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roseharpermaxwell · 1 year

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Bite-Size Dramione - Under 5k (Part One)

These are your bedtime stories, your palate cleansers, your individual serving sizes of serotonin. It’s okay to enjoy these even if you only read slow burn 100k+ fics, I promise. Live a little!

This is a sampling of some amazing favorites, but I’m always reading new things and will add to it regularly. If you find something you love, I know the author would love to hear it, and so would I! Take a deep dive into their catalog to find other gems.

Part One below:

Only Dancing by @sunflower-swan. NR, 378 words. Hermione is only dancing. No harm in that. Draco can get jealous or go with it.

Give and Take by @ambpersand. E, 1k. The softness of her curls brush against his thighs, and Draco has just enough slack to widen his knees to get closer to her. She’s everywhere, and it’s still not enough. He needs her to consume him whole.

Indulge Me by @millennialgrandma. M, 1k. A little eighth year Veritaserum-fueled confession of feelings.

First Kiss(es) and the Path to Forgiveness by millennialgrandma. T, 1.2k. Returning to Hogwarts for an eighth year felt like penance. Kissing Hermione Granger felt like redemption.

You’re Older Now by @simplifiedemotions. T, 1.2k. “I don’t know how to do this,” he says, his breath coming out in harsh gasps. The only time Hermione remembers him being so harried was when she’d first woken up with no recollection of even her own name. She distinctly remembers his blood-shot gaze, the trembling of his limbs, when he asked her if she had remembered him.

Tentative Exporations by @dreamsofdramione. E, 1.2k. What Draco lacks in finesse he makes up for in enthusiasm.

a cure for headaches by @whimsymanaged. E, 1.3k. Hermione has a headache. Draco has a suggestion. (Hint: It's not a pain potion.)

Some things, however by @frumpologist. T, 1.3k. Officer Granger is annoyed with Commander Draco and finds solace in the ship’s library.

A Full and Careful Analysis by @eveningstruggle. M, 1.3k. “Truth or dare.” Hermione traced her fingers over Draco’s chest, trying to match the pattern he was tracing on her back. “Dare. Wait—no. I need a refractory period first. Truth.” “Hmm…what’s the best sex you’ve ever had?” “That's too easy; it was four minutes ago.” or: Draco and Hermione talk about their past romantic history.

This Singular Night by @misdemeanor1331. T, 1.4k. On their last night in Las Vegas, Hermione asks Draco an unexpected question. He gives her an equally surprising answer.

Love of My Life by @mykesprit. T, 1.5k. A surprising revelation at their anniversary party sends Hermione reeling.

Round and Fluffy by @caitybellfics. M, 1.5k. Draco Malfoy and Harry Potter arrive at the DMLE to retrieve their spouses.

Jealous by dreamsofdramione and @inadaze22. E, 1.6k. Draco isn't possessive. In order to be possessive, one has to have some sort of attachment to another person. There is no such ‘attachment’ to Granger. Sure, he knows the precise way to move his tongue inside of her to make her moan, the shape of her hip under his palm when he fucks her so hard they both see stars, and the exact pitch of her voice when she comes, but he’s not attached to her. This is the lie he tells himself.

Write What You Know by @pacific-rimbaud. T, 1.7k. Prompt: Muggle University Student AU: studying Classics or MFA Creative writing

Counting Days by dreamsofdramione. E, 1.7k. Arithmancy was never Draco's strong suit.

What Was Lost, and What Remains by PacificRimbaud. G, 1.8k. My name is Monica Joan Wilkins. I am 57 years old. I live in Sydney, New South Wales. I share a dental practice with my husband. We've been married for thirty-two years.

What To Do by @willhavetheirtrinkets. E, 1.8k. "I can," she said, smirking at him. "I have that authority. Since you're always going at it quick and hurried, without the slightest attention to detail, I've been given the authority to make certain it's done properly."

Draco ground his teeth. "You can't tell me what to do, Granger."

You Owe Me by musyc. M, 1.8k. Hermione has an anniversary plan.

Mutually Assured Destruction… by @grangerdangerfics. T, 1.9k. As Head Girl Hermione Granger and Head Boy Draco Malfoy wage an escalating war of aggressive acts of kindness, will it spell ruin ... or romance?

Upper Body Injury by @provocative-envy. T, 1.9k. Hockey AU! "Careful," he says dryly. "Or I might think you're trying to flirt with me." "Oh, you'd know if I was trying to flirt with you."

"Maybe," he concedes, flicking his hair back with a practiced nod of his head. "But would you?"

Coming in for Landing by @sunlightdaydream. E, 2k. Draco loved flying when Hermione worked. She truly was the best flight attendant he knew. She followed directions to the tee on most days, but even better when she's on her knees before him. Or: It's cockpit porn and he is the pilot.

Inventory of Moments by optimise. T, 2k. Hermione makes a lot of lists. And a list of names just happens to be one of them.

My Brown-Eyed Girl by PacificRimbaud. M, 2.1k. Draco and Hermione have a lazy snuggle in the grass behind the Quidditch pitch.

The Dumbing Down of Love by inadaze22. T, 2.1k. Hermione is an expert at foiling Draco's plans.

Never Have I Ever by @niffizzle. M, 2.1k. With a bottle of firewhisky, a set of enchanted cups, and a game of Never Have I Ever, things turn interesting during one of the final days leading up to graduation. But just how much will be divulged? Maybe some things should stay private.

Two Full Inches Above Regulation Length by granger_danger. E, 2.1k. “Granger.” Malfoy’s voice was an ember in the dark corridor. He grasped her wrist and she almost dropped her jar of bluebell flames. “Your skirt’s not to the bottom of your knees. I may have to take points from Gryffindor.”

A Whole New World by simplifiedemotions. T, 2.2k. Draco takes Hermione out flying.

Passing Notes by @sodamnradd. T, 2.3k. D: Pay you 10 galleons to cover patrol tonight H: STOP throwing notes at me ferret. And no. D: 50 galleons? and so ensues a term of note-passing between Draco Malfoy and Hermione Granger

A Pretty Picture by @wickermayne. E, 2.3k. Draco wakes up with Hermione between his legs. Like a good boyfriend, he helps quench her thirst.

hands to myself by whimsymanaged. E, 2.4k. Every Friday night, Hermione goes to her favourite bar with her friends. One of the reasons this bar is her favourite is because she inevitably runs into Draco Malfoy. Tonight, all their flirting comes to a head.

Sucker 4 U by whimsymanaged. E, 2.4k. “You can’t just…casually talk about watching porn,” Hermione hissed, glancing around. “Why not?” Draco raised his eyebrows. “I’ve just discovered it, and I want to tell the world. Anyway, I saw a clit sucker in one of the videos, and I got to wondering how on Earth a contraption like that could feel like someone sucking your clit.”

This Time Tomorrow by sodamnrad. M, 2.5k. On the last night of school, Draco's unchecked feelings for Granger spill through the cracks.

A Different Kind of Magic by @canttouchthis87. T, 2.5k. Draco Malfoy watched Hermione Granger practice her Viola for six years. Returning to Hogwarts after the war, her music offers them both a place of freedom and sanctuary.

Shifting Perspectives by misdemeanor1331. E, 2.5k. Being a woman in a male-dominated profession is hard; being a woman and below average height is even harder.

Passing Notes by @shamione. E, 2.6k. Draco Malfoy has teased Hermione Granger for the last time, tucked away in an alcove with his fingers buried deep inside her.

Lessons in Darkened Rooms by @raven-m-3. E, 2.6k. Draco Malfoy's eighth year at Hogwarts should have been simple, if unpleasant. Instead he finds himself grappling with a Granger-shaped problem.

A Thousand Ways to Say Sorry by @wordswithways. T, 2.6k. Draco Malfoy goes on a gift-giving apology tour. But a crucial person on his list wants nothing to do with it.

How to Break a Curse by whimsymanaged. E, 2.7k. They only had a small window before the curse took effect. “Run me through it.” Granger swallowed. “We have thirty minutes to have sex that ends with you coming inside me.” Draco clenched his jaw so tightly that it cracked. “What are our other options?” She didn’t sugarcoat it. “Death.”

Caught Wet-Handed by millennialgrandma. E, 2.8k. “Did we not agree, sweetheart, that we wouldn’t?” “Yes, Draco, which is why-” “And were you not the one who suggested, no, insisted, we abstain until the wedding night?”

Draco’s Consolation Prize by emilyinwonderland. E, 2.8k. Head Girl Hermione Granger comforts a moody Slytherin Quidditch Captain.

Feeling This by @echoofpromise. E, 2.8k. The one where Hermione elbows Draco in the nose at a rock show and he likes it

Just Desserts by @thelashjedi. M, 2.8k. Why would you talk to me? Draco thought, behind a heavy wall of occlusion as he politely, but rotely declined the Head Girl’s offer to join her in the Great Hall, at the newly mixed tables set up in the wake of the war.

Two Dry Martinis by @darkofthemoonfic. E, 2.9k. “You’re brilliant,” he said, flashing those teeth again. “What did I do before you arrived? And what else might you teach me?” Hermione knew she was blushing so she took another sip of her drink. The gin crisp and just the slightest hint of vermouth — how she liked it. When she flicked her eyes back to the bartender he was watching her. “A fair number of things, I’d expect.”

Pin-Up by whimsymanaged. E, 2.9k. Hermione needs to raise funds for her non-profit. Putting together a calendar of naked Quidditch players seems as good a way as any.

Severn Way by @magicaltraveler3. E, 3k. Hermione didn’t know it but they weren’t going home. They were going to a log cabin far away from anyone that could bother them.

Taste of Affection by dreamsofdramione. E, 3.1k. “You’re doing so well, Pet.”

Savour by @mignon-chignon. E, 3.1k. Draco Malfoy had a dinner to savour, hopefully without any distractions.

Overtime by @scullymurphy. E, 3.2k. Draco and Hermione are working overtime. It's late, they've gotten into the whisky and Hermione's self-control is at an all-time low -- especially once Draco starts rolling his sleeves.

Triple Axel by @batmansymbol. G, 3.2k. “As I’ve said ten thousand times, Malfoy,” she says, unbuckling her helmet, still breathing hard, “you wouldn’t last a second in speed skating.” She tugs the helmet off and her hair springs free. She shakes it back with supreme disdain. “You know what, though? I’m starting to think I’d like to see you try.”

Deal by @its-banannaz. E, 3.3k. It was all a stupid deal, and why she made a deal with Draco Malfoy of all people? She had absolutely no idea. Suffice to say, she lost the game.

Good Girls Get to Sit on Santa's Lap by whimsymanaged. E, 3.3k. On a huge, plush red armchair that the Sigmas must have borrowed (they’re usually green and silver everything) sits a guy dressed as Santa Claus.

Well. He’s got the velvety red pants and the red coat, only the coat is open to reveal a hard, muscular, bare torso, and his Santa hat sits askew atop a pale blond fade.

Just Like the Ones I Used to Know by @acciomjolnir. T, 3.4k. It's 8th year, post war, and Hermione isn't feeling in the Christmas spirit. She's not the only one who has chosen not to go home for the holidays... and when they get into the eggnog, all kinds of things happen.

It’s Draco fucking Malfoy, bane of my existence.

*and it's followup: No Regrets for the New Year. E, 2.7k.

Where You Belong by @ecaworks, raven_maiden. E, 3.4k. When Draco Malfoy shows up at the Burrow over the holidays, Hermione learns she has a decision to make.

Third Time’s a Charm by @monsterleadmehome. E, 3.4k. Head Girl Hermione Granger has been hopelessly trying to seduce Head Boy Draco Malfoy all term, but he just won't get the hint.

Long story short (it was a bad time) by @ginnysocks. E, 3.4k. Were she and Draco currently shagging like rabbits every chance they got? Yes. Did they still utterly loathe each other? Also yes.

Flat(Mates) by WhimsyManaged. E, 3.4k. Hermione and Draco have been living together as platonic flatmates for years now. Neither have presented, so Hermione’s pretty sure they’re both betas. (Spoiler: they're not betas.)

Respite by canttouchthis. T, 3.5k. Hermione Granger is fine. Or at least there’s no reason for her not to be. But still, she finds respite under the stars, drawn to the night sky.

Mutually Assured Destruction by witchsoup. M, 3.5k. Hermione and Theo find ways to break it to each other gently... it's time to break up.

Continued in Part Two!

Give the authors some love! I also adore hearing if you found a new favorite fic or author.

I’ll be regularly adding to this, so if you’re seeing this as a reblog, feel free to check my Master List of Recommendations for the most current list. Lots of new tumblr users as well, so if you see yourself and you’re not tagged, let me know!

#dramione fic rec #dramione fanfiction #hp fanfic #hp fic rec #draco x hermione

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topduck48 · 7 months

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I hope you don’t mind me telling more of my ttte Duck headcanons. I know I already submitted some.

-everyone is allowed to make jokes about Duck’s name except for Diesel.

-in my human AU, everyone got so fed up over Duck and Diesel’s fighting that they were made to couple their engines together for a twenty four hour period. Another time they were forced to hold hands for an hour. (Thomas has video footage of this including the part where Diesel kicked Duck in the shins and Duck responded by jabbing him in the eye with his crutch)

-if Duck were to ever meet my OC, Casey (who’s from a completely different railroad) he would immediately jump at the opportunity to teach Casey The Great Western Way ™. But would get flustered very quickly at Casey’s antics (Casey is only 12 after all)

-Duck would find Casey’s “superstitious rituals” very weird, impractical, unnecessary and borderline annoying (these include pouring a can of beer outside of the shed every morning, holding in your smoke when you go through a scrap yard so the spirits don’t possess you, sprinkling ash in a line across the shed every night, and sleeping facing backwards so the chupacabras don’t get you)

-Duck is not superstitious or does he believe in any ghosts stories, nor is he that religious, he’s not an atheist, but doesn’t hold any religious beliefs. He would probably try and reason with Casey ( e.g “if you close your eyes and go to sleep, then you won’t see the Chupacabras”, “how does creating a line of ash stop the spirits? It’s just burnt wood”) but then would get creeped out about Casey’s weird paranormal encounters he had back home (even though in reality, the skinwalker he encountered was just a naked crackhead)

-he’s a very Black and White thinker with no grey area.

-it’s not uncommon for the engines to receive fan mail. Duck has received some fan mail including a custom mug that someone made with the “there’s only two ways of doing things, The Great Western Way ™, and the wrong way.”

-he also has received Duck x Diesel smut ship fan fiction as a joke once, and as per tradition with all the engines when they received fan fiction, they have to do a dramatic reading of it. Duck had to request that people stop sending him fanfics after being made to read it.

There is no limit to submitting headcanons. You can send as many as you'd like.

I agree with the first one. When people make jokes about his name, he just chuckles and rolls his eyes. However, when Diesel does it, he gives him the death stare. It tends to work. Duck has a knack for unsettling anyone that he doesn't like.

Duck would blatantly refuse to hold hands with Diesel, for he wouldn't want oil and other revolting things on his hands. As for the engines being coupled together, it would be debated, but due to Duck being a reliable worker and The Fat Controller not wanting everything to descend into chaos, he decided to keep the two separate instead. I think that Diesel instigates Duck until he snaps, which is a while since Duck also has a knack for ignoring people and their petty idiosyncrasies.

Duck would try to teach anyone the Great Western way, which he has adapted to become more "Duck's way". I have just looked at who Casey is, I really like his design, especially the funnel and reason for his eye. Anyway, Duck gets flustered at any sort of chaos, so it would make sense for him to get flustered with Casey.

I don't really have headcanons about religion or superstitions (aside from very general things like ghosts) due to the fact that it is a very broad subject that can sometimes become personal. Therefore, I don't have much of an opinion about this headcanon. That is just my opinion though, that doesn't mean that your headcanon is bad.

As said previously, I don't bring religion or superstitions into my headcanons, so I don't have much of an opinion on this headcanon either. I do think that Duck finds ghost stories interesting for the history behind them and why people have written them.

Duck is absolutely a black and white thinker. I headcanon him as autistic so that is one of the reasons for me.

I agree with this headcanon, he has lots of GWR mugs, and most of them have been sent in by fans.

I don't bring NSFW topics into my headcanons, so I don't have much of an opinion on this one. I do think that Duck would chastise the individual for sending in such inappropriate and immodest material. He is a very proper individual, and prefers not to talk about such subjects (he is not stigmatised, he is just very private).

These are all just my opinion. I like how original your headcanons are.

#ttte #ttte duck #my opinion #my headcanons #my rambles #ttte headcanons #ttte diesel #ask answer #ttte the fat controller

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husheduphistory · 1 year

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Light and Dark: The Tragic Times of the Big Bay Point Lighthouse

The waters of Lake Superior have a notorious history with those who have tried to interact with it. Responsible for over 500 shipwrecks and allegedly taking the lives of nearly 10,000 people, it has earned the nickname “Graveyard of the Great Lakes” through the most accurate and unfortunate means. Rising up over these infamous waters on the edge of a rocky cliff is the sixty-four foot tall Big Bay Point Lighthouse, a structure that seems cheery despite the unfortunate tales churning under the surface of the lake below it. This lighthouse has seen many things during its 127-year history but the water is not the only place that has seen its share of tragedy.

Map showing the number of shipwrecks in Lake Superior and calling it the Graveyard of the Great Lakes. Image via https://lakesuperiorstore.com/ShipwreckMaps

The lighthouse at Big Bay Point opened on October 20th 1896 with its white light blazing 150 feet above the water every twenty seconds to warn ships traveling nearby. The lighthouse keeper was provided with a two-story brick structure on site that could house him and his family on one side of the building and his assistant and his family on the other side. On the thirty-three acres of land there was also two cisterns, an oil house, a garage, two brick outhouses, a dock, a well house, and a brick fog signal building all situated outside a forest. It takes a certain kind of person to live the life of a lighthouse keeper, and they sometimes have very strict requirements for their crew.

The first lighthouse keeper of Big Bay Point was H. (Harry) William Prior (sometimes written as Pryor). William was the eldest of three brothers who all had experience tending to lighthouses, but it was William who became notorious for his impossibly high standards and a temper that matched his gruff red hair. William was the ruler of his domain and his extremely detailed logbooks paint the picture of a belligerent man who felt his crew was lazy and untrustworthy no matter what they did. On November 11th 1897 William left the lighthouse in order to attend the funeral of his only sister, a six-mile journey that he did on foot. When he arrived back on November 18th 1897 and saw how his assistant Ralph Heater ran the lighthouse in his absence he made his extreme disappointment known. In his logbook he wrote:

“I can not [sic] see that the assistant has done any work around the station since I left. He has not the energy to carry him down the hill and if I speak to him about it he makes no answer but goes on just as if he did not hear me; he is so much under the control of his wife he has not the hart [sic] to do anything. She has annoyed me during the season by hanging around him and hindering him from working, and she is altogether a person totally unfit to be in a place like this as she is discontented and jealous and has succeeded in making life miserable for everyone at this station.”

The sheer disdain for Heater and his wife became a theme in the logbooks. On January 1st 1898 Prior wrote about how Heater “claimed” he hurt his back, but any thought that Prior might be concerned for his coworker is quickly dispelled by the entries in February where he writes: “Mr. Heater arrived from Marquette at 6 p.m. and walked the entire distance of 33 miles in 12 hours, including two rest stops over an hour each … pretty good gait for a lame man.” This was followed by an entry on February 27th reading “Mr. Heater came across the ice to the other side of Big Bay with his wife. It is Sunday and his back is not lame today.”

Perhaps it was best for both men that Heater ended up leaving the lighthouse and his role was taken on by George Beamer, but soon after his new post began he left to serve in the Spanish American War. Upon his departure he left his wife Jennie to take his place at the lighthouse making her the only woman to ever serve at the Big Bay Point Lighthouse. Once returned though, Prior and Beamer were constantly fighting, Beamer kept insisting he could not work because he hurt his back, and by October Prior was writing:

“Asst. Beamer complains of being sick and talks of leaving the station to go home to Detroit. He is too high strung for a light keeper’s asst, between himself and his wife this season I imagine that I am keeping a Home for the Helpless Poor instead of a U.S. Lighthouse. I and my family having to do the greater part of the work while they receive the pay.”

Michigan Lighthouse Keeper crew and families. Image via mynorth.com.

On November 1st 1898 Prior dismissed Beamer, his last written thoughts on him being “this Beamer…is without exception the most ungrateful and the meanest man I have ever met.” The two problematic assistants were gone, but this meant Prior needed a new assistant and his reputation was making it difficult to find a suitable replacement. Since no outsider seemed to meet his high standards, he decided to look within the lighthouse grounds and he soon made his nineteen-year-old son George his new assistant.

Perhaps the two had an understanding or they simply knew each other well enough to work together, but for over a year George and William tended to the lighthouse side by side. Then, in April of 1901 tragedy struck the Prior family. While working one day George slipped and sliced his leg down to the bone. There are differing accounts if William was there and they sought immediate treatment or if George, fearing his father’s temper, waited until he simply could not wait anymore. The nearest hospital was located in Marquette, Michigan and the thirty-mile journey by boat and then on foot had to be nothing short of agony. Young George was checked into the fifty-bed facility on April 18th and that night William, the ever-meticulous record keeper, noted in his logbook “he will have to remain in hospital for treatment.”

The injury and any delay in treatment would prove to be catastrophic to the young assistant. The wound was too severe to simply stitch up and it became infected. Eventually gangrene set in and quickly took over the tissue in his leg. Treatment and medication stopped working and almost two months later on June 13th George Prior died in the hospital. On that day his father wrote in his logbook, “1:30 p.m. Keeper summoned to Marquette to bury his son who died this morning.”

William Prior had a reputation for being the most difficult, the most demanding, and the hardest of iron fists but everything fell apart on that June morning. The death of his son completely shattered him and he spiraled into a deep state of depression. The work fell to the side and the entries in the logbook became less frequent and shorter until June 27th when the entry simply reads “General work.” That was the last entry written by the lighthouse keeper. On June 28th 1901William Prior disappeared. He was last seen walking into the woods on the grounds of the lighthouse and despite an extensive search he simply could not be found. The following fall his widow and four children piled onto a boat and headed for Marquette never to return to the lighthouse.

The following November 1902 a man named Fred Babcock was walking through the woods around the Big Bay Point Lighthouse when he made the horrible discovery. Hanging from a tree approximately half a mile from the lighthouse was a skeleton with some tufts of red hair still visible. An entry was made into the logbook that day and it read:

“Mr. Fred Babcock came to the station 12:30 pm. While hunting in the woods one and a half mile south of the station this noon he found a skeleton of a man hanging to a tree. We went to the place with him and found that the clothing and everything tally with the former keeper of this station who has been missing for seventeen months.”

Newspapers reported the finding in cold detail, writing about how the rope was tied “around the fleshless neck” and without mentioning the death of George, only reported that “…a few months over a year ago, Mr. Pryor wandered off in a fit of temporary insanity, and was never seen again…”

Unfortunately, another tragedy would be tied to the Big Bay Point Lighthouse almost fifty years after the body of William Prior was found in the woods. In 1941 the lighthouse was automated and like many other lighthouses it became a training location for the United States Army and the National Guard. In the 1950s large guns were installed on the cliff to use during practice shooting over Lake Superior and the soldiers camped out in the surrounding fields and woods. One of the men stationed at Big Bay Point was Korean War veteran and member of the 768th anti-aircraft battalion at Camp McCoy in Wisconsin, 38-year-old Lieutenant Coleman Peterson who was there with his wife Charlotte. Lt. Peterson was known to be a very jealous man and on at least one occasion he and Charlotte had gotten into a fight outside the nearby Lumberjack Tavern because he accused her of flirting with another soldier stationed near the Big Bay Lighthouse.

Aerial photo of the Big Bay Point Lighthouse circa 1947. Image via https://www.lighthousefriends.com.

The Lumberjack Tavern was less than five miles from the lighthouse and it was frequented by those stationed there. On the night of July 31st 1952 Charlotte was out drinking at the tavern and she returned back home with a black eye. When her husband confronted her about it, she told him that the owner of the tavern raped her. Peterson left for the tavern and when he arrived just before 12:30 a.m. he walked through the screen door, went straight up to the bar where owner Maurice (Mike) Chenoweth was standing, and shot him six times at point blank range with a 9 mm German Luger automatic pistol. With Chenoweth dead behind the bar he calmly turned around and walked back out into the night as if the entire scene never happened.

Peterson was arrested and when he was brought into court on September 15th 1952 he was represented by John D. Voelker. Voelker used a defense called “irresistible impulse”, stating that Peterson killed Chenoweth due to a bout of temporary insanity. It was a defense that had not been used since 1886 but after only a few hours Peterson was found not guilty by reason of insanity on September 23, 1952. But, as stated in the court, this insanity was only temporary. He was examined days later, declared sane, and released to resume a normal life. Some accounts state that he fled the region, never paying Voelker and soon divorcing Charlotte. No evidence was ever found pointing to Chenoweth being guilty of the crime.

Peterson was free but John D. Voelker was not done with this case. Under the pen name Robert Traver he wrote the book Anatomy of a Murder based on the Peterson murder case. The book was on the bestseller list for sixty-five consecutive weeks and has sold more than four million copies in twenty languages. In 1959 the book was adapted into a film starring Jimmy Stewart. A rare occurrence at the time, parts of the film were shot on location at the Lumberjack Tavern where the original murder took place and in 2012 the film was selected for preservation by the Library of Congress for being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".

The Lumerjack Tavern with sign advertising Anatomy of a Murder outside. Image via remax.com.

Today, the Lumberjack Tavern is still standing, its walls filled with newspaper clippings and with signs out front proclaiming it as the actual place where the crimes of Anatomy of a Murder unfolded. The Big Bay Point Lighthouse also still stands in the same place where tragedy unfolded in 1901. Today, it operates as a bed and breakfast and its current owners are well aware of its history, partially because there are reports that its past is still very much present at the lighthouse. As told by the current owner to NorthernExpress.com in 2021, “It was haunted when I acquired it…” and there have been reports of footsteps, things moving in other rooms, faucets turning on, lights turning on and off, and some report seeing split-second glimpses of the red-haired William Prior in mirrors, still watching over the lighthouse he lived for and that eventually took the lives of both him and his son.

When the Big Bay Point Lighthouse was officially opened it was meant to be a literal beacon, guiding those away from danger. Its light could not save everyone though, and within its first fifty-two years both William Prior and Lieutenant Coleman Peterson succumbed to “temporary insanity” and became tied to some of the darkest chapters of the lighthouse’s history.

Big Bay Point Lighthouse circa 2019. Image via Rossograph on Wikipedia.com

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Sources:

The Tragedy and Haunting at The Big Bay Lighthouse by Mike Sonnenburg. June 6th 2016. lostinmichigan.net/tragedy-haunting-big-bay-lighthouse/.

Do You Dare Stay the Night at Michigan’s Most Haunted Lighthouse? by Dianna Stampfler. October 16th 2019. https://mynorth.com/2019/10/michigans-most-haunted-lighthouse-big-bay-point-lighthouse/

The Haunting of Big Bay Point Light of the Souls by Brighid Driscoll. Northern Express October 23rd 2021. https://www.northernexpress.com/news/feature/the-haunting-of-big-bay-point/

Big Bay Point Lighthouse https://www.lighthousefriends.com/light.asp?ID=574

Memories of a Murder by Lisa Didier. The Chicago Tribune August 20th 1989.

https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-1989-08-20-8901060128-story.html

Seen on Screen: Anatomy of a Murder in Big Bay by Talia Salem. June 30th 2014.

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schleierkauz · 2 years

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Capricorn, Basta and Gwin

Capricorn: Who are your top 3 otps?

I am a simple woman.

Roxanne x Dustfinger: Love conquers all. Love is all you need. Love is stored in the bread.

Resa x Dustfinger: He has two hands 🙏No seriously, I think their relationship is super interesting. For a while they were pretty much all the other had and I think they developed a pretty intense trauma bond for a while there... and yet they were both absolutely still in love with their respective partners that were just out of reach. No offense @ Mo, all the best for his marriage, he's a great husband (most of the time) but Resa and Dustfinger are just very interesting to rotate in my mind. I will always respect Cornelia for how she handled these four.

Capricorn x His unnamed lover who was so fucking annoying that Cornelia kicked her out of the story: Okay I know I know. But ever since Cornelia told us about her in that one Q&A I've been obsessed. Whoever this lover was, she haunts me. Can you imagine how dramatic that relationship must have been? With Mortola literally right there? Was this lady chilling in the Blackjacket's village? Was Capricorn still having ""affairs"" with his maids (aka assaulting them)? What about Resa? Did his lover care? Was Basta jealous of her? How active was she when it came to evil scheming? Was she from the Inkworld, and if so, what's her story? If not - oh my god? What's her story?? Please I have so many questions about this-

Basta: Who are your top 3 brotps?

Dustfinger and the Black Prince: Always!! I love their relationship so much, they have such a great dynamic. I love that the Prince has always protected Dustfinger, I love that Dustfinger always got in trouble alongside him anyway, I love how they both became legends in their own rights, I love that the Prince respects Dustfinger's choice to be fucking useless in battle despite having the potential to be a hightly effective fighter, I love how the Prince shaved his head when he grieved Dustfinger's death only for the motherfucker to show back up again, I love that as kids they decided they were soulmates because their names started with the same letter- god I love them so much.

Dustfinger and Mo: Where the fuck to begin honestly. I'm pretty sure they've both felt every emotion the human brain is capable of towards each other. They have SUCH a complicated and messy history and the fact that after All That, they seem to just be... friends? Regular dad friends? Absolutely incredible. I do hope Cornelia will put some more focus on the mind bond of death they're implied to still share because ??? Come ON, they literally felt each other's emotions and read each other's minds. Are they still just... just living like that, these days? Jesus Christ.

Elinor and Fenoglio: They meet up once a week just to fight recreationally. I love these senior citizens. Seriously, the way Elinor just DRAGGED Fenoglio to HELL every single day once she got to the Inkworld? And their relationship developing when they were travelling with the Motley Folk and all those kids? Them deep down really valuing and respecting each other? 10/10

Gwin: Who are your top 3 notps?

HM. Let me think.

Meggie x Farid: This is mainly nostalgic hatred but as a child they annoyed me to no end. I Did Not Care about their teen romance, I wanted to know where the story was going! In hindsight it starts out kind of cute, I guess, but... eh. And we all know where it eventually goes. Weird all around.

Violante x Cosimo: I probably don't need to explain this one but for the record. Yikes.

The Adderhead x Anyone: Again, obvious answer but man I just felt so bad for his wives during Inkdeath. DISGUSTINNNNNNG.

Overall it seems I don't carry much hatred in my heart when it comes to ships. I feel like the chill aunt. Like. As long as they're happy... :)

#ask game #this was so much fun! i couldve gone on forever with the first two questions haha #these are not in order btw #i just went with whatever i thought of first

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radiologica · 6 months

Text

X-7 DRACO…

That's the planet I'm being shipped to..

Why, why why why why…

They just… took us.

Crammed us in these damned ships…

Never told us where we were going.

That ticking is quite irritating…

Warp speed is sickening…

Nobody ever mentioned that in school.

After what seemed like centuries, I feel the jolt of the craft decelerating. I hear the startled noises of my fellow passengers as the engine's wail. Nobody dares speak as we feel the struts make landfall upon the foreign soil, telling us that we've arrived.

"Alright, get movin'," a soldier ordered over the loudspeaker, ushering out what must've been a hundred people. No, it was more than that. I look around, seeing the flock of ships blotting out the horizon. Like machines we make our way from the steel jaws of our transport ship, walking onto the strange new land. It all looks so familiar, yet different. So many colors… there's no color on Earth anymore… at least, not like this. This is beautiful. I've never seen this many trees. I've only ever seen pictures in the old history books and drawings in the old textbooks and art museums…

"Your only task is to not die." The same soldier called from the doorway as it closed. His face was almost mocking. I feel an unfamiliar anger boil in my stomach. Why were we put here and not them? Just what gives them the right, the audacity to sit beside the higher-ups on their shiny marble pedestals and look down on us? They refuse to see that we are no different, that we're all human… My fists clench as I bite back all my anger. The only thing anger will get us now is an early grave. Don't be rash. Don't do something stupid. Not now.

"What now?" Asked a lady to my left. I turn to see all that surrounds me. So many people… thousands upon thousands. How will we make it? My anger quickly shifts to a familiar shade of confusion. What now?

"Don't die, I guess." Mocked another woman. I look all around once again. Don't die. Psh, like that will be easy with so, so many… all confused… all scared… I feel the sudden need to get away, as if staying in one spot would be the death of me. I come back to my senses when I feel a rough hand on my shoulder.

"Are you alright, son?" An older man questioned. My body froze, what do I say? 'No sir I'm going insane, how are you on this horrific day?' My brain mocks, but to no avail.

"Y-yes, I suppose…" I finally responded. Turing to look him in the eye, I see a kind, weathered face looking back at me. He seems so calm.. how is he doing that?

"You're making that odd face again, what's on your mind." He said this with such a level voice that I almost had to take a step back.

"How are you doing that?" I ask, mentally slapping myself for not thinking before such a blunt question. "How are you so calm," I continue, "We just got dropped like trash, on a planet we know nothing about." I look at the man expectantly.

"Such a negative outlook you youth have…" He responded. "We get to live in nature again, something so far gone on Earth. This is an honor, son." He gently smiled and patted my shoulder. I turn away, once again getting the urge to escape from the crowd. The cloud of confusion that was now our lives. How.. how… how will we make it…

WEEK TWO ON X7-DRACO

FOREST VILLAGE

POPULATION - 103

STATUS - FOOD SOURCE FOUND. WATER SOURCE FOUND. 2 LOST TO NATURAL CAUSES.

"Seth, hey, world to Seth."

I close my eyes, exhaling as I calm my mind. I finally turn toward the person calling me, unsurprised to see an old man.

"Yes, Russell?" I answer, mildly annoyed.

"Has she come around yet?"

"No.."

"You've been out here for four hours Seth, it's time to come back home."

I look back into the maze of trees, hoping Russell would take the hint and leave. My hope's are fulfilled as I hear the older man sigh and the crunch of leaves as he left me to my wait.

Nearly an hour later, I hear the familiar thunder I had been waiting so long for. I grin and hop off the log, looking in the direction of the sound. My eyes fall on a familiar creature, a large drake-like animal with reddish brown scales, interrupted with a pattern similar to that of a ball python. She came to a halt about five feet from me. I walk toward her and hold out my hand, letting her sniff me. She hesitates, something she's never done.

"Is something wrong?" I ask as if she could respond. To my surprise however, she almost did. She tilted her head, evidence that she was thinking. "Ace?" I try with her name, seeing if that would get more of a response. Before I could move, the drake grabbed me, holding me by the collar of my jacket. The sudden action made me nauseous. My head spins as Ace runs through the labyrinth of trees, skillfully weaving through their branches.

Within a few minutes, Ace comes to a sudden stop. She gently bows to put me down on the ground. My upright posture doesn't last as quickly plop down, holding my head. As my dizziness clears, I look around. A… cave? My head slowly turns as my eyes roam over the large room. The walls have so much vegetation… Even a cave, a place that's supposed to be dark and empty, has so much life. My mind begins to spin once again. Suddenly, I hear Ace make a splash deeper in the cavern. Somehow, I find my way to my feet, starting down what seemed to be a natural staircase. As I round the corner, my breath leaves me.

In the center of the cavern room was a beautiful pool. Its light was unlike anything I've ever seen… The water was a brilliant teal, almost blinding. The water cast light throughout the cave, illuminating Ace. She ran out of the water, galloping towards me. She stopped, looking at me expectantly. I follow her toward the pool. It's so bright, but now, there's something else. Something seems to pull me towards the water. Ace suddenly shoved me into the water, then jumped in herself.

The pain was so sudden I opened my mouth to scream, water taking its chance to rush into my lungs. My body goes numb as fear rushes me.

'This is how I die this is how I die this is how I die this is how I die this is how-' My panicked thoughts are interrupted as a large paw wraps around my torso. Hacking coughs rack my body as Ace brings me to the shore. When I finally calm down from my fit, something feels off. I feel like someone else is in my head somehow. I feel like my soul has somehow been altered, like it was connected to something. I look over to Ace, seeing her tail wagging. Suddenly, I feel a pang of happiness.

"Wha- what did you do to me?" I desperately try to get up. I start feeling another wave… worry. 'What's going on.' Ace ran toward me, the worry got stronger, almost sickening. 'Wha- no. No, that's illogical.' I silence my thoughts. Ace relaxes and walks off, taking that sickening worry with her.

"No way. Nuh uh. Not possible." As I say that, also as if it was rehearsed, Ace turned around. She, once again, grabbed the back of my coat. However, this time she put me down on her back. I bring my hands to my chest, really not wanting to anger the animal that's the size of a box truck. As if she could hear me, Ace suddenly shook. With a yelp I grab onto the leaf-like membrane. I feel a pang of what I assume to be amusement.

"You think that's funny, really?" I frown. She looks back at me, securing her position as an absolute ass by proceeding to sprint full speed out of the cavern.

A few minutes later, we arrived back at where I was waiting all those hours ago. I say goodbye to Ace, watching as she weaves back through the trees. The feeling of happiness fades but never fully leaves. I can't help but believe the impossible…

what if?

#scifi #sci fi and fantasy #writing #creative writing #i tried #kinda cringe #itll get better #i promise #creature #original character #im tired #novel

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joel-millerr · 3 years

Text

The Chase - One Shot

Pairing: Din Djarin x fem!reader

Rating: explicit

Word Count: 5k

Summary: You bet Mando you could last two hours on the run without him catching you. Reluctantly, he agrees to the bet.

Warnings: outdoor (rough & unprotected) sex, hunter and hunted type of vibe, mild choking, being gagged, size kink, mando talks a lot during sexy time, maybe slight dom/sub mentions?

A/N: this is just my take on the whole “bounty hunter and quarry” fantasy. also I basically wrote the smut and then added context around it. this is pretty much shameless smut ///

*Masterlist can be found here**

It started out as innocent banter.

“I definitely think I could last a couple days,” you told him, slouching in the passenger seat inside the cockpit.

The modulator scoffed at you. “No.”

“Are you doubting my skills?” You asked, eyebrow cocked.

He swiveled his chair around to face you. “That’s not it.”

“Then tell me what it is, Mando.”

Even though you weren’t able to see what his expression was, you could tell by his body language that he was getting annoyed. The way his hands fidgeted at his sides, the way he leaned his body back in the chair—something he did every time you tried to rile him up about something. Despite the fact that he hid behind the beskar, he was generally easy to read whenever he was irritated.

“I bet I can last two days.”

“You wouldn’t last two hours, let alone two days.”

Now that was a challenge you didn’t want to back down from. Anytime someone told you that you couldn’t do something, it scratched that itch inside you to do that exact thing. Your incessant need to prove people wrong sometimes got the best of you, but Maker, the satisfaction you got from it was worth the consequences.

“I’ll take that bet,” you said to him, feeling your stomach stir.

“I wasn’t—”

“Too bad, Mando. You challenged me and I accept.”

And then the rest was history. All you had to do was last two hours without Mando tracking you down and then you could die happy knowing you evaded the best bounty hunter in the parsec, even if it were for a short period of time.

You’re not sure what planet Mando lands the Crest on but it’s definitely one of the quieter ones because he’s landed the ship in a large clearing with only woods as far as the eye can see. It’s not a problem for you, though. Growing up on Naboo meant you were always exposed to forests and clear landscape. In theory, this is the best place he could have chosen, not that you’d tell him that.

“There are some ground rules for this,” he begins to say, standing in the galley of the Crest.

“I’m all ears,” you answer back.

Mando lets out a chuff of air that crackles up through his vocoder, like he’s still considering calling this whole thing off, but after weeks of still not finding a Jedi for the kid, you both need a little distraction.

“First thing, no guns.”

“Okay, that’s understandable.”

“Secondly, you keep the commlink open at all times,” he orders.

“Not a problem,” lips curling into a smile, you already feel the adrenaline pump through your veins, body itching to get this whole bet started.

“Thirdly, if you somehow manage to last the day, we check in once it gets dark.”

“Ouch,” you take a step back, slightly offended at his jab. “You have so little faith in me.”

“I’m not the one overestimating my abilities,” he jests. Who knew Mando could be so snarky?

“Do we call it off at night and wait till dawn?”

“If you want to make to things easier.”

Oh, so that’s how he wants to play.

“All right, Mando. We don’t stop.”

“I don’t know how safe this planet it, but you shouldn’t run into any trouble.”

“Okay, yeah Mando, let’s do this,” you’re basically shaking from the thrill of all this. You can’t wait to show off your evading skills.

“I’ll give you an hour head start. Put as much distance between yourself and the Crest as you can.”

“Don’t worry, Mando. This isn’t my first time running away from someone,” you say with a smug smile.

“Fine,” his voice terse.

Your turn your back to him and face the open ramp. With your heart banging against your ribcage and your palms damp with sweat, this might be the most exhilarating thing you’ve ever done.

“Be safe, I’ll see you soon,” He says with a hint of mockery. He’s so confident in himself, it’s actually getting under your skin.

Looking over your shoulder, you hit him with your own jab, “We’ll see about that,” and then you’re descending the ramp.

Once your feet hit the ground, you think of the best direction to head towards. In order to do this successfully, you’ll need to choose every single one of your movements very carefully because any slip up could end up hurting your chances to win.

You hear your named being called, so you turn around to look back at the Crest and see Mando standing at the top of the ramp.

“When I do find you, try to put up a fight.”

That sends heat right to the apex of your thighs. If you didn’t have enough incentive, that was the last nail in the coffin. You’ll make this as hard for Mando as you possibly can.

You shoot him one last devilish grin and disappear from sight, opting to go to your right. Once you reach the forest edge, you break off into a sprint, heading deeper and deeper into the foliage.

The forest isn’t too dense, but there are roots everywhere on the ground and you stumble on a couple of them, nearly falling flat on your face. The positive to having so many branches and roots in the ground means the chances of your footprints showing up in the mud are low but Mando’s got a heat tracker on his helmet, meaning he can still track your movements without actually seeing your prints.

The adrenaline keeps telling you to run, run as fast as you can, but the rational part of your brain realizes that no matter how much distance you put between you and Mando, it won’t matter unless you have a clear plan as to what tactics you’ll need to use in order to make sure he doesn’t find you.

Should you try to find the closest village?

Should you stay in the forest?

Think, think…

You continue to put some more distance between you two and when you feel as though you’ve made some progress, you check the clock on your commlink.

2:50PM.

In ten minutes, Mando will leave the Crest and begin tracking you. You’ll have to start making important decisions soon. When you entered the planet’s atmosphere, you tried to pinpoint a specific spot that might give you some kind of advantage. If your memory serves you correctly, you saw a small area that appeared to be some kind of canyon. Ideally, that might be the perfect spot to find some shelter. A hard surface means no footprints.

Now if you could only find out how far away you are from it…

As you take in your surroundings—which is basically just trees and more trees, you think about finding a high enough viewpoint for you to see where this possible haven could be. A few metres away you happen to see a tree that appears to be much larger than the rest of the ones around it. Its branches look sturdy enough for a human to climb and it doesn’t take you long before you’re heading straight for it. You haven’t climbed a tree in years but if there was a perfect moment to touch-up on your skills, it’s right now.

As you climb up the stump, the branches and leaves break apart, and the sky begins to get clearer and clearer. When you finally reach the very top, you’re so high up that you’re able to spot what you were looking for. It looks like it’s a couple more clicks away, but you were lucky enough to be already heading in that direction. The Maker must be on your side.

One more look at the clock.

3:01PM.

Shit, you have to start moving.

If you start to climb down the tree, you’ll end up losing precious time, allowing Mando to close some of the distance. It’s something you can’t risk. Eyes scanning the woodland between you and your hideout, you come to the conclusion that you’ll have to jump from tree to tree and pray you don’t fall and break any bones. It’s incredibly risky, and your inner self is warning you against it. If you do fall, you’re screwed, breaking a lot of the bones in your body. You’ll have to hope that these branches will be able to carry your weight.

Trying to balance yourself on one of tree’s larger arms, you crawl across it on your knees, knowing damn well if you stood up, you’d lose your balance and fall down, and it would be a pretty big fall. You’re easily fifteen feet off the ground, maybe more. Fuck, this might have been a horrible idea, but it’s frankly too late to turn back, you’ve made up your mind and you need to go through with it.

The jump from the branch you’re currently on to the adjacent one you’ll be jumping onto is about four feet, but it’s not the jump that concerns you. What concerns you is the sturdiness of that branch. Will the impact cause it to snap? Will it make too much noise, letting Mando hear it? All these questions are racing through your mind as you hear your heartbeat pounding in your ears. The longer you consider it, the more time you waste. You’ll just have to take the chance and hope everything works in your favor.

“Okay… I can do this,” you whisper, psyching yourself up.

As you slowly rise to your feet, your legs are buckling. You take one last look down, fully realizing that this idea is absolutely bonkers and jump.

When your body hits the branch, you latch your arms around it, landing on your stomach. To your surprise, the branch doesn’t break off, it barely even moves.

Success.

You continue to leap from branch to branch, until the rest of trees in your wake look too unstable for you to leap onto. Luckily, the tree you’re currently on isn’t too far from the ground, so you’re able to climb down it in under five minutes before reaching the ground. Keeping still for a moment, you wait to hear something.

A twig snap, leaves rustling, anything, but you don’t hear a single sound.

“Did you actually climb these trees?” You hear Mando’s voice through the commlink on your wrist, which startles you.

Is he already there? He’s already so close, how is he already so fucking close to you?

“Um, no?” You reply.

“That’s convincing,” he answers dryly.

If Mando’s already reached the tree you started climbing at, then he’s really not far behind. You’ll need to start sprinting again. Without trying to make noise, you begin to tiptoe around the forest, trying to be as quick and efficient as you can. It doesn’t take long until you see a break in the forest and somehow quicken your tread to the clearing.

Once you reach the wood's edge, you’re about to take a step into the clearing when you stop yourself.

Kriff, if you step into that open field, you’ll be sticking out like a sore thumb, which is a risk you cannot take. Instead, you’ll have to walk along the sides of the clearing, keeping to the trees and hoping you won’t be spotted.

“Are you really about to step into that glade?”

Your breathing hitches, everything inside you is burning up, adrenaline nearly making you shake uncontrollably.

He’s found you.

He sees you.

Keeping very still, you turn your head in every direction, desperately trying to see where Mando is but you can’t see a fucking thing. You consider making a break for it—which direction, though? Do you turn around and head back into the forest and hope that you’ll be able to lose him in the trees? Do you stick to your guns and continue to make for the mountains?

“Better make up your mind quickly, pretty girl. Time’s running out,” he’s fucking taunting you. Mando knows exactly where you are and is relishing in watching you struggle in deciding what to do next.

There’s something incredibly titillating knowing that he’s watching you, right now. Predator watching prey, observing your every move, waiting for the perfect time to ambush you.

“What are the chances I outrun you?” You breathe into the speaker on your wrist, chest puffing in and out heavily.

Mando doesn’t answer right away, mulling over your question. “Very slim.”

“But not impossible?”

You’re sizing yourself up. You know damn well there isn’t a chance you lose him, not when he’s got eyes on you, but you have an advantage on him. Carrying all that armor on his body makes his movements more abrupt, meaning he’s less agile and relies more on his weapons to catch a bounty rather than his own speed. All you need to do is outrun him, make yourself impossible to catch and then maybe, just maybe, you can reach the other end of the forest without getting snatched.

“What are you planning?”

“’Put up a fight’,” you repeat the last words he said to you. “That’s what you said, right?”

“Yes?”

“Well… Come get me.”

And then you’re racing into the glade, your legs moving as fast as you possibly can. The air whipping passed the burning hot skin on your face, lungs feeling like they’re on fire, you’re running so much faster than you ever thought you could. Maker, you didn’t even know you could sprint this fast. Taking one quick look back over your shoulder, you see Mando break out from the forest edge, racing after you. He’s a couple metres behind you, but he seems to be closing the gap between you quicker than your efforts to gain distance.

Starting to panic, you make a sharp turn to the left, hoping he’ll be caught off guard, giving you just a few more seconds to stretch out the distance.

“I’ll give it to you, you’re much quicker than I thought,” he pants.

You’re so close to the forest, just a few more sprints. With your legs burning and getting tired, these last few metres are either going to make or break you, but with the determination to prove him wrong, you refuse to give up. You can almost taste freedom… just one more step—

And then you’re falling to the ground. Face slamming into the grass so hard, your vision goes fuzzy, and your head is pounding, hearing a faint ringing in your ears. When you turn over on your back, you look down at your legs and see your feet wrapped up in grappling line. Still in somewhat of a daze, you try to unravel the coil from your ankles with haste before Mando can close in on you. The tall grass shields your view, stopping you from seeing anything until it’s directly in your face, which mean he can be just a few feet away without you even knowing it. If you have any chance at slipping passed him, you need to move very fast.

Just as the cord untangles from your legs and you jump to your feet, you see Mando standing in front of you, just a little further than arm’s length away. Standing in place, you freeze up like a prey animal being spotted by its predator. Maker, he’s intimidating, carrying himself with such confidence and gusto that it could make even the more fearless predator cower in his presence and because you can’t see his expressions, you have no idea what he’s thinking under that bucket of his.

“Well, you managed to last two hours,” he notices after checking the time on his vambrace.

Relaxing your shoulders and readying yourself to break off into a sprint for the woods, you cock your head to side and chuckle. “Technically, you haven’t caught me yet.”

He tilts his head ever so slowly to the side, chest puffing out. With caution, he takes a step forward and in turn, you step back, maintaining the little distance between you two.

“Don’t make this harder for yourself.”

“When have I ever made it easy for you?”

The visor’s locked on you. Both of you stand incredibly still, waiting for someone to make the first move.

“Don’t run,” he warns.

It’s impossible to ignore the stirring in your stomach. It’s time to face the facts, you’ve already been defeated. There’s not a chance in hell you can possibly win this. You fucked up, somehow. Maybe you shouldn’t have started climbing trees, maybe you should have gone left instead of right. None of those things matter anymore. The only thing that matters how is what your next move is.

“Isn’t this what you really wanted?” His voice hitting low in the register.

Oh?

Does he mean what you think he means? Your pussy gushes, and you’re hit in the face with reality.

You would have to be a fool not to notice the way Mando looks at you on the Crest, and how you look at him. There’s clearly chemistry between you two, maybe even infatuation. It’s been three months since you started travelling with him which means there’s been three months’ worth of sexual tension. Both of you felt it, the electricity in the air whenever you were alone together. The air would get thick, your heartrate would quicken, and you’d wait for him to make a move, but he never did. Whenever you felt like that day was finally the day he’d let go of his devices and fuck you senseless on his ship, he’d retreat to the cockpit and lock himself up for hours, leaving you to take care of yourself in the fresher. It was enough to get the job done, but you wanted him, and you know he felt the same.

So, yeah, you’d be lying to yourself if that idea hadn’t crossed your mind. Getting him in his element, force him to come after you, and when you finally gave in or rather, when he found you, he��d be so caught up in the moment that all the sexual tension that had been building up for the last three months would climax at this very moment. What you couldn’t have anticipated was Mando figuring all of this out and actually calling you out on it.

Slacking your jaw, you lick your bottom lip, staring at the ‘T’ of his visor, realizing that this whole bet was just a façade—that the real reason you started this whole wager was to rile him up.

Mando body shifts, his fingers flexing at his sides.

“Been wanting it for three months, Mando,” you challenge.

He makes a guttural noise in his throat, and now you know you’ve got him. It’s taken three months to get you where you are now. Three months of walking around the Crest, swaying your hips purposely in hopes he’d look at you as you walked by. Three months of not so innocent touches on whatever part of him you could touch. Three months of soft moans and groans, trying to get his attention.

All your hard work is finally going to pay off.

Mando tries to close the gap between you, taking a step towards you. Being the brat you are, you step back.

“You’re really going to make this difficult?” He asks—very much a rhetorical question.

“Come get me, Mando,” the words slip off your tongue, once again trying to entice him.

A game of chicken.

Who’s going to make the first move? Is Mando going to charge for you? Do you let him? Do you turn and try to run away?

In a flash, Mando leaps forward and you’re just quick enough to dodge him, whipping your body towards the forest’s edge and taking large strides forward. You barely make it three feet before there’s more grappling line squeezing your ankles together. Once again, you land on your stomach with just barely enough time to cover your face with your hands.

Now, you know there’s no way you’d be able to get up in time and still somehow slip through his fingers, not that it was ever the point of this bet. You thoroughly enjoyed the thrill of being on the run and having Mando chasing after you but you’re way more interested in what’ll happen next than actually winning.

It’s takes a few seconds for you to get your bearings, and as soon as you begin to push yourself upright, you’re being shoved back into the ground by Mando using his bodyweight against you. He straddles either side of your legs, pushing them together.

“If this is what you wanted, all you had to do was ask,” Mando’s voice suddenly whispers in your ear, pressing himself into your body. He bucks his hips against your ass, his erection nuzzled between your cheeks. Propping himself on his elbows so he doesn’t suffocate you with his weight, one of his hands grab hold of your waist, digging into your flesh.

Trying to arch your back, you push your ass out to grind against his cock even more. Maker, you want him so fucking badly. Being fucked in an open field where anyone could see you, it’s daring and intoxicating.

Your hands fumble to your pants, trying to unbutton them and slide them down your thighs. Mando senses your urgency and swats your hands away and then his body leaves you momentarily, just long enough for him to tug your trousers down to your knees. It’s rushed, and you’re already panting underneath him, the anticipation eating you up from the inside.

A leather gloved hand grazes your lips, then he’s pushing two fingers in your mouth. The tastes of earth and salt lingering on your tongue.

“Bite,” he instructs.

You oblige and the glove comes off, discarded just inches away from your face. Without skipping a beat, his naked hand travels down your side, and with your ass in the air, he palms your stomach, keeping you in place and forcing you to arch your back even more. The pool of arousal in your stomach is making you squirm, getting more impatient as the seconds go by.

Mando takes his time trailing your lower belly, fingers barely grazing your skin. Your breathing is completely erratic, panting heavily into the ground. When he finally cups your sex, your breath hitches, a sharp inhale escapes your lips.

“Stars, you’re fucking soaked already,” he admires, and then two calloused fingertips are rubbing tight circles on your clit.

Writhing underneath him, you can barely keep still. The pleasure is overwhelming, something you’ve been waiting for for so long, you can’t believe this is really happening

Your hands grab at his waist with haste, trying to remove his pants but because you can’t see what you’re doing, you’re just aimlessly grabbing at him. He sees you struggling and lifts himself off of you. Hearing a small scuffle, he presses his body into your back again, and you feel his freed cock between your cheeks. Maker, he’s huge… is it possible for someone to feel this big when he hasn’t even stuck it in you yet?

“Are you sure you want this?” He asks breathlessly, his own pants scratching low in his helmet.

“Y-y-yes, please,” you croak, your throat already bone dry.

Gathering as much of your slick on his hand as he can, you feel him smear it all over his length and with your ass still shoved up against him, he teases your entrance with his tip. Hands grabbing at his hips with urgency, he actually fucking chuckles and then starts burying himself inside you.

Stars, he’s fucking huge, it almost burns how much he’s stretching your walls. Your eyes wrench shut so hard; you’re seeing stars. It feels like all the air is being knocked out of your lungs, you can’t even make a sound as your jaw fucking drops. He buries himself deeper and deeper—kriff you’re not sure how much more you can take. Your body freezes once he’s fully inside you, teasing your cervix with his head.

“F-f-fuck, you’re tight,” he breathes out once he’s filled you to the hilt. Steadying himself on his palms, his cuirass leaves your back, but he doesn’t move. He just sits there, giving you time to acclimate to his size. “I’ll try to be gentle—”

“No,” you say, cutting him off. “Please, j-just, fuck—do what you want,” you’re basically sobbing already, and he hasn’t even begun to fuck you.

He slowly pulls out and when you feel just the head still inside you, he slams into you so hard, you jerk forwards and cry out, your whole body stilling from being so full.

“You have to be quiet, someone might hear,” he tells you gently, pulling out again ever so slowly.

In an effort to stifle your moans, you bite down hard on your bottom lip, and when he bucks his hips and crashes into you again, you’re unable to stop the shriek that escapes you. Balancing himself on one arm, he grabs the discarded glove by your face and stuffs it into your mouth, gagging you with it and then begins really fucking you.

He drives his cock into you at a grueling speed, stopping his rhythm momentarily to roll his hips against your ass, making sure you feel every fucking inch of him. Whatever pathetic noise tries to slip through your lips is muffled by leather and you’re grateful for it because your cries would echo through the field if not for the glove.

Mando drops his weight back on you, feeling his breastplate dig into your back. He lets his cock just sit there as his naked hand wraps around your neck, applying pressure with two fingers. He resumes his pace, jackhammering your pussy with so much force, his balls slapping against your skin echo through the clearing.

“Shit, this—this is what you wa-anted?” He hisses, never once relenting his rhythm.

You couldn’t have planned for how mind-blowing this is. The daydreams, the dreams while you slept, nothing could have prepared you for the real thing. Nothing in your imagination even comes close to the actual feeling of Mando fucking you senseless in the middle of an open area. You’re so close to your climax already, something no other person has even gotten close to doing. Mando knows how to fuck, how to reach the right spots inside you, how to drive you fucking insane.

“Yes, ah-shit, yes Mando, please, please, it feels so good,” you babble, your mind unable to come up with a coherent thought; instead, you’re reduced to a blubbering mess. Tears are forming in the corners of your eyes, and when you squeeze your eyes shut, they begin streaming down your face.

“Be a good girl and come all over my cock,” he grits out between thrusts.

The grass is tickling your face, he pushes you deeper in the ground with every plunge, and then your orgasm rips through you, waves of white-hot pleasure crashing over you, electrifying your body from the inside out. Clawing at the ground and grabbing fistfuls of dirt, your body tenses and untenses at the same time, you can barely breathe. His hand is still pressing into your neck, making you dizzy from the limited air you can actually take in, as well as your climax punching out of you.

“Yes, fuck—ah shit—stars, you feel so fucking good.”

Mando doesn’t like to talk very much, only speaking when directly addressed, but now he’s a mess. He praises you, repeating words of admiration like it’s a prayer he tells himself at night and knowing you’re the reason for all this chatter just fills you up with pride.

He has incredible stamina, so he doesn’t need to pause in order to catch his breath very often. Mando continues to drill into you with such speed and force, you don’t know how much more you can take. It’s so much better than you thought it could be, you never could have predicted Mando to be so good at fucking you. He knows exactly how to treat your body, how to get the most pleasure out of you, it’s like he already knows you better than you know yourself. His cock rams that spot deep inside you that’s never been touched, nearly blinding you and causing your mind to go blank. You curse the Maker for making you wait this long. Both of you needed this, to take your frustrations and desires out on each other.

It’s primal, the way he thrusts inside you, feeling his cock pulse and twitch as your walls squeeze around him. Mando can barely shut up, if he’s not growling admirations in your ear, he’s keening into the helmet, his baritone hitting so low and rough, it only spurs you on.

The hand on your neck slacks, and then he’s pulling the glove out of your mouth. “Where d-do I—”

“Inside,” you manage to mewl, although your voice is barely above a whisper. “Please.”

“Ah—shit, you want me inside you? Fill your pretty little cunt with my come?”

You make a pathetic noise in your throat, the dryness of it too much for you to actually speak.

“Words, pretty girl. I need you to use your—fuck—words.”

You swallow hard, trying to get some dampness in your throat. “Y-yes.”

Mando growls contently and resumes his ruthless, hard pace. It’s no longer rushed, but with every thrust, he slams into your pussy so hard and hitting your cervix that your body jerks upwards, struggling to keep still. He grinds his hips a couple more times and then he reaches his own climax. You feel his cock throb inside you, filling you up with his seed.

“Fuck!” He snarls into the helmet, keeping it pressed against the side of your head.

You’re completely spent, you can barely move a muscle. Mando’s just fucked the life out of you, and you could lie here for the rest of your life, happy and satisfied. When you feel him start to pull out, with the little strength you gave—which is by no means a lot, you clench your walls around him, trying to keep him inside you.

“Don’t want me to leave?” He jokes.

“Want you inside all the time,” you mumble into the ground.

Mando hums, sheathing himself inside you once again.

“Pretty girl, I’m just getting started with you.”

#the mandalorian #the mandalorian fanfiction #the mandalorian x reader #din djarin x reader #mando x reader #the mandalorian smut #one-shot #pedrostories #fics

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misha-moose-dean-burger-lover · 3 years

Text

for @bend-me-shape-me 's SPN advent calendar 2020. prompt: phone calls and late night texts.

Cas isn't a serial texter.

And Dean's a-okay with it.

But for all that's worth, they sure seem to have a ridiculous amount of emotionally significant conversations via, or starting off as, texts. And most often, in the middle of the night.

>>> hello, dean. [12:07 am]

Dean jolts up at the sound, realizing he fell asleep still wearing his headphones, with the laptop on his lap (and a new episode of The Good Place playing) and rolls his eyes at himself, hitting pause before he can see what’s happening (because he has good reflexes, and because screw spoilers that’s why) and rummaging for his phone.

At this hour of the night, it has to be something important.

It doesn’t really strike him that Mechanical Engineering majors whose only other selfprofessed skill is air guitar aren't exactly the frontline warriors for midnight emergencies.

Cas's name shows up when he squints at the too-bright screen, and he sits up a little straighter.

<<< hey [12:09 am]

<<< you OK? [12:09 am]

The response is immediate.

>>> do you have peanut butter? [12:09 am]

And as if it's an afterthought, Cas adds.

>>> yes, I'm fine. how are you? [12:10 am]

Dean blinks.

<<< peachy. peanut butter? [12:10 am]

At least this time the response takes a while. Dean wonders if Cas realized it was midnight, and not exactly a time to run inventory on your best friend's stash of condiments.

>>> I ran out. [12:12 am]

Dean sighs, unable to help smiling.

It's not like he's a stranger to Cas's weird cravings when he's high. (There'd been this one time with pie and a traumatized Gas 'N Sip cashier that still sits heavy on Dean's conscience.) But he doesn't think Cas is supposed to be high right now — Dean's usually either invited or informed by an unspoken rule — which just means this is regular "jelly, not jam"-Cas, at his core a weird, persistently sleep-deprived economics major and astronomy nerd, that Dean may or may not have had a crush on for an embarrassingly long time, and who's also prone to grammatically perfect texting, deadpan, Disney references, and bluntness when the occasion calls for it.

<<< pretty sure i have some [12:14 am]

>>> :) [12:14 am]

>>> I'm coming over [12:14 am]

And weird as it may sound, that had turned out to be the night Cas told him he was gay. Said it had been a revelating moment, unprecedented and wholly unexpected — and apparently revelations come in pairs because it had been followed by an intense need for peanut butter, and the rest, he explained emphatically, was history.

Dean had just snorted, congratulated him, and brought out the fancier plates for sandwiches — shipped in from home instead of a sale at Target — all the while, repeating to himself in a loop, that this changed nothing between them, nothing at all, and Cas having the capacity to be attracted back to him didn't mean that he ever would be (or for hell's sake, he'd scoffed at his traitorous chick-flick-nonsense brain, is.)

The second time had been early — way, way too early and it was by pure chance that Dean was awake to respond at six friggin' am on a Sunday. Like, that’s practically nighttime.

Goddamn stupidly-fit running-freak.

Dean picks up his phone blearily, tongue in cheek as he clicks on it.

>>> I miss you [6:28 am]

>>> I'd* miss you [6:29 am]

Dean's stomach twists, and he's not sure if it's in a good way, or a bad way, or what-the-sincere-fuck-are-you-talking-about way.

<<< what [6:32 am]

<<< wtf are you talking about? [6:32 am]

Nothing.

<<< cas? [6:33 am]

<<< dude [6:34 am]

<<< cas???? [6:34 am]

Dean swears at his screen, more queasy than irritated. He can't stop fidgeting, so gives up on lying down altogether and hoists himself to his feet. Better to get his friggin' toothbrush since he's already up, and now definitely awake. Cas was so paying for this later.

He comes back, mouth mint-fresh in theory but still tasting awful and of fear and dread, and practically sags when he sees his screen blare with two messages from Cas.

>>> sorry, I had to make a call. [6:42 am]

>>> I'm not taking the job. [6:42 am]

And that's how Dean finds out about Michael (Cas's oldest brother, entitled asshole) inviting Cas to join his and Lucifer's (second oldest, bag of dicks) firm the year he graduates — invite, of course, being a loosely used word here for expecting it blindly (out of some crap he calls 'loyalty') and being readily willing to manipulate him into it.

And it's how he finds out that Cas turned them down.

"It's not who I am anymore." Cas had repeated, third time probably, and surer than before, and Dean had nodded earnestly before realizing Cas couldn't see him through the phone, and humming his affirmation instead. "And if I go back there, I'm never getting out again."

Dean'd swallowed.

"I don't want to." Cas had said, voice trembling. "I am — my own person here. It shouldn't be like this but this is the first time I have autonomy, Dean. Here is free will, and here are you. I don't — I can't. I'm not going to let them take it away."

"Good." He'd sounded shaky to even himself. "Don't."

"Yes." Cas had promised. "I'm not going."

And eventually they'd moved past the heavy talk into why-didn't-I-hear-about-this-before territory, Dean being righteously annoyed at his best friend for keeping something so huge from him, and Cas making lame (but probably valid) excuses in the name of not knowing how to explain the situation until he knew himself what he was going to do, because Dean may've been the first person he'd confided in about the insane fuckery that been his childhood and adolescence, but that still didn't mean he'd understand this, broken and convoluted.

And then Cas had nicely segued himself out of Dean's target of irritation and added, "They asked Gabriel too, by the way."

"And?" Dean didn't ever have much care for Gabriel (third oldest brother, cares about Cas, still a jerk) but Cas shared an apartment with him, so he had to face him plenty.

"He's running off to Miami."

And Dean had thrown his head back and laughed until Cas had smoothly added, "And I was wondering if you would consider moving in with me."

At which point, of course, he'd started coughing instead, because holy shit, it actually made sense (Sammy had left for Stanford two months back, and Dean lived alone in a space that had probably been two big even when there were two of them) and might actually happen, but Dean wasn't really sure how much longer he'd be able to hide his crush, sharing a friggin' kitchen with the guy.

The third time's after their first date.

(Because, well. It happened.

It happened with Dean leaning across the breakfast table to prove to Cas his bacon was superior (to cookie friggin' crunch, because goddamn is Cas a dork) and Cas taking a bite with their eyes fixed on each other's, and Dean turning red when Cas licked his lips and then, just like that, Cas swearing under his breath (definitely filed for later pondering, that bit), grabbing Dean, and kissing the living daylights out of him.

And Dean had kissed back with everything he had, hands cupping his face, and nearly melting in his arms - but then they'd separated for air and Cas had had an apologetic look on his face and when Dean had tried to lean in to kiss it away, he'd received half a smile and a shake of his head.

"Let's do it the way we're supposed to."

And Dean had known immediately what he'd meant. Let's not fuck this up by becoming best friends and roommates who sleep together. Let's...play safe.

"Okay. Uh," he'd rubbed the back of his neck. "Would you like to go on a date with me?"

"Thursday." Cas had promised with twinkling eyes, though Dean had already known he was going to say that since he knew Cas’s week at least as well as he knew his own, and two days and an anxious half of a thursday later, they went on their first date. Burgers and beer, and Led Zepp, and hands held in the Impala. Four hours later, they were back, and in their respective rooms, and Dean couldn't stop thinking about Cas.)

When his phone vibrates, Dean reaches for the bedside table.

It's at least midnight, it feels like he's been in bed for ages, and the only reason he isn't asleep is because all his brain seems to be capable of at the moment is thinking endlessly about the date. Fortunately, he's not the only one — although he's better at hiding it (practise, he'd say) because his heart is in his mouth the moment he reads Cas's text.

>>> I think I'm falling in love with you [11:43 pm]

>>> already. [11:43 pm]

Dean is very grateful for autocorrect as he types back with too-excited thumbs and a racing heart.

<<< so much for doing it the regular way cas mosby [11:44 pm]

>>> in my defense, it's been years. [11:44 pm]

<<< that part i get [11:44 pm]

<<< me too [11:44 pm]

<<< but youre supposed to wait three days before calling dumbass [11:45 pm]

Jesus, he'd never expected to blush cause of texts, but here they are.

>>> I'm texting. [11:46 pm]

And he guesses he'd never expected to giggle (he's alone there, sue him) cause of them either, but Cas apparently exists to prove him wrong about himself.

<<< good for you [11:46 pm]

He sends, biting his lip, and then lies in the silent darkness for a couple of minute, devoid of text notifications entirely, thinking uneasily — before he gives up.

They're idiots, sure, but nobody is this dumb.

<<< so when the fuck are you coming over then [11:50 pm]

>>> on my way <3 [11:50 pm]

And thinking about the lightening speed of that reply and the fucking heart emoji is enough to sustain him the entire one minute it takes Cas to get there, gently opening Dean's door, and climbing into bed — fitting in Dean's space like it's been made for him, and kissing him in greeting after leaving his phone on the table next to Dean's.

As it goes, with the confessions and the midnight cravings (and the grocery lists that keep getting piled onto through the day, and random pickup lines Cas decides are perfect to send Dean daily once he's found a website for puns, courtesy of Claire, and of course, pictures of Grease, which clog Dean's cloud in dozens whenever the ridiculously cute cat does something even slightly out of routine, god bless her lazy soul) Cas might just be a texter.

But Dean's pretty sure he's more than okay with it, so it doesn't really matter.

#spnadventcalendar2020 #destiel #destiel college au #casdean #dean is bi #texting fic #destiel fluff #best friends to lovers #+ roommates :))#deancas au #young dean winchester #young castiel #bluefirecas #rambleoncas #tearsofgrace #userpris #oh writing my writing #i had fun writing this :)#college aus almost feel like my roots at this point

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bamfdaddio · 3 years

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X-Men Abridged: 1981

The X-Men, those back-to-the-future mutants that have sworn to protect a world that hates and fears them, are a cultural juggernaut with a long, tangled history. Want to unravel this tapestry? Then read the Abridged X-Men!

(Uncanny X-Men 141 - 152) - by Chris Claremont and John Byrne, Brent Anderson, Dave Cockrum, Jim Sherman, Bob McLeod and Josef Rubinstein

While I also committed various fashion atrocities at the age of 14 (tye-die and fauxhawks, oh my), even Liberace would find Kitty’s outfits too much. (Uncanny X-Men 149; Uncanny X-Men Annual ‘81)

We dial back from the v. epic scope of the last few arcs. Instead, 1981 is just a lot of fun! We get:

Storm and Emma doing a Freaky Friday!

the X-Men vs. Magneto (again!)

A surprisingly effective Alien rip-off

An dystopian future! (OoOoOoOo)

Last year was the year of the Dark Phoenix, this is the year of Kitty Pryde. That’s not to say Jean’s death is swept under the rug: all throughout, we see her friends mourning her loss or remembering her fondly. (Scott even gets to have a demonic adventure about it.) But in general, Claremont puts Kitty in the forefront, fleshing out his YA-addition to the team. And what would a YA heroine be without a grim dystopia? Roll out the iconic Days of Future Past!

To be fair, 2013 was a dark time for all of us: What Does the Fox Say somehow got to the top of the charts and I was still watching Glee. (Uncanny X-Men 141)

How cool would it have been to see a name like Jonothon Starsmore or Eva Bell on those tombstones?

Anyway, that’s Kate. Kate’s had it rough. Mutants are at the bottom of the foodchain, most X-Men are dead and only a small cadre of resistance fighters remain, Sentinels dominate, and while she is married to Piotr, her children have been murdered. Bleak. Luckily, the rebellion has concocted the plan to shunt Kate’s spirit back in time to prevent this awful future from happening. (You’ve seen Days of Future Past, the last passably good X-Men film, you know what’s up.)

Let’s do the time warp again! 1981!Kitty’s mind gets taken over by 2013!Kitty, who promptly tries to convince the X-Men that a new Brotherhood of v. Evil Mutants will try to kill Senator Kelly, a presidential candidate who tries to put the mutant menace on the agenda. (Mutants tend to blow stuff up when he’s around.) Since the X-Men recently took a literal trip to Dante’s Infero and also befriended a cosmic world-ending entity, they basically shrug and go: “Yeah, this checks out.”

Off to Washington they go (zoommm) and there, they happen upon the Baddest Bitches in Herstory:

“How dare you hate mutants, senator Kelly! We’ll fix that by killing you!” (Uncanny X-Men 141)

This All-New, All-Different Brotherhood consists out of:

Destiny, a blind woman who can see the future. Definitely the eeriest member of this group. Badass lesbian, though that won´t be canon for years.

Avalanche. Greek who makes things shake. Is a long-standing member of the X-Men Rogue’s gallery, but rarely features in the spotlight. I think he got more characterization in four years of X-Men Evolution than he ever did in the comics.

Mystique. Shapeshifter. Ruthless and unhinged, the Cersei Lannister of the X-Men universe. Absolute legend, secretly the wife of Destiny, currently not as unhinged as she’ll be later. Immediately implied to be related to Nightcrawler: it’s the yellow-eyes-blue-skin-combo.

Pyro. Can manipulate fire, not create it. Absolute pillock, in all the best ways of the word. Originally intended as gay, but they decided to make him Australian instead. (?!)

Blob. Big, strong, immovable. We’ve seen him before.

One of the details in this fight I enjoy is that Storm is still struggling with her leadership, although she has a better grip on things than Cyclops:

Wolverine then proceeds to use those iconic but deadly claws about twice per issue for the next, oh, forty years. (Uncanny X-Men 142)

While the X-Men fight the Brotherhood in the present, we cut back and forth to the future. There, the X-Men consist out of some familiar faces - Storm, Colossus, Wolverine - and some surprises: Magneto (in a wheelchair), Franklin Richards (son of) and an unfamiliar ginger girl called Rachel. (She’ll be important later.) We even learn (one of) Magneto’s names: this is the first time he’s canonically called Magnus.

One of the strengths of Days of Future Past lies in its brevity, the way it tantalizingly taunts us with a brutal but familiar future without giving away too much. It’s single-handedly responsible for all those dark future timelines the X-lines are so fond of which will eventually culminate in time-displaced grandsons from alternative dimensions and the impossibility of a succinct answer to the question: “Who’s Cable?” Too much of a good thing and all that.

Still, what Days of Future Past does so successfully is:

Put the idea of the mutant menace back at the forefront, hammering home the metaphor of mutants being a minority. Mutants being put in camps and being forbidden to breed should - regretfully - make us think of all too many real life equivalents. (Specifically, all of the imagery harkens back to the Holocaust.)

It starkly shows what happens should the X-Men lose, reminding everyone of the stakes. The X-Men are here for a reason: bridging the gap between mutants and humankind. If they fuck up, we end up with mutant concentration camps.

It helps that the X-Men in the future almost all die horribly: Franklin is incinerated, Storm is impaled… It's brutal stuff. The only one to survive is Rachel, who wonders if their plan actually changed the future or if they created an alternative timeline. (It did the latter, sorry ‘bout it, Rachel.)

In the present, Kate chases after Destiny, who trains a gun on senator Kelly. I always wondered how this works: if Destiny saw the future, she knew that killing Kelly would trigger a terrifying future. What in the current Marvel timeline made her decide that the Days of Future Past was better? Did she see her own death? Did she see the Onslaught-crossover coming? The Chuck Austen run? What was it?

In any case, time-anomalous Kate stops Destiny from killing Kelly and the future is safe! For now. Kate disappears, Kitty returns to her body and some of the Brotherhood are apprehended. All is well, for now.

After being a key figure in DoFP, Kitty is also the main character in the Christmas special, which is basically a straight up horror and a pastiche of the Alien-movie.

Seriously, John Byrne still isn’t sure why he wasn’t sued by Ridley Scott for this. (Uncanny X-Men 143)

If you love Kitty Pryde? Read this issue. If you’re not convinced you like 80’s Kitty? Read this issue. It’s not continuity relevant and it’s basically Kitty playing the part of a Final Girl in a horror where she’s being chased by a demon, but it’s so good. It showcases all her strengths and her foibles. Kitty’s intelligent, cute (sometimes preciously so) and brave, but she’s also young, self-conscious and hot-headed. And it's not as if the other X-Men automatically adore her: Storm berates her all the time, she’s afraid of Kurt because of the way he looks (though she grows out of that) and she fights with Professor Xavier a lot. Moreover, she has a clever power-set for a young superhero who faces menaces on a daily basis: a thirteen year old who can go intangible is far less likely to have reality ensue on her and be dramatically offed because she's better at protecting herself.

I’m sure there are people who thought Sprite was hogging the spotlight, but I, for one, say she brings more to the table than, say, Angel. She’s not the Dawn Summers of this franchise.

Scott also gets a side quest. Poor guy can’t catch a break: first the love of his life dies, so he quits the X-Men, then he realizes he can’t do much else than be a superhero. He becomes a sailor on the ship of spunky captain Lee Forrester, is drawn into the sadistic plans of a demon unironically named D’Spayre and then shipwrecks in Bermuda with Lee.

The X-Men, meanwhile, are tormented by a team-up of Doom (who’s currently Latverialess and working on a comeback) and Arcade, that annoying crony. Locke, Arcade’s dom, has kidnapped the loved ones of the X-Men (Moira MacTaggart, Jean Grey’s parents, Illyana Rasputin and Amanda Sefton) in order to blackmail them into getting Doom to free Arcade. Apparently, Arcade accidentally insulted Doom and DOOM DOES NOT FORGIVE THAT FOLLY.

While the B-Squad (Polaris, Havok, Banshee and Iceman) goes to save Arcade’s hostages, the X-Men sneak into Doom’s castle. Well, except for Storm, who doesn’t give a single fuck and simply flies up to Doom, demanding an audience. Doom likes the cut of her jib and invites her to have dinner. (This is pre-Tinder, so this is a legit way of scoring a date.)

If Storm has a flaw (I said if!), it’s got to be her atrocious taste in men. (Uncanny X-Men 145)

The X-Men find Arcade’s cell empty, while Arcade casually saunters up to Storm and says hi. Storm realizes too late that this is a trap: while the X-Men are all trapped in Saw-like traps, Storm is encased in ‘living chrome’.

If you remember she’s claustrophobic, you know why this is a bad move.

While the X-Men free themselves from their traps - Polaris hilariously has to deal with a murderous merry-go-round - Storm is slowly driven mad in her prison, triggering a worldwide tempest. (She causes Lee and Scott to shipwreck.) Under the threat of Wolverine’s claws, Doom releases Storm - or rather, unleashes her.

“Instead of a Dark Lord, you would have a queen, not dark but beautiful and terrible as the dawn! Tempestuous as the sea, and stronger than the foundations of the earth! All shall love me and despair!” (Uncanny X-Men 147)

The memory of Jean brings Ororo back to herself and she starts undoing the superstorm she created. (If only climate change were reversed that easily.) Their confrontation ends by Storm easily forgiving Doom, because she apparently trespassed on his grounds without adequate cause.

Mkay.

All of Arcade’s hostages return to their homesteads, except for Illyana Rasputin, Piotr’s sister: she’s staying at the mansion for a while. Angel, who’s sort of been a part of the team since the Phoenix thing, has had it with Wolverine and his ‘tude, and decides to quit the X-Men : he doesn’t want to be a part of an outfit that has a killer like Wolverine on it. (Or maybe he’s just mad Claremont didn’t give him any storylines: his presence has been mostly pointless.) It’s too bad he left before Kitty started experimenting with her outfits: I bet he would have loved her ugly-ass costumes.

Equally inconsequential is the introduction of a brand new character, who then proceeds to disappear from the narrative for the rest of the year:

Black Tom has tried to kill you at least twice, but him sending you a long-lost daughter doesn’t give you pause? Ugh, Sean, you deserve Moira. (Uncanny X-Men 148)

Intrigued by Theresa? TOO BAD, WON’T SEE HER AGAIN ANYTIME SOON.

Another new character is the lonely, decidedly mutant looking Caliban, who can sense “people like him” and is on the lookout for companions. Like many lonely people who try and grasp at friendship, he decides to overshoot his shot and ruin the night of Storm, Kitty and Jessica Drew at a Dazzler concert. Because he tries to kidnap Kitty, the girls react a trifle aggressively. When they realize their mistake - the eerily pale Caliban is a simpleton rather than a menace - he’s already fled. No mention is made of the Morlocks yet!

There’s also another dull annual where the X-Men team up with the Fantastic Four to save Arkon’s dimension from the Badoon and yaaaaawn. Far more interesting is the landmark issue #150. Slowly, through the adventures of Scott and Lee Forrester, Claremont has been setting things up for the return of a favorite villain. While the X-Men investigate Magneto’s old base in Antarctica on a hunch of Professor X and tangle with Garruk, Scott and Lee survive Storm’s tempest, only to wake up next to a strange island that seems to have been raised from the ocean.

It’s apparently some ancient citadel from a long forgotten civilization with a fondness for squid statues. (I don’t know man, I’ve never been to the Bermuda Triangle, maybe this is just super-accurate.)The tentacles make Lee Forrester feel very amorous, but before Scott can tell her he is way too repressed to just have sex with an attractive someone he’s known intimately for a month or two, Magneto saves his ass by revealing he, in fact, raised this island from the seafloor.

Oh, Magneto. So extra.

My ambitious little mutant demagogue then proceeds to take the entire world hostage, showing how much he’s grown from the pompous, raving madman from the sixties. (Sure, Magneto is still a bit of a madman, but increasingly, he starts being on the right side of history.)

“I’m trying to make Magneto more sympathetic.”

“Just put him on a page with some bigger villains who are less noble, like the Vanisher, Count Nefaria, or…”

“Reagan, Thatcher and Brezhnov?”

“Er.” (Uncanny X-Men 150)

It’s obvious Magneto is being pivoted as a more noble villain, codified into the well-intentioned extremist we know and love today. Not only do we get the first hints at his past, fleshing out his motivations, he’s also not wrong. Humans are historically not great at taking care of the planet or each other.

When the Russians call his bluff and launch nukes at Magneto’s new island, he quickly disarms them. His retribution is swift and ferocious: the entire citadel is a machine that massively amplifies his powers. He sinks the submarine that launched the missiles, condemning the entire crew to death, and he casually erects a vulcano in a Russian city in Siberia.

Damn. Not messing around this time.

Despite his good intentions, Magneto is still definitely in the wrong: not only because of his methods, but as Scott points out: if Magneto unifies the world under his kind of benevolent dictatorship, all of that will simply fall apart as soon as Magnus dies.

In a way, Magneto is just as big a dreamer as Charles is: Charles believes in peace and integration, whereas Magneto believes his iron fist will be enough to make a perfect world happen. Both of them ignore the reality that acceptance is difficult and messy, because you’re trying to change essential human nature: the fear of the other. Magneto believes in big, sweeping gestures that will fix the world in move, while changing the world is also boring, hard work. One step forward, two steps back. Magneto just wants to leapfrog to his ultimate goal.

The X-Men fly over the citadel, returning from Antarctica, and their plane crashes into the ocean. (Magneto does not brook planes over his territory, humans!) The Professor is also nearby, looking for Scott with Moira, Peter Corbeau and Carol Danvers. The X-Men sneak onto the island, but to their horror, their powers are nullified by some machine of Magneto. They reunite with Scott, who formulates a plan to thwart the would-be ruler of the world.

While the rest of the X-Men go to trash the machine, Storm, Kitty and Lee infiltrate the control chamber where Storm finds a sleeping, shirtless Magneto. Once again showing her terrible taste in men, she is not weak in the knees at the sight of a sleeping Magnus: instead, she contemplates killing him.

Storm knows how dangerous he is, but she also knows that he’s a great man who’s fighting for ideals, no matter how misguided. She hesitates too long: Magneto stirs, suspects an attack and tosses her out of the window, to her death.

Magneto quickly undoes the sabotage the other X-Men have wrought to his machine. A fight erupts. Storm, meanwhile, has managed to grab hold of a ledge. She crawls back up and smashes an important-looking computer, restoring everyone’s powers.

The battle turns grim, but Scott sends Kitty away to wreck Magneto’s machinery. She sneaks off, following Scott’s orders and destroying both Magneto's power-up device and all of his plans by phasing though the computer circuitry. Magneto senses this and furiously gives chase. Overcome by rage, he attacks Kitty and disrupts her phasing power with a magnetic bolt, seemingly killing her?

Everything about this story beat is great: mama bear!Ororo, mournful Magnus and even the fact that Kitty’s godawful outfit serves a narrative function: highlighting to us (and Magneto) just how young she is. The fact that Kitty’s Jewish is just icing on the cake. (Uncanny X-Men 150)

And thus, the softening of Magneto commences. 1981 might be a year with wildly varying narratives, but it has given us at least three enduring legacies to the X-Mythos: a new kind of Magneto, a fondness for dystopian futures and the character of Kitty Pryde, who's really come into her own this year.

Ugliest Costume: Kitty! Purposefully, but still. Best costume, by the way, goes to Destiny, with her creepy, creepy golden mask. Just imagine this lady casually strolling across a battlefield, eerily calm and collected, dodging everything you throw at her. Awesome design.

Best new character: I usually pick one character - what good is having a shared award when declaring the best of anything? - but this year, it’s going to one of my favorite couples: Mystique and Destiny. Can’t wait to see more of them.

Most audacious retcon: Blob somehow retroactively becomes a member of the original Brotherhood, which is not what happened. Ever weirder is Xavier pondering that he never met Magneto before his attack in X-Men #1, while their cordially adversarial relationship rooted in a youthful friendship would soon become a cornerstone of the X-Men.

What to read: Uncanny X-Men 141 - 143 and 150 - 152

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creativeashproductions · 3 years

Text

A Distant Dream II // Luke Patterson

Summary: In 1994 seventeen year old Luke Patterson had once again tried to ask out the girl that held his heart. With the belief he would see the younger Mercer girl the next morning he decides wait to confess his feelings. Only to have soft music bewitched the reader into an antique wardrobe with lots of history.

Warnings: Swearing, talk of pregnancy, cops, strict parents, and angst

Words: 3.1k

A/N: I’m thinking maybe four or five more parts following this. I really fell back into a Narnia hole recently.

Part One

TO BE TAGGED SEND AN INBOX/ASK PLEASE!

Masterlist

Julie Molina didn't mean to snoop in Luke's things at all, but her elbow had bumped his backpack to the ground. A worn picture had escaped the open bag to float next to her foot. Her deft fingers picked the photo of Alex standing with a girl laughing at something out of frame. The jacket the girl wore was familiar to Julie as she had seen Luke wear it.

Her throws furrowed as she turned the picture to the back to see the writing on the back in legible black sharpie.

Y/N and Alex Mercer, Downtown Los Angeles 1993

Julie's took a guess that the girl was-

"What the hell Julie?" Luke's furious tone took the girl by surprise, but it was the rush to yank the picture from her hand. The guitarist flooded with the familiar grief that was never too far from his mind, it had been one a year to him instead of twenty-six.

The picture was cradled in the guitarist's hands as he pinned a nasty glare on his living friend as if she had kicked his puppy. Behind him stood Alex and Reggie becoming quiet at the picture in Luke's hand. The tears started to fill Alex's eyes as he vividly remembered the night when the picture had been taken.

Alex slung his arm around his sister's shoulders with the identical grin on display as Bobby and Reggie slumped over a paper. You had a feeling it was a song that Reggie had written and Bobby loved being able to give his input on the music. Something he didn't get to do with Luke. With that name in mind, you turned to the guitarist lazing around on a couch.

The band had finished a three-song set for a local club that often turned their cheek to minors walking in. It had taken a lot of manoeuvring, but you had been able to sneak inside to add the band to the list.

"Can you believe this?" Alex gleefully laughed, looking around the packed backstage room they had snagged. They had it for another five minutes, and the band ate it up as if they had already made it in the business.

"I can't believe you guys actually made this happen." You breathed before a laugh escaped your mouth at Reggie, pulling a face at you. The blinding flash bringing your attention to the boy holding the camera you had received as a gift.

"Always a great candid with you!" Luke announced shoving the camera in his backpack with a cheeky grin aimed directly at you, "We better split before security catches us."

"I thought they knew we were here!" Alex exclaimed rushing to grab his things with all bad ideas conjuring in his head. Being in the band annoyed your parents so if he ended up arrested he'd be shipped off to a behavioural boarding school.

He saw himself in a prison cell after being arrested. His mind going to the worst-case scenario instead of only being kicked out instead.

"If you knew the truth, you wouldn't have been able to sit still." Luke retorted as the sound of footsteps sounded outside the room. Luke's eyes scanning the room for any kind of solution to their problem.

With no safe exit, the five teenagers shuffled into the small bathroom with a big window that opened. Luke was quick to push Bobby and Reggie out first. He went next stationing himself to catch you before Alex was pacing in the bathroom alone.

"C'mon man!" Luke whispered to the blonde drummer glancing between the open window and the door separating him from security.

"If our parents have to pick us up from the cops, we are dead, Luke!" Alex hissed wincing at the loud knock on the door, "They barely condone being a band let alone getting arrested. We'd be in boarding school before you could say Orpheum!"

"Then get your ass down here!" Luke retorted jumping in place as Alex debated his options, but he slipped out the window with a sigh. The group running off with the sound of security hanging out the window screaming at the teenagers. His hand encased in Y/N Mercer's own soft hand.

"That's Y/N." Alex's voice was soft to the Puerto Rican's ears with his eyes a more delicate blue giving Julie the impression he was mostly lost in thought, "My little sister."

Julie's eyes shifted between the three ghostly boys all quieter than anything Julie had ever encountered with them. The only other time Julie had seen Luke so sad was when Alex and Reggie brought her to Luke's childhood home. It was unsettling to see the usual happy go lucky boy drained of energy.

"Did you find her?" Julie asked recalling that Alex had been the only one so far to not attempt to find his family. Reggie had told Julie how his house turned into a bike shack but other than that the subject wasn't brought up.

"She disappeared in 1994." Luke choked out, clenching his eyes tight at the last smile he saw on your face. The one that was seared in his mind with the regret of never taking his chance with you.

Twenty-six years didn't wipe the deep feelings he still held for the girl who had disappeared with his heart. Attempts to find her futile leaving her state just as unknown as back in the '90s. The case had been long cold with the years erasing her memory from people as they moved on.

"Did she-"

"We don't know. One night she just disappeared with no clues." Reggie supplied finding himself to be the only one able to speak. Luke and Alex overtook by the flood of grief and guilt that came every time they grew strong enough to mention her name.

"I can look for her if you want." Julie offered to the trio, "If she's living she may have social media. More likely Facebook with her age but if I can get-"

"No." Luke and Alex spoke at the same time with equal passion in their voices, but it was Luke that continued, "I don't want to know."

Julie's lips parted, but Luke already left with Alex in tow by the grasp on his distressed jean jacket. The Mercer boy sending a smile of gratitude, leaving Reggie alone with her.

"I'd like to know." Reggie softly spoke, meeting the gaze of the living girl, "Maybe that's why we're here too. To find the truth about her disappearance and if we find something, we can tell them."

The shadowed pain in his eyes creating a yearning in Julie's heart, "Of course. Can you tell me about her? I could build a portfolio on possible places she's been."

"Her disappearance was a catalyst for a lot of things that happened." Reggie admitted breaking his usual carefree and clueless demeanour, "Alex and Y/N aren't twins. She was a year younger than us but where one sibling went, so did the other. They understood each other more than the band could ever know."

"Why hasn't Alex talked about her?"

"It's hard. The world in the '90s is very different from this time. We've mentioned bits and pieces of our lives, but you don't know the darker pieces."

Julie listened intently as Reggie was the most serious she had ever seen him, showing her that there was more to Reggie Peters than he let on. Julie felt honoured he trusted her enough to drop his guard that he held up strong.

"Mr. and Mrs. Mercer had certain beliefs that their family should hold and show the rest of the world. Before the band, Alex and Y/N were shells of their real selves laced into designer clothing, perfect grades, charity galas and their futures already written."

"So, they came from money? Galas and designer clothing." Julie rolled her eyes, "What was so bad about that?"

"Just because they had money didn't mean they weren't suffering. Anything less than 98% was a failure to Mr. Mercer. By the time Y/N was thirteen, she was trained on how to be a perfect lady. Alex wasn't supposed to play the drums, both he and Y/N were classically trained on piano and violin." Reggie recalled, "The first time Alex held drumsticks it was like he shattered the glass window of the tank he was drowning in."

"What about Y/N?" Julie questioned, wrapping her arms around her knees as she watched Reggie melted into the memories he fondly held dear in his heart.

"She stayed in her tank drowning, so Alex didn't have to be alone." Reggie simply replied a fond smile reappearing at the days you would dedicate to solely to him.

Reggie didn't like to talk about the things that went on behind the doors of his idyllic beach house. You just knew and gave him days that let him step out of the fear of the unknown. He didn't have to put up his front like he did with the guys, he got to be unapologetically Reginald Peters. The boy that had wished his parents would stop fighting and be that happy family once more, but his wishes never got answered.

"She sounds like a really cool person."

"Luke and she had this unspoken relationship that never evolved into more. Both too scared the other didn't feel the same. The night she disappeared, he was going to tell her he loved her. When it didn't happen, he was going to do it the next morning."

"But she was never found. What do you think happened?" Julie questioned the Peters boy who's smile dropped. His mind flipping through all the what-ifs that had lived in his brain for the entire year before he died.

"I think she ran into trouble and couldn't find a way out. I only hope if she passed away, it was easy and quick." Reggie finished instantly flipping the switch back to his usual oblivious façade used as his coping mechanism.

"I was thinking we could work on that song?" Luke piped up as he and Alex both poofed back into the studio as if the last hour hadn't happened. Both their pain neatly placed back in that box in their brains the light barely caught a glance at.

As Sunset Curve poured themselves into the song, they worked on together deep in the basement of the Molina's a sound lightly filled the space. The sound of a celebration heard with the backing of upbeat trumpets followed by a laugh. A soft golden glow lighting up the dark basement through a sheet protecting an antique piece of furniture.

The Golden Age, Cair Paravel, Narnia

The House of Pevensie ruled fairly and justly for a decade and a half together with High King Peter and his Queen, you, by his side. Never one to cower from a battle you were often found by Peter's side holding the sword and the bow strapped over your back. Both items gifts from Father Christmas back during the Winter Rebellion against the White Witch.

Unfortunately, all good things come to an end. In the year 1015 of the Golden Age, the Kings and Queens of Narnia set out on a hunt. Leaving the daily duties to their court, the Pevensie family decided to hunt the magical White Stag. It was a break from the stress of ruling and failing to provide an heir to the kingdom for you and Peter.

"How are you?" Susan questioned slowly to a trot beside you and your horse Mercer. The question flaring frustration once more in your body.

"I am fine, Susan." You sighed looking ahead to where Peter was speaking with Edmund and Lucy animatedly. His blue eyes raising to meet yours with the fondness that had evolved from the love.

The courtship that turned into marriage had mellowed from the way it had been in your early '20s. At thirty-one, you found that what you had thought was everlasting love was simply just two teenagers with mutual attraction. The only two that understood each other coming from a different place than Narnia.

You still loved Peter, but something made you feel as if he wasn't the first man you had loved and certainly not as much as this nameless person. Overtime Peter and you came to the same conclusion, you ruled as before. You loved each other but not as fiercely as before with the kingdom's responsibilities, placing the relationship on the back burner.

You had years to fix it, however. That's the excuse you always told herself when the guilt of thinking of another.

"The last person to the White Stag has to sit through O'Rielly's draft of his speech," Edmund called out before racing off with his trusted horse Philip taking the lead. Only momentarily as Peter first overtook him.

Mercer swiftly brought you up right behind Peter with a grin on both of your faces.

"Ed, as usual, makes his declaration and can't keep up!" You called over your shoulder at the twenty-eight-year-old King.

His response is a teasing eye roll as he leaned over to caress Philip, "Are you all right, Philip?"

"I'm not as young as I once was." The dashing dark brown horse huffed to his rider as he shifts on his hooves returning to his confident stance—the other royal horses returning to Edmund's side as well. Mercer immediately stepping up on Philip's left flank with a soft sound of acknowledgement.

"Come on, Ed," Susan spoke barely giving Philip a look as she had known for a while that it may be time for Philip to retire. For Philip to choose his successor to serve his King, but it was hard for Edmund to think of Philip retiring.

"Just catching my breath," Edmund informed his cheery older sister patting Philip once more before sitting up straight in the saddle. His brown eyes scanning the surroundings hugging the family in warmth reminiscent of his mother's arms.

"That'll be all we'll catch at this rate." Susan retorted copying Edmund by patting her horse's head earning a thankful neigh in response. The teasing grin lighting up Susan's pretty features that had many a suitor at the castle for her hand in marriage.

"What did he say again, Susan?" Lucy inquired with rosy cheeks from the autumn wind hitting from the exhilaration of riding. Coming to a stop beside the youngest royal, your hand found a home in Peter's calloused one.

"I believe he underestimated us as usual." You inserted sharing a smile with both your sisters-in-laws, "I can't quite recall the words…Susan, would you recall them?"

"' you girls wait in the castle. I'll get the stag myself' were his words with his cheeky smile." Susan replied. Unlike when Edmund was thirteen, he joyfully joined in the laughter filling the woods of Narnia.

Your eyes scanning the area that tickled a faint memory of a girl wearing unusual clothing in the kingdom. A shirt that bared your skin in the dead of winter. The shirt paired with a short skirt of a similar colour to another young woman. Your attention brought Peter's to the landscape as well. So curious the High King dismounted his horse and helped you down.

"What's this?" Peter inquired stepping closer to a tall pole with a lamp lit up with a flame. Covered in vines it was nearly invisible to the eye unless you looked up, "It seems familiar. Love, do you know what it is?"

"I don't remember it. I've seen it but how I did evades me." You replied, stepping closer to the lamppost. Susan was quick to step up beside you just as confused.

"As if from a dream?" Susan spoke, earning a mute nod from you as that same faceless man flickered in your memory. The one that haunted your dreams with the odd cameo of a blonde man.

Your eyes returning the horse you named Mercer as the name held an emotional connection you never understood. Often you would have a memory tickle your brain before disappearing with tasks to be done at the castle. When you saw the back of a blonde in crowds, you felt sad and lost. Or feeling Peter's hand in your own fluttering your heart until your e/c eyes found his bright blue and the fluttering died down.

"Of a dream of a dream," Lucy spoke, turning on her heel to the vast trees concealing the beyond. Lucy spoke barely louder than a whisper, "Spare Oom."

With that, the youngest Queen raced off through the woods with her family on her heels.

"Lucy!" Peter admonished the retreating form of his little sister in her blood-red dress. A deep sigh pulled from your lips as the free-spirited woman ignored their calls.

"Every time. I swear she's still a kid at heart." You spoke jogging alongside Edmund behind Susan and Peter. Your midnight blue dress barely touching the grass of the forest floor.

"You're a kid at heart as well." Edmund merely replied, keeping his eyes on the bright colours of the royal garb his siblings wore.

"Come on!" Lucy's voice called out through the branches that slowly but surely turned softer and the trees tapered smaller.

"These aren't branches!" Peter called out in his deep voice that temporally turned higher before it went back to the gravelly tone. You swore with everything inside his hands became softer and harder to grasp.

"Keen observation there." You retorted taken aback at the attitude you found infused in your voice as if you a teenager once more. Peter's surprise quickly found in his blue eyes that glanced over his shoulder.

"Ow! Ooh!" Edmund hissed as a branch scraped his cheeks and the pain vanished with the soft touch of fur on the scratch. The sudden change of texture startled him almost as the switch of his voice to the high pitch of his thirteen-year-old self.

"They're coats! Fur coats!" Susan gasped startled by the odd shift between the forest and whatever this place was.

"Mrs. Beaver would throw a fit over th- Ow! Lucy, you elbowed my ribs!" You whined stumbling into Peter's side as the others complained at each other hitting, stepping and kicking as the area became smaller and smaller.

Your eyes raising to meet Peter's blue taken aback by his appearance back when you had fought side by side against the White Witch. The eyes that kept rapt with yours at the coronation fifteen years ago and then your wedding ten years previous.

Then behind the siblings in front of you, a door opened to a large empty room with windows behind framing a rural countryside. Then your husband and in-laws were gone, and you fell out with memories from a lost life hitting you full force as you tripped out of the wardrobe.

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#luke patterson imagines #luke patterson x reader #peter pevensie imagines #narnia #jatp fanfic #julie and the phantoms imagines #charlie gillespie imagines #luke patterson #narnia imagines #peter pevensie #caitsy and ash productions

148 notes · View notes

literaphobe · 3 years

Note

Two questions:

1. What do you feel about CorpsexSykunno ship?

I feel like it's MarkiplierxJacksepticeye all over again, starts out innocent and turns uncomfortable.

(Also I think real people shipping is gross in general)

2. Dream smp makes me so nervous, not necessarily because of any of the members but due to (1) the history of online teams dominated (and lead) by male influencers, (2) minecraft youtube's general history of exploiting fans. I feel like it's going to end badly. You seem to be enjoying it tho, and it's definitely up my alley, should I get into it?

1. Corpse and Sykkuno are not comfortable being shipped! Neither of them are okay with being shipped with ANY of their friends in general, so like, don’t do it, or if u do like. i guess just don’t say anything about it? it’s really not hard to just enjoy their friendship. like it’s an endearing friendship n there’s nothing wrong w liking it. but. nothing more u know. plus both of them have made it clear on several occasions that they’re both straight and my gaydar agrees JFKDKDK like they’re just. Friends. Who care about each other :)

I definitely think it’s not like the markiplier x jacksepticeye situation, because for one u have jack himself telling people not to ship etc etc and also BECAUSE of that u have people actively policing any form of shipping. it’s honestly gotten to the point where it’s annoying but i genuinely don’t think it’s that big a problem, plus the rising popularity of the amigops puts less pressure on one-on-one corpse + sykkuno interactions, since people now wanna see all four of them play games together n not just corpse n sykkuno!

2. I get why Dream SMP would make u nervous. An interesting thing I realized when I started finding out more about people on that server is that there’s marginally more poc on it than I previously thought and also A LOTTTTT more lgbt+ people than i previously thought. Like genuinely why are so many of u so gay. And like that affects the stories being told obviously. Like. I don’t think it’s perfect n I don’t follow EVERY person on the SMP, just like i obviously don’t know everything about every minecraft YouTuber like fkdkdkdk i would say the only people i watch are dream, george, quackity (and even then i haven’t seen most of quackity’s YouTube videos) and like I’ve seen a couple of tommyinnit’s videos Fjdjdjdj and sapnap obviously but he has like 10 videos and i watch Karl’s streams if certain people are on it. yeah i think that’s about it like i do like the feral boys (dream george karl quackity sapnap) and i have seen maybe one or two skeppy videos

Anyway I get ur concerns about online circles dominated by male influencers too. but quite frankly compared to past circles ive seen its genuinely not that bad and also. In terms of holding them accountable, I think mcyttwt makes VERY sure of that (which honestly has devolved into a problem. because privileged haters will dig up stuff on creators that either a. has been addressed properly or b. is just. several years old and i don’t like how minorities are being weaponized. also i cannot stress how little i care that some minecraft YouTuber said the r slur 10 years ago when they literally never do it now. like. i worry so much because so many of these stans who think they’re ‘educating’ are just wearing themselves out n burning themselves out. so many of them are minors too)

but like. the people i am kept up w definitely do take responsibility and accountability. like dream especially gets accused of stuff that’s either fake/not him or something that’s just like out of this world (e.g. accused of queerbaiting. w george. interestingly no one ever accuses george directly of doing this) and no matter what he like addresses it properly and accordingly. like looking at his journey as a creator over the past year he’s grown a LOT and changed so much and matured a lot and i think like. looking at how much he’s blowing up and how much more of a following he’ll gain. I feel much better that it’s him who has this following as compared to. Certain people. And like. It’s upsetting to see how a lot of people have this impression of him that’s objectively false? Due to all the fake stuff that gets spread by haters (most often white for some reason???)? Because genuinely he’s not the creator we need to be so worried about?

Anyway in terms of getting into mcyts in the dream smp. I knew who Dream was because he’s played among us w the amigops a lot n they all like him because he’s just a good natured amicable person. I vaguely knew who george was because of dnf n also people putting his stupid face on my tl all the time. I thought he was pretty n hated that I thought that. I don’t care anymore tho. Like what’s wrong w looking at pretty people. I deserve it. Anyway! I got into their videos through GEORGE first, funnily. I think Minecraft, But I’m Not Colorblind Anymore was the first one I watched and it’s very very good. It’s endearing because it’s George trying out colorblind glasses for the first time n he’s nervous but Dream is there with him to make him feel more comfortable. And also Dream is so happy n emotional (he talks about tearing up at the thought of George being able to see colors properly) and their friendship is just very endearing. The video starts w george taking a colorblind test and we find out he has protan colorblindness (severity: STRONG which makes them crack jokes about how George is SO strong 😤)

anyway these losers. Decide to test the colorblind glasses on colors in MINECRAFT because of course that’s the whole video and it’s really heartwarming to see George learn how colors look like again n Dream just being excited about it the whole time n then George taking the colorblind test again at the end but with the glasses on... n then u go on to watch more george videos but it’s the ANIMAL CHALLENGES. like George Speedruns Minecraft But His Friend Is (Insert Animal, This Animal Is Always Dream) and like...... yeah so I watched a bunch of George’s videos n I went onto dream’s channel out of curiosity

And i was like. What the fuck. These videos are so WEIRDLY named. What the fuck is Finale, Finale Rematch, Grand Finale???? But dream has adhd too and in hindsight I absolutely would’ve titled the videos in a similarly confusing way. Anyway dreams manhunt videos are...... a work of art. I swear to god like even if u don’t know jackshit about minecraft they are very entertaining and weirdly impressive.

Basically in Minecraft Manhunt: Dream has to beat the game, but his friends are there trying to kill him. If they kill him even ONCE, they win n the video ends. He’s allowed to kill them repeatedly though. Manhunt started with one hunter (George, to one’s surprise), then two hunters (Sapnap and George), three (Sapnap, George, BadBoyHalo), and now four (Sapnap, George, BadBoyHalo, Antfrost). The next stage is possibly 5 hunters but idk who is the fifth yet. Anyway the thing that’s so entertaining about minecraft manhunt is:

1) Dream’s Parkour & PVP skills, which he developed and trained over such a short period of time n got REALLY good, it’s satisfying to watch him do risky maneuvers n succeed, the ways he’ll jump from a high place but clutch w either water, blocks, horses, boats, scaffolding, etc, to escape from the hunters

2) Dream’s TRAPS, like he actually does research for possible plans n traps he could do to counter the hunters, since there’s so many of them and only one of him, and he can’t just fight them in combat exclusively, since he’ll lose eventually if he gets ganged up on. I won’t spoil any of his traps, but they’re very good and also very dramatic. It’s amazing

3) The banter and taunting!! The lies and tricks!! They’re all really close so it’s easy for them to crack jokes during a lull where neither party is engaged in a fight, they’re all on the same VC so they can potentially say stuff to trick each other, or they can hear the other team say stuff that gives them an edge

4) The editing. Like the pacing is incredible, and all the bgm used is SO good at setting the atmosphere n making things more tense n exciting etc. like “dream’s manhunt music” is honestly a meme at this point but he actually unironically uses it and it unironically makes the videos better. Also dream edits all the manhunt videos by himself!! he doesn’t hire editors to do it for him or anything

idk what else to say but yeah I watch most of dream n george’s YouTube videos and they’re in most of each other’s videos and I like their dynamic a lot!! Especially since they still have not met in real life but already know they want to like live together (forever, according to George), and it like reminds me of the friendships I have because most of my close friendships have been made online. And like. They remind me that online friendships aren’t actually inferior. That’s it :) sorry this is so long

#ask #mcyt #dnf #dream smp #amigops #corpse husband #sykkuno #dreamnotfound #georgenotfound #dreamwastaken #sorry so sorry I just #never have that many ppportunies to talk about this #n I realized I had the energy to answer this ask apparently #fjdjdjdjd #askplus

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discotreque · 3 years

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LwD 2.05: An Embarrassment of Dooplers

So I was a little nervous about this one! I hadn’t heard any spoiler-spoilers, but screeners have been out for weeks now, and I’d heard a bunch of individual, vague, non-spoilery hints about (1) big character moments, on the scale of a mid-season finale even though the show’s not taking a mid-season break; and (2) an ending that would make me cry.

I guess I imagined something relatively serious and dramatic, like “No Small Parts”? This show makes me cackle with laughter and giggle with nerdy glee and “d’awww!” at heartwarming friendships every week, but it’s only ever made me cry once—and then I was impressed that they were going to get there from the wacky hijinks we saw in the brief teaser.

The lack of a cold open made me apprehensive too—in my experience, that’s typically a sign that there’s so much plot in the rest of the episode that they need that extra scene—but after ~21.5 minutes of aforementioned hijinks, I was having so much fun that I’d completely forgotten about the alleged tear-jerker at the end…

…and they were not the tears I was expecting.

I didn’t think I’d be smiling and crying!!!! That was wholesome as SHIT!!!!!

I almost can’t believe they earned that—but they totally did.

After a Mariner–Tendi episode and a Boimler–Rutherford episode, we’re back to the “usual” Season 1 pairings… except the relationships between these characters have changed since Season 1. Mariner still feels thwacked in the abandonment issues by Boimler bailing for the Titan, and Rutherford’s having a tiny little existential crisis about losing an entire year of his life.

Both of which are extremely understandable and very heavy situations—and both of those situations get resolved because everyone in them is vulnerable with each other and honest about their feelings—AND that honesty and vulnerability brings both pairs of friends closer together. Are you kidding me?? I would watch SEVENTY seasons of that shit. Put it in my veins.

Onto the notes:

So basically Dooplers are Tribbles, but for cringe comedy instead of slapstick? Ohhhhh boy.

Look at Ransom the diplomat, tossing his own fork on the floor! I like that he’s actually a pretty competent Starfleet officer, despite also being a completely ridiculous person.

Wait a second, is that—OH HOLY SHIT, THE DOOPLERS ARE VOICED BY RICHARD KIND.

It makes sense that B. Boimler would find William annoying—who likes seeing their own flaws reflected back at them? And who could be a better reflection of one’s flaws than one’s literal duplicate?—but most interesting to me is that it implies on some level, Bradward knows the stick up his butt is a flaw. (Does William?)

Why does the Cerritos model have working phasers?!?!

I’m loving hot pink as the currently en-vogue colour for “dangerous sci-fi energy” in animation (cf. almost every previous episode of this show; Into the Spider-Verse; other stuff I can’t remember right now). As a former child of the 80’s, I’m living for it… but as a former teenager of the 90’s, I can’t help but wonder if it’s going to age as poorly as the harsh neon green of The Matrix, every Borg appearance on Voyager, and like 80% of the websites I made in high school…

SKANTS! SKANTS! SKANTS!

That fake-out joke with the fly-by over the Cerritos model was in the season trailer weeks ago, and I was so enthralled by that handsome lady that the sticker coming into frame still got me good 😂😂😂

BECKY Mariner????? omg yes

Some top-quality Boimler screams in this one. Poor Jack Quaid must drink gallons of throat-coat tea when he records.

One of the great things about Star Trek to me is that you never know what you’re going to get from any random episode. A murder mystery? A road trip? A spooky thriller? A cheesy romance? Broad comedy? Body horror? Didactic political screeds shrouded in tissue-thin science-fiction metaphors? Brain and brain, what is brain??? And after this many years of watching, you’d think I’d be hard to surprise. But if I ever told you I thought I’d see a Blues Brothers–style car chase through a frickin’ shopping mall on an episode of Star Trek, I would have been straight-up lying to you. I loved it, it worked for me, my jaw was on the floor and I was clapping with joy—but I’m definitely comfortable calling this one “unexpected.”

It’s CAPTAIN SHELBY!!! And an ancient babydyke crush rose from the depths of my childhood subconscious… (Also I think her Number One is based on the original makeup—eventually deemed too complicated—for Saru? Now that’s a deep cut.)

In 20th-century Trek, you almost never got to see what was going on inside a starship from the outside. Even after they switched from physical models (where it was next to impossible on a single episode’s budget) to CGI (which was still in its infancy, still not exactly cheap, and still broadcast in SD anyway), it was a rare thrill to see any meaningful interior details in an exterior shot. Disco’s modern VFX have given us some tasty, tasty treats in that department, but nothing quite as sublime as all the pink Doopler light glittering through the Cerritos’s windows.

Mariner says she’ll take her contact Malvus down with her, and threatens that they’ll end up “in the same cell.” Malvus is a Mizarian, a species introduced in TNG’s “Allegiance,” in which Captain Picard is held in a mysterious prison with one. I think I see what you did there, McMahan?

Bartender… so hot… lesbian circuits… overloading…

The Tendi and Rutherford C-story was, well, a C-story within a 22-minute episode, so there wasn’t much to it, but the one scene that mattered actually mattered a lot. I’m ambivalent on whether they should end up romantically involved—I’d prefer they don’t, but they’ll be one of the cutest couples in Trek history if they do—and as long as they keep that pure, sweet friendship between them at the heart of whatever else happens, I’m on board.

Carol Freeman was already one of my favourite captains before this season, and she’s been steadily moving up the list. The quiet throughline about her ambition to be on a better ship has been fascinating so far, and it’s starting to actually make me feel a little conflicted: I’m of course rooting for Captain Freeman to recognize her worth, make Starfleet recognize her worth, and become the ass-kicking captain of a hero ship that she’s clearly ready to be—but that almost surely means she’d be kicking ass off-screen, because LwD isn’t about those kind of adventures, and I’d be devastated not to have Dawnn Lewis on the show every week. So I’m kind of on the edge of my seat about this one!

I had so many favourite jokes this week I put them in a separate list:

“Even the replicated water on the Titan tasted better” is a low-key brilliant dunk on people who can’t shut the fuck up about the cooler places they used to live.

“Ooooh, they have a Quark’s now! That used to just be an empty lot where teens would make mistakes!” ← That’s literally me every time I go back to where I grew up. I felt so Seen™ I almost hid under a blanket.

“I would never go down the stairs!” (evil grin) (goes up the stairs)

The “well, shit” expressions from Mariner and Boimler as their crashed car sank right into the water… which started to bubble innocuously… and then the bottles of Data bubble-bath popped up, paying off a joke I thought had already been paid off—that was the one that woke up my poor cat this week. Just exquisite timing.

“YOUR PAGH IS WEAK, AND IT DISGUSTS ME!” “I don’t even know what that is, but I don’t like your tone!”

“Okona’s in there? He’s not even Starfleet! This is outrageous!” made me shout “NO!” at the screen like I was scolding my cat for scratching furniture. (She did not wake up that time.)

Best background joke: the neon sign at the dive bar advertising FREE SHOTS & BEERS. (Get it? Because they’re on a Federation starbase? Where nobody uses money?)

And of course Quark merchandised DS9.

This wasn’t just a standout episode of Lower Decks, this was a brilliant episode of Star Trek, period. The Dooplers, though extremely silly, are nevertheless also a clever sci-fi metaphor for real and relatable personal/interpersonal issues, and an effective plot catalyst for meaningful character growth from all four of our ensigns and the captain.

The jokes were hilarious, the action was kinetic, the A-, B-, and C-plots linked up thematically, the visuals were consistently and thoroughly gorgeous, the character beats—between Mariner and Boimler, Tendi and Rutherford, Mariner and Capt. Freeman—were all genuine, heartfelt and wholesome, and the references to other Trek canon were both deep and deeply affectionate.

Only 15 episodes in, and this series knows exactly what it is, exactly what it wants to do, and knows that it can knock our socks off doing it. Mike McMahan has said in recent interviews that the back half of S2 (and the apparently almost-fully-written S3) is a straight line uphill in quality from here—which surprised me at first, because McMahan seems like a pretty chill dude who doesn’t normally brag about his own work like that.

But then the Prophets sent me a vision of my space dad Ben Sisko, who reminded me of the words of 1930’s baseball player Dizzy Dean:

“If you can do it, it ain’t bragging.”

[Thanks to cygnus-x1.net for the screenshots this week—I was too lazy to do my own.]

#star trek #star trek lower decks #lower decks #lower decks spoilers #lwd spoilers #amy's episode notes

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maria-scribbles · 4 years

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we’re just like kevin bacon!

prompt: for @bricksatanakinswindow ‘s halloween writing challenge! this was initially inspired by "mortal enemies accidentally showing up in matching costumes every fucking year" but once i started writing it kind of snowballed from there and i ended up with this lmao

ship: jj maybank x fem!reader

word count: 4.6k+ (i think this is the shortest thing i’ve ever written lol)

warnings n stuff: childhood enemies to lovers, swearing, mention of underage drinking, halloween shenanigans, makin' out, smut (not too explicit but i still think it's spicy enough to need an 18+ warning), jj and the reader being cute lil nerds and quoting movies back and forth, the author blatantly using some of her personal favorite movies/shows as inspiration for costumes, the author also making her opinions on ghostbusters clear (instead of the human trash can peter venkman, stan the adorable dork known as ray stantz for clear skin)

a/n: this was hella fun to write and i already have so many more halloween fic ideas bouncing around in my head (it's spoopy season, y'all!). title of this fic comes from guardians of the galaxy 😊

Of three things in life you were certain.

One, you loved Halloween more than any other holiday of the year; after all, you and your twin brother Mason were born just after one AM on October 31st so you could say a penchant for all things spooky was in your blood.

Two, Sarah Cameron was your best friend. Being neighbors your whole lives, the two of you were thick as thieves and spent almost every day together, much to the annoyance of both your brother and hers; as much as you loved Mason, sometimes you wished Sarah was your twin instead of him and you knew without question the blonde girl would trade Rafe for you in a heartbeat (with little to no guilt, in fact.).

And three, you absolutely hated JJ Maybank. You'd been at the top of each other's shit lists ever since you were both six years old, when he made fun of you for the stutter you'd had back then and you dumped a full milkshake over his head as payback, and even as time passed and you grew out of your stutter, your disdain for the blond pogue only grew stronger. He was infuriating, plain and simple, and the mere mention of his name made steam come out of your ears.

The boy was just good at being annoying and seemed to love pushing everyone's buttons, yours especially, and always found ways to get under your skin without fail every single time your paths crossed (which was way too often for your liking, but running in the same friend group made it hard to avoid each other). It became an unspoken thing, the great Y/L/N-Maybank feud, with both of you trying your hardest to piss the other off until one of your mutual friends or your brother broke it up and pulled you to opposite corners of the metaphorical ring to take a breather before the next round.

You'd never admit it but deep down you kind of liked it. You liked being at the center of his attention (granted, it was antagonistic in nature but it was attention all the same), his bright blue eyes following your every move whenever you were within his sights and you liked that you were in his thoughts even when you weren't around, a fact proven to you by the tiny notebook Kiara carried around in her pocket recording how many times he mentioned your name. Knowing you lived rent free in his mind brought you an embarrassingly high level of satisfaction that you'd absolutely deny feeling if anyone ever asked, just as you'd deny the fact that he lived rent free in your mind, too.

...At least for most of the year. Everyone, including JJ, knew that to you Halloween was a damn-near sacred time. He knew never to mess with you during the weeks leading up to the holiday and definitely never on the day itself, lest he want yet another milkshake dumped over his blond head. He knew that, the whole damn island knew he did and yet...somehow, some way, he managed to get your blood boiling every. single. year. And you, like a masochistic idiot, let him.

It all started when you were twelve.

You, Mason, and your friends were finally old enough to go to the annual youth party held on the sprawling lawn of the Island Club, an event you'd been looking forward to attending every Halloween since you were eight. Of course, you were excited for the dancing and games and food but the thing you couldn't wait the most for was the costume contest, a chance to show off your skills and prove to everyone on the island that Y/N Y/L/N was the undisputed queen of Halloween.

So what if your hopes were a little too high (considering you were only twelve and going up against kids ranging from your age to fifteen), you were still gonna give it your all; you spent weeks perfecting not only your costume but your brother's as well with your mom, helping her cut fabric and sew zippers, styling wigs and painting props until everything was perfect.

"Oh my God, Y/N!" Sarah, dressed as Cinderella, yelled from the passenger seat of her dad's SUV when they swung by to pick you up. "You look amazing!"

"So do you!" You said, slipping into the back seat in between a miserable-looking Rafe as Sarah Sanderson ("I lost a bet," he explained with a scowl) and Mason, holding your mini R2-D2 on your lap. Was it kind of cheesy, dressing up as the most iconic twins in movie history? Probably, but you really didn't care because Leia Organa was a total boss bitch and Mason was practically over the moon that he got to be his ultimate silver screen hero and swing around his very own lightsaber as Luke Skywalker.

"The Force is strong with you two." Ward joked, earning an eye roll from both of his children as he drove to the Island Club to drop you off. Rafe immediately disappeared into the crowd to meet up with Topper and Kelce and the three of you went off to find your own friends, skirting around the edge of the party toward the snack tables, also known as the most likely place for them to be.

You spotted Kiara first, looking like an actual princess in her Tiana costume and waved, smiling when she waved back and beckoned you over as she said something to Pope, dressed as Albert Einstein, that made him start laughing hysterically.

"What's so funny?" You asked, reaching between them to grab two handfuls of pretzels and immediately dropping one into your brother's outstretched palm, careful to keep the sleeve of your white dress away from the bright orange-iced cupcakes on the table.

The two of them exchanged a look that instantly made you realize something was Up™ but before either of them could answer, Mason asked around a mouthful of pretzels, "Where're Tweedledee and Tweedledum?"

"J, why didn't we think of that?" John B's voice came from somewhere over your shoulder and when you turned to face him, you nearly dropped both the droid cradled in the crook of your elbow and the snacks in your hand. Not because of John B and his hilarious Chewbacca costume but because of the fact that JJ Maybank, the one person you hated the most on the whole entire island, was dressed as Han freakin' Solo.

"Yikes." Someone muttered behind you -it sounded like Sarah but you weren't really sure- and Mason nearly choked on his pretzels as he tried and failed miserably to keep himself from laughing.

"You've gotta be kidding me." You huffed, rolling your eyes as JJ crossed his arms and glared in your direction, blaster hanging from the holster on his hip.

"Listen, Princess, I'm not too happy about this, either."

"Oh, shut up, you nerfherder."

"Who you calling-" Mason and John B cut in and pulled you both in opposite directions before either of you could turn it into a shouting match, your brother physically grabbing you around the waist and carrying you off while the latter caught the back of JJ's vest and dragged him away. Despite their best efforts to keep you apart, you ran into each other more times than you could count and spent a minute or two squabbling like cats and dogs each time until one of them intervened once again. It was childish, it was immature, and it was fun, even though you'd never, ever admit it. Ever.

You didn't win the costume contest that year in the way you'd imagined at all. Still, first place in the group category was a win in your book and it felt good, even if one of the members of your unintentional Star Wars posse was someone who tested every bit of patience you had. The four of you split the cash prize and you went home 25 bucks richer, stashing it away for next year's costume and pushing the thought of accidentally matching with your mortal enemy from your mind.

You had no idea this thing was only just beginning.

The next year, you let Sarah and Kiara convince you to match with them and the three of you rolled up to the party as the Pink Ladies -you as Rizzo, Sarah as Sandy, Kiara as Frenchy- only to run right into the boys, your brother included, dressed as the T-Birds. John B, perfectly in character as Danny, immediately whisked Sarah off to dance while Pope, the most adorably awkward Doody you'd ever seen, went to grab some snacks with Kiara, leaving you stuck with the bane of your existence as, of course, fucking Kenickie (Mason, as Sonny, dipped sometime before then without you noticing). The two of you spent the whole evening glaring at each other and hurling insults back and forth at breakneck speed, more in character than either of you'd ever want to acknowledge and for the second year in a row, you won first place in the group costume category.

At fourteen, you went as Princess Buttercup and JJ showed up as Westley, fake sword in hand as he followed you around all night like an annoying fly, sarcastically drawling "as you wish" every time you so much as glanced in his direction. Your brother, dressed as Inigo Montoya, nearly pissed himself laughing and you wanted to snatch both of their prop swords and shove them up their asses. You came in first again in the group costume contest and begrudgingly split the prize three ways.

At fifteen, you worked hard on a Dr. Ellie Sattler costume from Jurassic Park, he strolled in as a disheveled Dr. Alan Grant with mud splattered boots and tattered clothes, and you really regretted not taking the offer to be the Tai to Sarah's Cher and Kiara's Dionne. Once again, Mason laughed so hard his face turned red and you were tempted to grab the sword he was holding and beat him over the head with it, not just for laughing at you but also for the completely atrocious Jack Sparrow costume he wore. To your absolute horror, you and JJ won the contest in the duo category and you wanted to melt into the ground when they called you onto the makeshift stage to collect your reward.

When you were sixteen, you and your friends "graduated" to the party held for the older teens inside the club itself. With costume rules a little more lax than they were for the younger kids, you decided to go as (an only slightly sexy) Janine Melnitz, complete with a prop telephone you answered every so often with a loud "Ghostbusters, whaddya want?!" much to the embarrassment of Mason, who was once again dressed as Luke Skywalker, this time in the fatigues he wore while training on Dagobah in The Empire Strikes Back.

You strutted into the party in your heels and pencil skirt only to nearly fall flat on your face when you caught sight of JJ in a terrible black wig and glasses, proton pack strapped to his back and 'Spengler' printed on the front of his jumpsuit. Your brother winced when you all but screeched "Again?!" right into his ear and grabbed your elbow, dragging you over to an empty table and depositing you into an open chair.

"There's no way this is a coincidence anymore! He could've picked Venkman, with all the womanizing and lowkey being a creep and thinking he's God's gift to mankind? It would've been the perfect choice! He's not nearly adorable or dorky enough to be Stantz or sassy enough to be Winston-"

"Jesus, you have a lot of feelings about Ghostbusters," Mason muttered, rolling his eyes when you shot him a withering glare.

"Shut up! Listen to me, there's no way in hell Maybank randomly decided to be, out of alllll the 'Busters, Egon fuckin' Spengler, okay? He had to have somehow known I was coming as Janine and did it just to piss me off!"

Your brother heaved a deep, heavy sigh that made you want to smack him and fixed you with a deadpan stare. "Or, have you pulled your head out of your own ass long enough to think that maybe you're just becoming...predictable?"

You really did smack him then, hard on his exposed shoulder and he yelped, scowling as he rubbed at the red mark you left behind. "Ow! What the hell, bitch?!"

"Don't you dare call me predictable, you dickhead! I pride myself on my costumes being very unique and unexpected -you know, out of the box!"

"Hate to break it to you but they're not really out of the box if Maybank shows up in a matching one every single year." He said with an infuriating, shit-eating grin, patting your shoulder before straightening the plush Yoda strapped to his back. "I'm gonna go get some food, wanna come with?"

Still miffed at his comment, you shoved his arm away and glanced down at your lap, ignoring your brother's sassy "your loss" as he headed toward the snack tables. Not even a minute passed by before his empty seat was taken and you groaned when you looked up to see who it was, your eyes meeting a pair of bright blues behind tacky, oversized glasses.

"Hi, Janine."

"...Egon."

The two of you sat in silence after that, watching the dancing crowd under the flashing neon lights and sparkling disco ball until you saw him turn to face you out of the corner of your eye.

"Why Janine?"

"Huh?" You turned to face him, too, one eyebrow raised in a perfect arch as he gestured toward your costume.

"Why did you dress up as Janine, Y/L/N?"

"I've always liked her sassiness and 'I like to play racquetball.'" You offered a casual shrug of your shoulders and carefully stuck a finger under your wig to scratch an annoying itch above your ear. "Why'd you pick Egon, Maybank?"

"He's my favorite." He answered simply with his own shrug, shooting you a genuine, real smile that you, for who knows what reason, found yourself returning without a second thought. "Smart, hilarious -plus, 'I like to collect spores, mold, and fungus.'"

For the first time in your life, your eyes rolled out of amusement and not annoyance at something that JJ Maybank said and, to your complete surprise, it kind of felt...right. "Really? I'd have pegged you for a Venkman stan."

"Are you kidding? He's the worst!"

Never in your wildest dreams did you ever think you'd sit across from your hated enemy, not only having a civil -hell, downright enjoyable- conversation but actually smiling right along with him, laughing at his jokes and doing your best to ignore the sudden flutter in your stomach each time you caught sight of his slightly crooked teeth when he grinned. You didn't even notice when your brother returned with Kiara, dressed as Moana, at his side and two heaping plates of snacks in his hands until his chair scraped gratingly across the hardwood floor.

"Kie, are you seeing this? Pigs must be flying 'cause they're actually smiling at each other." Mason said, cackling as Kiara turned to squint out the window.

"Yeah, I think I see one or two soaring around out there." She giggled and sent a mischievous wink in your direction. With your face feeling like it was on fire, you flipped them both the bird and took off, disappearing into the crowd and leaving all your traitorous, confusing thoughts about JJ behind with the boy himself; it was Rafe's last party at the Club and he owed you a dance anyway, but even as your best friend's older brother, cute as hell in his Thor costume, playfully twirled you around the floor to the Ghostbusters theme song, you felt more than your partner's blue eyes on you.

To no one's surprise, you and JJ won the duo category for the second year in a row and when you joined him onstage to collect your prize and didn't feel like you'd rather die than be up there by his side, you suddenly realized you were only certain about two things in life instead of three.

At seventeen, you were confident you and JJ wouldn't be matching for once (after last year, though, you were kind of thinking it wouldn't be that bad of a thing). You'd gone cult classic for your costume, pulling inspiration from your mom's favorite move, 1999's The Mummy, and put together a screen-accurate Evelyn Carnahan in her iconic black dress, including a handmade Book of the Dead and matching key. You blackmailed Mason with pictures of him, drunk as a skunk and dressed in your Janine costume from the previous year, and got him to go as Jonathan, complete with a pith helmet and prop bottle of The Glenlivet.

But, as always, JJ managed to surprise you. You literally ran right into his chest and if it wasn't for his arms instantly wrapping tight around your waist, you would've bit it hard.

"Whoa, careful there," He said, one hand keeping you close while the other moved to help you hold the book in your arms. "'The Book of the Dead? Are you sure you wanna be messing around with this thing?'"

Of course he'd make the perfect Rick O'Connell, you thought as you playfully raised one eyebrow and curled your fingers around the strap of the gun holster draped over his shoulder. "'It's just a book. No harm ever came from reading a book.'"

Mason was a little too in character as well as he dramatically rolled his eyes and wandered off, muttering "puh-lease" under his breath and shooting Sarah a conspiratorial wink that you didn't see. The blonde girl glanced between the two of you -arms still around each other and identical smiles on your faces- and grinned. The party flew by in a blur of movie quotes, laughs, and more dances than you could count and by the time you made it home, 50 bucks in the pocket of your dress and another group costume win under your belt, you were almost positive you never actually hated JJ Maybank in the first place.

Now at eighteen, you pulled out all the stops for your last party at the Island Club. You'd spent the last few months slaving over your costume, sewing custom pieces, hand-crafting your prop, and spending way too much money on body makeup and a wig but when you saw the final product in the mirror, you knew it was all worth it. You were ready to slay the competition this year and take home first place for the final time.

Mason, indifferent as always about the contest but willing to do anything to keep those pictures from seeing the light of day, didn't protest one bit when you forced him into the matching costume you'd made for him -in typical Mason fashion, he liked that he didn't have to wear a shirt and could show off his muscles- and spent a few hours perfecting his makeup.

You felt on top of the world when you walked into the party that night as Gamora, a replica of her Godslayer sword in hand and skin painted a perfect shade of green, followed by your brother as Drax, already flexing for anyone and everyone looking his way. The rest of your friends came to win as well: John B and Sarah as Flynn Rider and Rapunzel, Kiara as Eleven, Pope as T'Challa, and, of course, JJ as Peter Quill, Baby Groot perched on his shoulder and twin blasters at his hips.

"Lookin' good, Gamora!" He called over the music, shimmying his way over to you with some dance moves that would impress Star-Lord himself.

"Flattery will get you nowhere, Quill." You replied in a sing-song voice, even as you took his outstretched hand and let him pull you into the crowd of bodies hopping up and down to some terrible EDM beat under the twirling disco ball.

"It got you out here with me, didn't it?"

You rolled your eyes and hooked the sword to your belt before stepping closer and draping your arms around his neck, twirling your painted fingers in his hair. "Just remember, 'I know who you are, Peter Quill. And I'm not some starry-eyed waif here to succumb to your pelvic sorcery.'"

You should've known you spoke too soon the second you saw the spark in JJ's eyes that all but screamed 'wanna bet?'

And that's how you found yourself in the middle of the single hottest make out session you'd ever had the pleasure of participating in an hour later: back pressed against the locked door of someone's deserted office, legs wrapped tight around his waist and his hands hooked under your ass, both your sword and his blasters abandoned on the floor at his feet, and he was either a sinfully good kisser or trying really, really hard to blow your mind.

"I'm not gonna end up green after this, am I?" He mumbled against your mouth before trailing his lips along your jaw and you breathed a laugh, tightening your grip on his hair.

"This is professional makeup, dumbass. It's gonna take more than some kissing to smudge it."

"I'm down for some smudging if you are."

You pulled him back for another kiss in response and gasped into his mouth when he walked across the room, one strong arm reaching out to sweep whatever was on the desk to the floor before setting you down on it.

"Confident, are we?"

JJ smirked at your breathless question and the way you hooked your ankles around the backs of his thighs to pull him closer. "So is that a yes to the smudging?"

"Just shut up and kiss me."

He did -very well, you might add- and you kissed him back, untangling your hands from his hair to slide them under his jacket instead; you helped him push it off his shoulders and it had barely hit the ground along with poor Baby Groot before your fingers were tugging his shirt from the waistband of his pants.

"Someone's impatient." He teased, leaning back just far enough to let you pull it over his head and toss it somewhere behind you.

"Someone doesn't know how to stop talking." You whispered your reply low in his ear and then trailed your lips down his neck, smiling in satisfaction at the tremble in his voice when you kissed the purple mark you'd left behind earlier.

"N-never was very good at that."

"'You should've learned.'"

"'I don't learn, it's one of my issues.'"

One of his hands gripped your wig, pulling your head back a little roughly -you'd have so been into that if it had been your real hair he pulled- and you winced at the way the bobby pins holding it it place tugged painfully at your roots. "Ow, not so hard!"

"Wait, what the fuck? I thought you were wearing a wig!"

"I am but it's still pinned to my actual hair!"

"Sorry, but how the hell was I supposed to know that?"

The sight of JJ's face slowly turning red made the butterflies in your stomach go haywire and so you just shook your head, mumbling "don't worry about it," before pressing your lips to his once again. He was gentler this time with the pulling and you dug your nails into his bare shoulders at the thrill of his mouth against the exposed column of your throat, leaning back further and further until you laid flat on the desk.

His fingers had just unbuttoned your pants when your phone started to ring from your pocket, blaring the Star Wars theme you had set as your twin's ringtone.

"Mason's timing is impeccable," JJ said sarcastically, chuckling as you clamped a palm over his mouth and answered the call.

"What the hell do you want?"

"Jesus, no need to be pissy!" Mason loudly replied over the applause crackling through the phone's speaker. "I just thought you'd like to know that we just won best group costume with Maybank. Again."

The blond winked at the mention of his last name and pulled your hand away from his mouth, pinning it to the desk beside you with one of his while the other started tugging your pants down over your hips.

"Oh, that's cool, Mase-" You inhaled sharply when his lips touched the edge of your underwear, so close to where you wanted him most but at the same time so far away, and your fingers held your phone in a white-knuckled grip. "But I-I'm kind of in the middle of doing someone -something!- right now."

"Smooth," JJ said, not even trying to be quiet as he released your pinned hand to finish pulling your boots off, along with your tight leather pants that he casually tossed aside. "And I knew you weren't green under these!"

Your laugh quickly turned into a gasp when his fingers hooked under your panties and pulled those off, too, and the touch of his tongue against the skin of your inner thigh sent white-hot lightning racing through your veins; the phone slipped from your grip, falling with a clunk onto the desk as your fingers tangled in his hair and he lifted one of your knees over his shoulder.

"Okay, I'm hanging up now! I already know you're getting laid but I don't need to hear it." Mason's loud grumble drifted up through the speaker and if you weren't so preoccupied with the boy between your thighs doing some downright wicked things to you with his mouth, you might've noticed that your brother didn't actually sound that grumpy before he ended the call and your phone's screen went dark, right as you lost control of your voice.

"Fuck me."

"Funny, I thought that's what I was doing?" You felt more than heard his response against you and a shiver ran down your spine when his bright blue eyes flicked up to met yours in the dim light of the office.

"You know what I meant, Maybank."

"Trust me, Y/L/N, I know. Question is: where do you want me?"

You tugged on his hair, grinning wolfishly at the way his eyes fluttered closed and a low moan rose from his throat. "Everywhere in this damn room, starting right here."

"I was hoping you’d say that.”

- Back at the party, Mason looked up and met Sarah's gaze, both of her eyebrows raised expectantly as she asked, "Well?"

He took his time slipping his phone back into his pocket before giving her a quick nod, grinning triumphantly when she immediately burst into gleeful giggles.

"Yes! I just knew they had a thing for each other! Mortal enemies, my ass."

"I think that was the very first time in my sister's life that she didn't give a shit about the contest." Mason said and reached over to snag a cookie from her plate, chuckling when she pushed his hand away from the chocolate chip ones and toward the peanut butter. "We couldn't have pulled this off without you. I mean, making sure they showed up in matching costumes every year? Genius, Sarah. Absolutely genius."

The blonde girl grabbed her own cookie with a wink. "Think they'll ever figure it out?"

Your brother just threw his head back and laughed. "I hope not! I wanna save that story for my best man speech at their wedding."

taglist: @sinkbeneathwaves @cordeliascrown @maysbanks @jjpogueprincess @jiaraendgame @alexa-playafricabytoto @sexualparkour @agirlwholovescoffee

#brickswritingchallenge #outer banks #jj maybank #obx fic #jj maybank x reader #jj maybank x you #jj maybank x y/n #outer banks imagine #obx imagine #obx x reader #jj maybank imagine #jj maybank fic #obx fanfic

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simonfarnabyslegs · 3 years

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for the ask game: Julian, Captain and Humphrey! :)

julian

a song that reminds me of them: a cop out, since this one is canon. any time i hear "i'll make love to you," i think of him singing that at music club (and also mary going "i don't want him toooo" lol). i also feel like he would LOVE britney spears's music.

what they smell like: really expensive but really bad aftershave and too much cologne. also alcohol and sex. but the first thing you notice is the bad aftershave.

an otp: him and robin. there is no other acceptable pairing. i do think it would be funny if he and fanny had a thing though. or him and the captain (alison walks in on them doing something and the captain just yells "WE'RE JUST A COUPLE OF CHAPS IN THE LIBRARY" while julian isn't even trying to keep what they were just doing a secret).

a notp: uhhh him and kitty. she's the only one i would be mad about tbh.

favorite platonic/familial relationships: the way he's like a really awful, bad-influence uncle to alison.

a headcanon that is popular in the fandom but that i disagree with: i can't think of one. we all generally agree that he's a hilarious bastard man and come up with stuff accordingly.

the position they sleep in: he sleeps in the exact middle of the bed, or he starts out on one side, since he's used to sharing in life, but gradually spreads out, and if anyone else tried to sleep in the same bed as him they'd be really annoyed because he always manages to hog so much space and leave them barely hanging onto the edge.

a crossover au i'd love to see them in: very unoriginal, but i'd love to see a horrible histories stupid deaths segment with him.

my favorite outfit they've ever worn: we've seen a couple now actually, unlike some of the other ghosts. but i really do prefer the no trousers look and anything else is slightly unsettling if i'm honest.

the captain

a song that reminds me of them: i really can't think of one. the captain isn't one of my favourite characters so i don't really think a lot about him when i listen to music. sorry.

what they smell like: weirdly, i think he smells like nothing. like. unsettlingly so. you almost want him to smell like something, but he just. doesn't. he's very clean, but he doesn't even smell like soap. it's just. an empty air smell, if you can describe it as such. he smokes, too, so you'd expect a tobacco smell or a smoke smell, but even that isn't there. this man just smells like nothing.

an otp: i don't ship him with any of the other ghosts in the house. i do think him and julian hooking up exactly one (1) time could lead to multiple hilarious comedic possibilities, but i don't want them to be in a relationship.

a notp: i saw someone shipping him with fanny and just... no. that doesn't make any sense.

favorite platonic/familial relationships: i love how he's just got that Dad Instinct. he looked at kitty and alison and went "isn't anyone going to father these young ladies?" and didn't wait for an answer.

a headcanon that is popular in the fandom but that i disagree with: i don't like the patcaps ship.

the position they sleep in: series 1 cap slept board-straight in the bed, almost like he was standing at attention. series 3 cap probably sleeps curled up on his side, or on his stomach, or curled up all nice and comfy.

a crossover au i'd love to see them in: young wwi era cap in series 2 of downton abbey. i don't know if i'd like to see him turn up as a young man in the trenches or one of the patients at downton, or maybe as a medical officer like thomas barrow, in the lower ranks, helping out in the background.

my favorite outfit they've ever worn: *gestures* this?

humphrey

a song that reminds me of them: "blue caravan" by vienna teng. after all the "mr. cheese" stuff, i got to thinking about how he probably has a lot of time to imagine the different lives he could have had if circumstances had been different, and this song is about imagining the perfect supportive, caring partner, but realising that they're not real and it's just a foolish self delusion. or perhaps a lighter, more hopeful version of the same theme, "jackie and wilson" by hozier, where the narrator once again imagines a partner and an ideal life which they haven't achieved yet, but they're still holding out for.

what they smell like: okay so tudors only bathed like once every six to eight weeks or something like that. they believed baths were bad for them. not only that, wealthy tudors' diets were appalling. so unfortunately he probably doesn't smell great. (but luckily i've never had much of a sense of smell, so.....)

an otp: him and someone who actually likes him and wants to talk to him and spend time with him. so far we haven't seen that, so for now i'll keep making up random ocs to set him up with.

a notp: him and thomas, since thomas is so horrible to him.

favorite platonic/familial relationships: i'd love to see him be yet another dad to alison, or to kitty.

a headcanon that is popular in the fandom but that i disagree with: i don't like the whole humphrey and jemima thing because a lot of the stuff is either really fucking uncomfortable, or the people who write it make it weird by babying jemima. she's 11-12 years old and they treat her like she's four years old and that just feels really weird to me. obviously she's a kid and she should be treated like one, but there's also such a thing as age appropriate parenting. also i'm pretty sure jemima is meant to be one of john's kids who also died of the plague so like. acting like she's all alone and hasn't got any parents or anyone at all is so confusing to me because if she's one of john's kids, she's got like twenty parents. we just don't see her with the plague ghosts because like any kid, she probably goes off and plays away from her parents during the day. anyway.

the position they sleep in: when he was alive i feel like he would fall asleep in a normal position, on his back or on his side, but when his valet or whoever went to wake him up in the morning, he was always like, hanging off the bed or laying at a weird angle and they were always like "how the fuck did he even get like that." in death, like. his head just sleeps however it was set down or dropped. and i'm a fan of your headcanon that the body just collapses wherever it is when his head falls asleep.

a crossover au i'd love to see them in: forgive me for saying downton abbey again but i'm doing a rewatch with one of my friends. i'm gonna throw him into the edwardian era as some random gentleman cousin and he and lady edith are going to be poor, pitiful, unlucky-in-love besties who bond over all the ridiculously tragic shit that's happened to them and how they always get bullied or left out of things.

my favorite outfit they've ever worn: he technically only has one outfit (damn the bbc for putting the whole costuming budget into the georgian episode instead of the tudor one. /j), but i like the dressed down version where he's just in the white shirt and the breeches. he looks. very handsome. in that scene. ahem.

#asks #ask game #thank you! :)

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royalsunshinehotel · 3 years

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Hello space kiss anon here!! I’m thinking Saroo or Deon!!

A/N: My beloved, this took me a hot minute, I'm so sorry.

Kaboom (Deon x Reader)

July 19, 2021. Today is a big day. Not good or bad- you couldn't tell yet.

After six months of a run-and-gun anti-capitalist petty contest with the world’s first billionaire, the four of you were finally doing it.

You’re going to space. Because of crowdfunding.

Deon was the brain behind the whole thing. He

Alex was the muscle, who practically built this ship single-handed.

Rocky was the pilot, who was overqualified to be messing around with her girlfriend and her girlfriend’s “work husband”.

And you, social media expert and petty queen who put together

You all didn’t deserve a win, you needed a win.

Were you qualified? Did you have permits? No. You were someone that the three brits had recruited off instagram. You have a high school diploma, but you know how to promote things.

Six months ago, these people were strangers, and now you can’t imagine what life would look like without them.

And who knows, you were scared that they’d drop you after the launch. What did three geniuses have that they needed you for anyway?

But you couldn’t think about that.

You’d been live-tweeting the whole preparation day, trying to distract yourself with the audience interaction. That’s why you love social media. It’s just people, but like...far away.

Deon comes towards you, and you slowly go in for a hug. He’s warm and soft, and he’s always tried to make you feel included.

It’s all a haze. You do your job as best you can, but it suddenly felt as if you were on the ship. You set up your phone in the corner, basically duct taping it to a wall, but in a good enough spot where it could pick up all four of you.

It was perfect. No pieces of your hand-made vessel had fallen off yet. You had to trust the geniuses that had recruited you. It was all going to be fine.

You're fine, right? You barely made it through high school and now you’re in a homemade tin can because you hate Jeff Bezos.

Deon helps strap you into your seat, and his hand lingers on yours for a moment longer than it should have.

He pushes his glasses up his nose, before leaning his head back.

“Are you okay Dee?” You ask, and he snaps his head back up, giving you a sheepish smile. He always smiles like that when he doesn’t want to talk. A smile isn’t a good enough substitute this time.

“This is Operation Kaboom, preparing for liftoff,” declares Rocky over the intercom. SHe was literally a foot away from your seats, but it was better safe than sorry.

“Guys we’re really doing it!” squeaked Alex, kicking her feet in excitement.

“After all this time,” breathed Deon, looking over at you.

“Ten,” Rocky continued “Nine.”

“Being with you guys over these past few months has been the best I’ve felt my whole life, if we land, don’t forget about me please,” you spit out the words as if they were poisonous but you can’t die in a homemade rocket ship without telling your favorite people the truth.

A chorus of “what” rings out through the cockpit. Two sets of eyes are on you, only because Rocky couldn’t turn. You only had enough funding for a twenty minute trip to space, you couldn’t fuck up the takeoff.

“Eight”

“Why the fuck would you say that?” spits Alex

“Don’t say if, it’s WHEN we land,” adds Rocky.

“You’re all geniuses, and I’m just here.” Your eyes were welling up, and Deon felt a unique kind of distress he’d only ever felt once before. Did you really think they’d drop you? After you helped them make history?

“Seven.”

“Do you think we could have done any of this without you?” he breathed, taking off his glasses, trying to resist the urge to go sit by you.

“Yeah you kind of got all of this off the ground,” added Alex, who looked surprisingly annoyed- more than usual somehow, “Pun intended.”

“Six- please shut up.” Rocky snapped, only to be ignored.

“Like honestly, I was going to wait until-”Deon tried, running a hand over his face, as you feel like a toddler about to throw a tantrum.

“For the love of god, can you just ask her?- Five.” Rocky was about to have a fit, you knew that tone well.

“I mean if you decide it's IF we land, I want to ask you on a date when we land.” rambled Deon,as a large flower bloomed in your chest. What?

“Four.” Rocky would have thrown something if she had anything to throw.

“What would we even talk about, you’re a genius!” Maybe it was the day’s stress, or the fact that you are livestreaming the whole thing, but tears fall. The loud, hot, frustrated tears.

“I assume the same stuff we’ve been talking about this whole time!” shoots back Deon, aghast that you’re seeming to forget the dynamic the two of you had shared. You got along. Well. Regardless if he was a ‘genius’ or not.

“Three.”

“All he does is talk about you when you're not around, I mean when we land, maybe say yes,” prompted Alex, looking at the phone taped to the wall.

“For the love of god, date him so we can stop listening to him ramble about your eye color!” screamed Rocky, “Two-deon you suck, this was a bad time to ask.”

“Thanks Rocky, I know.” Deon let the horrible headache sink down to cover his body. You were going to die and reject him. He should have left you alone.

“One.” You stared at Rocky’s brunette ponytail bounce, “And we have liftoff.”

Over the next few seconds, you’re pretty sure that you’re dying, the pressure in your head felt too great to handle, but as quickly as it started, there was relief.

You want to hold Deon’s hand. He keeps his brow furrowed and his eyes closed. God.

“We’re doing it!!” Deon screams as you break the sound barrier, up above the earth.

You’d never heard Deon yell before.

There are a few moments where everything feels good. Through the window, you see earth getting far away.

It’s a beautiful thing, to say you could be above it all.

All of your pain- the pandemic, the country in a constant state of collapse, any hopes you had for a future that kept going up in smoke with every move you made.

All you had, all you cared about was in the tin can.

“Alright crew, we’re safe to get up!” Alex declares, already dropping her restraints and floating up into the air.

Deon’s face is split in half with a massive toothy grin, and the two of you stare. Your hair waves softly in the anti-gravity, and you decide to let your bonds loose and float over to him.

You’re delicate, flying above it all.

You’re an elegant wisp, even when you misjudge and hit your head on the wall above him.

No one laughs, you’re all too busy.

He takes your hand and pulls your mouth down to his. Nothing to say, but to put his mouth on yours.

You’d be lying if you said you hadn’t thought about it before. It’s better in reality. You could practically hear people commenting on the live, even if it didn’t matter now. Deon keeps his hands in yours, and you smile when you free him from his chair.

The two of you, in space, together.

The police were likely waiting down on Earth, and you were able to see #ASTROSLUTS trending on twitter already.

But everything is just fine.

Even if no one remembers this tomorrow, you still took a hit against one of the most annoying men, and you made a move on the greatest brain you’d ever met.

Today is a good day.

#deon wilson #deon x reader #chappie 2015 #chappie #dev patel #dev patel imagine

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