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foxcantswim · 5 years

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Golden Horses Part 2 ( I love you 4000 )

Post endgame - Golden Horses Part 2 ( I love you 4000 )

Stephen and Tony return to the party. Stephen already regrets being in a relationship with the man... And it's only been two minutes.

Aka, Tony wants to sing karaoke and Stephen starts to reconsider his entire life.

( IronStrange + SupremeFamily )

-x-

"No. Tony, don't." Stephen said as Morgan ate another spoonful of ice cream, her plush horse was sat upon the bar.

"You can't stop me, Stephen!" Tony said, "I am the Tony Stark... And I will sing for our country."

"Please don't." T'Challa said as he walked by.

Tony glared at him, "Our country would be proud!" he called after him.

"You're going to make our country deaf if you sing." Stephen sighed.

Morgan looked at Stephen from the bar-stool she sat upon, "Is daddy a good singer?"

"I've heard he's atrocious." Stephen admitted, "Cover your ears if you want to save your hearing." Morgan giggled at the response.

"He can't be that bad..." Peter muttered, "Right?" he looked at Tony with a glimmer of hope.

A hand was suddenly on Peter's shoulder, "Nah, kid. I bet your old man sings like a goddess."

"Wade?!" Tony exclaimed, "How long have you been here?!"

"A week."

"A week?!"

"I've just been hanging around the tower, buttercup. Your big buddy Drax has taught me how to master stealth. As if I wasn't good enough already." he paused, "Now. Has anybody seen a weird chick with big antenna and the weirdest looking eyes I've ever seen?"

Peter gulped, "Uhh... I think I saw her outside Mr Wade, sir."

"Thanks, pumpkin." he said before retreating. He quickly turned and pointed at Morgan, "Love the horse, kid. Unicorns are the best." he turned and left them, leaving Morgan with a big smile on her face.

"Who was that?" Strange asked.

"A pain in the ass." Tony replied.

"Can't be worse than you." he replied, causing Tony to glare at him.

"I like him." Morgan stated.

"You stay away from him. He has a habit of saying the wrong thing at the wrong time."

"So like you?" Peter asked.

Tony stared at him, "Again. Why is everyone on a team against me?"

"Because you want to sing and cause our ears to bleed." Stephen simply stated.

"Oh, I won't be singing alone." Tony smirked as he downed another drink. He definitely needed to be at least tipsy for this.

Stephen, Peter and even Morgan gave each other questioning looks, "And who will you be singing with?" Peter asked.

Tony winked at them before he leaned forward and kissed Morgan on the forehead.

-x-

"Humidity's rising... Barometer's getting low..."

"Sooo..." Thor paused, folding his arms, "You're dating that?" he nodded towards Tony.

Stephen had a blank expression on his face, "I think I'm going to reconsider, honestly."

Morgan tugged on Stephen's sleave, "You don't love daddy?"

The sorcerer quickly knelt down, "Trust me, Morgan. Your father may be..." he paused and looked over at him.

"...For the first time, in history! It's gonna start raining men..."

"He may be an idiot." he looked back at the girl with a smile, "But I love him, okay? I lived with him for over fourteen million realities and somehow we aren't at the stage of killing eachother yet so... that's a miracle." the girl lunged forward to put her arms around the man's neck.

"It's raining men! Hallelujah, it's raining men..."

Stephen chuckled as he picked Morgan up and put her back on the bar-stool, "Remind me again as to why Danvers agreed to this?" he motioned towards the pair singing.

"I'm gonna go out... I'm gonna let myself get... Absolutely soaking wet!"

The sorcerer tried his hardest to not crack a smile, "I'm sure the drinking had something to do with it." Thor stated, "And she's trying to impress Valkyrie." he quickly added as he swirled the remains of the drink in his glass, "I thought Stark said he wasn't drinking?"

"You know him. Never keeps a promise."

Bruce approached, "You know I'm tempted to build another gauntlet and snap my fingers just to stop this from happening..."

That caused Stephen to chuckle slightly, "Be my guest."

"God bless mother nature! She's a single woman, too!"

Another voice made Stephen, Bruce and Thor look towards the singing.

"I see the tiny man has had a few drinks, too..." Thor said.

Stephen wondered how his life had come to this, "I'm sure Hope appreciates his singing."

"...So that each and every woman! Can find the perfect guuuy!~"

"God, I love him." Stephen muttered.

"What was that, Strange?" Bruce asked.

"I said I hate Tony and I want to throw him out a window."

"Little bit over the top." Thor laughed.

"Hey, hey, hey!" a low voice shouted, "Please! You're a wizard, right?"

"Sorcerer." Stephen corrected the raccoon.

"Yeah, yeah, whatever." Rocket brushed him off before jumping onto the bar, he looked at Morgan, "Hey, kid."

Morgan smiled, "Hi, Rocket."

Rocket nodded before he looked back at Stephen, "Is there any way you can magic up something I can put in my ears to block out... Whatever is going on over there?"

"If we have to sit through it, then you do too, rabbit." Thor smiled. He soon cleared his throat and pointed over at the 'singers', "Would you look at that..."

"Oh, no..." Rocket groaned.

"Get on over here, Star Lord!" Tony shouted, very loud.

Quill had a drink high in the air as he cheered.

"This is getting ridiculous." Bruce mumbled.

A small yawn caught Stephen's attention. A warm smile appeared on the man's face, "Someone's tired."

Morgan folded her arms, "I'm not tired."

"Really?" Stephen asked as he went to pick Morgan up from the stool. She didn't resist as she grabbed onto the plush before putting her arms around the sorcerer's neck. The cloak moved from Stephen to wrap around Morgan.

"I'm sure she would be grateful if you got her away from this. Stark is... Something." Thor said.

The group had only just noticed that they had started singing a different song.

"Where have all the good men gone? And where are all the gods?"

"Get her out of here. Before it's too late to recover her sanity." Rocket said, jumping off of the bar. Strange smiled before nodding towards Bruce and Thor.

Stephen couldn't help but glance at Tony across the room. He had his arms around Carol and Scott's shoulders, Lang had his arm around Quill's. Fourteen million realities... Almost eight million people on planet Earth. And Stephen had to choose the biggest idiot ever. The biggest, smartest and most lovable idiot ever.

He'd only known Tony and Peter for just over a year and Morgan for just under. But there was nothing he wouldn't do for any of them. He'd give away the Time Stone again if he had to in order to save their lives. He wouldn't need to think twice. He would also gladly sacrifice his own life to save theirs.

"So... You and Stark, huh?" Natasha asked as he passed her.

"Don't ask."

Nat laughed as Stephen continued on towards the door. She continued to talk to Steve and Fury.

"Y! M! C! A!" Stephen wondered why they couldn't just pick a song and stick with it... He stopped walking and dared to look back, he saw Tony, Quill, Carol and Scott doing the YMCA. Or at least trying to do it. Pietro and Yondu had, for some reason, also joined in.

"Daddy looks silly." Morgan said into Stephen's ear with a giggle.

"I agree. He does." he replied, "Don't take after him, okay?"

"I promise."

"Pinky promise?" he said, despite not being able to do it physically as she had to hold on to his neck.

"Pinky promise." she nodded.

Stephen chuckled and continued to walk, "Don't pass out on me, okay?"

"Okay." she yawned again, "Will daddy come say goodnight?"

"I'll make him. Don't worry."

She nodded once again as she felt her eyes getting heavy.

As Stephen walked, he noticed a shadow cast on the ground.

He sighed before calling out, "Peter!" he looked up and saw the kid sitting on the high ceiling, "Tony won't like it if you get footprints on the ceiling... So keep doing it."

Peter laughed before shouting back down, "You got it, Doctor Strange!"

-x-

The muffled sounds of All Star rang throughout the tower. Stephen knew that Peter would be going crazy about Shrek or something. He remembered being forced to sit through the film by Peter and Morgan... And Tony.

He had seen the film exactly 72 times in past year now.

Stephen walked quickly through the hall towards Morgan's bedroom. Despite Pepper protesting the idea of Morgan having a room in the tower, Tony had somehow managed to convince her.

He pushed the door open and stepped into the dark room, the only light came from the moon and stars through the window. He allowed the child to jump from his arms before she made her way to the window to look out at the glistening city below.

Stephen raised his hands and a slight gust of wind blew throughout the room, orange dust fell from the air.

"What was that?" Morgan asked, turning around and looking at Stephen.

He put a finger to his lips, "Listen."

Morgan soon realised that she could no longer hear the music through the walls.

"Soundproof." he smiled, raising his hands a little higher, "Let me light the room up just a bit." he muttered to himself before he made the curtains close and formed a glowing solar system in the air, close to the ceiling.

The glow from the makeshift stars and planets shone in Morgan's eyes. She smiled, "Wow." a whisper...

Stephen chuckled, dropping his hands, "Now. I'm just going to get your father, okay?"

She shook her head, "I don't like being here on my own." she gave him the biggest puppy dog eyes.

His hand stilled on the doorknob before he nodded, "Okay, okay. Stand back." he said, stepping away from the door. Watching her smile, he lifted his hands up - doing the familiar action. A huge glowing portal slowly appeared in the air, the loud music quickly blared through it.

"Hit me baby one more time!"

"Oh, I'm gonna hit you if you don't come in here, Stark!" Stephen exclaimed, making Tony jump. Stephen quickly grabbed his arm and pulled him through, shutting the portal promptly.

"You trying to give me a heart attack, Strange?"

"Might be." Stephen shrugged in response.

Tony smiled as he looked towards his daughter, "Hey there, little miss." he knelt down in front of her, quickly pulling the girl into a hug which was equally returned, "Nice cape you got there."

"Cloak." the girl corrected him.

"Cloak." Tony rolled his eyes. He picked Morgan up as the cloak fell from her shoulders and returned to Stephen. Tony leaned up and pecked Stephen on the cheek before making his way towards Morgan's bed. She quickly climbed under the covers, complaining that it was cold in the tower.

"Your dad doesn't like paying heating bills. Despite being a billionaire." Stephen joked before he clicked his fingers. The room immediately became warmer.

"Why would I need to pay for heating when you can just do that?"

"You need to act like a grown up."

Tony looked back at his daughter, "Oh, do I?" he smiled.

She nodded as she held the horse close.

"What have you named it, honey?" he asked as he sat on the edge of the bed.

A small whisper, "IronStrange."

Stephen laughed under his breath.

"Peter helped me name him."

"Of course he did..." Tony paused, "It's an amazing name, sweetheart." he kissed the girl's forehead. The girl's smile soon turned into a frown, "Hey, what's wrong?" he pushed the hair away from her eyes.

"I don't like being on my own."

"We're only down the hall, darling." Tony tried to reassure her.

She simply clutched the horse in response.

Stephen came and sat next to Tony, "What if we set up a bed on the floor for Peter? I'm sure he would love to keep you company."

The girl's eyes lit up, "Will he?"

Tony agreed, "Yeah. Just don't stay up too late, okay?"

She nodded. Stephen waved his hand, a few blankets and a few pillows appeared on the floor, "There." he said, "Nice and comfy."

"Well... As comfy as you can get from sleeping on the floor." Tony laughed, diverting his gaze away from the makeshift bed back towards his daughter, "I love you tons." he said, kissing the girl's head once again.

"I love you three thousand."

"I love you three thousand and one." Tony replied, fast.

Stephen put a hand to his heart, "And what about me? I'm not loved?" he faked offense.

You are.

Tony nudged his shoulder.

"I love you four thousand." Morgan giggled.

Stephen laughed at Tony's shocked expression, "Oh, really? And what makes him so special?" Tony questioned.

"Magic." both Morgan and Stephen said.

Morgan put the horse to the side before sitting up to hug her father tightly, "I love you four thousand, too."

Tony wondered how he got so lucky.

"You too, missy." he said, putting his arms around her in return, "I love you so much." his eyes clenched shut.

Stephen smiled at the sight.

Morgan pulled back and stretched an arm over Tony towards Stephen, grabbing onto the sorcerer's arm.

Tony was confused at first, but he soon understood, "Come here, Merlin." her father said. He got the hint that Morgan wanted him to be apart of the hug, too. He put his arm around Stephen, pulling him closer.

The only thing that could make the hug better would be if Peter was there, too.

"Group hug!" a certain boy's voice came from the door as it swung open. He sat on the other side of Stephen.

After a few moments, Stephen muttered, "Did you complete your mission, spider?"

"Yes, boss. There are many footprints on the ceiling."

"I'm sorry, what?!" Tony exclaimed. Peter smiled as he jumped from the bed, landing on the blankets on the floor. He yawned and leaned his head against Morgan's bed.

Stephen quickly changed the subject, his arm tightened around Tony's shoulders, "Do you mind staying in here tonight with Morgan, Peter?"

Peter yawned again, "Sure. I can tell her a story about Mysterio!" he exclaimed. Morgan suddenly got excited. She grabbed the horse and sat on the floor next to Peter at lightning speed. The cloak quickly followed and floated on the other side of Peter.

"No scary stories okay, kid?" Tony warned as he stood up, his hand moved to grab Stephen's who stood up next to him.

"Cross my heart, dad." he assured, "No scary stories."

Stephen's free hand came up and waved in the air, making the 'solar system' glow a variety of different colours.

Tony nodded, impressed, "Wow."

-x-

As soon as the pair left Morgan's room, Tony's hands came to the back of Stephen's neck, pulling him down promptly to place a soft kiss against his lips. Stephen reciprocated, his own hands rested on the shorter man's waist.

"Why do you get to be a better dad?" Tony asked once he pulled away.

"Trust me, Anthony." he replied, "They only like my magic."

"Don't ever say that, Stephen. They love you. We all do. Magic or no magic. That's just a perk." He pulled Stephen into a hug, "We definitely danced around for too long, love."

Stephen nodded, "Definitely." he pulled back with a smile, "Now. I know you're just dying to go back and sing again."

A huge grin appeared on Tony's face, "I didn't know you could read minds, too!" he grabbed Stephen's hand and dragged him down the hall, "I'm singing Britney Spears and you can't stop me!"

Stephen wondered how he got so lucky.

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callioope · 5 years

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Rogue One Characters ~ D&D 5e Classes

My recent return to watching Critical Role inspired me to think (obsess) over what the RO characters’ classes would be. I’ve already played Jyn as a rogue, which was super fun, so I continued the mental exercise for the rest of her friends.

My recent experience with D&D is with The Sword Coast in the Forgotten Realms setting (fifth edition), so that’s going to color my thoughts here, just FYI. It also means there might be other specialty classes out there I’m not aware of.

I’d love to actually build out their characters some day and wouldn’t it be fun to find a group to play them with, but for now I’m just entertaining broader ideas. They’re listed in order of how satisfied I am with the class I settled on (I like the first three, and I think the last three are really still up in the air).

Let me know what you think -- I’d love to see other interpretations! (I can’t talk to enough people about this, really. Just ask my IRL friends who do not care.)

The Quick List (full notes below the cut)

Jyn Erso ~ Rogue, Swashbuckler Archetype

Cassian Andor ~ Rogue, Assassin Archetype

Chirrut Îmwe ~ Monk, The Way of the Open Hand

Baze Malbus ~ Ranger, Hunter

Bodhi Rook ~ Bard, Bard of the College Lore

K-2SO ~ Fighter, OR Wizard, The School of Abjuration

Jyn Erso ~ Rogue Swashbuckler Archetype

Aside from the fact that Jyn leads Rogue One, this just seems obvious to me. We think of rogues as thieves or criminals, which seems fitting for Jyn’s backstory. Rogues are cunning, sneaky, they focus on Dexterity, and are talented in a variety of skills (including Acrobatics, Athletics, Deception, Insight, Intimidation, Investigation, Perception, Performance, Persuasion, Sleight of Hand, and Stealth).

The Swashbuckler archetype (included in the Sword Coast Adventurer’s Guide) enhances the rogues melee combat abilities. She could dart away from enemies without inciting attacks of opportunity—a built-in Disengage that allows her to dual wield. Per the Sword Coast’s Adventurer’s Guide: “your method of fighting looks like a performance” (135). Does that not sound like Jyn?

Cassian Andor ~ Rogue Assassin Archetype

Cassian’s another character that sticks to the shadows, and the Assassin archetype is basically built for spies: “You focus your training on the grim art of death. Those who adhere to this archetype are diverse: hired killers, spies, bounty hunters, [...]. Stealth, poison, and disguise help you eliminate your foes with deadly efficiency” (PHP 94). Features include: Bonus Proficiencies with disguise kits and poisoner’s kits; Assassinate; Infiltration Expertise (ability to create false identities at level 9), Imposter (ability to mimic speech, writing and behavior at level 13), Death Strike.

Chirrut Îmwe ~ Monk The Way of the Open Hand

The mastery of martial arts and the connection to spirituality seems like an obvious fit for Chirrut. And the Guardians of the Whills are described as an “order of spiritual warrior-monks” on Wookieepedia. Monks study a magic energy called “ki,” what is described as “energy [that] is an element of the magic that suffuses the multiverse—specifically, the element that flows through living bodies” (PHP 76). Okay, so, it’s the Force.

The monk’s primary abilities are Dexterity and Wisdom, that sounds like Chirrut, too. For his Monastic Tradition, The Way of the Open Hand seems most fitting: “Monks of the Way of the Open Hand are the ultimate masters of martial arts combat, whether armed or unarmed. They learn techniques to push and trip their opponents, manipulate ki to heal damage to their bodies, and practice advanced meditation that can protect them from harm” (PHP 79).

Baze Malbus ~ Ranger Hunter

Baze was a little trickier. At first instinct, fighter seemed to fit, but Baze’s repeater cannon makes him more a ranged fighter than anything. Sorcerer was considered for its use of fireball, but that still didn’t seem to fit. I also considered Cleric simply because I like the idea of Baze as a healer, and a War Domain could put Baze in combat.

After much discussion, I’m currently entertaining the idea of Baze as a Ranger; per the D&D 5e PHP, a ranger is “A warrior who uses martial prowess and nature magic to combat threats on the edges of civilization” (45). Baze’s backstory as a Guardian of the Whill kind of fits that martial prowess, and his leaving the order could have possibly put him on the edge of civilization. Favored Enemy = Imperials, of course, and his Fighting Style could go to Archery for his prowess with ranged weapons.

Of all the ranger archetypes, Hunter then seems to fit the best: “As you walk the Hunter’s path, you learn specialized techniques for fighting the threats you face, from rampaging ogres and hordes of orcs to towering giants and terrifying dragons” (PHP 93). That could be Baze.

Bodhi Rook ~ Bard Bard of the College Lore

I’m not sure who gave me more difficulty, Bodhi or K-2SO. In canon, Bodhi begins the story as an Imperial pilot, and I’m not sure how that could translate to a D&D setting. A coach driver for some kind of villain who defects? Not sure.

In looking at his role in the story, though, it’s his message that inspires the entirety of it. In reading about Bards of the College Lore, I stumbled across this, “When the applause dies down, the audience members might find themselves questioning everything they held to be true, from their faith in the priesthood of the local temple to their loyalty to the king [...] they can expose corruption” (PHP 54).

Bards prefer to stay out of combat, something I see in Bodhi, too, although they’re capable if needed.

So maybe it’s a little bit of a stretch, but I can’t see anything else fitting him.

K-2SO ~ Wizard The School of Abjuration

K-2 presents two difficulties, since there are no droids in D&D. (Although I think I played in an Eberron campaign once that effectively had steampunk type constructs? That was a long time ago, I forget.) I know some people like to make K-2 a pet in modern AUs but this is a particular turn-off for me; he’s a sentient, not a pet. Anyways I suppose those who disagree might find a way to have him as a familiar or animal companion to Cassian, but I personally wouldn’t go that route.

So first, races to consider for K-2SO: goliath, merely for the height; dragonborns are also tall, and he could have silver/metallic scales; and then tieflings are generally outcasts, which kind of fits how droids are treated in the GFFA.

The first thought for K-2 was fighter, which I think does work. A friend suggested gunslinger a la Percy from Critical Role, since K-2 really wants a blaster (seems a stretch to me although I found it amusing). I see K-2 as naturally having a high intelligence ability score, and that screamed Wizard to me. That might seem kind of random, but it’d give the party an AoE spellcaster, which they’re missing, and I also see K-2 as seeing to odd jobs here and there (which actually might even suggest rogue, again?).

IF I went Wizard (which I’m by no means set on), I’d chose The School of Abjuration since it seems to focus on protection, which seems apropos for a character whose initial purpose is security.

But I’m probably overthinking this, he should probably just be a fighter.

What are your thoughts? I’m sure there are better ideas out there, especially for those last three!

Other Notes: 1. Given their religious bent and strict adherence to a moral code, I’d put Jedi as Paladins.

2. I also prepped “Leia Huttslayer” as a noble bard, for the same campaign I built Jyn for. I’ve idly considered Luke as a paladin, and maybe Han as a rogue?

#rogue one #jyn erso #cassian andor #chirrut imwe #baze malbus #bodhi rook #k2so #rogue one DND AU #dungeons and dragons #how i spent my sunday #whoops #sorry not sorry #LOOK I KNOW there are probably better ideas out there #this is basically just a summary of what's been going through my head the past week

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sonicrevival · 5 years

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Reunions: Chapter 3 of 4: Regicide

Quite large one today.

Read on Ao3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18573268/chapters/44028367

Sonic: Revival- Reunions

Chapter 3 of 4: Regicide Morning in Mobotropolis, and a small figure walked the streets, heading nearer to the palace as she pushed through the crowds. None of them paid her any mind, but if they looked closer, they might’ve spotted the faint glow in her blue eyes, or the similarly-bright gemstone in her forehead, mostly covered by her messy ginger hair. Emerl grumbled slightly. Sneaking wasn’t remotely her style, and part of her wanted to be caught so that she could run back and chant “I told you so” at her new friends, in regards to sending her on a mission that didn’t involve fighting… and yet, she remained undetected. She supposed that it wasn’t much of a surprise. Nicole’s holograms and nanite form were both incredibly lifelike. Even she had been fooled when they first met. Of course her new nanite skin was helping… Even if she had no idea what to do with the tail. She just wished that it hadn’t been her that had to do it. *** One hour ago… With the two teams reassembled, and all parties caught up on each other’s conditions, Sally had stressed the need to find where Naugus was first. “Fortunately, we have a team who are experienced with stealth and espionage,” She looked over at Harvey. “Well… we kinda fought Naugus, so now he’s going to be on the lookout for us,” Silver sighed. “We could try disguises, but that won’t hide our energy…” “And we’re not exactly in a position to go in, either…” Sonic grumbled. “I may have a solution…” Nicole spoke up, before gesturing to Emerl. “Me? I don’t think I can help unless you want me to beat his location out of someone…” She recoiled, holding up her hands. “All you need to do is a little scouting. Naugus won’t recognise you because he’s never met you,” Nicole explained. “Still a robot.” “Ah, but I can hide that for you… I can’t do much with the nanites at the moment, but I can form a sort of ‘skin’ with them that will make you look like a Mobian, like this…” Nicole’s eyes flashed green, and nanites swarmed around Emerl’s body. Despite her misgivings, she trusted the lynx, and allowed her to work. Once it was finished, Nicole waved her hand, the wall beside Emerl shifting into a reflective surface. The Nanite skin looked startlingly real. Staring back at Emerl was a small feline girl, with sandy-yellow fur, covered in black spots, with a short tail growing from her backside. Her lower legs and feet were almost completely black, and she had a mop of ginger hair on her head. “Huh… that… looks really lifelike… weird,” She mused. “What am I?” “A black-footed cat,” Nicole replied with a slight smirk. “I thought it was appropriate.” “Alright then… I guess this’ll work.” *** Truth be told, the Gizoid didn’t quite have the heart to tell the lynx ‘No’. Especially after she called her new form ‘cute’. Now that had confused her. She wanted to snap back that she, as a powerful and dangerous robot, was in no way, shape, or form ‘cute’... but she didn’t. Not even when she let out a soft laugh as Emerl’s new face contorted in response. This would require further study, she decided. For now, she had her mission to focus on. Drawing near to the palace, she spotted the figure of a skunk walking down the steps, carrying a staff tipped with a Chaos Emerald. All of that fit the description of Geoffrey St. John, Naugus’ apprentice, and apparently a turncoat. What didn’t match was the enormous energy spike she felt as soon as she locked onto him. Ducking into an alleyway, she made sure her surroundings were clear, then leapt onto the rooftop, brushing the hair away from her forehead to take a deeper scan. The energy levels were off the scale, compared to the profile Nicole had given her. “Hey, Nicole, you seeing these measurements?” She opened a communication link to her friend. “Yes, I can... I’m showing Sally now…” “Alright…” She nodded, keeping her focus on the skunk. “Hey, is red a natural eye colour for skunks now?” “I… no. And Geoffrey’s eyes aren’t red.” “Well, I’m looking at him right now, and those are definitely red…” She retorted. Nicole went quiet for a minute, before speaking up again, sounding alarmed. “Emerl, get to the Council chamber. That’s not Geoffrey, that’s Naugus!” “Uh, isn’t Naugus bigger and uglier than that?” “It’s Geoffrey’s body, Naugus is possessing him, but don’t worry, Sally has a plan already working. Just get the Council building, I’ll explain on the way.” “Right,” She nodded, vanishing in a burst of blue. *** Emerl lingered in the crowd outside the Council building, fingers gripping the heavy weight in her hands. Sir Charles had passed it to her when she arrived, and she had quickly hid herself in the throng of bodies. Apparently, ‘Geoffrey’ was due to make some kind of announcement, supposedly on Naugus’ behalf, explaining the large gathering of people. If all went smoothly, that announcement wouldn’t be made at all. She listened to the voices of her friends echoing inside her head- Silver’s team inside the Council chamber itself, protecting the city’s leaders. The main Freedom Fighter team, just below the street with Nicole ready to bring them up to the surface, and their secret weapon, lingering on the roof of the building itself, ready to make his appearance, all confirming that they were ready to move. The skunk’s approach drew mixed reactions from the crowd. Nicole had explained that, while Geoffrey was Naugus’ right-hand man, and thus received plenty of support from the wizard’s more ardent backers, to others, he was still considered a traitor after he was found guilty of betraying Elias and the Acorns. “Alright...” Sally’s voice cut through the chatter, the rest of the teams going quiet. “Phase one, go.” As Naugus began to climb the steps, a thin blue shape dropped from the roof of the building, crashing down in front of him. The stonework cracked beneath its weight, the possessed skunk leaping backwards as it rose. Several people in the crowd screamed, and began to run, as Metal Sonic rose to its feet, lunging at Geoffrey’s body. Emerl wasn’t sure what to make of this mechanical Sonic, compared to the last one she fought. Not as strong, by all appearances, but significantly faster. It shot forward with speed greater than Sonic’s own, punching Geoffrey’s face. The force of the first blow sent the skunk reeling, skidding across the ground in a heap. The staff slipped from his fingers, as the robot stalked toward him, its right hand restructuring into a drill. “Emerl, now!” Emerl grinned, racing out of the crowd with her cargo in-hand, lifting it over her head and gently throwing it toward the skunk as she called out to him. “Geoffrey, catch!” Instinctively, his hands snapped up, snatching at the blur of gold and steel. His eyes widened as he looked down at the pristine form of the Sword of Light. The empowered weapon let out a brilliant flash, and Geoffrey screamed in two voices as black fog poured from his mouth and nose. His body slumped to the ground, fingers still gripping the hilt, as the fog pooled nearby, Naugus’ hideous mutated form emerging from it, skin wrinkled and dark, lips pulled back to expose his teeth, barbs growing from his clawed hand, horn curving to a sharper point. Hurriedly, he snatched up his staff, glaring at both Geoffrey and Emerl herself, before noticing the civilians that hadn’t fled. Before he could open his mouth, however, Geoffrey rose and swung the sword at him. Naugus hissed in pain as the blade nicked his left hand. “Monster!” The skunk roared, wincing as the blade continued to glow, smoke rising from where his hands gripped the hilt. “It burns you too, my foolish apprentice!” The wizard fired back, black lightning blasting from his Emerald, knocking the skunk off of his feet. He lost his grip on the Sword of Light, which clattered to the ground nearby. “Alright, Phase Two, let’s move!” Sally’s voice cut in, as the ground nearby began to ripple. “Shard, how are you holding up?” “Not great, unfortunately,” ‘Metal Sonic’ spoke up, optics lighting up in green. “I’m almost out of power. Going to fall back.” “We’ll take it from here,” Emerl smiled over at him. Shard nodded, nanites flowing away from his body to expose his normal, if battered, body, and he fired his engines, launching away from the plaza. As Naugus prepared to strike the prone Geoffrey, Emerl broke into a run, launching herself at the two mages. Curling into a tight ball, she slammed herself into Naugus’ gut, knocking the air from his lungs and forcing him back. Unrolling, she slammed her fist into his face, breaking several of his fangs and sending him sprawling across the ground, before grabbing Geoffrey and launching herself back to the steps, just as the rest of the Freedom Fighters, with the exception of Sally, emerged from below the city. “Oh gods, what’s wrong with his face!?” Sonic yelled, as Naugus rose to his feet, glaring at the assembled team. “His… his body is decaying. Whatever that white flash that Eggman’s machine made was, it’s destabilised him, and he’s starting to de-fuse…” Geoffrey explained weakly. “Gross,” Amy winced. “Couldn’t have said it better myself,” Tails nodded. “Well, doesn’t matter what he looks like. We’re still gonna take him down!” Sonic lowered himself, preparing to launch. “Don’t be so sure, Quickster…” Naugus rasped, leaning on his staff. “I’m not sure why you have returned from your excursion to find the former Princess, but you still need me… and I am still the King… call off your new friend, and I might not have you all arrested for treason…” “Oh, come off it, Naugus. We all know what you’re up to,” Bunnie groaned, preparing her arm cannon. “Doesn’t matter how many people you brainwash into electing you, yer still gonna lose in the end!” “Is that so?” His mouth split into a rictus grin as he raised his staff, black magic exploding out from it. For a moment, all of the organic Freedom Fighters felt something dark trying to worm into their minds, before a flicker of green light shielded them, Nicole’s eyes glowing brightly as she strained against the magic, forming a protective bubble around the team. The last dregs of the crowd weren’t so lucky, as their eyes turned black, and they began to lurch toward the Freedom Fighters, reaching out as they shambled forward. “Oh no!” “Not good!” “Dagnabbit, of course he did this…” “It would seem that I still have the support of the people!” Naugus cackled. “Although you are managing to resist, it will not be long before I break the computer’s shields and you too come to recognise my legitimacy! In fact, why not hurry the process along...” He pointed his staff at Nicole, only for Emerl to crash into it, grabbing hold of it and trying to wrench it from his grip. Yet, despite her strength, he managed to hold tight, power arcing along the shaft as both tried to wrench it free from the other. “Leave her alone!” Emerl growled, as her fingers closed around the Chaos Emerald itself. She felt its power flowing into her, felt the two stones already within her chest pulling it toward her. For a moment, her mind began to race again, another flash of the city, and she staggered, head swimming. That was all Naugus needed. The mad chimera wrenched his staff upward, dragging her with it, before she lost her grip and he flung her into the air. At the same moment, he unleashed the bolt of crystallising magic he had been aiming for Nicole, and it caught the Gizoid’s chest, propelling her into the Council building and entombing her within a chunk of green glass. “Emerl!” Nicole called out, but she received no response. Immediately, she remembered Bunnie’s comment in her Uncle’s office, about not wanting to share the fate of Titan Metal Sonic, and she thought back to the destruction of her own nanites at Naugus’ hand. “Emerl, please…” Nothing. “Nicole…” Sonic ventured, eyes fixed on a child, no older than Cream, scraping his hand blankly against their shield bubble. “You gotta stay focused, she’s gonna be-” Nicole looked up at Naugus, growling with barely contained rage, fists clenching. Green fire flooded her eyes, as she floated off the ground. “Are you going to attack me, Nicole?” Naugus jeered, spreading his arms, almost as if he were inviting her to strike. “You know that I will simply destroy any nanites you use against me, and leave your friends at the mercy of both my spell and my people!” “Nicole, listen to me-” Sally’s voice again, but this time, the lynx didn’t respond. The shield flickered and dropped, but before Naugus or his enslaved minions could capitalise in any way, all of them were thrown from their feet by a shockwave of unseen force, hurled backwards. As the civilians landed, the ground beneath them melted, first giving them a soft landing, then reducing to the consistency of mud as they tried to stand, causing them to sink until their legs were trapped, preventing them from moving. She thrust her hand forward, a tremor shaking through the plaza before the ground split open beneath Naugus’ feet, tendrils reaching up from within to drag him down. He recoiled, thrusting his staff down to shatter them as his cape expanded into a pair of huge wings, carrying him out of the gap. Snarling, she reached out for his mind, feeling the presence of four separate voices, all occupying his head, all in conflict. The destabilisation that Geoffrey mentioned.Zeroing in on the strongest voice, she struck, firing psionic lance directly into it. Everything he had taken from her, the people she protected, her friends, her home, and now Emerl, she packed it into her attack, forcing him to feel every last day of it, from the entire three month period, in an instant. Naugus screamed. The glow from the Emerald faded, and his spell died. Those that he had already enslaved remained in his control, but the Freedom Fighters stood firm, all free, as Nicole’s arms sagged and she sank to the floor. “I have the zombies trapped… tear him apart.” “It’s gonna be okay, Nicole. Promise.” Sonic placed a hand on her shoulder, before surging forward, as the rest of the team followed. “Our turn!” Still steadying himself, Naugus had no chance of avoiding the blasts from Bunnie and Rotor’s cannons, staggering him. He raised his staff to fire upon them, but was stopped short when Amy’s hammer slammed into his foot, then his gut, sending him reeling. Tails clubbed the back of his head with his namesakes, as Sonic crashed into his chest, bouncing away to loop around and strike his back. Growling, Naugus melted into his own shadow, reappearing behind them and taking to the air. Immediately, Tails caught up to him, lashing his namesakes at the wizard’s wings. Rather than slice through, however, he bounced off of the magic field flowing through them, recovering just in time to avoid a swipe from Naugus’ claw. Any attempt on the mutant’s part to press the attack ended in another hail of cannon fire, forcing him to wheel away from Bunnie and Rotor’s attacks. He raised his staff, taking aim at them once again, only to feel something wrap around his ankles- a coil of nanites, rising up from the ground to drag him back down toward it. Switching focus, he lowered his weapon instead, preparing to destroy the tendril, just as a second one enveloped it, and a third engulfed his claw. With a howl of rage, Naugus let out a blast of black fire, turning all three to glass. Shattering all three, he glared down at Nicole, the lynx having fallen to her knees, wracked pain from the damage to her city. “You have become a thorn in my side, computer. A once useful pawn, but no longer worth anything… so die…” He hissed, preparing to attack her once more. Below him, Bunnie circled slowly, Sonic hanging onto her arm as she lined up with the chimera. Spotting her chance, she drew her arm back, as Sonic flipped himself over to perch on the palm of her hand. “Ready, sugah?” She asked, flashing him a smirk. “Oh yeah!” He grinned back. Bunnie thrust her arm forward, extending it as she did so, and launching Sonic with all of her strength. At the same time, Sonic sprang away from her, accelerating himself even faster, the recoil from his jump forcing Bunnie back slightly. Sonic’s spinning form tore through the membrane of Naugus’ left wing, not slowing for a second as he uncurled and reached out to grab Tails’ arm. Letting the momentum shift him, Tails went into a tight spin and hurled Sonic back down, straight through the other wing. Just as Rotor caught Sonic, Naugus went into freefall. Spotting his shadow growing larger on the ground, he prepared to melt into it, body turning into black ichor as he fell. Before he could properly shadowmeld, however, the ground itself shifted, and suddenly a brilliant emerald light shone out of it, removing the shadow entirely, stinging Naugus’ dissolving form, and leaving him with nowhere to left softly. He thudded heavily against the ground, rising just in time for Amy to slam her hammer into his forehead, snapping his horn off at the base. “AWAY WITH YOU!” Naugus roared, a shockwave exploding from his staff that knocked all of them down, agony spiking through their bodies. Purple energy seethed within his eyes and the Emerald, his body bulking up. “You cannot take what is rightfully mine away from me!” Dark lightning sparked around his weapon as he held it up, clouds gathering overhead, flashes of the same electricity rippling within them. When the first bolt crashed down, it slammed against the shield dome, arcing out over it for a moment, before both the charge and the dome faded. Before he could call a second shock, however, the crystal stuck to the wall of the Council Building cracked, and then exploded outwards. Emerl clawed her way out of the remainder of the prison, body wreathed in blue fire, nanites sloughing away from her to expose her true form. “Emerl!” Nicole’s face lit up. “Oh, thank the Source…” “Everyone, move!” The Gizoid growled, as her chestplate split open, exposing the raging core within. The Freedom Fighters scattered, and she opened fire, the beam exploding out from within her. Gritting his fangs, Naugus responded in kind, a colossal blast of purple storming up to meet Emerl’s head-on. Both were pushed back by the force of the impact, Naugus’ boots scraping against the ground, sinking into the nanites slightly, while Emerl felt herself pressed against the wall of the building behind her. Bracing herself with her arms, she planted her feet against the wall. Panels on either side of her legs opened, metal rods extending from within to punch into the building, anchoring her in place. At the same time, Naugus felt his boots sinking further into the ground, and realised that he couldn’t move. He glared at Nicole for a moment, before focusing on Emerl once more, and, with a roar of fury, channelled more power into his attack. Slowly, Emerl felt her beam being pushed back toward her, spotting Naugus’ face splitting into a hideous grin. Straining against the force, she dug deep, trying to find more fuel for her fire. A little more rage, a little more fury, anything that could make her burn brighter. Then she spotted Sonic reaching for the fallen sword, and noticed Naugus’ feet sinking into the ground. She glanced down at Nicole, feeling her power surging up again. Something to fight for, and a shot at winning- that was all she needed. Chaos exploded from within her, driving Naugus’ attack back, much closer to him than before. She swelled as she watched his smile die, giving way to a pained grimace- Using that much power while literally coming apart at the seams couldn’t be comfortable, she mused. Then, Naugus let out a shocked gasp, followed by a roar of pain, as Sonic surged past him, slicing into his back with the glowing blade of the Sword of Light. For a moment, he whirled to face the hedgehog, blinded by hatred, then paused as he realised two very crucial facts. Firstly, the searing wound inflicted by the Sword of Light had caused him to lose focus on his clash with the robot. Secondly, he was currently not paying attention to said robot. Almost resigned, he turned back forward, just in time to see the oncoming ray of Chaos fill his vision. His arms raised to shield his face- Not that it was really worth shielding, Emerl decided, and the blast consumed his form, ravaging his body as it ripped him up from the ground and drove him back into it, cutting a furrow through the pavement, until finally the storm of untamed energy finally died down, leaving him embedded in a long crater, the Freedom Fighters slowly gathering around his unmoving body. Emerl peeled herself away from the wall, extracting her legs before dropping to the ground beside Nicole, landing on her knee with a crunch. “Sorry about the damage, Nicole,” She rubbed the back of her head sheepishly. “I was just trying to put him down for good.” “It’s alright…” She smiled back at her. “I already partially disconnected myself from the nanites when I realised the direction that this battle was going in. Didn’t feel a thing.” “Well, that’s good to know,” Emerl shrugged. “You alright?” “You scared me there…” She admitted, looking away. “I couldn’t feel you or hear you or anything. I thought you were dead.” “I couldn’t hear you either, the crystal must’ve blocked our signals out…” She murmured. “I’m glad you’re okay, though.” “I’m glad you’re unhurt too… Just, please don’t scare me like that again,” The lynx looked up at her. Emerl did her best to convey a smile with her eyes, and nodded. “Promise?” “Promise. Now, let’s go see how much damage I did to that ugly jerkwad!” She pointed over at the crevice her beam had dug into the city itself. Nicole laughed, and the two made their way over. The rest of the Freedom Fighters had approached the crater already, where the mad wizard lay, crumpled and still. “Is he dead?” Bunnie asked. “Nah… he’s breathing… Still, while we’re here.” Sonic planted the Sword of Light in the ground, and jumped into the pit, sliding down the ledge. He snatched up the fallen staff, turning it over for a moment before snapping it in half over his knee. It splintered with another flash of purple and black sparks, causing Sonic to leap back and drop both halves. At the same time, the black aura faded from the eyes of the remaining crowd, and they stumbled, most of them collapsing as they rubbed their heads. “W-what happened?” One of them asked, blinking rapidly. Freeing the crowd wasn’t the only effect of breaking the staff, however. Naugus’ eyes snapped open, hands flying to his chest and forehead, clutching at them as he writhed in place. “No… no no no… I can’t… you can’t take this from me…” He hissed, his claw snapping out to close around the fallen Chaos Emerald, plucking it from the ruined staff, pulling it close to his chest. “You’re not exactly in a position to bargain here, Horn-Head,” Sonic shrugged. “We’ve still got the Sword of Light, and you’re not looking so great after that attack. I mean, relatively. I don’t think you’ve ever looked great.” “Oh, but that’s where you’re wrong, Quickster…” Naugus allowed himself a chuckle, a horrible rasping sound, looking up at the blue hedgehog with a twisted grin. “You need me.” “Oh, really?” He asked, raising an eyebrow as he barely managed to keep his smile under control, leaning down a little. “How d’you figure?” “My power is the only thing that can save your precious Princess from her terrible, terrible fate!” He cackled, trying to stand. His leg gave out, and he slumped to his knee, laughter turning to a fit of coughs and splutters. “Your rabbit comrade has seen fit to reject my gift, but Robotnik’s cruel treatment of Miss Acorn requires my special touch. Kill me, imprison me, find any other way to punish me for my crimes… but it will cost you any chance of seeing her restored to normal!” “Is that so?” Naugus froze, as Sonic’s smile grew to truly smug proportions, as the ground split enough for Sally to walk up the flight of steps that Nicole had provided her with, drawing level with her friends, folding her arms as she looked down at him “No, impossible… he… how did you…?” “I had some very good doctors,” Sally replied. For a moment, Naugus stared up at her, jaw hanging open. He barely moved as Sonic sprang back out of the furrow to stand beside her. Then, his face contorted in rage, gritting his fangs, claw tightening around the Emerald. Purple fire ignited within his eyes, flooding out and engulfing his body. His hand slammed against the floor, rearing back up as his muscles swelled, his height growing massively. His wings, horn, and missing teeth regenerated, the former stretching outward to truly enormous lengths. He stood tall, form still silhouetted in the violent purple aura, the Chaos Emerald floating above his head. “All the time I spent scheming, waiting, kowtowing to your idiotic council, and you wretched fools try to take it from me… I will not allow that… you will die for your insolence!” Naugus’ aimed his claw down, lightning exploding out from it. The team scattered, Sonic grabbing Sally and leaping away. “How the heck is he doing that!?” Bunnie yelped, stabilising herself in the air. “It must be one of his new powers!” Tails called back. “That’s right, that form is mostly made of shadows…” Emerl added. “Nicole, give us a light from the floor, and make it big!” Sally commanded, standing up from Sonic’s arms. The lynx nodded, pressing her hands to the floor, beginning to morph the nanites into light-emitting forms once again. Spotting the change, Naugus’ wings opened, lifting him off the ground. As he went, black fog poured from his mouth, hugging the ground. The fog spread out from the landing point, blotting out the light before it could even touch him. Bunnie, Rotor, and Emerl all opened fire on Naugus’ form, but their shots failed to even flinch him. Naugus slammed himself back to the ground, a shock of dark power exploding from his claw toward the team, tearing up the nanite stonework as it went. As they scattered once again, Naugus grinned, releasing a violent burst of power from his torso, throwing all of them to the ground. “I want you to feel my agony… I want you all to feel what it’s like to be torn into three…” He rasped, fingers snapping. In that same moment, purple tendrils speared out from his feet, stabbing into the fallen Freedom Fighters’ foreheads. All of them fell to the ground, reeling in an indescribable pain, except for Nicole and Emerl. “Sally!” Nicole rushed to her best friend’s side, grabbing her hand, but the squirrel didn’t seem to notice the lynx’s presence. “Of course, you two do not feel pain, do you? Not in a way that my magic can trigger… but that does not mean I cannot destroy you…” “I beat you once already… I can do it again!” Emerl stood firm, wreathed in blue. “And if we work together, you don’t stand anything resembling a chance!” “Is that so…” “You bet it is!” She slammed her fist into her palm, rolling out her neck. “Come on, Nicole, let’s finish this!” “Right, right…” Nicole stood up, jumping into Emerl’s storage slot once more. “I admire your confidence… but can you stop me and save them?” Naugus jeered, raising his claw. He pointed at the remnants of the crowd, lightning surging from between the two pincers. “No!” Emerl yelled. In a flash, she was gone, reappearing in the path of the bolt. Thrusting her hands forward, a square barrier of jade light formed in front of her, catching it dead-on. Electricity spread out over the shield, forcing the Gizoid to brace against it. Glancing over her shoulder at the throng of terrified faces, staring up at her, she formed a second barrier as her first shattered, the lightning forcing its way through to the new shield. “You all need to run! Get outta here!” The few that hadn’t already started trying to disperse began to flee, but the size of the crowd was so large that progress was slow, hindered further by the news vans parked nearby, who had initially been there to cover another meeting, and now found themselves getting the scoop on the battle between Naugus and the returning Freedom Fighters. Across the plaza, Naugus chuckled to himself as he watched the two struggle against his new power. As the second shield came up, he diverted his attention to the Freedom Fighters, still wracked with pain at his feet. “Now… which of you shall I kill first?” To his surprise, Sonic stood up, shattering the tendril holding him with a ripple of green. The hedgehog rose slowly, breathing heavily as he glared up at the wizard. His eyes flickered to his fallen comrades, and for a moment, Naugus swore he saw a glimmer of red in them. “Ah, a volunteer.” He grinned, raising his free hand, power flowing between his fingers. Then Sonic vanished, a gale blasting in Naugus’ face. The wizard stumbled back, steadying himself with his wings, looking over his shoulder in time to see Sonic racing for the Sword of Light. Despite his initial burst of speed, the hedgehog was noticeably slower now, his injuries evidently taking their toll. Bolts of dark lightning slammed down from the sky, striking at him as he ran, drawn toward the faster target, even as Naugus spread his wings and lunged after him, more long leap than flight. But even with his body aching and sore from the battle, Sonic dodged, sidestepped, and evaded every bolt. For all his newfound power, the Sword of Light still presented an enormous threat to Naugus. Letting Sonic get to it meant game over, regardless of how strong he was able to make himself with his magic. His armour of shadows would give him no defence against the light. He reached out with his hand, stirring up the darkness coating the ruined floor. Wisps of black magic stirred up, reaching out for Sonic, trying to bind his legs, to trip him up, or pull him down into the dirt. Sonic stumbled for a moment, then leapt upwards, allowing his momentum to carry him forward, over the reach of the shadowy tendrils. That would cost him. Naugus grinned, thrusting his claw out, purple electricity surging out from it. With no traction in the air, there was nothing the blue hedgehog could do to dodge it. The bolt struck home, shocking him for a moment before he fell to the ground, scraping to a halt just shy of the blade. As Naugus loomed over him, Sonic growled, gritting his teeth as he reached out for the sword, but it lay just outside of his reach. The chimera’s claw closed sharply around his body, the serrations on the inside biting into his skin as he was hoisted into the air, face to face with him. “After all this, Quickster… do you have any last words?” Naugus jeered, pointing one sparking finger at Sonic’s head. “What, other than ‘You really need a breathmint’? Just the one…” Sonic spat, grinning back at him. “You really, really shouldn’t have lost focus.” As Naugus opened his mouth to ask what Sonic meant, he felt it. The power of the Chaos Emerald had vanished. Immediately, the spell brewing at his fingertip evaporated, the purple aura faded, and the cloak of shadows melted away to nothing, exposing his body, even more hideously mutated than before. “Missing something?” A mocking voice called behind him, and a glance over his shoulder only confirmed what he had already worked out: Emerl hovered there, throwing and catching the purple Chaos Emerald. Seizing his chance, Sonic forced the distracted wizard’s claw apart, perching on it for a second before slamming himself into his face. Stunned, and with his power finally ebbing away, Naugus stumbled, tipping back into the now-darkness-free ground. Sonic caught Emerl’s free hand, as she lowered them both back to the floor, watching the mutant mage shrink down to his normal size. Lying on the cobblestone plaza, Naugus’ broken horn, teeth, and wings had returned, staring up at Emerl in a state of shock, eyes wide, jaw hanging open. Nicole projected herself out of Emerl as they landed, leaving the slot and merging herself with the city once more. Sonic dropped to the floor, sitting down for a moment as he took several deep breaths. Then Naugus shifted, and all three were back on alert. The wizard rolled over, righting himself as he reached out toward Emerl, weakly grasping for the Chaos Emerald. Emerl stepped back, keeping it from his reach for a moment, before her chestplate opened and the gemstone evaporated, flowing inside her core. She reeled back for a moment, optics turning purple as a matching aura ignited around her, but after a moment, she straightened, and the blue glow returned to her eyes. “Sorry, but that’s mine now,” She folded her arms. Naugus screamed in four voices. Sonic, Emerl, and Nicole all jumped back as the chimera rocked back on his knees, a dark crack forming across his forehead. Black energy floated out of it, as another crack appeared, then another, and then another. More and more cracks formed across his body, splitting wider and wider apart, until his form shattered, still screaming, into a chaotic spiral of magic and chaos, trying to force itself back together into one shape, then into three, then into one again, one mind fighting for control against three others, the former trying to hold their combined form together, the latter desperately trying to tear in apart. For a moment, Naugus’ silhouette was visible once more, the next, three distinct shapes, one with large wings and ears, one multi-limbed with clawed hands, and one with a large horn, clawing in an attempt to go their separate ways. “I guess this is what Geoff meant by de-stabilising…” Sonic mumbled. “What do we do?” Emerl asked, looking between her two more experienced friends. Just as Nicole opened her mouth to speak, a glowing blade tore through the centre of the magical aberration in front of them. The four voices- Naugus and his three components- screamed in agony for a long moment, before a brilliant flash of light tore them asunder, extinguishing their power in a violent conflagration of energy. As the glow faded, the Sword of Light fell to the ground, and Geoffrey St. John slumped down beside it, his right hand badly burnt. “Geoff!?” “I… I suppose you’ll all be wanting some answers, then?” The skunk wheezed, shifting to a sitting position. “I can explain everything.”

#Sonic #Sonic the Hedgehog #Sonic: Revival #Miles 'Tails' Prower #Princess Sally Acorn #Bunnie Rabbot #Rotor Walrus #Nicole the Lynx #Emerl #Emerl the Gizoid #Amy Rose #Geoffrey St. John #Ixis Naugus

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kleeboy · 5 years

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okay im deleting and reposting this because i put a swear word in the tags and it wasnt even showing up in searches for my personal, and i don’t trust the mobile editor to fix my problems but its time 4 me to make a post

Here's what I’ve got for a Thunderbirds D&D AU! I'm not gonna get into numbers and stats and levels because I do that enough when I play normal d&d and I'm gay and tired. Also, there’s probably gonna be a touch of rule bending not only to reconcile d&d with the Thunderbirds canon but just to boost the fun factor a bit. It’s not like we’re setting up a playable campaign so it doesn’t really matter as long as we’re not making it unrecognisable as part of the d&dverse. At that point, you might as well just call it a fantasy AU (still lit tho lmao). This is mostly TOS based but I’ll add some notes on TAG stuff now and then in italics because I’m here to provide. It’s hefty, so everything's under the cut. Hopefully comprehensible.

IR (presumably going by some other name but we’ll just stick with that for sake of ease) is still a rescue organisation - it operates on a somewhat smaller scale but access to magic means it’s got a pretty big reach for typical d&d technology. It’s centred around an ancient deity that few people have heard of and even fewer worship. There’s only one known temple dedicated to said deity and it had been abandoned for a long time before they found it, so it’s currently being restored - if rather agonizingly slowly. Anyway, IR is deity-based because nothing screams “fight for a cause” like paladins! They’re paladins, mostly, is what I’m saying.

Jeff is likely an ex-adventurer, probably a paladin but I’m seriously considering cleric just for interest’s sake so sue me, I love clerics. His party did some pretty cool stuff back in the day, and adventuring pays well as long as you don’t die, so he’s pretty well off. He left the party and settled down in one place when Scott was born, and the rest of them presumably disbanded and went about their own lives eventually. Or maybe they’re still out there causing a ruckus. Who knows. Pretty easy to just say “and he’s not there anymore” for TAG, rationalise his disappearance as you please. Either way, at some point he decided to start an organisation that would make saving lives a bit more structured than the usual “Let's hope a squad of adventurers stumbles on our predicament” that people have been relying on.

Scott is a Battle Master archetype fighter who multiclassed into paladin. Battle Master provides the most appropriate mechanics for a field leader, and also seems like the sort of thing Scott would have been doing previous to IR. He’s the least proficient spellcaster of the group if only by virtue of his class, but access to paladin magic gives his fighting an extra kick which, along with the Battle Master maneuvers, makes him pretty damn dangerous with a sword. It also means he can cast Find Steed, and because said steed’s form can go beyond normal when permitted by the DM and we’re making the rules here I’m giving him a pegasus, which is about the fastest flying mount you could get as far as the monster manual goes. A roc would just be too much. Very VERY cool. But too much.

Virgil is a College of Lore bard into paladin. When it comes to support classes, nothing beats a College of Lore bard for versatility. He’s got the range, darling. Slap an arsenal of magic items on that and you’re well on your way to the d&d equivalent of Thunderbird 2. He has some good offensive spells and weapon training but mostly works to keep others from getting hurt. With a high constitution, the Tough feat, good armour and a shield he pretty much becomes a mobile wall to be put between danger and anyone who can’t take too many hits. Find Steed again lets me give him something interesting to ride, and what better than an owlbear. A big one. Not quite as appropriate stat-wise as the pegasus for Scott but when it comes to aesthetics I’m yet to find something as good as a bear-shaped and -sized owl.

John is predominantly a Divination wizard, with a low paladin level - two maximum - giving him access to a lot of powerful magic but leaving him, how do you say, squishy. Divination is gameplay-wise pretty underwhelming, with not many spells to its name, but for someone whose job is centred around keeping an eye on things, the ability to see very far away and receive premonitions is gonna be useful. The system by which distress calls are sent is giving me some concept trouble but when it comes to receiving it’s as easy as a focus with some capability to project images and sound, gear already necessary to cast Scrying. So, as in canon, rather than going out on missions (at least for the most part), it’s John’s job to keep tabs on incoming signals and active operations. This is all based in the previously mentioned temple - out of the way enough to let me call it a T5 equivalent. He also has the secondary job of making sure nothing else tries to take up residence in the decrepit building. They had to clear it of goblins the first time. As far as Eos goes I don’t have room for all my thoughts (so many) but let’s call her a sentient magic item. Additionally, TAG John probs gets a level or two in cleric.

Gordon is a paladin into druid, Circle of the Land (Coast). He and Alan didn't have any previous class levels before becoming paladins. Neither of his classes give any bonuses for it beyond proficiency for paladins but nobody can stop me from making his primary weapon a longbow, plus the Sharpshooter feat is helpful. Coast druid is the only subclass of any d&d class that has a specific focus on water and what could go wrong if we let him turn into animals? It also has some good circle spells, when he gets to that point. He’d probably have a lot of fun with Mirror Image. There was probably an incident that catalysed his becoming a druid, I'd like to think it's the equivalent of the boat crash just placed on a different point in the timeline. Might get into it at a later date.

Alan is just pure paladin, it's all he's really had time to do with his life so far beyond being a kid and growing up, y'know? I’ll get a little into the subclass here, all of IR’s 3rd level or higher paladins take Oath of Devotion. From the PHB: “These paladins meet the ideal of the knight in shining armor, acting with honor in pursuit of justice and the greater good.” Devotion’s core tenets are honesty, courage, compassion, honor, and duty. Also their Channel Divinity: Sacred Weapon is just really cool. Who doesn’t like glowing stuff, man. Alan's got some more powerful paladin abilities than any of his brothers but probably has the lowest total level regardless. Giving him the Athlete feat, which lets him jump and climb a lot easier, feels appropriate. He snuck a griffon home when it was a baby, and is trying to train it. It's not very well behaved and causes a ruckus when it gets bored but he adores it. One day it��ll make a phenomenal companion. For now, it will continue to attempt to eat his fingers.

Brains is an artificer! Love that class. Artificers, rather than casting spells (though they can do that), make magic items. The artificer class is from Unearthed Arcana and a lot of the mechanics can be hit or miss, it’s been revised many times by lots of different people. But when it comes to the basic idea, it’s the obvious choice for Brains. The less common a magic item, the longer it takes and harder it is to make. The higher level an artificer the more, and more powerful, their creations are. Pretty simple. Also pretty much every version of artificer you come across has some sort of option for a mechanical companion so there’s MAX for you.

Tin-Tin is also an artificer, with a few levels in paladin for good measure. Her time is split between making and repairing gear and going out on missions, and when on call is incredibly useful for lightning fixes and is incredibly creative when it comes to the ways magic items (and nonmagic items) can be used to get out of predicaments. This is the character who constantly has Inspiration. Kayo is an Assassin archetype rogue into paladin. Assassins do… a lot of damage. If you know much about d&d rules (I don’t expect you to), the only thing scarier than a bard, stat wise, is a rogue. +10 to stealth is pretty easy to get by 5th level, combine that with Sneak Attack and Assassinate and you can deal up to 26 damage in one hit with a dagger alone. I said I wouldn’t do any maths but I lied.

Penny doesn’t necessarily have any class levels, though rogue would be appropriate. She falls more under the NPC umbrella, somewhere between Noble and Spy, perhaps? NPCs have a lot less restrictions when it comes to what they can and can’t do laterally, but it’s harder to make them powerful without assigning a class. I also think it’d be really neat to use the fantasy setting to make her nonhuman. High elf would be fitting and cool, but she’d also make a fantastic tiefling. Though, like, call me biased, everyone would make a fantastic tiefling.

I think that’s all I’ve got to say on the matter right now. I have a lot more specific details that I’ll get to eventually but this post is more of a jumping off point listing some options for anyone else who might want to mess around with a d&d AU but doesn’t know where to start. Pick out things you like, ditch things you don’t, add whatever sounds cool, and honestly? Congratulations on getting through this whole thing. This post is kind of in shambles. And thanks! I love taking any excuse to pore over these books.

Shoot me an ask or something if anything’s too incomprehensible or there’s something up with the formatting. Later, skaters.

#thunderbirds #thunderbirds are go #dungeons and dragons #long post #kleeboy talk #no commentary in here because last time i said the f word and got put in the naughty corner

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critical-ramblings · 5 years

Text

Mind’s Eye (3/n)

(Also on AO3!)

(Catch up on chapters 1 and 2)

Beau paced out around the edges of the mostly empty warehouse, listening intently for armored footsteps, for muttered spells or explosions. But all was silent through the wooden walls, dark at the cracks she could peek through. She hated feeling this useless.

When she came back to the group, she tapped her staff a few times against the ground. Out of nerves, maybe, or just so nobody (Nott) got twitchy fingers. Caduceus had conjured a little light into his staff’s crystal, making a tiny radius of yellow in the black of the building.

“I have an idea,” Beau said abruptly, standing just inside that radius. “It’s probably not a good idea, but...I figure it’s the only one we’ve got.” She waited a moment for someone to contradict her, to jump in with an actual plan. When no one did, she took a deep breath and went on, “We could make it to the Cobalt Soul. There’s got to be one in the city, and I’m still part of the order. Technically. I’m pretty sure we could ask for sanctuary. The monks are surprisingly sneaky sons of bitches, they’ll be able to stop us being scryed on. I think.”

“You think?” Fjord gritted his teeth. “Shit.”

“I know, I know. But what do you want from me, man? Either they’re going to find us through magic or the old-fashioned way. We’re not exactly stealthy.”

“I think we stealthed pretty good getting here.” Jester sounded a little affronted. “Can’t we just cast disguise on ourselves and hide Caleb in a bag or something?”

“Remember how we put the dodeca in the haversack to keep people from scrying on it?” Nott piped, but when Jester perked up she continued, “We should absolutely not do that with Caleb.” “Why not?” Jester asked, peering into the depths of her violently pink bag.

“For one thing, we put dead things and severed heads and shit in there,” Nott looked in with her, poking dubiously at the contents. “For another, I don’t think he would fit.”

“But we do have that bag of holding.” Jester sat up and made a grabbing motion at Fjord. “He would fit in there.” Fjord took a reluctant half step towards her, saying, “Jester, I don’t think you’re supposed to put living things in there...”

“Lets. Not test it now,” Beau said, though Jester sat back with a disappointed sigh. “What about the Cobalt Soul thing? For, against?”

“Well, we know that they don’t like the wizard-people,” Jester said slowly, looking around at the others.

“I think we can get there,” Yasha said. She was watching Beau the whole time, something uncomfortably like faith in her shadowed eyes.

“You know where it is?” Fjord asked, and Beau made a face.

“I’ve never been to Rexxentrum before. The only one who has is...” she trailed off, and everyone turned to look at Caleb. “But it’ll be in the temple district.” Beau continued, rallying. “I’ll know it when I see it.”

Fjord muttered a few curse words, but didn’t say anything constructive. Jester tapped her feet together nervously, watching him. Nott, still with her crossbow out, bared her teeth and said, “I don’t really care where we go, back to the inn or to the library, but let’s get moving. I don’t like being in one place.”

“Me neither.” Yasha stood and, moving Nott gently aside, hoisted Caleb over her shoulder in a fireman’s carry. She turned to look at Beau again and gestured towards the door. “Lead the way, I guess.”

With that extremely dubious endorsement, Beau slung her staff over her shoulder and crept out into the unfamiliar night. The rest of the Nein followed behind her, except for Nott, who moved to flank around their right.

Mostly the city was quiet, which was both good and bad. It meant the Crownsguard and the Righteous Brand weren’t after them in full force. Good thing. It also meant that the Scourgers–and by extension, the Assembly–were still operating under the assumption that they could kill the Mighty Nein quickly and sweep everything under the rug. Bad thing. Very bad thing.

The closest call they had was when a cloaked figure swooped overhead and hovered above the crossroads for a moment. Beau and the others ducked down into the nearest alley, but if they’d been spotted...

The figure turned a few times in the air, long enough that Fjord started to edge up to offer a distraction. Just as they flitted away. Everyone breathed a sigh of relief, and they went on.

They were on the streets a lot longer than Beau would have liked, more than an hour. But eventually they coasted up to the side entrance of the large, stocky building with two great banners of the Cobalt Soul at the front. The temple/library/archive/hopeful safehouse was blocky, just a big square of wood and stone amidst the splendor of the other temples. Even at night Bahamut’s sanctuary gave off a mirrored sheen in the light of the fires outside the Allhammer’s. During the day the streets would be thronged with faithful, priests, and Crownsguard. Now everything was eerily empty, and the knock Beau gave the door seemed to echo impossibly loud. For a long moment, no one answered, and then just as she was bracing herself to knock again, the door opened a crack.

A sleepy eye peered out at her, the shaved head of an acolyte maybe ten years younger than she was. “Can. Can I help you?” the girl said, stifling a yawn in the middle.

“Hey, hi,” Beau shifted, working hard not to lean on the door or get uncomfortably close to the door guard. “What’s your name?”

“Cleo.” The little monk wannabe was starting to perk up and look around at the motley crew gathered behind Beau, who smiled tightly.

“Cleo? That’s a nice name. I’m Beau, I work here. Well, not here here, but I’m part of the Cobalt Soul, and–”

“You don’t look like one of the Cobalt Soul,” Cleo said, and Beau paused. Looked down at the loose, comfortable clothes she’d bought in Rosohna.

“Uhh. Right. I’m...listen, kid, I’m an Expositor, I have some really important information about the war. The whole she-bang. So if you could just–” There was a rushing sound from overhead, and Beau broke off to look for wizard assassins. Everyone in the party ducked instinctively, making themselves smaller against the unforgiving wall of the library. When Beau looked back, Cleo was watching them with both eyes narrowed. This one might be too smart for her own good.

“I don’t know if I believe you,” Cleo said, but before Beau could answer she continued, “But I can get someone who’ll know for sure. Stay here.” And she slammed the door shut. Locked it, too.

“Shit.” Beau pulled out her staff and put her back up against the wood, one eye still on the sky. “We don’t exactly have time to wait around,” Fjord started, and then there was another rush of air and they all fell silent. She hadn’t spotted anything about them, but the temples were tall. It was possible the Scourgers had landed elsewhere and were headed here now. Hells, they might be invisible for all she knew.

“Maybe if we just hide inside...” she said, and suddenly Nott was at her elbow, lock picks at the ready. The goblin girl grinned up at her before focusing in on the door itself.

“Got it!” she said after just a second, and the heavy wooden door swung open soundlessly. Inside was a small foyer, empty except for a stool next to the door and a pile of books. There were three hallways that led deeper into the library, but Beau wasn’t anxious to push their welcome more than they already had, and she stayed put. The Nein did take up most of the little room, though, especially after Yasha’d set Caleb out on the ground so she could put both hands on her greatsword.

Not long after they’d closed and locked the door behind them, Beau picked up the pitter patter of anxious feet from the hallway to their left. Cleo emerged with an older monk, a light-skinned human with piercing brown eyes and a few wrinkles around her face, exaggerated by her scowl. “What is this, who are you?” the monk demanded, standing in the archway with one hand on Cleo’s shoulder. “How dare you break into the Reserve!”

“It wasn’t really breaking and entering–” Beau started.

Fjord broke in to add, “I apologize, ma’am, no harm was intended. We are simply facing pursuit of a very disruptive nature, and wished to avoid unnecessary damages.”

“Pursuit?” the matron looked like she was about to have a heart attack. But only if she could kick them out first. “Do you know Dairon?” Beau asked, a little desperately. “Elf lady, bald, about yea tall?”

The monk caught her breath for the first time since she’d appeared–stopped to think. “I know Dairon,” she said at last. “What about her?”

“She sent us. Me. Sort of–it’s a long story. But I’m training under her to be an Expositor, and we really need a place to stay.” Out of the corner of her eye, Beau saw Fjord give her a thumbs up.

“If you are truly what you say, you know that I have ways of verifying your story.”

“I do.”

“And you would submit to such questioning, given where your story stands?”

“I would.”

The monk looked faintly surprised, by Beau’s quick answer, or her agreement, or maybe both. But she took up a fighting stance after a moment, quirked her fingers in a ‘come hither’ gesture.

Beau took a deep breath as she stepped forward, bracing herself against a flinch. This was going to hurt.

The old lady hit her in the throat and the gut, one-two, and Beau felt the wash of unfamiliar qi sink into her body. It stayed heavy in her throat, like a wash of mint and ice. She had to fight for a moment to get her breath back, to work through the freezing sensation in her lungs. Only when she was sure she could talk without her voice cracking did she look back at the monk and nod.

The lady nodded back, slowly. Behind her, Cleo was staring at all of them with wide, fascinated eyes. “What is your name?”

“Beauregard Lionett.” Beau tilted her chin up to say it, a defensive tic she couldn’t quite swallow down here. “Although you might as well leave that last name out of it.”

“What is your purpose here, Beauregard?”

“We’re here seeking shelter, that’s all. From an enemy this group has in common with the Cobalt Soul–the Cerberus Assembly.”

The monk raised one pale eyebrow, like she doubted that last point, but Beau could still feel the freezing taste of truth on her breath. She wasn’t lying, though it was technically possible that the Assembly was more of a Dairon/Expositor problem than a widely known Cobalt Soul one.

“Very well. Are you, Beauregard, a member of the Cobalt Soul?”

“Yes.” This, at least, she could answer with confidence. “Like I told the kid, I’m an...Expositor.” That one took a little effort to get out, her throat trying to close up solid with ice. She hadn’t ever officially ‘graduated’ from being Dairon’s apprentice, but what the hell. If the last few months didn’t qualify her to be a full-blown Expositor, then nothing did.

Again with the doubtful eyebrow raise. The monk went on with her questions as if the title meant nothing to her. “And what is your relationship with Dairon?”

“Uh. Complicated?” That clearly wasn’t going to fly. Beau gritted her teeth and went on, choosing her words very carefully. “I was Dairon’s apprentice in Zadash, briefly. Until she got sent away to Bladegarden. She and I worked...in Xhorhas to gather information about the Krynn.” Beau tried to say that they’d worked together in Xhorhas, but the ice closed up and wouldn’t allow it. She and Dairon hadn’t–quite–been working at cross-purposes in the East, but they sure has hell hadn’t been working together on anything. Not until much later.

“You’ve been to Xhorhas?” Cleo butted in, and Beau grinned at her before the matron could push her back.

“Yeah, to Roshona itself. Pretty cool town, I thought.”

“Enough of this. I want you to swear that you will bring no harm to this library, or it’s keepers. That whatever your mission in Rexxentrum, you will keep the reputation of the Cobalt Soul clean.”

Beau had to glance back at the others before she answered that one. They’d already been hugely compromised by the Scourgers, and obviously everything else had to wait until after Caleb woke up. After that happened, they wouldn’t need to hide here anymore. They’d just have to keep a low profile while they were here. Lower than usual, anyway.

“I swear,” she said, looking back at the monk, who nodded again. A few seconds later the icy feeling faded from Beau’s throat and lungs, and she allowed herself a few gasps of warm air.

“Very well.” The matron was still frowning, but she didn’t seem like she was going to keel over or kick them out any second. “We have a few rooms available–”

“Is there someplace hidden?” Caduceus asked suddenly, from the back. He’d been leaning against the door a little, but at his height he was still easily visible. “Someplace that can’t be looked into from a distance, say?”

The monk’s scowl deepened, but she did nod after a moment. “We have a room like that. Follow me. Cleo, get a lantern and some food for our. Guests.” She led them down the central hallway, through a darkened corner and into the main library.

Even without the lights, the space was beautiful. Dark wood shelves stood in ten feet high rows along the floor, and two floors of open balconies above them were also backed with shelves. Smaller study rooms and nooks branched out from both the ground floor and the balconies, and the ceiling was covered in stars. Beau found herself craning her neck, trying to decide if the stars were actually glowing or if they were just that brightly painted. She stopped after she almost ran into one of the bookcases, and followed the monk to a small, inconspicious door under a staircase.

“This is meant to house the more dangerous tomes in our collection,” the old lady said, unlocking the door with a key from her ring. “Until such books make their way into our possession, or we deem it necessary for any of our current charges, it is empty. You’ll be hidden here, both magically and from more mundane searches.”

“Thank you,” Beau said, reaching out to grab the monk’s wrist as she stepped away from the door. “Thank you.”

The monk shook her off, but her frown had mostly gone, and she inclined her head in a very small bow. “It is my duty to help members of our order however I can,” she said, then added, “But if you have brought the Assembly down on us I will throw you to the wolves.”

“Better hope you keep us hidden then,” Beau said, her mouth dry. The lady smiled crookedly and gave the key to her.

“I will send Cleo with meals for you tomorrow as well. Open the door only for her, and you should be fine.”

“Will do.”

#cr #critical role #mind's eye #the mighty nein #cobalt soul

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batgirl-87 · 5 years

Note

For the newer ask game: 7, 8, 9, 10, 26! :)

Thank you for asking! =)

Omg these are all good questions that made me really think - you’re putting me to work! =p Which also means this got long, sorry… But I think I should be writing this game’s storyline now after thinking about Olivia Green… =p Also would love to hear other’s opinions on Olivia as well because I am super curious about her!

Talk About Your MC and Jacob Asks

7. What memory or thought does MC/Jacob use when conjuring a patronus? What form does it take?

Jacob, being older has a better memory of their mom and time spent together with her than Keira. So memories like them building a fort in the living room in front of the fire to curl up in to listen to a story their mom would read to them on a rainy day or the time their mom unleashed some of her fiery Irish temper on another parent of some kids who were teasing him and his sister for being “freaks” since they’re part Undine, while their parents did nothing but confirm that yes they were freaks so stay away from them, are memories he holds dear. Their mom went off, partially in French - that family had no idea what was happening but knew they pissed off the wrong person! It was awesome!

Memories with his ‘adopted’ parents are great too, he’s learned a lot from them and appreciates all they’ve done. He loved all the Quidditch practice and support, hiking in the woods and learning more about nature and Native traditions, but while those memories are fond to him I think memories of his birth mom would make for the strongest patronus.

I have debated a lot about Jacob’s patronus (buffalo, bear, elk - trying to stay away from stag!) and while I thought I settled on buffalo now I’m thinking bear… Whether it’s a buffalo or brown bear both are big, strong, calm, grounded, and fiercely protective of their families.”The bear is indicative of someone with a great reserve of patience and inner strength. They are confident, stable people that others may gravitate to in trying times for stability and healing. Though their quiet nature and tendency to spend time away from the crowd can lead to others thinking they are stern or anti-social, bears are often friendly and curious, and can surprise even those that know them best with something they didn’t think of. Brown bears are known to be the “warriors” of the bear archetype, standing their ground and facing danger to protect others or do what they believe is right, not backing down no matter the danger.” ; “Few possess just the right strength of character for their patronus to take the form of a buffalo. Those that do are dedicated individuals who are fiercely protective of those close to them, and not in a general way, either. Anyone foolish enough to attempt to harm another under a buffalo’s care is unlikely to come out unscathed. They are fighters, and it’s not uncommon for a buffalo to have their own personal code or way of acting to which normal morality simply doesn’t apply, which can be dangerous even for the buffalo.”

Unfortunately, Keira being the youngest and having her mom pass when she was about five years old means she doesn’t have as many vivid memories about her like Jacob does. But she does have a lot of memories of her brother Jacob, always being there for her especially after their mom passes, getting into random shenanigans together; and a lot of Quidditch related ones as well like watching his practices or games, accompanying their ‘adopted’ dad on jobs working with Quidditch players, making friends with other players. While it may be a memory about hanging with friends, Quidditch, or spending time with their ‘adopted’ parents Jacob is a constant presence in all her happiest memories. As she gets older I think some memories with her “Uncle Remus” would also be very meaningful to her and help her produce a patronus. And when they both get older I think the memory of winning the World Cup would be a great memory for both Jacob and Keira.

Keira’s patronus is an arctic fox, although it could change as she grows up and has new experiences. (I was also under the impression that typically one’s animagus form was their patronus, or original one since a patronus can change?) “Cunning, stealth, persistence. The arctic fox is infinitely adaptable, living its life in one of the world’s most extreme climates. Arctic fox people tend to be sly, graceful, and have a near magic ability to make something out of nothing, utilizing even the most limited of resources. Arctic fox as a totem can teach us the ability to go with the flow of life, changing ourselves to suit our ever-evolving environments. They adapt to whatever comes their way. They are light on their feet, and very persistent. They are known to do the best with what they have and even in the hardest of times, they don’t give up. But they can also betray you in an instant. Most arctic fox people are known to be cunning even when they don’t mean it and they can lie and con their way out of everything. They do whatever it takes to survive, even if they have to do something they don’t agree with.But nevertheless they are great people to have around if you’re in a jam and need help with something.”

*Spoiler* For the side quest I have yet to see, and therefore obviously do, I’m pretty sure her patronus is going to be some form of a cat because I don’t think a rabbit or horse suits her and her animagus is a cat - I’m not sure what the cat options are exactly but I’m pretty positive I’m choosing the cat option and then we’ll see what type of cat is for her.

8. Would MC/Jacob use legilimency on anyone, anytime, or only when absolutely necessary? Does this change over time? Do they ever become as powerful as Snape/Dumbledore/Queenie (wandless and nonverbal)?

Why do I feel like my Jacob would legit forget about his legilimency ability and then randomly be reminded of it be like “Oh yeah!” =p

I think for both Jacob and Keira they would resort to using legilimency only when necessary, however, I think Keira is more liberal about using it than Jacob but that could be because he forgets about it =p

I believe at first Keira doesn’t want to use it at all when she first finds out at Hogwarts but I think the more difficult and dangerous the hunt for these Vaults and dealing with the Cabal is going to get she’s going to get some more practice with it and realize she needs to use it and it’s a beneficial and useful ability to have. Then when she becomes a Curse-Breaker and is dealing with dark wizards and witches and mercenaries she’ll find again that this ability proves to be very useful. And the more dangerous jobs she takes on the more she may rely on it and use it. Whereas for a professional Quidditch player legilimency isn’t really needed as much so… hence Jacob forgetting about it =p

But neither of them would use it on anyone at any time unless they’re doing some fun party trick or something =p But they wouldn’t take advantage of it and misuse it or use it just because they’re bored or something.

I am a big fan of nonverbal and wandless magic, personally =p So I think, even if they don’t plan on using it all the time both would work towards improving their skills so they could do it at least nonverbally. I think Keira would work harder to be able to do it nonverbally and wandlessly while Jacob would be find if he couldn’t do it nonverbally and wandless, hopefully at least one if possible, but he has to admit being able to do so without a wand and nonverbally would be cool and could prove useful sometimes (especially if the Cabal ever finds him or something because now he’s become paranoid about that) so he’d probably work on it but wouldn’t mind taking longer and be more lax about it than his sister. They’re bother hard working and determined people but his sister his more intense than him =p

But Keira works hard to be able to cast any magic she can nonverbally and/or wandless so this wouldn’t be anything special compared to other spells and abilities. She wants to be a badass and feared opponent!

9. Would MC/Jacob fight at the battle of Hogwarts or go into hiding/avoid the conflict? Would they survive?

Not only does Keira fight at the Battle of Hogwarts but she saves Remus, Tonks, and Fred (and Sirius beforehand) - FIGHT ME!

I cannot allow them to die - CANNOT DO IT! Can’t save everyone BUT SHE WILL SAVE THEM EVEN IF SHE DIES DOING SO!

Here’s what I’m thinking =p While visiting her beloved relative Tonks who is now a badass Auror, and getting a tour of the Ministry she maybe pockets a time-turner thinking ‘this is cool and can come in handy some time’ or she gets one from another country’s ministry or during her own adventures as a Curse-Breaker or doing some other jobs… (for another time =p) Point is, she’s getting her hands on some sort of time-turner because she thinks it could come in handy some time - right?! Who wouldn’t think that?

And then after what happens to Sirius in the Battle of the Department of Mysteries gives her a good reason to use it and she goes back to save him from getting killed by Bellatrix (after he punches Lucius of course because that moment is iconic =p) And then during the Battle of Hogwarts clearly she’s going to use it again to save Remus, Tonks, and Fred after they are found to have been killed during it. And she definitely goes through a whole reflection moment of all the ‘what ifs’ and consequences she may have to deal with if she does this - ‘Well what if it’s their time and doing this messes things up and someone else has to die to balance it out? Go back and try and save them too? But if it really is their time to go then me attempting to save them won’t make a difference and they’ll still die some other way because it’s just their time, right? And I have to accept that. But it really feels like it’s not their time….And if by saving them some dark wizard and witches end up living as well instead of dying we can just arrest them later or deal with that later because a couple of them living isn’t going to make that much of a difference (at least not to Keira) And highly doubt by saving them somehow that means Voldemort won’t be defeated, don’t see how that’s related…. And if I need to go back in time a few different times to get things right I will! And if I have to die in order to keep them alive and safe, fine.’ - there’s a whole lot she thinks about but ultimately she’s doing this. She’ll deal with the consequences as long as they are saved.

But can she do it alone? Well guess it’s good she saved Sirius, right because he is probably the only one who knows about her time-turner and what she did to save him so they together go back in time to save Remus, Tonks, and Fred - you think Sirius is going to let Remus die?! Hahahaha no!

Honestly, Remus is the driving force behind all of this. Keira loves Remus possibly more than anyone else and he deserves to be happy! He finally gets reunited with his best friend who was wrongfully imprisoned and has a bit of happiness back where he doesn’t feel so alone and is relieved that Sirius isn’t this horrible people everyone tried to make him out to be AND THEN HE DIES?! NOPE! (Plus Keira loves Sirius too and she doesn’t want him to die! He just got out of prison, again, after being wrongfully put in there, he doesn’t deserve to just die like that!) Remus finally finds someone who loves and accepts him beyond his Marauders who wants to marry him, they have a child, again he’s happy and not alone AND THEN THEY DIE AND LEAVE THEIR SON!? UMMMM NO! No no no no no, not happening. Remus is not going to die and leave her, Tonks isn’t going to die and leave him, and they’re going to be awesome, amazing parents and Remus deserves to have a happy life DAMNIT!

And then there’s Fred who has nothing really to do with Remus but… come on, she’s not going to be okay with Fred dying who’s like her own little brother - she had an instant connection to the Twins! And the Weasley family is one of the most warm, welcoming, caring family in the whole wizarding world AND twins being separated like this when they have such a close and special connection - No, she could not live with herself if she knew she could save Fred somehow and not do it. None of the Weasley’s deserve to lose Fred and he doesn’t deserve to die. If one has to die it can be Percy =p JUST KIDDING!

Anyway, that’s my brief explanation of how Keira saves Sirius, Remus, Tonks, and Fred while also still sort of having it canon because they do die and then she just goes back in time and saves them =p Also I don’t care if it’s not canon because I refuse to accept their deaths and no one will ever make me and no one can make me feel bad about creating a way to save them. I know this wasn’t exactly the question so…

Yes, Keira and Jacob will fight in the Battle of Hogwarts. Both are fiercely protective of those close to them and have a strong sense of justice. And if Keira is going to fight to try and keep her friends and family safe then Jacob of course is going to be there to try and keep her safe! Plus they both like action and some danger. (Jacob is very much a typical Gryffindor in the sense that he’ll leap into action without really thinking about it or worrying about his safety and Keira… she sort of accepted her fate back when she was in Hogwarts that she wasn’t going to live to see graduation and then when she did every day after that is like a bonus day she didn’t think she’d get so she’s like ‘I already lived longer than I thought I would’ so she can be reckless. Plus they love being in the action and the thrill of battle! They like the adrenaline rush and may have too much fun with it =p Why she’s a Curse-Breaker and takes on other dangerous jobs and he plays Quidditch)

I feel like Keira would be there from the beginning while Jacob would show up later, sort of like Charlie, liking to make a dramatic entrance like taking out some dark wizard before they attacked his sister who would be like “so nice of you to show up!” (they’re Black’s, they like to make dramatic entrances and exits, okay?!)

10. What happened to Olivia Green? Is she an evil agent of R or as she wrongfully manipulated like Jacob?

What did happen to Olivia Green!?!? Isn’t that the question of the century….

So I am Year 5 Ch 14 I think, so I don’t know if there’s been any more information on Olivia Green than the little we know which is she worked with Duncan and Jacob on these Vaults and was a Gryffindor… right? Well if there is more please let me know because that’s pretty much all I know. But I will say, and I don’t know what it is, but learning about Olivia Green made me instantly suspicious and feel like she’s the evil one behind all of this despite having no evidence of that!

Either, I feel, she’s sort of like the Peter Pettigrew of this story and betrayed Jacob and Duncan (or would have if he hadn’t died) to gain power and position in the Cabal and/or whatever is in the last Vault or she would have/tried to but the Cabal ultimately still chose Jacob over her and now she’s seeking revenge on his little sibling and using them to get to the last Vault before the Cabal to sort of show them they chose the wrong person (like I’ve said, I like the idea for my Jacob to have joined the Cabal as a sort of undercover mission), or she is a hermit somewhere living traumatized by everything they endured with the Vaults. (Idk why I like this idea of MC finding out she’s alive and living in some little cottage in the outskirts of Hogsmeade or something and they go to visit her and when they mention the Vaults it causes her to go off on MC and warn them to stay away and just triggers her, bringing her back to all this trauma she faced when she and Jacob and Duncan looked for the Vaults). But as fun as that idea is I for some reason instantly got an evil vibe from the mere mention of Olivia. Maybe I’m just looking for another candidate for R who isn’t Rakepick or Rowan? It’s freaking Peter isn’t it?! (If it’s Peter you all owe me $5 because I’ve been saying this! =p)

Anyways, I know nothing about Olivia but for some reason I don’t think she’s easily manipulated - maybe because I feel like my own MC is better at manipulating than being manipulated and I’m here for to smart, powerful witches to go at it, like two mini Rakepick’s or something =p And even if R is some male leader of the Cabal (is this considered a spoiler based on some things I’ve heard of/seen?…) and she could be some right hand like Bellatrix Lestrange - I’m sorry, but we all know Bellatrix Lestrange is way scarier and more powerful than Voldemort, at least I believe so and she’s the real one that should be feared than no nose. So I think even if Olivia is this sort of Bellatrix Lestrange she’s going to be more powerful and scarier to deal with. She’s probably just using the Cabal to get what she wants! Again, I probably just want some badass woman villain who is not Rakepick so I’m making Olivia that. Maybe I’m also over the kids vs adult thing too and while Olivia is older than MC they’re both still relatively young and it’s not like MC would be fighting against someone 15+ years older than them. But again she could be some traumatized hermit living in the woods!

Maybe she is R and like Voldemort rearranged the letters in her name to give her a new one that starts with R (from Green)? Maybe she’s the reason Jacob and Duncan got involved with the Vaults in the first place and she’s the puppet master pulling all the strings here! Or maybe she’s a traumatized hermit in the woods who is devastated and heartbroken over the loss of her two best friends, maybe more than friends, who died and joined the Cabal or went missing or whatever… But I’d prefer Olivia to be the evil R or at least evil than Rowan because I am not here for a betrayal of a close friend - Please don’t make Rowan the Peter! I’ll be so disappointed (but not surprised because it’s a common trope, right? But still disappointed… Honestly, if any friend was to betray MC I still think Tulip is the most likely candidate.)

So I’m open to either of those options but I’m clearly hoping for a badass woman villain and an epic showdown between her and MC personally… Whether she’s a Peter, Bellatrix, or Voldemort type or a mix. I can easily see the puppet master behind all of this being a smart, manipulative woman using others and playing them to get what she wants and then easily getting rid of them once they’ve played their role and she no longer has a use for them. Give me a cold-hearted badass villain please! =p

Ooooo maybe she’s acting like some poor, traumatized, heartbroken witch in the woods but it’s all an act and she’s just trying to manipulate MC some more! Give me a reveal from her homely, tattered shawl she flings off to some cool, black armour or something! I SHOULD BE WRITING THIS STORY =P

But please, I would love to hear other’s opinions on Olivia and what happened to her, what she’s doing now possibly, etc. and if you have any opinions on what I want to happen with her because this is something that I’ve been very curious about because so far for me (since again I’m behind most people!) she was mentioned once briefly and then never again and we go around asking about Duncan but not her and like - what is up with this bitch?!

26. How does MC’s hairstyle change as they get older?

I feel like my MC went in the opposite direction of other’s MC’s I’ve seen since those I’ve seen start off with short hair and grow theirs out but mine started with longer hair and cut hers shorter. Not that she cuts it very short but it starts out long to her shoulder blades and then by Year 5 it’s cut up to her shoulders. She likes to have her hair long enough to pull back into a ponytail or bun. I also think when she was younger she straightened her hair and was frustrated by it’s natural wave but as she grows older embraces the waviness of her hair (maybe it’s embracing her House of Black side and realizing we have awesome hair! =p) And that’s pretty much where she normally keeps her hair throughout her life, either to the tops of her shoulders or to her shoulder blades, maybe sometimes a bit longer even but nothing too drastic in terms of hair style/cut - she’s a Black and has to show off their awesome hair =p Also there are more important things going on than her hair style and she’s blessed with nice hair so she fortunately doesn’t have to worry much about it (Bill is probably super jealous =p)

Like I said she likes to be able to pull it up into a ponytail or bun (most likely a messy one) to get it out of her face, especially for Quidditch, but she doesn’t really know how to do hair (possibly because her mom died when she was so young) - she’s lucky she managed to put it up in a ponytail or bun! So whenever Penny or one of her friends offers to do her hair she gets a little excited because she has no idea how to do it =p She’s not a fan of pigtails at all. Fortunately with her House of Black genes she can wake up and have her hair already looking perfect or have that “messy-chic” style so she can be relatively low maintenance with it. Quite literally she woke up like this. =p (Let me know if you all want to hear this dumb little idea I had about Sirius and James involving their hair =p)

It’s seriously like, boom, ready for the day =p

(This is more what I see her hair being, particularly the length, post-hogwarts and also for this current Year 5, it may grow out for Year 6 I’m not sure yet, and she still may grow it out to the above lengths as well throughout her life but these are pretty much her consistent lengths; honestly this is a very good reference for her hair, wavy, a little messy but still looks good - rolled out of bed looking like this - dark with a red tint [guess hers is more shades of brown but you get it], and I love this length - oh no now I’m thinking about cutting my hair - [although like I mentioned it fluctuates from this length to the above, longer ones])

(And this is a good reference for her hair when it’s longer - I had another gif but I can’t find it now so these will have to do but you get it. It’s Megan Fox hair, she’s essentially Megan Fox =p )

(And an obligatory biker moment =p)

#plasticdodecagon #hphm #hogwarts mystery #hphm mc #my mc #hphm jacob #olivia green #thank you for the ask!#asks

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sunflowerspectre · 6 years

Text

Of Idiots and Thieves

@tthemanwithmanyauandheadcannons

Request Information: Teen Titans x Young Justice AU Villain!Jason raised by Ivy & Harley Quinn

Red X! Jason Titans joined Young Justice w/ Robin Jason has a villain team w/Sixteen year old - Scarecrow, Firefly, Blackfire, Cheetah, Giganta, Nuclear Sis, Copperhead

Requested Word Count: 5000 Final Word Count: 5000

A03

As the sun begins to set, Jason can hear his mothers’ voices getting increasingly louder from the kitchen of their small apartment. Nothing too out of the ordinary, knowing that his Ma has a loud voice that borders on yelling no matter what it is that she’s speaking about. He can hear Mom’s smoother, more peaceful voice speaking in reply to whatever it is that they’re discussing this time.

He doubts that whatever it is will affect his plans. While there are times that it ends up colliding with his plans - which hardly ever ends well - as a whole, they tend to steer clear of each other. Apparently Luther thinks that him and his ‘team’ are better suited handling the junior superheroes. Or at least distracting them. Not that he’s complaining - it’s rather fun.

After all, it’s not like they get caught and they still get their job done. The heroes are more of a glorified training practice than a real threat.

There are days (or rather nights) when he rather looks forward to embarrassing the little red Robin. It’s always funny when he can get that little bird’s face as red as his tights. He still fails to see how anyone can take Robin seriously when his costume resembles a stoplight. Was whoever made his costume colorblind? It looks like he’s more suited for a circus than for stopping crime.

He suits up as Red X quickly, the familiar sensation of his suit bringing him comfort - it never fails to boost his confidence. He has to admit that he does look good in black. Shame that it’s fueled on such a hard substance to find, not to mention steal.

He saunters into the kitchen with the intent of grabbing something for the road only to find his mothers still talking with a lot of passion. Poison Ivy only pauses when she sees him ready to duck out - turning to him with a mildly stern expression on her face.

“Remember to water the plants when you get back,” Poison Ivy’s voice rings, “Your mother and I have business to attend to soon and won’t be back until early morning.”

“Yeah,” Harley Quinn rests her head on Poison Ivy’s shoulder, “We’re going to be making bank!”

Jason snorts, hopefully me too, Ma. Poison Ivy, however, rolls her eyes though doesn’t correct Harley’s comment. He snatches an apple off the table for his journey.

“I’ll water the plants, Mom, no worries.”

He dashes out the window and scrambles up the fire escape to the roof, ignoring his Ma’s requests for a ‘goodbye kiss.’ He lifts the mask to take a bite of the apple and uses his free hand to dig a black circular item out of one of the belt’s pockets as soon as he’s out.

He presses a button on the side and the ‘X’ glows across the item’s face glows a dangerous red. He enters the coordinates in, tosses the apple core off the roof hoping it would hit someone in the head, and jumps off the roof with grace.

They meet in their usual spot, a little abandoned warehouse just on the outskirts of Gotham - less likely to be picked up by anyone of the Bat family. Jason rests at the top of one of the ceiling beams and watches as everyone enters - some more discreet than others. He sighs deeply when Giganta just comes tumbling in with Jonathan and Nuclear Sis in her hand, not even caring about how much noise she makes. She sets them down with care before sizing down to a more reasonable size. Blackfire and Firefly are hardly any better, however, storming through an opening in the roof. Copperhead slithers in through the shadows and Cheetah isn’t far behind him.

“Are you going to tell us why we’re all here,” Blackfire shouts up at him, “Or are you just going to brood silently in the shadows?”

Despite her harsh tone, Blackfire has a smirk on her face as she lightly glares at him. Jason can’t help but smirk back, even if she can’t see it.

“Same reason we always get together, toots, I got a job for us to do.”

Blackfire’s eyes light up in warning at his nickname, and he raises his hand in peace. She lets out a huff, crossing her arms tight against her chest, but doesn’t make any move to throw a punch at him - something which he’s thankful for, last time she left a pretty nasty bruise.

“Don’t tell me Luther wants us to do something again,” Nuclear Sis’s voice drags with a whine, “We never get to keep anything good when he’s in charge.”

“Maybe you don’t,” Firefly snorts, “but some of us aren’t afraid to sneak some stuff on the side.”

Cheetah’s lip curls at the discussion, a hiss in her throat. It doesn’t matter what they get in the end if it’s what’s agreed upon. She may not like Luther’s politics, and would rather do things the straightforward way, but it doesn’t change the fact that he is their boss. Usually.

“Notta,” Jason saunters around them and they can hear the cheekiness in his voice, “No Luther, no Light, not this time. This time, it’s all for us.”

Copperhead flicks his tongue, “Wow, what a great idea, dumbass.”

Jonathan coughs into his elbow, “I - Luther may not appreciate us going on our own. It’s stupid to try and go against him. It’s insane and stupid and - ”

“Who cares what he ‘appreciates,’” Blackfire grins, “If we get more of the take, count me in. I’m overdue for a shopping trip.”

“I didn’t know they carried your size,” Copperhead barely gets the remark out before he ducks out of the way of a star bolt. Blackfire’s eyes and hands glow with the threat of another shot and he shuts his mouth.

“No Luther,” Giganta sets down the comic book she was reading, “I’m in.”

Jason looks to Cheetah, who lets out a frustrating yowl before begrudgingly agreeing, Jonathan not far behind her. He doesn’t even need to check with Firefly, knowing that he’d be all in if he gets more money to burn.

The gig is a good one, they have to admit that this has to be one of Jason’s few good ideas - even if he doesn’t always have the best execution since the smallest thing can set him off. If they manage to pull this off, and they’re beginning to think they just might, then they’ll all have plenty to spare and then some.

Giganta is happy to be lookout, since it means she can waste that time sitting on the edge of the building, eyes glued to her latest anime. She’s nice enough to put on subtitles and mute the volume, knowing that despite their good chance here that stealth is still necessary.

Copperhead isn’t too thrilled to be one of the lookouts and steers clear of where Giganta happily sits. If he gets too close, he won’t be able to resist not making at least one comment on her latest obsession. Or worse, he may actually get into it and then he’ll never hear the end of it. Maybe sometime when they get the chance to watch an episode without the others being there to riff on him for it.

Firefly buzzes around the building like the insect he is, cursing under his breath about hurrying up. Blackfire does her best to keep him in check in the air before he blows their cover by letting his impatience get ahead of him.

“I’m hurrying the best I can,” Nuclear Sis is true to her word, working as fast as she can to hack into the security system. She can feel a tick forming on her face as she feels Jonathan on her back, watching everything she does carefully.

On a typical mission, they tend to get caught by now - giving the others something to do as they fight that so called ‘Young Justice’ team. They always get away and it keeps the others busy, so it doesn’t particular bother her. What does bother her, however - she turns to Jonathan sharply.

“ - If I hear you tell me that I’m doing it wrong one more time, I will give you something to fear.”

Jonathan flushes and backs away with an apology. Cheetah huffs in amusement, a bit proud of Sis’ rather new confidence. Jason watches in amusement, loving the way Nuclear Sis can be nuclear at times with her temper. But at least she’s not as bad as Firefly. Copperhead snorts at Jonathan’s embarrassment.

“Should’ve asked that wizard for some bravery, huh?”

He sighs when that just causes Jonathan to wince away further, the skin that shows through his mask a beat red. He shuffles on his feet and tries to mumble some excuse or retaliation, but it’s too quiet to hear. Copperhead awkwardly pats his shoulder for a moment, but seeing it has no effect, he shrugs. At least he can’t say that he didn’t try.

“We’re in,” Sis’ voice rings out clear, “Just don’t do anything stupid.”

“Stupid, us?” Jason puts an arm around her shoulder, but she shrugs him off, making a face with her tongue sticking out causing him to chuckle.

“You’re the one I’m talking to, X,” Sis shoves him, but he doesn’t budge.

“Shame, I thought you were talking to me,” Firefly touches down and struts toward the opening Sis has decoded.

Jason pushes through the group with ease, most parting in his way even though he bumps shoulders with Firefly a bit roughly. He debates, briefly, about using one of his X’s on Firefly to save them the trouble of worrying about him doing something that would bite them all in the ass.

“Usual terms - free for all just don’t get too loud if two of you happen to like the same piece, Sis did good ruining the security system so we don’t need some concerned citizen calling the cops.”

“Let them,” Firefly huffs, “Not like they can actually stop us anyway.”

“They can’t,” Jason agrees, “But we don’t really need Luther throwing a pissy fit if he finds out about our fun little field trip.”

He enters the doorway easily and waits a brief second, hearing no alarms and seeing no lights, he continues. Nuclear Sis usually does a great job at disabling the systems, but he still likes to be at least a little careful - well, more careful than most of the others anyway.

The others fall suit easily. The door leads them to a walkway that oversees the entire building, which just makes it easier for them to see what exactly they would like to take for themselves. Giganta admires the open space and high ceilings, glad that once she gets on the ground floor, she won’t have to worry about breaking through the ceiling if she needs to grow.

“I think it’s pretty funny when Luther throws a tantrum,” Giganta comments, “I just imagine his voice getting all squeaky like a cartoon when he does it.”

“Well we don’t all have your imagination,” Blackfire rolls her eyes, “To the rest of us, it’s just a pain in the ass. Now get out of my way.”

She doesn’t wait for Giganta to move, just flying past her to land at the ground floor near one of the gems that’s caught her eye. She doesn’t hesitate breaking the glass and putting the elegant jeweled necklace around her neck - admiring how much better the green emerald suits her than her sister.

Jason rolls his eyes at how fast it takes Blackfire to put on the expensive jewelry, though is thankful she hasn’t yet taken the one that he planned on grabbing for her. He grabs it fast and puts it away where she won’t be able to see it, making it a wonderful surprise, though Firefly watches him closely.

“She won’t say yes, you know,” Firefly tries to shove him, but Jason stands his ground and doesn’t budge, “No matter what you get her, she still won’t go on a date with you.”

“Shut up, glow worm.”

“Alright, but don’t tell you I didn’t warn you,” Firefly takes off to grab his own reward, Jason watching him leave with furrowed brows before deciding that the lightning bug doesn’t know what he’s talking about - after all, it’s not as if Firefly is an expert in women.

“Do you think there’s any guards,” Jonathan calls out.

“If there are, just gas them,” Copperhead drags the s with a hiss, “It’s always fun to watch them scream and scramble around like roaches.”

Jonathan perks up at the idea and wanders off to look for guards. He shivers in anticipation and wonders just how loud that they’ll scream as he wonders what it is that they’ll see him as - a horrifying demon that’s come to take their soul, a monster ready to eat them alive? The possibilities are endless. He hopes that he can at least find one to gas and watch, finding it much more exciting than grabbing an expensive artifact or jewel.

“What do you think, Giganta,” Blackfire calls out and makes a dramatic twirl, showing off the multiple elegant jewelry dawned around her neck, head, and even arms, “Too much?”

Giganta snorts, “Maybe a bit, but you pull it off.”

Blackfire just gives an I know I do grin with a burning look in her eyes, but her fun is cut short as the doors bust open, her expression turning to pure hatred.

Batman got word of the break-in rather quickly, having eyes all over Gotham and its surrounding area. It never takes him long to find out about anything, especially when it concerns the adoptive son of Poison Ivy and Harley Quinn. He has a keen interest in the boy and a part of him remains curious about the lost potential. While Jason Todd can be discrete and rather tricky at times, his gang is anything but stealthy. When he’s with his little group of ‘buddies’, their activity just gets easier to track.

The only good news is that it seems this time that they’re working alone, there’s nothing to suggest that their heist has come from higher up in the food chain. It’s more than likely that they’ve been eager to just have something for themselves, not even realizing that their footprints are as obvious as an elephant in an apartment building.

“Robin,” Batman turns to the group of young heroes, some looking more eager to jump on board than others, “Starfire, Aqualad, Artemis, Superboy, Cyborg, Raven… Head out. Robin, keep an eye on X.”

Superboy grumbles at being put on such a boring mission, but at least it gets him out of the mountain. Artemis shares his thoughts, though she’s just glad that Wally won’t be bothering her the entire trip - she’s just as eager to get a break from him as she is to get out of the mountain and do something other than just train. Starfire lights up at the chance to try to ‘change’ her sister, always hopeful that this will be the time she gets her sister to join their side.

While it’s not as exciting as a good recon or fighting against some of the bigger named villains, Robin will always jump at the chance to fight against Red X. A part him, however, is a bit disgruntled as his mentor and father’s interest in the criminal. He doesn’t see whatever potential that his mentor does in someone who steals just for the fun of it - as far as he can see, Red X doesn’t have any morals. He’ll do whatever it takes to bring that thief to justice - whether Batman likes it or not.

Familiar, and very much unwelcome, young heroes reveal themselves in a series of dramatic poses to show just how serious they are. It’s a smaller group than Jason expected, a part of him insulted that they thought they didn’t have to send more. But he’s happy to see that his favorite bird is part of the group - he wonders just how much he can embarrass the brat this time.

Blackfire’s eyes go immediately to her sister with a dark grin, her eyes and hands lighting up as she takes off after her sister.

“Please stop this, sister,” Starfire dodges her sister’s tackle, “You don’t have to do this.”

“Get real, sugarpop,” Jason sneers as he throws an x toward her, “She wants to do this. We all do.”

“Because you’re criminals,” Robin releases his staff and goes for Jason, rage building in his chest already from his attempted attacks at Starfire.

Jason snorts, maneuvering out of the way of the staff, “Because it pays better, dipshit.”

Robin lets out a shout as he goes for a stronger hit, Jason lets out a yelp as he barely gets out of the way in time. His eyes narrow, now this is just getting annoying.

He looks over toward the others to see Cheetah yowling and hissing as she holds her own against Aqualad, though every time his water-based attacks nearly get her, her anger grows considerably. He’s a bit disappointed that Firefly didn’t jump at the chance to exploit the fish’s weakness to heat. Idiots, all of them, I swear.

Giganta is already full-sized and wrestling against Superboy, he can see her struggling but at least she’s keeping up with Superboy’s strength.

Firefly has his hands full with Cyborg, but he seems to be having fun with it. Nuclear Sis is doing a good job at having his back.Copperhead’s hissing at Artemis’ aim can be heard from a mile away.

He doesn’t see any sign of Jonathan nor who he could be fighting. He hopes that that won’t become an issue and it isn’t anyone that Jonathan can’t handle. As long it’s not Raven, one of the few that don’t seem to have a reaction to Jonathan’s gas, then it should be fine. Nothing to be worried about. His attention is best on the shameful fight that Robin is giving him.

“Come on, little birdie,” Jason taunts, turning his attention toward his ‘arch-nemesis’, “I know you can do better than that. You haven’t even landed a hit on me yet.”

“Give it up, Red X,” Robin growls, but Jason just laughs at the way he bluntly ignores Jason’s comments - it just shows exactly how much he is getting to the little bird.

“Why would I when I’m winning?”

Robin’s frustration builds, his staff swinging with wild, but calculated strikes. He lands one hit on Red X’s leg, bringing him down, but he gets his balance back too quickly for his liking. Their fight turns more even, with both of them not landing or taking another hit.

The longer the fight grows on, the more Robin gets more disgruntled, seeing the talent that his mentor must see. But it’s wasted on such a criminal, someone who doesn’t deserve the amount of attention that Batman gives him. It’s unfair, Robin throws a punch, almost hitting his enemy head on. It took a long time for him to get Batman’s approval, what does this thief have to offer?

Starfire’s heart breaks with each shot she has to fire at her own sister. She understands that somewhere, she has failed her sister, leading her to this path in life. But she wants to make it right, she has forgiven her sister for all of her misdeeds, why won’t her sister forgive her for whatever has made her hate her so much?

“Ugh, for the last time, I don’t want to be helped or ‘cured’,” Blackfire’s eyes glow in rage as she shoots a large blast toward her sister, “I want to be left alone, what don’t you get about that?!? I’m perfectly fine the way I am.”

“But a life of crime is unfulfilling and evil,” Starfire argues, “Why won’t you join me, sister? We’re family. I care about you!”

“Well I don’t care about you, dear sister,” Blackfire snarls, “You have no idea what it’s like to be older, and more powerful and still have the crown passed on to your little sister. It’s disgusting and I’ll never forgive you for that!”

Starfire’s eyes become downcast, her will to fight growing weak as she understands her sister’s words.

“I...I’m sorry, sister,” but her apology falls to deaf ears.

Cheetah’s growls builds in her chest as she lets out a yowl in frustration. The water based attacks from Aqualad are getting too close for her comfort. He stands a good distance away from her and his attacks are forcing her to keep that distance - she can’t get a decent hit on him and the more she tries and fails, the more pissed she gets.

The overgrown fish stands with a solemn expression on his face and a solid stance. The braces on his arms glowing brightly with magic. Shame, Cheetah raises a brow, he’s pretty cute for an overgrown fish. He’d likely be a lot more attractive if he didn’t have to be such a killjoy.

“Don’t you know cats bathe themselves,” Cheetah taunts, dodging another attack that grazes against her side. She bares her sharp teeth in warning, hissing sharply at the sensation.

Aqualad smirks, “You’re in need for much more than a bath, Cheetah.”

Cheetah sneers and dodging an attack, she leaps through the air and lands behind him. He doesn’t react fast enough. She lands a strike on his back, and thanks to her strong, more primal, animal claws, she pierces his skin leaving a large gash. He lets out a sharp yell before whipping around to retaliate, but she jumps out of the way of his attack easy.

“What’s the matter, fishie? Did the big bad kitty get her claws in you?”

“Have you ever seen One Punch Man,” Giganta’s voice comes out breathy as she holds Superboy in place, “You remind me of him, always eager to find a challenger that can make a fight interesting. But I think you bit off more than you can chew this time, Superboy.”

Superboy’s brows furrow in confusion, missing the reference and wonders if Miss Martian may be able to clarify - she’s always watching all the trending shows.

“I… have no idea what you’re talking about,” he admits as he pushes her over his shoulder just enough to gain the edge - it doesn’t last long.

With a grunt, Giganta turns the fight back in her favor as she wrestles him to the ground and pins him there with a solid grip.

“You really need to watch more anime.”

“What’s the matter, never a moving target before,” Copperhead hisses, “Not much of an archer then, are you?”

Artemis stays steady, bow stretched as she aims carefully. His body is lithe, and fast. Trying to land a good shot on such a flexible target is becoming a pain in her rear.

“Why don’t you face me like a real man instead of running away and then you’ll see just how good of an archer I am?”

“Can’t make it too easy for you, now can I?”

He slithers quickly, never stopping, knowing that if he slows down too much then one of her arrows may actually do some damage. Another arrow whizzes past him, but its close call scrapes against his tail and leaves a small nick.

“What’s the matter, did I get you,” Artemis smirks as she sees the small nick on his tail - the next one will be even closer.

The back hall is already full of gas, and a part of his is disappointed that he’s only been able to find two guards. He watches them scream in glee, giggling like a giddy school girl. It’s like music to his ears. He loves the gleam of fear in their eyes - true, primal fear. Fear for their lives as their darkest nightmare comes to life. They run off too quick for his liking and he takes a step forward, prepared to run after them.

A black dome forms around the hall and sweeps his gas into it like it’s not the source of people’s fears and it disappears like it’s nothing. His eyes narrow as he turns sharply to see the person whose ruining all of his fun.

Raven. She has to be his least favorite hero, even the few times that he’s been able to gas her, she never the reaction that he loves to see. She doesn’t scream, she’s never runs in fear. It’s like she, ugh, faces her fear like it’s something that she sees everyday. It’s an insult to his work, to his very being.

She watches him with her expressionless eyes and uninterested look, as if he’s nothing to be concerned about. It infuriates him that she can dismiss him so easily. She meets his gaze evenly, her voice as blank as her expression and frustratingly even, not even wavering.

“You don’t even know true fear.”

Darkness clouds around her, like a dangerous warning for him to back off. He doesn’t take it lightly, nor does he quite listen. He takes a step forward with a snarl, his hand on a small bomb that will gas her.

Then all he sees is black.

Firefly just laughs and shoots more fire toward the robotic humanoid, unfazed by the shots fired at himself. He’s too fast for the over sized microwave to hit.He wonders if the hero will melt and hums thoughtfully at the idea, wondering if he has enough supply to attempt to burn through the metal casing of the hero.

“Too hot for you to handle,” Firefly laughs and Cyborg screams something up at him - he doesn’t care too much for whatever justice nonsense the hero is trying to say.

He dodges another shot and buzzes past the cyborg easily, shooting blasts toward Cheetah and Aqualad to waver their own fight, but also knowing that if he tries to step in too much that Cheetah will personally try to rip his throat out - the cat and her honor are something laughable at times.

“It’s like you’re not even trying.”

“You’re the one who doesn’t even want to get close,” Cyborg snorts, “Scared that I’ll zap you like the bug you are?”

Firefly’s eyes narrow as he lunges toward the hero, “This fucking bug will watch all of you burn! You’re nothing, you hear me? Nothing! I’ll melt you into a fucking puddle!”

Cyborg smirks and plants his feet on the ground as Firefly charges toward him at a high speed, just like he predicted the bug’s temper is quick to catch on fire. As Firefly draws close enough, he waits until the last second to bring his cannon up and fire a blast - hitting Firefly straight on, sending him crashing into the wall.

“Booyah.”

“Hey, don’t you mess with him,” Nuclear Sis screeches as she jumps on Cyborg’s back, working immediately at on his panel to mess with his inner workings.

“Oh come on,” Cyborg reaches his hands back and tries to swat her off to no avail, “Why does everyone keep doing this?”

Nuclear Sis snorts as the panel pops open, “Maybe don’t have your panel in such an obvious place, dumbass.”

Jason lands a heavy kick to Robin’s chest and sees the rest of his team, save for Firefly who looks like he got his ass beat, wrapping up their own battles. Jonathan comes running in, heading straight for Giganta as he screams something about the devil - he raises a brow at that, seeing Raven following him. He understands that the goth chick can be a bit creepy at times, but calling her the devil seems a bit much.

He lets out a shrill whistle to get his team’s attention and makes a motion with his finger, signaling for them that the fight has gone on long enough - it’s time to head out.

“It’s been fun, little birdie, but I got places to be, things to steal.”

He leaps up and lets Giganta lift him as well as the others members who don’t fly out. Her free hand punches a large hole and they all exit with ease. Jason makes a signal to Firefly, who grins with glee as he cranks up his power. Large bursts of flame shoot out toward the heroes as Jason sends out multiple X’s and a large smoke bomb to cover their tracks.

By the time the heroes have gained their footing, the gang is long gone.

“Alright, we’re far enough, set us down, big girl,” Jason instructs.

Giganta rolls her eyes, but doesn’t object as she sets everyone down. Firefly and Blackfire land on the ground with ease, Blackfire still dawning her newest accessories. Giganta downsizes to a more human acceptable height. Jonathan sticks close to her, still muttering nonsense about Raven being the spawn of evil, though his eyes suggest something more of interest and intrigue as well as a bit of fear.

Copperhead whimpers as he clutches his tail and Jason turns to Blackfire.

“What’s wrong with him?”

“He got nicked by one of the Robin Hood Knockoff’s arrows. It’s barely even a scratch.”

He takes a step forward, wanting to check that it isn’t anything serious, knowing that Blackfire’s definition of pain and wounds vary from that of a typical human’s. He sighs with disdain seeing that this time, her description is accurate. On the side of Copperhead’s tail, the part he cradles to his chest like it’s been broken, is a small cut the size of maybe the middle finger. It’s not gushing blood or even necessarily deep.

He slaps the backside of Copperhead’s head,

“Suck it up, pussy.”

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#teen titans #young justice #commissions #fanfic #fic #tthemanwithmanyauandheadcannons #myworks #mycommissions #wastelandspectrecommissions

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thesmittensim · 4 years

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Spycraft: The Great Game (PC Game) [Open Letter Series] #1

[Note: This is a reply to Dylan’s opening letter]

Hello Dylan,

Lovely to be returning to this after so much time, and so many different life events!

I will start by saying that I didn’t love Hypnospace Outlaw – I know, I know, but for me, the aesthetic and mechanics were extremely grating, even though the story was strong. I had to force myself through it. But as you know, I absolutely got into Her Story, Digital: A Love Story, and I have yet to jump into Telling Lies but I look forward to it. I also come to this with the history of having played Phantasmagoria, the FMV horror game by Roberta Williams, a bunch when I was younger. I can still vividly recall some of the scarier scenes. In my later years, I can say that the great appeal of that game is that I wasn’t allowed to play it. It belonged to a friend’s mother, and we stole it from her home office. But as you know, I absolutely, positutely, *adored* Toonstruck, which was a little like Who Framed Roger Rabbit in terms of how it transitioned from live action to animation. However, the puzzles were admittedly ass, in that you often had to look stuff up, especially towards the end of the game. It has been so long since I’ve booted up Toonstruck that storywise, I can remember only the very beginning and the moment at the halfway point when the big plot twist happens which at the tender age of however young I was the first time I played it, I absolutely did not see coming and was completely floored and excited. Thus I was pleasantly surprised by Spycraft: The Great Game because unlike Phantasmagoria or Toonstruck, it was a good game — good play, good acting, and even a decent script.

The opening immediately captured my attention. I loved the way they had the cynic giving his tell-all while the actual CIA mission statement played across the screen. I immediately felt like I could trust the developers to deliver an intelligent and compelling story. I also thought the “test mission” to choose which agent will move forward as a mechanic for introducing a tutorial was really cute. I did worry for awhile that I had to take notes, because there was a lot of information, and unlike a point and click adventure, there was no scribbling sound followed by a blinking journal icon to let me know that this was information worth storing and I could find it again in the journal. Oh my god, the first person walk made me so happy too! It just immediately reminded me of The West Wing, so that was squee the second for me (the first was the opening). I didn’t come into this with a bias about FMV games per se, because I really only had good experiences playing them as a kid, but I was wary of one particular aspect that usually gives me trouble in video games: stealth. Fair concern, right? Coz spies have to be stealthy. But for people who are tired of getting stuck having to race to disable the thingamajig while the big red numbers tick down, the good news is this game is a lot more about information processes and a lot less about the sexy spy thing. Like you said, more realistic than a James Bond flick. But even with the technology. A film camera with a chip in it that records low res backups is far more believable than any Bond gadget.

And at least part of the reason why it’s more realistic is because it combines actual CIA footage with 35mm film and really makes an effort to disillusion the player, including the ending that you mention. One thing I wonder is whether the plot is as involved as it is in order to portray reality as well. In a movie, I think there would be less people, and less things happening. You mention it’s nonlinear and I agree, but I wonder if it was an attempt to be nonlinear originally or an attempt to to make an unwieldy amount of plot work. Either way, it is engaging and not a downside.

The minigames situation that you refer to was a little annoying for me in the same way that minigames usually are. I am one of those party poopers who hates the arcade game that you can play inside the game you’re playing. Not the interfaces, which I often found charming, but the structure of having to complete this challenge, then “go back” to “the real game” and then repeat. But overall, I also enjoyed this game and the mechanics.

You know, I don’t really understand why it’s so intent on disillusioning the player, but I do feel like that is both what gives it its authenticity and an underlying intention. When I was in graduate school, the CIA came to a job fair and they absolutely struck me the way you describe, ” tool for people who know better than you.” But why would you build a computer game around that idea. In particular, why would you design a computer game that leaves the player particularly unlikely to value the CIA or what it does? Not that I think it’s a bad thing, but it does make me wonder hmmm, who were the developers friends with? Where did the money for this game come from? Because it is, ultimately, a political narrative, even if it’s one I agree with. But I will say I really like that aspect from a literary perspective, it’s really nice to play a spy game as a top spy who is basically forced to be a dead eyed state functionary in all the ways that really mean something and get the fire burning. In short, learning that the everyday person is more likely to have the room for bottom line ethics than a superspy. Kinda neat.

-Joanna PS: I was looking at reviews of this game on Steam and check out this quote: “I remember this game like it was yesterday. This is how I first applied to the Agency, using this game. I was one of the first recruits to be digitally recruited using the internet.” I can’t think this is remotely true, especially because it ends with him getting hired by the Wizards at Langley, but I found it hilarious nonetheless.

[Dylan’s response here: http://www.augmented-vision.net/2020/10/01/game-club-spycraft-the-great-game-letter-3/ My final response here: http://joannatovaprice.com/wp/index.php/2020/10/30/spycraft-the-great-game-pc-game-open-letter-series-2/]

Spycraft: The Great Game (PC Game) [Open Letter Series] #1 was originally published on Joanna Tova Price

#crosspost #simblr

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ashiftchange · 7 years

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D&D: Everyone sleeps sometime.

The group I DM were escaped prisoners / slaves who arrived at a "safe" city that wasn't all that safe. The King still allowed an old Bounty Hunter guild to retrieve escaped slaves (bounties) legally. The hunters would stay in a fancy rooming house / inn across the street from the temple that helped escaped slaves and watch for any juicy bounties. While it made the King unpopular it was accepted. The characters got drunk with the local who was helping hide them and decided to hell with the King, they would kill the bounty hunters to send a message the city was off limits! Yeah! They would chp off the hunters heads, place them on sticks or something to send a message. They were all very excited, and inebriated.

The group: ALL 1st Level. Sovellis Nialo, an elven foppish frat dude Jester / Fighter

Noor VonKlaven, a violent one-armed Havilbor Wizard (Havilbor = Hafling race’s actual name “Who’d call themselves half of Humans, ya racists?!”)

Aldegund, a unique Warforged Monk created by the bad guys, who became aware and free. Big, heavy, Punchy.

Helaso (NPC) a young girl. The group’s 14 year old mascot who had fled from slavery with them and her grandfather.

The vastly more skilled Bounty Hunters. A pair of Mage/fighters (6th level) A brutal half-Orc warrior (7th level)

The groups plan? "Everybody sleeps sometime." They would sneak into the Inn and kill the bounty hunters in their sleep, easy!

The group spent their last coins to bribe the head cook of the inn the bounty hunters stayed at. The cook didn’t like the Bounty Hunters either so was helpful.

After midnight they all skulked in through the Inn’s kitchen, Noor and Flotsam head upstairs while Sovellis and Helaso stay downstairs (The high dexterity elf had no Stealth to speak of, and Helaso wouldn’t be of any use).

The wizard and monk pause at the top of the stairs conversing at the first door. The sounds of the nighttime Inn whisper around them. They keep sitting n front of the first door until Noor whispers down the stairs “Psst, Sovellis, can you pick a lock?” The elf shakes his head. “No? Why would you think I can do that?” “I don’t know? I can’t.” Noor says and looks at the Monk. Flotsam throws up their hands. “Well the damn doors are locked. They locked their doors. We are drunk and dumb. Who’da guessed! Right. Retreat!” says Noor. The plan foiled by doors. With locks. That people use.

They come up with new plan and this time are less (slightly) inebriated. (Harpsicord Heist Music Starts) Returning to their local hideout they report to the old guy hiding them that the doors were, unexpectedly, actually locked. The whole group passes out for the night. During a hung over breakfast, they decide (sober this time) that this is still a great idea. They ask about climbing in windows. The old guy tells them the 3 upstairs room’s windows are all secured via wizard lock at sunset everyday by a guild spellcaster, those windows are not going to open. Group decides to mug the wizard to stop the spell renewal, then sneak into the (currently empty and unlocked) third room and have Noor (the ONE ARMED Havilbor) climb out along the front of the building with a rope tied to her, climb in the middle window and get to killing the twins, then repeat with last room. She was the best climber by a lot, -4 for one arm notwithstanding. They hit the town and learn the renewal Guild Wizard has a thing for slight boys. Helaso volunteers to crossdress and lure him into an alley to get pummeled senseless. She had spent a fair amount of time retending to be a boy while fleeing the bad guys.

They launch Operation Stop the wizard who locks the windows so we can climb in and chop off heads of assholes. Sunset: The wizard is wandering down the street, wandering into buildings with a wand, sealing locks and taking payment. Helaso, now in her best ‘urchin boy’ drag, flirts with the wizard, poorly. After a very bad bluff roll she points to an alley and says bluntly “Lets go in that dark alley right there and make out. Now. Yes. Oh baby.” The wizard looks at the urchin, then the dark alley, and amazingly refuses because he is not an idiot. The party is shocked the wizard is not an idiot.

Helaso panics, snatches the wizard’s coinpouch (YOINK) and sprints for the alley.

The wizard raises his hand to cast a spell. The group (in unison) OH HELL NO, DON’T HURT OUR HELASO! Suddenly the wizard has 2 arrows jutting from him (Sovellis) A flurry of shimmering green Magic Missles slam into him (Noor)

The a large hulking figure sprints out of an alley, grabs him and flees (Aldegund)

The ground manages to escape and after robbing the near dead guild wizard, they have money to once again bribe the inn’s cook. Yay! Midnight: Noor and Flotsam sneak upstairs into the empty room while Sovellis sits across the street to be lookout with his Elf Eyes™. Helaso is sent back to the hideout under protest. The street is prosperous and wide, but has little traffic this late.

Sovellis watches from across the street as Noor, with a rope tied around her, manages to climb out and shimmy across the front of the building with her metal hook arm while Flotsam stood at the third window holding the other end of the rope. Falling only once and doing her pendulum imitation, Noor eventuall pried the middle window open (YAY not locked) and disappeared inside.

18 Long minutes pass. The elf is freaking out, the warforged is freaking out. Aldegund can hear vague subtle sounds from the room next door. FINALLY Sovellis sees Noor awkwardly wrestle a lumpy shiny backpack into the window with the rope attached to it.

She is covered in blood.

The backpack covered in blood. Everything is covered in blood. She shoves the pack out the window so Flotsam can reel it in but the slippery (Bloody) rope comes undone, dropping the backpack to the street below with a hollow thud and clunks. Two gore coated heads bounce out across the cobblestones in the moonlight. Sovellis sprints across the street, kicking at the heads to get them back into the bag while he looked up at Noor miming “WHAT THE FUCK NOOR?” Noor responded by holding up her one blood soaked arm with her dagger in it and making angry sharp sawing motions, then hacking motions, then twisting and pulling motions, all while miming a fountain of blood. Sovellis nodded, shrugged, and quickly packed the heads up and fled.

Noor disappeared back into the room and, after pulling one of the dead mages back packs up around her like a potato sack race, hopped about smearing and concealing the footprints and blood hand prints everywhere. Satisfied and growing more tacky by the moment she climbed out and continued stickily along the front of the building, leaving strange smeared bloody prints that would later be attributed to ‘a small goblinoid creature’. Reaching the last window she climbed in and THEN (seeing the massive hulking size of the Half Orc warrior asleep) got the brilliant idea to unlock the warriors door and just let Flotsam in. Who was able to end the warrior with far less anime-style blood fountains.

The Green Beetle Inn no longer rents the middle room. Its storage. Stained, stained, storage.

A few hours later the group stuck the heads on poles and Aldegund left a note warning that “The Path of justice is not for the weak who hide behind laws and know their sins.”

Within a week the actions were being ascribed to a group that became called ‘The Path’ which they are to this day.

#D&D #character stories #dungeons and dragons #blood everywhere

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chriscolfernews · 7 years

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Imagine, if you will, the Pillsbury Doughboy with Peter Brady’s haircut and Truman Capote’s voice. Add a sprinkling of the fear of being touched and the social anxiety of a shy Chihuahua. That was me at 18, and in December 2008, that guy decided it was a good idea to take a trip to New York City all by himself.

To reiterate why this cultural experiment was destined for failure, I should mention I was born and raised in Clovis, Calif., a small town in the heart of the San Joaquin Valley — you know, where they end up in “The Grapes of Wrath.” Clovis is a place of spacious farmland, quiet suburbs, ample street parking and trucks with testicle ornaments. It couldn’t be more different from the Big Apple, which is probably why I spent much of my adolescence wishing Kristin Chenoweth would show up in Glinda the Good Witch’s bubble and take me there.

In 2008, my spirit guides must have paid off their gambling debts, because I was unexpectedly presented with a plethora of life-changing opportunities. In June, I graduated from high school; that September, I auditioned and booked the pilot of “Glee”; in October, I briefly moved to Los Angeles to shoot it; and in November, I had neck surgery from the whiplash of it all. Actually, it was just to have my wisdom teeth removed, but I was under the influence of Vicodin nonetheless.

During this narcotic haze, I kept in touch with my “Glee” co-stars (I also sent a lot of emails to Condoleezza Rice, but that’s a different story.) Although I don’t remember it, I somehow managed to invite myself to the apartment that Lea Michele and Jenna Ushkowitz shared on the Upper West Side.

“You’re going to New York City … by yourself?” my mom was shocked to learn. “But Christopher, you’ve never even been to the doctor by yourself.”

“Mom, life is about stepping outside your comfort zone,” I replied — or maybe I said: “Cut the umbilical cord, Mrs. Bates! I’m going to see my friends!” I can’t remember.

I fully expected Lea or Jenna would greet me when I arrived at Kennedy International Airport — but I quickly learned that’s not how it worked in a big city in 2008. Getting into the taxi of a complete stranger was the most terrifying experience of my life up to that point. I was convinced that I would be whisked away and murdered like one of the victims in “The Bone Collector.” I was too afraid to look my driver in the eye or try pronouncing his foreign name (it was Gerald, by the way). The taxi’s door locks were broken and clicked loudly whenever the vehicle accelerated, so naturally, I thought gangsters were shooting at us.

Suddenly, everything changed as the Manhattan skyline came into view. My fears of being murdered faded away and were replaced with a wave of wonder. I couldn’t breathe, I couldn’t think, I couldn’t feel — all I could do was stare in bewilderment at the towering buildings in the distance. I had seen “The Wizard of Oz” a million times, but until that moment on the bridge, I never knew how Dorothy felt when seeing the Emerald City. It was as bittersweet as it was magical, because I knew I’d never see New York for the first time again.

At 3 in the morning on my first night, a garbage truck rumbled down the narrow street outside and rattled the whole building. I leapt from a deep slumber on the couch and ran into the kitchen. After some reassurance, the girls tucked me back in, but I couldn’t sleep another wink.

My mission for the week was to see as many Broadway shows as possible. My first New York theater experience was a preview of “Shrek the Musical,” and boy, did all the families from the Midwest and I love it! I also saw “Gypsy,” with Patti LuPone; “Hairspray,” with Harvey Fierstein and Marissa Jaret Winokur; “Mary Poppins”; “Avenue Q”; and “Spring Awakening” three times. But nothing compared with the musical number in “Shrek” when Sutton Foster tap danced with the rats. It just tickled me.

Jenna was still in “Spring Awakening” during my visit, so I spent a lot of time backstage at the Eugene O’Neill Theater with her fellow cast members. Playing it cool and pretending I didn’t know every detail about their personal lives and theater credits was my best performance to date. When I wasn’t being a creepy groupie, Jenna would kindly walk me to the theater of my selected performance before her call time, drop me off and then pick me up after our shows. It was the closest thing to adult day care I hope to ever experience.

The night I saw “Hairspray,” however, disaster struck! When the show was over, Jenna texted me and asked if I could catch a cab and meet her back at the apartment. My palms became clammy at the very thought of hailing a taxi on my own. The task was nearly impossible as all the shows in the theater district were letting out at that exact same time. I finally managed to snag a cab, but it was swiped by a stealth family in foam Lady Liberty crowns.

Just as I worried I’d be stranded in Times Square forever, I was hit by what I thought was a stroke of total genius. I sneaked inside a hotel lobby, hid in the bathroom for 45 minutes, pretended to be a guest as I re-emerged, and had the doorman hail me a cab. I was so relieved, I tipped him 15 bucks.

As I rode back to Lea and Jenna’s apartment that night, I was beaming with more pride than I had ever felt. Apparently the cruel streets of New York City were no match for the cunning farm boy from Clovis.

“Well, how was New York?” my mom asked later as she sprayed my shoes and luggage with Lysol.

I told her how the Bone Collector had driven me into the city, how I was awakened by a deafening garbage truck, how I had braved the crowded theaters on Broadway, and how I had conned my way into a cab after a taxi was taken from me at knife point. Admittedly, I may have exaggerated a few things.

“Oh my,” she said. “I guess you won’t be going back to New York City anytime soon.”

“What are you talking about?” I said. “It was amazing!”

#chris colfer #ny times #lea michele #jenna ushkowitz #glee

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fictionalthrill · 7 years

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The Auror (Series) Chapter 5: Worth The Risk

Percival Graves Imagine

A/N: At last a new chapter! As I was writing this chapter, I felt that it was going to be a bit long so, I decide to carry it out to a certain point, and continue it differently. You can expect the next chapter real soon. Thanks for being patient and for following. I appreciate it all!

Thanks to all who’ve read my work, and for following. It means a lot! Take Care, God Bless.

Description: As the pressure grows within MACUSA, everyone is desperate for some results. Right now, the only thing that can dig them out of the whole is if by some miracle, the next mission can be carried out.

March 21st, 1928.

The twenty first of March already. Practically an entire month has passed since the trainees had begun the detecting and identifying of magic in Auror Training. There was no doubt this was one of the hardest lessons in the preparation, but it was quite odd for them to receive it so early on in their training. Not to mention, this lesson was quickly followed by Stealth and Tracking; all skills that are supposed to be brought up later in time. This type of insistent readiness was giving all trainees a great sense of pressure. In the time that had passed, at least five of applicants had either failed or dropped out, leaving very few left, and creating a bit of worry on Seraphina. The Major Investigations Department was hanging on a thin thread, and it was the President’s head on the line. Either MACUSA produced worthy Aurors and takes action on apprehending Grindelwald, or the International Confederation and the British Ministry take charge of them and their investigations.

The entire Congress came under stress. It spread like a virus through the air, creating conflicts in between departments and the workers. And today, the pressure was on. A meeting in the Major Investigation Department had brought forth Senior Aurors, Auror trainer Julius Weaver, Director Graves, and Madam President. After an awfully long investigation, Graves had finally pitched the plan to infiltrate Grindelwald’s followers location. He and Y/N had spent much time together studying the dark wizard and his ways. On top of that, in all that time, the location was constantly scouted and the suspicious activity only escalated. There was a great deal of magic being casted, causing everyone at MACUSA to wonder if this was the beginning of something big.

Never had the department been under this state. After Graves, had explained the plan to everyone in the room, the meeting went from adults in session, to children bickering.

“It’s too risky!” A male Auror exclaimed.

“We could be exposed!” Another said.

“Enough!” Madam President suddenly declared amongst the lot. They all silenced themselves and looked to her, “Now I don’t know what is wrong with all of you, but you must respect and follow the potential orders this department establishes. Never have I seen a group of Aurors, masters in witchcraft and wizardry, behave like children.”

All Aurors bowed their heads and glanced to each other. One Auror in the far end of the table where they all gathered, stepped forward and spoke, “On behalf of us all Madam, our sincerest apologies. But please understand us Madam President, while we respect the director’s plan, we have to accept the fact that we might not have the man power to face whatever or whoever is in that building…”

“I see your predicament, but what other option do we have? If any of you can come up with a suitable plan that over shadows Graves’, and we could consider carrying out, be my guest...” Madam President left her final words be carried in the air. Graves rested both palms on the table as he stared at every single Auror, waiting to see who would supply a better plan than his. A deep silence weighed in the room as no one could even begin to come up with the slightest idea.

“I see… Well, if none of you have something to offer, then I guess we’ll move on with the director’s plan.”

Next to Graves sat Julius, and at the President’s final words, he cleared his throat. In an elegantly manner, the wizard stood up and glanced over to the President, “Might I make a suggestion, Madam?” his voice worn out and old.

“Of course you may Julius.”

Suddenly, the door to the room burst open. Y/N strutted inside and stopped dead in her tracks when she spotted the collection of witches and wizards staring back at her, “I am so sorry. I didn’t mean to interrupt, I just received an urgent memo from Mr. Weaver to see him here,” she shared as she extended the memo up in the air for all to see.

“Perfect timing Ms. Y/N. Please, join us!” Julius said as he went to her and dragged her up to the table. He placed her up next to Graves who casually slipped his hands in his pockets and gave a questioning look. Y/N could only raise her shoulders to answer, for she too was confused about her presence here.

“Julius, this is a private meeting which concerns only the higher ups. This is no place for Ms. Y/N.” Madam President stated.

“Yes, Madam. But I have a reason for her being here.” Julius responded.

“Please, get on with it then.”

“Everyone, this here is Ms. Y/N. She was my source which tapped into the mind of Grindelwald. She is the reason why our missing persons-”

“She is the reason for which I’m here. And, she’s the one who’s been assisting me in this investigation.” Graves interrupted. When it comes to bringing up Graves’s investigation, everyone is very cautious as to how they will speak about it, Julius included. He knew exactly where Julius was going with it, so he decided to spare him the trouble.

“Yes. Thank you, Graves. Ms. Y/N here is one of my trainees, and I can assure you she is quite the witch. Her, along with the rest, have been able to keep up with the fast-paced training MACUSA has had to instill upon them. That being said, I would say they are all ready.” Julius’ words hang in the air.

“Ready for what?” An Auror proceeded to question.

“To perform in the field. To join you in this operation.” Julius replied surely. With this statement, everyone was outraged. Some Aurors began whispering between themselves, while others were shouting unnecessarily. Graves was shocked just as well as everyone. He immediately looked to Y/N who held an expressionless demeanor. In the middle of it all, Madam President silenced the room.

“I must say, Julius, this is quite the suggestion.” She says.

“It could be an even bigger risk. Sending unexperienced wizards and a witch, to the field?” The same Auror questioned once again.

“Mind how you speak of them. They are my students and they have been working exceptionally hard.”

“They aren’t ready, you’ve said it yourself, it’s only been a month.” The Auror says.

“Perhaps you’ve missed the part where I said how fast paced the training has been and how they’ve managed to keep up…” Julius said in a sarcastic tone.

The Auror scoffed, “Madam President, are you seriously considering this?”

“It wouldn’t have been my first choice, but given Julius’ determination, I’d say it’s something to think about.”

“Madam President, if I hadn’t seen what I have from them, I would never had suggested it. The five applicants that we’ve lost never would have made it, I knew it from the start. But those who are left have proved to me how much they are willing to sacrifice to be of MACUSA’s service. Trust me on this.” Julius confessed.

“Do you have an idea on how they would fit in to the operation?” Madam President asked him.

“They will need to be briefed. I want them to know the actual purpose of the investigation. And I will prepare them further in any way you might deem necessary, so that they are ready for the field.”

“Very well. Still, I won’t just make the decision myself. Seeing as there are strong feelings towards this strategy, we will take it to a vote. All those in favor of uniting the trainees into this operation, please raise your wands.” As the president commanded this, at least half of the Aurors in the room raised their wands; the president included.

Meanwhile, Graves looked around to see those who were most likely to be opposed. He knew he would end up having the final say in this predicament. He thought about how this wasn’t a bad idea. How adding the trainees could actually serve the cause and create a stronger force. But, at the same time, he thought about Y/N and all of the things that could happen. She could get hurt. She could be kidnapped or even killed… He shook the thoughts out of his head. Why am I thinking this? Why am I thinking of her? Something was off in him.

While Madam President continued to request those opposed, Graves leaned in to Y/N and spoke, “How do you feel about this?”

Y/N glanced at him and stared straight into his eyes, “I’ll do whatever is needed of me, sir.” she said firmly.

“Are you sure? Because if you don’t believe you or anyone else is ready, just say the word.” He spoke a bit concerned.

“I am ready, sir. We are all ready.” She replied. At her words, Graves responded with a nod.

“Graves, as Director of Magical Security, you now have the final say in this vote. Are you in favor or opposed of this strategy? If you are, please raise your wand.” Madam President declared. And just like that, Graves took a final glance at Y/N, and raised his wand in favor.

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actutrends · 4 years

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GamesBeat managing editor Jason Wilson’s favorite games of 2019

Each year, it gets harder to nail down my favorite games of the past season. Part of this is because there are just so many studios putting out fantastic games. The rise of live-service games plays a role here, too — each year, the living games I enjoy seem to get better and take up more of my life. I can’t think of a better time to enjoy games, and as my compatriots at GamesBeat have shown, this year has had such an amazing amount of quality — be it on PC (my favorite platform), consoles like the PlayStation 4 or Nintendo Switch (portable mode is a godsend for role-playing games), or my phone. Here’re my favorite games of 2019. Note: These aren’t the games I consider to be “the best.” The most important factor is how much I enjoy playing them (and, increasingly, how much my kids enjoy watching me play them). The Outer Worlds

The Outer Worlds can be gorgeous.

Obsidian Entertainment is one of my favorite studios. It’s made three of my most-played RPGs of the past 15 years — Neverwinter Nights 2 (and its expansions), and the two Pillars of Eternity games. The Outer Worlds is different than these. You’re running around a system of planets that are at the mercy of a group of greedy, power-hungry corporations. It’s a capitalist dystopia, but it’s a funny one. And it skewers a world in which plutocrats, not people, run things. It also comes with a good character-building system, and its loading screens show off fantastic pieces of art (some of which only shows up based on your decisions). It wears its Fallout influence on its power armor (its makers include some of that landmark RPG’s creators). The Outer Worlds will also leave an important legacy for Obsidian: a fantastic finish to its run as an independent game studio. Pokémon Shield

Dynamax Pokémon loom over the battlefield.

Image Credit: GamesBeat

Years ago, I wrote about how much I hated Pokémon when I tried Red, the then-new release for the Nintendo 3DS. But last year, Let’s Go: Pikachu captured my heart. I credit part of this to my children, who love the TV series and the cards. Yet the game has plenty to recommend it. It’s cheery, and the way so many of its characters are supportive of you and each other is touching in an age where so many people seek to just tear everyone and everything down. It’s also fun to find all these new Pokémon, use the Dynamaxx power to turn them into giant monsters, watch them evolve, and explore the world. My favorite part, though, had little to do with the gameplay. Every time we encountered a new Pokémon, my kids would look it up in their books, helping me find its vulnerabilities and plotting how I should set up my team. Pokémon’s better when we’re playing like this, together. Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order

There are fouler things than Imperial Stormtroopers in the deep places of the world.

Image Credit: Respawn

Respawn created new worlds and characters in Jedi: Fallen Order. It nailed how I’ve long thought a Jedi should feel in a game. Using your Jedi powers and lightsabers to smash through legions of stormtroopers just feels right. Mixing in metroidvania-like levels gives players plenty of places to explore, and I enjoyed going back to different worlds in key moments of the story (like your second time on Kashyyyk). But most important, it creates a compelling, sympathetic character in the Second Sister, showing that a servant of the Sith can be more than an evil person with a lightsaber. My only quibble: I wish Respawn’s easier modes made it, well, easier to deal with some of the challenging platforming sections, not just nerfing combat. Mistover This is a fantastic spin on Darkest Dungeon and Etrian Odyssey from Krafton, a small team inside the larger Krafton Game Union group. You start in a town, recruit a party, get quests, and outfit your crew. This is where it feels like Etrian Odyssey. But in town, you open up different buildings as you accomplish quests, the first of its many Darkest Dungeon influences. Food and light play a role in the exploration as well. Once you’re in a dungeon, moving around becomes more like a traditional roguelike. For every move you make, the monsters move as well. Combat is strategic as well, as your formations and the abilities you choose matter on the battlefield. It’s a fantastic take on roguelikes, and it’s worth playing. Grindstone

Grindstone is a clever puzzler in which you slay monsters by drawing lines for your buffed-up brawler.

Image Credit: Capy Games

Capy’ Games Might & Magic: Clash of Heroes and Superbrothers: Sword and Sworcery are two of my all-time favorite mobile games. So when Grindstone hit Apple Arcade earlier this year, I had to check it out. And when it debuted, I spent about 2 hours playing it. It reminds me of Clash of Heroes in how you line up enemies to slay. It’s a puzzler. You draw a line from your warrior through groups of baddies. It’s simple enough that young children can understand it, but it gets complex enough that it becomes a real challenge to accomplish every map’s goal. It’s fantastic, and I think it’s the best game on Apple Arcade. Magic: The Gathering — Arena

The Brawl decks I’ve settled on during the final day of the event.

Image Credit: GamesBeat

Two years ago, I had no idea I’d love Magic. Now, I play it almost every day thanks to Arena. It’s a fantastic adaptation of the granddaddy of all collectible card games. I’ve learned to play every color, and I’ve even had success beating tuned netdecks with creations of my own. I’ve become a better-than-average draft player as well, and when publisher Wizards of the Coast introduced Brawl, I not only found myself making decks in Arena but with my growing cardboard-card collection as well. Earlier this year, Arena left its open-beta status. The game still has some problems. Most days, you’ll find someone on Reddit complaining about performance issues. Wizards’ monetization tactics are annoying — more than once now, it has introduced an idea (such as the 2-to-1 wild card crafting cost for Historic cards), then changed it after outcry from players. Right now, it’s charging 10,000 in-game gold for a month-long Brawl event, and while you do get one special card as a reward, it’s pretty much charging you to play what I and others consider to be Arena’s best format. That sucks, as Brawl should be a format we can play in a queue, not just in a friendly challenge, at any time. But despite these issues, Arena has proven to be the best way to play Magic when you can’t shuffle cards with your friends. And that’s pretty awesome. Hearthstone

There be dragons!

Image Credit: Blizzard

Year 5 of Blizzard Entertainment’s free-to-play collectible card game might be its best yet. Hearthstone’s development team has been more active this year than ever before, introducing a flurry of prompt card changes to fix problems, better in-game events, its first new mode in years (Battlegrounds, which is pretty dang good), and a willingness to try new things (like the recent Wild event or Arena rotations). It’s even telling better stories with its expansions. Like Magic, Blizzard has stumbled some this year. During its Wild event, it didn’t do anything to address the power of Evolve Shaman, which drove many players (like me) away from Standard and into other modes like Battlegrounds … or spending more time with other games. And its handling of the Hong Kong situation was clumsier than a newborn calf trying to stand up for the first time. But even with those problems, Hearthstone feels more vibrant now than any time since its first expansion. And that’s a good thing for Blizzard and its millions of players worldwide. Dragon Quest Builders 2

Even the quest lines have punny names in Dragon Quest Builders 2.

Image Credit: GamesBeat

I’ve never been able to get into Minecraft. I know it’s fabulous. My kids love it. But I like a little more direction, and I get this from Square Enix’s Dragon Quest Builders series. In the sequel, you’re building your way to defeating a great evil. It’s charming, and as you finish off quests, you open up more building materials and options. It has most of the fun of a Dragon Quest game, but with a sandbox openness. It’s neat, and it’s even more fun when you play with kids. Disco Elysium

Disco Elysium is like no other RPG that came out this year … or in any recent year.

Image Credit: ZA/UM

This might be the trippiest RPG I’ve ever played, and I dig it. You play a detective coming off a bender, trying to solve the mystery of a hanged man left on a tree. It doesn’t have combat, really. You face decisions in conversations you have with the characters around you (and in your head). The system revolves on skill checks in conversations and reactions to the words you and others use, not weapons, warriors, or wizards. It’s fascinating, and it developer ZA/UM delivers something I’ve rarely seen in my decades of gaming: an RPG where choice, not combat, matters the most. A Plague’s Tale: Innocence

A Plague’s Tale: Innocence is a fascinating game.

Image Credit: Asobo Studio

I’ve been fascinated with this game since seeing it at E3 in 2017. It’s from Asobo Studio in France, and it’s about a 15-year-old girl and her younger brother surviving during a horrible plague afflicting France. And rats. Swarms of rats. Millions and millions of rats. The pair must use stealth to escape an inquisition that’s after them … and may be at the center of the plague. It’s a terrific, terrifying story, and it has the bonus of capturing the repulsiveness rats and magnifying it into a game that both fascinates and disgusts. It’s unique. Honorable mentions Code Vein Etrian Odyssey: Nexus Iratus: Lord of the Dead Metro: Exodus MechWarrior 5: Mercenaries Path of Exile Queen’s Wish: The Conqueror Slay the Spire The Surge 2

The post GamesBeat managing editor Jason Wilson’s favorite games of 2019 appeared first on Actu Trends.

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rainyrami-blog · 6 years

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Mea (Draft)

Since I’m bored, let’s write this short piece of memory down.

There was a boy attending a swimming marathon.

To be more precise, it was the annual swimming test, where they graded the participants.

You would swim one kilometer. The time you had for that length would be measured and the grades were made with that information.

Anyway, on that day, the sun was shining and the rays were projected on the water surface, the water split the light and thus it was sparkling.

The boy wasn’t really into sports, he wasn’t good at them either, but he still looked forward to the weekly swimming lessons.

Incidentally, the annual test would happen instead of one of those lessons..

He disliked it when the teacher declared it to be a “free-lesson”, the boys would start to shrink into little brats again and play in the water while shouting and laughing loudly. It was just a plain annoyance to him.

He was already content with just swimming laps, no long speeches or explanation or even something which resembles a swimming lesson where the teacher actually teaches you something.

Of course, he wasn’t good at swimming or something, but laps really weren't too much of an effort for him compared to other competing types of sports; or running marathons, which always left his lungs screaming and feel the pain on different places. Obviously, nobody would care and just call him weak and lame instead.

The exercises in the water where when he could just force his body to do the troublesome task while his mind would fly somewhere else. He could just space out and let his body exhaust itself. The feeling of pure exhaustion and fatigue would come only afterward anyway when he would get out of the wet.

So on that day, when there was this swimming marathon, the boy was actually happy, even if he knew that he probably would get bad grades again.

With the signal from the teacher, everyone, only males naturally, jumped into the water and began to swim…

And so did he, his head dived in first, his torso followed and soon were his two feet swallowed by the sparkling liquid as well.

Everything turned blue, to be more precise, the floor of the pool was painted blue thus the water seemed to be blue as well, even if he was aware of that, it still felt like something was transforming...

While the world started to change its colors, he also started. He started to tell a tale when is mind slowly faded away…

(´～`)

The tale was about a boy, who was going to attend one of the most crucial turning points in his life.

The sun was shining and the flowers were blooming, it was one of those wonderful days.

He hated the physical activity which was awaiting him, due to the confrontation with it in his past although at the same time he was looking forward to it. It was something like his fate after all.

Today was a special day, a day where he could prove something important to himself and his ancestors. Something which would change his life, regardless if he won or not. It was something he really worked hard to gain, so a loss would throw him away while a success would give him the power to finally take the next step.

Thus, when the instructor gave his signal, he jumped into the cold water without hesitation. The arms first, the torso followed and the feet as well. Everything distorted, the sounds became dull and he started to lose his consciousness.

His eyes closed, he relied on his own yet weak body to accomplish this task, letting it create the one story he always yearned for. The story he suffered, bled and screamed for this whole time.

(ㆆᴗㆆ)

There was a girl.

To be more precise, a nymph.

For some reason, she ended up in the swimming pool of a certain school.

That place of education and improvements itself was infamous for teaching children to become adults. To be more precise: thiefs, which have the ability to hide their presence and attack with stealth, clerics, who were taught to the holy teachings of the religion and have great divine abilities to heal even the most severe wounds, archers, who were blessed by the goddess of the hunt, wise users of the bow and arrows, knights, who were strong and full of courage, they wouldn’t back off even in front of the most disgusting or ominous monsters and wizards, who were masters of one specific type of element.

The education system would provide those youngsters’ support and help them to choose their path. Make them useful for the society. To make them able to become adventurers eventually.

A person which was called good for nothing a long time ago, since it was more like an unsteady job, unsteady in the income. It was certainly possible to get rich quick, but the amount of money was based on the difficulty of the different tasks and the danger behind those.

You could not only lose everything, but you would lose everything when you fail.

The school was created by certain, poor adventurer, also a good for nothing which became later a hero.

As a hero he found himself drowning in a fountain of wealth, thus he decided to build a school to create strong adventurers.for the future.

Basically, the school was created to protect the world even after his death, it was his last gift to this world.

Incidentally, the hero eloped with a certain, mysterious girl and left the school for his party. The party consisted of a thief, a cleric, an archer, a knight, and a wizard. Since they were the party of the hero, of course, they were all outstanding by themselves and created the main categories of the school.

The hero himself and the girl were never seen again. Some people say that they became ghosts and were still watching over the school this day, but only nymphs would know that for sure.

Our water nymph here, certainly never saw him, even though she was a nymph of a near river. It was actually right in front of the school entrance.

The river was practically isolating the school from the country, people say that the hero himself made it as a sign of independence. It wouldn’t surprise anyone since the hero could easily afford to buy off the country from the king.

Only one single bridge was the connection which let many aspiring (maybe) future adventurers enter the school. Every year, when the new ones came, the river seemed to glow and sparkle. As it was welcoming the freshmen.

This would make the river a graceful and elegant thing, the pride of the school. However, there was also the day before the new students came. The day was the old ones graduated.

The school ends in a season where the weather is remarkably bad, thunders and flashes of lightning were showing up frequently and the river stream becomes so strong, that it even splashes over the bridge. Every time a graduate would try to leave the school and become a proper adventurer, the water would push the people from the bridge and spit them out on the other side, the side which wasn’t school territory more. A rather tough farewell, indeed.

Naturally, the person responsible for this was no one else than the water nymph. She didn’t like to say goodbye and was always melancholic on the graduation day.

A further sad moment for her was, that those two days were the only ones where she was active. The other days she would just peacefully watch the nature or listen to the children who admired the school from the outskirts. Since there was nothing more than the bridge at the outside of the school walls and because the school was basically a big, flowering city at this point, there were only rarely people who would cross the bridge on other days.

Usually during the vacations, where few students decide to visit their families. The wouldn’t wear their school uniform on those days but the clothes which they had on the first day, so she didn’t dare to mess with them.

One day, a certain day where again people were leaving the school for their reasons, she somehow was floating under the bridge and was eavesdropping on them.

Thus she heard about the annual event for the wizard classes. An event which involved her very own element.

The examination to find wizards who were able to create water with their mana. The element of water was the rarest of all. The reason was that it wasn’t needed by humans anymore. Water was everywhere and during the age of the hero, humans and nymph learned to live together peacefully and stopped fighting each other, which had lasted since then.

Water nymphs are incidentally the most common nymph types, they would keep the rivers, lakes, and seas clean in exchange for something. Such deals became the only natural between them and humans.

Combat-wise, water magic doesn’t seem to be useful at all. It was possible to create ice with it, sure, but that was also possible with the element of fire. The wizard of the hero’s party was also called “Researcher of Magic” besides “Master of Elements”. I don’t think that the second one needs an explanation.

As a researcher, he tried to come up with new, innovative ideas of using magic and thus he figured out a way to completely replace the combat abilities of water magic with fire.

The only thing water magic was still good was the healing and cleaning of the body and soul. Nowadays there were many resorts led by nymphs who would do that for a cheap price.

Because it was the wizard’s fault for making the water magic useless for humans, he decided to create an annual event dedicated to the water element.

That event should help people grasp the sparks of the element water. It was said he was chanting and cursing many spells on that pool. The water would never get dirty but swimming in it was a still a difficult task, since it was able to cause pain in many different locations of the body to trigger the ones own mana.

The nymph of the river heard all of this and decided without thinking twice that she had to witness that exam.

She, which had the water element as its own essence she was able to do even more than a normal human water magician was capable of.

She pressed her whole being in one single water drop, evaporated it and then slowly rose over the walls of the school to then became liquid again and dropped on the head of a female teacher.

(ㆆᴗㆆ)

After many hardships, she eventually reached the pool of the wizard. Incidentally, it didn’t harm her anyway since she already mastered the element of water to 100%. Which was even for a water nymph extraordinary. Maybe the river was also enchanted and made her, who was inhabiting it, stronger.

She was exhausted and was floating in the water while observing those boys who got their bodies examined.

As the essence of water, she was able to compress herself to anything which contained the element of water in one way, it was difficult to move through airs due to the many different mana convection which was emitting from the instructors as well from some strong students. Thus she chose the hard way with body contact.

Everytime her current subject would touch someone, she would go to that person until she found someone who was related to that rumored examination.

Eventually, she found the person who was in charge of judging today’s attendees. Still shocked by the last teachers which were having “their sweet time” together she wasn’t able to correctly recall the way he took.

She just found herself in the pool at some point, apparently, the judge checked the temperature and touched the water with his fingers which transferred her again to a big water spot which started to fill her again with energy.

And there she was now, watching all those young men preparing for their examination. Their muscular bodies illuminated by the bright sunlight. A truly glorious spectacle.

While drooling, if that is what you call it in the case of a water nymph and observing those Heracles-like bodies she noticed him.

He was one of them, a boy with black hair and cold, blank, blue eyes which were directly staring at her.

After a while, she understood that he wasn’t staring at her but at the pool itself. He looked determined even though he seemingly looked like the weakest of all those men.

He wasn’t talking, laughing or goofing around with the others which treated the examination like a piece of cake or just didn’t cared enough for it since the exam was about the element water which was certainly unnecessary for the eyes of that time.

The single boy was the only one who was staring at the water and clenching his fists. He seemed determined.

The instructor gave his signal and his body immersed in the pool. The others started to groan but still continued to swim, while he was just diving in deeper.

No, he wasn’t diving, he was sinking.

The nymph, who had the feeling of concern and curiosity welling inside deep within her, approached him and also created a connection to his mind. He wasn’t aware of it of course...

How was she able to do that? A nymph-like herself, someone who mastered every possible part of the magic element water, was naturally able to enter every kind of flow.

In other words, since she was that one nymph who was inhabiting the river which was blessed by the hero, she was constantly confronted with the magical flow of his mana which was accumulated there. A mana which was created of someone who could be considered as supreme in that world.

Thus it is a natural conclusion, that she herself cannot be an ordinary nymph but something far above that and is also able to do way more than just usual.

The thought process of humans can be also considered as a flow, there were naturally some which were still able to engage in combat without thinking but usually, everyone thinks, even unconsciously which makes them forget about what they thought and gives them the illusion that they weren’t thinking about anything.

A flow certainly exists regardless, as there were currents of mana emitted by everything, there were also the flows of mind and soul which were visible for those who mastered the essence of that special movement. Just try to create an image of it in your mind, what does come first?

She wanted to enter the mind of the boy immediately after she saw his eyes. They were blue like hers when she was in her human form but for some odd reason, they were emotionless, cold as his soul was seemed to be broken as well..

His thought process was unexpected. It was not the usual mind which just consists of random words appearing and disappearing and were pretty hard to make sense out sometimes.

It was as he was actually talking. As he was telling someone a story. It was a monologue of the current situation and it was also explaining the reason of his cold gaze by telling/spilling everything out from the beginning, again and again.

(´～`)

His memories, told by the gentle yet cold voice of his soul.

The rival of the wizard which only mastered the element of water.

His lineage.

A clan

Mockery because he didn’t possess any elemental powers.

Domestic violence, pain inflicted by his own family because he was a failure. His parents beat him up after he lost to his siblings for the 100th time, needless to say, that they attacked him with strong water attacks which made his lungs scream for air each time.

Loss of the people who he thought were his friends, everyone started to look away from him and some even started to bully him because he wasn’t able to defend himself anyway.

The girl he loved not only rejecting him and telling him about her love to that talent. A kid who was considered to be a prodigy and was beloved by everyone. The boy knew he didn’t possess the right to get angry or jealous thus he just apologized to the girl and wished her good luck.

Eventually, he got banned from the clan, left with nothing. The just threw him somewhere in the desert, a place which didn’t possess much water and for him which lived in the clan of a water mage, it was something really unsettling. He understood that they hoped him to die there.

He begged traveler for water and food, he didn’t cry because all his tears were already gone after the nightmare which was once his home.

Most of the travelers just ignored him, some gave him food and he always bowed deeply when they did that. One traveling merchant picked him up and saved him.

They traveled together and thus they boy not only gained knowledge besides the water magic. How to calculate, how to kill monsters even without any mana or physical strength but only with intelligence.

The merchant was a healthy, round man who always said that the lazy lifestyle would acquire a large amount of wisdom. Since the sloth was at the end always the smartest.

The boy still stayed thin because he knew how precious food was and how even a low amount of it was able to keep him alive for one day with certain techniques. Incidentally, the merchant was although his appearance the very person who taught him that.

After one year the boy left merchant after repaying him everything he earned on his own. The boy learned from his mastered and was able to give everything back to him. He thanked and apologized before he parted ways with the merchants.

The boy eavesdropped too on a certain day when he was making some deals, about a certain school, about the wizard from the hero’s party and that pool of magic.

An annual examination which was able to trigger the element of water which could reside within a person. If he truly was someone from that lineage he could finally acquire the element of water, the very element which caused him so much pain and suffering.

And now he was sinking deeper into the water and cursing the new pain which was caused by the wizard’s pool, it felt like bolts of lightning running through his whole body, shocking him everywhere. Without showing any hints of his suffering in his expression he just endured quietly.

It was then when the girl felt that something was off. Something didn’t feel right at all. At the moment the boy was just enduring the pain while he unconsciously recalled the pain he once endured at his home. That pain from the past seems to change frequently, describing sometimes something completely different, something which didn’t fit with the memories of the boy at all.

The nymph wanted to help the boy. She radiated a bit of her power through the body of the boy. It was the non-combat power of the element, a soothing and healing effect. She knew that the boy wouldn’t forgive her when she’d help him cheating but at the same time she wasn’t able to watch the boy suffering and blaming the element for his pain.

He felt that pain became a bit dull thus he started to move his arms and also swam no laps. The nymph followed him.

Nymphs are creatures who never do things for free, as already mentioned the always want something from the humans if they ask them to clean the rivers, lakes or seas. The nymph which inhabits the river in front of the school wasn’t different.

She pitied him, she suffered with him and she helped him. Now she wanted to have her repayment and because the boy had no idea that she was doing things behind the scenes, she decided what she wanted without actually communicating with him. She went deeper into his mind while hiding her presence.

She was curious about the irregularity in his memories thus she went in to not only read and hear his thoughts and voice of mind but actually also able to see his visions.

◑.◑

What she witnessed was more pain. More suffering but this time there were also other things involved. Many strange, disturbing and cruel things.

The boy just suffered all on his own, praying to nothing special and hoping for a miracle which would save him somehow, it never came.

Only one single lap and then it was over, the boy wasn’t feeling any exhaustion but only determination. At the same time, he was hoping that he wouldn’t pass out when exits the wet.

She, who witnessed everything vowed, that she would stay with him. She wasn’t sure if she could become his miracle but she vowed to become the one person who would stay with him, who would take away, even if it is only a bit, his terrible loneliness, always.

The last lap ended, obviously, they were just those few moments which feel like an eternity but time doesn’t care about that. In the end, they are mere moments and nothing more.

He panted heavily but was also satisfied with himself. Although he wasn’t thinking how good his time was nor how he was still able to stand properly without kissing the floor.

Obviously, the latter was yet again just a confirmation that even if he thought many things were painful and he hated them. They couldn’t be like that at the end because he was still healthy and alive after all.

The boy sighed and slowly headed to the showers not giving a single glance to the board where the grades of each swimmer were listed, for some odd reason the teacher liked to show all grades to everyone instead of keeping them private or at least discrete.

Naturally, he didn’t give a glance because he already knew for a fact that he did badly. There were only a few swimmers left which indicated that he was one of the last ones.

Before leaving the swimming hall, he turned around for one last time and smiled. He hid it with his hands because he didn’t like to show those rare occasions to others though. He thought while his chest began to warm up slightly:

“Gotcha! I hope we’ll get along and thanks for taking care of me from now on.”

(σ≧∀≦)σ ＜(。_。)＞

#short story #dream #fantasy #isekai

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bloodyshirtrpg · 6 years

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♔ OC INFORMATION ♔

NAME/ALIAS & AGE:

Risa, eighteen.

PREFERRED PRONOUNS:

she/her.

TIMEZONE & ACTIVITY LEVEL:

EST. I would place my activity at a 6/10 at the moment. I currently have a pretty heavy courseload, so on some days I won’t be online, though on weekends I’ll try to make up for it. During school breaks, I’ll definitely be more available, with my activity rising to a 7 or 8/10.

♔ IC INFORMATION ♔

FULL NAME:

Selene Iora Avery

Selene: For moons and goddesses, soft vengeance and honeyed venom. She was named after beauty and mystique, that twilight enigma captured by no man or empire. Selas (σέλας): for the bright elite, for the numinous and the sacred. People would worship her. She would illuminate their sins like a passing crescent of light.

Iora: Greek for pure; for what true politician could resist the opportunity to prove and prove again his allegiance to his values? She was pure, she was pure like all the others of her status. Through her veins ran the ichor of the highest echelons of her race. But there is no power in the obvious. It was almost pitiful, that her name had to reflect her father’s pointed ambitions: that he would treat her as a bartering piece upon which ‘pure’ had to be written, like an envelope addressed in ink and blood.

Avery: They were immortalized in the 1920s by Cantankerus Nott; and ever since that moment there hasn’t been a day gone by in which the Averys did not strengthen their legacy. To be Sacred. They were a sly family, full of weasels and snakes — but she would be a raven with wings as black and glossy as night, set apart from her predecessors by her ability to soar.

FACECLAIM:

Nina Dobrev

FUTURE PLANS:

Heartbreak; She was a seductress of the highest degree, a white rose dipped in a sheen of thorns. All her life, Selene has been the most beautiful, the most coveted — and while her beauty was meant to attract suitors, she used it to devestate them instead. I think that it would be a very interesting plotline to reverse the roles for once: let someone else break her heart, wrench her affections from her. Let them lead her on, let them kiss her and promise her great things, let her believe them. Then, and only then; tear it all away. In a way, there’s a terrible excitement to exploring the tragic and unexpected: and I think that this would be a game-changer for Selene, to finally want someone with all her will, and have them play her dirty.

Sabotage; Did she truly hate her brother, or did she just envy him? It’s a question that I want to explore with Selene in-game. She has very mixed feelings regarding Nathaniel and his inability to uphold their family values, and I believe that there will come a time when she makes up her mind regarding her brother, and acts upon it. If she hates him, then she will cripple him, ruin him. If she envies him, then she will do all that is in her power to steal the throne and crown herself queen: but which is the lesser evil? Essentially, I would love to have her move against Nathaniel and wreak some family havoc. What’s more classic than the story of Cain and Abel; one sibling coveting the other, even to the point of murder?

DATE OF BIRTH:

November 15th, 1959 (age seventeen, nearly eighteen) / Scorpio — “The Scorpio motto might be “What is hidden is more interesting than what is obvious.” Their magnetic personality draws others to them, but they can also be secretive, for they learn early on that when you express everything, others may be afraid of the power of your feelings. They can become cold and withdrawn when hurt in love, and have the magic to light up the dark, but sometimes they would benefit by looking at the positive side of things rather than going into the darkness at all.”

SEXUALITY/SHIPS/ANTI-SHIPS:

I believe Selene to be bisexual at the very least - though she has a tendancy towards hetero-romantic ideals. Her battle is against men, not women: and so she makes them her victims most often, though this isn’t to say that she hasn’t rendezvoused with the same sex before (in fact, I am certain that she has).

I’m very fluid when it comes to ships, so I don’t have a specific answer to this question. I feel that the bio sets the stage for a possible romance between Nikolai and Selene - and I would entirely be up for that, given development. But the possibilities are truly endless, and I imagine that whatever may happen, it’ll form organically as gameplay moves forward. I’m a huge fan of slow-moving, deeply built ships; so I don’t expect anything fast and furious. Angst is my middle name. Tragedy is my son. Anyways; I think you know how I tend to roll by now, and I’m too invested in crying over ships to relent my ways. Slow and steady wins the race…perhaps once in a blue moon. But isnt heartbreak always the more interesting route?

WAND, PATRONUS, & BOGGART:

Wand:

Madrona, 9 & ¾ inch, supple – “A beautiful evergreen from the Pacific Northwest region of North America, it is rare in British wandmaking. However, its distinctive peeling bark denotes its magical powers of change- hence, a powerful wood for Transfiguration.”

Veela hair core – “Veela wands are temperamental like the creatures they come from, and are considered too volatile for a decent wand core in many circles. However, some wizards enjoy the boost it gives to outdoorsy magics, divinations, and Charms. The veela’s inherent intelligence makes finding these wands among the non-Veela blooded most common in Ravenclaw.”

↳ She began with a wand of Rosewood; passed down to her from her father’s mother. The only defining trait was that it was a graceful wand wood, as if that alone merited her trust. To believe in appearances alone is the folly of a weak man. That first year was somewhat disastrous as she fanangled with the weak, graceful wand that had been pushed upon her. It was when Selene went to Ollivander’s herself that he retrieved for her a wand of Madrona, uprooted from his deep archives. Her particular wand was made in the year 1929, and the bark has been polished away from the wood.

Patronus:

Arctic Fox – “Cunning, stealth, persistence. The arctic fox is infinitely adaptable, living its life in one of the world’s most extreme climates. Arctic fox people tend to be sly, graceful, and have a near magic ability to make something out of nothing, utilizing even the most limited of resources. Arctic fox as a totem can teach us the ability to go with the flow of life, changing ourselves to suit our ever-evolving environments.”

Boggart:

“Darling, what are you afraid of?”

It was a sleepy, pleasure-fed rasp in the dark. Selene felt a body stir besides her, the boy at her side raising himself up with one arm in order to press himself to her, mouth at her ear, hands running along her skin like cold satin.

“Why do you ask?” And hers was a coy, soft response. “So that you can scare me in the dark?” She smiled for his benefit rather than her own. In truth, a trembling sort of doubt had crept into her chest with that one word. She didn’t like the concept of it.

Fear. It signified cowardice, it signified that there were things in this great, grand world which could cripple her with their potency, like a drowned man in the face of god.

He smiles into the nape of her neck. “The dark, then?” And she felt herself being tugged backwards, she felt his lips crash hungrily into her own; and she gave into it, not because she was afraid of the dark, but because she was afraid of the mundane. That fate that lay before her, every night like this one - it seized her in her most vulnerable moments, and she was entirely, helplessly afraid.

↳ Her boggart would be a vision of herself as a domestic housewife: the most mundane of existences, in her opinion. The idea that she can hold as much talent and ambition as all the world and still be confined to a lifetime of boredom - it’s more terrifying than the prospect of death. She is desperate to escape her fate and build a new one. She would rather die than be reduced to someone’s prize horse, to be ridden hard, and retired easy.

FOUR CHARACTERISTICS:

Fascinating: She was beautiful, she was full of divinity and consequence. Fascination is a curious thing: it’s striking, it’s memorable; it’s something otherworldly. She was a girl of silk and lace. The people she met, the hearts that she broke - she would never fade from them, they would never forget her. Her very presence cast an impossible imprint upon all those who looked at her and heard her speak. It made her formidable, she supposed. To be known and idolized, to be worshiped and dreamt of. Wetdream, daydream, chiffon-nightmare. Chanel No. 5, pervading their sleep and whispering sweet nothings into their ears.

Pragmatic: Her sharpness of mind was like the glint of a sword; all at once lethal and impressive. She was ambitious, yes. But beyond that, she was intelligent, sensible; possessing an enormous capacity for reason. Crime and Punishment. War and Peace. While the Slytherins followed their blind ambitions to the gates of Purgatory without blinking, she knew well what lay on the road before her. All things, even suffering, can be alleviated by planning. Her judgement is one of her greatest assets; and her mind is her greatest weapon: beyond her lips or her legs or her eyes, her mind is what truly entices. Aphrodite was beautiful, yes - but Athena had ended empires with a close of her fist.

Jealous: Even god himself is a jealous god. It seems that the fate of all divine beings is to want and hoard and hold close to them that which is theirs. Selene is often prone to envy: she envies Nathaniel for his unmerited inheritance, she envies Nikolai for stealing Evan’s affection, she envies and envies until it fills her lungs with thoughts of retribution. Things and people who she sees as “hers” are sacred in her eyes, and she will break heaven and raise hell in order to wrestle them back if they are taken from her.

Manipulative: She was a raven, but she possessed the cunning of a snake. As Helen had started a war of the ages with her manipulation and beauty, and Delilah had rendered Samson futile with her charming murmurs and a well-placed mouth; so Selene manipulated those around her with her charisma. She could be the devil’s prostitute for those boys who craved a bit of brutality, she could be a heavenly wraith for all the girls who wished to be treated softly. Her manipulation came in many forms - verbal, metaphorical, physical. Even with a single glance, she could convey entire worlds of lies. In the span of one conversation, sinners could be born again, the blinded could again see a pinprick of light. She had the tongue of a seductress, the mind of a empress, the voice of a siren, the hands of a nympth.

CONNECTIONS:

Nikolai Selwyn — “I don’t want to be around you. I don’t want to drink you in. I want to walk into the heart of you and never walk back out. “ —Nico Alvarado from “Tim Riggins Speaks of Waterfalls”

↳ She wanted him for no rhyme or reason: just that she could. She wanted him to bow before her, she wanted to place her hand upon his cheek and see him shudder at her touch. “You cannot evade me,” she murmurs to him in the twilight. “Not all of us are conquerable,” is his flippant response, matching her every move with a mirror move of his own. In truth, she envies Nikolai: she envies his bond with Evan, she envies his promising future, she envies that he is not hers to touch and hold captive. There is a wine-dark streak of ambition in his soul, and she senses it calling to hers. She’s considered it; my god, she’s considered it. How would they look standing side by side? Would their scepters match in shades of gold? How great an empire could they build, if they were to give into their primal urges and kiss each other like the hungry, insatiable beasts they were?

Nathaniel Avery — “Do you want it? Do you want anything I have? Will you throw me to the ground like you mean it, reach inside and wrestle it out with your bare hands?” —Richard Siken from “Wishbone”

↳ Her brother had everything that she ever wanted, but he still found ways to hurt her anew. But she loved him, oh she loved him with a lingering purity, an inconsolable affection. They were both children once, after all: those were the best days, weren’t they? She still sees Nathaniel as a child, given his reckless antics, and often she’s the one to clean up his messes. He resents her, she knows this. But as much as she covets what he has innately been given, she doesn’t truly hate him. They both know that she’s more capable, more dangerous, more fit for the throne. But no matter how he might shirk his responsibilities and despise his role, Selene knows that Nathaniel would never, ever relinquish his hold on the Avery legacy to her. Not without a fight, not without a blood-soaked war.

Evan Rosier — “You happened to me. You were as deep down as I’ve ever been. You were inside me like my pulse.” —Marilyn Hacker from "Nearly a Valediction”

↳ “Do you love me?” It’s a tradition of theirs, to ask one another this. She asks him now, curled up against his shoulder as they watch the breeze roll in from the mountainpeaks, rippling across the grounds like a ghost. “Until the day the sun sets in the east,” he replies with an absolute certainty. And she smiles. All else can fade, but she’s certain that her bond with Evan will last forever. Contrary to what others might assume from their affectionate touches and deep familiarity, they are not lovers and will never be. They’re platonic soulmates, a different sort of union that is unbreakable by time or war. She worries deeply over Evan. He is her light and her shield, and she can’t imagine losing him to the hysteria which has overtaken the others of their society — he is not Achilles, golden warrior of the front lines. He is Patroclus, and she’s so desperately afraid of letting him go, only to receive him back in ashes. She does everything in her power to save them both from their impending dooms.

FREESTYLE PORTION:

Playlist: The Comets (for Selene & Evan)

Tag: (quotes, images, flashes of who I envision her to be) Click here

Diary Entry:

JULY 21ST, 1976

There is a misconception that beautiful women are thornless. We are ripe for the picking, simply a commodity to be auctioned and then bought by the highest bidder. It is just as Mary Wollstonecraft wrote: we are flowers, cultivated and planted within the shallowest of soil, so that every breath we draw depends entirely upon the whims of our masters. Our petals are ground to be their perfume, and because we were watered with wine and dreams, we inevitably wilt before our time. I am my father’s flower, a helpless, wilting bloom. I am to be here one day and gone the next, and he is to clink his pouch of gold as he makes the trade.

I fear destruction. It is like oblivion, a monstrous, infallible thing, armoured and willing to face even the strongest of souls. I feel myself hurtling towards it every day, every night. Particularly now, when I cannot breathe for the corset at my waist, and cannot cry for the mask upon my face. The monsters are already closing in. Their eyes pierce into my side and shake every foundation I have built in my seventeen years. They undress me, and I am always scrambling for honour, fighting not to lose it. There will come a day when they become too many, and even I cannot fight them any longer. My weapons are quiet ones - they brandish armories and swords, I brandish only myself.

Today, I nearly lost even that. It sickens me to write of it, but it also is a reminder that must be committed to ink, an admonition to my future and my psyche.

I am always willing to be touched, to be violated, even - for the sake of my games. Like a queen must sacrifice pieces, I must allow certain events to transpire in order to reach my goal. Some are small.

Pawns: a man’s mouth against mine, rough and hard, his teeth clicking against my own, the taste of whiskey in his breath. The warm slithering feeling of a tongue slipping past my lips, intertwining as he presses me against the edge of a table.

Rooks…wandering hands that begin at my waist and then stray to my chest — grasping, handling, lingering over the black lace and dark chiffon we women don for their imagination.

Some are larger, more important, less forgivable…and it is when they are taken from me that I feel like I may be slipping, that I may be losing this match to the enemy.

My knights, my bishops.

Last night, I suffered a loss that haunts me even now. It is not a loss that I have not already seen. And yet his hand between my thighs, thrusting, twisting, drawing this primal, feral thing out of me…I’m almost ashamed to say that I almost enjoyed it, that I arched my back and cried his name out like it meant something. Then there was his mouth, already stained crimson from my lips, and I hated it, I hated him — and yet I fell to those carnal pleasures, the stubble of his chin against my thighs, my fingers grasping the thick locks of his hair, torn between wanting him to stop and wanting more.

This is the danger of the precipice.

You think yourself powerful, guarded — and yet as your soldiers fall beneath you, you feel the urge to leap into that gorge, to face the beast yourself, to offer everything for the sake of victory. But you lose yourself to the glory, the feeling of love and sweat on your hands, spilling down your thighs like Poseidon’s saltwater spring…unintentionally wonderful and yet utterly pointless.

And that is when you fall.

Or nearly. He was naked, a beautiful youth, Adonis of our age. I did not know him, but his blood was pure like ichor, like those of the gods, he may have been Aphrodite’s favorite. And in the marble bareness of his chest, that moonlit organ hard between his legs, I found a type of twisted satisfaction. But not enough, never enough. He was a bishop, but I am the queen. When I fall, the entire board capsizes.

I left him there with a kiss and nothing more.

There was something ugly, hideous in his gaze; when I pulled from him. He made as if to grab me, to silence my cries and get it over with. I would have killed him if he had.

Perhaps the blood wouldn’t even lie on my hands — I know that there are those who would murder with a single word of my command.

WRITING SAMPLES:

( For this portion of the app, I decided to take the prompt literally, and provide a few flashes, glimpses, and short windows of insight into Selene at various points across time. Some are vague, others are fleeting — but I hope that they come together to give a somewhat holistic view of how I plan on portraying her. )

♚ ONE.

“Do you believe in omens?” Her voice is quiet, musing, a murmured menagerie of pale interest and cool apathy. She watches the bodies stream pass their perch at the banister, one after another, caught in a bacchic frenzy, food and drink fueled by an anxious trepidation. Her companion looks on at the scene below. They are like lions surveying a stampede of gazelles; choosing their prey, calculating their victories. Selene scoffs, a soft sound. “In times of war, harbingers like this always promised riots to come. Look at them. Look at their fear.”

♚ TWO.

It was always an exciting affair to return an illicit volume to its rightful place upon the shelves. A trickyaffair, dangerous, full of sleights of hands and misleading paths to fool the eyes of any beholder. Selene slipped past the stories of magical beasts and their destruction, stepped through the sector dedicated to the most famous of the wizarding race — slowed as she approached potions and alchemy. Her fingers wrapped tighter about the leather-bound notebook at her chest, remembering page 37 and its deadly advice, thinking upon it. A turn of the corner, a glance cutting across the small expanse — and dark eyes reflected dawn’s light as recognition flooded their depths. A sigh, soft, like the grey light. “I don’t trust you with your own judgment this morning, mon cher. It seems to be…lacking.”

For there Evan was, asleep on the ground. He was graceful even in his sloth, but she nonetheless goes to him, shakes him lightly; presses a chaste kiss to his forehead when he stirs but does not wake.

♚ THREE.

Her smile wavered before falling into oblivion. She did not play games where others were used as leverage, certainly not those who she had purposely excluded from her board. Nathaniel had crossed some irreversible line, broken an unspoken rule. He had involved a piece that she had expressively hidden away in his convoluted games.

“Our father must be pleased that a boy like you is his heir and that I’m only the spare.” Her voice was quiet, eerily so; the imperium was not in volume, but in nature. “But to have half a beast inherit his name would be a harrowing blow, would it not? Like Minos and his Minotaur, a creature appeased only by the blood of maidens, confined within a labyrinth where he believes himself k i n g .”

Now she leans forward as she stands from her seat, her lips inches from his ear, dark locks lending the two Avery siblings a brief moment of seclusion, a heartbeat for her to etch her murmered mark. “I suggest that you heed my warning, little king. You’re running yourself into a dead end.”

♚ FOUR.

It dripped from her, a seduction as golden-dark and rich as honey; that gilded absence of imperfection. To look at her was to die. Such a mouth, such a face, such fingers, pressing bruised kisses into the flesh of men and women alike; Eros’ executioner, bedecked in a cloak of darkness and lace, feeding upon the misguided love of her victims.

She stands now, wrapped in that invincibility (that impossibility) of bedroom eyes and smokey murmurs, champagne-kisses and the soft flutter of a dress as it falls to the floor. About her, a dozen beings are having a thousand dreams of touching and being touched by her, and she is fully aware of their hunger. They may deny it, they may suppress it, but the way that she moves, ah, she is from heaven and they are sinners begging for salvation, found in the passionate press of her lips, the flicker of her dark eyes, silver in the moonlight.

“My darling.” It’s the real executioner sweeping up to her in all his finery, smiling like a wolf, all teeth and hackles and obsidian daggers. Nikolai Selwyn. He is seventeen and already holds himself with the same air which characterizes his father’s dynasty, and though she doesn’t want to play into his game tonight, together they nonetheless exude a sense of power which is both intimidation and seduction.

Their surroundings pale, their opponents simmer with a quiet envy, daggers in their gazes and an unbidded wanting drying in their mouths. Opulence and wealth become quite inconsequential unless they are inhabited by the sure-footed elite, and in this manor of silk screens and white lace doilies, of ash fireplaces and ancient halls of secrets, they nearly dominate.

“My tormentor,” she replies to him in greeting, offering him her hand. He smiles, a crooked sort of smile that indicates that he’s genuine, if only for a night. And though she never does tell him, throughout the duration of that night, she is grateful for his company, the shadow-dark solidarity of him. If only for a night. What more should they expect; when they lived lies as extravagantly as if they were the glorious truth?

♚ FIVE.

There was a certain restlessness to the halls even in their state of solitude: but perhaps the feeling of frenzy was merely the beating of her heart. Once, she had relished its pulse. It was a sign that she was human, that despite all her wrongdoings, she had not yet risen to a place too far to be redeemed. Surely, when the day of her judgement arrived, she would hear it in the beating of her heart; it would skip and wrench, she would know with certainty that this is the end. Wretched organ of love, destroyer of worlds.

Tonight, as she steps lightly over the marble floors of a castle asleep, there is blood smeared on her mouth.No, it was merely lipstick. Hers? Theirs?

It had come to a point where she barely blinked after one such entanglement. Kiss them, lead them, lay with them; hear their breaths in the dark. These sorts of excursions had once been sparse, but now, with the last dredges of her humanity coming out in desperate attempt to change her impending fate, the nights were blurring, the sheets tangling one step closer to the ultimate picking of the rose. She was on dangerous grounds. It was her version of delirium, this uncouth consistency, one hard mouth exchanged for another, a different skin against hers each time the moon rose again. Pureblood, halfblood, blood without blood - did it matter? Promiscuity was separated from temptation by a fine division, but she could be characterized as neither. This was not a sport to enjoy, it was a hunt to numb the senses.

She walked as if in a trance. Dark cloaks drawn about her to make up for the chill of minutes prior (she was told that her collarbones could bring the sharpest of men to their knees), Selene was sweeping through the empty bones of a great establishment, and her mind was fleeing from her. Gaze lost; thoughtless. This was her delirium. And someone else was witnessing it. Darkness’ brother was fear. But she does not fear the boy in the shadows when her black gaze coolly rises to meet his.

Few specters frequented this twilight realm of hers.

“If not for your trademark arrogance, Nikolai, I might have passed you by.” She raises her chin by the slightest degrees, adjusting her tired bones to his height, adjusting her mindlessness for weary blades of steel.

“If not for the smear of your lipstick, I would have let you,” is his quaint reply, light; but carrying a far deeper connotation. He challenges her.

She meets his eyes across the moon-dark hall, and all at once they understand one another. Not like Evan understands her, no; but there is something familiar and innate in the Slytherin’s face that mirrors the hidden emotions in her own.

They had been children once. Pure, untainted. Once - though she despised the act of remembering it, she had been defenseless. Perhaps he had been as well. She wonders then, what had brought him to this place, to walk with her in shadows, to see the same dappled halls as she did, with eyes cold, serpentine…a gaze that so mirrored her own.

For her, it had been the roughness of hands in the dark, a snarling command pressed against her ear by her father and all his male companions alike, the reminder, the constant beratement that she was weak, meant only for another’s pleasure, that her power lay between her legs and no place else. She was in a labyrinth, and it was her destiny to be devoured by the beast who lusted for her flesh. Or so they insisted.

She would devour them if they spoke to her now. They would see her and want her, and she would tear their filthy hands from her waist, leave them bleeding out like dogs groveling at her feet. She was more powerful than they could ever dream to be. One movement of her hips, and she could destroy ships, obliterate mountains, move men like pawns across a board built from her fear, her anxiousness, herdetermination. There was nothing inevitable but her, and she would make them pay for what they had wished. But Nikolai— he was this world’s gentleman, void of such malignant tendencies, such terrible bigotries. There was a cool charm to him. There is now, as Selene stands across from him, drinking in the image of his dark cloaks, his dark hair, those tantalizing eyes. They may seem like equals, her cold gaze holding his accountable, but she had climbed further, run farther, reached and sacrificed and tiptoed and fought with a vigor that he would never know.

Fear, know thy master.

“I’m tired tonight, Nik.” It’s a familar nickname, too familiar perhaps. But it slips from her like water, and she doesn’t try to take it back. “Let me pass.”

“Let me see you.” He’s looking right at her. But she knows precisely what he means. This is another game, but it doesn’t feel like a game, it feels real; it feels heavy like the weight of a world. Her heart sinks, she feels her exhaustion anew. When she speaks again, her wariness is palpable

“I’m standing right here.”

But he’s adamant. Nikolai never did disappoint. His control was impressive, and she sees it now. He wants to let go, but still he holds back. He’s holding back from her. He sighs, for her. Because of her. “No you’re not, Selene. Not the real you.”

She meets his eyes for a long moment. Then Selene brings one hand to her mouth, and with an almost brutal motion, smears the rest of her lips. A scarlet slash cuts across her face in shades of creme and rose. She looks like an angel of death, just returned from swallowing a mortal heart.

“See me, then.”

Now he falters, and she drinks in his fallacy as a butterfly would nectar. Leo Tolstoy once wrote; It is amazing how complete is the delusion that beauty is goodness. Did this boy of darkness and torn shirts fancy her in need of his protection? The thought makes her want to laugh, and if she were a being of impulse, who allowed every whim to come to fruition, perhaps she would.

Instead, a smile. It cuts like a wound, blood-red lipstick. Waning crescent, holding a transcendence like the moon in an unforgiving November sky. There are some things that she has learnt to sense. Darkness is an old friend, she has walked hand in hand with it upon many a lonely, narrow road; and she recognizes it. Tonight, it resides in Nikolai’s chest, fluttering as strongly as a dragon’s wings at her proximity. Selene knows that she has won. She sweeps forward, gliding in the silence, relishing its softness as she draws closer to this proud, tall boy who could not show his concern, could not live without his wand, cannot hope to capture her —

“I show you only what you need to see, mon amour.” A pause, and she is close to him. She can smell his cologne, and there it is again, the feverish reflection of herself in his gaze. “While you,” and she wraps one hand about his, which is slack at his side. It’s strangely warm. Her fingers intertwine with all those tendons and knuckles, calloused skin against her soft palm. “You show me everything that I want.” That flash of a smile. “Your gaze is feral, Nikolai. There are primal urges that have been awakened within you; but you crave for something more than flesh and blood.”

“You crave what you don’t understand,” She passes him like a wraith, and he makes no move to stop her. Her whisper lingers.

“And it consumes you.”

♚ SIX.

Any other would hide their marks, those shameful scars of being dominated by another. But she is not ashamed, nor is she made so by their words, those sly syllables crafted to strike, to bury themselves within her flesh and wound her psyche. But she was not ashamed. She had awned her head back, felt teeth bite. Her jugular was not so easily split.

“Do you think this is the first time someone has raised a hand to me?” A musing murmur, and as that velveteen tone slips through scarlet lips, she can see that somewhere, her words have struck a truth. She turns towards the windows, her visage illuminated by night, a small reprieve in which she will allow them to recover. The bruises upon her throat glow ghostly in the night.

“How do I cope?” It was the unasked question, so she asks it for them. “I like to think of it as a temporary affliction, an insect’s fervored kiss.” And like a velvet curtain falling to reveal the work beneath, a single movement of her head, and her cloak slips from her shoulder, revealing half a dozen more dark compressions, littered like stars upon the smoothness of her shoulder. She makes no move to hide what they already must suspect. Sex is rough. Ambition is rougher.

“Don’t worry after me, love. I have very high tolerance for suffering. ”

♚ SEVEN.

She had promised retribution, and it trembles in her bones, the sound and the fury of it, the echoes of every premonition and terror. He stands before her, gaze averted, and it’s written all over his face: the guilt, the ready admission. It’s too easy - she wishes that it were harder, that he stood tall and straight, unblinking, insisting upon his innocence, proud until the end. But it seems that tonight has changed both of them, turned one into the mirage of another, stuck pins into the hard ice of their hearts, melted them for the sake of preserving what has been tainted.

The sincerity of what is to come is heavy in the air between them, and as she swallows the lump in her throat, she thinks: how ironic, that only when a threat of such caliber hangs above them that he can face her like this, without his armour, his barbs, those offenses that would barrage her so, push her until she was gritting her teeth and at the edge of the cliff, tempted by the idea of abandoning all care for the sake of primal revenge. So when Selene does speak, she is past suppressing what has been building in her, for years and years — this is the tipping point, and he knows as well as she how terribly their ship has rocked, how monstrously the storm rages. “Look at me,” she says, once. She is the wolf and he is silent. “What did you do, Nathaniel?” Her voice is eerily calm, but then it breaks, and the anger, the emotion that she has withheld for so long; it begins to leak. She speaks in a hiss, like the snake she almost could have been. “Nathaniel.” It’s not a question, but a command, and you can see it in her gaze — she would kill to see it obeyed. “Were you or were you not part of that despicable affair?”

♚ EIGHT

Eyes are the window to the soul. It was a timeless phrase, recycled, reused, debated by philosophers who thought themselves privy to the world of inner turmoil, hidden agendas behind flashing eyes and painted smiles. Who thought themselves able to speak of a secret history. She had seen many eyes in her lifetime - met a thousand gazes. Demurely, coldly, sweetly, cruelly — and perhaps it was true, these musings. In those lingering stares, she found more than carnal desire…and oh, if the stars had only hid their heavenly fire, perhaps those veiled depths might have remained today’s gift, tomorrow’s mystery.

Nathaniel’s were dead wet, the color of sickness. A puerile sickness, all tantrums thrown at twilight and too much force behind thick fists as they pounded against mahogany tables. A vicious jealousy, fueled by rash thinking and a need to conquer all - a boy who thought his future held a crown, and thus acted like a tyrant long before it had ever touched his head. When he campaigned and lost against his self-made enemies, & all his tricks lay slain on the battlefield, the wail of rage that went up was a terrible, terrible thing…such a shame, such a waste of a pretty face, such a waste of p o w e r .

Hers were hellfire, obsidian dark and ash gray - smoking flickers of a smoldering flame contained in that crevice between her lungs and her ribcage. When you leaned into the crook of that beautiful neck, swanlike, it was the scent of jasmine…and something else. Did a m b i t i o n have a scent? Or was it a subtle thing that she tucked within herself, deep in that cold cool organ which she called a heart? A warrior queen dressed like a lamb: a long-legged, lupine thing, all silver teeth and golden claws, taking on the guise of her prey. She ate the bodies that the boy king left behind, wolfed down the remnants of his mistakes, turned that formidable pair of eyes upon another unsuspecting ruler to do it all over again. Her stealth was her weapon, it was her a d v a n t a g e .

Girls don’t speak until spoken to - and so she watched the world through heavy lashes until it bent to her bidding, until there was no creature that could resist her charms. She was not a beautiful thing, not in the classic sense, not like they wanted her to be. No, she was the crack of thunder against alabaster stone, a drop of blood in winter’s first snow, the thorn that pricks the unsuspecting finger on the underside of a rose. She was cruel, she was ruination, she was the saccharine taste of poison a moment before it grips and kills, bittersweet until the very end.

Girls don’t become powerful - and so she was not, at least, not from her appearance. She studied in secret, cut her delicate fingers fumbling with ancient pages in the midnight dark, marred those honeyed hands with the waxen heat of her quiet fury, her searing aspirations. Candlelight was where she stood her vigil, where she planned her battles. It was beneath the sun, in the clasp of daylight, that she played them out. A lovely thing she was, in these hours when she was most dangerous - soft, graceful, a vision of divine absolution, ichor flowing through her veins and making her glow, making her desirable. A lovely thing she was, when she had so much power to h u r t .

You are man’s plaything, you are their pet, their every whim. You are Eve, made for Adam’s pleasure. Their warmth, their foundation, their dearly beloved — their shadow, their buried support, the thing that they bend across the soft silk of a bed with hands rough and too accustomed to love lost. A mare to be ridden, until the sheen of sweat on her hide was broken by a cry in the dead of night, a child mewling its hallowed name. She knew what they expected, she had known it her entire life, this impending doom above her head, threatening her and constraining her, making it ten times more difficult to rise than to fall into that niche she had been born into - but her resolve was beyond what they ever could have imagined. She knew of legislation and judgement, of landmasses and kings - the history of the world perched upon her palm, and among it, there were so few women queens, so few heroines: but had they existed as she did? Quietly, a simmering force beneath a complacent exterior? Did they paint their lips, smooth the waists of their gowns and chiffon, glance at themselves in the mirror and see the serpent beneath the flower? She had been told to be men’s companion, and so she was. She was bound to them, so she made them her foundation, the poor unfortunate souls who she sucked dry, their blood smearing her mouth. And she laughed.

She laughed like a god.

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