “How do democracies turn into dictatorships?” Discussion of exactly how racist it is that he considers the ewoks to be based on the Viet Cong is for a totally other post...

This was also super unsubtle if slightly contemporized with the PT, when Palpatine became less Nixon and more Bush, working to create a global economic crisis that would precipitate a war against his own long-hated enemies. At the same time, it’s been pretty widely believed that part of what muddles the PT’s storytelling is Lucas’ dual focus on criticizing the Catholic church, who at the time that the PT was being written and filmed -- late ‘90s through mid-2000s -- was finally being publicly held to account for centuries of corruption and abuse that had been downplayed as just being part of the status quo because of the Church’s obsession with ritual and dogma. While a worthy thing to criticize, trying to go for moral ambiguity and “both sides are bad from a certain point of view” while also trying to adhere to Campbell’s schema while ALSO trying to make people sympathize for a character that the entire audience already knew grows up to be a mass-murdering cyborg was... a lot to tackle. Lucas arguably failed a lot of his intentions with his execution in the PT, but he still HAD intentions, and again: they weren’t subtle. ROTS literally ends with Anakin cribbing one of Bush’s jingoistic declarations post-9/11: “You’re either with me, or you’re my enemy.” In some ways, the most successful criticism Lucas made through the PT was that this kind of dichotomous sociopolitical dialogue eventually causes you to get three of your limbs chopped off as you backflip into lava to your own downfall -- and yet, it doesn’t cause you to die -- it just makes you come back stronger and angrier than before. Which leads us to the ST.

Although Lucas has nothing to do with the ST, it’s honestly rude to the Storygroup, JJ, Kasdan, and even RiJo to pretend like it isn’t following the same edict to use the fantastical setting of a Galaxy Far Far Away to level harsh, and super overt, criticism of the sociopolitical power structures of the real world contemporaneous to the trilogy’s release.

Snoke -- the gold bathrobe-wearing charismatic fascist megalomaniac who smooth-talked his way into a figurehead position of power despite functionally having others do all of the actual work of both “governance” and violence.

Hux -- the far-right neo-Conservative political schemer who actually WAS raised from bith to idealize the explicit, intentional SW-universe analog for Nazism and thus became a powerful and Dapper Haired neo-Nazi leader.

And Kylo Ren, the violent angry entitled man who sees the kind of power his life position (wealthy, male, Force-sensitive AKA educated and gifted) would have garnered in previous generations but doesn’t today in a Star Wars Analog For Democratic And Increasingly Diverse Landscape*) and is enraged by it, so thus turns to the rhetoric of the megalomaniac and the Neo-Nazi to find afocus for that anger beyond, idk, trying to fucking just be better.

SUPER UNSUBTLE METAPHORS FOR THE POLITICS OF MODERN AMERICA.

* See: Bloodline, and the differences in policy/goals of the Centrists and the Populists; as the Populists have more Senatorial power at the time directly preceding the destruction of Luke’s school and the chief schism between them and the Centrists is that the Populists believe in giving more planets and more sentient species equal rights to vote and self-determine governance, and the Centrists -- many of whom are secretly funding the First Order, not unlike how many Republican senators and congressmen IRL have turned out to have very strong ties to the Klan, the NRA, the TWP, the Proud Boys, various neo-Nazi groups, and alt-right supremacist organizations and militias, fwiw.

THIS PARALLEL WAS NOT AN ACCIDENT.

All of the insistence y’all make to it being Just A Kids’ Movie This Shit Is Just ~Ess Jaw Dubbayoo~ Reaching!!!! is a) something you have to know, truly, is just borne of wanting to stan for Kylo, and honestly, it’d be less irksome if you just... stanned for him without trying to rewrite canon and insult everyone else? and b) Insulting, both to fellow fans and to the SWST writers.

While TFA was written long before The Election, it was still written within the modern sociopolitical landscape. Trump already was out there leading the idiot Birther movement. Sarah Palin was a thing. Alex Jones and Glenn Beck and Fox & Friends had 24/7 airtime. Antisemitic hate crimes were on a steep rise both in America and overseas, and homophobic and Islamophobic hate crimes were still happening far, far too regularly. Police brutality and the unlawful extrajudicial lynchings of Black men and boys by Klan-affiliated police officers and unjust Thin Blue Line that protected their murderers was already (finally) a daily headline. Standoffs between the government and far-right fringe militia groups lasted months; conflicts between armed militias and civilians over access to statehouses and public spaces was on the rise. Mass shootings by angry disaffected young white men were happening every fucking day. Gam/e/r/g/ate was a thing, exposing the depths to which angry entitled young men could sink if they felt like their stranglehold on All Media Things was threatened. The writing for 2016 was on the wall long before the campaigns on either side officially began.

And you know who probably was not an unaware dumdum just scootin’ along without a clue of what was in the air?

Two Jewish men, one of whom was the son of a man who won two Emmys for a docudrama about the Nuremberg trials -- gee, wonder where JJ came up with the imagery for Hux’s Hosnian rally on Starkiller, though? -- and the other of whom does interviews of Holocaust survivors for the HMH.

Denying that is both to assert that JJA/Kasdan don’t have the right, as Jewish writers, to react to the world authentically, and to assume that they are too stupid to know what they wrote. You gotta stop pretending like everyone who fucking sees what they wrote into the ST on fucking purpose is either lying or crazy. Seriously. Stop it.

~*Antis*~ don’t en-masse see these parallels and metaphors just because wE tHiNk EvErYoNe We DoN’t LiKe iS A NaZi!!! It’s because that’s what they’re fucking overtly intended to be.

And guess what? Hitler was in the ear of the Hitler Youth from infancy, too.

It 0% absolves anything they fucking did.

SW is not subtle. The only thing LESS subtle than SW is Harry Potter, and they’re both the same fucking story. With the same fucking villains. The difference is that JKR is white and goyishe and you can tell. (As you can, tbh, in TLJ being written by RiJo. RiJo goyishe as hell and it, uh, shows. A lot.)

For all of RiJo’s faults and lazy writing, he ultimately did not undo the metaphors that JJ/Kasdan set up. He handled it in maybe the most circuitous and sloppily written way possible, but honestly, the longer since TLJ came out, the more it becomes clearer that RiJo really wasn’t trying to make Kylo seem heroic, or trying to subvert TFA’s storyline insofar as giving Kylo depth that belied his character’s setup. He was showing the audience just how easy it is to be hooked into a narrative like the one that suckered in Ben Solo, and that he tries to use to sucker in Rey -- and nearly succeeds.

In TFA, it couldn’t have been more overt if he were straight-up just constantly watching snuff film porn or something, but in TLJ, Rian’s cues -- which I STILL will always maintain are poorly executed -- are less “out on the street in Charleston with a tiki torch in hand” than “on Twitter sealioning female journalists until they delete their account, and then retreating back into anonymity on /pol.” It’s still Kylo Ren as the toxic masculine underbelly of rage, violence, and entitlement that is part of the current sociopolitical nightmare hole, even though he’s actively trying to seem like an empathetic #normie. Every single frame of Kylo Ren in TLJ, especially after Snoke makes him remove his helmet, is in service to the Dark and to all of the real-world metaphors of toxic masculine rage that Kylo represents.

Because when given the choice between being free and usurping Snoke’s power, Kylo chose to the power. That is Dark.

It isn’t even Dark inherently because he First Order are an explicit Neo-Nazi parallel, although they are -- and FWIW you don’t get to be antisemitic by rejecting JJ Abrams’ and Lawrence Kasdan’s right, as Jewish artists, to create fantastical metaphors for their Jewish pain and name them as such [“The original name for the First Order was the Neo-Empire,” etc.] in the name of ~protecting Jewish feelings~ when the entire schema was created by Jews and the fact that y’all are excited to claim that theyre are “six Jewish reylos” is... just yikes; I gotta say, as a Jewish ~anti~, there are more than six of us -- it’s Dark because it is the self-serving choice at the expense of the Galaxy.

And, truly, at the expense of what Ben Solo would have known was moral and ethical. Ben Solo was raised by Han and Leia. He was educated by Luke. He grew up with three parental/guardian figures, plus Uncle Lando and Uncle Chewie, who ADORED him and doted on him. He canonically had happiness and friendship in his childhood (per Bloodline). He isn’t a sociopath devoid of empathy; I’ll give you that, because it’s true. He knows exactly how much he is hurting people, both emotionally and physically, with his actions. And he chooses those actions anyway, because they further his goal of becoming the literal Master of the Universe.

Kylo Ren considers his own desires to be of higher value and priority than the well-being of the Galaxy or his own sense of morals/ethics, and that is a Dark choice. (See also: Anakin killing Mace Windu.)

(Cue Palps cackling about “POWAAAAA!”)

Being brainwashed by a fascist lunatic to murder for them does not absolve you from that murder.

Are you out campaigning for the release of Manson’s girls, too? Because they were brainwashed. Psychologically, medically, truly brainwashed to the point where they were unable to perceive the fact that Manson’s beliefs and orders were objectively fucking batshit and evil. But they still were responsible for their actions. They committed the murders. They are in prison for them because of the choices they made.

How about Allison Mack sex trafficking and branding women for NXIVM? Is she an innocent lamb-flower who could not possibly have made any other choices because her charismatic leader was in her ear for years and years? I’m sure that in her trial, her lawyers will make the same exact arguments about her relationship with Renier than y’all make about Kylo and Snoke, but uh, it ultimately doesn’t fucking matter. Allison Mack is the one who slowly and torturously branded her victims with a goddamn laser-pointer. That was her choice. That was her action. She will be held accountable for her choice.

...and his parents didn’t know what to do with him. They have a super force sensitive child, who has a presence constantly poking at him, and he’s highly emotional…

This just literally isn’t canon.

All of Ben Solo as a child’s appearances in canon have shown him as a happy, playful, mischievous child who knows that he is loved and is responsibe to the emotional cues of his parents and others. He is exactly as upset by things that would upset any child as... any other child. He doesn’t have a Presence Constantly Poking At Him in canon. You guys invented that, and it isn’t backed up by his largest pre-Kylo canon appearance, which is Last Shot. Ben, in Last Shot, is loved and knows it, and he loves back. He is happy. He is a normal, good-natured child. He babbles, he plays, he cuddles, he goes outside and gets muddy with his friends and beams and laughs. He has toys and watches cartoons.

He cries a) when he gets woken up, which is when all babies cry and frankly everyone else wants to cry when they get woken up lbr; b) when he doesn’t get to do exactly what he wants to do, and, tbh, it could be interpreted as foreshadowing of the way that Kylo Ren uses the display of emotion to manipulate people into letting him do what he wants in both TFA and TLJ. Or it could just be him being, you know, a normal toddler.

I will give you: he IS highly Force-sensitive. SO IS LEIA. Leia is the granddaughter of the Living Force for fuck’s assing sake. You really think that Luke and Leia are LESS Force-sensitive than Ben??? Being highly Force-sensitive doesn’t, and literally in canon did not, turn Ben into a hyperemotive mess as a child. He’s just, you know, two years old.

“But Kylo Ren is hyperemotional, so what happened HUH!?” you cry.

Well -- for one, the main emotion that he canonically shows as Kylo Ren is anger. He is an angry man, and he acts like an angry man, because he is in a social environment -- by his own choice as a 23-year-old thru 30-year-old -- that encourages violent expressions of male anger. He punches walls. He chokes subordinates. He destroys property. He yells at people. He SCREAMS at people. He is angry, because he feels entitled to more than he has, always more, more power, more respect, more control over others, and he has been encouraged to believe that acting on that anger will help him get what he feels he is owed.

That ain’t special. And it’s hardly even a scifi metaphor. That’s just how violent, angry men ARE.

“But he cries so much!” He cries once in the movies. Once when he is about to kill the father he still loves, because he craves the power he sees as his due more than he cares about anything or anyone.

The other time that it looks as though he might cry -- in the elevator after Snoke’s mocking and the Force lightning -- he instead does what violent, angry men DO when they live in a culture or subculture that glorifies male violence and disrespects all other emotions: subverts actual emotional processing or catharsis by turning it into an act of violence. He destroys his mask, the symbol of his obeisance to Snoke. RiJo even confirmed that was the moment he started to plan Snoke’s murder more concretely. His reaction to feeling sadness, or rejection, or guilt, or WHATEVER, in the face of his killing Han not actually getting Snoke to give him more control and power and leadership, was to PLAN A MURDER.

(AKA: It wasn’t to save Rey; Rey was only there because, using Snoke’s playbook of manipulation, Kylo got her to believe what he wanted her to believe and come to the First Order because Kylo couldn’t kill Snoke alone, and Snoke had to die for Kylo to get what he wanted: ULTIMAAAATE POWWWWAAAA.)

(And FWIW, I’m not saying Snoke’s murder was unwarranted, I’m just saying that it was borne of the same exact cocktail of toxic hypermasculinity that caused Ben “Jedi Killer” Solo to kill Luke’s students and flee to Snoke in the first place. Kylo Ren’s sole motivation, in canon, is the pursuit of total power over others, which he feels is his due because he happened to be born to the family he was and with the genetic makeup [Force sensitivity] that he has.)

[B]ut his parents are also war heroes and they’re trying to build a government and just rebuild in general after a war, so they can’t be there for their son. They’re not the best parents, okay. They leave him in the care of a kitchen droid instead of one suited for care giving. (Also, this kitchen droid tries to murder him as a toddler due to a…let’s call it a computer virus or malfunction. so that’s extremely terrifying).

They literally left him with BX for like 20 minutes because his actual nanny droid had to run an errand.

This argument is so tired and it also kind of proves that you don’t even actually read/watch canon, you take all of your beliefs and cues from what Reylo BNFs with vested interests in keeping y’all brainwashed to believe that Bennyboo is a Pure Sweet Angel Baby Who Never Did Anything Wrong so that they can maintain the social capital of having lots of followers.

Gee, I wonder if that’s similar to anyone we’ve been talking about?

That said, this argument is also exhausting because it places blame on working parents for being working parents, and that’s misogynistic bullshit. Han was Ben’s primary caregiver. In canon. T-2 is really only ever in full-on Nanny Mode during Last Shot, when Han has to leave the house for more than a day or so.

Otherwise, it’s literally canon that Han is a stay-at-home parent whose full-time vocation is caring for Ben until Ben leaves for Luke’s school. After that, he STILL is a full-time househusband, but does some charity ship-racing on the side to raise money for galactic orphanages. He does mentorships for junior pilots, too, and once one of them -- Greer Sonnel -- starts to seem like she has a terminal chronic illness that will keep her from flying, Han helps to place her in a safer job opportunity rather than have to go back to her impoverished home planet. MAN, what a BAD GUY who HATES KIDS and is BAD AT CARING FOR THEM.

Not even the nanny droid -- they kept T-2, who had programming for obstetrics and pediatrics, around because he was a protocol droid just like Threepio but with the benefit of specialized programming that would help them better care for Ben, from early on in Leia’s pregnancy at least through when Ben left for Luke’s school. God forbid parents have specialized, knowledgable help raising their child!  

It is only after Ben “Jedi Killer” Solo destroys Luke’s school and becomes Kylo Ren that Han leaves, and that’s alluded to in canon -- although I’ll give you that it isn’t confirmed at this juncture in either Road to TFA or Road to TLJ material/timeline -- to search for Luke, search for Ben, and/or help raise and gather capital for the burgeoning Resistance. He isn’t a deadbeat who’s never around for his son. His son’s disappearance is the only thing that could make Han leave the domestic home and life that he’d wanted since before he even met Leia.

Second, his powers are erratic and POWERFUL and when he’s like a preteen or something he hears his parents discussing him behind closed doors…like he’s some sort of monster.

And what, exactly, did Ben do before they said this?

We don’t know.

We have had hints in both Road to TFA and Road to TLJ canon that something Ben Solo did, at age 10, was sufficiently powerful and Dark enough that Leia and Han did the best thing they could as parents to a child who did a Dark thing: get them help from a source who has the training and knowledge to help them in ways the parents themselves cannot.

That is not bad parenting. That was the right thing to do.

We don’t know what Ben did that caused his parents to worry about how Dark his behavior, in that act at least, had been, but parents admitting that they are out of their depth and getting their child help from a professional is not neglect, or a lack of love, or a lack of empathy. I get it; being forced to get help, when you view your own actions as justified, is scary and painful and embarrassing. When I was teaching, I had an eight-year-old male student who had been expelled from public school after breaking another kid’s arm and was in a specialized school for students with violent behavioral issues because he had kind-of-accidentally killed his toddler cousin by hitting him over the head with a chair when he was angry. I’m 100% sure that his parents talked about that event, amongst themselves, behind closed doors, with horror and the kind of language that would be immensely hurtful to this boy if he overheard it. That’s a human reaction. A monstrous thing happened, hard to comprehend, and like... parents are allowed to react like humans about complicated emotions of trauma or shock or horror, even though they are parents. But then they did the exactly right thing for their profoundly violent son by getting him professional help. That specialized school was not fun. The boy definitely saw it as, and talked about it as, a punishment. But it wasn’t a punishment. It was loving him enough to try to save him from himself.

Sending Ben to Luke’s school was not a punishment or some way to ~throw him away. Ben DID need help, objectively, although we haven’t yet been told exactly what the final straw was. I believe, IIRC, that the Road to TFA referred to whatever he did as a “great family tragedy,” but I don’t 100% remember -- I only recall that was part of why most people assumed that the incident occurring right around the time of Rey’s birth would ultimately be significant, and who knows, it may yet be. We don’t know. There’s no canon about it.

Also --

You guys act like Luke was some mean, scary stranger who hated Ben on sight, but Luke was Ben’s uncle. Leia and Han adored him, and he adored them, and he loved Ben. We don’t have any canon about Luke’s feelings towards whatever child!Ben did to warrant the intervention, but even in TLJ, there’s no actual objective statements of Luke hating Ben, or even Kylo.

The only person who asserts that Luke hates/hated Ben Solo is Kylo.

And frankly: he needs to believe that. Just like he needs to believe that killing Han will cause Snoke to finally respect him and give him more control/power/leadership. These are things that, honestly, he’s gotta KNOW are not true, but has to create the believe of their truth to continue acting as Kylo Ren.

So this belief, and those actions as Kylo?

Are agential, active choices. As an adult man.

Further:

Re: the moment with Luke in the hut, any interpretation that doesn’t take into account the filmmaking and CANONICAL choice to present it twice, once in Kylo’s POV and once in Luke’s POV, is missing the point of its being shown at all.

Kylo has already begun his manipulation of Rey in service to the eventual murder of Snoke and usurpation of the throne when he tells Rey about that night. He knows that Rey is frustrated with Luke on her own merits, so she will be receptive to a telling of that story that frames Luke as all of the things that Rey is already annoyed with Luke for being: stubborn, afraid of the Force, afraid of the Dark, quick to anger, irresponsible, whatever.

In the flashback from Kylo’s POV, he is telling Rey the story, so it is being presented to her for the purpose of garnering her sympathy in order to manipulate her. It isn’t even necessarily how Kylo remembers that moment when he’s just remembering it to himself, late at night, or whatever! We have never been privy to what’s actually in Kylo’s mind about that night. While you guys are using that as evidence that his mind was good and guileless and sweet, it’s equally (or more) likely that he was so Dark that night bcause he was, just like with Rey, already planning his next Dark act. In both TFA with Han and TLJ with Rey, Kylo’s choices in Dark actions tend to rely on someone else -- someone Light -- falling alongside him because he is a skillful manipulator of empathy.

Han steps closer and takes the lightsaber, blade-end pointed at himself, because he believes that Kylo Ren is choosing the Light and will come home.

Rey mails herself to the First Order, becoming a pawn in the takeover of Snoke’s throne, for the exact same reason.

When Kylo is telling Rey about the night that he destroyed Luke’s school and killed the other students, he is relying on the same tactic -- using someone’s own goodness and Lightness against them.

Han, on the bridge, even as he was dying, believed the best in his son and believed 100% that if given the choice, Kylo Ren would be Ben again, and that he wanted the Light and just felt like he couldn’t have it anymore.

So when he’s manipulating Rey with the story about that night with Luke, in Kylo’s POV, we can visually see from the filmmaking choices that he is telling it in a way tailored to her belief in inherent goodness. Rey, until after the throne room, believes that people are ultimately and innately good and Light -- it’s stated basically outright iirc in her Survival Guide -- and Kylo knows that because he mind-raped her and saw her thought processes and viewpoints and knows, exactly, how to mold his story to ply her. When we see that night with Luke as Kylo tells it to Rey to get her to come to the First Order, he tells it in a way that casts his choice to flee to the Dark as being borne of fear and confusion, not desire. (And y’all reylos buy that??? Okay.)

But if Rey herself weren’t being so muddled by her own confusion and sadness, honestly, TLJ itself presents her with enough evidence that wasn’t true: she knows Leia and Han loved him, and he tells her that he didn’t hate Han. And yet, he stayed. He stayed in the First Order for six years after that night. He didn’t destroy Luke’s school by accident out of shock and fear and pain in a whirlwind of Dark energy that he couldn’t control, and then, you know, feel bad and atone and try to make amends and acknowledge his bad deed and accept consequences and try to redeem himself.

He destroyed the school and fled to the First Order and stayed. He destroyed the school and kept on destroying.

But he IS a skillful manipulator, and he also knows that Rey most likely assumes that he wants to come home because, he’s seen in her mind AND she’s reaffirmed, that all she wants is a loving home and parents. If he tells about that night in the hut in a way that casts himself as the victim, his hand forced so that he doesn’t feel he can come home, she’ll believe it (despite literally having seen him in front of her face reject the invitation to come home with his dad, but whatever Rian).

So that’s how he tells it: Luke, fallen to the Dark side, his face twisted into something demonic in his fear and hatred, and Ben, still innately Light inside, only acting in the Dark basically by accident. THAT IS KYLO REN MASTERPIECE THEATER PUPPET STORYTIME, AS HE ACTIVELY MANIPULATES REY TO LEAVE LUKE AND COME HELP HIM KILL SNOKE.

It is, in the world of the story, and in the narrative through-line of TLJ, not the truth.

Personally, as with a lot of the things that Kylo claims to believe, I don’t think even he believes it’s the truth. It is what a convenient truth would be in that moment to further his progress towards his goal of supremacy. He KNOWS that he was steeped in the Dark side (by choice, as an adult) when Luke entered his hut that night. Even though you’re trying to insist that he was an innocent lamb that night, even your own pro-Ben Solo arguments rely on the idea of his being fully and totally steeped in Darkness by then -- don’t you think he was 23 years and 9 space months into being groomed by Snoke by that night? If Snoke really had been grooming him for so long, then by default Ben Solo was already Dark by then, and the Dark has no power unless you choose to act on it.

And to that end: what, exactly, if not kill all of the other students, destroy Luke’s school, and help to destabilize the New Republic in favor of the neo-conservative fascist junta of the First Order, was Snoke grooming him to do or be?

If you believe that Snoke was grooming Ben Solo to the level that ALL of his Dark actions were really Snoke, and not Kylo Ren actually making agential active choices to further his own agenda, then what was Snoke’s plan for him before that night? Because unless his plan for Ben Solo involved the destruction of Luke’s school... wouldn’t Kylo be starting out his tenure under Snoke’s tutelage with Snoke HELLA PISSED at him for doing something so rash and stupid?

So yeah, granted, it IS only an assumption that the Ben “Jedi Killer” Solo actually consciously and actively planned the destruction of the school and the murder of any classmates who refused to join him... but it’s an assumption based on all of his actions since that night. He has made zero efforts towards self-aware atonement or culpability, and if he truly did not mean to destroy the school and kill other students, one would think that someone who ultimately wants the Light and to be Saved Ben Solo Again would, idk, feel bad about it. Not try to blame someone else as a tactic to get a partner in another murder.

And you might hate the comparison to a school shooter, but that was as unsubtle in Ben’s destruction of Luke’s school as the comparisons to Neo-Nazis are in Hux’s rally in TFA.

He is an angry and entitled man, already steeped in Darkness and resentful that he doesn’t have all of the power that he feels is his natural due, and he scapegoats the adults in his life for making him get professional help that he didn’t want and was angered by because one of its tenets (if Luke was adhering to at least basic Jedi teachings) was that no one person should have that much power.

When he is caught continuing to act/think/speak/etc. in Dark ways -- like, IDK, someone’s loving parents trying to disconnect their internet access because they were so deeply entrenched in alt-right conspiracy theory that they were functionally insane and had become frighteningly violent -- his reaction is extreme violence (like stabbing to death the father trying to protect you from your own delusional conspiracy-driven subculture) in service to leaving his life for a literal, in-world neo-conservative fascist slave-owning militia planning a political coup through the equivalent of an atomic bomb in the capitol. Again: the parallel that JJA and Kasdan wrote and created for Kylo is not an accident, nor is it subtle. We’re MEANT to see him as a toxic masculinity-driven, entitled, violent white man, and we’re meant to view his slaughter of his classmates as having been driven by his rage and his quest for the power he feels is his due.

That is a school shooter. Trying to pull the “you can’t compare this overt fantastical metaphor to a real-life bad thing to the bad thing it’s meant to be because that would mean acknowledging the bad thing!!!!” card is really tired.

Like. There is no realistic, actual, canon-based scenario in which Ben Solo, by the night of the hut, DIDN’T have plans for violence against any who would not join him.

Remember? Star Wars has already cribbed-and-canonized the reactionary mindset once: you’re either with me, or you’re my enemy.

#|franchise| star wars #**star

[douxreviews]

True Detective - ‘The Hour and the Day’ Review

“I wanna know the whole story.”

The fourth True Detective episode usually features a big action scene that solidifies the halfway point in the story. The harrowing one-shot sequence in season one. The relentless shooting spree in season two. This is more of a prelude to this season's intense powder-keg separating the first half of the story from the second. It's another way that this new story toys with paying lip service to what came before while contenting itself with being its own thing.

What this does instead is take its sweet time in fleshing out what exactly is going on in each of the three timelines and the states of the characters as they exist within each of those eras. It sets the stage for what comes next in the season, while also being character and dialogue heavy. It also takes more time to explore the themes of the season, which I especially enjoyed.

Racial Divide

The issue of race is finally examined, which I feel the show has been dancing around until now.

I felt it was always in the background, noticeable in the lingering, guarded or just suspicious looks that are directed at Wayne Hays, the black detective in rural Arkansas. I've noticed it from the very first episode. Some people don't realize that prejudice is not always overt. In fact, I'd say a majority of it goes understated or unspoken, in that Travis Bickle sort of way.

The thing is most of the people who regard Hays in this way probably aren't even malicious about it, or would even consider themselves racist; I know people like this. You've got ones like state prosecutor turned Attorney General Daryl Kent who clearly looks down on Hays with this smug, dismissive superiority. Then you've got people like Mrs. Faber who will maintain politeness but always see him as an other, holding that look of thinly veiled fear and suspicion. Then there's guys like Tom Purcell, who'll drop racial slurs in moments of anger or frustration and then quickly feel ashamed; that reaction exists somewhere in their upbringing, but they know it's wrong.

No matter the shade in which it presents itself, there's no doubt it sticks in the craw of men as dignified as Hays.

Or men who aren't, as displayed when Hays and West pay a visit to Sam Whitehead, a possible lead on the one-eyed black man who bought the ominous dolls. Was his immediate rabble-rousing and accusations of racial profiling and witch-hunts just a natural reaction from an old black man who has experienced decades of injustice from white cops, or was it an easy way of avoiding direct answers to the questions he was asked? It's not entirely clear.

The hectic encounter with Whitehead and the other residents of that local ghetto did highlight the nuanced dynamic between Hays and West, which I've enjoyed throughout this season. While clearly a bit of a good ole' boy, West does not seem prejudiced. He even seems rather progressive for a man of his era, region and occupation, given his deep respect for his partner and stony admonition of Tom for his aforementioned drunken insult toward Hays. And Hays, while constantly on his toes about the racial divide between them, seems to recognize West's empathic quality, even enjoys it when West jokingly needles him about this sensitivity. It's another reason I dig this partnership, that understanding between two no-nonsense individuals.

Another character who appears not to be clouded by the resident race elephant is the priest at the Catholic church attended by the Purcells. Although West distrusts him on account of being a priest -- which would make even more sense today than in 1980 -- the man is very helpful in organizing his congregation to aid the detectives. He seems sincere in his assessment of Will and Julie and he hopes Hays, a former altar boy, would be open to confession. Nice guy, but there were certain things about his scenes that made me wonder if he might be involved in what happened to the kids.

Couples Counseling

More personal than societal, but equally important are the various relationships we are faced with in this story. It's heavily suggested that they have quite a bit of bearing on what's going on.

The big one is Wayne and Amelia's relationship. The contrast between their blossoming romance in 1980 and their rocky marriage in 1990 is very striking. We first see that the later stage is marred by feelings of resentment from Wayne and accusations of inadequacy from Amelia, despite the love they still share. After ten years, they've become worn down by the flaws and neurotic tendencies they seemed so excited about discovering at the start of their romance.

The first dinner date between Hays and Amelia was certainly the best scene in the episode. It was very cute, even sexy in a surprisingly subtle way. And their dialogue back and forth was just wonderful. Despite being so different in terms of background, occupation, politics and temperament, there was an instant chemistry that both recognized. Almost like these two people who each claim to have never wanted marriage or kids saw in each other the possibility of a future together in this first foray into intimacy.

Initially, though, there's Tom and Lucy Purcell. A couple whose furiously tumultuous marriage bred an unhappy family life, which may have played a factor in their children's secretive meetings with mysterious strangers and their eventual abduction.

Amelia gains an insight into this as she tries to comfort the distraught Lucy, and ends up getting the feeling that Lucy might be hiding something and ends up getting cursed out by the latter thanks addressing it. Not a very good first attempt at junior detective work, but she may have just unearthed a clue without realizing it. Lucy claimed that "Children should laugh", the same phrase included in the cryptic letter sent by Julie's abductor. Either Lucy was just wistfully acknowledging the logic of that message or it could be that she had something to do with what befell her children. It's still ambiguous.

As for Tom, we get to see the beginning of his and West's odd friendship as West gives the heartbroken Tom a place to stay away from his sad home. It's another indication that West is a naturally empathetic person, despite occasionally coming off as a hardass. Though it might be that his empathy has dampened somewhat in the years since.

It's a shame that the 1980 dynamic between Hays and West doesn't return when Hays is brought on board the task force of the second Purcell case ten years later. A shame, but realistic. No way the dynamic is the same after Hays got the shaft and West became the successful, award-winning career lawman who shook hands with young, pre-controversy Bill Clinton. And the fact that Hays, lead detective on the original case, is now expected to follow West's lead doesn't help. No-nonsense or not, old friends or not, pride asserts itself. To put it bluntly, dicks will inevitably be measured and pissing contested.

Haunted Houses

Now let's get more cerebral. The first season's tagline was "Touch darkness, and darkness touches you back", vey Nietzsche-like. That seems to be a constant theme throughout this series. The ways in which human horror and trauma can have dramatic effects on a person's sense of self and their reality. How they might serve as some explanation of what we see as the spiritual, supernatural and even paranormal.

It's introduced well-enough. Tom and Lucy Purcell feel trapped in their house, the place where the kids, the only thing that united them, were raised. Tom can't stay there, broken by their absence. And Lucy seems to stay in it as self-imposed prison for her failings as a mother. A disturbing situation where the place that is meant to be home feels more like hell.

The Hays household experiences a similar phenomena later, which Old Hays admits. He came to believe his unending obsession with the case infected Amelia and their children, sullying their chances at a stable, happy family. That he ended up cursing them with his own restless demons.

This takes on what could be a more literal meaning as Old Hays finds himself reminiscing on the past at the same time he struggles to beat back the ghosts in his mind. It's an incredibly haunting scene, watching him struggle to grasp the memories of his life as men he killed in Vietnam (and one caucasian man in a suit) close in and hover over him like phantoms, whispering, accusing. And the show has played so fast and loose with the line between psychologically unhinged experiences and what might be darker forces that exist on the fringes of existence. Rustin Cohle had his drug-induced visions which at times appeared to grant him insights into hidden otherworldly realms. Ray Velcoro's near death experience offered a bizarre yet prophetic glimpse into a possible afterlife. Now Wayne Hays' years of multi-faceted PTSD compounded by dementia conjure menacing ghosts from the past.

"Purple" Hays, indeed.

Escalating Confusion

But themes aside, the more concrete plot points are there as well.

In 2015, a dogged Old Hays enlists his son -- revealed to be an Arkansas State Police detective like his father once was -- in finding West to help him remember the details of the two Purcell cases. To my surprise, he tells Elisa Montgomery in their private meeting that the 1990 case haunts him most of all. Elisa informs him that she and her team of investigators discovered that the skeletal remains of Dan O'Brian, Lucy Purcell's cousin and suspect in both cases, were recently found in a drained quarry after he went missing around the time of the second case.

Which is interesting, because Dan O'Brian was already missing prior to 1990.

But Hays makes a possibly huge development in the second case when he spots a mysterious young woman who could very well be a grown up Julie Purcell on the security footage of the store where her prints were found.

Meanwhile, in 1980, Hays and West end up traumatizing Freddy Burns when his prints are discovered on Will's abandoned bike; I'd totally forgotten him drunkenly riding it at Devil's Den in the first episode.

The detectives and feds are drawn away from this obvious red herring when they catch wind of the redneck lynch mob advancing on Brett Woodard's home, who has prepared for this event with a military arsenal that's sure to deliver on the action spectacle we've all been waiting for.

Bits and Pieces:

* “The Hour and the Day” was co-written by David Milch, creator of Deadwood. This explains why the characters, dialogue and themes felt even richer than usual in this episode. Milch is almost as acerbic and literary as Nic Pizzolato, if not more.

* There's a framed picture of a brunette woman on West's desk in 1990. I'm betting that's Lori, the girl he was putting the moves on at the church.

* Hays sarcastically raising his hand during a briefing was another fun little callback to the first season.

* Not sure if it was explicitly stated before, but Kent, the state prosecutor in 1980, appears to have blatantly used the Purcell case to snag himself the Attorney General office. What a guy.

* Black Sabbath has been around since the late ‘60s. Seems kind of strange that a bunch of men in their 30s act as if it’s some strange new thing in the early '80s. Perhaps its mainstream recognition in my generation is simply coloring my perspective.

* During his ghostly encounter, Old Hays makes note of a dark sedan that is staking out his house.

Quotes:

Amelia (1990): Let go of me, Wayne. Hays (1990): Stop talking shit about me! Amelia (1990): Or what? Hays (1990): … Or I’m gonna start crying. Wasn’t expecting that.

Sam Whitehead: And you. How’re you gonna wear that badge? Hays: It’s got a little clip on it. Ha!

Hays: Can we say this was anonymous vandals? West: We’re not going with irate negroes?

Hays (1990): We ain’t doing any of that shit they just said, right? West (1990): Wasn’t planning on it.

Priest: Would you like to confess now? Hays: I reckon I’ll let it pile up a little more.

Hays: Thing of it is, Father, we’re about ninety percent sure that whoever took Julie or Will are one of yours. Priest: I find it difficult to believe that anyone here could something like that. Hays: They don’t exactly wear a signboard says “psycho killer.”

Four out of five Claymore mines.

Logan Cox

#True Detective #Wayne Hays #Mahershala Ali #Roland West #Stephen Dorff #Doux Reviews #TV Reviews

[amcnh]

Cub Sport

If their story was a film, it would forever be my favorite. It has all my ideal elements: slow burn romance, music, travel and gay leads. Tim Nelson and Sam “Bolan” Netterfield met at school. Bolan’s mother recalls her son coming home one day and telling her he met a boy who played the piano really well and that he wanted to learn to play like him. Tim and Bolan became fast friends. They started spending more and more time together and eventually playing music together. The group – since 2013, called Cub Sport – took off. Buzzy EPs turned into hit singles turned into a highly anticipated debut album. Cub Sport, made up of, yes, Tim and Bolan but also bassist Zoe Davis and drummer Dan Puusaari, was officially a successful project. The band was together a lot, recording and touring and promoting, and Tim and Bolan were spending pretty much all their time together. Both admit now that, at the level they could have clocked or allowed it, they realized quite early on in their friendship that they were in love with each other, but, both raised in super religious environments, were not willing or ready to address that let alone their gayness. While on tour in America during 2016, however, things unsaid finally were spoken. They describe it all much better, and it makes me swoon, so here are some quotes:

Tim to OUT Magazine:

“I went on a writing trip in the middle of 2015 for about a month and I missed Bolan (Sam) so much. I started to recognise that I was in love with him, but I had a lot of fear and denial to work through. In the middle of 2016, we went on a two-month overseas tour. Being away from the reminders and restrictions of normal life back home was really instrumental in us feeling like we had the freedom to explore and pursue what had been building between us.

The Orlando attack happened while we were on tour in the U.S. and it was not only a reminder of how fleeting our time on earth can be, but a big wakeup call that if we just embraced who we really were we could also try to help inspire and encourage young queer people facing the same internal battles we were both experiencing. We went to Pride festival in Denver around the same time and the atmosphere was really supportive and beautiful.”

Bolan to The Guardian, discussing the impact Hanya Yanagihara’s A Little Life had on his relationship with Tim:

“I think I had buried so deeply within me what I really wanted that it took me seeing it play out in fiction to actually have the clarity and perspective to look at my own situation and give me strength to realise that life is too short not to follow… I think I realised early in the book I was drawing direct correlation with those characters and with myself, then seeing one character die really shook me. I was suddenly hit with the notion that if Tim was to die, how could I have not said something. I realised I had to put everything on the line and I was willing to potentially jeopardise and lose our friendship to get everything that I suddenly realised I wanted and needed.”

On the final night of their American tour in that summer of 2016, after a long night of partying and celebrating, Bolan, as told to The Guardian, finally addressed his feelings to Tim. He recalled saying, “’I don’t want this to ruin our friendship but I want to be with you, I love you and I want to be with you forever,’ and then Tim started to cry and said, ‘So do I.’” It’s adorable and happy and lovely. Bolan, in an interview with triple j about their relationship, said, “We fell in love over the course of about eight years.” That’s some fucking cinematic shit.

They’ve been so generous in sharing the personal details of their story. It influences their sophomore record BATS that they self-released this year (we’re getting to that), but it also is a generous, helpful decision to be so open. This year in Australia’s clusterfuck of a marriage equality “debate,” a lot of queer kids were left confused and isolated and scared. To see Bolan and Tim happy and proud, as they’ve said, meant a lot to their young fans. Beyond the adorable story of it all, it’s been for good.

Now, the record. BATS, sonically, is a shift from Cub Sport’s previous work. Tim, the lyricist and vocalist for the group, cites A Seat At The Table and Blonde as huge inspiration for the project. Content wise, the record documents their romance. To Notion, Tim said, “It more-or-less follows my personal journey from the moment I admitted to myself that I was gay, to coming to terms with being in love with my best friend/bandmate Bolan (Sam), finally acknowledging the situation a year later and to then coming out and getting together.” He further told Music-News, “Bolan’s and my story rolls out over this list of songs, more-or-less in this order – ‘Chasin’,’ ‘Look After Me’, ‘Crush,’ ‘Solo III,’ ‘Bats,’ ‘Give It To Me (Like You Mean It),’ ‘O Lord’ and ‘Banyo Blue.’” And if you read the lyrics to those tracks, the details – starkly honest and evocative – are all there.

“Chasin’” was the song Tim wrote after returning from his trips to Los Angeles and London to write, when he realized his feelings for Bolan. He said he wrote it without fully understanding what it was saying at the time. Now, it’s clear. It’s a song about fear and confusion. “I’m trying to be honest and live deliberately. Is it delusional to think that I can do this? Time always makes me doubt what’s coming out me.” To Notion, Tim said, “Sam had heard ‘Chasin’’ in its original demo form for about nine months before we actually had the conversation. He said he already knew what it was about so I guess that helped inform him that what he was feeling was reciprocated, even though I hadn’t had the courage to say it out loud in words.”

On “Look After Me,” Tim is sensing something. “There’s something in the way you look at me like I’ve never done wrong.” It’s visceral – that, “I think maybe he feels this way because I see this look in his eyes, but am I just seeing things because I want to see things or am I seeing the truth?” It’s a rhythmic, interior processing.

“Crush” sees that post-tour, mid-celebration conversation when they first opened up to each other. “And you whisper to me 'Why are you crying?’ I think it's from the years of trying to try and push you from me. I didn't know who I was meant to be. Did I crush you with the things I wouldn't say? Did I hurt you on the way? How am I so lucky that you waited for me.” We’re there, hearing and seeing this moment. It’s a lot.

“Solo III” is, indeed, inspired by Frank Ocean’s songs on Blonde. “We keep blazin', playing ‘Solo,’ and now we've got our song. And I believe in me and you. We make each other strong. And here it is, my first love song. It didn't even take that long. Now I'm not laying solo.” This marks a first – them, honest and together, celebrating their love and its newness. To Junkee, Tim shared the importance Blonde and “Solo” played in their relationship: “That album came out pretty soon after [we got together] and for the first few times, every time we got to ‘Solo’ I would cry. I was like, ‘I can’t believe I get to have what we’ve got.’ It immediately became our song, but the lyrics didn’t match up with our situation at all, and so I wanted to take from that and make it out own. And I think the melody’s just different enough that we could get away with using it.” Tim asks, “Oh, what did I do, do I deserve you?” This line’s a reminder that, yeah, we’re getting the timeline of their relationship, but Tim is writing these songs. We’re getting his feelings on what’s going on here – the disbelief, the joy.

“Bats,” if you’re a fan of the pair’s Snapchats, makes total sense. For the unacquainted, Tim clarified to Music-News: “The house we were living in when I recorded BATS was just up the hill from a creek that had a huge colony of bats living along its banks. Bolan and I would walk our dogs down there each evening and watch the bats fill the sky (usually soundtracked by Frank Ocean – ‘White Ferrari’ playing off my phone). I’d often put it on my Snapchat story and one day someone from Texas replied and said that they’d see the same thing there. It inspired the opening lyrics of the song ‘Bats.’ ‘Bats in the sky, it looks like Texas. I like this time because it reminds us we can be anywhere, that doesn’t change us, nothing can change us now.’ ‘Bats’ the song felt like it really represented the vibe/story of the album which is why we decided to make it the title track. There was always something exciting and emotive about seeing thousands of bats fill the sky and I wanted that visual to represent the collection of songs.” The lyrics refer to “Solo” and Tim’s overseas writing trips again, saying, “I've been on flights. I've seen some sights, but I didn't feel it. Just there to write. If I fly again, it won't be solo 'cause that got me so low.” “Bats” is a quiet, peaceful celebration of their togetherness and inseparability. He says, “You’re the reason that I keep on tryin.”

The next song on their timeline is the record’s most chilled track. Co-written and featuring vocals from Sarah Blasko (an eternal favorite of mine), “Give It To Me (Like You Mean It)” is a flat-out love song. An adoration song, even. “I like that light on your face. You are my favourite place.” “I could just watch you move. Everything you do just makes me…” It could be cringe, but, fuck, it isn’t. It’s really rather beautiful.

“O Lord” is the first single they chose to bring out ahead of BATS. It was a brave choice seeing as the first thirty-seven seconds are Tim and Bolan harmonizing without any instruments, but it was also a way of announcing, “Hey, things are a bit different now.” The visuals for the track are as stunning as the song, showing Tim and Bolan embracing in some muted neony, pastelish colors. This is their “radical softness.” This is the Solange influence. Tim told The FADER, “This video challenges everything I grew up believing about masculinity, beauty and homosexuality — it's super liberating to create this video and feel free from judgment, both internally and externally.” Lyrically, this marks a step away from the portrayal of the new, intense love. Tim says, “I was free to be my true self, I was finally in a relationship with the love of my life and I had full love and support from my friends and family, but what I didn’t expect was the realisation that when you get everything you’ve ever wanted you suddenly have everything to lose. This song ended up being my way of grappling with those feelings.” To the world, as a return, as an inviting in, as a reinvention of sound and style, “O Lord” really fucking works.

“Banyo Blue,” the final track on the standard version of BATS, leaves us with the most updated glimpse into their relationship. This is them settled. This is, “Yeah, the world is really intense and not wonderful, but, here, with each other and choosing each other, we’re gonna be good.” Tim asks, “Can we be a story throughout the ages?” He says, “I write about you. I could go on for pages,” and “I just kind of feel like I have found my light. The rest’s not perfect, but it’s fine when you’re tight.” Here, this love that they have so damn graciously shared with us and painstakingly and beautifully documented for us, is good. It’s ongoing and it’s committed. The confusion and shame of the past is gone, and shit’s still bad elsewhere, but in this honesty and in this sharing, they’re gonna be okay. (Since the recording of BATS, Tim and Bolan got engaged and are getting married next year, a thing they can now legally do because Australia just legalized marriage equality [s/o to queer Australians dragged through that dehumanizing process, btw])  I’m emotional.

Now, I gush. The details of Tim and Bolan’s story make the record a living, immersive, gripping experience. It’s truly the shit great films and novels are made of. If you don’t know what every song’s about, it’s still a moving work. In an essay he penned for The Line Of Best Fit, Tim said, “For me, getting to a place where I could really connect with myself and write, unguarded, from the heart has been a journey that has taken me over a decade.” I truly love their past material. Their first full-length album This Is Our Vice is a record I still listen to every week, without skipping a song. The songwriting is clever and the lyrics are insightful. But, here with BATS and (again) the brave decision to share their story and illuminate the details of each song, there’s something else happening. It’s, as they dubbed, truly some “radical softness.” Tim said, “BATS is a product of queer love and I hope it can be a comfort and encouragement for the LGBTQI community and our allies during this time.” It is.

@anaserhall

[ramrodd]

Peter J Williams & Bart Ehrman • The story of Jesus: Are the Gospels his life?

COMMENTARY:

In essence, Ehrman has adopted the Republican argument that there is no quid pro quo here and applied to his version of the Gospels.

Ehrman's entire Christian journey has been based on the fraud of his "born again" experience. Ehrman's Christian experience is essentially the same as Brett Kavanaugh's, whose cultural orientation is the same as Matt Gaetz if only by being white, male and over 13 and growing up right in the middle of the intellectual and commercial transition from the Playboy Philosophy to #MeToo that really got traction when the white boys who came to town with Reagan ( the period Tucker Carlson identifies when "Conservative was Cool". Conservative was never cool; they misstook the social buffering copious cash flow could purchase with being part of Sinatra's "Rat Pack", much less a child of the sexual revolution going on in DC during the 70s.

Having a "Born Again" experience as the essence of Christianity was marketed relentlessly by Bill Bright and his 4 Spiritual Laws and Campus Crusade for Christ as being in with the cool white kids in school who  controlled the Prom Commttee. The very possibility that an authentic "Born Again" experience bringing someone into the presences of Jesus in real time could ever be apostate. My opinion is that Ehrman faked a "Born Again" experience in order to be in with the cool kids raised in near perfect white privilege, especially the chicks. I mean, I've had a working relationship with the Holy Spirit since 1954 and in high school, Senior High Youth Groups on Sunday was short, intense make-out sessions totally absent of "sexual relations", as in, vaginal intercourse. It was more fun avoiding sexual relations and the necessary purchase of condoms in a small town pharmacy that were legally forbidden for sale to minors. "Paradise by the Dash Board Lights" is the sound track of Sunday Evening Church Meetings. Hand Jobs are the favorite of the Holy Ghost: see  who can cun fastest.

So, that's pretty much the Pro-Life Evangelical status in regards to the sexual revolution. And that's why Ehrman became "Born Again" and then discovered it offered a congenial career path in various ways until he ran headlong into the social milieu of Dale Martin and that being apostate was a superb career move. Being an evangelical athiest is business plan.

The thing about knowing Jesus is that, once you know Jesus, you cannot unknow Jesus. That's the source of the dramatic tension of "The Book of Job". The three friends who try to entice Job into denying The One by perfectly logical and compelling arguments, probably similar, if not identical, to the internal debat Ehrman conducted to become a born-again virgin, so to speak, and cash in on the post-modern deconstruction of the professional athiests and evangelical anti-thiests like Ehrman. Anti-Theism and Pro-Life Evangelicalism are opposite sides of the same coin. They both trade on the moral confusion which they create and share.

The Gospel of Mark is written by a Roman professional soldier directly from the Q Source, the Roman military intelligence files in Caesarea. All four Gosples draw directly from the Q Source, which was controlled by Cornelius, Pilate's military spy master and fellow member of the military guild of The Praetorian Guard, the so-called Italian Cohort. Both Pilate and Cornelius are instrumental clones of the core mechanism of the Roman Republic that August had incorporated into his model of Empire and Tiberius and Sejanus perfected by 31 CE.  Like the American federal government (that is, all the personnel on the federal payroll, including Congress, the Courts and the Executive,  the Praetoraian Guard is the Deep State of the Roman Empire.

And everbody in that particular organic structure of the Roman diplomatic and military patriots knew about Jesus before Peter or Paul came to Rome before the next Easter. Tertullian was perfectly correct. Christianity was an underground military communion. Like Jesus, the centurion class of the Roman legions shared Jesus's ontology: they knew Yawah, Queen of Battle. The sacrifice of Isaac is a study in the nature of Duty in a Duty, Honor, Country kind of way.  

Nobody in the Roman legions expected anything like the Resurrection. Consider that old Easter favorite, "Were you there when the crucified My Lord?" All four gospels agree that there were 12 Roman soldiers and I Gunnery Sergeant centurion whose pay voucher reflected they were present and correct at that particular routine crucifixion guard mount. And, then, there were 16 soldiers and one Gunnery Sergeant centurion whom sealed the tomb with a big rock it took everybody to move and then sealed it with 7 official Roman seals. And we have their movements and experience that comes directly from the Q Source that had been triggered as a routine force protection/threat assessment when Jesus created a stir among the Hebrews connected with John, a religous agitator.

The Gospel of Mark is named after the publisher located in Alexandria, Egypt, John Mark. John Mark did not write Mark, although he constributed to the Q Source and edited the Mark narrative in at least two places, but it, the Gospel of Mark was compiled as a continuing intelligence assessment of all things Jesus. I mean, Resurrection is big medicine and not to be taken lightly for soldiers. Yaweh is Minerva and both are She Who Must Be Obeyed, the Bitch Queen, Duty. Cornelius is the only other person in the Bible to be justified by faith by God besides Abraham and Devotion to Duty is why.

And The Gospel of Mark is at least the second intelligence report to come out of Judah regarding resurrection, the first being immediately and may have arrived in Rome before Pentacost. Again, Tertullian observes that Tiberius has received this FLASH intelligence sometime between 30 and 37, when he was assassinated.

My guess is that it was after Sejanus was executed and after the resulting purge. Tiberius rolled up the Sejanus plot in a typical Roman blood letting, but neither Pilate and Cornelius were not implicated. So, my guess is that it was after 33, because that date fits elements of the crucifixion better than 30 independent of Roman politics. Using this intellence from the Q Source, Tiberius proposed that the Senate elevate Jesus to a legal deity status, but the Senate was feeling surly from the insult to the Senate's illusionary sovereignity of the purges and refused.

As a consequence, the nascent Roman military communion remained covert until the Milvian Bridge, but they were like Gideon Bibles.

All 4 Gospels draw heavily from the Q Source: John Mark seems to become something of an archivist for the records.

In contrast, The Acts of the Apostles has very little Q Source material in it, except, of course, for Acts 10, the source of the Q Source, Cornelius, in particular, and the Praetorian Guard, as the larger Roman military context. There was somebody like George Smiley in the Rome headquarters of the Praetorian Guards that the Gospel of Mark was prepared for. My candidate is Theophilus and he is my candidate for the author of Hebrews and Hebrews is the Magna Carta of the Roman Catholic Church.

A difference between the Judaism of Moses and the Judanism of Jesus is that Jesus replaces all the laws and rituals before the meal and replaces it with the communion before the meal. The Shema remains sancrosanct and grace after meals fulfills the Trifecta of celebration and thanksgiving of The One as described in Revelation 4:2 and required of Moses.

The fact that Bart Ehrman might deny these probabilities is expected, but the fact that this probability has obvious never occurred to  Peter J. Williams, N.T. Wright, Gary Habermas or Dan Wallace either. I don't have any explanation why I am the only one in history to have made this connection: I blame it on the Holy Spirit. I had an epiphney reading Barclay's commentaries on the Gospels regarding the connection between Mark and Cornelius in 1990 and it's been something of a hobby ever since.

But the arguments of anti-theist like Ehrman and Richard Carrier and Ken Humphreys irritate me in the same way the southern white male Republican bigots like Moscow Mitch, Mick Mulvaney and Matt Gaetz irritate me when they propose to continue to run America on the basis that there was no quid pro quo. I get tired of the same old Fascist sophistry no matter its source.

The Gospel of Mark was transmitted to Rome around 40 CE. By the time Claudius conquered Britain, manuscripts of the Gospel of Mark were beginning to be produced by John Mark and his community of copyists. According to Dan wallace, 90% of the manuscripts we have from before the 4th century came out of Alexandria.  After that, Constantine shifted the center of gravity to Antioch.

Bart Ehrman just wants to be popular and wealthy and evangelican anti-theism fills the bill.

The communion before meals connects the dots for the Romn author of Hebrews with the bread and wine of Melchizedek by way of the ethic of  Socrates and the secular humanism of Jesus.

None of this would have happened without resurrection. And it happen at the moment in recorded history when recorded history was being invented. The timeline of the Gospel of Mark is probably as slavishly obeyed as a modern scientific and/or academic protocol for observational journalism: Margaret Meade would have approved. The Romans did everything by the numbers: the timeline of the Gospel of Mark is as stable as the grid system of an archeological dig. It is a very coherent  and congruent presentation of data. It is not a Greco-Roman biography or the novel genre of the time.  And it may have been briefly part of the oral tradition when it was captured in the Q Source, it is not an example of a mature narrative of the oral tradition. Among other things, there is very little mythology in the narrative. Matthew is provided the dots to connect in the dots of the Jewish constellations reflected in the fushion of the narrative of the Hebrew Bible with the career of Jesus as the instrument of epistemology in the flesh.

The fact that Ehrman has spent his entire life engaged in this narrative, it puzzles me how he could have missed these things, except that he approaches the biblical text as a mechanical construct and deconstructive history and not as literature. It's a little bit like being color blind, culturally.

So, it's possible that Ehrman actually believes his bullshit: there really is no quid pro quo. He's not apostate: he never was "Born Again".