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nordleuchten · 1 year

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hi there! can you tell us more about the drama between La Fayette and Lord Carlisle? 👀

Dear @ouiouixmonami,

of course! :-)

In the second half of 1778, a British peace commission, headed by Frederick Howard, 5th Earl of Carlisle, was send to America to try to broker a peace. Their mission was almost surely doomed to fail, given the instructions they received from their government in England.

Shortly after the arrival of the Commission in America, La Fayette wrote in a letter to Henry Laurens what his opinion upon the matter was:

La Fayette to Henry Laurens, June 12, 1778:

I can not write to York Town without asking my good friend Mr. Henry Laurens how he does, and which are his present ideas upon the arrival of the commissioners appointed for to corrupt a part of the continent, deceive the other, and if possible enslave the whole as far as it is consistent with the present state of affairs. If you were to ask my private opinion I would refer you to the Earl of Abington’s speech, as the candid sentiments of a man who being at the fountain head may give us some knowledge of the true idea they have in Parliament of theyr Ridiculous and deceitfull commission for to grant pardons to the faithfull subjects of George the Third. I understand they have sent five commissioners, ambassadors, or whatever you’ll be pleas’d to call them. (…) I do’nt understand how they did send those commissioners with such instructions as will immediately discover theyr scheme of treachery, deception, tyranny, vengeance, corruption and indeed of every Rascality under the fairest names. That word of pardon is not only abzurd but very insolent. Ah my dear sir, never suffer such a people to approach you. Look down upon them and when ever they’ll want to come near in order to corrupt and deceive, keep them alwai's at a distance, and never suffer a word to be spoken, or a letter to be writen to them till independency will be aknowledged by Parliament, the troops with drawn, even from Canada, for Canada is necessary to the liberties of America.

He then went on to state his opinion about the different members of the commission:

I have reserv’d the Earl of Carlisle for the last. He is a fine gentleman, very well powdered, and a man of bon goust. He began by Ruining his own fortune, and wanted to get the Reputation of a man belov’d by the ladies. While I was in England he was much in love with a young fair dutchess and pretty ill treated by her. However he is a good poet.

Idzerda Stanley J. et al., editors, Lafayette in the Age of the American Revolution: Selected Letters and Papers, 1776–1790, Volume 2, April 10, 1778–March 20, 1780, Cornell University Press, 1979, p. 74-76.

While his judgment of Carlisle may sound a bit harsh, it was indeed the most forgiving. It is also quite interesting to see that La Fayette apparently has met Carlisle during his trip to London in 1777.

The Commission wrote several letters to Congress and published statements. In one of these statements, a manifesto written on August 26, 1778 and printed by the Pennsylvania Packet or the General Advertiser on September 12 of that year, they warned America to lean not too heavily on France. France was, by the commission’s arguments, no reliable ally because their were no religious or civil liberties in France. They also wrote that France’s only wish was to prolong the war to weaken England and not to settle it. The most offending passage in La Fayette’s eyes was the accusation that “the designs of France, the ungenerous motives of her policy, and the degree of faith due to her professions, will become too obvious to need any further illustration.” That was the absolute final straw for La Fayette and he began to toy with the idea of challenging Carlisle as the head of the commission to a duel. Before doing so, he sought advice both from George Washington and from Comte d’Estaing, the French Admiral who had just arrived with the French troops.

La Fayette to the Comte d’Estaing, September 13, 1778:

It is a matter of the nation’s honor not to let it pass in silence. Lord Carlisle is the president of those gentlemen (…) I am going to write him a billet-doux and propose to him an exemplary correction in the sight of the British and American armies. I have nothing very interesting to do here, and even while killing Lord Carlisle, I can make some more important arrangements at White Plains. I flatter myself that General Washington will not disapprove of this proposal, and I am sure that it will have a good effect in America.

La Fayette to George Washington, September 24, 1778:

I am going to Consult your excellency upon a point in which I not only want your leave and opinion as the Commander in chief, but also your Candid advice as the man whose I have the happiness to be the friend—in an adress from the British Commissaries to Congress, the first one after jonhstone was excluded, they speack in the most di[s]respectfull terms of my Nation, and Country—the whole is undersign’d by them and more particularly by the president lord Carlisle—I am the first french officer in Rank of the american army, I am Not unknown to the British, and if Somebody must take Notice of Such expressions, that advantage does, I believe, belong to me—do’nt you think, my dear general, that I schould do well, to write a letter on the Subject to lord Carlisle, where I Should Notice his expressions in an unfriendly manner—I have mentionn’d some thing of that design to the Count d’estaing but want intirely to fix my opinion by yours which I instantly beg as soon as you will find it Convenient.

“To George Washington from Major General Lafayette, 24 September 1778,” Founders Online, National Archives, [Original source: The Papers of George Washington, Revolutionary War Series, vol. 17, 15 September–31 October 1778, ed. Philander D. Chase. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2008, pp. 118–119.] (02/35/2023)

We see that La Fayette’s passion had considerable cooled down by the time he wrote Washington. Washington replied in early October.

Washington to La Fayette, October 4, 1778:

The generous Spirit of Chivalry, exploded by the rest of the World, finds a refuge—My dear friend—in the sensibility of your Nation only—But it is in vain to cherish it, unless you can find Antagonists to support it; and however well adapted it might have been to the times in which it existed, in our days it is to be feared that your opponent, sheltering himself behind modern opinion, and under his present public Character of Commissioner, would turn a virtue of such ancient date, into ridicule—Besides, supposing his Lordship accepted your terms—experience has proved, that chance is as often, as much concerned in deciding these matters as bravery—and always more than the justice of the Cause; I would not therefore have your life, by the remotest possibility, exposed, when it may be reserved for so many greater occasions. His Excellency the Admiral I flatter myself, will be in Sentimt with me; and, as soon as he can spare you, send you to head Quarters, where I anticipate the pleasure of seeing you.

It is interesting that Washington mentions d’Estaing here because the two men had a four letter long discussion about the subject. The Admiral wrote to Washington on September 25, 1778, to inquire after his opinion of the proposed duel. Washington replied on October 2, 1778 that until now he had not been aware of La Fayette’s sentiments. To that, d’Estaing replied with a detailed explanation why he is against the duel.

Comte d’Estaing to George Washington, October 20, 1778:

I had the honor of asking you whether you permitted him to send his Cartel to Lord Carlisle to satisfy myself whether you were informed of it—you were so kind as to acquaint me that you had not seen the Cartel1—I thought from that circumstance that you would forbid the execution of it—I am still persuaded that this is the case—Such marks of zeal, bravery and sensibility are never authorised in Europe by its Generals—they might fruitlessly rob the respective nations of their best subjects—Besides, Embassadors, Commissioners and men in office—Are supposed to speak only in consequence of orders which they have received—as public organs they owe an account only to their own government of the things which they hazard—Nations revenge their own injuries—those who have most reason and Strength on their side are the most sparing in opprobrious terms, and despise them—they respect their enemies while they endeavour to subdue them; they surpass them in wisdom when they refrain from such offensive terms; which one would think should be only the useless resource of those who would dissemble their injustice: I could not then but presume that Lord Carlisle would not accept a Cartel, which he would have done extremely well to refuse—Older than Mr de la fayette, the experience which age gives, tranquilised me upon the two subjects which I have just submitted to Your Excellency, and which made me regard the Cartel ’till now as almost null—it appeared to me a consequence of the interesting Character which led this brave and amiable frenchman into the service of the United States—to have entreated your interposition in this affair would have appeared like a doubt of your doing it. the delicacy of my countryman might likewise have been wounded, if it should have been known that your Refusal had been solicited by me—I do not hesitate however Sir to make the request; I am this moment informed that Genl Hancock told Mr de choin yesterday that the English Commissioner had provided himself with a Substitute; can he have been guilty of choosing a bully! it is impossible that you should have suffered a doubtful expression in this cartel, to have had such an effect—This Challenge can only regard Mylord Carlisle and could not have been construed otherwise—Your Excellency certainly will not have suffered it (…)

“To George Washington from Vice Admiral d’Estaing, 20 October 1778,” Founders Online, National Archives, [Original source: The Papers of George Washington, Revolutionary War Series, vol. 17, 15 September–31 October 1778, ed. Philander D. Chase. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2008, pp. 479–480.] (02/25/2023)

Washington replied on October 24, 1778, that he was of the exact same opinion as the Admiral and that he had just communicated this opinion to La Fayette:

The coincidence between Your Excellencys sentiments respecting the Marquis de la fayettes cartel, communicated in the letter with which you honored me the 20th and those which I expressed to him on the same subject; is peculiarly flattering to me—I am happy to find that my disapprobation of this measure, was founded on the same arguments which in Your Excellencys hands acquire new force and persuasion. (…) I however continued to lay my friendly commands upon him, to renounce his project, but I was well assured that if he determined to persevere in it, neither authority nor vigilance would be of any avail to prevent his message to Lord Carlisle. And tho his ardour was an overmatch for my advice and influence, I console myself with the reflexion that his Lordship will not accept the challenge and that while our friend gains all the applause which is due to him for wishing to become the champion of his country; he will be secure from the possibility of such danger as my fears might otherwise have raised for him—by those powerful barriers which shelter his lordship, and which I am persuaded he will not in the present instance violate.

“From George Washington to Vice Admiral d’Estaing, 24 October 1778,” Founders Online, National Archives, [Original source: The Papers of George Washington, Revolutionary War Series, vol. 17, 15 September–31 October 1778, ed. Philander D. Chase. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2008, pp. 551–552.] (02/25/2023)

While we see therefore, that d’Estaing was not in favour of the duel, La Fayette would later write in his Memoirs that he had the Admirals full support.

Despite Washington’s refusal to grant La Fayette leave to fight a duel, La Fayette did challenge Carlisle anyway. He wrote to the Earl on October 5, 1775:

Until now, milord, I believed that I would have to deal only with your generals, and I hoped for the honor of seeing them only at the head of the troops which are respectively entrusted to us. Your letter of August 26 to the Congress of the United States and the insulting sentence regarding my country to which you subscribed your name could alone have given me something to clear up with you. I do not deign to deny it, milord, but I wish to chastize it. It is you, as head of the commission, whom I summon to make amends to me as public as was the offense and the denial that follows it will be. That refutation would not have been so delayed had the letter reached me sooner. Since I am obliged to be away for a few days, I hope to find your answer upon my return. M. de Gimat, a French officer, will make any arrangements in my behalf that are agreeable to you. I do not doubt that, for the honor of his compatriot, General Clinton will willingly countenance it. As for me, milord, all terms are good, provided that to the glorious advantage of being born a Frenchman, I shall add that of proving to a man of your nation that no one will ever attack mine with impunity.

Lord Carlisle replied to the Challenge on October 11, 1778 and, as predicted by Washington and d’Estaing, refused to accept the challenge:

I have received Your Letter transmitted to me from Mons. de Gimat, and I confess I find it difficult to return a serious Answer to its Contents. The only one that can be expected from me as the King’s Commissioner, and which You ought to have known, is that I do and ever shall consider myself solely answerable to my Country and my King and not to any Individual for my public Conduct and Language. As for any Opinions or Expressions contained in any publication issued under the Commission in which I have the Honour to be named, unless they are retracted in Public, You may be assured I shall never in any Change of Situation be disposed to give an Account of them much less recall in Private. The Injury alluded to in the Correspondence of the King’s Commissioners to the Congress I must remind You is not of a private Nature, and I conceive all national Disputes will be best decided by the Meeting of Admiral Byron and the Count d’Estaign.

I have to admit that I really, really love Carlisle’s answer! But alas, La Fayette did not. He wrote, rather furious, to d’Estaing on October 20, 1778, that:

Lord Carlisle made me a very tardy reply, in which he escapes by means of diplomatic prerogatives. His prudence even goes so far as to provide for the time when the commission has ceased and I might take up my desire to correct the commissioner. He claims not to be bound to any reckoning of this kind.

While La Fayette was rather displeased with the turn of events at first, he later, in his Memoirs, acknowledged, that Carlisle had been in the right and that it was good of him to refuse the challenge.

That is the context surrounding the proposed Carlisle-La Fayette-duel and the only time that La Fayette actually challenged somebody to a duel instead of just contemplating the thought.

I hope you have/had a lovely day!

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artharakka · 3 years

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✨ Another commission I finished some time ago! ✨

#once again thank you and hopefully you don't mind I post this #(ofc I can take anything down or link my commissioners if they ever want)#I try to ask but if I don't remember or the commissioner doesn't answer either way I assume that it's fine to post these #but I can always keep it private if the commissioner so wishes!#commission #d&d #dungeons and dragons

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maxwell-grant · 3 years

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So, any thoughts on The Green Lama (who unexpectedly became one of my faves), the Pulp Hero who is also a Superhero?

Much like other pulp heroes of the time, The Green Lama had multiple secret identities and a massive supporting cast aiding him in his quest for justice. Unlike his contemporaries, The Green Lama eschewed guns in favor of radioactive salts, magic, and sleight of hand. He rarely, if ever, killed his enemies. His tales also had an advanced sense of continuity, with characters growing and changing over time, plot points introduced in one story paying off several tales later. The Green Lama is a character of contradictions, driven forward by a faith he is forced to betray. It makes him flawed and imperfect, and in that way, one of the most human of all pulp heroes - The Green Lama: Scions

While not the "only" example of a pulp hero who is a superhero, The Green Lama is arguably the one who leans the most into the superhero aspect out of all the classic 30s pulp heroes that usually get brought up. I would argue that The Green Lama is the most direct answer to the question "what happens when you combine The Shadow and Superman together", considering he was modeled extensively after both in his forays into pulp, radio and comic books, and has also grown into his own character.

He's got the unique skills bordering on superpowers (that eventually became outright superpowers). He's got pretty much The Spectre's costume, except of course he came first. He's an urban costumed crimefighter wh deals with gangsters and criminal masterminds, and yet has an extremely strong stance against killing and carrying guns under any circumstance, even saying they would make him no better than the criminals he fights, which makes him by default the pulp hero that Batman would get along best with. The comics took it way further even turning the “Om Ma-ne Pad-me Hum” chant into a Shazam! transformation cry (Shazam came first, although the two debuted in the same year).

He's got a suitably punchy and dramatic origin: guy spends 10 years in Tibet and returns to America intend on spreading Buddhism's pacifist doutrine, only to witness the murder of children at the hands of mobsters the literal second he steps off the boat, and after spending restless days in the police station to see if they would find the culprit, he sees the killer walk out of the commissioner's office free, which convinces him he needs to take up crimefighting because the police are useless, and he outright calls the police "incompetent" in a letter to the papers that he uses to introduce himself to the world, which is not something you find often in 30s/40s fiction even if's an implicit part of the pulp hero/superhero fantasy.

He had a stronger sense of continuity than most pulp heroes were usually afforded. He has a lot of the pulp hero stock and trade like the assistants and the pseudo-science and the odd radio gadgets and of course the Orientalism that we'll get into, but remixed in a pretty cool way that allows him to stand out from his inspiration. He's got incredibly weird aspects to him like the fact that he gets enhanced abilities from crystallized salt or even becoming radioactive (which could be interesting to explore considering "radiation" became the go-to origin for superpowers in the 60s). He's got an allright supporting cast and Magga, while ultimately a deus ex machina, is a very interesting addition to it and I wish her mystery was played up more often in subsequent stories past the original run. There's a lot about The Green Lama that really works, he was incredibly successful at the time and he's managed to thrive over the years lot more than most of his contemporaries

Despite all the powers he wielded he felt impotent, nothing more than a rich boy playing the games of gods. He had chosen the path of the Bodhisattva, sacrificing himself for the good of all sentient beings, but even so the weight of responsibility, the lives of so many in his hands, threatened to crush him. It was tempting to turn away, to deny his calling, but the life of a Bodhisattva demanded more; and it was only recently that he had begun to realize how much it truly required.

The main problem with The Green Lama, and by problem I mean "the character works fine for his time but this is seriously holding him back from becoming sustainable again", is the fact that he's a white rich man who fights crime by going as hard into Orientalism tropes as possible, which is inescapably baked into the premise.

Now, I will argue that The Green Lama was, for his time, a progressive character. The Buddhist aspects of his character weren't just backstory fodder or an excuse for his superpowers as they were to pretty much every other character at the time, Jethro was a practicing Buddhist, who fought crime informed by his beliefs, trying to respect them (and not exactly succeeding) and offering a wholly positive perspective of Buddhism. Nowadays, it creates a problem, but at the time, it made the character stand out from every other hero who had "traveled to Tibet" checked out, because Tibet and Buddhism were heavily incorporated into the character. The Lama may have been born merely out of a desire to cash in on The Shadow's newfound radio popularity, but Crossen took it much more seriously than his contemporaries and made it an effort to instill admiration in his readers towards what he was referencing, which he was pulling from books about the subject and the Pali language. Is research the bare minimum? Yes. But it’s a bare minimum that even today’s writers don’t do even having an infinitely bigger wealth of information at their disposal.

To further cement my point: There's a particular Green Lama comic story called The Four Freedoms, which is about the Lama receiving a letter from a fan in the army who's worried about a racist private who keeps insulting the black privates while crowing about racial superiority, and so the Lama kidnaps the private and takes him on a tour through Germany so he can witness firsthand how his talk aligns with Nazi ideology, even specifically referring to Jim Crow's laws, criticizing how easily Americans fall for racial war rhetoric, and pointing out the idea of racism as a tool of tyrants to divide and conquer. It's not my place to champion this as some great representation and that's not what I'm doing, but if this all seems passe or simplistic or even problematic to you, trust me, this was still the era of Slap-A-Jap Superman, stories like this were absolutely not the norm at the time, even in other stories where superheroes dealt with racial discrimination.

He even caps off the story by stating that punching or ending Hitler is not the solution (although he lets Jones take a couple of swings) because Hitler is just one part of a much bigger problem that needs to be fought on all of it's forms. It's all very much afterschool special/anti-racism PSA, sure, but it's easier to mock those in our time. You find me a Golden Age superhero comic that shits on Jim Crow specifically while the hero tells the reader that Hitler is not the ultimate evil but merely "a cog in the wheel", part of a problem that's deeply entrenched in America's own shores (really, do, I'm genuinely curious if more of them did anything like this).

Does any part of what I said negates the fact that, at the end of the day, he's still a white man using Orientalism mysticism to fight crime? No, it doesn't. And if Iron Fist can't get away with it, if Dr Strange only just barely does, the Green Lama sure as hell can't. And you cannot downplay those aspects either lest you end up with a completely different character. It's a bit of a conundrum that makes the character tricky to approach from a revival perspective.

I completely agree with what you said here, Green Lama would benefit from a Legacy Hero approach very strongly. And Green Lama: Scions opens up an interesting possibility of Jethro Dumont not being quite what he seems, backed up by the fact that he wore disguise make-up in the original stories:

They had a lot of names for him in the papers—the Verdant Avenger, the Mysterious Man of Strength—but Reynolds had always been partial to “Buddhist Bastard.” No one had ever seen his face or, at the very least, the same face. Seemed like everyone had a different story. The Green Lama was white, he was black, he was asian, he was old, and he was young. You could fill a room of witnesses and no two would describe the same person.

Really I think if you just got rid of that one thing that holds the Lama back the most from catching on in modern times, I think he's the kind of character that lends itself a lot to long-term sustainability. He's already fairly popular as is, definitely an indispensable inclusion of any shared pulp hero or Golden Age superhero universe and definitely one of my favorites among the 30s American pulp heroes. And there’s ways to make the concept more interesting and workable.

Maybe The Green Lama is just a title that's been going on for generations, with Jethro being one of many to fill in. Maybe Magga used to be it, maybe the tulku that instructed Jethro did, maybe there's a new character with it. Maybe Jethro is just an identity used by an Asian-American adventurer to operate safely in the US, or maybe Jethro has a sort of Lamont Cranston arrangement going on. Maybe he's part of the reason why Tibet was the superpower capital of the world in the 30s or 40s, or part of the reason why radiation started granting so many heroes superpowers in the 60s.

The character's skillset has been fairly "anything goes" ever since his author made him a flying superman for the comics, and really he already started out being able to deliver electric shocks through his fingers by guzzling radioactive salts. He's a very weird character, and I will always argue that weird is what works best for the pulp heroes.

#replies tag #pulp heroes #pulp fiction #comic books #comics #the green lama #jethro dumont #alex ross

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dottiechan · 3 years

Text

Tempest (Pt. 4)

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5

Read on AO3

Pairing: Ava Du Mortain x f!Detective

Wordcount: 2177

Warnings: mentions of death, smoking

Summary: Ava’s handler has information that will turn her lengthy mission upside down - along with her heart.

Lady Ashbury’s parlour, London, 1898

“You’re ridiculously torpid this afternoon, Ava.”

The hostess’ words ring clear in her ear and she almost flinches - not like the others can hear them. Nate has taken it upon himself to entertain Lady Ashbury’s guests when Ava turned even more sullen and laconic than she usually would in a setting such as this. Afternoon tea wasn’t exactly her scene after all. Nor was being parted from the private detective in such a hurried, unplanned manner as the invitation that simply could not be refused was thrust upon her this morning by a note from Lady Ashbury. Letters such as that hold no importance to her at all normally. She doesn’t socialise. She doesn’t attend parties, or put on a show for the sake of being thought of as ‘pleasant,’ whatever that is supposed to mean these days.

But it would have been impossible to ignore her handler’s request.

“You said it was urgent, Lady Ashbury.” Ava folds her arms almost petulantly as she gazes out the window, refusing to look at the older vampire clad in a divine tea gown of showy green silk and soft cotton frills.

“Had I known this lengthy assignment would make you so surly, I would have invited you to my gatherings more often.” The sentence passes from the socialite’s parted red lips, and the corners of her mouth twitch upward in a way Ava can’t help but feel secretly mocked. “Oh, don’t frown like that! Or else we will all die of your ennui. I have great news, great news indeed! But I see no reason why we shouldn’t have an equally pleasant afternoon to ourselves before we talk business.”

“Half of your guests are not even of the Agency,” murmurs Ava, her disapproving glance sweeping over the almost gaudily overdecorated room. Eventually, her eyes settle on Nate serving tea cakes to some of the ladies, all refined charm and long fingers and even longer smiles, and a pang of guilt runs through her when she realises that her old friend is actually enjoying himself, thriving and basking in the plenitude of attention he is showered with. She’s been so absorbed in her love for the detective that she nearly haven’t had enough time for him as of late.

“All previously settled engagements, of course. I’m sure you understand how rude it would have been of me to entreat them not to come,” Ashbury lies fluidly, yet her brown eyes glint with a mocking light that betrays her immediately and on purpose. She delights in the tensing of the muscles in Ava’s jaw.

“Of course.”

“Now don’t be so uncouth, or else I will be the talk of every party and club for the coming weeks about the questionable company I keep,” Catherine Ashbury shakes her head stubbornly, dark locks bouncing defiantly as she links their arms and tugs Ava away from the window. They walk down the long parlour slowly, close enough to the guests that they feel like they’re part of the occasion, and yet far away for their conversation to remain private.

“You’re already the talk of London, Lady Ashbury,” Ava retaliates, almost suavely wrapping her jest in a cloak of concern. “Thirty years you have been here, and thirty years you haven’t aged a day.”

“Some of us are just lucky in that regard, aren’t we?” the hostess grins at Ava. “Unlike these poor ladies here... Or even your private detective. They’re young now, but they’ll whither away soon like roses in the winter. Such a waste. Just like this whole operation has been, if you pardon my frankness. I understand her protection was part of the deal the Agency made with the Police Commissioner, but such a waste of resources this endeavour has been! Our top agents, wasted on the protection of one human. I’ve always appreciated your practical thinking, so I know you must feel the same way as I do. And to be stuck in it for two whole years...! Well, I’m sure you will be relieved to learn the rumours I’ve been hearing lately.”

Ava awakens from her listless silence when Catherine Ashbury ceases to prate about the question of mortality and baits her into enquiring more about the mysterious little sentence she dropped at the end of her speech. She schools her features into an emotionless mask even as her heart begins to fill with uncertainty and fear, painfully aware of Ashbury’s almost predatory gaze fixed on her at all times. “Do they have to do anything with our mission?”

“Would you be intrigued if I said yes?” Catherine asks, red lips curving into a satisfied smile when she notices her quickening pulse. “Alright then. Mind you, these are only rumours, and you didn’t hear them from me... But it is said that the Agency wants to form permanent working units - much like your partnership with Nathaniel, only in teams of four and with greater autonomy than what is usually granted to field agents. I hear the top squad has already been assembled - and utilised. Here, in London. Isn’t it wonderful?”

“What could possibly be their objective here?” Ava frowns as they walk slowly, Ashbury leading the way to the small balcony facing a lush park of green fenced in by equally posh buildings as the one they’re in right now. “I haven’t been alerted of any major supernatural activity here, save for the rouge dark elf, of course.”

“Ah, there you go, spoiling the surprise,” Catherine sighs, finally giving up her maddening secrecy as she takes a deep breath, the crisp air chilling her lungs in the most effervescent way. Or is it the anticipation radiating off of her agent in waves as great as ocean tides? It is an exhilarating game, reading others, playing with words and watching the body betray the mind as it answers all questions so truthfully. She is only the temporary handler of the two agents, and has been that for two years straight now, but a sudden recognition manifests in her heart - as difficult and disagreeable and perfectly unpleasant Ava can be sometimes (the very opposite of her companion) she will miss her. She thinks her a remarkable entity, a true novelty among the cheap copies upon copies of women who thoughtlessly sacrifice their truest parts on the altar of hypocrisy and vanity, until no vestige remains of their original self. To know Ava is to face a lot of uncomfortable but all the more truthful feelings - one can decide to despise Ava for it, but the wise learn to look within.

Though Lady Ashbury may not look it, she is old. Older than Ava, and certainly older than youthful, handsome Nathaniel. And she feels old too, the debauchery of her long centuries and the dishonest little games that made up her life ageing her soul prematurely. But when Ava speaks...! When Ava speaks, her throat becomes the well, and her words truth, and she shames mankind in the most delicious way. Like that splendid painting by Jean-Léon Gérôme, La Vérité sortant du puits armée de son martinet pour châtier l’humanité. Truth Coming Out of Her Well to Shame Mankind. A painting she wishes she could procure for herself.

And Ava. A woman Catherine wishes she met when she was still herself.

But it wouldn’t have mattered anyway. The demise of the rogue dark elf is only part of the rumours circulating in the Agency about Ava’s involvement during her latest assignment. Or about Ava herself, and her career, for that matter.

“Speak plainly, Catherine,” Ava almost pleads, her diplomatic facade slipping up to reveal a shade of fear in the green of her eyes. Ashbury wishes nothing but to descend upon Ava’s connection to the private detective like a vulture until she realises the rumours have more truth to them than even those who maliciously spread it could imagine. She hasn’t a shred of doubt about Du Mortain’s feelings for the human woman now, her initial doubt obliterated by every sign in Ava’s body language as they stand so close to each other on the small balcony overlooking the beautiful Cornwall Gardens. Ava is a clever woman, capable on jobs, willing to take on risks no one else would dare. And more importantly, she is aware of her strengths too - and thus her self-aware nature marks her as superior to all the other humble little agents. She must know what Catherine is about to tell her - with the task forces forming, and the first such group striking in a place none other than London, she must know that it is only a matter of time before the rogue is dealt with. Before she’d be given an assignment and a position befitting someone of her talents.

And here she stands, this brilliant woman in all her glory, terrified of a promotion that would have put a smile on her stern face two years ago.

“As I said, you didn’t hear this from me,” Lady Ashbury resigns, a little sullen at being robbed of her smug pleasure all of a sudden. “But I know for a fact that your current assignment is drawing to a swift conclusion as we speak. And rumour has it, you are destined for greater things once it is over.”

“Greater things,” Ava echoes, her whole being feeling hollow. Around the detective, she forgot about the world, to be honest. And it seems like she is about to pay the price for her two years of blissful ignorance. She always knew the mission would end, and yet in a strange way she didn’t really believe it. It’s like how people know they are mortal, and yet feel so much entitlement to life that when death comes for them, they have the audacity to appear shocked.

Ava has no illusions. This is a goodbye, not an opportunity. Nate may think that bringing in the private detective is a reasonable step, but Ava will do everything in her power to prevent her from learning who she is, what they are, what the last two years have been about. They were never right for each other. She was never right. And if she leaves now, maybe she can draw that conclusion too.

“My dear, everything you’ve done up to this point is in the past now. And it is best to leave a dead thing in the ground.” Catherine’s plummy honeyed words have an admonitory yet sad edge to them. It is a warning about the detective, and what clinging to her could mean to her career, with an undertone of genuine empathy uncharacteristic to Lady Ashbury. She inspects the woman to her right, a dark speck against the grey sky, and feels honest to god sympathy - and emotion she hasn’t felt in decades. Maybe it is good she will no longer be her handler, Ashbury thinks as she lights a cigarette. She felt too many real things ever since Ava came into her perfectly splendid and dull life, tearing apart the walls of hedonism and debauchery she’s built around herself. But that is a goodbye that can wait.

“Congratulations, Commanding Agent Du Mortain.”

Catherine watches Ava from the balcony still as she purposefully cuts across the Cornwall Gardens, stomping the prized lawn of the old Mr Thomas Broadwood Junior in the process as that sweet Nathaniel treads on her heels ever so loyally. They must be headed for Cromwell Road which will no doubt have available hansoms for them to hail. Not that they need them, but if they are going to Whitechapel, which she is certain of, they need to travel the old fashioned way for appearance’s sake.

The tea gown is too flimsy for her to stay outside for much longer, so she heads inside, cheer and conversation and the wonderfully lukewarm sensation that only pointless small talk can elicit wrapping her in a blanket of comfort instantly. And Lady Ashbury is finally home.

On the other side of London, a woman is losing the only home she’s ever had in centuries. How many lives can she save if she goes along with the Agency’s plans for her? Surely the detective isn’t worth all that. (She is. Her rationale may deny it, but she knows she is worth all that and more to her. And she ignores it anyway.)

Ava will go on loving her in every following decade, in every language she knows, with every breath she takes. She marries duty, and allows death to make a martyr of her lover left behind. Turn her into her very own memento mori.

And in the end, the agent isn’t completely mistaken - something will indeed claim the private detective’s very soul. But it will not be as serene as eternal sleep, as Ava keeps believing. No, it is not death that claims the detective after all.

Even though sometimes even she wishes it were that simple. That peaceful. That freeing.

But there is no rest for the wicked.

#dottiechan writes #ava du mortain x detective #a du mortain x detective #the wayhaven chronicles #twc #twc detective #ava du mortain #a du mortain #I finally finished reading Dracula by Bram Stoker and the same day I was like #y'know what I'll finish this chapter as well #also in case you're wondering #yes #Lady Ashbury is a vampire #and I blatantly stole her last name from Vampyr

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blooblooded · 3 years

Text

Lee bullies some children

It was only out of paranoia that Lee Harlan did not vape inside of Kip’s apartment. Logically he knew that the chances of it leaving an odor were low to none-- after all, he vaped inside of his own home and never noticed anything. But he used cherry flavored pods and the risk of Kip’s mother coming home, noticing the smell, and confronting her children about it was too great so he always went outside to the landing when he needed a hit of nicotine.

If Police Commissioner Nguyen found out that a 22 year old man was habitually hanging out at her home unsupervised with her children and their friends...it was best not to think about what would happen.

Lee slid the glass door shut behind him to ensure that no vapor could get inside, turned and found that he was not alone. Kip’s youngest friends were out there. Well, not his friends, not really, more like the kids that hung around because they had to. Esther Bellamy’s twin siblings and their friend.

And Marty.

He didn’t know how old any of them were, only that the differences in maturity between them and 18 year old Kip were noticeable. The twins, Eddie and Evangeline, sat in two of the landing’s rickety old deck chairs, pretty and redheaded, unconsciously mimicking each other’s body language. Nervous, quiet Rome sat in another chair. And on the table between chairs was propped a tablet, the screen broadcasting Marty’s face from the mysterious outside land he came from.

They had clearly been chatting amongst themselves but shut up the moment Lee came outside. He smiled at them and projected his will to put them at ease with his presence, then leaned against the railing and took a hit from his vape.

Instantly, there was a problem.

“Are you fucking smoking?” Marty demanded. His accent was strange, round and musical and nothing like anything heard in Eden.

Lee exhaled. He didn’t understand why this kid had such a personal problem with him. They had met 4 times, and every time, Marty would try to incite him by accusing him of bad intentions. He didn’t trust him and nothing Lee said or did seemed to help. It was strange to not be liked instantly, usually his slight psychic abilities masked him from mistrust. “Relax, I’m vaping.”

Marty’s round face screwed up like it always did when he came across a term he did not understand. Dumb ass kid didn’t even know what vaping was. Where did he come from, that’s what Lee really wanted to know. How was he in contact with people in Eden? It was information he doubted he would ever get due to Marty’s hostility. He exhaled another cloud.

“Can you not do that around people?” said Marty.

Lee looked at the other teenagers and raised his eyebrows. “Is this bothering you guys?” he asked.

“It’s cool,” said Eddie, who was trying to lean his chair back on two legs.

“Whatever,” said Evangeline.

Rome didn’t say anything. He usually didn’t, it was hard to get more than two words out of him.

Still, it was all he needed. It wasn’t a no. Nobody ever said no to him. He smiled at Marty and continued to vape, enjoying the expression of pure disgust and anger he was receiving.

It dawned on him that he desired to make Marty angry at him. The novelty of pissing off someone who was thousands of miles away and helpless to do anything about it was good. Getting away with doing things he knew was wrong always gave him a little thrill, it was one of the reasons that he had been enjoying hanging out with Kip and all his underage friends so much. Not because he had any ill will towards them or wanted to harm them, but because he found it funny that he could if he wanted to. Most of their parents were powerful people, a police commissioner, a career capitalist, a member of the intelligentsia: all people he hated on principle. If he wanted to, he could really hurt them. Not that he wanted to. He wouldn’t. But he could.

This was different. Marty was just a fat little teenager on a screen. He had no power over Lee. He was not responsible for any of his suffering, his poverty, his frustration. The only thing Marty had was the inability to be influenced by his psychic abilities. The only thing he could do was watch. Lee thought about all the things he could make Marty watch. He felt the sudden and unnatural urge to hurt him.

There was no reason for that. Lee liked to think of himself as a good person. Still, this urge grew inside his heart.

“What are you guys doing out here?” he asked them. He pointed at a soda bottle one of them had drunk. “Playing spin the bottle? That puts Marty at a disadvantage.” It was just a little joke but he watched the twins’ pale faces blush and Rome’s posture change. He knew he had made them uncomfortable. “Kidding, kidding, sorry. Really, what are you talking about out here all by yourselves?”

“You should go away,” said Marty. His wavy black hair seemed to puff up as he grew angrier.

Eddie was the first to grow comfortable again. He leaned his chair back on two legs and held onto the table to balance himself. “We’re just talking about homework,” he said. He and his sister looked semi inhuman in the way that all genetically modified people looked to Lee. Artificials. The elite shelled out hundreds of thousands of dollars to ensure that their children would be beautiful, that unlike Lee, they would never have to worry about bad eyesight or crooked teeth. The Bellamy children all had clear, almost translucent skin and tall graceful bodies. Looking at them stirred up those old feelings of resentment at the knowledge that some people had a leg up on life from day one. He would always be treated differently than them. “We have papers due on social studies. I’m writing about the Prison District and stuff, you know. Jail. I’m going to ask Ms. Nguyen about it so I can get an A.”

The thought of the Prison District caused Lee to feel a chill down his neck and the short hairs there stand on end. Unbidden, he remembered the face of his mother; her sly smile and strong jaw resembled his own in his memories. But what memories did he really have of her? Few and far between. She had hung herself in her own cell when he was 12 years old, not long after being arrested, the reality of a life in a cage had been too much for her to bear and she had made the choice to evade that fate.

At 17, he had contemplated that choice as well. He took a drag on his vape to clear his head.

“Just ask Kip,” said Evangeline, so curt and unpleasant for a girl her age. “Don’t you remember Kip getting arrested in July when he spray painted that building?”

“That doesn’t count, Vega bailed him out before anyone even knew that happened.”

“It does too count, if you got arrested even for five minutes you would be crying like a baby. Kip’s good at talking about that kind of stuff.”

Silent, Rome sat there and picked at one of his fingernails. On the little screen, Marty rolled his big black eyes.

Lee considered ways of endearing himself to these children. He wanted to know that he was not a threat, that they could trust him so that they would not betray him to any adult figures in their lives. At this point, he could not risk it. He had to stay close to Kip, after all the work he had put in with the kid, he couldn’t just throw that away. He needed-- Yancey needed-- him so that Eden could become a better place. At the end of the school year, Mayor Malena would make a speech in the School District, and Kip’s cooperation would allow the United People’s Liberation Front to eradicate him and open Eden up for actual representation, not representation from a tyrant. For that to happen, he had to keep Kip on his side, and for //that// to happen, he had to keep Kip’s friends on his side.

Eddie Bellamy was still leaning his chair back and Lee felt the urge to stick out his foot and knock the chair leg so that he fell over. Instead, he smiled in a way that was open and disarming and tried to remember what he had learned in his Investigative Journalism course about building trust and credibility.

“I’ve been to prison,” he said, casual as anything. “I was in prison for 6 months.”

They all looked at him. Was this too much too fast? Or did teenagers think stuff like that was cool? He certainly had, at that age.

“Why were you in prison?” asked Marty, almost immediately.

Lee shrugged. “Because the system is unfair and oppressive. It discriminates against people who are poor.”

“Qu’est ce que ca-- What does that mean? That doesn’t mean anything, what did you--”

“Cool,” said Eddie. He took a handheld tablet out of his pocket. “OK so I don’t even need to talk to Ms. Nguyen, I can like, just talk to you and get this paper done before the weekend. Was it terrible? How was the food? Kip said they have to shower with everyone else in prison, did you have to do that? I would hate that.”

“Why are you even talking to this guy?” snapped Marty. “He just told you he was in prison, they don’t just send guys there on vacation! Can you listen to me for once, I wish that someone would just listen to me for once. Quit talking to him, he’s like 40 years old, you can just make things up and write them down, whatever he says is probably just as made up!”

“Can you calm down for once?” asked Evangeline. “Why are you always shouting?”

“Why would anyone even lie about something like that?” Eddie said blandly, typing on his tablet. “Let me think of some questions for you, Lee.”

Marty ground his teeth. “Rome,” he said pointedly. “Do you want to say something about this? Maybe about what you’ve been messaging me about this guy in private? Huh?”

It was clear that the heir to Prosperity Inc. did not like being around Lee, but was too anxious to say anything. He started to breathe in a fast, funny way. Lee raised his eyebrows at him and then looked at Marty. He smiled. It was a crooked smile because he could never afford to get braces. Marty’s face turned red.

“Do you really think I’m 40?” he asked him. “Really? You think I look like I’m 40? That hurts.”

The only response was a string of what was probably curses in the kid’s own language, and then the screen went white as he turned it off in a fit of temper.

Making him angry was pretty funny.

The next step was easy. Lee and Kip were in a computer lab, designing posters for an upcoming UPLF meeting. Due to the nature of what they talked about, Lee sometimes felt anxious about advertising the organization, but Yancey assured him it was fine. After all, they needed more people. More bodies.

Kip got frustrated by little things. He could not figure out how to rotate text the right way and was jiggling his leg. The small repetitive movements put Lee even more on edge. He put down his coffee and leaned over Kip’s workspace so that their shoulders touched, then took the mouse from him and fixed the poster easily.

“Thanks,” said Kip, who didn’t move away when Lee touched him. “I just don’t really understand art.”

“That’s OK. There’s nothing to get.”

“Yeah.” Kip kept jiggling his leg. He smelled like body odor. Lately he had been neglecting personal hygiene. Lee couldn’t imagine such a thing. He spent upwards of an hour getting ready every morning.

He couldn’t stop thinking about Marty and his round little musical language. What did those words mean? In Eden they were taught that the land outside of the 10 Colonies was uninhabitable, but that was clearly just another lie. Clearly there were people there, people with civilization. Civilization both unlike and like the one in Eden. Marty had mentioned a revolution, a civil war, while arguing with Kip, and Lee had felt his blood run hot.

He wanted to know that it was possible.

He wanted to know that the world could change.

And then, there was that part of him that was fascinated by Marty. Like the differences and similarities between Eden and the strange land that Marty came from, the two of them had their own similarities and differences. Such vivid similarities. Such stark differences. It wasn’t normal for a man in his twenties to feel curiosity towards a teenager, but Lee knew that his intentions were not inappropriate. He was, after all, a good person. He just wanted to know more. He wanted to prod, just a little bit, to get a reaction.

Kip was typing a short informative blurb for the poster but had misspelled the word commodification. Lee moved his hands away again so that he could correct him. “You don’t have that kid Marty’s contact info, do you?” he asked.

“Yeah.”

“Would you send it to me?”

The long pause that followed reminded Lee that this was a weird request. It hinged upon his assumption that Kip would do anything he asked him to, no matter how absurd, how obscene. Infatuation was a powerful motivator but the desire to protect others was a key part of how Kip Nguyen positioned himself in the world.

Another long second. Kip pulled out his communicator and typed into it. Lee’s own device pinged with a long string of numbers that did not match any in Eden.

He realized how much power he had over this young man. It was something he was unused to, but something that he wanted more of.

“Why--” Kip furrowed his brows, then looked back at his screen. “Why do you want to talk to Marty? I thought he didn’t like you.”

It was that obvious.

The truth was the best option in this situation. “I want to talk to him about the place he lives. I think they’ve accomplished the same thing we’re trying to do. They killed their oppressors, they made things fair for everyone who lives there. Can you imagine that? I want to know how they were able to do it so that I know we can do it. I just want to hear about a place that did it first.”

Kip was no longer jiggling his leg. He was spaced out, unfocused out of nowhere. Whenever he got this way, his expression turned flat and his eyes went glassy. Over the last few months, Lee had realized that Kip spaced out all the time, mostly when he felt stressed. He almost felt bad.

Was he putting too much pressure on Kip? Despite knowing that he was using him, he liked him a lot. He liked how outrageously passionate and articulate Kip was and wished that he could have been the same way at 18. At 18, Lee had been dweeby and ineloquent, still held back by the grief of losing his mother and the horror of what he had endured during his incarceration. He did not want to ever take away Kip’s ‘spark’.

“You good?” he asked carefully.

Kip shook himself. He clicked aimlessly on the keyboard. “Yeah. It’s just-- I don’t think Marty is very happy. You’d think that in a society where everything is fair, everyone would be happy.”

“It’s more important that everything is fair than for everyone to be happy.”

“Right. Yeah, I know. I mean, I know that. It’s stupid, I don’t know why I was thinking about that.” Kip deleted the strings of gibberish he had just typed, then turned so that he could face Lee. He was smiling but everything else was off, like he was forcing himself to look normal. “Marty’s weird. If you bother him or something, Ayda’s probably going to come after me, so can you-- can you be cool when you talk to him? I really don’t want Ayda getting mad at me, Case will get mad if Ayda’s mad. You know? Please just be cool.”

Lee put a hand on Kip’s shoulder to reassure him and projected his will in his direction. You think everything is OK, he thought. You think everything is just fine. You don’t think that anything is wrong. Then he gave Kip a few pats. “When have I ever not been cool?” he asked.

######

He waited a few days before calling Marty. It was the week before he had a long paper due, and he had his deadline on an editorial in the student paper. Life had to come first. His life was busy, between classwork, his job, and his position in the UPLF. So many responsibilities. Lee just didn’t have the time to call anyone, he barely even had time to sleep at night. The loans he had taken out to cover his school bills, combined with the measly wages he earned from writing were hardly enough for survival. Every day was a struggle, and in that struggle he had little time to think about a foreign teenager who hated him.

On Sunday afternoon, he had a little time. Lee’s editor at the student paper had messaged him with the revisions they wanted and he just didn’t have it in him to open his word document and read over everything he had screwed up. They liked him there, they just didn’t like his work. He could make people like him, that was easy. Making people like his ideas, making people like his vision of a better future in Eden, that was harder. He thought about Marty and the place he lived. He thought about Marty’s better future.

That was real. He could talk to someone who had lived through a revolution, who had entered a socialist society, and figure out what worked. He could write about what worked.

Certainly it would be easier than coming up with ideas on his own.

Lee reclined on his couch. It was the only real furniture in his studio apartment, apart from his bed. He often slept there. It was one of those rare occasions that he had not gotten dressed for the day, since he had not gone out anywhere he only wore a pair of thin sweatpants and a meat-packer’s union T shirt. He had not groomed his hair nor his beard and was wearing his old glasses. It did not make him feel good about himself. When he did not dress up and take care of himself, it reminded him that he was mediocre-- average frame, crooked teeth, mousy brown hair, brown eyes. Nothing special.

When there was nobody around to see him or talk to him, when he was alone, he was reminded of his mediocrity. The emptiness of it.

He pulled out his communication device and opened up the message where Kip had sent him Marty’s strange number. Again, he wondered how someone from the outside was in contact with Eden. Who else knew about this? What kind of trouble would West Agapama be in if the government caught wind of his daughters collaborating with outsiders? It was likely that Marty was only in contact with them due to Agapama’s alleged smuggling activities. While he shipped items from Eden to the Colonies of Serenity and Green River, it had always been rumored that his trucks ended up elsewhere.

Lee lingered on that number. He pressed it.

His screen flashed white a few times as his device connected to one that was hundreds of miles away.

Marty answered after only a few rings. Wherever he was, he was outside, because Lee could see blue sky and the blackness of the Rift. He could see trees, real trees, growing in the wild. Marty’s fluffy black hair was covered by a knit hat and he had a scarf pulled up to his nose. His cheeks were pink, perhaps affected by the cold air. When he saw who had called him, his black eyes went so wide that Lee could see the reflection of the kid’s communication device in them. “Ah, merde!” exclaimed Marty in a high pitch of surprise. “Comment as-tu--”

“Est-ce que ca-va, Mari?” A harsh female voice from off camera. Marty spluttered something in response and retreated a few steps, looking over his shoulder as he went. He got his back up against a tree and then glared daggers into his camera.

“Hi,” Lee said mildly, distracted by the landscape and Marty’s strange clothes. He had never been cold before, not really. He tried to imagine it. The temperature in Eden was regulated carefully to keep everyone comfortable.

Marty pulled the scarf away from his lower face with a quick, aggressive motion. “How the fuck did you get this number?” he demanded. “What made you think it’s a good idea to call me? Oh my god, you are a freak. I’m telling Ayda that you called me, you fucking psychopath, what is wrong with you?”

It was amazing that someone could switch between languages like that. Marty’s voice even changed when he spoke his own language, he lowered it when he spoke English. Lee smiled at him and tried to project his will, although he knew it would be hopeless on the other side of a screen. You want to talk to me, you want to talk to me, he thought.

Marty’s expression turned to disgust. “You’re staring at me,” he said. “I’m hanging up and then I’m going to figure out what I’m gonna do to you.”

“Wait, wait wait wait,” Lee laughed. “I just want to talk.”

“I don’t want to talk to you.”

“Just talk to me. Five minutes. What’s five minutes?”

“I don’t want to talk to you. Who gave you my number?”

“Kip.”

For a second, Marty’s face fell, his eyes darted to the side and he sniffed. Then he looked back at Lee and sneered. All of it was posturing, him trying to act big when he was just a little kid. Lee was familiar with the need to make oneself something that you are not. “Kip, huh?” said Marty. He exhaled through his mouth and his breath fogged. “Kip. Right, Kip is in love with you, of course he would do something shitty to me if he thought it would get him on your dick. Fuck you, and fuck him too.”

“Wow. Sort of inappropriate, don’t you think?”

Marty pulled his scarf back up over the lower half of his face, probably to mask his expression more than because of the cold. Small white specks were falling around him, landing on his hat and getting stuck on his eyelashes. “Inappropriate? Like you care. Inappropriate is you calling me when there’s nobody else around. Why is that, huh? You’re scared I’m going to tell Ayda’s dad you’ve been giving her alcohol? You know what he’s gonna do to you? He’ll peel off all your skin and break your teeth with a hammer and castrate you before killing you. You’re trying to manipulate me. You can’t trick me, you think you’re so smart but you can’t fool me.”

Teenagers were so stupid. They all thought that they had the world figured out but their brains weren’t even finished developing. Lee kept his face pleasant. “I feel like we got off on the wrong foot. I just want to talk to you about your life. I promise I’m not manipulating anyone, all your friends like me, I don’t know why you don’t. Can I just ask you a few questions?” He noted that they had already been speaking far longer than five minutes.

“‘On the wrong foot’, I don’t even know what that means,” replied Marty. He paused, thinking, and blinked away some of the white flakes that were falling on him. Snow? “I know for a fact that not everyone likes you. I’m not talking to you, I’m not telling you anything about my life because that’s weird. You’re weird, this is over, don’t call me again because I am blocking you, you creep.”

“Aw, come on, I just--”

The screen went black.

He had to laugh.

###

He had promised to buy Kip and his friends liquor and came through. Lee did not enjoy drinking much. At this point in his life, the novelty had worn off, and he found that drinking excessively dulled his senses too much for his taste. But teenagers were in to that kind of thing, and he knew that it would further endear himself to Kip, so he had complied.

About two hours into the night, Lee started to wonder if he had made a really terrible mistake.

They were all drunk. Well, except for Kip’s little sister, who didn’t touch the stuff. They were all drunk and the dawning realization of exactly how much trouble he was going to be in if anyone found out was starting to make Lee scared.

He watched as Ayda, Esther, and Rosaline sat sprawled in front of the television, clumsily playing a video game. They giggled as they repeatedly drove a virtual cart off the side of a brightly colored bridge, not seeming to care or realize that they were doing the same thing over and over again. Casey and Kassidy were sharing the same chair, Casey with her long legs twisted over Kassidy’s as she braided her hair. Casey’s eyes were half closed. Kip sat next to Lee on the couch, jabbering idiotically about something that Lee was not really paying attention to. The younger kids were off by themselves, he really wasn’t sure.

And Marty.

Marty’s little blue hologram face was visible on Ayda’s communication device. Every now and then, he would glance over at Lee and give him a poisonous glare.

It could be worse, Lee thought to himself, as he held on to his own barely touched drink for dear life. It could be worse. Nothing bad had happened, and most of them were well behaved, Still, he couldn’t help but think about how West Agapama would skin him alive and smash his face in with a hammer if he found out that his girls were getting drunk in the presence of a grown man, He wasn’t going to find out though. There was no way he could find out.

Well. There was one way. Lee looked over at Marty and their eyes met. Marty widened his eyes threateningly.

“That’s why it’s not fair,” he heard Kip say loudly. “It’s not fair. I don’t want to take all these stupid elective courses, just to graduate. Why are-- why are they making me do that? Just to graduate? When, when am I ever gonna have to know about bio-electrical engineering, huh? Did you have to do that, Lee? These stupid classes, did you have to take them?” He was slurring badly and his face was sweaty, his buggy eyes were completely unfocused. Alcohol interacted badly with his medication. Kip sat very close to Lee, pressing his knee against the side of his leg. “Did you?”

Lee quickly moved his leg away from Kip. “I don’t know,” he said.

Kip looked like he was about to lean his head against his shoulder. Under other circumstances, he might have let him, but with all of Kip’s friends around, the risk of one of them thinking poorly of him due to Kip’s intoxication was too great. Lee got off the couch and stood up, thinking about how sweaty and uncharacteristically nervous he was. This was different from a couple beers. If one of them got sick or hurt, he was going to be in serious trouble.

The apartment was trashed, with soda bottles and food all over the floor. At some point, Casey had shriekingly spilled her drink on the carpet, leaving a stain. It was only 8pm. Kip had said that his mother would be at work until late the next day, but Lee kept imagining Dana Nguyen walking in to all this. He paced around.

On the floor, Ayda put down her controller, then pulled herself up. Beside her, Esther and Rosaline had started to kiss, but Lee didn’t let his eyes linger on them for too long. God knew that he did not want to see a couple of horny teenagers drunkenly make out, he didn’t want to be responsible for that. Ayda wobbled on her feet for a second like she was going to fall.

“Can you make me another drink?” she asked. Her long dark hair was in tangles and her eyes were unfocused as Kip’s.

Lee tried to make his face appear calm and not anxious, thinking about how badly he had fucked up. What was he doing with his life? This wasn’t worth it. “How about some water?”

“I want another drink,” Ayda whined.

Marty’s big black eyes were fixated on Lee. “What do you think would happen if I called Ayda’s dad right now?” he asked, in his round little accent.

“Ha ha,” said Lee, humourlessly, imagining his own death.

“It feels like you’re about to try and molest someone. I just want you to know that I know Ayda’s dad’s number. So you don’t, you know, try to molest someone.”

“That’s a really dark thing for someone your age to be thinking about.”

“Ugh, Marty, gross,” said Ayda.

Over on the chair, Kassidy yelped as Casey sleepily pulled her hair a little too hard to tie off one braid. It made Lee flinch. He saw Esther and Rosaline get up and head towards Kassidy’s bedroom, giggling and still tangled up with one another. Best not to think about it. Lee became determined to regain control of the situation.

He looked at Ayda and put a hand on her shoulder in what he thought was an authoritative way. The action made Marty’s fluffy hair stick up. “I’ll tell you what, I’ll make you another drink if you go hang out with Kip. And give me your communicator so I can talk to Marty.”

“No. No, no, no!” said Marty, as Ayda complied and handed her device over. “Ayda, you stupid bitch!” But it was too late, she was not listening to him and had already flopped on the couch next to Kip, who seemed happy enough to have a new victim to talk at.

Lee took off his glasses and wiped the smudges on his shirt. He wanted Marty to be able to see his whole face and tell that he was being sincere. The kid seemed bad at reading expressions. Some people just couldn’t do it. He held up the device that connected Marty from his part of the world, so far away. Marty glared at him, but didn’t switch off his camera. Of course he didn’t-- he did not want to risk being separated from his friends. It was a profoundly lonely existence and Lee knew that he could exploit that.

“So,” he said, walking across the living room and to the Nguyens’ small kitchen. He lowered his voice even though he didn’t need to; nobody was paying attention to him. “I’m the first to admit that I made an accidental mistake.”

“That’s funny,” said Marty. “Because I feel like buying liquor and bringing it to Kip’s apartment is hard to do by accident.”

“It’s actually very normal for teenagers to party like this,” Lee kept his tone formal and educational so that Marty could not tell that he was scared. “It’s actually good that I’m here so that if something bad happens, I can do something about it.”

“You’re stupid on top of being a pervert. Give Ayda’s comm back to her.”

Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Casey slump over on Kassidy, falling asleep. For all her big talk, it seemed as though she was a lightweight. Kassidy, whose hair was only half braided, appeared uncomfortable and awkward, but she didn’t try to move away. Lee made sure that the camera was facing away so that Marty could not see Casey passing out.

He looked at Marty. “I just want to make sure you’re not going to do something you regret later.”

“I could say the same thing to you.”

Lee gritted his teeth.

“Normal people don’t try to get teenagers drunk.”

On the couch, Kip said something that made Ayda laugh loudly, and her high state of emotion filled the apartment. An ease, or a lightness passed through Lee’s body. Even at his best, his psychic abilities would never match Ayda’s, he would never be able to affect people the way that she could. He shook off the warm, euphoric feeling that attached to him, wanting to stay clear headed.

He wanted to vape to calm his nerves, but knew that would enrage Marty further. “I’m actually only 22 so--”

“Ew.”

“Look, I’m just trying to reassure you that I have no bad intentions. I’m Kip’s friend, that’s it, it’s nothing more than that. I want to support him, he’s been through a lot.”

“Uh-huh, sure.”

“What do you want, you want me to promise that I would never do anything to hurt Kip? I’ll promise you, if you promise that you aren’t going to tell anyone’s parents. Do you know how mad they’ll all be at you if you did that? Everyone would stop talking to you.”

Judging from the expression of anger blooming on Marty’s face, he had struck a nerve. Hurt. Reality. But before Marty could make his undoubtedly biting retort, their conversation was interrupted. Eddie Bellamy approached from behind Lee and touched his elbow, startling him.

“Oh! What--” Lee spun around to face him, almost dropping the communication device in the process. He fumbled to keep his grip on it. Embarrassed to have been surprised so easily, Lee struggled to keep smiling, and pulled his glasses back on. “What? What do you want?” In his slightly tipsy, frightened state, he found it more difficult to stay pleasant around Artificials, and his discomfort around them was harder to hide.

“Uh…” Eddie’s pale face was flushed and he was wobbly on his feet. Lee’s heart rate skyrocketed as his body sensed an imminent disaster before his mind did. “I think Rome needs help. He’s throwing up.”

Lee’s fingers tightened around the communication device as terror flooded him. Forget taking a hammer to the face. Richard Prospas would string him up on a meat hook if anything happened to his kid. Terrible stories about the violence that company had perpetrated came swirling back to him. This was it. This was the bad thing that he knew was going to happen. It was his fault for assuming that if the younger kids sequestered themselves off out of sight, they wouldn’t be able to get in trouble.

“Oh, fuck you, Harlan.” Marty sounded scared and angry, presumably worried about his little crush. “Fuck you.”

Eddie’s lizard eyes shifted down towards the floor and he wobbled again. Lee reached out to hold onto his shoulder, suddenly worried that he would fall. “Yeah. He’s kinda freaking out, I think he had too much to drink.”

“I don’t think I gave you guys anything to drink,” Lee said through his gritted teeth. “You wanna tell me about that?”

“Uh…” Eddie blinked stupidly and Lee had to resist the urge to shake him. Usually Esther and her siblings acted like they were so superior than he was, so now, seeing one of them act so weak and stupid, Lee had to bite down his instinct to lash out. “Yeah. Rome brought some stuff from home, we didn’t want to be left out. I mean, we didn’t drink a lot, I think, we just-- can you go check on him? We don’t know what to do.”

The last thing that Lee wanted to do was go deal with a vomiting 14 year old, but there was no other option. This was what he had been scared of. He had told Marty that he was a responsible adult, and now he had to act like one. How hard could it be to make sure that some kid didn’t have alcohol poisoning and then bully him into not snitching?

This was his own fault. He had put himself in this situation where he had to act as a responsible adult, so he had to follow it through.

His voice seemed to come from outside of himself. “OK,” he said, very calmly. “I’m glad you came and got me. Why don’t you go hang out with your sister in Commissioner Nguyen’s room for now?”

“Eddie,” Marty said angrily. “Don’t leave Rome alone with this freak. I mean it, I don’t understand why you don’t believe me when I tell you that he hates you guys. He hates you. He hates Artificials. Don’t leave Rome alone with this guy.”

Eddie looked from Marty to Lee. Lee smiled at him tightly and patted him on the shoulder. You trust me, he thought. You trust me, you trust me. “Uh…” Eddie said, wavering.

“Oh my god,” exclaimed Marty. “You’re all so fucking stupid. Eddie, do not--”

It was too easy for Lee to turn off Ayda’s communicator and banish Marty from the apartment, leaving him in his isolated far-away land. Easy as anything. If the kid wasn’t so irritating, it would almost be sad. At any rate, Esther’s little brother was not about to cause any problem, a combination of childish pliability and Lee’s psychic suggestions saw to that. He watched him wobble off to Commissioner Nguyen’s bedroom to be with his sister, just as had been suggested. Easy. Easy as anything.

The communicator went down on the kitchen table. No doubt Marty would be frantically calling Kip, and if that did not work, Kassidy. He would not have any luck with either though. Lee sighed, pushed his hair out of his face, then went to the bathroom to see exactly what was going on.

#####

The next call came a week or so later. Lee had been expecting to talk to Marty again, he just hadn’t expected that Marty would be the one to call him. That was the kind of thing you couldn’t plan for. He looked at the light flashing on his slim metal communication device for a moment, then answered it, unable to hide the surprise on his face.

“What’s up?” he asked, like he was talking to a friend, instead of to a little kid who hated his guts.

Marty’s face was pink and angry. His eyebrows were so furrowed that his eyes had become black slits. Wherever he was, he was inside, perhaps in his bedroom. It was difficult to make note of his surroundings, since he had his face so close to his camera that his blackheads were visible. “You’re gonna leave Rome alone from now on,” he said, in what was probably the meanest voice he could muster, but his pubescent voice kept cracking humorously. “And I know you’re not gonna listen to me, but if you freak him out one more time, I’m going to call Ayda’s dad.”

Again with the empty threats. Marty was never going to call Ayda’s dad. He kept saying that he would, but had still not ante’d up. If he did that, if he followed through, he would lose all his friends. Loneliness was a stronger motivator than anger. Loneliness was even stronger than fear.

It was still early evening. Comfortable on his shitty couch, Lee was back in his sweatpants and a t- shirt. “What are you talking about?” he asked, laughing, but he knew what Marty was talking about.

“Don’t play stupid. Rome told me that you were bothering him when he was sick the other night, and that you called social services on his family. Why would you do that? You know that social worker pulled him out of class, asked him a ton of questions, then called his dad? Why would you do that? Are you stupid? What’s even wrong with you that would make you do that?”

The amount of care that Marty had for his friends, for people that he would never meet in person, was almost touching. Lee pushed his own hair back so that he would not appear so scruffy. He hated to think that someone would see him not looking his best, but there wasn’t anything for it now. “Right. I’m sure that in whatever backwards place you’re from, they never taught you about mandated reporting--”

“--I I know what that is--”

“-- but since I’m an adult, it’s actually my responsibility to report it to the proper authorities if I believe that a child is in danger. You understand that, right? You understand that I’m just trying to help.”

“Oh, tu essaies d'aider.” Marty’s face grew more pink as he got so angry he forgot how to speak in English. “Don’t mess with my head. You know what you did.”

“I don’t know what to tell you, then.” He pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose, a habitual gesture he hated because it made him appear dweeby, but was unable to break.

“Tell me that you’re going to leave everybody alone, even if you won’t leave Kip alone. You don’t understand what you did.”

Oh, Lee understood, and that’s why he had contacted social services in the first place. He took a hit off his vape pen, because he knew that irritated Marty, and felt the nicotine simultaneously calm and invigorate his body. “I think it’s interesting that you were calling me names for just being in the same room as your little friends, and now when I’ve been a responsible adult who has reached out to other adults because I’m worried about, oh, I don’t know, about how it looks like a kid is getting beaten at home, you’re still not happy. How am I the bad guy? What’s your problem with me? All I ever do is try to help people.”

“I understand what Rome’s going through. You don’t.” He said it so defensively that it took Lee by surprise. All this time, he had assumed that Marty had a crush on his quiet friend. He had not imagined that instead, Marty might relate to him. He had not imagined that someone as hostile and outspoken as Marty might see a piece of himself in passive, nervous Rome Prospas.

That was a piece of information that Marty should not have revealed. So much of his strange life in a far away Colony in the North was obscured by his hostility, but Lee’s curiosity about it could not be sated. It seemed that even under a socialist revolution, the lives of normal people could still be painful. Children there still had lives where they were not safe at home. It was something that could not be fixed by grand ideas. He exhaled a cloud of vapor. “Do you have parents?”

It looked like Marty regretted revealing so much of himself, even if it had been meant as a hateful jab. Much of the pink drained from his face. “I’m not telling you that.”

“You’re right. I don’t know anything about having a family that doesn’t treat me right,” Lee continued. Maybe if he opened up about his own life, he could gain a little trust. Even at this point, it was possible to do that. “I never had a dad. My mom killed herself when she got sent to prison. I was 12. She wasn’t the best mom, but I was still sad when she died. She loved me a lot. I miss her a lot. What about you?”

A flash of connection. For a second, Marty stopped scowling and his eyes were once again large and black.

In that moment, Lee could see that they were the same.

He continued, as carefully as he could, looking for cues. “She got pregnant with me when she was really young. Sometimes she didn’t know how to take care of me. I’d go to school in dirty clothes and stuff, that’s when social services got involved. They helped Mom learn how to take care of me better.”

Marty was still staring at him and it looked like the wheels of memory were turning in his head. Lee had him, he had found a weak spot, the soft underbelly.

“I remember the day they took me away from her, though, right before they took her to jail. I think about that every day.” He had not expected himself to be replaying the most traumatic moment of his life for the sake of connecting with this surly preteen, but there he was. His mother had refused to let go of him, he had been so scared. That one moment of fear and unfairness had propelled Lee Harlan through the next decade, and he had held on to that memory through every terrible thing that had happened to him since.

“I--” Marty opened his mouth like he wanted to respond, then seemed to remember exactly who he was talking to.

Gently, prying, Lee tried again. “You look like you want to talk about your mom.”

The small, fleeting moment of connection ended. Blood rose to the high points in Marty’s face again. “No. Don’t try to distract me. I don’t care about you, I don’t care about your life. I called you to tell you that if you even breathe in Rome’s direction one more time, I’m not even kidding, I’m contacting Ayda’s dad. You know, like a mandated reporter, or whatever you called it. He will kill you. You can keep perving on Kip all you want, I don’t really care, but if you mess with anyone else, I’m gonna get you. You’re gonna get what you deserve.”

“Not if I get you first,” Lee said blandly. “What do you deserve?”

The screen of his communication device went white. Marty was gone, disconnected. All his bravado, his childish little threats, for nothing. Lee was not scared of him. If he was truly going to do something, if he truly had it in him to call West Agapama, he would have done it already. Deep down, Marty did not want to do it.

Whatever it was, fear or some sense of connection, or perhaps obsession, would not allow him to do anything.

And Lee knew that he could use that to his advantage.

#writing

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marzaid · 4 years

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I always see quirkless Izuku AUs when it comes to Tododeku fanfic but consider this quirkless Shouto. Shouto still went through hell at the hands of Endeavor because he refused to accept that he could have produced a quirkless child. He’s still trained through hell and knows how to fight purely because it protects him from his father at least in some way. Rei still pours water on Shouto but that’s because the abuse she receives makes it hard for her and she ends up pouring boiling water on Shouto and breaking down afterward. Endeavor locks her away and brutally abuses his number one failure Shouto who dreamed of being a hero like All Might but thinking he can’t be one especially after Rei is locked away because she was the one that always had faith in him.

No one knows about Shouto so when he applies to UA it’s under his mom’s last name. He takes the entrance exam and makes it into the gen ed department with the determination to become a hero to prove his father wrong. There’s another boy he runs into during the entrance exam with unruly, green hair and a constellation of freckles on his cheeks. The boy, later he learns Izuku Midoriya, seems frightened and as if he has no real power that is until Ochako is in trouble from that zero point robot and he watches Izuku shatter the bones in his arms and legs to save the girl and smash the robot. To Shouto it’s as if this boy was just manifesting his quirk for the first which was actually true but he doesn’t find that out for a while.

There’s another boy in the gen ed department, Shinsou, that Shouto becomes acquaintances with. The two of them have been burned by society and people that were supposed to care about them so even if they aren’t best friends and even if they don’t tell each other their life stories, they still have each other’s backs. They train together because they’re two outcast kids that have never fit in and that aren’t really that good with social interaction. Shouto points out Izuku to Shinsou and watches him carefully from afar for a long time. It has nothing to do with a crush, he’s just fascinated by the boy and his relationship with All Might. When Shinsou asks if he envies the boy, Shouto vehemently denies it but there is a part of him that is envious of Izuku. Of course, Shinsou also suggests that Shouto has a crush on Izuku and he of course vehemently denies that as well.

Shouto and Shinsou go to the USJ not to train but because they are getting extra credit to be the people in need of being saved. Neither of them is thrilled about but they will take whatever they can get to observe the lessons the hero course is getting. They are there and attacked when the League of Villains breaks in and attempts to kill all of them and All Might. It’s during this time that Izuku learns of another quirk of his. It’s unfortunate really and later he will get an in-depth apology and explanation from All Might. But for the moment Izuku sees Tsuyu and Mineta getting attacked by a villain with ice powers and wishing he could take the power away he unlocks the quirk that had lain dormant for fifteen years. In a flash, Izuku has the ice quirk and ends up almost giving himself hypothermia while he uses it.

Izuku learns early on about All For One and the true implications behind One For All. He learns that his quirk implies that All For One is his father and that now that he has One For All, he will have to face his own father, the greatest evil on earth. There should be confliction within Izuku but because he barely remembers the man, he accepts that he will have to fight the man. And when Izuku is alone he will admit to himself that All Might has become his dad anyway so he doesn’t care about some far off man that was never in his life anyway. After his discussion with All Might, Izuku works to hone All For One and One For All with All Might’s help. With the ice quirk, he works on giving and taking quirks and doing it with other people. At first, he wears gloves purely because he isn’t sure how the activation works but when he learns that it’s through intention he gets rid of the gloves.

The Sports Festival arrives and this is when Shouto declares Izuku as his rival because he wants to prove to his father that he can a hero better than All Might even without a quirk. Izuku accepts his challenge because he understands. God does he understand! And he’s determined to show Shouto that he’s so much more than his father. Shouto right before the third round reveals the truth to Izuku who is horrified and then he meets Endeavor shortly after and snarls at the man telling him that Shouto is so much more than him and will be a greater hero than he could ever imagine. Izuku storms away ever more determined to help Shouto. When they do face each other, Shouto attacks cold and calculating with a fierce need to prove himself. It ends up being a hand-to-hand fight that gets quite nasty and Midnight and Cementoss are ready to break it up. Izuku has Shouto in a hold and tells him that he is not his father nor his father’s impossible expectations. This is what Shouto needs to hear and he uses this as a way to flip Izuku over and immobilize him. Izuku graciously accepts defeat but is happy about it because he knows that Shouto is going to break away from his father. Endeavor sees Shouto just after the match and tries to greet him as if he had always loved him and tells him that he wants to truly train him but Shouto tells him that he was able to fight well because he just let himself feel it and ignore Endeavor. Pushing past his father, he tells him that he is going to be a hero like All Might regardless of his quirk.

After the Sports Festival, Shouto goes to meet his mom and they talk about everything. She tells him that she’s so happy to see him and she can’t wait to see him as a top hero and tell everyone that her son is an amazing hero. He stays and they talk for hours. He returns whenever he has free time and regularly sends her letters when he gets the chance.

In the coming days, Shouto opens up more to Izuku and then the rest of Class 1A. Most of them think he’s pretty cool especially since he doesn’t use a quirk and he beat Izuku, though he did lose to Katsuki in the final round. Izuku asks Shouto if he wants to train together and Shouto tells him he will only train with Izuku if Shinsou can train as well. He had promised the boy at the beginning of the year that they were in it together and if he is going to get some good hero training from the kid whose adopted dad is All Might then he will make sure Shinsou does as well. As it turns out, Shinsou is also getting private lessons from Aizawa who includes Shouto in on those lessons as well. During one of their training sessions together, Izuku gives Shouto the ice quirk to practice giving and taking. Shouto is a natural at using the ice and seems so happy to Izuku that he doesn’t have the heart to take it away. They talk to All Might, Aizawa, and Nezu and it’s agreed that Shouto can keep the ice quirk but he is going to have to update the quirk registry.

The official story to Endeavor is that an ice quirk magically manifested during training with Aizawa. It’s accepted Shouto’s quirk gets updated in the registry. He continues to train his quirk but soon finds that using it on his left side is painful. It’s too cold for his left side to bear and it starts freezing too much so he mainly uses his new ice quirk on his right side.

The biggest issue that Shouto has is Endeavor. The man is furious that his failure of a son manifested an ice quirk and not a fire one. But because he sees his son on the hero path he decides to train him, so he takes Shouto on for an internship. Izuku goes to Gran Torino and learns to control One For All though he’s still having a bit of difficulty with All For One. En route to another city, the train gets stopped there are the nomus attacking Hosu City. Without thinking, Izuku jumps out of the train to find Tenya and make sure he’s alright. When he does find the other boy, he sees that he’s in trouble. Izuku faces Stain and knowing he’s in trouble sends his location out to his contacts. Shouto shows up a few minutes later using his new ice quirk and together Izuku, Shouto, and Tenya fight stain and win.

Originally, they get scolded but then the doctor comes in and pulls the police commissioner aside to explain that Shouto has too many improperly healed injuries that were not from the Stain Incident. The truth finally comes out. They find out about Endeavor’s years of abuse and his new training regimen. Under false pretenses, they invite Endeavor to the school and he ends up getting in an argument with Aizawa and All Might. Izuku fearing for his teachers and more importantly for Shouto doesn’t think when he sees Endeavor raise his arm. He jumps in and takes away the man’s quirk.

There is a huge trial where Endeavor is found guilty of child and spousal abuse and put in jail. The jury doesn’t want Endeavor to get his fire back but they do not think that Izuku should be the one to keep it. After coming to an agreement, the jury decides that Shouto will get his father’s fire as well and Izuku is forced to give it to him in front of the entire courtroom and on international television. This sparks interest in the villain-underground since they all know of a man with such a quirk.

Rei is released from the hospital and Shouto goes to live with her in a house near the Midoriyas. They take her last name and Rei becomes close with Inko. They’re constantly at each other’s houses after this and are more inseparable than they had quickly become. Friends were always over watching movies or playing video games or just hanging out. Rei is determined to give her son the childhood he never had so is sweet and gentle with him. It’s during this time that Inko and Rei had found their sons falling asleep on the couch together or doing homework together. With the constant close proximity, Izuku and Shouto begin with soft brushes of hands and reddened cheeks. Both have gone through so much and never really had friends their own age so don’t immediately realize what’s happening.

The semester ends and they go to training camp. Shouto and Shinsou are invited because they are hopeful candidates for the hero course so the teachers want to prepare them and give them a taste. During the period after the trial and before camp, Shouto had refused to use his new fire quirk because it reminded him too much of the abuse he received at his father’s hands. It’s not until during the training camp that Izuku yells at him that it’s his power now, isn’t it? After this, Shouto trains both of his new quirks equally so that he can catch up with the rest of his peers that had a decade to get accustomed to theirs. He’s feeling a little annoyed that he isn’t at the same level as everyone else and Izuku explains to him that he had gotten one part of his quirk right before coming to UA and the second part manifested during the USJ Incident. Shouto puts it together and asks him if he’s All Might’s son but no matter much he denies it, it catches on quickly. Pretty soon everyone accepts that Izuku is All Might’s son, even the teachers, who quite frankly should know better.

They’re still attacked during training camp and have to fight the League of Villains: Vanguard Squad. The villains treat Izuku with reverence and happily face off against him but don’t capture him because he’s too strong and surrounded by too many friends. He still shatters his arms fighting muscular to save Kouta. Katsuki is still taken by the League of Villains. But there’s a spark of recognition when Shouto sees Dabi. Momo makes the tracking device and tells the police about it.

Shouto and Kirishima are determined to get Katsuki back and tell Izuku that they are planning on rescuing him. Of course, Izuku says yes. Tenya goes with them to make sure they don’t use their quirks in a fight and Momo also goes along under that same pretense. They get to the warehouse that has the nomu and experience All For One, the Villain, for the first time. It’s horrifying and none of them can move but Izuku still comes up with the plan for Kirishima to be the one to reach out his hand for Katsuki. Thankfully they all make it to safety and watch All Might fight All For One in a final epic battle. All For One is exceptionally pissed at All Might because he stole his family and made his son his protege.

All Might still wins but at the cost of his body. Katsuki puts the pieces together and figures out that Izuku is All Might’s protege and confronts them about it. They tell him most of the truth but don’t mention Izuku’s father because Izuku doesn’t know if he can handle Katsuki’s reaction. This doesn’t save him from Shouto. But Shouto understands what it’s like having a shitty father so when he confronts Izuku he is much more understanding.

They all get permission to go back to the dorms and it takes Rei and Inko a little bit more convincing but do eventually agree. Because Shouto and Shinsou aren’t in the hero course yet they don’t get to take the Provisional License Exam. The only person in Class 1A that doesn’t get their Provisional License is Katsuki and he’s furious both with himself and everyone else because of it. With time he will get it but only after he’s learned to reflect on his issues and start growing from them. At the beginning of the semester, Shouto is transferred into the Hero Course and works extra hard so that he can catch up. He does work hard and is allowed to take the supplemental lessons that Katsuki is taking so that he can take the Provisional Exam. At the end of the semester, the two of them take the exam and pass thus getting their Provisional Licenses.

During this fall semester, Izuku and Shouto grow even closer. Shouto has never slept well due to nightmares and Izuku gets them on and off as well. They run into each other at some point when they both go to make tea in the middle of the night. The first time they talk they end up falling asleep cuddling on the couch and wake up with the sun dance on their faces wrapped up in a blanket but all of their classmates making comments about it. They never find out who it was but it was Aizawa because he’s secretly soft for these kids. After this, the two of them make tea and go to one of their rooms to talk until they fall asleep. It’s comforting for them to have someone else who understands and isn’t going to judge them. To have someone stand by their side and accept them where they are and be excited to help them continue to grow in the future.

Life isn’t perfect and they have to learn to navigate new quirks and strengthening villains in addition to school. On top of that, they have to learn how to understand their feelings for each other. But by the time they realize that they’ve fallen in love, the other is their right-hand man and they would rather sink into the deepest depths of Tartarus then be without the other. It’s Shouto who confesses first because Izuku has done so much for him and his family and he can’t handle another moment with Izuku knowing how grateful he is. Quickly, his gratitude gives way and he confesses how deeply he cares for Izuku. He’s terrified and shaking because he’s not sure that Izuku is going to cast him aside and call him worthless and disgusting like everyone else. But he doesn’t. God he doesn’t! Immediately, Izuku is sobbing and tackling Shouto. In between tears, he tells Shouto how much cares for him too and how glad he is to have Shouto by his side no matter what. The pair get together soon after this and become even more of an unbeatable duo. Villains find out and think they can use one against the other but between Izuku’s AFO and OFA powers and Shouto’s ice and fire quirks, they’re practically unbeatable.

In the beginning, two lost, lonely boys were beaten down by life and everyone in it. But by the end, those two boys grew stronger together and with their friends became unstoppable. They would later go on to become the joined Symbol of Peace with Izuku being the Symbol of Love and Shouto becoming the Symbol of Justice.

#Shouto Todoroki #Izuku Midoriya #Tododeku

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fatalezr · 4 years

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A form of justice - part five

“I think this is the nicest Hollandaise I’ve ever had”

Kate gave Rebecca a satisfied look. She continued to eat the Eggs Benedict in front of her. Rebecca was enjoying some smoked salmon too but wanted Kate to answer her original question.

“No Kate, I mean what do you think about the case?”

“Oh that” Kate continued to chew on her food. Rebecca had woken at Claridge’s to a text from Kate accepting her offer of breakfast. She had been in the office with the team until midnight chasing down identification on the dead bodies in the flat in Ealing that Patrick Hanlon had been staying in. They had managed to find some details on one so far, and Sullivan eventually tired and told the team to pick up enquiries again on Monday. “Look at it like this. We know there’s a mole somewhere within the Met. We know about the trafficking ring. We’ve made progress. Has it been easy? No. Has it been dangerous? At times. Are we still alive and in a better place than we were a month ago? Yes. Are we better dressed...?” She gestured at the new summer dress Rebecca was wearing

Rebecca could not argue with her logic. Kate had an ability to rationalise like no one else she knew, and she had to admit she liked the clothes MI5 had bought her as part of her reward for the hit she had performed. There was one other question she had for her partner. “Ok. No judgement here, but your closet.” Rebecca had found a multitude of weapons and ammunition in Kate’s spare room and wanted to better understand how she had assembled them.

“I need to introduce you to my friends one day” she replied. “Paula and Marcus. They’re SO19. We met in training and well, we’ve borrowed some items over the last couple of years”. She cut another slice of egg and muffin and chewed it.

“They must be good friends” Rebecca commented.

Kate winked at her. “You have no idea!”. They both laughed and enjoyed the remainder of their breakfast.

—————

“Sod it, I’m off. Don’t work late”.

DCI Sullivan put on his jacket. It was 5pm but he was exhausted and Rebecca could tell it. She wished him a good evening and watched him walk dejected out of the office. Monday had been an interesting day in the office. The weekend of hot weather had led to dark skies and thunderstorms over London. There was the occasional crash or rumble outside the windows of their office at Scotland Yard. Rebecca was still in her position as Sullivan’s secretary and he had called her in to his office first thing to catch her up on the weekend’s activity. Rebecca feigned ignorance as he regaled the story of finding two dead assassins and one dead protection officer at the safe house, Hanlon going missing and the call from MI5 late Saturday to finally tell him that they had picked up Hanlon in time and now had him stashed away in a secret location. Rebecca listened to his exasperated story and then offered to help how she could. Sullivan had her work with the team to file reports on the weekends activity, as well as setting up a harrowing call to the family of the murdered officer. Rebecca had to listen to the call but did so standing, proud of the empathy and emotion with which Sullivan spoke to the young man’s mother. She felt emotional about his death, having witnessed it first hand. Unable to share this with anyone other than Kate, she vowed to pursue Mulvaney and help the team in any way she could.

The team had now identified the two assassins and their links to Mulvaney. Both had worked for companies that had ties to him, and they were searching for any extra payments into accounts or other financial ties they could use as proof that Mulvaney had paid them to kill Hanlon and the protection officer. They had no luck so far, and Kate had privately confided in Rebecca that they did not expect to be so lucky. When it came to his dirty business, Mulvaney paid in cash.

There was also the issue of how they had found the house in the first place. Rebecca had spent a lot of time putting together a list of who would have access to the files. It read as a list of all of the senior commissioners in the Met hierarchy as well as the Detectives she worked with. She didn’t know who to trust but formulated a plan to find out. With Sullivan now out of the office, she put it into motion. She saw Oli Afidi also stand and start packing his bag on his desk. He’d been soaked during a storm whilst getting lunch earlier and Kate suspected he wanted to get home and change his blue shirt. She stood and smoothed the red sleeveless dress that she was wearing. It was modest with a high neckline and came down to her knee but it was well-fitted. She walked to Afidi’s desk with a folder.

“Excuse me Oli, you heading off?”

“Soon” he replied, “but what can I do for you?” Afidi was in his late 20s and a generally jovial character. He had a glistening smile and was friendly to everyone in the office and outside. His parents had moved to the UK from Nigeria before he was born and whilst he had faced a lot of prejudice in his life, it seemed to make him more determined to excel.

“You’ve been working on some of the pawn shops right?” she asked him.

“Yeah that’s right”

“Well we just got the paperwork through to do a raid on a property in Hackney tomorrow. Local force want to shut it down. I need to get the authorisation done tonight for our involvement but now the guv has left could you sign it?”

“First I’m hearing of this” Afidi said, taking the folder. “Hackney want to move in now?”

“I think they’ve pulled some strings. You know how it can be”.

Afidi shook his head. “Yep, I do” he said. He signed the papers. “They’re a go tomorrow morning?”

“8am. Shall I say you want to join them?”

“Please. Thanks Rebecca”. He handed her back the folder and checked his phone. “Shit”, he said, “told the wife I’d be on the tube 5 minutes ago. If Hackney give you any more, will you let me know?”

“Sure” she said.

“Cheers Becca. Catch you tomorrow”. He gave a smile and left.

One down, thought Rebecca. She returned to her desk and prepared some more papers, keeping herself busy. At half past five, Kate bid everyone a good evening, loudly announcing she’d “had enough of this load of bollocks. We’ll finish this fucker tomorrow” and storming off. Rebecca took another file to Detective Inspector Tim Warren. He was at his computer reading intently and Rebecca had to pause by his desk for a few seconds whilst he finished before he acknowledged her existence.

“Good afternoon Rebecca” he said in his typically English voice. Inspector Warren was a Cambridge graduate with a keen mind and an eye for detail. He was often quiet but deliberate. Rebecca knew him least of the team as he was private and coy about his life away from the office. He had let slip that he had a boyfriend of several years and lived in Hampstead but that was about it. He always dressed professionally. Even in the heat of summer he was still wearing a floral tie and his white shirt was crisp and clean.

“Sorry to disturb Warren, but you’re the only one of the team left. Just had some papers faxed over from Waltham Forest. They’re going to be raiding a pawn shop in Leyton tomorrow. It has Mulvaney links”.

“What?” Warren snatched the papers from her hand and looked at them irritated. “When did these come through?”

“Just this second” she replied, “had they not told you?”

“They had not”. His face was red. “Does the DCI know?”

“I just contacted him, but Waltham are saying they need this signed ASAP. They’re hitting at 8am”.

“Communication!” he said, “this is very poor”. He looked at her and shook his head. “I apologise for my rudeness”.

“Not at all” she said, “it’s wrong they’ve dropped this on you last minute”.

Warren sighed but signed the document. “Thank you Rebecca, please let them know they can expect me in the morning”.

“I will, Inspector. Hope it’s a good night”. She took the documents and went back to her desk. She waited another 15 minutes for Warren to leave before logging off her computer and calling Kate.

“We’re a go”, she told her briefly. She used the bathrooms of Scotland Yard to change out of her dress and into black leggings and a tight black running top, looking as if she was heading to the gym. She left the office and walked towards Temple station. She had not gone far when Kate’s car pulled up alongside her and she quickly got in to the passenger side. It took them a while to navigate the streets of London and it was 7pm before they got to the first pawn shop in Hackney. It was on a main road but Kate found room on a side street where they could see it and parked up.

“Your favourite is in the glove box” Kate said. Rebecca opened it and found her trusted Glock 17 and it’s suppressor. She screwed it on to the gun and loaded it, also putting a couple of spare clips into the back of her leggings. “Getting good at that” Kate commented and Rebecca laughed. It was her third time holding a gun in three days and she was right, she had become more comfortable with the idea. She had dreamed of her kills again on Sunday night, waking up breathing heavily and aroused. She found herself hoping to not need to use the weapon but yet ready and wanting to.

Kate was preparing her own Glock. She had changed into a black tank top that sat just above her breasts, giving a hint of her black bra underneath and the black straps over her shoulders. She was also wearing leggings. When she finished, she handed Rebecca a set of car keys. Rebecca pressed the unlock button and saw the car in front of them flash its lights. It was an old Fiat and Rebecca knew it had been acquired from the local police lock up.

“I guess I’ll see you later” she said to Kate. She hugged her partner.

“Tenner says I’m right” Kate replied. She winked at Rebecca, who shook her head and got out of the car. Kate had bet that Warren would be the mole and insisted on staking out the Leyton property, leaving Rebecca to see if Afidi tipped off Mulvaney about Hackney. Their theory was that if one of the two detectives was the mole, Mulvaney would be told about the non-existent raid and make sure the property was empty by the morning. Now sat in the other car, Rebecca was strangely torn. She hoped that neither Detective would be involved and that their nights would pass without incident. But even if nothing happened tonight, would they be able to tell what that meant? It could be that the officers tipped off Mulvaney but he considered moving any money overnight too risky. Rebecca opened her bag, took out her headphones and settled into listening to an audiobook while she pondered these thoughts.

————

Rebecca looked at her phone. It was just after 11pm. She paused her audiobook as a chapter finished and looked out at the stillness around the pawn shop. There was no further update from Kate. The two had made sure to check in every hour via a text message and the most excitement Kate had reported on was when she saw a fox walk by her car. Rebecca dared to hope that maybe all would be ok, that neither detective would have tipped off Mulvaney because neither was working for him. She tried to keep her focus on the shop in case there was anything suspicious. The minutes ticked by.

She shut her eyes briefly but then almost immediately opened them. A white van caught her eye as it pulled up outside the pawn shop. Rebecca studied it and noted the licence plate. It looked like two men were in the front wearing flat caps but she could see not make out their faces. The driver got out of the van and moved around the side so she could not see him but a brief orange glow told her he had likely sparked a cigarette. The passenger stepped out on the side closest to her. He was wearing a black shirt and brown jacket. As he opened his jacket, Rebecca saw something sticking out of the waistband of his jeans. It looked like the handle of a revolver and she sat upright, studying their movements closely. The passenger went to the back of the van and opened the door. A third man came out the van wearing a black jacket and jeans. Rebecca gasped to herself. They must be Mulvaney’s men - Afidi! He had told them! She watched as the third man exited the vehicle. He was gripping the arm and forcing out a young woman. She was wearing a short denim skirt and high boots along with a black strappy top that exposed her back and shoulders. Rebecca wondered if she was also part of the crew. The woman stumbled out of the van and the bald man gripping her arm slapped her with the back of his hand. Rebecca was confused. This didn’t make any sense for a crew stashing cash from the business. Maybe they weren’t there for that, but then what? What were they doing with the girl? She didn’t look to be safe. Should she intervene?

Rebecca processed the thoughts in her head as she saw all men disappear into an alleyway that led to the back of the shop, the woman being forcibly dragged and stumbling. The sight of her in distress made up Rebecca’s mind. She briefly thought of Kate but knew there was no time. Whatever was going on the woman needed help, and only she could provide it. She tucked her gun into her leggings and stepped out of the car. She crossed the street quickly and paused by the alleyway. Hearing no sound, she glanced quickly and saw no-one. She pulled out her gun and advanced, keeping the Glock supported in both hands and raised high, ready to strike. She paused at the end of the alley and flattened herself against the wall. She peaked her head round, trying to get a view of the back of the shop. She saw the back door was open and the driver of the van was keeping guard, his hands tucked in his pocket. There was a high-pitched scream from inside the building, muffled by its distance and he looked into the room that the door led to for a couple of seconds. Rebecca surmised that the woman was being attacked further inside the building, presumably by the other two men. The guard seemed disinterested in what was going on and Rebecca took her chance.

She swung her body around the corner, raising the gun as she did so. The guard had time to look at her but did not see the black of the gun initially until she fired pfft-pfft into his chest. He opened his mouth but Rebecca had already raised her aim higher and fired pfft into his head. He fell and was motionless. Rebecca covered his body with her gun as she moved towards him but she trusted her shots - he was surely dead and she had not made a sound. She briefly his jacket and found a large knife tucked inside and a blue Nokia cellphone. She pocketed the phone, then trained her eyes through the back door. It led to an unclean back office, where piles of cheap jewellery and mounds of paper sat around a poorly organised desk and chair. She tiptoed into the office and had a closer look. There was another wooden door in the far corner of the room that presumably led to the counter and one by its side that led to the front of the shop. There were some filing cabinets and what looked like a heavy safe, neither of which had been touched. Either the men were not here to clean the place out or had not got round to it yet. Rebecca heard another scream, then a crash and a harsh voice shouting “fucking bitch!” and focussed her mind on the task at hand. It sounded like the voices came from the door to her left, the one that led to the front of the shop. She placed her hand on the handle and raised the gun. She took a deep breath and opened the door wide.

The door opened to a wide shop floor with rows of jewellery and electronic goods in glass cabinets around the place. She saw the woman was being held down on top of one of the cabinets filled with watches, the passenger from the van holding her arms above her head whilst the man from the back grabbed at her legs. The woman was thrashing but Rebecca could see the men had her subdued. Her pants had been pulled down and were on the floor and there was a cut on her head. As she entered the room, both men looked up at her.

“The fuck?” said the one holding the woman’s arms as he saw Rebecca clad in black with her suppressed weapon. His hand reached inside his jacket towards the revolver and Rebecca turned her gun on him quickly. Pfft pfft pfft pfft. She fired rapidly to stop him reaching what he was grabbing for. She hit him in the chest and side and he staggered back, crashing into some shelves.

“Oh shit” said the other man. His belt was undone and as he turned to face Rebecca his trousers fell down, exposing his grey boxer shorts.

“Put your hands up” Rebecca commanded him and he did so. She quickly glanced at the other man on the floor. He was wheezing but not moving. The woman had stopped thrashing and was just staring at Rebecca, unsure of what happened. “It’s ok” Rebecca said to her, “Im not here to hurt you”. The woman said nothing but edged off the cabinet and away from the man. “Who the fuck are you?” she asked the man, keeping the gun pointed at his chest.

“Fuck off” he said.

“Who sent you here?” she asked. He said nothing. She lowered her guns aim to the man’s knee. “Answer me or the gun” she told him.

“Nobody sent us” he said. “I know the owner here. Just wanted a laugh”.

“I don’t believe you”.

“It’s true!” he protested, “this place is empty overnight”.

Rebecca rationalised what he saying. There were no bags or cases on any of the men. They had not made an attempt to get in to the safe. Perhaps it was poor timing after all. Did that clear Afidi? She could not say.

“So she’s just a laugh?” Rebecca asked him, nodding at the woman against the wall with her torn clothes and bleeding head. She felt fury towards the would-be rapist.

“She’s just a fucking whore” he spat back, “and so are you”. He lunged forward towards her but Rebecca took a step back and fired pfft-pfft into his chest before he could reach her. He fell to the floor on his back.

“Fuck you” she said as she stood over him. She aimed at his manhood and fired pfft. The man howled in pain as the bullet hit him, blood pouring and staining his boxer shorts. Rebecca watched him squirm and smiled. There would be one less rapist on London’s streets. That could only be a good thing. She put her foot on his chest and felt the endorphins flow through her. She let them linger for a second, then fired her remaining bullets into his chest in rapid succession pfft-pfft-pfft-pfft-pfft-pfft, each squeeze of the trigger bringing her enjoyable sensations. The slide on the gun stayed back and she ejected the clip, getting a new one from her leggings. She fired a nonchalant pfft into the mans head, then walked to her first victim in the room and did the same.

She turned to the woman in the strappy top. She put her hands up instinctively. “It’s ok”, said Rebecca, “but I think you need to get to hospital”. She had an idea and went to the body of one of the men. She found his wallet inside his pocket and 40 pounds in cash. “Take this”, she said, handing it to the woman, who lowered her hands. “Get a cab. You never saw me ok? There was a man here. He wore a mask and had a gun. That’s all you need to say”.

“Tha-thank you” the woman stammered. Rebecca smiled at her.

“Go, go now” she told her and the woman headed out of the office. Rebecca searched the remaining bodies and found an old iPhone in the pocket of the man she had shot in the balls. She surveyed her carnage and then left quickly, heading to the car she had been using. There was a chance someone would have heard the commotion and the police could arrive soon. She drove off, calling Kate on speaker as she did. The phone rang several times and Rebecca was starting to get concerned before Kate answered.

“Not a good time now” her colleague said.

“No Kate, I need to talk to you” she said hurriedly.

“Not now”.

Rebecca was annoyed. “Why not?” There was silence for a few seconds. “What’s going on?”

“I found the mole” Kate replied. “I’m with him now”.

“What?!” Rebecca exclaimed. She listened down the phone and heard Kate’s footsteps. She was evidently walking somewhere. She heard a chik-chak as a bullet was chambered and a man’s voice. It was well-mannered and deep.

“Kate! What are you doing here?”

Rebecca recognised the voice immediately. It was Warren.

#assassin #female assassin #femme fatale #silencer hitwoman #hitwoman

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violetsmoak · 5 years

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No Safety or Surprise [Part I - Excerpt]

Summary: A haunting broadcast reveals the Joker’s final act and sets off a chain of events that will destroy the world. Terry finds himself collaborating once more with the estranged members of Bruce’s former team. As the end nears, however, he and the other Bats are faced with hard choices about survival—and forgiveness.

Disclaimer: I don’t own anything to do with Batman. I don’t make any money off this. It’s just me playing in a sandbox. (And I’ll put a better disclaimer on this at some other point.)

Author’s Note: First fic in the Batman universe, yay! (Well, second, but the first one was high school ago and was a blatant self-insert lol). I’ve been toying with this idea for a while now. It’s taken some in-depth planning, but I finally have something to show for it. This is only one part of a very large first chapter, but I thought I’d throw it out there into cyberspace and see what people think. I’ll post it here in mini excerpts, but eventually I’ll put it on FF.Net and Ao3, once it’s all shiny and edited.

Spoilers: Everything in Batman Beyond until but not including the “Rewired” storyline or anything afterward. Also, references to events and characters present in the DC ‘verse up to the New 52 (after the “Robin Rises” story arc) but before Rebirth. (And JFC do I hate keeping all these timelines straight!)

Warnings: Leading up to canon-divergence; eventual main character deaths (except not really, because timey wimey stuff); a few minor original characters; multiple POVs

Timeline: Takes place after the events of 10 000 Clowns but before Terry McGinnis graduates high school.

Bruce is beginning to wonder if a Lazarus Pit might not have been a better idea than the liver transplant. Of the methods for artificially prolonging life, at least with the Pit, he would eventually start to feel like he was recovering.

After the madness subsided, at least.

On days like today—when it’s damp and chilly, and there’s nothing going on in Gotham to keep him glued to the computer screen in the Cave—it’s hard to remember the arguments he’s always made against using the restorative powers of a Lazarus Pit. He body protests with every movement as he eases it through several slowed kata variations. Part of his physical therapy, as suggested (ordered) by his doctors.

Since his procedure, he feels the exhaustion much more keenly. It’s a bone-deep fatigue that seeps into every muscle, emphasizing the way his bones creak and grind against each other, cartilage worn away from age and decades of abuse. It’s the way his energy levels drain so much faster no, to the extent that even his usual ability to will himself into action seems to wane every day.

Not that he really had a choice in the matter. He was in end stage liver failure, and the nearest Pit is in New Cuba. He’d just been lucky that there was a suitable donor in the hospital at the right time.

‘Luck’ is one word for it. ‘Cruel irony’ might be a better phrase.

Douglas Tan is one of the names he’s going to carry on his conscience for the rest of his life; or, at least on his liver.

Terry still makes jokes about Batman having a piece of a Joker inside him, but then Terry tends to use humor to cover up when he’s worried. Dick always did that, too; and Jason.

Bruce scowls, bothered by the direction of his thoughts, as well as the raggedness to his breath. He isn’t even moving very fast, but it’s taking him every bit of strength to keep at it.

Ace is curled up in his usual spot in the cave, watching Bruce with what seems to be narrowed eyes. As if to say, don’t overdo it or I will knock you over.

He knows the dog is smarter than most people.

Ace is one of the reasons the doctors were willing to leave him to pursue recovery on his own and not under some beady-eyed nurse in hospital. Money isn’t as much an incentive as it once was, with so many legal and health standards in the way; the older he gets, the less likely people are to trust his ability to make decisions, lawyers or not.

He tolerated a private nurse for about a day while having Terry make other arrangements and manufacturing a piece of paper saying Ace was a certified service dog. He’s not, but Bruce has no doubt the dog would activate the medical alert button at the computer if something were to happen. And Terry has an alarm set up, keyed into the surveillance and motion sensors in the Cave. If anything were to happen, he can be here faster than any ambulance.

Old age has fed into long-buried fears, and it gives him an embarrassing sense of relief knowing there’s someone to look in on him. It has always bothered him, being dependent—being weak.

Some days he’s more accepting of it; some days he wishes he had Kryptonian DNA.

Which is usually the point at which he forces himself to occupy his mind with other things, because envying Clark Kent can only lead down a dark, frustrating path of self-pity. One he’s determinedly avoided ever since meeting the other man.

After another fifteen minutes of forcing himself to think about nothing but the movement of his limbs, Bruce finally finishes his exercises. Sweat coats his back and his limbs ache with the same burn as if he just spent several hours grappling through the Gotham skyline. Even if it took less challenging movements to reach this point, that burn is comforting.

Familiar.

And that’s a word that’s been cropping up more in his thoughts lately. History tends to repeat, after all, but it’s still strange to experience. Terry’s been an excellent example of that.

Like Bruce, the McGinnis boy started out with nothing but a suit and an old man’s voice in his ear. Now, he’s got a network. Friends who he trusts and who will keep his secret. A steadily growing list of allies in the field.

The Police Commissioner. The Justice League.

And a Catwoman too, for Christ sakes.

He wonders what Selina would think about that.

Bruce just hopes the kid won’t make his mistakes. Forty years is a long time to rack up regrets.

At least Dick’s back in contact now.

Sort of.

He showed up the second night that Bruce was recovering from his procedure at the hospital; he’d managed to convince Terry to go out on patrol instead of wasting his time watching an old man sleep.

“Batman doesn’t get a day off.”

Bruce had dosed for a bit, but not deeply; it wasn’t difficult to discern that he wasn’t alone.

One minute the room was empty and in the next, Bruce could feel that familiar presence—the one of a man who had carried the mantles of Robin, Nightwing and Batman—and somehow lived to tell the tale. Then his estranged son was stepping out of the shadows, glaring down at him, muscles in his jaw working and fists clenching and unclenching.

“I know what you’re going to say,” Bruce had croaked, wishing he had thought to ask for ice chips before the nurse left. “I’m too stubborn to die.”

The silence hanging afterward was filled with everything he couldn’t say yet. For once, Dick didn’t call him on it.

“You’re more stubborn than God,” his boy countered.

(He’ll always be a boy to Bruce, grey hair and eye-patch be damned.)

And yet, he sat, arms crossed and spine stiff for the rest of the night. Still angry, but there nonetheless. He stayed until morning rounds without saying anything, and then left.

They haven’t seen each other since, but sometimes Bruce can hear feedback on the comms when he’s directing Terry’s patrols. The tinny whisper of signals crossing from the bug he pretends he doesn’t know Dick planted on the underside of his medical ID tag.

It’s not much, but it’s something. The opening of the possibility that at some point, he’ll come around.

Barbara did, after all.

Mostly because of Terry, but afterward Bruce started making the effort. They can have conversations alone now that don’t end with her yelling at him (or punching him, on one or two memorable occasions). Bruce forgot how much he enjoyed her sense of humor and intelligence—how much he enjoyed their friendship—from before they slept together.

(That might be one of his life’s biggest shames. Oh, he has regrets associated with all of the family for one thing or another, but this is the one that still wakes him up at night feeling dirty.)

In a way, it’s easier with Tim, and that’s a bridge Bruce thought had been obliterated long ago.

Granted, he’s leaving Gotham again—the last incident with the Joker army rattled him enough that he put in for a transfer to the Chinese division of Wayne Enterprises—but he stuck around long enough to collaborate with Bruce on a subdermal antitoxin deployment implant against Joker venom.

(None of them want to be caught unawares again.)

It’s in the prototype phase, with only five of the devices in existence; he, Tim and Terry are testing them personally. It’s not exactly something the FDA is going to approve for human testing anytime soon, not with all the new legislation, but with the state of Gotham, it’s unwise to wait on it.

(He sent one to Barbara and one to Dick but doesn’t know if they’ve bothered to activate them. At least they haven’t sent them back.)

If the implant works, Bruce is seriously considering modifying the tech for the Wayne Enterprises medical division. There are a lot of illnesses and viruses out there which require regular dosages of medicine to keep them under control.

Maybe that’s the next project, after CAIN, he muses, grabbing his towel from where he draped it over one of the computer processors.

His global Clean Air Initiative Network is something he’d been working on before stepping back from the company. It was shelved almost immediately by Derek Powers when he took over, but since Bruce has been back, he’s been revisiting a lot of old projects.

Lucius’ boy did most of the technical work on it, and Foxtecha will have joint ownership of the patent when it’s ready for public consumption. Bruce would have asked Tim, but he knows how determined he is to get out of Gotham. He can read it in the tone of his emails, which have thankfully lost the stilted, formal business tone they’ve had since he returned to the company.

(Bruce mentioned paying a visit in the future, and Tim didn’t say no, so he counts that as a win.)

It’s a little disconcerting how the family is coming together again; disconcerting but welcome.

He’s received a vid call last week from Cassandra expressing concern over his surgery, and then a short, gruff email from Duke all-but ordering him to get better. There’s even a letter from Stephanie—or Eurus, as she goes by these days—smelling of dust and desert sun and incense found only in Nanda Parbat. Her messy, looping scrawl, echoed Dick’s sentiment about Bruce’s stubbornness and alluded to its genetic inheritability.

(That said more than if she had actually mentioned Damian outright.)

Bruce lost track of her not long after his son’s short and brutal stint under the cowl; it had surprised him to find out she ended up in Tibet.

It also relieved him. Because no matter how dark a path his son wandered, there would be someone to challenge him. To not obey without question. To give him a link to the life he once had, to being human and alive.

(Bruce very carefully doesn’t think about Jason—doesn’t wonder if things had been different, if he wouldn’t have reached out as well. Even after so many years, that wound is still raw.)

The whole thing is a stark difference from the last few times he ended up in the hospital, including when he was dosed on Joker venom several months ago. He didn’t hear anything from them at that point, which makes him think someone really thought he was dying this time and reached out.

Barbara, maybe. Or Dick. However much tension there is between himself and Bruce, he does keep in touch with the others.

Hell, it might even have been Terry. The kid doesn’t know the rest of them personally, but he’s gotten adept at navigating the computer in the cave. And he’s always been curious about his predecessors.

Bruce’s first family.

Or maybe just the first phase of the family.

Bruce shies away from that secret bit of knowledge he has about Terry, and his brother Matt. What he discovered the first time the kid returned to the Cave with bloody gashes that needed stitching up. The files and medical information buried beneath every firewall he could fashion, so the boy never stumbles upon it accidentally.

The most he’s allowed himself to acknowledge it is an amendment in his will setting aside trust funds for both boys.

As if triggered by his thoughts, the screen of the Bat-Computer flickers to life. He rolls his shoulders, expecting an alert on some heist or robbery going on in the city; another case to add to the docket for Terry to investigate after school (depending on the severity).

Bruce doesn’t expect the Cave to suddenly fill with a jaunty, haunting carnival tune that makes his entire body seize in recognition. And yet, he already knows what’s coming even before the words HA HA HA coalesce upon the screen.

TBC

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heartslogos · 5 years

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newfragile yellows [429]

Bull hears the sound of the front door being unlocked and opened. He takes a sip of his beer, flipping the page on Pavus’ latest publication. He hasn’t gotten around to reading Pavus’ paper, he’s trying to work up to reading it by reading all of the other ones in front of it. Tonight seemed like a good night for it. Ellana’s gone out to her monthly book club and he doesn’t have anything to work on.

And so far there’ve been no attempts at assassination, so he figures that whatever the Inquisition’s been doing to get both himself and Ellana off of other people’s radars must be working.

He hears the front door open, the jangle of Ellana’s keys as she drops them onto the table next to the door, and calls out, “You’re back early. How was book club?”

Bull swears that there’s something weird about Ellana’s book club. There’s just something wrong with it. He isn’t sure what, but sometimes he’s woken up to Ellana on the phone with someone from book club in hushed, but heated, whispers. Her response is that the passion of a good book knows no time table. If either of them were anyone else, and if their relationship was half a step closer to the average brand of heteronormative, he’d half suspect that she was having an affair.

Ellana doesn’t respond.

Then there’s a loud thump and Bull jumps off the couch and runs without thinking, chucking the journal aside.

Ellana’s wheezing and leaning heavily against the coat stand that she’s knocked into the wall, which is threatening to slip and send her crashing to the floor.

“I got stabbed. Lightly,” Ellana explains a little needlessly and breathlessly, hand pressed against her thigh, teeth gritted.

“And you drove home?” Bull says, “Why didn’t you go to a hospital? I would’ve met you there. Who stabbed you? What happened?”

“Helen and I had a disagreement over our current book. She says it makes her depressed and angry, which is obviously the wrong reaction because it’s a book about finding hope in the darkest places,” Ellana says. “We had words. There was a cheese knife present.”

“You got stabbed at book club?”

“Yeah,” Ellana grimaces as Bull helps her to the bathroom, sitting her down on the toilet lid as he gets the first aide kit. “Anyway, we had to scatter a bit after that. Some narc called the cops.”

“On you getting stabbed?”

“Nah, someone squealed on Mary Ellen for dealing molly out of her garage,” Ellana replies. “I bet it was her son’s ex-girlfriend’s brother. He’s got his own operation running in the next district.”

Bull drops the med-kit on this foot, “What.”

Bull stares at his wife. She stares back at him.

“What?”

“Is book club code for…illegal operation?”

“No,” Ellana says, “Book club is book club.”

“With drugs?”

“Listen. We’re in the suburbs, babe,” Ellana says, “The craziest shit happens in the suburbs. Besides, it’s cool. It’s her side hustle, she’s got to pay off her student loans somehow.”

“Mary Ellen has student loans?”

“Uh, yeah? She went to a private college for undergrad and for her major, she’s like. Swimming in debt right now and dealing molly is enough to keep her floating. You thinks he can afford that two story Antivan colonial on her husband’s salary? That’s optimistic of you.”

“I feel like you’re opening my eye to something,” Bull says, grunting as he gets on his knees to look at her leg. Ellana holds her skirt up giving him better access. It isn’t as bad as he thought, just in an annoying place. “Did you drive home? Where’s your car?”

“Nah, I jumped in with Susan and Adrienne, they dropped me off. I’ll get my car from Mary Ellen’s tomorrow.”

“I can’t believe one of your book club members deals drugs,” Bull shakes his head, “You’re lucky I’m not obligated to report that anymore. The Inquisition doesn’t care about party drugs.”

“Chill, Bull,” Ellana pats his shoulder, hissing as he starts cleaning the wound. “Besides, it’s not like we can cut Mary Ellen out of book club. She brings that good shit alcohol and it gets Jennifer talking and she’s got the most buck wild ideas of what constitutes poetry. Listening to her and Genivieve got at it is like listening to two jazz scatters with a pair of spoons. That’s like…half of the book club experiences when you aren’t debating with Helen. Fucking Helen. The only reason why she’s in book club is because her sister-in-law’s our treasurer. I wish Adora wasn’t such a doormat.”

“You’re always so colorful when you’ve got blood loss,” Bull muses. “Is there anything else I should know about your book club?”

“Yeah, we aren’t going to get busted for this. One of our members is the police commissioner’s husband’s mom,” Ellana says. “So I’m going back same time next month, but it’s going to be at Jennifer’s house next time and also I don’t know if we’re starting a new book because we had to adjourn before that could be decided. I need to text Adora about it.”

“Is the violence a normal part of book club or is that just a new thing?”

“It’s book club, Bull, what do you think?”

“I think I know nothing about your book club because everything I thought I knew is crumbling before me,” Bull answers. “As long as you’re happy.”

Ellana slumps over him, laughing as she mashes her face against his neck and shoulder.

“I love you, too, babe. I’d invite you to book club, but there’s a strict no spouses rule. You’d like the intrigue, though.”

“I can’t believe that I didn’t find this shit out about your book club sooner.”

“You didn’t seem interested,” Ellana says, “And you used to be a cop, I didn’t want to give you conflict of interest.”

Bull glances up at her, “You’re a crime syndicate heiress, and book club is where you drew the line for conflict of interest?”

“Former crime syndicate heiress,” Ellana stresses, “Former.”

#heartsfic #gather your party and venture forth

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spineofdeathwing · 6 years

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The sincere level of cherry picking in this post is absolutely laughable and abhorring. I’ll start from the top to bottom of ‘evidence’.

The first discussion and issue of Hu'lon was that I saw a pattern in something that I had seen in a lot of my members past; it escalated due to Hu'lon refusing to communicate, and through the grapevine I just heard that they wanted to ‘not put it in the Accord’. I was concerned, and I reached out - the first time, I was met with stalwart refusal to communicate, so I backed off due to knowing that they had a legitimate social issue. I approached later on, and as you can see, the discussion was very forward and after clearing up my concerns with them, I backed off and that should have been the end of it. For the officers reaching out to people - I apologize if I prefer to discuss things over solving everything with a block button and refusal to speak.

Moving onto the part about me being tired of this. I had my current best friend leave the guild in the middle of the night, after seemingly everything was good (again, due to a lack of communication, I was not made aware that the other person was uncomfortable.) I suffer from BPD - i.e. Borderline Personality Disorder, which, if any of you have associated or learned of it, is the behaviour of absolute fear, anxiety and melting down when you’re met with someone leaving you. Tiao Lin was one of my best friends, and I still consider them to be, and I was in absolute tears when I made these messages. There is no guilt-tripping, there is legitimate depression and anxiety happening when these messages are happening. Conveniently, they left out the part where I explained such.

Moving onto the art 'requests’. I asked every single one of my artists in the guild - which, my guild has quite a number and I sincerely admire each and every one of them - if they’d like to collaborate in an effort to recruit people. This was clearly outlined in the picture: HERE at the top, almost cut off and further cherry picked.

Moving onto Tiao Lin once more, I reached out to a few of the stable people that I know she would make good friends with so that she would feel more at home in the guild. She suffers from anxiety and I genuinely wished her the best. I messaged three people to just reach out for her - if she felt anxious because of something, then she should always have a way to help and heal with her guild. I do not believe this was something that is wrong.

People were hurt by her departure. She blocked and removed everyone without a word.

One hurt person, that didn’t wish to include them in our recruitment post anymore. Note that I was still actively attempting to defend her.

Another hurt person. Both close friends of hers.

As you can see, I talked and discussed with all of them. I never made the claim that the whole guild absolutely hated her, because I never told everyone she had left - I had elected to keep that a non-topic until it had been fully closed, because I knew from their patterns of behaviour that they can have these blips of panic. I did not fault her, and I explained to those people further into the conversation how and why it happened.

More art requests - this was very clearly a joke, and taken out of context.

Now, for these claims of racism and others. Correct, I did say them, in private games with friends that I had been around for months at this point. Note in the first one that Tiao Lin (Sylvissa) was clearly leading the joke towards what I said, and I just expanded on an edgy joke. There is no hatred, no calling other people these words, nor is there any sort of malicious intent behind it. It’s a joke. By holding these words so high in the realms of taboo, you give them the power behind them. If, at any point, someone mentioned that they were uncomfortable with what I said, I would be more than happy to apologize, and not say it again, which - with another cherry picked screenshot, I did HERE .

For the second member of the Accord that you listed that I was upset about creating alts; they’re still very much in the guild, and we’ve discussed this in length before to ensure that there will be no misconstrued information again - they do not feel wronged. They are wronged however that you, Hu'lon, used them without permission just to push your letter. They used sixty dollars of their own money to boost a character, and when you had finished with them - you blocked them. You made them cry because of your actions. Your entire argument on these things is based on exceptionally out-of-context statements that I’m appalled you think you can spread to other people just to scorn and ruin my guild.

This is laughable .. Wey is a friend of mine and that is clearly taken out of context once more - and the bottom snippet has never happened. I haven’t run HFC in years; nor have I ever done a commission that had horns in it - and if I had, WMV doesn’t 'not’ export horns. It’s attached to the body model. This is clear and utter bullshit once more just to push an agenda.

Onto the worst, and final point. Hu'lon, you dug through five years of drama and unburied it in an effort to burn me, and my guild down. Yes, I faked having cancer. Five years ago, as a teenager with an undiagnosed mental disorder, which is now diagnosed as BPD - which I also have much more control over, nowadays. The circumstances revolving around this are as follows: I ran a guild called Mistborn, that had around two-hundred to three-hundred members. Due to conspiring between my officers as they found it humorous to antagonize me and make me meltdown; they managed to collapse my guild within a week. At this point, I had never dealt with something this heart-sinking and strenous - my BPD forced me into an absolute panic, and craved for nothing other than emotions of hatred from people. Yes, I claimed that I had cancer in an effort to gain pity, because at this point in my life with my mental disorder - I couldn’t think of anything else. I was in a panic.

Since then, I have apologized to every person that was involved with me, back then. Extrenously. I know that doesn’t make up for it, but I’ve moved on. They’ve moved on. You had one of the officers that -caused- that meltdown tell you that it was not my fault, but you elected to bring this up because you wish to become a martyr for.. whatever cause it is that you’re standing for. I’m not absolving myself because of my mental disorder, but I took every step necessary to cleanse any ill-will that people had from me back then, to which most understood once they heard the full story.

To end this all off, I will summarize. Yes, I had some extrenous issues in the past that have led to the reputation that I have today. I have been working day-in and day-out to attempt to make rights where I made wrongs in the past, but this is stuff from five years ago.

To Tiao Lin - I don’t blame where you stand right now. You’re always welcome to talk to me again, because clearly there is a lack of communication. I understand - you have anxiety. I’ve attempted time and time again to try to help that, but apparently I missed the mark. I’m sorry.

To Hu'lon - I do not respect your attempts to become a martyr to take my guild down. You made claims that you’re hurt that everyone in the guild is turning against you - because you’re making rash decisions that could harm all of us, because of your grudge against one. You never made any attempt to get further information in all of this. You snipped out of context screenshots, and just worked to paint me as the bad guy time and time again. You are the issue with roleplay realms. Instead of discussing and talking like a rational person, you argue with the block and ignore button - without caring about the consequences that come with it, involving multiple people that you USED in these screenshots - and then aim to call me out.

If you read all of this, even if you do not see my side of the argument - I respect you for refusing to listen to blind lies. There will also be follow up posts from people that have known me since back then that -will- discuss in truth what happened, instead of your cherry-picked mess.

Remember when you posted evidence and claimed that I was threatening Wey? Here’s the actual commissioner. Picture 1. Picture 2.

Another commissioner that will happily back-up the fact that I do not do these kinds of things.

Another one. Picture 2.

And when you said I was trying to get free art from you? Here’s another artist in the guild.

And, now statements from my BPD. I asked these people to be absolutely honest about their experiences. These are not hand-picked to try to further my agenda, these are straight from people that have known me for years, and have struggled with my disorder with me.

Picture 1. Picture 2. Picture 3. Picture 4. Picture 5 (very important.) Picture 6. Picture 7.

I’d appreciate it if didn’t bring up stuff you weren’t personally involved to try to bring down me, and my guild from now on. If anybody has an issue with me, you may add me at Zushou#5130 and I will discuss any grievances, hatred, questions, or you can sit there flaming me. Doesn’t matter to me.

#Story #world of warcraft #Moon Guard #submission

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