#I’m also curious about what kind of injuries will actually kill an angel…. like being stabbed with an angel blade obviously

[castielmacleod]

Hi! Have you already made a post about the parallel of both Crowley and Cas digging a bullet (specifically targeting them) out of their bodies to triumph over their enemies?

I feel like I've seen it.

Hello! I have not, though it’s neat that they both do that! I think it’d be fun to pretend Crowley got the idea from Cas in the first place, after learning what happened to Ion, before getting the chance to use it himself. Although if I remember correctly, Abaddon also frees herself from the devil’s trap bullet by digging it out (with her severed hand no less—VERY metal of her) so maybe it’s just the thing to do lol. Nothing tops Cas sticking his bullet in his opponent’s eye though, that was wicked clever.

It’s interesting that Abaddon wasn’t bothered that Crowley might attempt to free himself in more or less the same fashion she herself so recently accomplished, though I think she only wanted to slow him down rather than actually keep him in place permanently? So maybe it wasn’t a high priority for her anyway. Or maybe the writing is just bad 😭

Anyway if that post about Cas and Crowley’s tactical similarities does exist and you’re able to find it again, let me know! I’d love to have a look.

#Ask #I’m also curious about what kind of injuries will actually kill an angel…. like being stabbed with an angel blade obviously #Getting shot in the head with an angel blade bullet will also do it #But getting shot in the stomach won’t. At least not immediately? Crowley implies Cas will bleed out but #I’m not sure how blood loss would kill an angel exactly? #Maybe blood loss specifically from an angel blade bullet wound??? Lol #And then of course Cas is able to kill Ion by pushing the angel bullet into his eye #Maybe that counts as “stabbing” the way it does with an angel blade? #Or are angels especially vulnerable through their vessels’ eyes? #That might be kind of a cool weakness for angels to have actually. At least in a headcanon sense #Regarding the blood loss though there is a little notion in my head that Crowley was just lying that Cas would bleed out and die #Because Crowley deliberately spared Cas’ life already (when he honestly had no reason to) #(The tablet could have easily been taken off of Cas’ corpse) #But Cas would certainly know better than to think he could die from his vessel merely losing some blood. Even if it still hurt #So maybe Crowley was just saying that to make it seem like “oh I only ‘spared’ your life so you could bleed out painfully” #And not because he actually still cares in his own twisted way #But those are the c/c brainworms talking for sure lol #Anyway.

[theres-an-impulstor-among-us]

Heyo, reporting back to request a continuation of a continuation of a continuation, if you wouldn't mind! Aka, please more 3rd Life Villainpulse angst, I'm so invested (and very curious as to whether his latest murder attempt was an actual success, or if he really should have stuck around to verify the death...)

i genuinely rly love this! i’ve got such plans for it now that i think i’ll make it into an actual proper fic.

i’ve also now posted it on AO3, titled Stand For Nothing! link here

…

Impulse is getting concerned. It’s been over five minutes and no death message in chat. It should’ve happened by now. He had been worried about being found near the scene of a death — it’d already been about five minutes since the meeting and someone would’ve gone to find Skizz, so his items would almost certainly be found — but now he’s starting to think he should have stuck around anyway and made sure the job was finished.

He had been intending to stay here at his villager trading centre until the death notification came up and then he would run back to Dogwarts and play the distressed best friend.

But no death message. So his plan has to change.

When he makes it back to Dogwarts, he finds Ren standing outside the Renchanting building, his face pale. When he spots Impulse, he quickly beckons him. “Impulse! For the love of god, where’ve you been?!”

Impulse blinks. With no death message in chat, what can Ren be so worked up about? “W-What? What’s happened…?”

“Skizzle’s been attacked! We heard an explosion outside our walls and when we went to check, we found him out there, passed out. He’s in a critical condition but Martyn’s with him now and hopefully he’ll recover.”

Impulse can only stare at Ren with an open mouth and a pit in his stomach. Somehow, in all the possible outcomes he pictured for this scenario, he never imagined Dogwarts would actually find Skizz alive. After three perfect murders, it seems he got careless.

“O-Oh my god,” he manages to choke out. “C-Can I see him?”

“Not yet, but Martyn will tell us when we can.”

Ren takes him down into the living area under Renchanting. There, Etho is pacing back and forth in front of a closed door, clearly deep in thought, but he glances up as Ren comes in. “Ren, you found him.”

Ren nods, even though it wasn’t really a question. “Any word?”

“Not yet. Martyn has three healing potions in there with him though, so I’d say Skizz’s chances are really good.”

Impulse has to strain to keep his expression steady at that. “G-Good. That’s good.”

Something changes almost imperceptibly in Etho’s expression, but Ren, clearly not noticing, rubs Impulse’s back reassuringly. “He’ll be okay, Impulse. Don’t worry.”

All Impulse can do is nod, not trusting himself to speak.

Finally, after what feels like hours, the door opens and Martyn appears, his body blocking the view inside the room. “He’s awake,” he reports, a very serious look on his face. “Ren.”

Ren quickly ducks into the room, but when Impulse starts to follow, Martyn blocks him. “Not you,” he says coldly. “Etho, stay with him, please.”

Impulse’s heart freezes. There’s only one reason Martyn would stop him from seeing his injured best friend.

Skizz has told him everything.

He takes a step back and bumps into something behind him, causing him to jump.

“What’s going on, Impulse?” asks Etho casually, an only-just-discernible undertone of danger in his voice. “You seem a little tense.”

“My best friend almost died,” Impulse replies coldly, but even he can tell his words are unconvincing.

“Indeed. I wonder how that happened?”

“I don’t like what you’re implying, Etho. Why would you have any reason to suspect me?”

Etho just folds his arms and says nothing, infuriating Impulse. “You said I was the only person on this server you really trust!”

“That was before I joined these guys. I’ve had a weird feeling in my stomach about you for a while, Impulse. Something hasn’t felt right since this whole thing started, but I assumed it was just me trying to apply rationality to this irrational world. But one thing never changes, Impulse. No matter how much you try to change it.”

Impulse falls silent, scowling at the ground. He’s already given away too much in his tone and expression.

He glances sideways at Etho, who has his eyes fixed on the door Ren and Martyn went through. Realisation dawns on him: Etho isn’t expecting him to put up a fight. Etho thinks he has nowhere to go.

Now is the time, then. He can’t afford to wait any longer; when Ren and Martyn come back out here, it’s over. Impulse knows he can’t take on three people at once. This is his last chance to escape alive.

So when Etho shifts position a few seconds later, Impulse strikes. Before he can react, Impulse sweeps Etho’s legs out from under him and shoves him into the wall as he’s falling. Without waiting around to see the result of his attack, Impulse takes off running.

He makes it out of Renchanting and is just about to run down the hill towards the crastle when an arrow whizzes by him, nicking the sleeve of his t-shirt and causing him to lose his balance. Suppressing a scream, Impulse topples down the hill and lands in the shallow river at the bottom. He tries to continue onward but has to stop as he puts weight on his left foot and realises he must have twisted his ankle during his fall.

Gritting his teeth through the throbbing pain, he looks up in time to be able to dodge another arrow fired at him by the figure on top of Dogwarts’s wall.

He has to keep going.

Every step on his left foot is agony but he pushes himself on, half-galloping down the hill on the other side, the crastle in his sights.

“Bdubs!” he shrieks as he draws near, his heart racing. The Red Army is likely right behind him. “BDUBS!”

The person he’s calling rushes out of the castle over the drawbridge just in time to catch Impulse as he finally loses his balance and pitches forward.

“Impulse! You’re soaking wet!? What the-?!”

“Th- They’re coming for me,” he croaks. His eyes flicker up and he spots two faces in the windows on the second floor. It’s time for the performance of his life. “Dogwarts turned on me! They think I killed Tango and Cleo a-a-and made you kill Joel!”

“What?!” gasps Bdubs. “That’s ridiculous! Why would they think that?!”

“I-I don’t know but th- They’re gonna kill me, Bdubs…!”

“Not on my watch!”

Bdubs quickly ushers Impulse inside the crastle and into the waiting arms of Jimmy. Together, the two guide Impulse upstairs and lay him down in the bed Grian has placed in a position safely away from the slit windows.

“What happened, Impulse?” Bdubs asks softly. “How did they turn on you?”

Impulse takes a shaky breath. “Something happened to Skizz. He… He got attacked. Then he told everyone it was me and that I’d killed Tango and Cleo and manipulated you into killing Joel.”

“First of all, that’s utterly ridiculous,” Bdubs snaps. “I killed Joel because he was about to kill you. And second, why on earth would you want to kill Tango or Cleo?”

“I-I think you might’ve been right, Bdubs. I th-think Etho was responsible for Cleo’s death. And now he’s got Dogwarts trying to make me a scapegoat.”

Bdubs’s gaze darkens. “Despicable little-.”

“BDOUBLEO!”

“Stay there,” says Bdubs.

He strides to the window, flanked by Grian and Scott, armed with his crossbow. “What do you want, Ren?”

Down on the ground, having left Skizz in the care of BigB, stand Ren, Martyn, and Etho, staring up at the castle. The latter two hold bows, while Ren is armed with a sword and shield.

“We know Impulse is hiding out in there,” Ren announces, with the regal but dangerous air of a king. “Hand him over to us, Bdubs.”

“No way in hell,” Bdubs snaps back. “He told me everything!”

“We can guarantee you he did not,” responds Martyn steadily. “Not the truth, anyway. He’s using you, Bdubs.”

“YOU’re the ones using HIM! As a scapegoat!”

“Impulse isn’t the angel you think he is, Bdubs,” Etho says darkly. “You’re protecting the person who killed Cleo.”

“No, YOU killed Cleo,” snarls Bdubs. “And I bet you killed Tango too and tried to blame it on me! You’re just trying to frame anyone you can so you can get away with it!”

Despite the pain and stress he’s experiencing, Impulse can’t help feeling proud of himself. The seeds of doubt and suspicion he’s sown between Bdubs and Etho are paying off now.

“Bdubs.” Ren’s voice drops slightly as emotion creeps into his tone. “He attacked his best friend and left him to die. If we hadn’t found him in time, Skizz would have succumbed to his injuries alone and terrified in the middle of nowhere, murdered by his own best friend.”

“What exactly is Impulse’s motive supposed to be, here?” Scott asks suddenly. “You say he killed Tango and Cleo, orchestrated Joel’s death, and tried to murder Skizzle. Why exactly would he want to do that?”

“Skizz claims Impulse said it was because Tango “knew too much” about something,” Martyn says. “Some kind of secret that Impulse is keeping. And that Cleo’s and Joel’s deaths were “necessary to push the war forward”. That’s his motive, Scott. Impulse wants war, and he doesn’t care who he hurts to get it.”

“We ARE talking about the same Impulse, right?” demands Bdubs. “Our Impulse? The sweetheart who wouldn’t hurt a fly? Are we sure Skizz didn’t just misremember? He's a little unreliable like that. Maybe he said it was someone else who-.”

“Don’t you dare!” Martyn bursts out suddenly, his voice filled with the most venom anyone had ever heard it. “Don’t you DARE say that! You weren’t there, Bdubs! You didn’t have to fix his broken ribs and his fractured neck and his shattered arm! You weren’t there when he finally woke up after several minutes of crying out and panicked breathing like he was having a nightmare! You didn’t hear the way he cried, how terrified he was when he told me what happened, the raw agony in his voice! That’s not the demeanor of someone who MISREMEMBERED! Skizz has gone through hell today and it’s all Impulse’s fault! So I’m not leaving here without his head, in one form or another!”

“YEAH!” Ren yells in agreement, hitting his sword against his shield. “No more arguments. No more wasting time. If you don’t give us Impulse right NOW, we will declare war on you and take him by force.”

Inside the crastle, Impulse’s heart skips a beat. This is it: the moment of truth. Either everything he’s been working towards will finally come to fruition… or Bdubs will hand him over and he will die.

Bdubs straightens up, a steely look of determination appearing in his eyes.

“Then consider us at war.”

#3rdlifesmp #3rd life smp #impulsesv #bdubs #rendog #skizzleman #etho #vaunna’s requests

[pinkoptics]

Cherik ‘Fallen Angel’ Fic

Part 2 (of Chapter 1)

Find Part 1 (of Chapter 1) here.

Charles is an angel. He loves Erik. He saves Erik. God takes issue with that. Hilarity and adorableness (with a smidge of angst) ensues. In this part, protective!Erik makes an appearance at the hospital.

*

“I don’t know what his last name is!” Erik growled at the nurse, just barely managing to hold back the ‘fucks’ he wanted to pepper the sentence with. “I wasn’t exactly trying to get all of his info while he was bleeding to death on me.”

Erik released them in his mind— Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. She’s just doing her job. She’s just doing her job. Don’t strangle her with metal.

“I told you,” Erik gritted his teeth and repeated a variation of the same combination of sentences he had already uttered twice. “I was crossing the street. The car barrelled through the red light. He jumped in and saved my life. I tried to return the favour. His name is Charles. He’s cute. I promised to take him to dinner. That’s all I know and that’s as far as we got before he passed out.”

How was Charles? Was he okay?

It didn’t seem like he could be. It had looked like so much fucking blood. The utterly insane things the man had said (“You should know you’re beautiful. Before I leave this mortal realm, I want you to know that”). Those spectacularly bright blue eyes fading to a frightening dullness. Not that Erik knew anything about anything medical, but none of that had seemed promising. So, not only was this nurse annoying as all fuck, she was stonewalling him. They wouldn’t tell him a goddamned thing because he wasn’t Charles’ next of kin. No one, in fact, knew if he had any next of kin in New York because he didn’t have a wallet, ID or phone on him. This was why the nurse was presently grilling him for information he did. not. have. They hadn’t let him ride in the ambulance, so he’d taken a cab and prayed that the ambulance had made a hell of a lot better time than he had. The only reason they were talking to him at all was because he had been there, had a name, a first name, and that was it.

The swinging doors opened and a woman in scrubs emerged. Erik nearly lunged.

“Are you Erik?”

“Yes.”

“He’s asking for you. I don’t want to let you in at all, but I don’t think we’re going to be able to start anything beyond emergency treatment until he talks to you.”

Asking meant conscious. Living. Thank fuck. The relief was powerful and nearly knocked him on his ass. Later, when he wasn’t teeming with barely contained frustration, and desperately trying to ascertain just how okay Charles was or wasn’t, he might spare a moment to think about how unexpected it was to be so powerfully moved by a stranger (a cute stranger who’d saved his life, granted), but not now.

“How is he?”

“He lost some blood, will need stitches on his arm and he has a few fractured ribs, but he’s stable. He’s going to be fine. After he stops trying to get out of bed to talk to you, we might actually be able to treat those things with something other than bandages.”

If Erik had thought the first wave of relief was powerful, he was not prepared at all for the second.

She sighed deeply and gestured to the double doors from which she had emerged. “This way.”

He followed her a short way down the hall, nearly stepping on her heels each step of the way. She stopped so abruptly before they entered the room that Erik nearly ran straight into her back.

“I should warn you that he’s... well, you’ve both been through a trauma. The mind processes such things in all sorts of ways. If he doesn’t seem... ‘all there’ don’t be overly concerned. Play along, don’t distress him further.”

Charles certainly hadn’t been ‘all there’ at the scene of the accident. His bizarre last words kept spinning through Erik’s head at random intervals— you are so loved. On their own, they were strange enough, but the reverence of Charles’ tone had sunk the words into Erik’s bones like a telepath projecting the emotion behind what they were saying. He hadn’t heard the words, he’d felt the words. Even if Charles was a telepath, it didn’t make them make anymore sense. More forthcoming then... he nodded at the doctor.

“You’re here!” Charles beamed at him from his sitting position on the hospital bed, looking much happier than anyone had any right to be in his situation. “And, you look well. Are you well?”

Charles did too, relatively speaking. He was a little pale, a little bruised but nowhere close to as bad as Erik had expected. Though the car had clipped him as he’d tackled Erik out of the way, it seemed to have been a case of looking much worse than it was at the scene. Small miracles.

“I’m fine.” Fine enough, at any rate. Like Charles, he was understandably bruised, and it was probably going to hurt more in the morning, but his suit had taken the harder beating. Between contact with the pavement and Charles’ blood, there would be no saving it, not that that mattered in the slightest. “You’re the one who was bleeding out all over me. How are you?”

Erik was sitting at his bedside now, the doctor presumably hovering in the background for all Erik’s attention was on Charles. The man in question blinked, cocking his head slightly to the side and giving Erik’s question a more thorough consideration than Erik would have thought necessary.

“I really don’t know,” he finally answered. Charles stretched his injured arm out in front of him, now bandaged (if not stitched) and looked at it with a plainly perplexed expression. “I’ve never been hurt before you know. It’s curious... interesting, but I don’t at all recommend it.”

“You were hit by a car.” Erik couldn’t help but be amused. Perplexed Charles was endearing. “Not something that happens to a person every day.”

“Quite.” Charles conceded the point. He went from staring at his arm to deliberately poking his own rib cage, and subsequently wincing. “You’re all very fragile, you know. So much could kill you every single minute of your life and yet so many of you manage to survive until old age. How do you do it? I’ve only just arrived and I’ve already nearly died.”

He turned his focus from his ribs to Erik and genuinely looked as though he were waiting for a response. Erik opened his mouth and then closed it. Despite the doctor’s suggestion to ‘play along’ he didn’t have one. Erik decided to change course.

“The hospital needs your personal information— last name, address, insurance.”

“Oh, well, that’s easy enough. I don’t have a last name. Just Charles. Or an address for that matter. I feel it’s unlikely my former profession came with any benefits.” Charles suddenly laughed. “That’s not true. It absolutely had many benefits, but certainly not State Farm. Besides, I’m no longer working for Him.”

The emphasis on the last word was... odd. Was Erik supposed to know who he was?

“I was... goodness. I was fired I suppose. Fired. That means I’m—I’m unemployed. For the first time in a millennia, I’m... on the pogey!” He laughed a little harder, the edge of hysteria he’d had at the scene worming its way back in. “Wait, no, you don’t say that anymore, do you?”

Pogey?

“Oh you look so confused. I apologize. It’s a Canadian phrase come to think. Or it used to be, a century ago.”

Shit.

Had Charles hit his head? Was this some kind of bizarre amnesia? The doctor hadn’t mentioned either possibility but... Erik side-stepped again.“How about family? Is there someone I can call and let them know you’re here? Maybe they can provide your information?”

The shift in Charles’ expression and demeanour was so abrupt and dramatic that Erik’s gut clenched. The stunning blue eyes that had stared up at him with such naked concern and relief, took on an unmistakable sheen. The wetness made them impossibly bluer, an unnatural colour that was as striking as it was otherworldly. The tears did not fall, yet Erik somehow knew that Charles would cry beautifully if they did. Erik somehow also knew what the response was going to be before he uttered it.

“No. There is no one. Not anymore.”

Erik surprised himself by doing something he would normally never do, under any circumstance, even with someone he knew well, let alone someone he had just met. He reached out and took Charles’ hand, squeezing it gently. His was a pain Erik was all too familiar with.

“It’s all right. We’ll... we’ll figure this out. You’re Charles. You saved my life. You have me. That’s all we need to know right now. Don’t worry about the insurance or anything else.”

Charles stopped staring out into the middle-distance and focused on Erik. “Truly, you don’t owe me anything.”

Erik snorted. “The hell I don’t. Besides, we’ve got to get you healed up. I can’t take you to the diner in this state. We’ve got date, remember? So there you are. Here you think I’m indebted, but really my reasons are purely selfish. You’re hot and I want to date you. Humour me.”

The wetness retreated and that red mouth quirked up into a small smile.

“As long as you’re being self-centred.”

“Oh, trust me, I am.”

Somewhere behind them, someone cleared their throat. Erik turned. Oh, right, the doctor. “As much as I would love to watch the two of you keep flirting, we need to take care of those injuries.”

She was right, so Erik reluctantly stood and even more reluctantly released Charles’ hand.

“I’ll be back later, so stop trying to leave and let them take care of you, all right?”

Charles nodded. “If you insist.”

“I do.”

Erik forced himself to turn and exit the room. Only after he’d left it, did he truly exhale. Charles was okay. Charles was okay. Charles was flirting even... well, possibly. They were still on for that date. Erik took a few much needed breaths and strode more determinedly, and much less frantically, back toward the nurses’ desk. He would take care of this.

He would take care of Charles.

*

Thanks for reading 😊. I really hope inspiration continues to strike because I’ve had a lot of fun with this thus far.

On to chapter 2 part 1

#cherik #cherik fan fic #cherik fanfic #charles xavier #erik lehnsherr #pinkoptics fic #fallen angel fic

[paralleledmediaexperience]

a part 2 to this ficlet as requested by @xanthomonus in the notes! I’ve got at least one more part conceptualized (no way you can guess what’ll happen there) though i may extend it or add more, so if anyone would like to be tagged let me know!! 

- 

 Sam is insistent that they try to research ways to get Cas back. Jack has explained that Amara won’t fail- it is simply the process of extracting an Angel from the Empty that takes time, since she didn’t want to wake or anger it like… well, like what Jack had done. He could feel Amara’s sincerity in a way that he was certain Sam and Dean wouldn’t understand, let alone be comforted by. She’d been in his head, crossed with his soul in the transfer of power. He’s kind of sure that if he hadn’t missed Cas so much too, she probably would have ignored Dean’s request altogether.

But it makes Sam look less frazzled when he’s able to lose himself in the research for something, and Jack doesn’t mind sitting with him and pretending he’s not hiding chapter books behind the large tomes. He’s been working his way steadily through some books Sam had collected for him last time they had been out shopping, and while he had enjoyed the first one (a mystery about siblings called the Boxcar children even though they no longer lived in a boxcar) he’d chosen Matilda next, because she sounded nice. And he was right! Matilda was his new favorite, even more than his last favorite, which had been Where the Wild Things Are.

He doesn’t even notice when Dean walks in, because Matilda had just glued a hat to her father’s head, but he does when Sam says, “What, none for me?”

“You’re a grown man, Sammy, you can make your own food. He’s four years old with a foot injury.” Dean says, scowling at Sam. The effect is rather ruined by both Dean’s flour dusted apron and the plate in his hands, and Jack smiles when he turns back to him instead. “You both missed lunch.”

Sam grumbles, but gets up anyway, stretching. “If you didn’t make me food how could I have missed it?”

“Shut up,” Dean shoots back half-heartedly. “Here, Jack, and don’t let him steal off your plate just because he got distracted reading.”

“Thanks, Dean!” Jack says brightly, moving his secret reading setup to the table instead of his lap and pushing it away, ignoring the way Sam’s eyebrows raise when he notices his no longer hidden book. Dean sets the plate down and ignores that Sam sends him one last annoyed face before heading off to the kitchen, where Jack knows there is going to be a plate ready for Sam, or at least a serving of the macaroni and cheese sprinkled with bacon bits and breadcrumbs that Dean’s brought him. “Are you making something else?”

“Just some bread,” Dean grimaces down at the mess of flour across his front, and Jack has to contain his giggles when the movement reveals a streak of flour in Dean’s hair. 

“Just some bread,” Sam echoes, swinging back through the door with his own plate of macaroni. “Dean. Do I need to remind you that we need vegetables and can’t live off of carbs and meat alone?”

“It’s macaroni, Sam, quit whining and just enjoy it,” Dean rolls his eyes. “I swear, you’re the pickiest-”

“It’s not being picky, it’s eating healthy-”

“Same difference!” Dean insists, his twitching lips betraying the irritation in his voice.

“Just one meal with something green a day, Dean, I’m begging you.” 

Eyes flicking back and forth as they snipe at each other, Jack takes an appreciative bite of the macaroni. Expectedly delicious, because Dean made it and Dean didn't make bad food the way Sam sometimes did. Mostly.

“Then beg,” Dean proclaims stubbornly, eyes narrowed. Sam doesn’t respond, his own expression pinching up into very familiar exasperation. 

“Actually, I’ve never had brussel sprouts before, and Claire said I should try them!” Jack interjects. He isn’t sure what a brussel sprout is beyond a vegetable, but Claire had said he’d like them and that he should bother Dean into making them. 

Dean looks unimpressed though, gaze switching from Sam back to meet Jack’s eyes. “You want me to make you brussel sprouts?”

“Please?” Jack tries, unsure if Dean thinks there is something wrong with brussel sprouts or if he is still simply offended by the concept of vegetables.

The please works, Dean’s capitulation coming in the form of a displeased huff and an, “Alright, fine.” He swings back around to point at Sam accusingly. “I’m blaming you for this.”

“As long as we get something from each of the five food groups, sure,” Sam says, taking his seat again. “And no, you don’t get to use tomatoes as the catch all.”

“Fine,” Dean bites out again, clapping Jack on the shoulder as he starts to turn away.

“Thank you Dean! Love you!” Jack says, and he hears Sam’s quick inhale just as he sees Dean almost stumble and he smiles to himself.

“Love you too, kid,” Dean manages to get out, hand squeezing just a bit tighter on his shoulder. “Alright, go back to your books, I have to go to the store for brussel sprouts apparently.”

The speed at which Dean walks away couldn’t be called running away but Jack definitely thinks it qualifies as retreating, and he straightens up a bit, very proud of himself for receiving his second ‘love you’ from Dean in twice as many days. He watches Dean get out the door before turning back around in his seat.

Sam is staring at him with a blinking mixture of incredulity and open affection, the smile on his face wide, if confused. “That’s… new?” 

“Yep,” Jack confirms, pulling Matilda back towards himself and abandoning the pretense of reading the book Sam had suggested he search through. Sam had already searched it himself twice. He doesn’t manage to open it, because Sam continues.

“And I don’t need to check that it’s actually Dean?” Sam teases, bewilderment clear and pride clearer. “Saying yes to vegetables AND and I love you?”

“It turns out,” A voice whipcracks out, startling them both, “That Dean Winchester is actually a big old softie at heart. Who knew?”

“Balthazar?” Sam says, and Jack almost gets bowled over by the wave of shock. Balthazar? He knew that name. He stares openly, unheeded as Balthazar talks to Sam.

“Well, except Castiel, of course, but that Profound Bond of theirs hardly makes it fair,” The angel says, stepping forward. “Yes, Sam, I’ve been hand delivered back from the dead, at the temporary cost of my Grace. Don’t look at me like that.”

“Your grace?” Jack asks, curious about how Sam had been looking at him, but unwilling to turn around and take his eyes off of the angel Cas had once killed. “What do you mean?”

“Ah,” Balthazar strides over, and before Jack can say anything he’s got him clasped by both shoulders, staring into his eyes with a curiosity so intense Jack almost steps back towards the table. “And you’re Jack, I assume? I was warned that there would be no murdering of nephilim if I returned.”

“So Amara freed you?” Sam cuts in, and Jack huffs out a small breath as Balthazar lets him go to spin back around and face him. “Did she have a reason?”

Jack doesn’t voice his own question, which feels far more important. He wants to know when Cas will be back.

“Uh, yes?” Balthazar sneers. “Most of the angels are dead, Sam, no thanks to you and your brother and my brother. I’ll admit some of us deserved it- were rather asking for it, if you ask me- but it did leave dear aunty with rather less personnel than she wants to run heaven with.”

“She’s not grabbing all the angels, is she?” Jack breathes, terrified suddenly, despite Balthazar’s assurance that Amara had apparently set him off limits. 

“Not a chance. Seemed to have a list in mind, and I think I was simply the first she found. I thought perhaps…” He trails off, just for a split second before he grins again, bright and covering up anything he might have been about to show. “Well, I didn’t, actually. Rather hard to do when you’re sleeping in eternal torment.”

Jack catches Sam’s flinch, and frowns at the other man. “Are you sure you were the first?”

Balthazar ticks his head to one side, considering. “Well, I’m the first to show up here, I’ll assume by your reactions, and given that she’s bringing us back graceless, I imagine any others will also be sent here.”

Jack scowls. If so, then Cas may be further off than he hoped. But this was- conclusive proof. Amara could do it, and now they would just have to deal with powerless angels until she came back and dealt with them herself. And Cas would be home.

Sam sighs, deep and weary and cheerless. “Yeah. That would make sense. Well, we can put this away, then.” He closes the book on the table with a hefty thump and then stacks Jack’s abandoned tome on top of it. “And I suppose we should try to make sure we have rooms ready. Jack, would you-”

“I’ll call Dean and let him know,” Jack says, suddenly tired and wanting to get away from Balthazar, still staring at him hawkishly, wanting to be away from the library, where more angels could show up without warning. He wants to hide in his room or possibly Cas’ until Amara brings him back and takes all the others back to heaven or whatever she planned to do. He wishes viciously in his head that he hadn’t opened his mouth about brussel sprouts and that Dean was still here in the kitchen where Jack could escape to without feeling alone. As it is, he grabs Matilda and his plate, still half full of macaroni, ready to walk away, but he catches Balthazar’s face again.

“You’re hungry,” Jack realizes as he says it. Balthazar has a facial journey of his own to deal with that fact before he grimaces.

“Human,” he says, displeasure and embarrassment warring on his features, even as his stomach growls.

Jack doesn’t want Balthazar here, he doesn’t want Amara to try to find anyone but Cas, or at least to find Cas first, and he most definitely doesn’t want to share his food that Dean made him, or Dean and Sam’s attention in general, and he swallows all of this down and he says, “Here. If you’ve never been human before, you’ve never really tasted food, right? Dean’s always makes the best food.”

He holds out the plate and drops it into Balthazar’s hands and tries his best not to stomp out like a real child, or run out like he’s scared, but he makes it around the corner and leans against the wall, out of sight.

Except that Sam immediately pokes his head around, following him. “Jack?”

“I don’t like this,” Jack says plainly, staring up at Sam like maybe he could explain why all of the good feelings he’d been having had shriveled up in his stomach and refused to leave, even though Sam clearly didn’t think Balthazar was an actual threat to them.

“I could tell,” Sam says, almost teasing again, but he drops it immediately. “Is it okay, Jack? Because we can absolutely just send him and any others that show up to the nearest motel instead.”

“No,” He says immediately, but he pauses after, thinking. He takes a deep breath in, trying to ease the odd tightness inside his chest.  “No. They can stay here until Amara gets back. I just…” 

“Don’t like it,” Sam nods, as if that explains it, and Jack guesses it does. “Well, Dean won’t like it either, so you can let him know that the two of you are free to hole up wherever you’d like to get away from them, and I’ll try to deal with them myself as much as I can.”

The tightness in his chest does soften, another breath rushing out like he’d been holding it. “Thanks, Sam.” 

“You know I love you too, Jack,” Sam says, earnest and open and Jack barely makes the decision to hug him but he ends up wrapped up in Sam’s arms anyhow.

“I do. I know. Love you, Sam,” Jack says, fixing his grip on Matilda as he pulls away. “Okay, I need to go call Dean, because if he leaves the store before-”

“He won’t want to turn around, yeah,” Sam laughs.

Jack can’t help the smile that bursts across his face. “Well, I can’t use it too often, or it might not work anymore, but maybe if I say please.”

#Jack Kline #Sam Winchester #Dean Winchester #Balthazar #supernatural #my fic #creativecaviar #me remembering that time i tricked my cousin into eating brussel sprouts. ehehehehe. #also!!! what the FUCK balthazar's voice is very difficult but also very fun and rewarding to write so PLEASE tell me whether it reads okay #my in my head: ive seen four year olds become territorial when their parents have visitors this is gonna be SO funny #anyway Jack IS going to get I love you's from all his dads thank you much. we just gotta wait for Cas. #this isn't going on ao3 until i have a good name for it so if you like reading better there suggest a fic name this time so it can go up

[excitedlysuffering]

How would the members of Akatsuki be with a fem s / o who is a medical ninja?

Akatsuki With A Med Nin S/O

Since there’s so many of them, I’m making them a little shorter!

Pein~

He’ll be impressed with your skills, although he won’t typically need your help. If you don’t mind he’d like to watch you work sometimes and it’s kind of nice actually. Bonding over blood and guts we love it🥰

He’s also quite relieved because most of the Akatsuki are reckless and get injured all the time. Like four times a week you have at least one of them in your office reckless. Genuinely believes everything would fall apart without you.

Konan~

She believes you’re the true Angel from the first time she watches you heal someone. You were so at ease and in your element she finds you absolutely captivating.

Definitely yells at the boys for not being careful because, yes you’re strong and can handle a lot, but they’re getting injured all the time and it’s draining you. She’ll take care of you without fail everytime you reach, or exceed, your limit.

Itachi~

It’s kind of bittersweet to him. You have such talent with medical jutsu that you could probably cure him, but he can’t let you. He can’t be at full power if he wants Sasuke to kill him. He will let you help make him comfortable though. Like if he’s feeling particularly bad or with his poor eyesight.

Will try to put a limit on what’s worthy of your skills. If it’s not serious, you shouldn’t be wasting your energy on it (mainly because the others are idiots) and he’ll try to turn lesser injuries away. You might be the only med nin, but you’re not the only one in the base who can do medical work.

Kisame~

Finds you cooler than regular ninjas, because yeah you can kick ass and all that but you can also heal injuries that are typically death sentences. What’s not to love?? Brags about you all the time it’s not even funny. (At least to Itachi who has to listen to the highlights of every surgery you’ve ever performed)

Loves to hear you talk about it! He wants to learn as much as he can because he loves how excited you are and plus he’s a swordsman there’s a lot of benefits in knowing techniques that are virtually unhealable (that’s a word now don’t @ me). Overall totally enamored by everything you do.

Kakuzu~

FINALLY. That’s his reaction. He’s tired of having to deal with the idiots and their injuries. (ahem: Hidan) (Because Sasori is only willing to help Deidara and he still throws a fit about it) will definitely assist you though if you need it and is always open to sharing and learning tips/techniques.

When you fight together you probably have competitions to see who can kill the most people with a specific type of injury. (You and Kakuzu once killed 57 people by severing one specific artery in every person)

Hidan~

He sees you as his personal nurse and thinks that he gets priority over everyone else because you love him. (“Step aside, loser, I got stabbed!” “B-but your immortal! I’m bleeding out!” “Get yourself a doctor for a girlfriend then!”) Good luck with this one🙂

He’s alsways in your office/workspace just hanging out whether he’s hurt or not. Likes to see you in your space, doing your thing. Is present at every surgery he can possibly be at because he claims you look sexy covered in blood. He’ll try not to interrupt you but he can’t help but steal one six kisses while you look like that.

Sasori~

Very fascinated by your work. He’ll want to learn from you, as well as teach you things about treating poisons. He probably tests his new poisons out on random people so he can see if it’s easy for you to treat or not, so he can make them more dangerous. You also help him turn live victims into his puppets! So romantic what a keeper🥰

He’ll let you deal with Deidara’s injuries while he watches over your technique, but he’ll grumble if you treat the others especially Hidan. Thinks it’s a waste of your energy and that you’re above such things. He likes it when you don’t use your chakra so he can work with you on regular medical skills and he might even use chakra strings to guide you.

Deidara~

Is so curious about your work like when you’re healing someone it’s never quiet for more than a minute because he has so. Many. Questions. It’s kind of endearing though, because besides art, he’s not this fascinated by anything else. He likes it when you heal him because unlike Sasori, you’re careful to make it as painless as possible.

Tries to stop you from healing Itachi as much as possible. Like if he sees him with an injury he’ll whisk you away on a date or something because he’s that petty. You probably healed his arms and he does about everything he can for you because he feels so indebted to you like he’s so in love with you it’s not even funny🥰

#akatsuki #itachi x reader #kisame x reader #pein x reader #konan x reader #sasori x reader #deidara x reader #hidan x reader #kakuzu x reader #requested

[misssophiachase]

Godspeed - Chapter 1 - Born Alone Die Alone

(I did post a sneak peek but this is chapter one in full and also posted on AO3) Thanks to everyone for leaving such lovely comments including @lilacsandorangeblossoms @sekretny13 @slstmaraudersjple @she-walked-away @kiaraalexisklay so far. 

Synopsis: Immortal destinies bring together two very different people in an uncertain world. But can they get past their budding chemistry in order to defeat the real enemy and take back what is rightfully theirs? (A Klaroline/The Old Guard story)

Mystic Falls, VA - February

Caroline woke up slowly, the smell of dried blood, stale beer and the invading light through the window blinds tickling her senses.

The room was still, her memory momentarily suspended as she searched for some signs of life throughout. If only she could remember what happened. Not that it was unusual to wake up without a shred of recognition after one of his unprovoked attacks.

Her neck hurt, so too the rest of her body riddled with visible scars and bruises. Although, as she slowly rubbed the offensive, purple mark on her shoulder, Caroline could swear it vanished just as quickly as it appeared so too the bloodied scar on her wrist.

Was she that confused? She generally didn’t complain because his abuse was frequent and targeted but waking up with a curious and attractive blonde staring down upon her shocked Caroline into forgetting that her injuries were healing at a rapid rate. 

And not because he was extremely good looking with an abundance of unruly stubble and curls. His dark, blue eyes staring deeply into hers were full of concern, something foreign to Caroline too. Then she focused lower on a pair of rich, crimson lips and a stray dimple that appeared no doubt on purpose.

“Caroline?” He knew her name and given the way he was suddenly cradling her neck as she laid splayed out on the ground made her unusually awkward. But at the same time she felt weirdly comfortable even if she had no idea who the hell this person was and why he was touching her.

“I don’t usually let people touch me so intimately,” she replied gruffly, attempting to move away even if it did ache. “Especially weird strangers staring at me in the afterlife."

"For starters, this isn't the afterlife and I'm not that weird," he shot back. "In fact, I pride myself on being the least weird person you've probably ever known."

"Am I in Hell? You’re Lucifer, right?”

“Should I be offended that you think I’m a fallen angel?”

“You have that kind of boisterous and arrogant nature about you.” He sent her a knowing smirk that meant he liked her assumption. “Calm down Romeo, not in a good way.”

“Way to ruin the mood, love,” he chuckled, his blue eyes lighting up animatedly. “But we do need to talk.”

“Is this how you pick up women?”

“Someone has a high opinion of themselves,” he joked. “No, let's just say we need to discuss the life and death of it all.”

“Why does that sound so morbid?”

“Because it is,” he shot back. “But don’t be discouraged, I’m here.”

“So, this is my worst nightmare?” His intense stare told Caroline that he wasn’t joking and that she’d somehow entered the twilight zone.

“I’m here to explain things.”

“Because you think I can’t save myself?”

“On the contrary, love, you’re going to save us all." For some reason those unexpected words broke through the haze and buoyed her mood considerably, although Caroline had no idea why.  

He placed his hands in hers, the warmth filling her body, and pulled her off the ground carefully. Caroline was trying to ignore the ensuing dizzy spells and the fact he looked so attractive and toned in the black pants and khaki vest combination.

"But right now we need to leave the country."

"I'm not leaving the country, I don't even know you," she hissed. "I need to buy milk, not to mention the fact I don't have my passport, actually I don't have anything," she rambled. "I can't just up and leave on a whim, mister. Clearly your intel on me didn't include my need to be prepared for everything. I wasn't the highest decorated Scout for nothing."

"Awww, did you sell those cute cookies?"

"Is that seriously your answer?" He gave her a look which said it was. "You're not going to let me go, are you?" Again a look that confirmed his sinister intentions. "I have a life here with my boyfriend.."

"Is that what you call him?" He growled and Caroline could sense his protectiveness. Given she didn't know him it was unexpected. "I haven't known you long, Caroline, but you can do so much better but we can discuss that later. Now, we need to get to the local airstrip and catch that flight before I kill him with my bare hands. And if you really need some milk, we'll pick it up in Paris."

"You're really going to throw Paris in the mix?" Caroline should have probably mentioned the fact that this stranger was going to kill Damon but for some reason it wasn't her most pressing concern right now.

"You're going to love the milk in France not to mention the baguettes."

"And you think that's going to make me go with you?"

"I'm hoping."

"I'm not that easy."

"That's why I like you, love."

#godspeed #klaroline fanfic #klaroline fanfiction #klaroline #misssophiachase #hope you like it so far

[autumn-foxfire]

Yeah I know it's unfair, but isn't that a reason in itself for why they should blame him? If they actually took responsibility then people would really start to think that the Commission isn't all that bad. Not sure how a team is gonna work? What would they do? Oh. I forgot, it is like the training camp. Wait, you think there's gonna need to be another press conference after this? And yeah what Plf is doing might not be good, but by the end of the series things will change for the better. (1)

I know violence isn't the only way to make change. I personally dislike it, same with consequences first. But in the series, that's just seems to be the only thing that will push the series towards it? And wait what dig, not knowing if wings will grow back, the rankings? Oh yeah that sounds rude. I meant it like 'this is all the ways the hero side has been damaged and now their no.2 can't even be an on-duty hero anymore' as for the deleted ask, ah hold on. (2)

I was just talking about how an idea of mine is that Hawks, if he wakes up might do so off-screen. And he might be very, err different somehow? I don't know how. Maybe he finds something to do. And mentally-physically looks super different too and we see him at a diff location doing the thing. Or do you think things might be like Marvel's Angel? Would he try to get his wings back, would AFO offer? We don't even know how Hawks is gonna react yet. Anger, sadness, acceptance? (3)

Oh you were just talking about Hawks being used as a scapegoat? I can see that happening. Especially if people start to point fingers at the HPSC for the failure. What people usually want is someone they can tear into and I’m sure the HPSC will do everything to make sure it’s not them that it happens too (even if they have to sacrifice Hawks to do so).

What I meant by a team is just support, missions like that can be very taxing psychologically, especially when you’re surrounded by an ideology very different from your own. Also, failure can’t be placed on just one person (say Hawks got caught, they could have had more moles that could get the information).

Anon, realistically, there will probably be a very big press conference. Especially with the death of the number 6 hero, potential death of the number 8 and the permanent injuries of the number 5 and number 2 (if Hawks has lost his wings forever). Also, they would have to adress the disappearence of the number 3 hero too (where it will probably come out if he’s alive or not.) This alone would probably shock society because of how many of the top ranked heroes have been killed or hurt and also brings to question whether the heroes are enough to protect them anymore if so many got taken out in one go.

I get what you mean by violence being the thing to push society forward but the reason I feel so strongly against it is because I don’t think we’ve seen the alternative first (I think maybe Destro tried before resorting to violence? I’m not sure). Also, it’s not even for a noble cause like a free society but rather a more selfish one, if that makes sense?

But that said, it should still cause a change. But in a more violent way then needed (Kind of like a harsh wake-up call).

When I said dig, I meant when you talked about Hawks hitting his head. I didn’t get what you meant, sorry.

Although hitting his head does open up some (probably cliche) routes. Say he got amnesia and doesn’t remember anything? Whatever happens, it’s going to affect Hawks in some way. Dabi revealing he was Endeavor’s son causes the question as to why Dabi is so against heroes to begin with. Which could lead to Hawks looking into Endeavor’s past. I’m curious how Hawks would react to learning about his hero’s less then decent past, especially when Hawks himself was saved from a bad situation by Endeavor and his desire to become a hero stems from him. It opens a new realm of possibilities. (Also don’t forget about Eri’s existence, her and her horn growth was hinted a lot in the previous arcs)

#bnha #bnha hawks #bnha meta #long post #thanks for the ask!! #I hope I've cleared somethings up! #Anonymous

[travellingmonk]

PART 1 - An Image That Predicts The Future 3 by Sunao Ari - Translated!!!

Now, to explain this a bit, I don't normally go out of my way for a doujinshi. (pain in the arse for me to translate with conversational Japanese and I am, by far, NOT an expert in the language.) However, this one I just HAD to know the story of and share. Because reasons. Fair warning, this is a Seiji x Touma story... where Seiji dies... and Touma takes it EXTREMELY BADLY... then dies, too. And the art style is consistent... but... eh... It's not comparable to Ken Mizuki or Lapis Homme art style. (to be honest, took me 3 times flipping through this, and the third time actually paying attention to the story being told, not the art style, before I picked up on the very emotional story that was unfolding. -_-U) So... yeah, if that upsets you, keep on scrollin' and pay no mind to this post.

If you're curious, then keep reading.

Now, to give you a VERY short version of these 3 pages, it’s a summary of what happened in the past 2 books (lordy only knows where a copy of them could be since this was released back in the early 1990′s).

Short version summary : Touma’s got a disease that’s landed his butt in the hospital. At first he lies and tells everyone he’s fine, but gets worse, thinks he’s gonna die, then goes all ‘Seiji! I love you!’ to which the blonde Trooper goes ‘I love you, too <3′. By the time Touma is well enough to leave the hospital, he catches sight of his boy on TV, severely injured, trying to whoop some Youja bad guy butt. Only to end up getting himself rushed into the hospital. Which ends up with the truth coming out that Seiji’s got cancer, has a month left to live, and life sucks. They decide to get married asap, with Touma giving Seiji a wedding ring.

Not long after, a new round of attacks from the Youja World (and Arago’s army) is unleashed on the city. Seiji knows he needs to be out there to help fight back and to form the Kikoutei armor, but he’s too weak and can barely move.

He prays / begs to Kaosu for help, saying he’d give his life if it means he can help stop this. Lo and behold, POOF! Seiji is magically made better, the Youja gate the baddies came through gets sealed up, all the bad guys are dealt with, and Seiji says goodbye as he walks into the magical sphere that will seal all of that evil away. Touma doesn’t take this well, AT ALL. He tries to stop Seiji, Shin attempting to hold Touma back, and, just like that, Seiji, the Youja bad guys, and the Youja gate are all gone.

Current book starts off by jumping well over a decade into the future with Shin, all grown up, with his now 8 year old daughter.

It’s a weird way to start this book, but we go from Shin and his daughter in the future, to back in the past after Seiji’s death.

Touma is not taking his friend’s / husband’s death well AT ALL. To the point he’s having violent nightmares, wakes up still being stressed / freaked out, and to where Nasutei has to use sedatives on him to make him calm down to any degree. Even then, he’s still in denial, and the others have to lie to him, saying that Seiji is out but that he’ll be back soon.

An exhausted Nasutei commenting (after he’s fallen back to sleep) commenting about why can’t he just accept Seiji’s death like everyone else has? Having Touma go through this is torture on all of them. Time flows ever onward and the warm weather turns cold. Touma gets past the worst of it, more or less, but is depressed and suicidal. To the point he locks his bedroom door, slits his wrists, and tries to bleed out. The others rescue him, get him to the hospital, to which, afterwords, comes back to Nasutei’s house where EVERYONE keeps an eye on him and makes sure anything sharp is locked away.

This stresses out everyone, and gets Shin, who’s been the most patient and compassionate of the bunch, to snap. Saying that Seiji wouldn’t have wanted his friend to behave this way, and that there’s no guarantee that if Touma WOULD die, that they’d end up meeting in the afterlife.

Things really aren’t made any easier when Kayura comes to visit and has news. Sure Seiji’s sacrifice was a noble one and did seal up that one location so no other evils, gates, or soldiers could return, but it’s messed up stuff to the point where any wickedness happens, a gate will appear and, well, we all know that the Earth isn’t the most peaceful place in the universe.

Touma gets upset, to the point he grabs her by the neck and slams her down onto the dining room table. Despite her best efforts, she’s unable to open the seal at all and reclaim Seiji’s body. At least if they had his body they could have a funeral and say a proper ‘farewell’. Eventually he releases her, then gets super depressed. One day while out on the the terrace with Ryou, a tree branch breaks and wallops Touma upside the head, giving him a nasty bleeding cut.

As his friends tend to the injury and stop the bleeding, Shin gives the blue haired Trooper a letter. After everything, Shin had claimed the bag of Seiji’s clothing and belongings from when he was in the hospital and, among the things is a letter addressed to Touma.

In the letter is a lock of Seiji’s hair and the letter basically reads ‘By the time you read this, I’ll be dead. Don’t be sad. Are you lonely? Are you alone? Go out and live your life. You still have one to live. Make me proud.’

That seems to be what it takes to snap Touma out of his mood and turns his whole world around. The next morning finds the Trooper of Tenku coming downstairs to breakfast wearing clean clothes, with the lock of hair tied to a necklace, and stating that he’ll be leaving the house soon. He’s decided to aim to become a doctor and to find a cure to the cancer that took Seiji’s life. (Line of logic here would probably be more like ‘if he hadn’t had that cancer, he wouldn’t have gotten so severely injured, and wouldn’t have had to sacrifice his life to safe the city. Hence, is all cancer’s fault that this happened’.)

Chapter 3 picks up in the future (or would this be considered the present?) with Doctor Hashiba getting called into surgery to save someone’s life.

The surgery went well. He gets praised. Then his mother decides to swing by for a visit. Half because she just won a Pulitzer Prize and wants to celebrate, and two, because she’s now got some time off from work to do so.

The only thing is, she’s got bad timing. This is Touma and Seiji’s wedding anniversary, and the anniversary / observance of when he died.

They have a bit of an arguement. She saying ‘I don’t want you to be alone’ and he saying ‘I’m not alone. I can’t love anyone else. Seiji was the only one in the world for me’. The conversation dies out when Shin arrives for a chat and Touma’s mother leaves. (And, yes, that IS Shin with the really long hair. I honestly think that Sunao Ari was channeling Shin’s early design from when the characters were still in developtment. Not even kidding, here.)

Anywho, onwards with the story~

Touma and Shin get to chatting. Shin’s here because, thanks to Touma, his daughter is cured of the same kind of cancer Seiji had. Today is the day she’s being released from the hospital and can go home. Touma asks if they’d seen Seiji’s inspirational statue out in front of the hospital. Shin has but his daughter hasn’t. She goes out to look? He sends her out to look? Not really clear on that, BUT, either way, she’s outside meandering about while the two men talk. The conversation is basically ‘everything changes, but it sure seems like Seiji / the memory of Seiji has never changed’. Touma makes an offhanded comment about his own disease and says that he knows / he has a feeling that he’s going to die soon.

Suddenly there’s noise from outside and, come to find out, Shin’s daughter (4 years old at this time) is out in the middle of the road. The two men race outside, with Touma being faster, and shoves her out of the way of danger.

Unfortunately, this lands Touma smack dab in the middle of traffic instead. And, well...

The headlights of a truck? ambulance? are all too familiar to the light that Seiji walked into all thos years ago. Just like that BAM!!!!

Shin rushes to his friend’s side and, understandably so, freaking out. (Pretty sure the pictures speak for themselves here. Also, TOUMA! NUUUU!!! I may be a loyal Ryou fangirl at heart but, TOUMA! NUUUUU!!!)

As Touma is dying in Shin’s arms, Seiji in angel form appears. Touma manages to whisper out the name of his beloved significant other before completely giving into death.

Is super sad. (DANG IT, SUNAO ARI! WHY MUST YOU HURT ME SO!? GWAAAHHH SUCH A SAD STORY!!!!!)

The story picks up later at Touma’s funeral. 

Despite the super sad atmosphere and Shin blaming himself for his friend’s death (’it’s my fault. I killed him.’ Shin, sweetie, no you didn’t. Your daughter wandered into traffic and Touma died saving her life. You didn’t do a thing! ~*sad hugs*~ ) Touma’s dead body had a gentle smile on its face. At least he died happy.

Around his neck is the same lock of Seiji’s hair from the letter so many years ago.

(Shut up, dun look at me! I’m not crying! You’re crying! Bwaaa~ :,( )

The story ends with Shin noticing the fact that it’s beginning to snow. In October. Too early.

He wonders if the snow is a sign that Touma and Seiji are now happy together, or sad.

Sunao Ari, I know it’s been decades since you made this story, probably the first time someone NOT Japanese has been able to read it, but I hope that where ever life finds you, that you’re doing well, are enjoying good health, and are no longer torturing Seiji and Touma. (not sure mah lil ol’ fangirl heart could take another book like this one from you! ^_^U) Well, that’s it. Hope you enjoyed the story and the fact that it was translated for your .... it’s not right to say ‘enjoyment’ here, is it? for your reading pleasure? ... still doesn’t sound right. ~*offers you soft tissues and a warm blanket after that story*~ excuse me whilst i go hunt down some cute pictures of fluffy kittens to console mahself with.

#Yoroiden Samurai Troopers Ronin Warriors Seiji Date Sage Date Rowne Hashiba Touma Hashiba

[angelynrostrand]

Chapter 14

Summary:  To the outside world, nothing should connect shy girl Angel Monroe and popular boy Xavier Hazelwood. But that isn't entirely true. They both hold secrets. Behind both of them lie 2 separate wolf packs. Xavier is well on his way to Alpha status and running the pack. Angel is not a wolf but instead the last healer in the world. When the realization comes forward that they are connected by destiny, will they decide to fulfill it? Is their connection predetermined by fate or will they choose their hearts? Lives and packs cross and mingle while romance and conflict brews. The story of 2 opposite souls on a collision path. Will destiny win out? Even the most innocent face, has the darkest secrets.

Word Count: 2,282

https://poshinsta.com/user/grungeliex

I feel weighed down by something. I open my eyes to find myself in my cottage, but with Xavier. We slept in each other's arms. I lay over his chest, but still comfortable to sleep with an injured leg. His arm draped over me making sure I don’t fall over the small couch. I look around. The books are still out. We must have talked and talked for hours until we both fell asleep. My disconnection from his body causes him to also wake up.

In his morning voice, he says, “Well...good morning to me.” He smiles as he notices our position.

“Morning,” I say as I start to leave the couch.

“No, you are not going anywhere.” He pulls me back.

“Xavier we need to get up.” I try once again but he won’t let go.

“No, I almost lost you. I am never letting you go.” I let him win this round. This is for him and I let him have it after everything last night.

“Fine. 5 more minutes.” I agree. We both stay together in each other arms and I can feel him combing the top of my hair. I smile and accept his cute affection.

After telling him the truth we talked and he had a bunch of question like always. I let him read most of my healer books and anything he could get his hands on. It might be annoying for some people when others go through your things. For me, it was refreshing not having to lie in front of his face. He was like a kid. Curious about everything and wanted to learn more about me.

“You have 2 more minutes,” I say playfully.

“I definitely have 3 more minutes,” he fights back.

“I think you need to check your watch. It might be broken.”

“It’s working just fine. How’s your leg? Are you in any pain?” He asks. He adjusts our bodies so we are both sitting up. He places me in between his legs and holds me around my waist. His fingertips brush my leg to touch the scar.

His touch surprises me. We have never been so close like this before. I can’t speak, I am too lost in his brown eyes when I turn around to look up at him. I could only shake my head no.

“Good.” He leans down to kiss me just like last night. “Are you sure?”

“Yes, I am fine. I am mostly sore It still hurt when I try to walk on it.” His hand is still on my scar.

“What happened in the bathroom anyway? I just remember you were bleeding and Rebecca crying. I have to admit when I was waiting in the hospital, I went to get cleaned up, your blood was on me and I got sick.”

“Sick?” I place my own hand on top of his.

“I threw up.” He laughs to play it off cool but I can tell he is embarrassed. “I went into shock. I could feel my heart dying a little.”

“I’m sorry,” I announce. After explaining the same story I told my father, my brother, and the police, he watches my expression and he is just as shocked about Rebecca’s life. “Also I have bone to pick with you.” I get mad and distance myself from him.

“What did I do?” He becomes sad when I move to the opposite side of the couch.

“You told the police about when Becca hurt me the first time. My father and brother got really mad. It didn’t help for Becca’s case.”

“Wait. They didn’t know?”

“No. You outed me.”

“Sorry, but they needed to know and for Rebecca, she deserved it for hurting you. I mean she has always been a bitch especially towards you. I do feel bad about her situation, but she could have killed you. I am sorry.” He says as he tries to fix his mistake.

“I know, but please don’t tell anyone else my personal information especially my family. They don’t need to worry.”

“But Angel…”

“Xavier please,” I beg. He only nods and moves closer to me. Before he can though, there is a knock on my door. Eric walks in. “Eric!” Both Xavier and I stand up from his intrusion.

“What the hell is going on here? Why is he wearing my clothes?”

“Are you more worried about Xavier or the clothes?” I try to lighten the mood.

“My clothes of course. Just be glad I’m not father.” He casually sits down. I'm confused. Why isn’t he exploding or pushing Xavier out?

“Ya, thank goodness.” Xavier looks just as confused as I do.

“Did you just get here?” Eric asked.

“Ya.” I lie. If he knew Xavier stayed the night then he’ll really blow up.

Luckily, Xavier gets the memo and lies with me. “I just got here a couple of hours ago. We were talking since we didn’t finish last time.”

“Is there something you need?” I ask Eric.

“Yes, I need you.” He says and I raise my eyebrows. “Today you start your physical therapy with Trevor.”

“What time?”

“At 12, which is in an hour.”

“I should get going anyways. Do you want them?” He refers to the clothes. “I’m just going back in wolf form.”

“Yes please,” Eric answers before I can.

I roll my eyes. “Ya, just leave them outside.”

“I’ll call you.” Xavier exits out of the cottage and I can tell he wants to hug me goodbye or something, but my brother’s presence was hindering his intentions. That could have been worse, but I am grateful for my brother keeping his cool.

“Angel! What the hell? Why was he here?” Never mind he isn’t cool. He just pretended to appear cool and collected in front of Xavier

“I told you we were talking and he promises to keep my secret.” I whisper, “ Please don’t yell at me. You don’t like it when I do it to you so don’t do it to me.” I stand up for myself.

“You’re right. I am sorry.” He stands up. When he apologized it made him remember that he isn’t father. “I’m sorry I didn’t mean to yell at you but he knows..?”

“He knows everything. I told him everything.” I finish his sentence.

“Come on we are going to be late.” He changes the subject. I am not sure if he is upset that I told Xavier everything, but it is not his choice. Of course, he did make a big fit about Xavier wearing his clothes and that it only took seconds for me to allow him in my cottage. Since I still fight father and Eric to stay out.

We both make our way to Trevor’s office and are welcomed by father’s appearance. All four of us sit inside Trevor’s office and he is giving us my recovery progress. I notice my father’s sleepy eyes and dark circles under his eyes. I hate that he works himself to the bone.

I refocus when Trevor says, “You’ll back to normal in a week only if you stay in bed for the rest of week. Understand. You almost tore your stitches. The more you rest the faster you recover. You are on bed rest for the remainder of the week.” I nod. I am slightly frightened by Trevors demanding a voice.

My father speaks first.“Thank you for everything, Dr. Shirley. Angel, I am serious you will be in your room for the rest of the week. Jesus will give you all your meals and he will be there if you need anything. I do not want you leaving your room.” Is this my father’s way ‘grounding’ me? For being with Xavier. Does know he stayed last night? “Eric make sure your sister does not escape her room while I am gone.”

“Wait where are you going?” He looks tired and almost sick. He shouldn’t be traveling.

“I have some business meetings in France. I’ll be back in 9 days or so. Sorry, I forgot to mention but you know the drill. Eric is in charge and now you must stay in the house.” He says,  reminding me all of the rules for when he travels.

He is not even going to help me back to recover. He just has others do it for him. “Why do you have to leave? Why can’t you stay?” I beg for my father but at this point, I beg for a father.

“I am sorry love, I need to go. Eric and Dr. Shirley keep me updated on her condition. I’m going to be late for my flight.” He checks his watch. Wait he is leaving now and is just telling me this. I know I have been avoiding him but I thought I would have some time with him. “Stay safe and I’ll see you later. I love you both.” We walk him to the car and see all of his bags in the car with him. He kisses our heads before leaving. Bye, father.

This week has been painful not because of my leg but because I am dying of boredom. I am actually recovering fast like how Dr. Shirley promised. Jesus’s kind soul has not left my side for this whole week but he is suffocating me. I appreciate him, but I think he is so invested in my recovery because he feels like it is his fault for my injury. Every hour I would give him pointless errands to run for me. He will do them with a smiling face. But as the days go by he would come to my daily check-ups with Dr. Shirley.

While Jesus is gone, I mostly watch tv or do some small artwork.

As I am watching tv and my attention was pulled in by my phone’s notification, a new text from Sage.

Sage: Hey, sorry I haven’t texted you in a while I have been super busy a work. I was wondering how you are feeling?

Angel: Don’t worry I understand and thank you for thinking about me. I am fine but on bed rest for the week.

Sage: Oh no, are you sure you are ok? Would it be ok if I come over and pay a visit?

Would it be okay? I ask myself. Sage’s reply makes my thumbs stop moving. I don’t know. I would love the new company but Sage doesn’t know my secret rich lifestyle. No does. My father never said I couldn’t have visitors. I texted back with my address and “I would love that, thank you .”

I notify the gatekeeper to let in Sage when she arrives. My brother accepts Sage’s surprise visit. I text Jesus to bring Sage to my room or she will get lost. Plus he can direct her to the proper area just in case she finds wolves roaming around.

Within minutes, I got a text from Jesus saying “Got her. We are coming up.”

I prepare myself and make sure I look decent enough for the living. Soon Jesus opens my door with Sage.

Sage rushes in my room with a hand full of flowers and a big sigh of relief. “Angel oh my god. How are you?” she sits on my bed to give me a hug.

“I’m fine. Thank you for coming.” I say as she hands me my flowers. “Thank you for the flowers.”

“I’m just glad you are feeling better. I am sorry I could visit you sooner.”

“No, you're fine.” I try to ease her worry. I notice her eyes looking around her surroundings. “Sage just ask. I know you’re curious.”

“Well you live in a palace, you have a gatekeeper and is Jesus a servant? And I’m curious about the shooting.”

“Ya, I am rich. Well, my father is wealthy and he likes his privacy. Jesus is my friend but officially he is a servant, at least in my father’s eyes.”

“I never thought you were one of those rich girls. Is everyone rich at our school?” she asks herself. Our school is known to have wealthy families.

“I try to keep my home life private from my school life.”

“So I bet you want to keep it that way?” She asks.

“Yes, please.” I smile and hope she will agree.

“Don’t worry, I respect that. Compare to most rich girls at our school. They always flash us with their jewelry, clothes, and their cars. Well, I’ll keep your secret.” It seems like everyone has been keeping my secrets.” I’m not here to gossip or to report back to a journalist for money. I generally want to make sure you are okay and feel better.”

“Sage don’t worry, I trust you.” I do. She is my first friend from school to be at my house. Minus Xavier but he is a wolf. Sage is normal. I do trust her to be in my house.

“Good. I just want to know because all I know about the shooting is whatever shit they are pouring on tv.”

Sage and I talk back and forth about the false reports. We both laugh about the dumb interviews from “my friends” saying “We are keeping Angel in our prayers.” Underneath the laughter, there is a  sense of anger. It is a shame that they want to be my friend just for their 15 minutes of fame. I am glad Sage was able to visit me. It was the best way to finish my week. After Sage’s visit, Dr. Shirley comes to my room to give me the all-clear for school tomorrow. Whatever Sage did, she healed me. 

#in an ordinary world #healer #soulmates #writing #werewolf #wolf pack

[waif-of-the-night]

Supernatural rewrite

Prologue

Chapter 1

Rewrite Masterlist

Masterlist

Summary: You are a hunter and have been hunting alone for the past three years now. You parents are dead and you still don't know their killer. You are a human or so you think of yourself but there's something wrong about you and you know that but you've never told anyone about your little secret. You've heard of the Winchester brothers from other hunters, the brothers who killed the yellow eyed demon, azazel but now what happens when you actually meet them?

Warnings : language maybe, otherwise nothing really

A/n : Okay, this is my first attempt at writing so please be kind and also this rewrite starts from somewhere between season 4 because that's when the reader first meets the Winchesters. Some chapters from the start won't be aligned with the series because I need some things to straighten out before we get on track. Okay so enough of this rambling, happy reading! :)

It was just a normal day for you. You had been hunting for years now, 3 years to be exact. You had adapted to the hunting life quite good till now, in 3 years you had become a great hunter, a hunter who was fierce and had no intention of giving in just yet. You hunted alone, but you did make some friends and valuable contacts in your time hunting to help in times of need. You started the day by reading through the newspaper to find any incident weird enough to look into. You woke up exhausted from the last hunt when you killed a werewolf but lucky enough to not get any serious injuries. You freshened yourself up and went through the newspaper while taking a sip from a half empty beer bottle that you got from a liquor shop just near the motel you were staying at for now. You spotted news in the newspaper about a murder in Moline, Illinois, of a 20 year old woman, Melissa Frost, with her body fully drained of blood and the body found in her apartment by her roommate. The case looked like a possible vampire hunt to you so you decided to check the thing out. You quickly packed your stuff in the duffle bag you always carried, checked your gun securely bound in your waistband and the two knifes placed inside your boots , checked out of the motel and headed towards your car. It was a 1966 Chevy camaro which you took much pride to call your own. You weren’t that far from the place so you made the trip in 5 hours and checked into a motel which looked good enough for a few nights.

++++++++++++

It wasn’t much time after Dean was raised from perdition by Castiel, the Angel of the Lord, that Dean found out about Sam and Ruby’s little alliance to find and kill Lilith. Dean still could not wrap his hand around the idea of Ruby helping Sam by making him drink demon blood in order to be powerful enough to kill Lilith and stop the apocalypse, but he didn’t really have a choice so he kept it to himself. They were looking for any leads on finding Lilith before she broke more seals but all they had this far was nada. So they decided to work on a possible vampire case in Moline.

The Winchesters arrived into town on the next Thursday a day after you arrived at the town police station posing as FBI, Agent Argent. Sam and Dean were in there usual fake FBI outfits of formal and sophisticated suits and tie. They entered the town sheriff’s office to find the sheriff talking to a woman who appeared to be in her mid 20s, with (y/h/l) (y/h/c) hair tied into a neat ponytail and (y/e/c) eyes. She too was dressed in formal pants and blazer and had a professional stance. As soon as they were about to interfere their chat, the woman turned around and started walking towards the door, while not taking notice of the two young men standing in the office. As soon as the woman left, Dean introduced Sam and himself as Agent Riggs and Agent Smith while holding out his leather batch, Sam doing the same. “ Hello officers, I’m Sheriff Tacker. I gotta be honest , Didn’t think FBI would be this interested in the murder of one lady, that they would send three officers on it.” Said sheriff with a look of confusion on his face. Sam asked him what he meant by three officers to which the sheriff told him that the woman who talked to him about the case before them was also an FBI Agent. Sam and Dean exchanged a look and then continued their interrogation about the murder. From what the Sheriff could tell them it was clear that it was a vampire nest they were facing. They were surviving on blood bags but looked like a vampire went rogue and hence the murder.

++++++

They checked themselves in the first motel they could find, Golden Bay Motel was the name of it, little did they know that there was another hunter living in the same motel, coincidently in room right next to theirs. You were already in your room researching after interrogating some witnesses and relatives to find any leads on the location of the nest. From what you gathered you were sure that the vampire who attacked the vic followed her from a bar she visited that night, and the vamp jumped her on her way home or was with her from the bar, so you decided to visit that bar tonight. There was still light outside therefore you had time to kill so you thought of visiting the library you saw in the town when you first rolled in, to maybe brush up on some lore. You were scrolling your hands through some books neatly arranged in the library shelf. You already had two books in your hand and was taking out a third one using your free hand when a tall frame of a man collided with you making all three books fall on the ground making a large sound in a rather quiet library. You quickly crouched down picking up your books, face red from embarrassment of people looking in your direction when the person you had collided with also bent down helping you with the books muttering apologies on repeat. You were soon standing straight again with the books clutched to your chest like they would fall again. “I’m really sorry I wasn’t looking. Are you okay? I’m really really sorry” You finally looked up to the man. He was tall, not average tall, but gigantic tall with muscular built. He had hazel eyes and long brown hair. His cheeks formed dimples as he spoke and you could see he was genuinely apologizing for bumping into you. “It’s okay, really.” Was all you could say.  He noticed the books in your hand; they were about some east Indian folklore. “I can see we have similar taste in reading, is that so?” You saw his eyes and replied “Yea I guess, I’ve always been curious about this stuff”. You gave him a hearty smile. “By the way I’m Sam.” he said giving out a hand to shake. “Jamie” you lied while shaking his hand as firmly as you could, his hand being almost twice the size of yours. He took his hand back and shove them into his pockets. He opened his mouth as if he was about to say something but was interrupted by the sound of another man taking his name assumingly from behind the shelf. “Uh I gotta go but it was nice meeting you Jamie” “likewise”. You gave the man a smile and went off towards the other corner of the library.

Sam and Dean were in the library to figure out more about Lilith and how to stop her. “Who was that?” dean asked sam while carrying some books from the shelf to a nearby table. Sam sat across Dean at the table before he answered, eyes still searching for the girl thinking he’ll see her again. “Jamie, I bumped into her while looking for this” said Sam while holding up a fat hardcover book in his hand. Dean started reading through the books he got without giving it much thought but Sam couldn’t focus on the task at hand. His mind kept wondering back to the girl, her beautiful (y/e/c) eyes and her smile. But that wasn’t the only thing that occupied his head, it was also the fact that she looked oddly familiar, like he had seen her before but he couldn’t figure out where. It was because he in fact had seen you, at the sheriff’s station but it was only for a brief second, not enough for him to recognise you on meeting again.

++++++++

Soon it was dark enough for you to get back on the case, to take down a vampire nest, by yourself. You were prepared for it, it wasn’t the first time you were taking on a task that big on your own. With this, you entered the diner where you were hoping you’d find the vamp who’ll lead you to the nest. You sat on a stool at the bar and ordered a beer. You had a careful eye on everyone around you, for anything out of the ordinary. A few minutes passed by before you saw a young woman leaving the diner, alone, and a shady looking, head to toe covered in black, following the woman while keeping some distance. You knew this was your cue and you instantly pulled out a twenty dollar bill from your pocket and kept it on the bar counter, telling the bartender to keep the change and hurrying towards the door to follow the woman with the vamp on her heals. You saw them take a turn towards a dark alley and then in a split second the vamp was dragging the woman towards a turn ahead, one hand gripping her shoulder tightly and shoving her ahead despite her resisting with all her strength, other hand on her mouth making her cries for help almost inaudible to you. You sprinted towards the vamp with your machete now in your dominant hand ready to slice the motherfucker’s head off. Just when you reached near enough to swing the weapon in hand, you felt a hand griping your hand with much force, making the machete fall from your hand. It was another vampire. The sudden force on your wrist made you slightly whimper from the pain which made the first vampire now notice you, a huge grin forming on his face showing off his fangs, when he saw you, with his friend holding you by your wrist. “We got ourselves a hunter today, I’m sure she tastes far better than that blonde you got there brother” the vampire holding you said looking at you with hunger filled eyes. The other vampire let go of the blonde woman and she ran away as fast as she could. The vampires didn’t care about her getting away because they knew no one would believe her if she said that a vampire attacked her. You were quick to think, and while they both were distracted by the running woman you pulled the Kukri blade from your boots with the help of the free hand and without any delay, the vampire grabbing you had his head chopped off. Seeing this, the other pounced at you with all his strength, ready to turn your body to shreds. He threw you against the wall, knocking all the air out of your lungs. You saw your machete lying near you on the floor so you rapidly move your arm to grab it when you notice two more figures appearing close to your right side. They seem to be yelling something but you can’t make out there exact words. You now had your machete with you when you saw that the vamp had already paid attention to the new man, as a result of which, the taller of the two was lying face front on the floor struggling to get up while the other, shorter one, was fighting off the vamp. You saw the sight and without wasting much time sprinted towards them and just as the vamp was about to sink his long fangs into the man’s neck, you sliced his head apart from his body. You gave a hand to the man, but he refused it and got up on his own with a smug look on his face. He hastily reached the other man who was now sitting up, tending to a wound on his left arm. You noticed the man carefully in the dim lighting of the alley and it didn’t take much time for you to realise that it was Sam, who you met at the library the same afternoon. You were standing at some distance from the men, when Sam noticed you and istantly recognised you.

“You’re the girl from the library”

“I am. You okay there?”

“Yea uh- ” He was cut by Dean’s voice

“Who are you anyway?” he said with a look that was a mixture of curiosity and arrogance.

“I’m the girl who saved your ass, you’re welcome btw”

“Yea well I didn’t ask for your help.”

You rolled your eyes at his response and started walking away while cleaning your bloody machete with the side of your sleeve. You were almost out of the alley when you heard Sam yelling your name making you stop and turn around. He was pacing towards you, while keeping pressure on his wounded arm with his other arm. “Jamie” he said stopping a few inches from you. You turned now giving him your full attention. “Uh sorry for my brother Dean there, he can be like that sometimes, but thank you for your help.”

You studied his face for a while before replying with your lips pressed in a faint smile.

“It’s fine. Well, I’d say, didn’t take you for a hunter”

“I didn’t take you for a hunter either. You hunt alone?”

“Mostly yea, and I take you hunt with your brother?”

“Yes, I do. Wait, so you mean you were going to take on a possible whole vampire nest on your own?” sam said with surprised tone. “Wasn’t going to be the first time, but luckily this time it was just these two idiots and not a whole nest” you said while waving your hand towards one of the vampire corpses.

By now his brother Dean had walked upto Sam, and stood next to him with a confused expression.

“What is your name? Really?” it was dean doing the talking now.

"What makes you think Jamie isn't my real name?"

"Well, the fact that you took a second to turn when Sam called for you would be it." Dean have you a smug look.

You had heard of Sam and Dean, the brothers who killed azazel from some other hunters before, but you didn’t show them that you had heard of them. You were considering whether you should give them your real name or not, and you came to the conclusion by telling them your real name – (Y/f/n) (y/l/n)

You saw the two brothers conversing something through their eyes when Sam abruptly said “You can hunt with us if you want”. He had a hoping smile on his face but his brother looked at him dumbfounded. You were quick to answer because well, it wasn’t the first time someone had been nice and offered to be a hunting partner, but you had your own issues. “Thanks for the offer but I’m not exactly team play type. And I got a place to be so I need to go.” With this you thought the conversation was over but then Dean added to it by asking “Why not?” His expressions unchanged. It was visible that he had some suspicions now in his head regarding you. “I choose not to answer that” was all you said, before leaving the two men behind and ending the conversation for good.

++++++++++

“Man I’m telling you there’s something wrong with that girl” Dean said while opening the door to the driver’s side of the Impala. Sam was standing at the passenger side with one hand on the roof of the Impala and the other on the door’s handle. “Dude she’s a hunter and she saved you, what the hell are you talking about?” “I’m talking about the fact that she was going to take on a whole vampire nest on her own. I mean who in their right mind would do that?” “Maybe she’s just a hella good hunter” The passenger side door was now flew opened by the younger Winchester and he was about to get in when Dean came back with another argument. “Okay, maybe she is a hella good hunter” he said with a sarcastic tone. “But what about the fact that she turned down our offer without even taking a second and didn’t even care to give a reason. Sam, I’m telling you I’m getting real Ruby vibes from her.” With the last words leaving Dean’s mouth, Sam shoved himself into the passenger seat and closed the door with a loud thud. Dean quickly realised that his remark including Ruby was responsible for him getting such reaction from Sam. He sighed remembering the fact that the reason they came on his hunt was to have a break from everything regarding Ruby or Demon blood or Lilith but he had ripped open the bandage with his remark about you. The ride following the incident was a rather quiet one.   

Chapter 2

#dean x reader #deanxreader #sam x reader #samxreader #supernatural #supernatural rewrite #supernatural fanfic #fan fiction #spn fanfic #spn rewrite #supernatural fandom #reader insert #sam winchester #dean winchester

[danschkade]

PAGE x PAGE ANALYSIS — ‘THE SHADOW STRIKES!’ #13 (1990)

PUBLISHED: DC Comics, October 1990

SCRIPT: Gerard Jones

PENCILS/INKS: Eduardo Barreto

LETTERS: John Workman 

COLORS: Anthony Tollin 

EDITORIAL: Brian Augustyn

THE SHADOW STRIKES! is high on my list of favorite ongoing series ever. As far as I’m concerned, of the many four-color iterations of The Shadow, this is the one that truly gets it right. The Shadow of STRIKES! is a lurking, manipulating hybrid of The Phantom of the Opera and John Wick, the action of the series playing out mainly through the perspectives of his agents and his criminal quarry. This book is tight, hard-edged, and restrained; it avoids a lot of hacky pulp comics pitfalls because it understands that the original Walter Gibson Shadow novels weren’t “trying to be pulpy” — they were trying to be lean, lurid action thrillers. This is almost entirely down to writer Gerard Jones, but it works better than anywhere else in the issues drawn by the artist that defined the look and feel of the series — Eduardo Barreto. STRIKES! sometimes suffers from being the type of lower budget 80’s/90’s DC book where the fill-in issues can be sloppy to unreadable and the truly great issues mainly succeed by virtue of being the product of creators who weren’t really being watched that closely, but that doesn’t mean I’m grading on some kind of a curve when I say the truly great issues are truly great. 

Today, we’re looking at one of those issues — the second installment of an amazing four-part storyline that sees The Shadow, along with his most trusted agent Margo Lane and the begrudgingly complicit Inspector Cardona, taking his private war on crime from their habitual New York haunts to the streets of Chicago. In this analysis, I’ll be looking at how tightly Barreto’s pencils and inks hew to Jones’ script, and how the diligence of colorist (and Shadow historian) Anthony Tollin actively facilitates the near-seamless transitions between the plot’s many storylines. This is a full comic that never feels crowded, a dense comic that keeps light, and a very comic booky comic book that never loses sight of the emotional reality of what it’s depicting. 

THE SHADOW STRIKES! #13 and all characters contained therein are property of DC Comics and/or Conde Nast Publications, reproduced here solely for educational purposes.

COVER

I love how conceptually simple this cover is. Graphic, understated buildings. A mostly obscured main character. Smoke and mist wafting around for a little atmosphere. There’s only one thing that’s clearly rendered — a tommy gun, unfired. The Shadow is usually depicted using handguns, so him holding this universal visual signifier for “MOB STORY” immediately lets you know what you’re in for. And that’s even without the blurb at the top. You wanna see The Shadow fight the Chicago Mob? I know I wanna see The Shadow fight the Chicago Mob.

PAGE ONE

Something THE SHADOW STRIKES! does particularly well is maintaining the balance between mainstream comic book sensibility and HBO subject matter without making either seem out of place. We open with a prime example — the hand acting in panels one through four clearly conveys uncomfortable reality of a woman having sex she doesn’t enjoy with a man she doesn’t like. This transitions to her reaching over to grab a cigarette and light up in panels five and six (along with the barb “what was even quicker than usual” for those in the back). This establishes her as our POV character for the scene, something every scene going forward will have in some form or another. The point of this opening scene is to establish bad guy mobster Anthony ‘Half-Step’ Sbarbarro as a detestable macho prick in his personal as well as professional life. By identifying with this woman, we share her lack of fulfillment and, soon, her ongoing victimization. We quickly learn to hate Half-Step by seeing him through her eyes. We also see a hint of a gun in a shoulder holster, in case you didn’t realize what kind of comic you’re about to read.

PAGE TWO

This page validates the bad feeling we got about Half-Step on the previous page. Not only so we establish the leg injury that gives him his nickname, we show how petty and violent he is. Note how loose his fingers are as he strikes her in panel four — it’s a casual, low-effort act in between tying his tie and pulling on his pants, and it absolutely demolishes her. Half-Step is a powerful man who callously uses that power to abuse those weaker than him. The scene ends on her, leaving us stewing in the emotional trauma Half-Step leaves behind him. Imagine a version of this scene that focuses on him instead of this nameless woman; his hands on the first page instead of hers, him walking out into the hall in this last panel instead of her crying into her pillow. One version of the scene encourages you to identify with Half-Step, or, jesus, maybe even thrill in his violent savoir faire. This other version shows him for the monster he is by humanizing the people around him.

PAGE THREE

Chick Heck — a dynamite name — catches us up on the events of the previous issue and shows us pictures of the main players so we’ll recognize them when we see them later. While Joe O’Hara is mainly just a quippy mannequin to help Chick with the recap, there’s some great staging between him and the showgirl in the first couple panels. She’s way too smart for him, and even though she’s constantly placed in positions of power in her panels (larger than him in panels one and three, walking past/in front of him in panel two) he just keeps checking out her legs with the unearned confidence of a white man with a little hair.

PAGE FOUR

More concise, well-written recapping, which Barreto livens up even further with a variety of camera angels and some cool lighting and drapery. We see Half-Step (who I keep accidentally and only quasi-understandably calling “Johnny Stomp” before correcting myself) near the end of the page, connecting this scene to the last and reminding us how much we would like for somebody to kill him. Chick does us a final narrative solid by setting us up for the next page with a great dramatic line.

PAGE FIVE

And now, after getting to know the distinct personalities and motivations of five characters across four pages, we get our title page. The Shadow stretches out onto the scene, speaking like goddamn Dracula and dressing the part. Between Barreto’s smoky effects* and Tollin’s icy, atmospheric coloring, The Shadow really feels like a different kind creature than anything else in the book. Also worth mentioning is John Workman’s great work on the issue’s title, with the rigid ‘B’ adding extra viciousness to the sketchy, violent ‘UTCHERS.’

*I was curious how exactly Barreto achieved this affect. I consulted with Jesse Hamm and Lukas Ketner, and the consensus is that Barreto probably drew these pages on coquille board, using graphite or lightly-applied colored pencil for the smaller areas of texture and watercolor sponge with white gouache, or possibly even just correction fluid, for the large smokey areas. If any collectors or collaborators of Mr. Barreto know otherwise, please let me know. I’m still curious. 

PAGE SIX

This page does a great job of immediately changing the focus of the scene from The Shadow to old man Romanowski. The Shadow is a non-character who will never learn anything new about himself or struggle with a decision, so the drama of the series usually centers around how ‘normal’ people react to him. In this case, it’s the equally resolute Romanowski, whose whole motivation is neatly laid out in the first three panels. “And I will owe NOTHING... to NOBODY...Not even YOU,” Mr. Devil-Man With A Gun. 

There’s a nice leftward motion as Romanowski tries to hustle this intruder out of his house, followed up by the overwhelming rightward motion of The Shadow as he silences the old man and makes his final pitch. This panel’s layout, its placement on the page, and even Tollin’s blue coloring all loosely mirror the Half-Step slap on page two; I think this is the first instance in the issue of the creative team setting up parallels between the two men. The Shadow also possesses a frightening degree of physical power, but he uses it carefully. He’s scary, but not dangerous. Or at least less dangerous. He’s not actively a woman-beater, how about that. The two panels in question, so you can draw your own conclusions:

Continuity note: the money on the floor in panel two carries over from the previous issue — Tad came to his father asking for money to pay out his gambling debts, and Romanowski, enraged at his son’s weakness, grabs glass jars containing his savings and smashes them to the floor, yelling “take it! Take it!” He uses jars because he doesn’t trust the banks — having his own money during the stock market crash was what allowed him to grow his business to what it is today. This goes further toward establishing that Romanowski sees himself as a man who doesn’t owe anything to anybody. This scene here doesn’t rely on that information, but it’s useful garnish, no?

PAGE SEVEN

Tad’s brief show of spine on the previous page immediately melts once The Shadow leaves — Barreto keeps him wobbling and weak while his father is still and resolute. The scene transitions from being about Romanowsky the senior to being about Tad, tears in his eyes as he speeds away. The last panel switches it again to the Shadow, watching silently from high above. Note how Barreto makes liberal use of the graphite shading, but leaves The Shadow’s hat and Tad’s car flat, highlighting them by omission. And man, how insane is this angle? We somehow see the train and the car at the same time without it feeling forced. The complexity of the El Tracks The Shadow’s hanging on might at first seem punishingly complicated, but I think it’s actually the parallel beams of that structure that makes the warped perspective visually legible in the first place. Using something difficult to depict something impossible. Eduardo Barreto. I tell ya.

PAGE EIGHT

This page gives us what I like to call ‘an artificial action beat.’ The Shadow catching a ride on this train is hardly a conventional action set piece, but it’s a splashy, physically extraordinary Thing That Is Happening and it breaks up a couple of dialogue-heavy scenes. It also gives us a private moment from The Shadow, helping us like him as our macroprotagonist by seeing him successfully doing something difficult. How do we know it’s difficult? The acting in his face in panel two, plus the fact that he loses his hat. On some level we know he can’t fly or teleport, but seeing him actually have to put effort into getting around helps us identify with him, without sacrificing too much of his mystery. 

At the bottom of page: the return of shaky Tad. Jones does a good job of keeping small NPC type characters around, like the singer in panel four, making their Chicago feel full. It’s easy for large-cast crime comics like this to start to feel like the only people in the world are the people involved in the case in question; bizarrely, this can actually serve to make the case seem less important. What’s so bad about bad guys if there’s no society at large to be threatened by them? 

PAGE NINE

Georgie Katomeris’ office (containing Georgie, Tad and Half-Step) and Frank Nitty’s drawing room (containing Nitti, Jake Guzik, and Half-Step again after some passage of time) are indistinguishable from each other as Barreto draws them, but are still kept distinct by three things. One is Jones’ dialogue — the ellipsis in that precedes Nitti’s panel three dialogue indicates a jump in time. Another is Nitti’s smoking jacket — he wouldn’t be going out in it, so we must have changed locations from the office to his private residence. The last and most effective is Tollin’s coloring — the grey of George’s office gives way to the green walls of Nitti’s drawing room. I admit this transition felt abrupt to me at first read, but these three clues let me easily find my footing again.

PAGE TEN

We spent the first two pages of the issue showing Half-Step to be detestable; now we show him to be truly dangerous. His patience and planning further draw him into parallel with The Shadow — having him tell a story that essentially ends with “I could have killed the President of the United States but didn’t want to because of my deeply held principles” does a great job of showing us his crazy ego and, more importantly, his ambition. The point of the end of this scene is clear: this is not someone who’ll willingly stay in a subordinate role forever. But he’s not just going to throw his weight around. He’s going to be smart about it. Note how he goes from very small in panel five, cut off by the top of the panel, to large in panel six, crowding Nitti into the corner. 

PAGE ELEVEN

Half-Step dominates his half of the page. The heavy shadowing on his face in panel three indicates there’s something dark going on in his mind. The other half of the page is all about The Shadow. We finally have the two of them in the same location here, with the Shadow placed in a position of power — the low angle of his glory shot in panel five, the fact that Half-Step doesn’t know he’s being watched. They’re even sort of almost facing each other down, with Half-Step facing left in panel three and the Shadow creeping in towards the right in panel five. But like Half-Step, The Shadow won’t just smash in guns ablaze— he’s playing a longer game. This page really sets them up as worthy enemies, with a lot of good, or at least better, people caught in the metaphorical crossfire between them.

PAGE TWELVE

Here we finally catch up with Inspector Cardona, Brenda Shield, and Margo Lane, who Chick Heck introduced us to by proxy in his earlier scene. This page has what for my money is the only real misstep this issue makes; although Margo and Cardona are both name-checked on this page, Brenda is not, and it’s been so long since the Heck scene that it’s asking a lot of the readers to remember her by sight — especially since there isn’t really much going on with her design to visually distinguish her, big polka dot bow or not. That said, this page does still somehow manage to give us that cool, spacious three-panel sequence of Cardona walking away from the ladies only to be waylaid by The Shadow while still leaving room for a nice big ‘Identify With This Character Please’ shot of Margo in the penultimate panel. Jones also manages to give us clear ideas of both Margo and Cardona’s characters, their dynamic with each other, AND their individual dynamics with the Shadow while he’s at it. Lastly, I like Tollin’s choice to give Margo a Green color scheme, making her instantly as visually distinct in the issue as the Shadow in his blacks and reds. For a page that makes the issue’s one arguable mistake, it sure does a hell of a lot right. 

PAGE THIRTEEN

Half-Step is back, haunting the plot just like the Shadow does. Seems to be a theme of men preying on women in this issue — let’s keep an eye on that going forward. Note how much real estate on the page is given up, letting the panels float around; this is used in the top half to separate Half-Step from the other guys in the car, painting his “Like I’m gonna break this city down” line as an unthinking quasi-crazy utterance, as well as to separate Margo and Brenda from the gossiping nightclub crowd in the bottom half.

PAGE FOURTEEN

Here we explain Brenda’s stakes in this scene. Even if you don’t empathize with her high-society worries, it’s worth noting that Jones has made clear through action and dialogue that every character in every scene has something they want, need, and/or fear, and Brenda is no exception. Tollin draws attention to the dreaded encroachment of gossip in the last panel with a change in background color from a neutral yellow to a threatening orange. 

Now, bear in mind, Margo might be genuinely supportive here, but all of what he’s saying about herself is a lie. There is no Dick. She's never met the Hartes. She’s working Brenda as per the Shadow’s orders — she and her fellow agents are basically Ocean’s Eleven if Danny Ocean decided to start dressing like Doctor Sax and fighting crime, and if that means pulling a hustle on a pie-eyed heiress, then I guess that’s just what's on the agenda for the evening. 

(Fun personal trivia: This comic came out the month my girlfriend was born. She also sort of has the face Barreto gives most women he draws. Coincidence? One wonders.)

PAGE FIFTEEN

Margo is the only person in this issue who gets an internal monologue, which she uses here to reveal the way her charade chafes, but also the freedom she feels from being anonymous, from being unconnected to her past mistakes. So, of course, enter: the man who knows all her secrets, here to spoil her reverie. This scene takes place in the ladies room — another example of a man trespassing against a woman, except that while our gangsters are doing it for personal gain, the Shadow (here unsexed and dehumanized to the point of being almost a silhouette) does it in service of his theoretically higher calling. He dominates panel four, almost encircling her. Margo’s body language tells it all — not afraid, but very uncomfortable. We keep the scene in her perspective by cutting from the Shadow in panel five to Brenda in panel six, both more or less in her literal point of view. Note again how Barreto employs negative space above and below the final panel to create a zoom-in effect on Brenda’s eyes. 

PAGE SIXTEEN

More Big Sister Margo; see how she controls Brenda’s body in panels one through three. Half-Step is inside now — I think we’re supposed to infer that he’s responsible for loosing the rumor that’s upsetting Brenda. A slightly abstract example of a man invading a female space? I might be reaching, there. 

Barreto does a great job of changing locations by making panel five a round panel with poor Joe Cardona on the right of the frame, contrasting with Half-Step’s leftward placement in the square panel opposite. Tollin helps with a cold color shift. The last panel might not seem like it does a lot, but it actually sets up two things for later in the issue: One is that it makes for the second time we see The Shadow and Cardona together, so when we see them together again at the end of the issue it benefits from a satisfying ‘rule of threes’ thing. The other is that it sets up one of The Shadow’s later appearances — I’ll touch on why this was necessary when it comes up.

PAGE SEVENTEEN

A great falling line of action as Tad stumbles and falls across the top four panels. Employing steadily lengthening panels like this is something Barreto does so well, and here it has the side benefit of giving Half-Step room to really loom over Tad in panel four. Meanwhile, I’m glad Half-Step’s poor, mistreated girlfriend had a good lay. She deserves it.

PAGE EIGHTEEN

Barreto is so good at clothing and drapery that you start to take it for granted — and then you remember it all over again when he draws a disheveled suit like the one Tad’s stuffed into. As soon as Nitti shuffles Tad out of the apartment, Half-Step’s attention turns to the woman. We get super close to him, the rendering becomes denser, meaner. Tollin even gives him an angry rage-flush. He’s huge in panel four, crowding her to the edge of the frame. His dialogue transverses panel five into panel six, implying he’s following her as she tries to get away from him. The final panel puts us back in her shoes, as Half-Step’s rage is directed straight at us.

PAGE NINETEEN

Panel one to panel two is the kind of cut we don’t see much in comics, despite it being incredible effective. We get the point of her abuse without — man, I guess the phrase I want to use is cheapen it by showing it explicitly on the page. Clearly implying something and then cutting away can be even more effective than showing it outright. If we were to see this scene play out, we’d still know in the backs of our heads that this is, essentially, a superhero comic, and that it’d be possible that when we turned the page, The Shadow might show up to save this woman. When the scene is over and the hero never appears, we might be left wondering, “Christ, then what was the point of seeing all that?” This method here conveys what happened with a haunting finality, but without any creepy exploitation.

On a characterization front, the thread that culminates in this scene is massive. Half-Step treats this woman like an appliance, but claims he’d kill any man who touched her. He actively entraps her into this weird “gotcha” self-cuckold and then punishes her for falling for it. This shows us so much about the depth of his bizarre self-loathing, his warped pride, the outright evil of him. And yet, again, staging these as events in her life keeps her from being just a prop to let us know how super duper bad this story’s bad guy is. She has an internal life outside of him. This all actually makes these displays of his violence more effecting because we’re seeing its effects on a “real person,” not just some Real Doll who doubles as a speedbag. 

Note also how well panel two and the butcher hanging up the cow in panel three frames the interaction between Romanowski and his debtor, Karl. Size continues to equal power as we get the huge foregrounded gangster (rendered into one monotone shape by Tollin’s colors) making the bright, full-figured Romanowsky look smaller and more vulnerable than he realizes.

PAGE TWENTY

The empty room in panel one gives us a moment to breathe as we head into a tense scene. At the same time, we know we’re getting close to the end of the issue, so an entire panel dedicated to an empty room makes us slightly nervous — we’re aware we’re running out of time. Which, by design or by happenstance, is the Shadow’s point at the end of the page. Tad is consistently rendered in a clear, clean comic book style, while The Shadow is rendered in planes of light and darkness, making him seem elemental, powerful, spectral.  

PAGE TWENTY ONE

This is the best page in this comic. I lost my mind when I saw this page. It’s AWESOME. Look at how well rendered Romanowski is in panel one. The oppressive dark architecture in panel two, drawing the eye to the small, bright Romanowski. That unnecessary but oh so cool-looking graphic black-out in panel three. The hatching on Romanowski in panel four. The callback to Half-Step’s leg injury, set up nearly twenty pages ago. The cascade of action across those last three panels. Tollin’s colors across the whole damn thing. I love this page. This page is why they have comic books.

PAGE TWENTY TWO

Look at Romanowski’s face in panel one, highlighted by the falling glasses. The FURY. The reveal of Half-Step is so pat, so understated. The little throw-away line to himself further cements him as a bona fide evil psycho criminal — one more reason we want to see him go down. The circular panel inside the square field of panel five, a technique I can’t ever remember seeing before, gives the impression that a notable amount of time has passed since the glasses fell — glasses that Barreto made sure to pointedly re-establish as a visual signifier for old man Romanowski in these last few pages. 

So, The Shadow shows up late. This is why it was important to set up The Shadow’s intent to see Romanowski in that panel at the end of page sixteen; to have The Shadow appear too late would come off as arbitrary, or even as an intentional delay on his part, if we hadn’t established The Shadow’s intentions beforehand. Or, put more simply: in order to show a character failing at something, you have show they were trying to accomplish that thing in the first place — especially when so much work has gone into conveying that character’s competence.

PAGE TWENTY THREE

The Shadow respects Romanowski’s principles. Of all the characters in this story, the two of them are the most alike in that regard. But while Romanowski was a stubborn old butcher and easy prey for Half-Step and his guys, The Shadow is an unkillable psychic murder man.

Panel two is full of space, both geographic and negative, giving us another much needed moment of breathing room. All the gangsters present have distinctive color cues, easily letting us get a feel for the size of the gathering as opposed to an amorphous clutch of same-colored “GANGSTERS (tm),” which often happens in comic book scenes depicting groups of men in suits. They can become like zebras if you don’t take the time to make him distinct, as they are here. Half-Step’s buggy zooms into panel four from beyond the page, a nice way to emphasize that the vehicle is coming at them from out of nowhere.

PAGE TWENTY FOUR

The tommy gun EXPLODES through panel one, dissolving the panel border itself. Those carefully color-coded mobsters from the previous page all catch bullets, which wouldn’t mean as much to the reader if they weren’t distinct from one another. “A bunch of gangsters got shot” becomes “several men were brutally murdered by machine gun fire.” Said gunfire chases Guzik from left to right in panel three — note the diagonal line that tracks his presence in panels two, three, and four, making his plunge to the ground in panel four seem like an extension of his movement in the other panels, even though the they happen on radically different parts of the page. Barreto keeps the same angle on Guzik in panels four and six, cementing him as the lone survivor of this drive-by and the default POV character for the scene. Or, to put in visually:

This is some seriously solid craft. 

PAGE TWENTY FIVE

The Shadow is HUGE on this page. This drawing of him the biggest thing in the entire comic — the same size as he is on the cover. He bookends this story, dominating it. Cardona’s fear and uncertainly help sell the terrifying finals words of his boss, seen here in full on What-If-Hannibal-Lecter-was-Batman mode. This drive-by was easily the biggest act of violence in the issue, and the heavy blacks of The Shadow on this last page emphasizes him as this dark presence bringing doom to the Chicago mob. This page cements what we can expect from the next issue: The Shadow’s done his ground work. He’s ready to start making some moves.

FINAL THOUGHTS

Despite having three more pages than your typical modern comic, the page for page action is always dense and well-paced. Every scene feels necessary and the story never lingers long on any one place or character, and yet it never feels overstuffed or rushed. It takes time for some impressive visuals to break up the action, but never to the point of self-indulgence. There’s always something happening, even in a scene that basically boils down to ‘Two women go a club and a third woman talks shit.’ I talk a lot about Barreto — and I would, he remains one of the best artists of all time — but I don’t think enough can be said for Jones’ masterful pacing and lean yet conversational dialogue. These are two creators at the top of their game, with a solid coloring/lettering/editorial team backing their play. Almost thirty years after its publication, there’s still a lot to learn and even more to admire in these pages. This is definitely the kind of read that makes me want to up my game. 

When possible, I’ll be placing links at the end of these so you can buy better copies of the comics I’m analyzing with out my words getting in the way. 

Retroactively, here’s Comixology links for the comics I covered in my first two reviews:

BATMAN: GOTHAM ADVENTURES #17

PETER PARKER: SPIDER-MAN #13

As far as I can tell, THE SHADOW STRIKES! has never been collected in print, nor does Comixology doesn’t carry it, so I’ll link to another great Shadow story by someone else who really understands the material: Matt Wagner’s GRENDEL vs THE SHADOW, with Brennan Wagner on colors. I’ll also throw in a link to another Eduardo Barreto DC comic I’ve always dug, written by this issue’s editor, Brian Augustyn: BATMAN: MASTER OF THE FUTURE.

As always, feel free to check me on any mistakes I might have made, add your own commentary, or share similar examples of good comics done well. I’ll be back next week with a different comic to peruse. 

#The Shadow #The Shadow Strikes! #Analysis #Educational Purposes #comics #pulp #DC Comics #Eduardo Barreto #Gerard Jones

[tamboradventure]

Is It Time to Break Up with Airbnb?

Posted: 10/08/19 | October 7th, 2019

There is no denying that Airbnb has changed how we travel. It got people out of the hotel/hostel quandary, gave locals a way to monetize their extra rooms and earn more income, and got tourists into different parts of cities, spreading the benefits of tourism around to a wider part of the community.

It wasn’t the first company to do this, but it made this kind of travel widespread and socially acceptable. The idea of “renting someone’s home” is now seen, not as weird or unsafe, but as a perfectly normal way to see a destination.

I’ve been an Airbnb user since its early days (it began in 2008) and have had some wonderful experiences using the service: the Swiss couple who made and shared dinner with me, the folks in Paris who left me wine as a welcome gift, the retirees in Tours who put a candle in my breakfast croissant for my birthday, the couple in NZ who gave me veggies from their garden, and countless other wonderful experiences where I got to meet locals and learn aspects of life that I might not have otherwise. (I’ve also hosted some really fabulous people too. The site works both ways!)

Over the last few years, I had gotten out of the habit of using Airbnb, instead staying with friends, in hostels, or hotels on points. However, while I was on my book tour over the summer, I decided to start using the service again.

I was nervous about doing so though.

From overtourism to hosts with multiple listings to companies using it to run hotels to a general “whatever” attitude toward complaints, there are a lot of problems with Airbnb. It is no longer the whole “people renting out their room for extra money” service it markets itself as.

I’ve read all the stories. I’ve seen the data.

With over six million listings, Airbnb is one of the biggest booking sites out there. In the first quarter of 2019, it booked 91 million room nights. By comparison, Expedia booked 80.8 million.

But I figured there had to be some gems on the site.

And what kind of travel expert would I be if I didn’t know Airbnb’s current state?

I went in determined to not rent places that were not people’s homes — that is, any rentals run by folks with multiple listings or property management companies, which have the effect of raising rents for everyone. While Airbnb has a lot of problems, the “commercialization” of the service is the biggest.

The growing number of people buying property just to rent it out on Airbnb is driving rent up for locals1 and forcing them out of the city. A recent study from the Institut d’Economia de Barcelona shows that rent in Barcelona’s most touristy areas has increased by as much as 7% between 2012 and 2016.2

Furthermore, in 2016 (the most recent data I could find), true home sharing, where the owner is present during the guest’s stay, accounts for less than 20% of Airbnb’s business in the United States; 81% of Airbnb’s revenue nationwide — $4.6 billion — comes from whole-unit rentals where the owner is not present.

A search on the website Inside Airbnb shows that a high percentage of units are rented by people with multiple listings: in Venice, out of 8,469 listings, 68.6% of hosts have multiple listings; in Barcelona, out of 18,302 listings, 67.1% of hosts have multiple listings; and in Los Angeles, out of 44,504 listings, 57.8% of hosts have multiple listings.

That doesn’t really scream the “just a person renting out their extra space” model the company likes to tout.

And I found avoiding that a lot harder than I thought it would be.

Even having spent hours trying to weed those kinds of homes out, I was fooled in London, DC, and Santa Monica: those listings existed solely to be rented out on Airbnb. Those pictures that made it seem lived in? Faked. (And the place in London, which was supposed to be a room in a guy’s house, was just a room…but in a house for Airbnb guests.)

All that time spent trying to do the right thing…and I still failed!

As this happened over and over again, I thought to myself: Is it time to break up with Airbnb? Was using Airbnb was worth the cost it exacts on residents and the time spent trying to find gems in vain?

Being a responsible traveler is really important to me — but not contribute to the problems Airbnb causes.

Airbnb is one of the biggest drivers of overtourism. It has created a lot of new accommodation for travelers, which in turn contributes to higher tourism numbers.3 On the one hand, that’s good: cheaper accommodation = more tourists = more revenue. But, when unregulated and combined with the issues highlighted above, increased tourism kills the very places we love. It becomes a vicious cycle: more tourists = more money = more properties on Airbnb = fewer local residents. However, thankfully, as I highlight in this article, a lot of locales are fighting back and beginning to restrict the service.

Moreover, the company doesn’t really take action against hosts behave badly. From spying on guests to denying last-minute bookings to substandard conditions to fake reviews, complaints against hosts go unattended until they become news stories like this:

Airbnb quietly shut down a top host amid scathing reviews, but hundreds of guests were left to stay with him

Airbnb Has a Hidden-Camera Problem

A disturbing video of a violent Airbnb host is reigniting fears of racism in the sharing economy

‘Which monkey is gonna stay on the couch?’: Airbnb host kicks out black guests in racist exchange

British couple spends $11,800 on Airbnb rental in Ibiza that doesn’t exist

As such, I’ve found the customer service to be really terrible and slanted toward hosts. There are a lot of protections for hosts but not guests. If I cancel, I have to pay a fee. If the host cancels, there’s little punishment. When talking about my recent experiences with Airbnb on Twitter and Facebook, I found I was not alone. A lot of people have noticed a decline in the quality of the service lately. They still use it, but I was surprised that so many people didn’t do so as much as they used to. Here are some examples:

Super cool how consistently my Airbnb bookings for conferences (WWDC, now XOXO) get canceled by the host the week before the conference (presumably to make more cash by raising the rate).

— Sebastiaan de With (@sdw) September 1, 2019

My Airbnb host cancelled 48 hours before I was supposed to arrive for a two-month stay. Now I am left homeless and have received no help or compensation. This is ridiculous @Airbnb @AirbnbHelp

— Raimee (@doitallabroad) August 31, 2019

There are plenty of people who are still having wonderful experiences with the service. As a whole, I still like it. There are some hidden gems, wonderful people, and cool experiences on the website, especially when you get out of the big cities.

But, given the social problems it causes, the poor customer service, the hassle of dealing with hosts, the crapshoot in quality, the cleaning and other fees that make the service’s costs on par with traditional accommodation options, I’d often rather just book a regular hostel, hotel, or B&B. Those are simple, easy, and straightforward. (And, unlike the Airbnb I had in D.C., will come with rooms that actually lock!)

I don’t want to contribute to overtourism. I don’t want to price residents out of their homes. I don’t give my money to a company that doesn’t want to be a responsible stakeholder. (I haven’t even got to the lengths the company goes to fight against oversight, taxes, and regulation.)

And I don’t have all day to spend finding a room!

And I’m not the only one having second thoughts. Look at this survey I conducted on Twitter about using the service:

In light of my recent tweet on @Airbnb (and some ones from the past), I'm curious:

Do you use Airbnb?

— Nomadic Matt (@nomadicmatt) August 31, 2019

Those are not numbers I’d want to see if I was Airbnb. It’s clear, for most of us, the sentiment has shifted away from the service as it’s become more commercialized.

I’m not fully ready to give up on the service quite yet. I still think you can find some hidden gems and meet some great people.

And maybe their upcoming IPO will change its ways by bringing in new stockholders, activist investors, and more attention (stockholders don’t like negative news stories that lowers their stock price!).

Then again, maybe it won’t, and Airbnb will only get worse and I’ll have to stop using it altogether.

Only time will tell.

But I think the situation is bad enough where one needs to be wary of the service and use it with extreme care.

It’s not the same as it used to be.

Notes: 1: Since my team and I have been using the website a lot this year, we’re updating our guide to Airbnb to reflect changes in the service. It will be out in a few weeks.

2: You can also find another study done by California State University here.

3: Airbnb is not the prime cause of overtourism, but it definitely contributes greatly; the company’s desire to turn a blind eye to the problem is part of my problem with it.

Book Your Trip: Logistical Tips and Tricks

Book Your Flight Find a cheap flight by using Skyscanner or Momondo. They are my two favorite search engines because they search websites and airlines around the globe, so you always know no stone is being left unturned.

Book Your Accommodation You can book your hostel with Hostelworld as they have the largest inventory. If you want to stay somewhere other than a hostel, use Booking.com, as it consistently returns the cheapest rates for guesthouses and cheap hotels. I use them both all the time.

Don’t Forget Travel Insurance Travel insurance will protect you against illness, injury, theft, and cancellations. It’s comprehensive protection in case anything goes wrong. I never go on a trip without it, as I’ve had to use it many times in the past. I’ve been using World Nomads for ten years. My favorite companies that offer the best service and value are:

World Nomads (for everyone below 70)

Insure My Trip (for those over 70)

Looking for the best companies to save money with? Check out my resource page for the best companies to use when you travel! I list all those I use to save money when I travel — and they will save you time and money too!

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[hotfitnesstopics]

On a bright Friday morning in May, I walk up to The Perfect Sidekick Queer Gym in Oakland, CA. Outside, a garage door proclaims "You know you're curious . . ." and a rainbow flag hangs on the door. Owner Nathalie Huerta, an NASM-certified personal trainer and self-described "CEO of Making Sh*t Happen," and her wife, MJ, are waiting for me under the pull-up bars between clients. A heavy tire rests in front of the closed garage door near the weight benches and battle ropes. Black floor mats absorb the sound of my steps, and not a single mirror reflects back at me. In the back room, a few early attendees stretch and bob along to the playlist blaring through the spartan space - even the music is on beat with the exercise reps. In a half hour, I'll have my ass thoroughly kicked in that room by trainer James Cooley during a strength-training class called Hard Core Homo. "Our first location was previously a therapist's office . . . I thought, "If I do push-ups here, now it's a gym.'" Nathalie, a queer woman of color whose business caters to the LGBTQ+ community of the Bay Area, goes through the workout with the rest of the class, looking just as tired as I feel. Halfway through, when James accidentally addresses the group as "ladies," Nathalie gently corrects his verbiage - "No 'ladies.'" During my chat with her, she mentions that we all have a lot to learn, even when we might think we already know enough. "Us being the first queer gym in the nation, there's an expectation that's like, 'You better get it right.' We're almost held to a higher standard. You can expect a straight person to f*ck up, but as a queer person of color doing this, it's like, 'Oh, what do you mean you weren't inclusive of transgender people at first?' The misconception there is that we're gonna get it right at the beginning. We're gonna f*ck up way more than anyone that comes after us." When gym members informed Nathalie that the language used during workouts wasn't inclusive of transgender folks in the early days, Nathalie immediately went to the Lyon-Martin Clinic in San Francisco to learn more about how to fix that. It specializes in health care for the LGBTQ+ community, especially transgender and genderqueer folks, making it a perfect resource for Nathalie. After the director took her through the clinic's sensitivity PowerPoint, Nathalie decided to develop her own version for the Queer Gym. Her biannual Queer 101 community training emerged from those efforts to educate herself. Soon after her Lyon-Martin visit, she held the first session with her trainers; she realized afterward that in order for the gym to be totally in line, the members needed the training as well. In fact, the community as a whole could benefit from it. Now, even the tourism bureau of Oakland has come to Nathalie for Queer 101 training. "Queer 101 is like my golden child," she tells me, explaining that while it started with just language and cultural information, it now also includes practical things like how to cue someone for their pronouns, how hormone therapy affects training, and how to prepare for top surgery. Nathalie works hard to make Queer Gym the safe space her members need. Each class begins with introductions - name, pronoun, injuries, and an icebreaker, like your biggest change of the year - and every new member receives pre-workout homework in the form of educational videos. Nathalie vets each potential client herself, explaining, "If our main gym is a safe space, we have to hyper protect that. We don't sell memberships online." It's just one way Nathalie pours herself into the gym. "A new member recently asked me, 'What do you do for fun?' 'This,' I said. 'No, this is your job. What do you do for fun?' 'This!'" she says, laughing. Starting Queer Gym Queer Gym was founded in 2010. Nathalie, who studied sports medicine in college after years of playing basketball, took up a gig as a personal trainer in a gym after graduation. Even as an instructor, the stereotypical gym atmosphere got to her. She began advertising on Craigslist's "women for women" page as a trainer for lesbians specifically instead, leading her to the idea of Queer Gym while getting her MBA. "The Perfect Sidekick was the original concept, which was half trainer, half wingwoman," she explains, ruefully confessing that the fitness part is going strong but she never reworked the wingwoman aspect back in. "There have been four marriages that have come out of the gym, though," she points out. "I started with $50 and went to Target - bought what I could afford. In terms of challenges or difficulties, I never really stopped to think about it, which, in hindsight, is pretty f*cking crazy," she admits. "Our first location was previously a therapist's office . . . I thought, 'If I do push-ups here, now it's a gym.'" Eight years, a few moves, and a name change later, Queer Gym is pulling in more and more members. Nathalie and her coaches even offer a six-week challenge, which is FREE if you manage to stay on track and meet your goals. "We made it so far, I think, because of the niche and serendipitous events." As the first in her family to graduate college, Nathalie mentions numerous times that her MBA actually provided little real help when she started Queer Gym. Instead, she relied on "a lot of googling" and pushed through on her own - "That Mexican muscle, that's all I've got." At first, the struggle Nathalie wanted to address was the need for a safe space. "A lot of the comfortable stuff kind of comes from my own sh*tty experience in the gym. You know, I hated mirrors; I hated being misgendered; I hated the locker room situation," she explains. Nathalie, a college athlete and personal trainer, recognized that others must share her need, and thus Queer Gym emerged. The clientele, of course, play a large role in maintaining that feeling, but the all-gender restroom/changing room, no-mirror policy, and required sensitivity training reinforce it. "First problem was we need a queer gym where we feel comfortable: check. Now we need to find a program that gives people results. Having a queer gym is cute, having members is cute, but I want to change lives. How do we get to that?" she asks. For now, the answer lies in that highly successful six-week challenge. "People are coming because of the results," she says, but she wants more. "I don't want to be known just as a queer gym. I want to be known as the best gym." Queer Gym and Its Community In addition to that goal, though, Nathalie connects it to the larger community we both belong to. Specifically, she wants to impact more nonprofits and work with LGBTQ+ spaces to improve lives. Gaining more members ties into this handily. Despite the rising price of living in the Bay Area (and the price of being queer), memberships at Queer Gym are on the rise. "Part of the reason I want to kill it is because you can make a bigger contribution when you have something to contribute. You can donate time, but really what nonprofits need is monetary funding. That's when it gets really fun. Sure, I can donate a certificate or get some volunteers, but the impact is economic. I would like to get us to the point where 10 percent of our revenue is donated." That tie to the community connects many people in Oakland. The doggy day care next door to the gym is run by a queer friend of Nathalie's - they cohosted a puppy happy hour the Friday after my visit. Queer Gym also hosts a 5K run during Oakland Pride. Nathalie's job, friends, and family all converge where Queer Gym is concerned, as do the lives of its members. The day after the shooting at Pulse Nightclub in Orlando, FL, for instance, surprised her by being one of the busiest days at Queer Gym. "People told me they needed this more than any other day ever. It's our human nature to be in a tribe," she tells me. "We have members whose kids have kind of grown up with us - so many different types of families." It certainly rings true for Nathalie herself. "I proposed to my wife at Queer Gym's five-year anniversary party," she says. "The fact that I shared that moment with my family and our members and our community . . . it just tied everything together." It stands out as one of her favorite moments and reinforces everything she and the gym stand for. What's Next? "This is about fulfilling needs." "We always get [negative] emails from people in like Mississippi and Alabama and these places. That's where I really want to open the next [gym]," she admits, acknowledging that MJ finds the idea surprising as well. "This is about fulfilling needs. A queer person in Alabama probably has a bigger need for us than someone in Miami or Los Angeles. Yeah, I'm worried, but I'm more worried to continue to allow people to think that's OK. It's a big agenda." "That's a lot on your plate," I tell her. "Yeah," she says, smiling. "Change the world." from POPSUGAR Fitness https://ift.tt/2Lcn0Yw via IFTTT

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Rita Moreno Is Playing a Dream Role 70 Years into Her Career (Exclusive)

After West Side Story won her a Golden Globe and an Academy Award for her lead role as Anita in the 1961 musical, Rita Moreno was sure she'd end up in film after film, thwarting Latin stereotypes in Hollywood. But even as the first Hispanic woman to earn an Oscar, the work offered to her was scarce and conventional, leaving the legendary actress crushed when the promising rush of stardom proved not so promising anymore.

Now, at 86, Moreno is having the last laugh, as the adored and very funny abuelita Lydia on Netflix's multicam family comedy One Day at a Time. The timely Latina-led update of the classic sitcom, which premiered in 1975 on CBS, is helmed by Gloria Calderon Kellett and Mike Royce, while the series' original creator, the now-94-year-old Norman Lear, executive produces.

The show is centered on a Cuban-American family living in Los Angeles, the Riera-Alvarez clan, including Lydia's daughter, Penelope, played by Six Feet Under alum Justina Machado, and her grandchildren, Alex (Marcel Ruiz) and Elena (Isabella Gomez) – as they work through a variety of hot-button issues relevant to today's gender paradigm and sociopolitical climate. Penelope is a divorced single mom and Iraq war veteran with PTSD, for one. But with plotlines including Elena's coming out, depression, gender stereotypes, immigration and religion -- and that's just season one -- One Day at a Time isn't afraid to speak its mind with ample heart and humor. Season two furthers its topical commentary by broaching gun control, nonbinary queerness, racism and Lydia's lack of U.S. citizenship.

One of only 12 performers with a coveted EGOT (an Emmy, GRAMMY, Oscar and Tony), Moreno recently opened up to ET about playing the kind of authentic Latina role she could only dream of after West Side Story. During the conversation, Moreno also reflected on how the beginning of her career left her "heartbroken," the current state of Latinx representation on screen, and how One Day at a Time is helping to break ground for Latinx actors.

ET: Why does a Latina-led One Day at a Time feel particularly important right now?

Rita Moreno: Norman Lear seems to have a clock in his head or something. It just seemed the right time. And it’s interesting, because there have been some other Latino-based shows, but there have also been some not-so-good Latino-based shows. Obviously, I'm not gonna mention anyone, because everyone needs their job.

What makes one Latinx show better than another?

Ours is authentic, ours is so respectful of the culture. We don't mess around. And my character could very easily be a Looney Tune and, in fact, we're always very, very mindful of that -- I'm certainly very mindful of that. And she can be theatrical and she can be dramatic, but Looney Tunes is definitely not a part of this series. I think it's extremely important to stick to what Latinos as Latinos recognize and laugh at.

The other great part of this show is that a lot of people who are not Latino are loving it. It's so universal -- that's the word that Norman keeps using. It's a family. And though some problems are strictly related to being Latino, many other issues are not. I mean, in the first season, we had a marvelous show about the United States Department of Veterans Affairs. It really took the VA to task without pointing fingers in any way, and it was hilarious. It was also very serious -- [Penelope] had her shoulder injury from the war and she couldn't get anybody on the phone. I thought it was a tour de force for Justina.

How did this season's racism-centric first episode resonate with you?

Oh, are you kidding? We loved it. One of the most wonderful touches that nobody has ever addressed in these kinds of shows is the fact that Alex is getting picked on because his skin is darker than his sister's, and their mom points out the difference in hue. I don't think anyone has ever even touched that.

The second episode addresses gender neutrality both in terms of the Latinx community and the LGBTQ community. I imagine that's been a lesson for a lot of people the way it was for Lydia.

Oh, absolutely. And you know, I love that there's just a bit of racist in Lydia. When she says, "Oh, no, no -- we're Spanish," and her granddaughter says, "Mom, we are all colors." But I say, "We're mostly a Spanish." Which to her means white. So, I love that she has this prejudice, because it makes her very real.

What are some of the hot topics covered on the show that have been personally important to you?

Last year, we talked about Lydia’s citizenship and her lack of citizenship, and the whole family was absolutely shocked that she was not a citizen. This time, not only does Lydia become a citizen, but also Schneider [the family’s Canadian landlord, played by Todd Grinnell] has become a citizen, which I thought was kind of neat. And, oh, God -- there are so many hot topics and I can't remember half of them because I'm 86.

The show challenges many stereotypes. After West Side Story, you were seeking to do the same, but studios were offering you a lot of stereotypical Latina roles.

Actually, I wasn't offered a lot of them -- I was offered some. There was such a dearth of roles. After winning those two awards, I was absolutely heartbroken. I couldn't believe it. I really thought, "Wow, an Oscar and a Golden Globe, what could be bad? My career is made."

The lack of roles -- what do you chalk that up to?

Oh, the same usual kind of thinking: "She's Latina, she played a Latina, and here are some gang movies if you want to do that." And I said, "No, I do not." Nothing came. It was just really, really absolutely devastating. It was hard to believe. I mean, how naive of me, but who knew?

So how did being cast on One Day at a Time feel?

Oh, my goodness, I can't even find the words for it. I'm so proud to be a part of it. I feel privileged to be working with Norman, whom I dearly love. He and I have a creative love affair going on, in the sense that he just thinks I'm the bee's knees and I thinks he's the cat's meow. We're the two old farts on the show, and I call myself the "fartette."

I wanna be a fartette when I'm 86.

No -- a fartette is a girl.

Oh, I don't care. We're all about gender-nonconformity here now, aren't we?

[Laughs] That's great. You've learned from the show!

This season's finale was really emotional. Was it a difficult day for you on set?

Not at all. No! It wasn't difficult. I did nothing but lay down!

Emotionally, though?

It was very hard to listen to some of the monologues -- it was hard to listen to Justina. But you know, she always kills me under any circumstances. She's just one hell of an actress and probably the best acting partner I've ever had. She's just sensational. And the granddaughter, Isabella Gomez -- her thing was very sweet and sad and moving.

Do you think this show will hopefully open the doors for more Latinx actors?

I think it will, it absolutely will. Gloria Calderon is doing her own show for a network [the upcoming History of Them on CBS with On Your Feet! star Ana Villafañe]. And you know, we can use two on the air! That would be nice.

We could use Rita Moreno on both, too.

I'll be sure to tell her that! [Laughs] So, it's terrific. Whenever we can we use Hispanic actors -- not just Hispanic, but black actors, East Indian actors, every kind of nationality, whoever is good for something gets the part, no matter what the nationality.

What are your thoughts on the diversity reflected in this year's Oscar nominations?

Viola Davis put it so succinctly when she said as long as there aren't roles for us -- meaning all nationalities -- there will be no awards possible for us. A lot of people say, "Well, why aren't you getting awards?" Well, you have to have the roles first. It's not just one-sided. You have to get the roles. And now I think the Hispanic community has to really start pushing and taking some very much-needed lessons from the black community. They really did it up. They did it up just fine. We have to start doing it, too. We have to unite more and we have to pull for each other more. Did you happen to read the very angry piece that John Leguizamo [creator and star of Latin History for Morons currently on Broadway] wrote for Billboard? He's one angry Puerto Rican. He was talking to his own people, [saying that it's] nice to say, “Well, I’m lucky to get this part,” but you’ve gotta do more than that as a Hispanic person. So I'm hoping that's gonna start to happen very, very soon.

At the SAG Awards in January, when you presented Morgan Freeman with the Lifetime Achievement honor, you were given a standing ovation.

That was so moving; I started to cry. That was astonishing -- who would expect something like that?

What's it like to be acknowledged in that way by your peers 70 years into your career?

Oh, that's why I started to cry, because they are my peers. And it was also my peers who helped vote for me when Morgan presented the award to me [in 2014]. It's just fantastic. What went around came around.

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Rita Moreno Recounts #MeToo Experience (Exclusive)

9 Life Lessons Learned on 'One Day at a Time'

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