#i was so genuinely excited to a) see an ask and b)get the chance to talk about beartown and backman and his writing | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

fuckyeah-jessicabiel · 1 year

Photo

GQ Magazine - July 2007

The Summer of Jessica Biel

To celebrate Biel’s being in a movie actually worth seeing, we sent Adam Stein to play carnival games with her.

When I told various friends I’d be interviewing Jessica Biel, I got the responses you’d expect—jealousy, mild rage, a plea to give her a phone number because she’s the one person that a friend’s wife would give him a free pass to sleep with. The uncanny thing is, when I asked these guys what they thought of her as an actress, most of them drew a blank. They hadn’t seen a single motion picture of hers. Okay, one or two had girlfriends who’d brought them to see The Illusionist, but otherwise, nada. As my friend Taj put it: “I’m obsessed with a girl I’ve never seen move.“

Well, that’s about to change. Later this month, men across America will see Jessica being very good in a very funny movie, and the nature of their love for her will…deepen. She’ll still be inhumanly beautiful, sure, but now they’ll have to contend with genuine talent, too, and that one-two punch can be disorienting. You know what else can? The fact that despite her recent tabloid exposure, she’s actually sweet, funny, earnest, occasionally a little crude, and—if my time playing carnival games with her can be used as evidence—uniquely driven to conquer whatever stands between Jessica Biel and what she wants.

I am waiting for her at the Santa Monica Pier, sitting on a stool next to one of those games where you shoot water from a gun into a clown’s mouth. I haven’t shaved for a week, because I read somewhere that Jessica Biel likes guys with beards. I’m inspecting mine in the reflective back of my iPod when a nice-looking young woman materializes in my view. “Excuse me,“ she says. “Are you Adam?“ “Jessica?“ I ask, ridiculously. Of course it’s her, in wraparound sunglasses, an open gray sweater over a white blouse, and faded jeans. She wears checkered Vans, like Jeff Spicoli. On the pier, no one recognizes her, which I suppose makes sense: There’s little resemblance between the pinup girl and the sneaker-wearing civilian out on a Monday afternoon. She doesn’t stick out as we walk the wooden planks of the amusement park; she blends in. She is, you might say, a very chill girl.

“Can we get a photo next to a star?“ she asks, stopping in front of a booth hawking photographs with huge cardboard cutouts of celebrities. It’s an impressive, eclectic array: Bill Clinton, Mini Me, Michael Jordan, Hilary Duff, Enrique Iglesias(!), Jean-Claude Van Damme, DiCaprio in Titanic. “They’re all kind of old,“ she says. I don’t know if she means the cutouts or the celebrities themselves (because to me, Mini Me will never age). She’s only 25 years old, so it could go either way. I ask her who she’d most want to pose with. She scrutinizes the assembly and makes her call: “I’d probably pick Van Damme, cause he looks the coolest.“ She takes the Muscles from Brussels over Leo—a victory of might over sensitivity. Nice.

Then she decides it’s time for the games to begin. She passes up the Riptide Ring Toss (“That one is impossible,“ she says) and focuses her attention on the Pier Plank Plunge. The PPP is basically a rope ladder suspended horizontally over an inflatable mattress. The trick is to climb, perfectly balanced, to a taunting red button placed approximately ten feet away. Press the button, win the prize—an enormous Sonic the Hedgehog. I ask her if she’s ever Pier Plank Plunged before. “Yes,“ she says, assessing the structure, looking for its weaknesses. “But I’ve never been able to achieve it.“ She begins barraging the bored-looking carny with questions. “Do you have any tips?“ (It’s all about balance.) “Have you done it before?“ (Nope.) “Has anyone ever won?“ (Yeah.) “Has anyone won today?“ (Not yet.) She turns to me, and I have to say she seems genuinely excited. “This is our chance,“ she says. “It’s our chance to win.“ I’m beginning to get the distinct impression that winning is important to Jessica Biel. “Ladies first“ being the imperative, I take the initial go-round. It’s harder than it looks. My arms shake. Everything shakes. I can feel her hopefulness—Do it, get there—but I fall off within seconds. The shame is truly surprising. I wanted to do it for Jessica and failed. She throws me a “good try“ before stepping up herself.

Jessica was a gymnast when she was younger, and the training appears to be paying off as she mounts the unstable rope ladder. (It also occurs to me that the view I currently have is one the paparazzi would kill for.) She deploys a disciplined crawl, gets tantalizingly close to the red button, reaches for it—and loses her balance, flips over, and lands flat on the cushion, laughing. “Holy shit,“ she yells. “It’s so hard. That’s so frustrating.“ The carny asks if we’d like to try again. She pauses for a moment, looking at the button, and then, with obvious reservations, demurs. “You were really, really close,“ I tell her. “I know,“ she says, still staring at it, reluctant to move, apparently, without conquering the damn thing. “That’s how it gets you.“

Next up is something called the Hi-Striker, a game in which you swing a mallet to test your strength. I take three feeble swings, each one less successful than the last. A huge Hispanic man laughs every time I bring the mallet down on the metal block, and when I exit the cage and hand it off to the female attendant, she takes one exhibition swing and makes my emasculation complete. Up goes the projectile. Ping goes the bell.

J.B. watches, rapt. “Look at her awesome stance,“ she whispers, absorbing the details, memorizing the motion. Some actors “find“ their characters via a process of internalization—investigating emotions, plumbing psychology, creating an “inner life.“ This is known as the inside-out approach. Other actors work outside-in—developing a walk, a gesture, a physicality. Look at, say, Hilary Swank in Million Dollar Baby. Look at Jessica Biel in the Hi-Striker cage.

Mimicking the attendant’s, her first swing easily skunks my best effort. And she improves with each attempt. She’s getting into character. As she exits the cage, there’s a look of satisfaction on her face. She returns the mallet to the attendant, who looks at me and says: “She did better than you.“ As we leave, I ask her: “Is it more technique than strength?“ She shakes her head. “Brute strength,“ she says. “You just throw it up and slam it as hard as you can.“ On our way off the pier, we pass Zoltar, the animatronic fortune-teller who turned that kid into Tom Hanks in Big. Zoltar senses us and speaks: “Destiny is not a matter of chance; it is a matter of choice. It is not a thing to be waited for; it is a thing to be achieved.“ Zoltar makes Jessica smile. She digs his philosophy.

Jessica Biel’s destiny, at least of late, has led her to a prominent place in the trashy supermarket gossip rags. First it was snapshots of social excursions with second-banana studs (Chris Evans, Ryan Reynolds). Then, upping the ante, there was a beach fling with a sports icon (Derek Jeter). And then, in February, she grabbed the tabloid brass ring for reportedly nabbing the world’s most eligible bachelor, Justin Timberlake. Unsurprisingly, it’s not something she’ll discuss.

One thing she is happy talking about, though, is the unladylike girth of her knuckles. We’re getting dinner at an unassuming Italian trattoria across the street from the pier when she flashes those meaty joints and describes her nascent production company. “It was almost called Fat Knuckle Films. Because I have fat knuckles. See?“ she asks. “They don’t really look that way until you start putting rings on them, and then it stops right there.“

I have to say, Jessica Biel’s chunky midfingers are endearing, human, attainable—a word she uses a number of times in our conversation, as if to remind the world that she’s just a regular girl from Boulder, Colorado, who happens to have been called, by Esquire magazine in 2005, the Sexiest Woman Alive.

“At first I felt really embarrassed about it,“ she says. “You know, it’s a weird thing to talk about. Like, Hey, guys. Guess what?’ You don’t just go telling everybody that.“ She shifts her weight forward and goes on: “But after I got over that, I just started to embrace it. I started thinking, If I ever do have kids, and if they have kids, I can tell them: You know what? Your grandma in 2000-and-whatever was the Sexiest Woman Alive. How about that, kids?’ That’s what I started to think about. I’ll always have that picture to say, That’s what Granny used to look like.’ “

Before coming out here to get my ass handed to me at the Hi-Striker, I immersed myself in Jessica Biel’s Collected Works. She got her start in the mid-’90s on 7th Heaven, the WB dramedy that made a splash with the moral-values set, before leaving around 2002 for bigger (and badder) things. It’s been a grim scene ever since: Summer Catch (2001), which starred Freddie Prinze Jr. and stands at number forty-nine on Rotten Tomatoes’ 100 Worst- Reviewed Films of All Time. The Rules of Attraction (2002), notable only for Fred Savage shooting heroin between his toes and saying things like “I can feel my dick.“ (Remarkably, Biel comes across as fresh and charming, despite the astonishing pointlessness and nihilism of the flick.) The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003), which was Biel’s first top billing and is her biggest box-office performer to date, with a take of about $80 million. J.B. screams her head off throughout the movie and is entirely believable in distress, but you can’t help thinking as you watch her, There’s got to be better material than this. Sadly, no. There was an atrocity called Cellular, in 2004, and Blade: Trinity that same year (in which Biel kicks much undead ass as a midriff-baring vampire hunter). But the nadir has to be London, in ’06, a delusional piece of trash that starts off with a sex scene, Biel on top, saying, “Are you coming? Are you coming?“ before she proceeds to another not-quite-dignified act and then dips out of the frame to, presumably, swallow. Like I said, a grim scene.

And then, just in the nick of time, salvation arrived. A script called The Illusionist, to star Edward Norton and Paul Giamatti. There was a problem, though. The filmmakers didn’t want to give Biel an audition. They weren’t convinced the vampire-hunting Hollywood creation could rearrange herself into the role of a refined fin de siècle Hungarian duchess.

But Jessica Biel has a hard time taking no for an answer. And when another actress “dropped out“ of the film, her tenacity paid off. They finally brought her in. She arrived wearing a full period costume. She made them take her seriously, she says, and three days later, an offer arrived.

The Illusionist wasn’t what you’d call a “hit,“ but it got good reviews, made decent money, and changed the industry’s perception of her. Doors that were closed began to open. They just weren’t opening fast enough for her taste.

She sets down her after-dinner tea and says, “I want choices. I want options. I want to lay out all the directions I could go and have the ability to choose. I’m slowly starting to have that now.“ It’s the “slowly“ that kills her.

One film that will almost surely expedite the process is I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry, which will be released this month. It stars Adam Sandler and Kevin James as two Brooklyn firefighters who pretend to be a gay couple in order to receive domestic-partner benefits. J.B. plays the female lead, their hoodwinked attorney who falls for Sandler by the end of the picture.

Chuck and Larry is Jessica’s first real shot at popular, mainstream film success. Unlike her previous big-budget endeavors, it doesn’t rely on CGI or fetishistic weaponry to make its points. It is also—apologies to Freddie Prinze Jr. —her first comedy.

“It was a little bit intimidating,“ she says. “I really admire Adam and Kevin, but then, I didn’t try to equal them or one-up them, and the character I created didn’t have to be that. She’s the straight woman, but very fun and very cool and just—attainable. That’s the kind of part that I’d like to play more. I mean, a vampire hunter? Is that really attainable? I’d just like to play something a little more quirky, interesting, outrageous. And uninhibited.“

“You’re not worried that she can do comedy,“ the movie’s director, Dennis Dugan, tells me. “You can tell she can do comedy. So we just met her and cast her. I really think she can have one of those diverse, Oscar-winning careers. As far as I’m concerned, there’s no horizon to her talent.“

The sun has gone down, and we’re standing on the sidewalk in front of the Italian joint, across from the pier. I’m holding a small stuffed Spider-Man doll that Jessica won as a prize back at the amusement park and which she’s given to me to give to my son. I ask what she’s doing tonight, and she says she’s playing chaperone to a girlfriend on a first date. “Basically, I’m her wingman tonight,“ she says. “I’ll probably slip away if it’s rolling along well.“

She graciously agrees to a photograph with me, which I would include except for two reasons: (1) I don’t want to make Justin Timberlake jealous, and (2) you never quite understand how unattractive you are until you see yourself in a picture with Jessica Biel.

I watch her as she walks toward the pier. I know it’s where her car is parked, but I have this image of her heading straight back to the Pier Plank Plunge. The carny won’t know who she is, nobody on the pier will recognize her, and she’ll just hand over her fiver and go at it. That red button, almost within her reach. Attainable.

#jessica biel #gq #gq 2007 #articles #magazines #cover #interviews

249 notes · View notes

nyoomerr · 3 months

Note

How do you always pop out banger fics? I feel like everyone and their mothers in the fandom adore your fics and not one of your stuff has ever been a flop! Seriously, what's your secret??

djkhfg but more seriously, there have definitely been fics i've posted that i personally wasn't happy with at the time i posted them, or that i was really proud of but have indeed "flopped" when i posted them**

**recognizing that all success is relative, and considering a "flop" to be a lack in response compared to my other svsss fics from a similar time period

overall though, i have indeed been extremely lucky with how kindly this fandom has treated me and how much support my work gets... but mostly i do think that really is just luck 😅

if you just meant for this to be a very sweet compliment about how you like my stuff a lot, thank you so much, and feel free to stop reading here!! if you were genuine in asking "seriously, what's your secret," though, i do have some tips for fic writing!

first thing is for me to say that it is 100% the most important for you to personally be the #1 fan of your own stuff.

it's super fun that so many people like my fics! but it's mostly fun because it feels like i'm holding up a rock and screaming and everyone screams along with me - it would be a lot less exciting if i was holding up a rock and watching in silent indifference as everyone screamed at it, lol. writing stuff just because it's interesting to you will also help you avoid writing + fandom burnout, and people who read it will always be able to tell when you love what you're writing about.

i also personally think it's really important to see the things you like to completion, which includes either posting it somewhere or saving it alongside your finished works, whatever you personally do to metaphorically put a finished piece "on the fridge."

it is a wildly common experience for creatives to begin disliking their own work partway through the creative process, or to dislike it after it's done. but if you're creating something because you're personally excited about some aspect of it, then you theoretically enjoyed something about that work at some point in time. and, with enough time and distance from it, you'll probably end up liking it again in the future!

if you've made sure to put that work "on the fridge" somewhere it's safe and marked as 'done' in your own mind, then you'll get the chance to create that time and distance. it's not sitting in some guilt-ridden folder of abandoned wips, or discarded because you were never able to write or edit it to your satisfaction - it's just 'done.' i can't count how many times i've come back to a piece i disliked at the time of finishing it and, months later, decided it was actually pretty good.

so - put your work on the fridge, even if you're not satisfied with it! and when your brain is able to let it go, reread it. find the parts that made you write it in the first place, the stuff that got you really excited, and let them excite you again, and inspire you to write even more!!

okok so that's a) write what you like and b) don't give up on your hard work. now i'll address the last bit that touches on fandom reception of your work... 💦💦

... i really do think it's mostly luck 😅

the very first fic i posted on this ao3 account is, without doubt, still my most popular one. i could talk about how i feel about that for a whole separate essay post lmao, but it is a good example of how fic "popularity" often works.

i was still on twitter at the time that i made it, which was where most of the mxtx fans were at. a promo post i made got retweeted by a handful of people with big followings, and that combined with the fact that there were way less binggeyuan fics at the time meant that it kinda hit it big. and since so many people sort by kudos or bookmarks, fics that are already popular just end up more popular...

i think a lot of popular fics are like this to some degree. they use the right tags and post at the right time to get seen by just the right audience, or there's a promo tweet/post somewhere that lands on just the right number of dashes, and their popularity snowballs. of course, these popular fics are also often absolutely fucking incredible and worthy of their popularity, but i've also read fics with very very little "popularity" that are just as good or better than some of the top kudosed or bookmarked fics in the tag.

the only thing i have ever (personally) noticed as something you can control that affects popularity is fic length - from what i've seen in both my fics and those others write, multichaptered fics that update semi regularly and stretch on for multiple months have a tendency to drum up more excitement the longer they go. people start to get more excited for each update + they talk about that on socmed, and that combined with consistently bumping the fic to the top of the tag when sorted by recently updated gives it more and more chances for it to hit that lucky combo of "seen by the right people."

so, that's all to say, actually my advice for this section is also "just write what you like," because you can't control whether or not the people who will also like it will see it when you post it, so make sure there's at least one reader enjoying the ride (you).

...and then of course for more generic "how do you write """well""" advice, just keep practicing, and take note of the things you like in other people's writing and how they accomplish it!

sorry if that was like. way more than what you were really expecting as an answer for this 🙈🙈 i really am truly very grateful for all the super kind feedback i get on my work, but i'm really out here just writing whatever i want in whatever ways i want and then throwing it up "on the fridge" before i can chicken out dkfjh

i hope you (or whoever else bothered to read this far) can also be really satisfied and excited about what you're making, and my fingers are crossed for your luck in the "everyone in the fandom likes this thing" lottery 🤞🤞

#kjfdhg i wrote way more here than intended tbh but i do want to try and be helpful if someone asks me for advice so kfgjh #ANYWAY ty for the ask and for enjoying my stuff!! i rly am lucky with so many lovely people in this fandom supporting me ;w;#nyoomerr ask

27 notes · View notes

inkdemonapologist · 8 months

Note

How do you feel about the upcoming DCTL graphic novel?

Cautiously optimistic!

When I first heard the rumours, before Adrienne’s announcement, I had pretty mixed feelings. My background is in comics, like that’s what I went to school for and worked on semi-professionally for years, and I love it as a storytelling medium, so I’m really intrigued to see how they handle the adaptation…and I also really, really don’t envy whoever has to make decisions on how to depict these characters.

But the announcement is encouraging! I haven’t kept up with Chris Hastings’ more recent work, but I remember enjoying Dr. McNinja back in the day, so I have to admit there’s something exciting about seeing a name I recognise and can be hopeful about to do a good job with the adaptation. Checking out the artist’s work, I’m gonna put a lot of my poker chips on “Sammy will look really normal actually,” but I don’t think that’s a dealbreaker – like, Dober’s Sammy is a big fav as far as Sammy designs go, and I think he’s a good example of how you can still get great Sammy vibes in a more conventionally attractive face. (though i also think there’s a chance of “the artist will lean fully into his unhinged vibes and make Sammy look like a batman villain” so wE’LL SEE!!) Genuinely, the artist’s portfolio seems well-suited to this. I would’ve pictured DCTL with a rougher, more indie look if you asked me to pick a fitting style, but I think this artist's slick Western-Comic-Book style with its strong spot blacks could be a REAL good fit for the inky vibes this story demands, and they don’t have the level of “sameface” that I’d usually be concerned about with these kinds of styles; there’s enough solid variation in their character art that I believe they can handle all the characters needed, and also do a cool ink demon.

DCTL does have some design questions that are genuinely pretty fraught, in that there's no perfect way to handle it (Norman’s a great example; do you take someone that 80% of the fandom has been drawing as a black man for years and make him canonically white, or do you present the Weirdo Creeping Around In The Shadows Who Mysteriously Gives The Protags Supernatural Info And Then Dies At The End And Nobody Misses Him as canonically a person of colour??? ROUGH CHOICE I DO NOT ENVY), but I'm still so curious to see designs for these guys, and my big hope is that the fandom will be understanding of the huge task the creators have been given and that this won't be regarded with the pressure of getting “The Official Canon Design That I'll Be Mad If It Josses My Interpretation” – like, getting an official Henry & non-old-man Joey in BatDR just felt like, y’know, seeing anyone in the fandom make a new set of designs. It feels like drawing fanart of the BatDR AU; it doesn’t mean my henry and joey designs are Obsolete. And I hope these designs are enjoyed from that perspective, as a new DCTL Comic AU, and that the fandom takes whatever we get as less THIS HAS TO MATCH MY PERCEPTION OF SAMMY B/C ITS THE OFFICIAL REAL SAMMY and more just, a take on a design for Sammy Lawrence.

Though of course I can’t help but be a little more anxious about Sammy specifically, haha. He is my big fav after all, and as embarrassing as he is in DCTL it has become a part of his story I’m quite attached to. A lot of humanity could be added to him or taken away depending on how he’s drawn… I don’t want to get my hopes up, but it’s hard not to hope that he’ll have Good Sammy Vibes that Resonate With Me Specifically.

And in general, my expectations are still tempered – the comic could certainly turn out to be very mediocre, especially depending on how well the artist is paid and how much time the creators can afford to put into it – but tbh I’m super interested in how this turns out. I can’t wait to see Joey in this style and it’ll be SURREAL to see a comic of like……. BatIM humans…… I’ve wanted sincere visual content about the humans for a long time and I’m stunned we’re actually getting it, so I’m feeling kinda cautiously eager!! I’m also curious if the comic will make an effort to preserve Buddy’s “voice” from the original novel, and how that will be handled – like, the whole book is really strongly framed as being written by Buddy, and that’s not just an incidental detail; it fleshes out his feelings about Dot, ambiguously gives us info on Boris without directly revealing the ending, and shapes the way he presents some moments as unreliable and time jumping strangely – he even talks about the frustration of not being able to just draw these things and having to describe them! (RELATABLE) – but at the same time, just filling a whole comic with tons of narration boxes is not usually a great artistic choice. It’s a really interesting challenge for the adaptation, and I’m curious if they’ll shift away from the framing device altogether or look for a balance to keep it.

Anyway TL;DR I’m keeping my expectations low but I’m really intrigued!! I don’t know if I’ll, like, actually acquire it; I usually don’t buy JDS Inc. stuff, but I feel more wibbly about the books in general b/c of how strongly I appreciate Adrienne Kress specifically, so we’ll see how I’m feeling when it comes out, haha.

#i know you have questions you always do #dctl graphic novel

49 notes · View notes

humanmorph · 7 months

Text

PALISADE 28.crazy good this week etc

New radio person for the intro...! This comes at a good moment. I still miss Baldwin Home like. That very first PALISADE intro is genuinely so hard to beat... but this feels good. I'm once again thinking about Austin writing these... The style used for Black Screens intros obviously shines through (she's his protégé) but she does have her own voice already (way more rhyming? I mean, I'd have to doublecheck HIS intros, it's literally just a feeling). Just the tone used and intonation already does a lot. Austin is so good at this fr. I'm still curious how he even approaches that. Also the "watch me unloose 80 Ls on these next lines" I knewwww that's 80 Ls for real as soon as Parti said illogical. I wonder if he wrote that bit first trying to see how many Ls he could fit in there & then finetuned it to get to a good number? I guess that's just how I would do it.

(who knows if we'll ever get a description for Parti. we never did for Black. maybe if she shows up in a conflict turn somehow? so im just fuckin around for now... i haven't sold myself on the clothes. i'm just not a fashion guy. but i do like the braids)

Oh & new guy alert part 2!!! New Keith character! And he has a funny hat. Not even funny as in goofy it just makes me laugh a bit because my dad and maybe every 5th 70+ y/o man I see has a hat like that. Love the sequin poncho.

(btw I am almost certain Keith has posted a picture of that teapot on Cohost before... He posts about tea sometimes so there's at least a chance. I mean the description of the coloring he gives is actually pretty good IMO, you can work with that, but I as an artist I like to have a visual reference. EDIT: someone just asked him. thank you keith and also rosecrest)

I have the. I got Armor Astir & a lot of the playbooks other people made in a bundle a while back and I'm real torn if I should just look at the Investigator because I'm really curious. But. I also love to be surprised. So I probably won't, but it's good to know I COULD, if I wanted to. Anyways, I was pretty sure it'd be another B-Plot character too, just because it makes sense. Brnine COULD go alone on a B-Plot, I guess, but it's more fun with 2 groups to jump between, surely. Though this means the Eclectic-Brnine dynamic is crucial! I hope they can meet up soon... But yeah I just really am gonna miss Phrygian backing them up and cheering and clapping and asking questions. They were so fun together... A great team :' (

ok so I wrote everything else about Eclectic down yesterday & then noted down "vibes?" as break between paragraphs because all I had at that point was the description & I wanted to get back to this. And ooohhh my god the vibes are fucking immaculate right off the bat I'm having a hard time to not Already be obsessed with this guy he's SO funny conceptually and it KEPT getting better... Truly delighted with this new type of guy (& Keith is doing a voice!). And I fucking love the hooks. Truly so great to me. The thought of these getting loosened OR deepened is already really really good. "Leap says"..... oh it's SO funny I keep laughing to myself

And I'm VERY excited it's a delegate like genuinely so happy. I was mourning the loss of a branched onscreen (okay.I still am) but this does make it worth it. Ever since they got introduced basically I so badly wanted to know anything more about them, but especially what Austin mentioned in the episode itself: the delegates relationships to the divines they are made from & of course the divines themselves (who are alive!!! Apparently that was already written in a dossier way back when, but I rarely read those). That has me sooo excited.

Oh and the like... I only thought about this just now but the connection there to Thisbe's new project is. That's gotta be something! "The divine who's being held captive somewhere on this planet, and has been tortured for millennia" hearing a message of... That this can end & rest is possible and it's SO CLOSE? But does that just make it worse... Ohhhhh. Yeah this rules. What a great idea.

That project generally is really... god, I love Thisbe so much. I love how Janine talks about her and what she thinks and why she does what she does. Thisbe's relationship to work and being a tool and of use is so interesting to put here, with the divines wanting to rest. (And Janine saying something like... Thisbe thinks of herself in relation to divines how Mow is to her? Kind of?) And saying it seems so solitary a project... every divine should know about it. Every divine deserves the right to rest. But it's also a call to action of sorts when she talks about like... "shouldn't you want to protect this?" I think her "Fighting is not my purpose, but there is nowhere else for me until the fighting is over." hook could be in conservation here too... Also I'm just looking forward for Thisbe to Broadcast again. It was like, one of her things in PARTIZAN. I really liked her & Cori working on this together with the. Experience they just had behind them. Sylvi & Janine reading the hooks for each others characters kind of sheepishly was soooo funny "I forgot how bitchy this was!". That's good stuff to me. (as an aside: god, Thisbe has always had good as hell hooks/beliefs/whatever else. Remember "Operant Broun lies to me because they believe I am a person."? Banger. ) I also love that she thought of this/about this at the rib(?) of Barricade. Barricade as an axiom who had this close (& good, protective) relationship with another axiom...

btw now that Leap is NOT coming back I do miss him a bit. Mostly out of principle like I am So happy we have Eclectic but Leap is my guy.... shoutout to him... being a bitch bastard pirate out there in space... + shoutout to Figure A too always : ) (speaking of, on the Gathering Information Extra bit from today he talked about if he had played Leap, picking a class that also had like, a crew, and I'm mostly just really curious who that would've been. I would love for Keith to make up some funny guys for Leap to order around. I wonder if Eclectic or an Eclectic type would've been on that?)

(Also Leap investigating Motion. Ok. To ME it's at least partly bc this was so important to Millie. And he has reason to be concerned generally he fought Motion too but. That's MILLIE'S rival! And it doesn't even have to be at the front of his mind when he does this. Maybe it isn't. But it's real & it's something to remember her by through actual action. Because he's not the sentimental type.Do you get me.?)

Brnine talk show. This was sooo good. After they joked about it in PAL25 too. I recognized the hosts name, but wasn't quite sure from where until I read the dossier - of course he's that guy from the podcast. God. I have got to relisten to that sometime... I remember Ali on one of the recent Gathering Information ep (the one w/ Austin on, I think) mentioning a conversation that was like. stressful to do. and then also to listen to? (since she has to for production/editing) and I figured it would be another Gucci-type talk but ooohh my god. This was sooo. EDIT: ACTUALLY what if it wasn't even. What if it's about to be this talk with Rye edit: GALLICA i cant believe noone called me on this. mixing my elects up. rye is the one gur killed (mvp). Austin was sounding a bit ominous about it at the end of this episode! HUGE shoutouts to Ali again she is just absolutely killing it this season for real... And I honestly feel like overall Brnine was, considering the situation, doing very well. Genuinely. You're feverish and hollowblooded and have this fucking. Guy needling you & asking the stupidest questions... & like. "You made Kalmeria. They'd never let you rot in jail." of courseeee they want Brnine working for them. They're so GOOD at what they do. They messed with the parts of A Fucking Divine. . I just had a scary thought and it involved Mustard Red. But. Surely not. Nooo. I'm shaking my head. However Arbitrage? An Arbitrage deal (like they tried to make them take before) would work just perfectly for this, wouldn't it...

some other stuff:

When Austin mentioned Grand Mag in that vision Cori had I thought something like 'man. sucks to be him : (' but like. In a genuine way. "I can't stop it from hurting people a little"........... Hah oh wow I just thought of this but I am so excited for people who haven't listened to TM to meet him now. He's not even my favourite he just makes me crazy in a way almost no other character does? Like there's something so WRONG with him. And there's things wrong with a lot of FatT characters but it's like... Well. Grand Magnificent.

I love the thought of them watching Brnines interview at the next movie night (POOR BRNINE.) but I also want to know what Eclectic would pick for movie night. Oh and Partial too. Though he may not be staying I would still really love to know. Partial coming on board for the mission has me intrigued generally.

Oh and Gur talking! Even if just a little. I still feel so bad for them. "I believe in whispers in ears"... and they have reason to now. Figure is a person trying their best to do good & make changes, which is what Gur wants. I just wish they weren't a specter haunting someone elses body & what even happens when Figure rolls a 10+. Is Gur still there and Figure just stops seeing him? oohh it hurts a bit.you can't do this to him you can't (related: I extremely forgot about the other specters and ghosts and ghouls and whatnot that Figure can also see. It's not just my friend Gur Sevraq. Looking forward to hear more about that & how it affects Figure so much as to roll with disadvantage!)

Love to learn just a little more about devotion. I really need to just relisten to that again & think about it a bit harder.

At one point Austin says "Still flanked by guards, you are" and it caught me off guard & made me wheeze. He didn't even do that on purpose . I get him I do this way too often(realize I forgot to say part of a sentence and pack it at the end)

#from yesterday and also today.#palisadeposting #palisade spoilers

20 notes · View notes

omegaworld · 2 years

Text

Trust [Alpha Law x omega reader] - part 2

Important to understand the context

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4 - Final

Word count: 3253

Y/n waited anxiously outside the submarine while the man went to get Law. The man finally exits the submarine accompanied by Law and a few other crew members who she remembered were Penguin, Shachi and Bepo the alphas of the omegas she had been with. Her inner omega purrs and her knees almost buckle again at the presence of her alpha, certainly the poster photo did not do justice to the real thing.

The three crewmen seem excited to understand who she was and Y/n holds her breath as Law looks at her and frowns. 'What is this? I made it very clear I didn't want her'

This was it, she was rejected again. Couldn't he see that they were mates? No, he could otherwise he wouldn't have said he had made it clear before. So what was it? Money couldn't be the problem since she was being offered to him. Was she such a disappointment?

'B-But Captain she is your mate!' says Bepo in shock with Shachi and Penguin agreeing. 'I don't want a mate' Law was about to walk away leaving her standing there without even a chance to utter a word.

Y/n's heart was broken into a thousand pieces, she knew she shouldn't have fed those false hopes. Still she clenches her fists and shouts 'Wait!' 'What don't you understand when I say I don't want you for anything?!' Law shouts back irritated and Yn cringes, even if his alpha has that opinion the same doesn't seem to be the case with the alphas accompanying him 'Maybe you don't want an omega but I bet they do!' Y/n shouts pointing at Penguin, Shachi and Bepo (Yes they are alphas, would it be interest an x reader with them?)

Law casts a glance at the three who seem genuinely interested 'And what do their omegas have to do with you?' Taking a breath to regain his calm Y/n continues this time in a lower tone 'When the merchants go to contact a crew they round up all the omegas they have found of that crew' 'And why didn't they say anything like that when they called?' 'Because omegas are expensive. If the captain doesn't want his for them it's not even worth talking about the others. I've met all three of them, they're lovely and they don't deserve the fate that awaits them if they stay there.' 'And what does that have to do with you?' 'I'm a beast, my value is much higher, if you take me you can trade me for all three without any problems.'

Law sighs at the stares of his crewmates. He might not want an omega but that didn't give him or right to stop his friends from having one. 'Bring na and set a course for the omega trade where she came from' With this Law walks back to the submarine not sparing another glance at the poor omega.

Y/n smiles and plays with her fingers sadly, positively thinking at least she would be good for something good.

___

The trip to the outpost lasted about a week. During those few days Y/n was able to get to know the crew and everyone became quite attached to her recognizing that she certainly had the charisma to be her captain's mate. Even though she was rejected, it was the best and probably the happiest single week she would ever have in her life. She adapted to the routines of the crew, learned to read maps and a little about how the submarine worked, also learned how to cook a few things, first aid, and showed interest in learning to read and write, but for this one week was not enough. The best part of that week was being able to see Law around the ship, and as the dominant alpha of the gang, the whole ship smelled of him, which was very comforting to Y/n.

Shachi, Bepo and Penguin liked the omega quite a bit and eventually felt guilty that she was going to sacrifice herself. They asked several times if it was really okay and she always assured them that it was. After all with no friends, no family, no alpha, an omega's freedom mattered little if she had nowhere else to go. The three alphas even approached their captain several times about why he rejected her trying to convince him to keep her, but it didn't work as according to him 'omegas can't be trusted'.

Although the days were fun Y/n had to fight nightmares every night. His frightened, crying moans were low enough to go unnoticed by the crew. Except Law. To him the sounds rang loud, digging in and making his inner alpha become desperate with the need to protect his omega. He would never admit it out loud, but it was extremely difficult for him to resist the omega. The way she fit so perfectly into the crew learning and always trying to help or how the environment around her always seemed to rejoice with her beautiful smile. Her scent was also one of the reasons his alpha struggled, he wished he could simply get closer and soak in it.

The night before his arrival at the post was definitely the most difficult. Aside from the fact that he had a glimpse of enormous pain in his eyes when she gave her 'goodnight' to everyone broke his heart, the sounds of the omega that night seemed to be even louder than any other. As such Law was eventually unable to sleep and spent the entire night lying there staring at the ceiling, cold sweats, gasping for breath and his hand pressed heavily against his heart in an attempt to calm the struggle of his inner alpha. After all, omegas were not to be trusted and he would not let a mere instinct overpower him.

First thing in the morning they were able to spot the 'trading' post. The tribulation disembarked and entered the dungeon after Law warned the guards that they were coming on business. Following one of the guards through almost endless corridors Y/n feels chills run down his spine knowing that he would soon be in the same, if not worse, situation again as all those omegas.

___

Early in the morning they were able to spot the 'trading' post. The tribulation disembarked and entered the dungeon after Law warned the guards that they were coming on business. Following one of the guards through almost endless corridors Y/n feels chills run down his spine knowing that he would soon be in the same, if not worse, situation as all those omegas again.

Arriving at a specific room where omegas were delivered they meet the 'manager' and Law decides to sum it up in cold words 'I want to trade it for the three omegas of my crew members' the manager analyzes them and turns his attention to a stack of papers reading attentively. 'Shachi, Penguin and Bepo from the pirates of the corazon, two common omegas and a polar bear omega mink' the man looks at Y/n again and flashes a smile stamping that Law was an idiot 'for a beast with white fur' Y/n cringes at the look the man gives him and Law almost growls 'I accept the offer, in fact they were leaving just today, the buyer should be here soon, but I believe you will not be disappointed with such an exchange'. Y/n's eyes open in shock, she didn't expect to leave so soon.

'Just wait a bit, they should be being brought in now.' It was said and done, after about 10 minutes 3 omegas entered the room with their heads down accompanied by guards who release them after a nod from the manager. The eyes of the 3 alphas literally glow and upon smelling the smells the omegas raise their heads looking between the alphas and Y/n and after a moment of hesitation they run to Yn enveloping her in a tight hug. 'Y/n! Did you make it and come back for us?!' Y/n smiles amidst the hug and strokes the head of Shachi's omega 'Exactly, now you will be able to go with them' they look at the alphas and Y/n urges them 'Go'. They each run to their alpha and are immediately enveloped in a tight hug. Y/n tries to soothe the ache in her chest, she wishes she had been greeted like this by Law. But that didn't matter, now at least they would be happy.

The manager approaches Y/n and one of the guards places some handcuffs on the omega. The other 3 omegas look confused between her and the heart pirates. Y/n smiles as she starts to be taken away 'It was bad. You guys go and I'll stay. Take good care of them for me guys'. Law looks away from the scene as he grits his teeth forcing himself to allow his mate to be taken from him forever. 'Law' when she speaks he immediately raises his gaze, looking directly into her bright grey eyes she continues 'You will be happy right?' everyone looks at the captain in expectation as he swallows and putting on an indifferent mask replies 'I already am happy and will be'. Y/n sighs happily at his answer and gives Law the truest smile he had ever seen in his entire life. Not a hint of remorse or rancor, just love and sincerity. It takes everything in Law not to get up and snatch it out of that man's hands. But he didn't, he just watched as those bastards took his omega out of the room and the door closed behind them.

'Let's get her ready before we bring her back here for the negotiation with the celestial dragon' the man says to one of the workers 'And you dear customers, I believe our business is taken care of, please leave' he finishes leaving the room.

All the way back to the submarine Law had his eyes glazed over the floor. The whole crew was confused as to why the captain hadn't brought her along, it was obvious how the situation was really affecting him and that he did care about her. The three omegas felt a huge guilt, during their 'stay' together Y/n was the most positive, promising several times that everything would work out, but in the end she sacrificed herself to make it work for the three of them. Both wanted to attack Law but they knew they couldn't because besides being useless it would only create more problems.

On the other hand, Law's thoughts were racing a thousand times an hour about what could happen to her in the hands of a celestial Dragon.

'Captain'

Law who is already in the polar tang sitting on one of the couches with one of the cushions tightly clutched in his hands, is brought out of his thoughts by Bepo. 'We wanted you to at least see it to the end so you won't regret it later' said this Penguin pressed a button and the room they had been in earlier began to be displayed on the screen. Bepo, Penguin and Shachi could not understand their captain's denial regarding the omega but they all knew how important a companion was. It was apparent that she cared a lot about him and even though Law's denial was quite affected by the whole situation so the 3 alphas decided to place a small transmitting den mushi that would not be visible in the room so that they would later be able to see the negotiation with the Celestial Dragon in a last ditch attempt to get their captain to back down.

Law's eyes widen as he recognizes the room displayed on the screen and was about to question when a loud bang is heard from the den mushi transmitter and redirects everyone's attention to the scene. The bang corresponded to the door being opened and soon the manager entered accompanied by a Heavenly Dragon, two workers and some Heavenly Dragon deer.

The manager nods to the guards who immediately open one of the cells and remove Y/n from it. The little omega keeps his gaze low with his tail between his legs and his ears glued to his head while the Heavenly Dragon smiles 'It is indeed a beautiful specimen! When you told me you had changed my order I was worried, but I'm glad I trusted you! What cute ears, and white ones at that. And this body, I'm sure I can still make good use of it today,' says the dragon as he approaches Y/n and starts stroking her ears with a wicked smile.

At the sound of the Dragon's words and seeing the omega Law's shudder of fear he begins to growl without realizing it too wrapped up in anger over the whole scene he was watching. The growl was low but loud and grew in intensity as he got closer to the omega. Hearing him add 'I bought good doses of potent aphrodisiacs' Law growls loudly and begins to fill the room with his strong alpha dominant scent. The entire team is startled by Law's growl but they proceed with their plan to ignore his behavior and wait for him to get out of control and do something.

When the Heavenly Dragon approaches the omega's neck to get a whiff of him he twitches his nose and backs away. Looking down at the omega's cuffed hands he quickly steals the fabric from between her small hands and twitches his nose as he smells the pungent scent of another alpha. 'What-' 'Give it back!' Y/n screams with tears of despair as the Dragon pulls the fabric further and further away from her. Law recognized it, it was a scarf he used to wear, now it should be in the back of his closet so no wonder he hadn't noticed it was missing. 'Why should I?' 'Because it's my alpha's!' Dragon grimaces and glares at the salesman 'In case you haven't figured it out now I am your alpha and there won't be another one' the manager tries to calm the whole situation down 'You know what? It's that I went to get her especially for you! She was in the hands of another alpha, but as you can see she remains untouched and without any signs of marking! The poor thing still hasn't accepted that she's been sold, but she's always been quite naughty and I'm sure she'd love to break your spirit!' the Celestial Dragon thinks before smiling smugly at the man's conversation 'P-please' Everyone looks at Y/n and she sniffles 'I-if you let me keep it I promise to be a good omega for you'

This whole situation was so scary and Y/n was sure it would only get worse. That alpha smelled so bad, she never found alphas smells particularly pleasant and after smelling Law all the others seemed even worse. Just the thought of living surrounded by that disgusting smell made her feel like she was about to vomit. Her fate was sealed. All she could do was try to keep that Law-scented handkerchief that Bebo had kindly given her.

At this point Law was crazy, her inner alpha was screaming and clawing for him to get her out of there. So what if he didn't trust omegas? So what if he didn't want her as a mate? He was her predestined mate and if she didn't stay with him she shouldn't stay with anyone. Or at least not with an alpha she didn't want. If she didn't smell like him she should smell like herself, not another alpha. Seeing her like this scared and helpless, his alpha instinct demanded that he protect her. Seeing her like this, despite everything, fighting for the last piece of him she might have, his alpha purred with his loyalty.

The Dragon lets out a sneering sound 'You have no choice little omega' throwing the scarf away he approaches the omega again 'You will learn that from now on I am the only alpha, the one who will mark you' Y/n's heart sinks, with wide eyes she is unable to move in sheer terror at what the alpha was about to do. She feels like vomiting when she feels his breath on her neck, her marking spot, where an alpha's bite would reclaim her as his.

Something inside Law just breaks, if anyé was going to mark that omega it would be him when the celestial dragon is about to bite Law quickly creates giant 'room' and with a 'shambles' exchanges Y/n for the pillow he was holding. The moment he has her in his arms Law pulls her to him by the waist and his other hand is tangled in her hair getting a good angle of her neck he bites deeply.

The bite sends shivers throughout Y/n's body, Law's scent invades her and she falls forward, the warmth of the alpha marking her enveloping her. She sighs happily, there was no way in the world she could mistake her alpha's presence and looking crazy or not he was right there, marking her and that was what mattered to her. She was being marked by her alpha.

The omega clings to Law like a lifesaver as he recovers from his stupor while licking his wound. As his alpha instincts calmed down he became aware of what he had done. He had scored an omega, his omega. Law takes a deep breath and pulls away, what he sees in her eyes again surprises him. Joy and gratitude, not an ounce of remorse that he had left her there, not an ounce of doubt as to why she was here, just that, joy and gratitude.

'You can stay here' everyone rejoices at the captain's words, 'but I still don't want a mate' Law says walking away and turning his back 'you stay here only because it is dangerous out there for omegas' Bepo prepares to question him, but Y/n interrupts him with a happy voice 'Yes captain'

Bepo, Shachi and Penguin had separate rooms now that they had their companions. Y/n had her own room where she had stayed before and for the first time in a long time she slept happily and without nightmares. She was now not only marked by Law but was also covered in his scent making her feel totally protected. What did it matter if Law didn't accept her as a mate? She was with him and safe, she could see him, hear him and smell him every day. This was a thousand times more than even a few hours ago she believed she could ever have.

That night Law remained in his room, the smell of the omega had lingered on him and he hated to like it. As much as those instincts overwhelmed him he still wanted to fight, he knew it was hard and now it would be even harder as he had already partly given in. But the more he sank into that feeling the worse it would be. He remembered as if it was yesterday, Corazon. His omega was also a beast, he loved her more than anything and yet she ran away. Abandoned him to die when he needed her to. If she had fought back surely they would have beaten Vigo and Corazon would be alive. He would not make the same mistake. Omegas are not to be trusted.

147 notes · View notes

boysplanetrecaps · 4 months

Text

The Great Produce 48 Rewatch: Ep 2, Signal Song [Part 1]

In my previous post in this silly yet necessary project, we finished off the auditions, including the ones that weren't aired on MNET. It's time for the girls to move into their dorms and start practicing for their upcoming large-group performance to your favorite song and mine, Nekkoya! Let's do it.

In this second phase of the Produce 48 series, the 96 trainees (well, 94 -- 2 of them dropped out already) are asked to learn the lyrics, tune, and choreography of a song then get one chance to perform it in front of a video camera for their final grade. Did I mention that they have to learn the lyrics in both Korean and Japanese? Also, per AleXa in her interview with Grazy Grace, they had about a day and a half to learn the choreography and lyrics in both Korean and Japanese, and this was the very next day after they filmed the auditions for about 24 straight hours. Seems… like a bad idea. But what do I know?

So, the signal song is called Pick Me aka Nekkoya. The only signal song from any of the Produce series that I actually like is Nayana from Broduce101 -- I remember hearing it playing at Cafe Bene in K-town and just liking it without knowing what it was. But I’m not wild about Nekkoya, even if it is marginally better than Pick Me from Season 1. (I mean, “oh won’t you pick me up?” is the worst, ugh). I do enjoy the fact that Nekkoya sounds extra funny to the Japanese girls, because “neko” is the Japanese word for cat. You’d think that someone would have noticed that already…?

The girls are told that they’ll get to perform on MNET countdown. They’re so happy, despite the obvious fact that most of them aren’t going to get any camera time. They’re probably just giddy from lack of sleep. As in previous years, those in higher ranked groups will get more screen time -- but it’s even worse this year than in previous years, because rather than having the Bs and Cs flanking the As, they’ll all be stacked behind each other, so that it will probably be impossible to see even the members of the B group, much less the Ds.

The diagram at the top of the post shows the F ranked girls at the very back, but actually they won’t even be allowed on stage. The F-ranked girls, the majority of whom are Japanese, are heartbroken, notably the fashion challenged Mogi Shinobu in her blue furry sleeves. This girl is like a living meme.

We stan a relatable queen.

The judges remind them that all the grades will be reassigned, and that only someone from group A can be in the overall center, a very desirable position. I genuinely don’t remember who gets chosen, but it also seems obvious that it’s going to be 🌸Sakura🌸….?

Dorm Move In

The girls move in to their dorm room and find color-coded t-shirts waiting for them. I feel like I can feel the texture of these t-shirts through the screen. You know, those t-shirts that feel like steel wool and hang off you like a burlap sack? But despite being a full centimeter thick they somehow are also see-through and show the outlines of your bra? No thank you.

Miru is happy, but I think she is always happy. Honestly, I’m jealous.

Many of the girls like the colors, but the A girls are especially excited by their shirts, which feature a glittery A on a light pink background. Gyrui, the member of Fromis-9 who rocked a side-pony in her audition, is a bit salty that some of her roommates have pink shirts while she has to make due with orange.

Meanwhile, the F-ranked girls get gray, just to make sure they feel as bad as possible about their situation. SUFFER, the producers seem to be saying. SUFFER FOR YOUR DEFICIENCIES.

Suffer more, Ichikawa Manami! Your performance in What’s Your Name means you don’t deserve such a thing as “color”!

The F-ranked girls are joking that at least the F is on the back so they don’t have to see it themselves (unless they turn around really really fast). Goto Moe, who mysteriously seems to have completely recovered her voice, finds a white shirt she plans to wear instead. Doesn’t seem like a good idea, Moe.

Some of the girls find rules posted in their rooms. The rules, as translated by Google translate via my phone camera:

Adhere to the class schedule

Maintain cleanliness of accommodation and practice rooms.

Do not make noise while going to bed.

No unnecessary physical contact.

Compliance with writing a practice journal.

Prohibition of use of mobile phones and communication devices

Thorough management of the training center facilities

That fourth rule causes a lot of giggling and “touching” among the girls, and the editors play Knock from Broduce 101 in the background. Uh-oh, no skinship allowed! (Gossip online seems to imply that this is because of certain trainees, but I’m not sure that this is true and I don’t want to put anything out there like that without more confirmation.) This was a new rule for this season, but to the best of my knowledge had been kept in place for later seasons. For example, I remember that it was a rule in Boys Planet as well.

The girls have trouble communicating with each other, but some translation heroes step forward. Miyazaki Miho, who was in What’s Your Name and who I noticed writing in Korean at the beginning, can speak Korean reasonably well too, and serves as interpreter in one of the D-class dorms for Kim Minju.

Multi-lingual queen Miho!

Lee Chaejeong, future member of Alice who auditioned with Roller Coaster, has a little stuffie (that she calls her “chingu”) with her. Cho Ahyeong, who auditioned alongside future Cherry Bullet’s Haeyoon, has a stuffie that is sitting in for her mom. Kim Da Hye from Banana Culture (who auditioned with I Don’t Like Your Girlfriend) has a pink stuffie that is a gift from her mom. Wang Yiren (future Everglow) has a piggie. Strong approval on all that. My Christmas wish list is at least 50% Squishmallow. On the other hand, Sato Minami (who I continue to think of as Sailor Mars) has a terrifying doll named Lemon-Chan. No thank you.

NO THANK YOU

I SAID NO THANK YOU

1:05:35 Training Begins

Ok, we’re an hour into the episode, so it makes sense that it’s time to do something or another! The girls gather in the big studio wearing their Caste T-shirts (see what I did there? I spelled it caste not cast) and get ready to learn.

Kindly Soyou says, “You will be practicing the title track starting today. Since it’s the first time that the Japanese trainees are being trained in the Korean way, this may be quite difficult. But please trust in us, your trainers, and listen to us.” The girls are excited to learn new things -- we hear from Bibian, with her distinctive baby-doll face, and Nakanishi Chiyori, who had the fluffy pink skirt in What’s Your Name.

So the dance class, led by Psychopath, begins.

You can tell that he’s trying to break down the steps and give specific advice. I don’t know how it worked with the translations -- none of the Japanese girls seem to be wearing in-ear devices, so there must have been someone on a microphone, translating the information into Japanese or this would have been chaos. But it I had to learn a dance with someone speaking a language I don’t know, with a translation following a few moments later, it would be so hard to learn. It’s going really fast even for some of the Korean girls, and the Japanese girls look completely lost. Even Miru looks sad. Oh no! Protect Miru! Then after they suffer for a while, Dance Bae tells them the part they just learned is the “easiest part of the choreo.” Oh no!

It’s time for them to study in their groups. This is their class schedule, with the benefit of my google translate on my phone:

I think “consonant practice” should say “self-practice”.

The A group and B group both have Soyou for vocals and Psychopath for dance. The C group has Dance Bae for dance and Soyou for vocals. The D group has Mary J Lee for dance and Jeremy for vocals. The F group has Dance Bae for dance and Jeremy for vocals.

So, let’s start off with group C, in their yellow shirts, who apparently did the best at the big group dance instruction. Park Seo Young, the blonde individual trainee, has been elected leader and has the L sticker on her shoulder to prove it.

They are scared when Dance Bae comes in.

They go up to do the choreo in smaller groups, 5 or 6 at a time, and Dance Bae’s eagle eye picks out even the smallest mistakes. When they make mistakes, she tells them they have to try harder, which, like, lady, they ARE trying.

Then she picks out Son Eun Chae and Honda Hitomi to dance on their own -- one Korean girl and one Japanese girl to represent their respective groups.

They both look great, and Dance Bae compliments them. The other girls think they’ll both move up a rank.

Meanwhile, in class B…

B group has elected Park Minji -- future Secret Number -- as their leader, perhaps because she has experience from being on the first season of Produce 101.

AleXa is serving with a deep red lip. She understands the assignment.

When Psychopath comes in, they introduce themselves in unison, and he greets them impatiently. He watches them perform, then tells them they have to be more “bashful” in their dancing, mocking their more “powerful” attempts at the girlish choreography.

They all love him, saying that he’s a good dancer. Cho Ka Hyeon -- the Starship girl who isn’t Wonyoung or Yujin -- voice overs, “I stared at him shamelessly because he’s so good at dancing.”

Yoon Eunbin likes him a lot.

They might also think he’s handsome or cute, for all I know -- he was only 34 at the time of taping, so not necessarily too old for them to have crushes on (though obviously way too old for them to date, to be clear!). I know he’s being relatively nice to the girls and it must seem weird that I’m calling him Psychopath, but I DO NOT FORGIVE HIM FOR WHAT HE DID TO THE BOYS ON BOYS PLANET. It was full on psychological abuse.

Anyway, the dance practice continues. Miru-chan is trying to keep smiling, but she looks more like she’s crying. Psychopath scolds her, because that’s so helpful, and Jurina comes over to try to cheer her up.

This choreography is much harder than what any of them are used to.

Her training diary consists of this drawing and the words, “Today I had my first singing and dancing lesson in B class. I couldn’t follow the choreography during class B. I made the teacher worry. Is there no hope for me?” Aww, Miru-chan!!

We check in with Team A, who are having a vocal lesson with Soyou. Lee Gaeun from Pledis has been chosen as leader, probably on the strength of her already having debuted, and being the oldest in the group.

Soyou asks for a brave volunteer, and at first, no one steps forward.

Left to right: Lee Ga Eun, Jo Yu Ri, Park Hae Yoon, Kim Do Ah, Yu Min Young, Miyawaki Sakura, Takeuchi Miyu, Kim Cho Yeon, Lee Ha Eun, Lee Chae Yeon, Kim Da Hye, Hwang So Yeon, Choi Ye Na, Na Go Eun, Kwon Eun Bi

Finally, Na Go Eun (future Purple Kiss) volunteers. We’re reminded that at her audition, Soyou had said of her, “She’s the most promising trainee among the ones we’ve seen so far.” But Goeun, singing acapella, goes slightly off pitch, which is what happens to people who don’t have perfect pitch. I mean, most people don’t have perfect pitch! Soyou tells her that she’s going sharp, and that she sounds like she’s just reading a textbook. I would also find it difficult to put emotion into lyrics like:

From now on, you’re mine, mine, mine, only mine / Mine, mine, mine (Superstar) / From now on, you’re mine, mine, mine, only mine / Will you tell me? Pick me up

… but I guess that’s why I’m not cut out to be a K-idol. That’s literally the only reason, though.

Jo Yuri goes next, and has a bit of trouble with the high notes. Soyou tells her that she, Soyou, had fought for her, Yuri, to be in A group (no pressure!) and then tells her she’s disappointed. Kwon Eunbi is next to be insulted for her pronunciation and lack of, I don’t know, spirit (?).

🌸Sakura🌸 is next, and inspirational happy music plays as she talks about how she has studied the Korean lyrics -- amazing! She sings completely incorrectly, like the tune is only slightly an approximation of correct. Instead of insulting Sakura and/or expressing intense, soul-destroying disappointment, like she did with every other girl, Soyou kindly asks the talented Miyu to come forward to sing it correctly to help 🌸Sakura🌸 understand the melody. Finally, 🌸Sakura🌸 manages to sing a few notes correctly, and everyone applauds. I get it that the other girls like her, because she’s a nice girl, but even so. What. Is. This.

Next we check in with D group, who has chosen the multi-lingual Miyazaki Miho as their leader. Good call!

They are working with Mary J Lee, who many of them know from her Youtube dance videos. They seem a little star struck by her.

Sweet faced Motomura Aoi, who we met during the Never Ending Ferris Wheel performance, is in the back row and seems to have trouble seeing what’s going on. She knows the other girls are more skilled and is determined to do better.

Kim Minju, one of the Very Pretty Girls, is having a lot of trouble with the dancing. She’s self-conscious, looking at everyone instead of focusing on herself. She’s acutely aware that the others are better than her, and she’s taking it to heart, crying in the interview chair. We see her showing up in the dance practice room when no one else is there to practice some more.

In what may or may not be the next day, we check in again with the B girls at 1:21:48. Kim Sihyeon, future Everglow, and Lee Seunghyeon, who I’m going to just call Riina from H1-Key, interview that their group has Americans (AleXa), Chinese people (Wang Yiren from Everglow, Wang Ke of the red polka dots), Japanese people (Iwatate Saho, Miru from Dancing Hero, Juri, and Jurina), and of course, Koreans. So it can make communication tricky.

We see Jang Gyuri (future ex-Fromis9) and Lee Chaewon (future Le Sserafim) trying to get Jurina to understand that they want to practice the Japanese version of the lyrics together, using mostly English, but Jurina doesn’t seem to understand.

Husky-voiced Kim Hyuna (who did that excellent audition with My House by 2pm -- did you watch it yet?) encourages everyone to come watch the dance on the tablet, and the Japanese members, who don’t understand at first, come over later, when there’s already a big crowd.

Jurina interviews that the Koreans crowd around so much that the Japanese trainees can’t see at all. She is obviously frustrated.

What we see in the video, though, is that the Japanese trainees’ method of trying to see the video is to just stand there looking sad and wishing that the video will magically come closer. We don’t, for example, see them tapping anyone on the shoulder and pointing at the tablet with a hopeful facial expression. They just STAND THERE. I know it’s a cultural thing, but toxic passivity drives me nuts.

Quick story time. A few months back, I was flying somewhere for work, worried I’d miss my connecting flight which would cause serious issues with my job. I was seated in an aisle seat, and I noticed that boarding was taking a really long time. There was a woman standing in the aisle wearing a big backpack that kept smacking me in the face as she spun around trying to let people pass her. She apologized when I pointed that out, and I was like, it’s ok, but why don’t you just sit down? And she said, well, there’s someone sitting in my seat. I asked her which one was supposed to be her seat, and she pointed to the aisle seat in front of me. I was like, just say something, and the woman was like, oh no, I can’t, I don’t want to be rude. Meanwhile, people were still trying to board. The woman with the backpack was trying to duck into chairs that are open to let people pass, but there were hardly any open seats left and so she was really slowing down boarding, making everything really difficult for everyone. And all because she doesn’t have the chutzpah to either (a) tap the person on the shoulder and say “I think you’re in my seat” or (b) at least ask a flight attendant for help. So then I had to be the one to tap that person on the shoulder. Turned out she had sat in that seat KNOWING IT WAS THE WRONG SEAT because there was someone in HER seat, which was the window seat. So then I had to tell the person in the window seat that SHE was in the wrong seat. Like here I am just trying to get the plane to take off on time so I don’t miss my connection and no one has the ability to speak up about the simplest of things. The woman in the wrong window seat realized she had just made a mistake, and she apologized and moved up one row to the correct seat, and everyone got seated. But like, my GOD. What was your endgame, backpack woman? To just stay in the aisle the whole flight? URGH. I get it, some people are shy, but sometimes if you don’t speak up, it’s actually irresponsible and rude. And it’s even worse if you then make the other people out to be the bad guys.

Sorry, this is a pet peeve of mine. Deep breaths.

The four Japanese members sulk about how no one is “letting” them see the video, without ever, I don’t know, pointing to it? Walking over and gently taking it out of someone’s hands? ANY FUCKING THING? If I had to deal with people that passive I would evaporate. Just boil away into space.

Finally, husky-voiced Hyunah grabs Jurina by the arm, drags her over to the side of the room, and begins teaching her the choreo. Jurina realizes that the Korean girls who know how to dance learned the choreography first, so that they could teach it to the other girls, and regrets the misunderstanding.

H1-Key Riina helps Saho learn the choreo.

Saho interviews that in Japan, the girls typically work by themselves, but in Korea, the girls work together as a group, which makes her really happy. What I’m learning from this show is that Korean culture is superior to Japanese culture. Thanks, MNET editors! Thmeditors.

We see some of the Korean girls using English to talk to AleXa. Cute!

Choi So Eun interviews, “It feels like we’re communicating telepathically.”

We end the segment on this shot of the girls all crowded around Juri and Jurina -- looks like maybe Juri had been crying and then everyone in the whole class came over to cheer her up? Maybe? Anyway, it’s cute. They’re working together. This is my favorite thing about shows like this.

At 1:24:20, we switch over to watch the A girls at their dance practice. Gaeun shows off her dancing, and she looks great, of course. She’s so cute!

Behind her, you can see, left to right, little Lee Ha Eun, the “little Chungha” girl; Kwon Eunbi, looking a little different with her hair pulled back; Lee Da Hye from Banana Culture; behind Gaeun, you can see a tiny bit of the short, talented Miyu; Jo Yuri, of the yellow Chewing Gum; and Yu Minyeong of the mint green polka dots in the Celeb Five performance. (We’ll see Minyeoung dance in a little bit….)

As Gaeun finishes her performance, we get to see Hwang Soyeon, the “little Sunmi,” show off her teleportation skills! At 1:24:45 she’s standing by the wall next to 🌸Sakura🌸, calmly applauding for Gaeun.

Psychopath praises Gaeun, saying that all the details of her dancing are very neat and precise.

At 1:24:57, Soyeon has teleported to be sort of behind Gaeun. Dahye from Banana Culture is still near the wall -- but she’s out of breath and is pumping her t-shirt back and forth to cool herself down. Jo Yuri and Miyu seem to have disappeared. Soyeon has charged the part in her hair, and also seems out of breath. Gaeun’s hair is much messier, too.

And at 1:25:00, Soyeon has teleported back to her original position next to 🌸Sakura🌸, with her hair put back to its original part.

These are some talented girls, my friends.

Look, obviously this is just some bad editing, but it wasn’t an accident. For whatever reason, they wanted it to look like Psychopath was praising Gauen alone. Maybe he was, but maybe he wasn’t. This is all just to go back to one of my key points about this show: It is edited with such a purposefully heavy hand that it might as well be fiction.

In the next group, though the editing wants us to focus on Choi Yena, my eye kept getting drawn to Kim Doah, future Fanatics/GP999 contestant. She’s just so expressive there!

Left to right: Eunbi (권은비), Doah (김도아), Dahye, Yena (최예나), and Minyoung (유민영).

Psychopath reminds Yena not to let her fingers go in her mouth in the “tap near your mouth” part of the choreo. It’s interesting to think about those little details.

Many of the girls have their turn, and then he asks Yu Minyoung to come out to the center. He calls her “Celeb Five,” not by her name, even though she’s wearing a huge name tag. He called Gauen and Yena by their names, but not Minyoung! She makes quite a few mistakes. We see a flashback to the very first dance rehearsal, something we’ve never seen before -- Dance Bae pulling Psychopath aside and asking why on earth did Minyoung get an A. Honestly, I wondered that too at the time -- I said I would have given her a C. Psychopath reminds her that Minyoung was part of that Celeb Five performance. Back at the A-team’s dance rehearsal, Psychopath, showing his true nasty colors, says, “I think it was a really good idea to do Celeb Five back then. But you have no charisma now. You’ll end up in lower classes.” She just sort of says “Yes, I understand.” She wants to stay in A class, but I think she knows her skills are just not up to the task given her short training period.

This next segment, which begins at 1:27:35, is probably my favorite part of the whole episode. Jeremy just actually teaches the D-grade girls to sing. Instead of insulting them, or scolding them, or telling them that they have to “try harder,” or rolling his eyes and asking if they even want to be here, he just teaches them how singing works, physically. It’s a delight to watch. He has them do something that my vocal teacher taught me, an exercise to open up your palette. You start by being super super nasal, making a sound fully through your nose, then sort of make a “nnnngg-gga” noise that clears the sound out. It’s hard to explain in words, but it’s something I do before I sing a note, even alone in the shower. He even explains it to them in Japanese, since there are so many Japanese members of the class and the Japanese girls are especially nasal. Is he or is he not the most lovable of people?

He has Minami (owner of the Lemon-chan doll) lie flat on her back to learn how to engage her abs while she sings, and afterward, she can hold a note without wavering unpleasantly. You guys, this is what learning to sing is all about. The segment is only about 2 minutes long, which is a shame -- I could watch this for a long time. I like watching kindness in action! If you want to watch, here’s a Youtube clip.

And that's as much as I can fit in one post, so I'll have to cut it off here! I hope you're at a temperature you like to be at, and that you have the right number of Squishmallows nearby. Take care and see you in the next one, when we finish off their preparations for the signal song evaluation!

#produce48 #produce 48 #bpr recaps p48 #sakura #le sserafim #akb48 #lee hongki #ft island #choi yena #alexa #lee chaewon #h1-key

1 note · View note

painfulrant · 1 year

Text

Boy Trouble

Sierra & Reader (friends)

Angst and Comfort

Boy Trouble

Deathly silent… That’s the only way possible to explain the silence that engulfs your form. The moon is high and the water moving along with the trees who dance and twirl, throwing confetti leaves over anything around. Yet there is no sound. There are no crickets, no whispers from the wind, no cracks or knocks from the trees or even the swooshing of the tides. It was scary-peaceful to say the least. It had your hairs on the back of your neck standing up and goosebumps appearing on your bare arms.

A loud slam of what you assumed was the Chateau door echoed around the night, sending birds flying before everything aside the sound of approaching footsteps quieted. A sigh sounded behind you before another body joined yours in the hammock. Without a word, you reached down and grabbed a beer, passing it to who you soon found to be Sierra. Her face was red and from the way her eyebrows were scrunched up, you knew she was furious and hurt. Her glossy eyes and tear stain face also gave away to what may have been a fight between her and John B, your best friend.

You both just watched the water and drank your beers and silence, not needing to say one word to understand each other. Boy problems, to be put in simple words. For her, you assumed, it was a fight with John B about her work trip. She would be gone for a week and travel to South Africa to experience the different social classes there. You weren’t totally sure what her job had to do with it but you knew she was excited. A world round trip to South Africa for free? You understood why she was excited. Only down part was that it was only a two person trip which means it would be her and her boss. Her boss happens to be a male.

As for you, it was that JJ has been actively ignoring and avoiding you. Everything was going well until you told him that you got a job interview for the hospital nearby to become an ultrasound technician. Usually, he would’ve been ecstatic and you knew this… but the way he acted and what he said really hurt you. Not to mention, the only time he’s been coming home is at night, after John B checks for JJ to see if you were asleep. Only once did you confront him when you were pretending to sleep and he’s been gone since. Still haven't returned home. It hasn’t been long since, only a night, but that one night and the way he’s been acting brought you great suspicion.

“Anything on JJ?” Sierra asked with a hoarse voice, both of you still watching the water. Dropping your eyes, you took a deep breath before shaking your head.

“Not since last night. I figured I’d stay out here tonight so he can actually get more than three hours of sleep.” You mused softly, playing with the fringy ends to the thin blanket over you. The silence returned for only a minute before you glanced up to study Sierra. The tears had dried but her eyes were still puffy. She’s ready to talk, just waiting for someone to ask. You knew it so you let out a small amused huff and gently nudged her with your knee.

“Was it over the trip?” You asked, pulling the good-for-nothing blanket closer to your freezing body.

“Yeah. We were just fixing to lay down an-” Before she could finish, you throughout an ‘The less I know the better’ statement, referring to where exactly that sentence was leading. A genuine laugh fell from her lips bringing a smile to your face.

“Anyways, I told him about the trip and how it’s free but he wouldn’t be able to go. He was excited for me, kissed me, and asked when I leave… but I couldn’t just not tell him that I’m going with my boss who I know he doesn’t like.” She explained before bringing the bottle to her lips and drowning the rest.

“I’m guessing he didn’t take it too well then.” You continued, looking back to the sea. Your mind drifted to what and where exactly your boyfriend was and if, by chance, he could be amusing another person.

“Nope. Said I wasn’t going. I told him I had to or I’d lose my spot as manager.” She paused and you could see the tears she was holding back, though you didn’t state as much.

“He said that traveling is like flirting with life. It’s like saying, ‘I would stay and love you, but I have to go; this is not my station.’ and it felt like a double stab. As soon as he grew quiet, I knew it held double meaning and that was it. I came out here to breathe.” The laugh that fell from her lips was anything but humorous and you found yourself frowning from the situation. You understood why John B was hesitant with their past but you also knew this job was important to Sierra. With a lazy shake of the head, you grabbed two more bottles, popped them open, and handed one to Sierra.

“Join the club, sister.” You muttered before the deathly silence from before returned, both of you being content with it.

#outer banks #sierra cameron #sierra obx #sierra #Sierra x reader (friends)#angst!#comfort #boy troubles

3 notes · View notes

paramorefan999 · 1 year

Text

journal entry #40...2/28/23

Dear Diary,

Life has been pretty crazy lately, genuinely. For starters, I fucked my brother’s best friend on Friday. I will explain...

I was on tinder with my friends playing the tinder game where you drink every time you see a red flag and Starfruit said it would be funny if one of my brother’s friends who were downstairs hanging out came up on my feed. And it fucking happened. Basically, he asked to hook up and so we went into the garage and in my car we had sex. He kept saying things like “it feels so good but it feels so wrong” and “he can’t find out about this.” He bought me Plan B the next day. We agreed to keep it a secret but...I told so many people. To be honest, it has a likely chance of getting back to my brother, but I don’t care. I felt guilty at first but now I think of it as payback for my brother being an asshole and a shitty person to me. But also I think my brother would kill his friend for doing that with me. It honestly feels like a movie.

I started school last week! I love it so far. It’s so fun to learn about something that I’m interested in. I made a few friends, but there are some fake girls there. I’m going to study at the library with one of my new friends this Friday after school! I’m excited for everything about school, which is new. It’s cool!

I’m talking to Ice again. He slid up on my snapchat story and basically asked why I wasn’t answering his messages or calls. I told him I blocked him cause it was the truth. I fibbed why I blocked him, though. It would be too awkward to reveal the real reason. Anyway, he canceled on me a few times and we haven’t hung out since. He’s very damaged. I don’t know how it would ever even work.

Thanks for listening,

#paramorefan999 #journal #diary #journal entry #journal entries #diary entries #february #february 28 2023 #february 28 #2023 #love #dear diary

3 notes · View notes

blissfulalchemist · 2 years

Note

✨ 🙋‍♀️🏆❌ and 👀 for the writer emoji asks please :3

Ahh!! Thank you Lydia! I uh...got a little long at the end there because I just decided to be an over sharer. Apologies if I’ve posted any of them before!

🙋‍♀️ Do any irl people know you write fanfic?

.....Listen....people may not know exactly what I write but I tend to tell people that I write fanfic in my free time. I just get excited to share my stories and characters with people that will listen that it just kind of comes out before I can stop myself. I do also uh use it for job interviewing as it does help in showing I have something of a hobby that isn’t just watching tv and playing games.

🏆 What's your most popular fic?

So I believe on here it’s still the phone sex piece I wrote for Hayat and Mason with that being a stand alone work that isn’t attached to a commission, in which case it would be one of the first Cat and John scenes I wrote ever! (Like even when I first started to write for them before joining the fandom on tumblr.

On my Ao3 if you go by views alone its “A Chance for Faith”, but if you go by kudos then its “A Little More Complicated Than That” which is my Sahar and tv Marc Spector.

❌ What's a trope you will never write?

Other than your standard like icky things I won’t really write things I’m not personally interested in reading or just don’t have a good handle on just what it is. Like I can’t really list off tropes as I genuinely don’t know what things are specifically all the time. While I may say I don’t like a/b/o that doesn’t mean I haven’t already possibly written it on accident (I am fairly certain though I haven’t written it as its not something that sounds like my tastes) as I just write with little regard to genre at the time of writing. I guess horror might be the only one I won’t write as like a trope because its not that I dislike it (I quite enjoy me some good horror!) I just don’t know how to and I have very little frame of reference as to what it means to create good horror that fits my style and characters, I will simply leave it to the professionals (yeah mutuals that write horror I’m looking at you!)!

✨ Give you and your writing a compliment. Go on now. You know you deserve it. 😉

alkdjfldjgl! Uhm....hmmm....I think I have to compliment on the ability I have to put emotions into my writing that people seem to like a lot! I always have a goal in mind that when I write things it should feel like you are feeling what the character is feeling (and hopefully not in a way that acts like I’m telling you the reader exactly how you should feel about it). I use styling of how words look, placement, and body language since these were things that I saw and read growing up that influenced how I also convey a scene. So apologies to those that don’t like the abundant use of italics, exclimations, ellipsis, single word paragraphs, and those times I just smush words together making it hard to read, its just the best way I can make the scene feel like the movie I see in my head.

I will also give a shout out to the times that I managed to subvert the intention of prompts sent in to me. Again most of the time I just let a piece take me and sometimes that means making very fluffy and domestic kind of prompts into angst sagas.

👀 Tell me about an up and coming wip please!

God! I really haven’t written anything more significant in a long while! I have things started but nothing that hasn’t been shared before and that isn’t FFXIV related. Like I’ve touched on things but they’ve been little notes here and there so I could have reminders as to what I was thinking about with certain pieces going. In the mean time I’m gonna catch up on wip tags and sharing a little bit of everything that I think is new. There might be some stuff that gives away plot pionts to ffxiv so please be warned!

To start here’s a little Demos from FF during Heavensward:

“Come here to drag me back to Alphinaud’s side, Yugiri,” he asks with a smile, not ready to face her quite yet.

“I actually thought I’d join you for a bit, Demos.” He nods, sitting up right to give her more space, “Why do you come up here? It’s not the easiest of places to get too.”

He shrugs, “Not that hard, but no one thinks to look up here.” They sit in silence looking over the city for a few minutes, Demos watching her relax out of the corner of his eye. “How did you know I’d be up here anyway?”

“Hm,” she looks over at him and down to the journal stuffed into the band of his belt, “Tataru gave me one of your drawings to use as a map, the perspective of it could have only been achieved from some place up high. So I just looked towards the sky.”

“I should have known it was her that’s been taking my cityscapes,” he laughs, “Was it helpful at least?”

“Quite. I use it to show the other shinobi where to be when the need arises.” She tilts her head, nodding to the journal, “Have you done anything new?”

In truth he hadn’t drawn more than a few lines for almost two weeks now, nothing here felt new or inspiring. Still she looked at him so expectantly and gods he didn’t want to disappoint her. He pulls the journal free, quickly flipping through the mass of blank pages before landing on a random one, “Oh plenty! Here take a look.” She looks at the page confused, “I call it Blizzard Forest,” he flips to a different page, “This one is more abstract and titled Collection of Snowflakes.” She looks up at his smiling face that’s holding back some laughter, the next page he flips to having a few rushed lines, “Oh this one is of the area just past the gates.” Yugiri laughs, making his smile grow as he picks yet another blank page, “This one is just a snow covered rock. And this one-.”

“Wow you really love to draw the snow don’t you,” she teases, handing the book back, “I was hoping to see something different of yours.” He sighs, giving another shrug, “Guess you would need a bit more variety of surroundings.”

“Most of my other works are either at home or Revenant's Toll….along with the better supplies.”

“Can you not find them here?”

“I can, it's just,” Demos shakes his head, “Well there’s something about using your older stuff. Like it’s not fair to give new life to something when the others have so much more to give still.” He leans forward, brown hair falling into his eyes, “It’s a weird sentiment but it’s just….” Demos gives a shrug, shaking away the thought.

“I don’t find it weird at all,” he glances up at her soft smile with wide eyes, “Sounds almost like something an old friend of mine would say.”

“From back in Doma?” She nods, eyes filling with melancholy as she looks straight ahead, “What was it like there?” He asks, pulling out the journal and pencil from his pocket, “Describe it to me.”

Here’s a little Sahar post Moon Knight show events:

“It was me,” she repeats, “I made sure Ammit was dead.” She steps forward, “Marc and Steven knew nothing about it.”

“Well clearly,” she hears Steven mumble.

“I am the current High Priestess of Khonshu, I was simply following my duty.”

“And what duty is that? By my understanding you have been very vocal about your distrust of our brethren.”

“I swore to protect the travelers in the night, to enact vengeance and justice on those that deserve it,” she tilts her head, daring them to look her in the eye, “I may be from another earth but I will not stray from my purpose.”

“Are you implying that you have become his most current avatar?”

She swallows, rolling her lips, “He needed one and I am the most qualified, don’t you agree?”

“Sahar you shouldn’t have done that,” Marc growls out, “You know what he’s capable of.”

She crosses her arms, glancing at Marc, “Exactly. The Khonshu of my earth was an opportunistic dick that had many more tricks up his sleeve making it harder to tell him no. This one is a cakewalk.”

“Is this an agreeable arrangement, Khonshu?” A goddess asks, lifting her hand prompting the old bird to speak. You better get the hint, Khonshu, After a moment she feels a chill throughout her body and a force slam into her back, gasping as she no longer feels her limbs.

“It’s not like I have much of a choice,” she says in a deeper tone, “Don’t worry I will help in keeping Jake a secret.”, “This world still needs justice to be served.”

“Are you saying that you’d rather have Marc back?”

“Well sad to say that even if he did, he can’t have us back,” Steven asserts, “We made a deal.”

“And I will uphold that deal.” Khonshu flexes her hands, “Though I could grow to like this one. She’s gained more training-.”

“And she’s stubborn enough to keep you in line. Don’t go thinkin’ we haven’t forgotten about how she’s stood up to her universe’s version of you,” Steven narrows his eyes, “Not that I like this idea of her being your avatar.”

Here’s a little bit of Anthea and their first meeting of Hythlodaeus:

The person sitting across from them exhales removing their mask and hood revealing lavender hair that goes just past the shoulders braided loosely, paired with sparkling amethyst eyes that keep Anthea entranced until he smiles softening the angles of his fair, lightly sun-kissed face. He’s one of the most beautiful people they’d seen, their brain already spouting out ideas on flowers that could be made based around him. “You‘re free to remove your mask if you’d like.” Anthea stiffens recognizing the man’s voice as the same one from the stranger she fell into. He gives a nod, “Do you wish to begin, then?”

“Hm,” Anthea blinks a few times while the words he says gain meaning in their brain, “Oh right. Yes, sorry. Uhm….” They look down in their lap at the plant bag and stack of papers beneath it, deciding to put the plant between them hoping it can mask the blush they’re sure can be seen through the one they already wear. “Apologies, normally I just send paperwork in or someone else takes it for me, rarely do I ever make the trip myself, but I felt it necessary this time around.” They take a breath, shuffling papers before looking up to see the new centerpiece does wonders to block the distraction his all too pretty face can cause. Anthea clears their throat, “Right, well, my name is Anthea and I am here to submit new flora for approval to be studied on Elpis.”

“Wonderful,” he says cheerfully, peeking around to meet their eyes, “I’ve seen the design and have been most curious about the finished product.”

His hands reach out to open the bag, Anthea quickly shooing them away, “Well see here’s the issue, mister…,” they look around the desk hoping to find a name plate before-.

“Hythlodaeus,” he smiles, folding his hands in front of him politely, “Pleasure to meet you, Anthea.”

“Same to you,” they respond quickly, looking down at their paperwork once more, I swear he’s purposely trying to show off his face which is wholly unfair. “The issue, Hythlodaeus, is that this particular flora wasn’t approved prior. It just….happened. I didn’t mean to make something so far from the design already approved, so I’m hoping for a retro approval and approval to allow Elpis to study it.”

“Hmm, I see.” He looks to their lap, “Might I see what you have written so that I can prepare myself.”

“I could uhm also just show you.”

He laughs, “I do try to be prepared for my appointments, Anthea, and I read that the last time something like this occurred you brought in a carnivorous plant of some kind.”

“No one’s going to let that one go are they,” they grumble.

And finally a little bit of Siberite during Heavensward:

She shakes her head, “No, everything is fine. I apologize for waking you.”

His body relaxes giving her an easy smile, “Good, good. No need to apologize. You just, well, you just never know in these times,” he assures with a chuckle, “How may I be of service to you?” She looks down, absently tearing at her nails, Was it truly not enough to just lay in silence?. He cocks his head to the side looking at her curiously, “What’s wrong, my friend? What’s happened?”

She takes a deep breath, “I uhm-. I was-. It’s too cold in my room, I was hoping to stay with you?”

“I can arrange to have a fire started for you.”

“No, thank you,” she says, shaking her head.

He opens his mouth only to shut it once more, giving a solemn nod with the understanding finally hitting him. “Of course,” he says, opening the door wider, “I can sleep on the chair over-.”

“No. No need to give up your bed for me.”

“Well I certainly can’t have you sleeping in the chair, it's simply not right of a gentleman to do so.”

“Then we share the bed, Haurchefant.” She looks up at him, the words having slipped out before she had a chance to stop them or even phrase the whole thing in a less direct manner. “Unless you don’t feel comfortable with that idea.”

He gives her a soft smile, “Of course not, your comfort comes first, Siberite.” She gives a single nod, finding a place easily in the bed, Haurchefant covering her delicately with the blankets before laying down next to her. Her eyes close with ease into a dreamless sleep with his even breathing as her lullabye and his warmth melting away the last of the lingering nightmare.

When she wakes, his hand is pressed to her chest underneath her own smaller hand, leg tossed between his, and her head using his free arm as a pillow, all the while his fingers trace patterns up and down her arm with a small smile. She blinks a few times until the ash blonde hair turns back to the silver of who really is tangled up in her limbs. “Good morning,” he says with a light laugh once she finally focuses on him, “Did you sleep well?” She nods, releasing his hand and sliding back to free him fully of her grasp, the ache and pain starting once again the instant his skin is no longer in contact with hers. She stands from the bed, Haurchefant reaching for her hand, “Wait, there’s no rush. Stay. Have something to eat before you run off to be a hero.”

Siberite hugs herself, shaking her head, “I should really be going. Thank you, though, for coming to my rescue last night.”

“No need to thank me, just send for me and I’ll be there.”

His never ending smile falters as he sits up, tugging at her heart. “I’m sorry for my behavior, it-. It wasn’t fair of me to throw myself at you like that.”

#Truly i apologize if I've shared any of this before I just decided to share what I had stashed away #some of this is a iykyk kind of thing but like it has to be written with that forbidden knowledge #anyway! Thank you again for asking lydia! I love you!#my wip tag

3 notes · View notes

fakeloveaskblog · 2 years

Note

(Hi, me again. The ask was definitely worth the wait. I’m slightly scared that Oswald is going to show up and hurt Remus. But if he does then maybe it’ll give Remus the chance to confront him and recognise that what he did was abuse. Also it might help Remy to draw parallels between Oswald’s treatment of Remus and Virgil’s treatment of them.

Sorry, please excuse my brainstorming I’m incapable of accepting happy ‘angst free’ moments and am already speculating on how it will go wrong. Virgil can’t show up for a while now because he’s with his parents so my mind turns to Oswald. either way I’m excited, and a little scared, to see what comes next.)

Hi Remy, it’s the Drug ghost. I think you should try to talk to Remus, worst case scenario is he doesn’t want to be around people at the moment and then you can give him some space. But if he does want company then you can be there for him. I can help you walk over to him if you are struggling, it’s not an issue for me.

Also make sure to remember that you are loved and that you deserve all the love that you are given plus more. I’ll keep out of your chat with Remus but feel free to get my attention if you need something, until then just pay no attention to the ghost behind the curtain. (This is a reference to a movie called The Wizard of Oz don’t worry if you don’t get it.)

Tw: Talk about (past) sexual assaults, general talk about abuse, minor drug mentions. I will put a ~ right before and after the worst of it so it can be skipped

Remy was still laying silent with Janus' arm around them. Your big eyes popped up above the edge of the bed as you whispered your message to them.

"girl you're right. remus wouldn't be the type to get all pissy at me over something like this. thanks, you watchers know how the logic part of my brain ain't working no more. Like 99% of my logic comes from you people"

They gently moved Janus' arm away. He immediately hugged onto a pillow instead and mumbled out something about his boyfriend between snores.

Your eyes shone a calming orange to hopefully help with the pain as they leant their elbow on top of your ghost head to try and get up. As soon as they stood up their knees began to shake and nearly buckle.

An ice cold hand appeared on the other side of Remy to help. The blue silhouette of the ghost shone a bit extra blue to send them a smile.

The two ghosts helped Remy out into the living room. Remus still sat on the couch with his back turned towards them. He was unusually still.

A floorboard creaked and Remus immediately turned to look at them. For a moment Remy flinched. The instinct to run and hide when they made too much noise was still wired into them.

Remus let up into a soft look "Good morning Beanie" There was this weirdly solemn expression on him.

"I always thought of you as like a night owl" They replied as the ghost gave them a final push to the couch before both cramming together behind the curtain.

"Beanie, it's 1 pm"

"I think Janny is like hibernating" They practically sank down into the couch "We should like scare them awak-"

They cut off their words in an instant as they took their first look at Remus. He was sitting hunched forward with his elbows leant on his thighs as he moved something between his fingers. It was a small plastic bag filled with white powder.

"Hey beanie. This is ketamine, isn't it?"

Remy forced themself to nod.

“I swear I wasn’t like prying around your home like a thief” Remus quickly assured “I genuinely went out to the kitchen to get water ‘cause my mouth felt like a dry cat anus and I immediately started to dissociate again. I just opened a cabinet and saw it”

“It’s Virgil’s” Remy lied.

He looked over to them and let his eyes wander over their face before mumbling out “Yeah that makes sense”

“No offense babe but uhm should I like take it? I know you’ve been to rehab and all that. I know that you ain’t gonna lose control and sniff it like some ketamine werewolf but still y’know”

They reached out to take the plastic bag away from him. In one fast motion Remus had grabbed onto their lower arm. He made sure the grip didn’t hurt as he met their eyes.

“The bruise around your wrist was from a hand. Those kind of bruises don’t come from bumping into things”

Remy forced themself to keep perfectly still. A nauseous feeling crawled up their throat “Babe I thought you got it” They tried to say it in a jokey way but their voice cracked in the middle of it “Janny they just- they just think the worse but you get it don’t you?”

“Fibro just makes it easy to bruise huh?” Remus replied.

“Yes exactly! And like it was a mistake and he tots didn’t really mean it and he said sorry afterwards and made popcorn and it was just ‘cause I was being such a shithead”

A numbing feeling spread out like a veil over his mind “Yeah.....Yeah...it was understandable....it was........it was...yeah”

They took the ketamine filled bag from Remus’ now slack hands and put it on the coffee table. They hesitated before leaning forward and bonking their forehead against his shoulder. They bonked over and over.

Remus looked down at them as a confused smile spread on his lips “Whatcha doing? If you’re trying to set off the bomb inplanted in my MIGHTY Bones you’re aiming wrong”

“Nah girl. I’m just trying to annoy you like you usually like annoy me”

“Ah. Giving me a good dose of my good ol medicine. Good strategy. Want some coffee?”

“Girlie is that even a question. C’mon now”

He stood up and pressed a kiss to the top of their head before doing a jokey bow “I’m gonna go kill many enemies now on my quest to return with earth shatteringly good coffee!!! Just for you!! My lovely royalty!”

Remy let up into a soft giggle. They playfully took his hand and kissed his knuckle “Good luck my brave knight”

Remus spun around and walked with ridiculously long steps while swinging his arms around and sing-songing “on an adventure! not gonna get stabbed! not gonna get my legs cut off! not gonna get blood on their carpet! on an aDVENTUREEEE!”

He put on a can of coffee and as the beans began to get pressed down into liquid he hummed to himself. The kitchen smelled like rotten food and ketamine but the smell of the coffee kept him grounded. The floor was dirty from pieces of food, hastily thrown away food packages and dirt brought in by shoes. Mold was growing in the corners of the walls.

There was a spot near the wall where the dirt had been visibly kicked around. He hunched down next to it to check. Maybe a bird had accidentally flown in and messed around. There were footprints from two people. Maybe they’d had a close together make out session. There were marks from hands on the wall and one of the footprints had clearly tried to move away or kick the other away. It looked like one person had pushed the other up against the wall and strangled them.

Remus flinched back and hurried to get up on his feet. His hands trembled behind him until he grabbed onto the kitchen counter to keep him stable.

Phantom like sensations went around his wrists. It was so clear. He could feel hands grab onto him. Onto his wrists, onto the back of his head, pressing his waist down. Against the kitchen counter, down against the living room floor, up against walls.

It became hard to breathe. It was so real. Os was right there. He could feel his ex boyfriend’s breathe against his cheek. His rough hands. The smell of his cologne. And yet Remus could clearly see he wasn’t there! He wasn’t blind! But it was so real! So tangible!

He felt something touch against his finger and looked down to see blood. Dried up drops of red blood was stuck to the counter. At first he thought it had to be a hallucination, but no it was actual blood. He remembered the big bruise on Remy’s cheek, how there was a small wound trying to hold itself together in the middle of the blues and purples. He felt sick.

He couldn’t tell if the feeling of blood running down his skin was a hallucination or a memory. His sight went a bit blurry as his mind was quickly trying to dissociate away from the situation. Everything became flat around him, like they’d suddenly turned 2D. The blood ran down to-

The kettle rang. The coffee was done.

Remus jumped and stood frozen for a few seconds as if the kettle was about to attack him before letting out a big sigh. He collapsed onto the ground and buried his head in his hands. He tried to think of all the ways blood could be fun. All of the gory deaths that could bring out the most blood possible. Oceans of blood and vampires and big scary monsters lurking through the woods.

His hands were still shaking a bit as he poured up the coffee into two cups. Remy had wrapped themself in a blanket and were rubbing their feet together to stay warm as he went back to the living room. Their knuckles always got this blue hue when cold, even now when it was nearing spring.

When they saw him they opened up the blanket and welcomed him in. Their arm stayed around his shoulder for an extra moment before letting him adjust the blanket how he wanted to.

“Thanks” They said as they cupped their hands around the cup of coffee to warm themself “I see you were able to like avoid getting caught in a sandpit on the way to retrieve the coffee”

“Yeah I uh managed to not get my head cut off” Remus mumbled back. he felt too nauseous to drink.

The strap to Remy’s top had fallen down so it hung around their arm. Their shoulder blades looked so bare, the silhouettes of their ribs could be seen through the top. Remus reached out and gently moved the strap up to their shoulder again.

Remy turned to him and smiled softly. Their cold feet touched his under the blanket.

“Do you have anything to do today?” Remy asked.

“Nothing. Aside from the normal torturing, drinking pig blood, the usual”

“Could you stay here for another day?”

“Yeah. Yeah. Sure. Of course. However long you want me to”

Remy bumped their head against his shoulder “I think I will miss you whenever you’re not here. Not in a like obsessive weird overbearing way. Just like a small lil missing”

“I miss you too”

“Why you saying it in the like present?”

Remus shrugged.

“Do you remember how long we’ve known each other?” Remy asked.

“Beanie-babe you should know my memory is shit”

“Mine is too”

“It hasn’t been That long I think”

“It feels like far longer. In a tots good way”

“Knowing you feels like a very old injury” Remus replied “Like when you crack your wrist as a child and it still snaps extra loud because of what happened all those years ago. It feels like I’ve known you that long”

Remy sat down the coffee cup against the table and leaned a little closer “Do you think it feels old ‘cause we’ve both been two people?”

“Oh look at you being a super smart philosopher” Remus teased.

“A super duper sexy one as well”

“Yeah. SUUper you got lots of nice organs under that skin”

“But c’mon. Does my theory sound That bad?” Remy asked.

"It sounds a little nice. Both of us been two people huh” He smiled a little “A sick girl”

“And a sick boy” They filled in.

“And now it’s just us”

Remy took his hand and intertwined their fingers “When we touch I feel all four of us at once”

They closed their eyes and leaned their head forward. They wanted Remus to be comfortable so they eagerly waited for him to take the first step.

“Are they healing well?” Remus asked.

Remy shot back and looked him up and down “What uh what now?” Oh god they had both completely misread the vibe.

“The bruises. Are they healing well?”

“Yeah girl yeah they’re- they’re like tots fine. I’ve always bruised easily”

Remus sighed “I’ve always bleed real easily”

“He knows better” Remy muttered out like they were half unsure of what they were saying “He like- he just tries to make me happy- he knows better than me how to like make sure i’m safe and happy ‘cause I’m all stupid and pathetic and can’t take care of myself”

“Too delusional to know what good for me” Remus whispered to himself.

“What?”

“Nothing”

He moved out from the blanket and sat as far away on the couch as he could. He mumbled out something about it getting warm as an excuse. Remy curled up closer to the other side of the couch in return. They sipped on their coffee while glancing over to him over and over. A silence firmly planted itself between them.

Remus started to nervously bite on his fingers. He tried to keep his breathing steady. There were phantom hands- Oswald’s hands on him again. The sight of the dried blood flashed before his eyes. The marks left on the kitchen floor. The bruises all over Remy’s body. The silence of their pain.

A part of him wanted to take their hand and guide them out of there but another much louder part of him was straining his hair and screaming in horror about how if Remy was being abused that meant He had been abused. There were too many similarities. It couldn’t be real. It couldn’t.

Think about how Oswald also made you become isolated in your apartment just like Remy is, Remus thoughts reminded him. It wasn’t abuse. He was just telling you the truth about how much people, even Rowan, loathed being around you.

Think about how Oswald persuaded you out of going on hormones just like Remy has said Virgil did. It wasn’t abuse. That’s just how relationships with cis people go.

Think about how Oswald would have to restrain you or push you down or hold his hand over your mouth so hard that it left similar bruises to Remy’s. It wasn’t abuse. You were just creating such an overemotional fuzz over nothing he had to make you quiet. You gave him no choice.

Think about how Oswald talked you into not taking your medicine just like-

Think about Remy Damnit!

Remus turned to his best friend and rose so fast from the couch a cushions fell down onto the ground. He took Remy’s hand, looked them directly into the eyes and breathlessly let out.

“Love, we have to leave!”

“What- What are you talking about!? I thought you understood!”

“I do! I do understand! Which is why we gotta wake Jannie up and leave!”

A look of betrayal swept across Remy’s face “You agreed that Virgil had valid reasons for like- like doing what he does- did! He’s gonna stop! Everything is gonna go back to normal if I just like stop being such a horrible partner!”

“No- Remy-”

“I can take it! I’ve always taken it! I can survive it! I’ve done it before! It can’t get any worse than this. It’s all gonna get better from here. Viv is worth it! Our relationship is worth it! I can’t lose him! I can take pain. I can’t take living without him!”

Remus sat down on the couch arm and cupped their cheeks “I’ll be here. Janus will be here. You’ll survive. I’ll make sure of it. If you ever dare dying I’m going to hell and I’m resurrecting you!”

Remy closed their eyes and shook their head “No. No. It’ll get better. I’ll just have to- I have to-”

“IT WON’T!”

He glanced around as if Oswald was waiting behind some corner, ready to jump out at him. A lump formed in his throat and he tried to push it back. His hands let go of Remy. He felt too ashamed to touch them.

“Uhh y’know actually I- I- About a week after I’d moved in with Os we uh we went out with some of his friends to a bar an-and they- they all misgendered me and Os said sorry and said that’s just how his friends were- but that isn’t important- we went home and I was- I tipsy and tired and I just wanted to sleep and I- I remember nearly passing out as soon as I hit the bed but Os he- he was- he was laying next to me and I saw him uhh..touching himself and i remember slurring something out about being ace or sex repulsed or something and he just- he just assured me he was only enjoying himself. the sexual stuff didn’t involve me at all and- and I thought yeah that makes sense. he has every right to- to do that in his own bedroom. An-and when I woke up in the morning there was....bodily fluids on me from him but nothing more he hadn’t done anything but I still- I still felt so filthy but when he asked I said it was okay ‘cause he had a point and he made me promise not to tell anyone ‘cause if someone heard he’d helped me get into a bar and given me cigs and alcohol he- he’d get in trouble. So I didn’t tell anyone. I never told. Not until right now”

He looked over to Remy while feeling like an old wound that had just been scratched raw open once more. They reached to take his hand but hesitated and kept their distance.

“I’m sorry. Babe I’m real sorry that happened. Feeling like that wasn’t like an overreaction at all. I can promise you th-”

“That’s not the point Remy. It didn’t get any better. It only got worse. ANd I just kept deluding myself into thinking it was fine. I kept making excuses”

“Are you- What the hell are you trying to imply” They said it in an ever so soft tone.

Remus hadn’t even told Rowan anything. She’d had pieced together things here and there from his flashbacks, what triggers made him dissociate, what made him throw up, The blood. He looked at Remy. It was just them.

He took a deep breathe.

“It started with that night yeah but...it kept happening. I don’t know how many- he got more handsy and- and it was so often- it felt like so often- I’m unsure if it actually was often- I have no idea- but I couldn’t sleep anymore- My body constantly ached from being too tense until- until I- I went into psychosis while at work an-and I hurt myself- a coworker had to stop me- And- Os- Os used it as a reason to make me quit my job- I got stuck in that apartment- he made me quit my antipsychotics. He told me they didn’t help. They only hurt me. He knew better”

Even though he was starting to look moreso through Remy than at them they kept nodding every now and again to show they were genuinely listening.

“I was constantly paranoid. I was constantly overanalyzing myself to find what I was doing wrong. He started to touch my- my thighs when we sat close together. He touched my....my...behind as a joke. I woke up with his lips against my neck- my mouth an-and when he- during the times he would touch himself he started to...to like...not touch me but- he- he- he grabbed my wrists or thigh or pulled in my clothes- ANd I just kept overanalyzing Everything! I couldn’t understand why this was happening so it had to be my fault! I had to be sitting too close to him! I had to be wearing too little clothing! I had to be leading him on! I had to be broken ‘cause a normal gir- boyfriend would have enjoyed it! So- So I changed as much as I could- I wore my binder all the time, I always sat as far away as I could so when he held me down or pulled me too close it wasn’t completely my fault, I barely slept, I stopped wearing shorts even in the summer. But i kept happening! And every single time it did I was able to come up with another reason for why it was my fault!”

Remy opened their mouth to let out some nasty comment about Oswald but no words seemed quite right so they stayed silent.

“Saying it out loud makes it seem so...obvious...but it’s like when- when you don’t see how much your friend has aged until you see a photo ‘cause it happens so slowly. An-and I was- I was high....a lot....Os- After i went off my meds he said His Meds would help me more. He knew better. He was older he’d seen how this stuff had helped other people. His past girlfriends and all that. He usually didn’t even tell me what drugs he was making me take. He just told it would make me feel better. Calm down for once. Stop being so annoying or overbearing or overemotional. I swear I didn’t always want to get high! I tried saying no sometimes! But he would- he would- until I agreed! It would take the paranoia away! And the delusions! Hopefully I would stop ranting about my stupid interests. He said it all as a joke. All the insults. How my nose was too big, how i was always chatting about my stupid interests, how i seemed so cold when i didn’t cuddle with him. he never yelled at me. Never even raised his voice. Never hit me. Only pushed me into things or held me down or- but he always made it seem like he had good reasons- I was just too frantic- I didn’t realize- I stopped talking ‘bout my interests. I stopped it all. I just- I don’t remember most of it! Most of the- He made me take my clothes off- I was high- I don’t know- I was always high- So he could look at me an-and enjoy himself- I- I think he told me to- made me do things to myself but I don’t remember! I don’t remember! It happened so slow! First like like touching through- then- he took my shirt off- few weeks later- I don’t- I remember puking constantly! I remember constant headaches! I remember my body hurting the mornings after. It wasn’t the normal hurt I swear. It wasn’t- I don’t remember- I don’t remember”

“You don’t have to tell me” Remy suddenly said.

“I- I know”

“You don’t”

“I want to. I need to. I need to say it so I know it was real”

Remy nodded at him to show it was okay to continue.

“I- Os changed my phone number without me knowing so I thought Rowan had just- she had just stopped contact- He said I was too unstable work- to take care of myself- to know what would make me happy....I....I felt like I couldn’t survive without him”

Remy’s knuckles turned white as they held onto the fabric of the couch. Their teeth gritted together ever so slightly. It was too familiar.

“I barely remember anything! YEARS of my life just gone! Except for pain and how it felt an-and the worst details- I was high- I couldn’t- I would wake up half dressed or bruised or with..fluids on me- an-and after a while- I- I woke up an-and there was- My mouth ached- There was a taste- even if i puked- even if i put soap in my mouth- even if i binged on food- I could still feel it”

He was visibly holding back tears.

“Oswald said I was just delusional. I was just imagining it to have something to go crazy over. That he would never do anything like that. That I was being a bad partner if I said stuff like that. I was making him sad. I was- I was- He always used my delusions against me. I have delusions. I am not stupid. I know I have them. But I am not dumb enough to think Those kind of aches on my body weren't real- But I didn’t wanna be a bad partner so I- I let him convince- when- whenever I felt it I just- I puked, I made sure not to look at myself as I showered, I moved on, I took more of his meds ‘cause I couldn’t survive without him. I was too stupid and mentally ill and overemotional”

Remy nearly felt sick listening to it. It almost got hard to breathe. They didn't want to hear more. It was too similar. They wanted to shut him out and pretend everything was alright.

“At least he gave me the curtesy of letting me be high out of my mind most times! I- The week- The week before I left- I wasn’t high- I hadn’t even smoked that day- I was- I can remember it perfectly- I mean- As perfectly as someone can remember a traumatic event- It was- He was just gonna- He told me to- to take off my clothes so he could...enjoy himself and- I know it’s stupid but it felt so normal I obliged and- I guess- I guess that means I technically consented so it was my fault and I deserve to feel the shame for it and the guilt and it was all-”

“Shh. Shh. Breathe. He was the one who coerced you” Remy reminded.

“Yeah. Yeah. He didn’t stop- He got...closer- I remember- A cop show was on tv- we were on the living room couch- he put his hands on me- It was NCIS- the show- I think it was NCIS- I wasn’t high- He- He- He put his fingers in me”

It sounded like he had to strain his throat just to get the words out.

“I- I think I tried to stop him- he turned my head to the tv and told me to just keep watching- I stayed quiet- Yeah it was definitely NCIS I think- I was bleeding- When he was done- I was bleeding- We hadn’t eaten dinner yet- He left me bleeding on the couch to make dinner and when he got back he laughed and- he asked if I wanted another round- why else wouldn’t I have moved- I threw up in the bathroom- I don’t remember eating- I was bleeding- sometimes the wounds reopen to this day- And I didn’t leave! I thought I had consented! I thought it was normal! It was my fault! I was the fucked up one! I was the one who needed him! And then he did the exact same fucking thing the next fucking day!!”

He surprised himself with how angry he sounded. He’d never had a chance to voice it before. Being angry at Oswald felt good, it felt right. It didn’t make him feel guilty like it had when he’d been angry in silence.

“Except this second time I got to keep my t-shirt on. How nice of him. I felt so guilty ‘cause I hadn’t been wearing my binder that day- I’d been puking too much- I thought it had to be the reason- I- I remember- We were in his bedroom- Standing up- His arm around me- His other- When- When his fingers- I remember my feet lifting from the ground for just a moment- After a while he had to cover my mouth- he didn’t want anyone to hear- he said I wanted others to hear- I was that dirty- I was- And then he was done- An-And I still didn’t run- I thought- If I survived it happening once I could keep surviving him doing That to me ‘cause I couldn’t survive without him- I hadn’t spoken to Rowan in- I dunno- I dunno- I didn’t have any money left- I was too delusional- He said I was too- but he was done- There was blood- But he was done- He was done- He was done”

His fingers dug down into the couch cushion. He nearly ripped the fabric open.

“He laid me down on the bed- HE WAS SUPPOSED TO BE DONE!- I remember- I remember- I was nearly crying with relief it was over- And- And he- He Wasn’t- He- Details don’t matter- I- I had a single thought in my head- My boyfriend is going to rape me. Just repeating in my head- I think some of me died in that moment- a part of me will always be stuck in that bed looking up at him as he is getting ready to- to- I don’t remember running- But my body ran- I’d never fought back like that before- He wasn’t ready for it- I locked myself into the bathroom and I was still bleeding- I- I- He didn’t bang on the door- he was speaking so nicely- I called Rowan for the first time in 6 months- by the time she was there he had nearly convinced me to open the door- She held a knife to his throat to get him away from the door- I left all my belongings there- She just guided me out and I never saw him again. I never even said goodbye. He tried to- my boyfriend- ex boyfriend tried to-”

Remus suddenly turned to Remy and cupped their cheeks. His face was red from shame and guilt and fear of them judging him. For them laughing at his face for trying to play the victim, But he had to help them! He loved them!

“I’m so sorry babey” Remy murmured out “You got a whole like notebook of murder ideas right? I wish I could use every single idea against him”

“Remy don’t you get it. It only got worse. I kept making excuses for him! He kept manipulating me! Kept forcing me to rely on him! Isolate me! Being hurt became normal! It’s probably become normal to you but it will get worse! You’ll hit a limit! Like I did!”

They shrunk in on themself “I don’t think Viv would-”

“It’s not about the specifics of it! But he WILL eventually do something so horrendous you WILL want to leave! Even if you love him! Even if you rely on him! You will want to leave or your body will do it for you!”

“I- I-”

“I was lucky! I was so fucking lucky! Do you understand that!? Imagine if the bathroom hadn’t had a lock! Imagine if Rowan had been away filming in another country or she’d stopped caring about me! She could have been HOURS away and by then Oswald would have manipulated me back! Or I wouldn’t have been able to fight off him! Do you understand? If I wasn’t lucky! If Os hadn’t been unable to get Rowan to stop caring about me I would have probably still been with him! Or I would have been DEAD! He would have- He would have continued to- He would have-”

Remus closed his eyes and shook his head. This wasn’t about him. He pressed a gentle kiss to Remy’s forehead.

“Bloody heart of mine please understand. You will probably not be as lucky as I was. Virgil has already blocked our numbers once. He might make you unable to reach out for help. If you stay you WILL reach that limit and me or Janus will probably not be able to help you out of here. Please. Please leave. Please run away with me”

Remus reached out his hand. For a few egregiously slow seconds the two of them sat there and looked at each other in pressed silence. Before Remy took his hand and held onto him like it was the last thing they would ever do.

And they nodded.

Remus shone up in a bright smile and pressed a kiss to their cheek “Let’s go wake up Jannie then”

He stood up and let them lean against him as they walked. Remy mumbled out a quiet question if he was okay with being this close right after saying all that. He murmured something back about how it was okay since they were his Beanie.

He sat down against the bed before jumping onto the side of the bed Janus was still sleeping on. They had wrapped themself up into the blanket like a snake digging into the sand. Remus patted his hands right on top of their head while exclaiming.

“Boo! Wake up! Wake up!”

Janus opened one eye “Wake me when the apartment is on fire”

“We’re leaving” Remy said.

In an instant janus was already halfway up from the bed “Indeed! We are! Do you need anything? Any important documents? Clothes? Meds?”

“I...I think one of the watchers put all of the important stuff in a bag in my closet”

“Great” Janus looked between the two of them. It was so starchily clear something had happened between them but they didn’t want to pry “I will go and get everyone’s jackets then. Re-check if we perhaps have missed anything important. Like any organs or money. The normal things”

He let out a yawn while quickly leaving the room. The bedroom door closed behind him. Remus and Remy looked at each other. There were still tear streaks on his cheeks.

“It’s uhm the bag is in that closet. Behind all the like shit” Remy said while pointing.

“Nice nice nice”

Remus leant down and looked around in the small closet. Remy fiddled with the ends of their skirt.

“Hey babe?”

“Mhm?”

“I know we don’t got like much time to talk right now but I....I’m really sorry...I wish I could pour cyanide down His throat for you...If you ever want to talk about it again I’m here y’know. I will listen or just sit with you. I promise. You are the most wonderful lovely and fucked up IN a good way duder I know. You never- You never deserved it. I hope he feels so guilty he can barely sleep. I hope he pisses himself every night. I hope you know all reasons it was your fault is total bullshit. I uh I love you y’know”

Remus turned around and sent a soft look to them. He pulled out the bag and stood up. He leant their foreheads together.

“Thanks Beanie” He murmured out.

“Are you alright with a hug?”

“Think so”

Remy wrapped their arms around him. They didn’t squeeze too hard, they wanted to show that he could step back whenever he wanted to. He embraced them back.

“Whenever I tell people ‘bout my dad being a tots abusive piece of shit I always like worry people are gonna see me differently so I just like- I wanted to let you know I still see you as a stinky raggedy little rat man. Nothing has changed. I’ve just gained another person to be pissed off at. And I’ll like extra check before like cuddling too close and that stuff. That’s all, unless you tell me some new boundary or something like that”

“Thanks” Remus whispered again “Sometimes i get scared all I am is what happened to me. Like I’m- I’m used up goods- a wound- a- but we’re not. The only ones who should feel shame for what happened to us for the rest of eternity are our- our abusers”

“I-”

The sound of a door opening rang through the apartment. Both of them flinched by instinct. Remy held onto him harder without realizing it. Remus moved his arm in front of them without realizing it.

“Babe? Remy? You okay?” It was Virgil’s voice “I’m hom- YOU! WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING HERE!?”

“A demonic snail brought me here actually. Had no choose in the mater. Neither did your precious Remy” Janus smoothly lied. He was making his voice sound as calm as possible “Mayhaps they could see that leaving your disabled partner all alone on a short notice wasn’t a completely good decision”

“YOU DIRTY SLUT HEARD THAT MY PARTNER WAS ALONE AND THOUGHT IT WAS A GOOD TIME TO EXPLOIT THEM HUH!? YOU DISGUSTING MOTHERFUCKER WAS JUST READY TO MANIPULATE THEM AGAIN! I KNEW IT!!”

“Oh please with the name calling. You should happy I have enough self control to not beat your goofy ass into the ground”

“YOU SHOULD BE FUCKING SCARED ‘CAUSE I DON’T HAVE SELF CONTROL! NOT WHEN IT COMES TO THE LOVE OF MY LIFE!”

“You have the strength of a wet cigarette and the bone density of a sorbet”

“I’VE NEARLY BROKEN YOUR UGLY ASS NOSE ONCE I CAN DO IT 15 MORE TIMES. FUCKING TRY ME!”

Remy flinched even harder as the sound of something shattering against the floor rang out. Their whole body was shaking while they mumbled out something about this all being their fault and how sorry they were. So sorry. Over and over. Remus stroked his hand through their hair while trying to hide how his hands were shaking as well.

The door to the bedroom was slammed open and Virgil stepped in. His right cheek was red like he’d been punched. His eyes darted between the two Rems before taking ahold of Remus’ hoodie and pushing him away so his back hit the closet door.

Remus watched on as Virgil grabbed onto Remy’s already bruised wrists and held him down against the bed. He towered over them.

“Babe I was going to come home and forgive you and make everything good again but now I see that I was right!! I was right all along!! I wasn’t being paranoid or overly anxious or too restrictive over you or anything! I was right! As soon as I left for even a secOND YOU WENT AND CHEATED ON ME WITH THESE- THESE” For a second he glanced over to Remus “THESE UGLY LIARS! I WAS RIGHT! I WAS RIGHT!!”

Remy tried to shake their head. Aside from the trembling they felt frozen in fear.

“OH DON’T YOU TRY ME! I KNEW IT! YOU NEED ME! YOU WILL IMMEDIATELY RUN INTO THE ARMS OF PEOPLE WHO ONLY WANT TO USE YOU IF I’M NOT HERE! YOU CAN’T TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF! YOU CAN’T DO ANYTHING! YOU’D BE USELESS IF IT WASN’T FOR ME! EVERYONE WILL LEAVE YOU EXCEPT FOR ME! THEY WILL LEAVE YOU!”

Remus recognized it so well. He’d been held down just like that. He could feel his abuser’s lips grazing against his neck. Could hear his murmured insults about how stupid or annoying he was. Could see the sly smile on his face as he said it was just a joke if Remus ever talked back.

Remy kept shaking their head. They shut their eyes and tried to jerk away from his grip. Their legs kicked out to try and get him away. They weakly hit his side. In response he moved his hand to their throat. Remy let out a gasp of breathe as he choked them. They felt such shame at Remus being able to see them like this.

His other hand moved up into the air. It closed into a fist. But before Virgil could hurt them any worse a hand gripped onto him, forcing him to stop.

He turned his head and met Remus’ eyes.

“You’re weak!” Remus let out through gritted teeth “That’s why you had to choose someone already physically under you. You’re just that pathetic!”

Virgil let out a yelp of surprise as Remus easily pulled him away from Remy. He’d spent so much time hurting them he’d forgotten he actually wasn’t that strong.

“If it weren’t for Remy you would be NOTHING! And you know it! You’re so empty you need someone to fucking parasite off of!”

Remus took ahold of Virgil’s neck. Not hard enough to choke him, just hard enough to make him freeze. He pushed on Virgil as he began to walk forcing the abuser to stumble backwards.

“That’s how all of you abusers are! You take someone and you dig your fucking fingers into them and you take Everything from them bit by bit! Because YOU need something to fill yourself with!”

He pushed him out into the living room. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Janus. There was blood rolling down their cheek. One of their eyes was shut close. As soon as they saw the other two they hurried into the bedroom to help Remy.

“You TAKE and TAKE and TAKE until your victim is hollowed out and then YOU blame them for acting hurt! For reacting to the pain YOU put them through!”

Virgil’s back hit the wall. His mouth was half open in shock. Remus held him against the wall and forced him to keep looking at him.

“YOU have to convince your victim that they will never amount to ANYTHING without you! YOU have to tell them over and over that they need you to survive! YOU’RE THE EMPTY ONE! YOU’RE THE PATHETIC! WEAK! MISERABLE! ABUSER! WHO NEEDS TO FEED OFF OF SOMEONE ELSE TO SURVIVE! If your victim dares to leave you will immediately revert into NOTHING!”

Remus grabbed ahold of the collar of Virgil’s hoodie and pulled him even closer.

“I hope you’ll be unable to sleep for a long Long time. I hope the guilt over what you’ve done eats away at you. I hope it makes you just as hollow as you tried to make them! I hope you change. I hope your rotten ugly soul changes”

There was an utterly destroyed look on Virgil’s face as Remus let go of him.

Janus had quickly helped Remy on with their shoes and grabbed onto the bag before helping them out into the living room. They looked over to Remus.

“We’re leaving.” Remus said.

Remy had their gaze firmly planted down at the floor. They didn’t want to see. They didn’t want to think. They just wanted their loves to lead them out of there.

“Wait” Virgil gasped out. He looked over and tried to meet his partner’s eyes but they didn’t look at him “Remy. Babey. I-” With a slight tremor he fished around in his pocket and took out a package of painkillers “I got you your medication on the way here”

He held his arm out to let them take it. Remus cut in and grabbed the package away from him instead and handed it to Remy who held it close to their chest. He kept a hand on Virgil’s shoulder to show he was ready to hold him back if he tried anything.

“I was genuinely going to say sorry and like let you leave if you wanted. I would have been nice if I hadn’t seen these two here!” Virgil continued. “Or I was at least gonna give you your meds ‘cause you’d been such a good par-”

Remus pushed him into the wall again “You’re just guilt tripping them again! They don’t have to be ANYTHING to deserve meds you dipshit!”

Virgil still tried to reach out to Remy “I’m not lying. I swear babe. I was gonna try. It’s just hard to try y’know”

Janus kept his arm gently around Remy’s waist as a small reminder he was there for them. “We can leave at any time. You don’t owe him reconciliation or a goodbye or anything. Not a single thing, okay darling?” He whispered to them.

Remy moved their hand down to Janus’ wrist and moved his arm away. They took an uneasy step closer to their boyfriend and held out their arms. Virgil immediately embraced them.

It was the type of hug two people about to die had. Virgil buried his face against the crook of their neck. Remy held onto him so hard their arms ached, their fingers digging down into the fabric of his hoodie.

For once Virgil didn’t try to hold back his tears. He tried to memorize how it felt to hold them, to feel their skin against his, the smell of their hair. Remy could feel his tears drip down onto their shoulder which made tears well up in their eyes as well.

It was over. It finally set in that it was over. They weren’t sure if they were crying of sadness or relief.

“I’m sorry” Virgil murmured out “I’m sorry. Even now” His hands held onto them even harder “Even now I’m getting the urge to beat you for daring to let those two into our home. I don’t know how to stop it. I want to feel good. You make me feel good. Hurting you feels good. I’m sorry. I wish I could change for you so we could be us again. I never want to let you go. I’m sorry I wish hurting you didn’t feel as good as loving you”

“I’ll miss you” Remy whispered back “I love you”

“I love you too. Forever. I’m sorry”

“I miss you. I miss...I miss something between us that never really was....I miss you....I’m not like ready to let you go”

Virgil hesitated. He took a deep breathe before whispering in his most gentle voice “It’s okay Remy. You can let go now. I’ll try. I hope...I hope one day...I’ll change for myself and you...and...and maybe if you want to.....you can forgive me....and...and we can go out for coffee.....as friends...I love you...You can let go...I won’t be mad...I promise...I’m sorry”

“Yeah” Remy let out a shaky sob “I’d like that. I love you too”

He loosened his arms to let them step back. Tears were still running down both of their cheeks as Janus let Remy lean on them. Remus sent Virgil a last threatening look before following his loves out into the apartment hallway.

The moment the entrance door closed Virgil sat down on the ground and began to sob like his entire world had just ended, which it had. The apartment turned quiet. The only sound was his cries.

“Are you okay?” Remus asked Janus as he saw the blood on their face.

“It’s all good deary, I barely feel i-”

Remy suddenly stopped dead in their tracks. Janus felt how their body seemed to nearly go limp. He had to hold onto them harder to stop them from falling to the ground.

Their eyes were wide and stared out into nothing. The tears kept running down their bruised cheeks. Their fingers twitched and their legs trembled.

“Honey? Bloody little heart of mine? You feeling okay? Need anything?” Remus asked.

They let out a choked back whine while continuing to stare out.

“You’re safe. Everything is alright. You’re safe now” Janus reminded. They looked over to Remus “Hopefully it’s just shook. If I remember correctly Logan lives nearest. It’s just a bus ride away. Should we-”

“Yeah that sounds good. C’mon. They deserve some rest. We deserve some rest”

#mini fic #thanks for the ask <333 #i cant believe i actually wrote this after all this time #i hope yall enjoy it #i finished proofreading befor e 2 am wooohooo

3 notes · View notes

a-b-riddle · 24 days

Text

Taken Chapter Four: No Longer Waiting

Warnings: Religious Trauma, Cult, Forced Marriage, Kidnapping, Stalking, Stockholm Syndrome, Non-Con, Dub-Con. Violence against women. Threats and intimidation. Childhood Trauma.

She had agreed to meet Bucky for coffee after her shift. Bucky had gotten back into the city from somewhere he wasn't at liberty to disclose. She was overdressed for the 24/7 diner to say the least. Once again in a tight, form-fitting black cowl dress and heels that pinched her toes; far too cold for the weather they had been having even if it was nearing March.

The diner was decorated in a 50s theme, but wasn't more than a few years old. It made her miss Waffle House. There wasn't a cook smoking a cigarette out back or a waitress who didn't judge her order of hash browns double covered, chunked and topped.

Not that she was going to order anything. She didn't have much of an appetite after the sunflower scare so she was going to stick with just a cup of decaf. The flowers were tossed in the trash before calling the police and calling out of work that night. She felt like she was being watched and even her own shadow making her jump.

Usually after work she made a B-line for her apartment, but knowing Bucky was back in town gave her a sense of security. She was more than excited to meet up with him when he asked what she was doing tonight.

She wasn't able to keep in touch during his trip and she wouldn't deny the small part inside her that did actually miss him. She had no one besides her co-worker who offered any sort of social interaction. Most of the 'friends' she had met her first few months in New York were Joe's friends first and after the break up, no one really cared that much to stay her friend.

But Bucky was different. He seemed to genuinely enjoy spending time with her. She took him to the aquarium and told him that he needed to see the one in Atlanta. He said that the two of them would have to make a trip out of it one day. She talked about Atlanta a lot. It was her favorite place to live minus the heat and the traffic... and the potholes... but she always liked the water boys outside of an event ready to sell coke or water for a dollar.

It had been two weeks since he had been gone and Elizabeth tried her best to hide her excitement when she walked in. Bucky was waiting in a booth, a cup of coffee already waiting for her when she sat down in the pleather seat, the material already sticking to the back of her thighs. He wore that red half button up that always looked so good on him with his sleeves rolled all the way down.

"Hey," she greeted, practically beaming. "How was the work trip?"

"Good," he shrugged. "Nothing exciting." She noticed how Bucky wasn't in his usually chipper, or at least pleasant, mood. Usually he maintains eye contact and is more engaged. Now he wasn't taking his eyes off of the table.

"Did something happen?" She asked leaning forward.. Bucky sighed before locking eyes with her. "Is everyone okay?" A dread filled her. They had dangers jobs. It wouldn't be surprising for their to be an injury or a casualty.

"No." He dismissed her worries. "Nothing happened. Everyone is okay. It was an easy mission its just that..."

"Just... what?" She pushed.

"Listen, I know Steve said you weren't looking for anything serious. I know that I said I wanted to be friends and I know you said that you didn't want a relationship, but I got to at least take a chance otherwise I'm going to kick myself."

"Bucky-" she sighed, not wanting to have this conversation again. She wish she could tell him how this was easier and all she could do. They were both at a safe distance.

"I like you... I like you a lot and I just don't know how to get woo you, so tell me. I tried with lunch, I tried doing stuff that I thought you would like, and don't get me wrong I liked them too. I tried with the flowers-" Suddenly it hit her.

"You got me the flowers" Bucky could see the relief on her face. Elizabeth's shoulders seemed to relax a little more, as if a weight had been lifted.

"Yeah." He said. "Would there be another guy who knows where you live getting you flowers?" He chuckled. He was glad he was able to conceal his jealousy with his joking tone. The idea of another man pursuing his Elizabeth nearly made his blood boil.

"No, I just-" she waved her hand. "I appreciate them I really do. They were beautiful."

"But...?" He pressed.

"I thought they were from someone else." She explained. "Someone I didn't want to see."

"Like an ex?"

"Just this creep I knew. It's nothing." She said dismissively, not wanting to overshare. "I'm sorry I didn't say thank you sooner." She gave him a sorrowful, slanted smile. "I just didn't think and there wasn't a card or anything."

"It's no problem," he reassured. "I just called and said I want flowers delivered to this address."

"I really am sorry." She sighed. "Now I feel like an idiot for throwing them away. They were so pretty too." She wanted to kick herself for overreacting so harshly. They hadn't had found her. As far as they knew she had died, or disappeared at the least. New York was too big. They wouldn't be able to track her down that easily.

"Well I know a way you can make it up to me..." he trailed. She felt the hair on the back of her neck rise. She swallowed nervously before asking him what that might be. "If you're not doing anything tomorrow, Wanda and Natasha were wanting to grab lunch with you. I think I've been taking too much of your time and they want to hang out. I think if you went that would cut me some slack for keeping you all to myself."

"Oh," she was surprised. Hanging out with his friend compensates for throwing away his gift? "Yeah, sure, I'm not busy at all."

"Great," he said. "I'll give them your number after I walk you home and you can just coordinate." Bucky pulled out his wallet and placed two $10 on the table. "Come on, let's get you home. I know you got to be tired."

It took them about 15 minutes to get back to her building. Bucky's hands buried themselves in his pockets. She was worried about the sweltering heat that would soon be here. Would he still wear that henley he looked so damn good in or would he actually wear a short sleeve? She had pushed him into worrying about his own comfort before the comfort of others even though the words were hypocritical as they rolled out of her mouth.

"Well, this is me." She said motioning to your building with her head. "Thanks again for walking me home. I'll talk to you tomorrow." Turning around, she began up the concrete steps.

"Elizabeth!" She was at the top of the stairs, hand still on the door handle. "I'm not asking for a yes right now, but I just want a chance." He said. "I'm old fashioned." He gave a chuckle as did she to his insinuation. "There are some things I haven't caught up with and asking a cute girl out is one of them. I promise you will get nothing, but a complete gentleman, but I wouldn't mind if we started seeing each other and with more intent... eventually."

She gave him a smile. "Eventually." And that's how they ended the night. While Elizabeth felt those same butterflies flutter in her stomach at the idea of Bucky having 'intentions'. It made her feel like what she should of felt as a teenager. That giddy, schoolgirl feeling. The very idea of it, sending her blushing.

Bucky, however, wasn't as thrilled as she was. Who the fuck was this creep she talked about? A weird neighbor or an old co-worker who couldn't take a hint.

"Hey, Steve," He said as he unlocked the door to his apartment. "Look up what you can on Elizabeth Snow. See if she got any order of protections or restraining orders. I just have a funny feeling."

Elizabeth assumed Bucky had given Wanda her number since she got a text around 11 AM asking about when and where to meet for lunch. Elizabeth let her coordinate and agreed that whatever Wanda chose would be fine. Once again, she traded in her smoldering temptress attire for something more whimsical. The first thing she noticed about New York was the fashion, especially the street style; a concept she couldn't fully comprehend. She chose an off-white cable knit sweater and some light denim jeans. It was simple.

Wanda had sent the address and Elizabeth headed that way. The entire walk there she was lost in her own thoughts. This was different than when she was with Joe. She didn't hang out with his friends without him. So would Bucky be there or was did he actually want her to bond with his friends? Whatever the reason, it didn't make Elizabeth any less nervous.

Wanda chose a Italian place not too far from Stark tower. She and Natasha were already waiting at a table when Elizabeth arrived. Wanda waved her over, a bright smile on her face. "Thanks so much for meeting us." She beamed as she got up to hug their soon-to-be third.

"Thank you having me." Elizabeth smiled back warmly and scooted into her chair. "I don't really have that many girl friends to hang out with so it's always nice to have a girl's day. I haven't really been in the city that long." The truth was she didn't have any.

"It's just me and Nat, so we understand." Wanda assured. "It can be hard making girlfriends in a city like New York."

"Tell me about it." Elizabeth understood the struggle all too well. "I would pay to stay inside rather than going out. I'm close with a co-worker, but she is much more social than I am."

"Wanda and I have to deal with the boys' club." Natasha finally piped up. "Anytime we go out with them the dress code is usually anything skin-tight."

"So what do y'all usually do?" Elizabeth asked before the waiter came by to take your drinks. Each of them rattled off their orders.

"I've gotten into baking recently. I like it more than cooking since I always have a bit of a sweet tooth." Wanda said.

"I burn all my cookies to a crisp." Elizabeth laughed. "I could use some baking tips, but I do love to cook."

"I listen to murder podcasts." Natasha admitted. "Not as cookie-cutter."

"Knowing how to hide a body is just a useful and making the perfect creme brûlée." Elizabeth joked.

Lunch continued and overall the conversation was pleasant. They did ask about what was going on with Her and Bucky since he wouldn't share any of the details.

"He's really sweet." Elizabeth swallowed trying to hide how uncomfortable she was talking about Bucky to his friends. "I do like him, but the whole idea of getting into another relationship just-" Suddenly, her phone began to buzz in her purse. No one called her, but when the name 'Cody' flashed on her screen, she grew nervous. He never called her.

"I'm sorry. It's my dog walker," she apologized, standing. "I have to take this." She answered, putting the phone to your ear. "Hello?" Natasha gave a side eyed glance to Wanda that Elizabeth didn't seem to catch . "Yeah, I'm fine," She turned her body away from the table. "Why?" Elizabeth felt a knot of anxiety forming as her dog walker, Cody, described the scene of her apartment."Oh my god," she covered her mouth as her eyes welled up with tears. "Just stay right there. I'll be there in just a minute." She hung up and stood from her seat, panic written on her face.

"Is everything okay?" Natasha asked, noticing the change in Elizabeth's demeanor.

"Someone broke into my apartment, I have to go." She began to fumble around in her purse searching for bills. Elizabeth looked like she was on the verge of tears. Wanda's heart sunk and the scene.

"Don't worry about lunch, we got it." Wanda urged and waved her off. "Just go."

Chapter Five: True Intentions

1 note · View note

moonlightperseus · 7 months

Note

You're genuinely making me want to try reading them again so badly give me a sec to like, pull them up for motivation. (93 issues? Insane fam) (also again your comic site is great lmao, like just for instance I just pulled up the first issue of bombshells NO pop-up ads, NO leaving the page. If I'd used mine the second I clicked the search bar I would've been sent to a scam site I had to back space from before it could load, then when I clicked on the actual comic there'd be a 50/50 chance that would happen again, same as when I clicked on the specific issue, and then there would've been a giant pop up over the whole comic that I'd either have to read around or exit and if would send me to another site, or open another tab, and would only be gone for like 2 minutes tops, so again, you're a life saver lmao this is GREAT)

That all sounds very interesting!!! That's very exciting!!!

and Barda isn't as BIG as I like my Big Barda, that's a bit of a con for me, but she is still very pretty and I appreciate the mention she deserves to be in a wlw relationship all the time. (Is there a girl doctor light in DC like normally? That's a genuine question idfk)

I DO honestly mostly agree everyone needs to love things and it's so exciting. But I started talking about orcas for like 10 seconds and I shit you not the mental health worker said "hey have you heard of Asperger's?" (I also get asked "have you ever thought of being a marine biologist?" And I say "no that sounds really boring" and then I get yelled at)

I've never been to SeaWorld (or anything of the sort) bit as a kid I BEGGED to go to Marineland so I get it. I, obviously, do not support that anymore. I haven't done anything like that but I want to go to British Columbia SO BAD to go whale watching. All of my writing is set in BC (a place I've NEVER BEEN) just because I long to be by the whales lmao. I NEED to see orcas before I die. I would think it's stupidity. I GENUINELY wonder, if I was like swimming in the ocean and a pod of orcas came up to me, if I would remember y'know, COMMON SENSE and leave the water, or if I'd just be so blinded by love I'd be like !!! Oh my god hey guys!! Hey buddies!!! Wanna play fetch?? Wanna be pet??? Because I'm NOT dumb but I HAVE loved them my entire life so they should just also love me instinctively.

dude that sounds SO FUN we should become Spies. I can talk about whales forever. My phone case is called like "Canadian whales" or "whales of the Hudson's Bay" (I think it's the former bit it's just belugas and orcas and Canada has more whales than that but The Hudson's Bay doesn't???) But yeah it's covered in whales. I can go ALL day. And with an AUDIENCE of ORCAS THEMSELVES???

My mother and brother and an ex-bestfriemd all loved/ liked agents of shield so I get it!! And Peggy!! I love like her style and her everything honestly. I had to do an assignment where I wrote a diary as a solider years ago in school and I drew a portrait of his wife and everyone was like 'thay looks like the girl from captain america" as though that wasn't the point? Why would I draw anyone else??

It's volumes, I barely buy issues because they're so delicate and that scares me, but I bought a couple individual issues of SAGA this year as they came out and I think *they* were 4$ each? And as for bombshells, as a direct comparison I'll check mine to tell you bit a) I bought it years ago (proves have gone up since) and b) I just recently reorganized my bookshelves but don't really have space for my comics anymore so I couldn't keep it in alphabetical order and I have literally no idea where bombshells is.

Okay so it was under a lot of comics and it was very hard to get at and I need to figure out what the fuck to do with my comic collection. But I bought it at Indigo (Canada's main book retailer, essentially our Barnes and Noble) so it sold for normal retail value and it was 22.99$ CAD. I remember it being more expensive? But I also had no job then because it was many years ago so. The most recent one I bought was definitely either 30 or 40$ but it's also like half of the green arrow and black canary run. (apparently the Hardcover Injustice: Góðs Among us year four volume 1 should be 27.99$ and the paperback should be 19.99, but most of my paper back (I don't think that's what they're called in comics?) Are 22.99$ like bombshells. The green arrow and black canary comic was 45.99$ and so is my deluxe rebirth justice league comic that I bought from Dollarama bit again I only paid > 5$ for two of those)

That could be good!!

That's faid yeah I don't like when they don't that either. It's cool to know it's all cohesive ( unlike how the current BOP started with Dinah talking with Oliver when in current green arrow comics he's "missing" (I won't like spoil the rest that's literally the plot so it's not intrusive if you haven't read them: Dinah's a fairly active character so far if you were interested but obviously it IS a green arrow comic and I always get annoyed when he's the main character) but it IS frustrating (and, if I were buying them as they came out, more expensive I'd think?)

I didn't even know that it moved!! And I really just know her from Gotham city garage and Injustice 2, so not like,,, canon things) and I love that the three mom's were so important you mentioned it twice thats wonderful I trust that they're very good

It is now OPEN on my phone so hopefully I'll get to it bit I won't be starting it immediately since I have go work early tomorrow but hopefully that will be SOON and I absolutely will

Oh dw I will talk about my mental health relentlessly and do not mind when people do it back so you're good. But I actually get that pretty much exactly so maybe it's kind of a common thing? I don't know how I feel about libraries (the last time I went to one was a year ago for my friend and I just read a book on dolphins while he looked for dantes inferno) but the used book thing is a big one. I have issues in thrift stores entirely but my town has a big book sale once a year where it's all just used books and I go every year and buy SO MANY books but I have go wash my hands as soon as I get home and am now too scared to read any of them. (which sucks because one is called the doctor who lived in a house at sea- I love doctors and the sea!! But I cannot touch it) it's good that you made progress!!! Buying them for someone else was a good idea. And I'm glad that made it easier! And tbch I mostly just buy new books, but that's because I'm stupid. I do have an online library app that's wonderful but my old library card expired so I have to go to my local library and ask for a new one but I am scared :( so I just can't listen to audiobooks for free until I do that (or read the books)

I have no idea what kind of books you like but while I had Libby (my library app) I only listened to two and one was Wonderwoman War Bringér, which was honestly really interesting but I do chronically read YA so. And then a book called wild and wicked things that you might like? It's an adult book set after WW2 about witchcraft and lesbians.

I didn't like the Harley x birds comic just because everyone but Harley seemed incredibly out of character but I do really like the way her relationship with Dinah was essentially just Harley being like !!!!! And Dinah being 😮‍💨 about it the entire time. I want that back. (honestly it's somewhat similar on Injustice too and it's just like bring that back please). I also hope it gets better!!! If worse comes to worst I'll take over and write it myself I can do it. We deserve it.

That's fair!! Hope you enjoy it!!

(I only know so many "good time of day" in Gaelic so you have to be reading this at the time I say I don't make the rules, anyway) Madainn Mhath!!

akalsjg i'm so glad the site is working well for you! and that’s very fair re:big barda. and yeah! dr kimiyo hyoshi exists as dr light in the main continuity too!! according to wikipedia she was introduce during crisis on infinite earths & has even come face to face with the villian who goes by the name dr light.

also like i don’t really know much about working in marine biology but i gotta say from my own personal experience in working in a career related to smth im passionate about (i work in the dog world) definitely has serious drawbacks in that im hitting serious exhaustion and burnout and it feels like my passion itself is kinda burning out. so yeah gotta say totally respect not wanting to go into a career specific to the animal you love.

ajsjdjsjs i did mention bombshells!kara’s three moms (four actually if you count her earth adoptive mother) twice huh. the silliest part is when i mentioned it the second time i even remember. going back and checking if i had mentioned it previously but clearly i didn’t read my own words throughly enough, whoops lmao

yeah supergirl was originally a cbs show for s1 and then i forget the details but it switched over to the cw for s2. thats why supergirl was set on a different earth from the rest of the arrowverse (up until they changed that with their version of crisis on infinite earths and they decided no more multiverse, which really is no fucking fun i love a multiverse)

i haven’t read the new green arrow run but i think i may give it a try bc i do enjoy comics ollie (he’s VERY much preferred to arrow oliver in every possible way ((which is kinda like saying i prefer pizza over a moldy slice of bread))) and i have a friend who’s really into green arrow comics so it could give me smth to talk about with them too.

also yeah!! thrift stores are hard for me too. it took me a long time but i can buy clothes from thrift stores now because they can go directly in the washing machine but anything else is a pretty hard no. i hope this isnt weird to say but its nice to find solidarity/similarity in struggling w/used items.

i actually own a physical copy of wonder woman warbringer!!! i got it as a gift, and then my dog decided to rip the cover of it and made me very upset (he has now been assigned Wonder Woman Hater-he also ripped up some wonder woman stickers i got as a completely separate gift) but yeah i really enjoyed warbringer, wouldve loved it even more if they let alia be diana's love interest instead of that dude who i barely remember (maybe i should reread its been a long time) i will have to add wild and wicked things to my to read list! one of my friend groups just convinced me to start the raven cycle series so i ended up listening to that on my drive to my parents today, i havent formed a solid opinion on it yet but ive been intriuged/enjoying it so far!

you know i actually dont remember if i read the harley x bop run or not. i feel like i probably did but i have no memory of it. alas such is the way my memory works

okay i kinda liveblogged my reading of injustice a little bit which i will put below the cut for you, its a little scattered bc i read a lot in one sitting last night after work and then fell asleep (on the couch lmao) but ive definitely gotten invested in it. but i have to ask, does dinah not come back until injustice 2? (she comes back right? i feel like i definitely remember seeing panels out there of her and other earth ollie). anyways. yeah here are some of my thoughts i had, a bit scattered, i might attempt more coherent thoughts later but i wanted to finally respond to this ask <3

okay i finished year one of injustice and i am continuing to read as i write this reply. i have to say it is by no means my favorite comic series and its a bit frustrating at times however..... the dinah of it all.... yeah. i was also really loving the dinahollie of it all, i did... forget that ollie dies in injustice. didnt know superman literally beat him to death. killing martian manhunter and green arrow really isnt a good look for superman i gotta say.

the hardest thing with reading injustice so far has been the whole wonder woman aspect of it but ive simply chosen to decide that its not really diana. like idk who that is but that is Not My Wonder Woman <3 i simply know her better. it is nice to see some of the other heroes working with superman questioning things and beginning to have Doubts about what superman is doing. (i feel so bad for shazam who is literally a fucking child he should not have to be a part of these horrors.) and im curious to see what reactions will be if/when they find out superman killed ollie bc like, sure he had a justification for killing martian manhunter (he was trying to kill imposter wonder woman) but ollie was just vibing (he... put an arrow in papa kent but papa kent was fine about it! and that was after clark starting attacking ollie) now if i remember correctly injustice brings in like an alternate earth version of ollie? looking forward to when that happens i hate when dinah is sad.

and okay just got to ollie's funeral and damn even hal's staying on superman's side huh. homoerotic friendship means nothing to hal i see. (i dont actually know that much about hal but from my understanding he does have a homoerotic friendship with ollie and i support that)

okay i just got to the beginning of harley & dinahs friendship and oughghghghghghghghghhghghghghg i love them (i had seen pretty much the entire interaction between harley & dinah that i just read previously but it still was so good and wonderful)

okay so its been a minute since the last sentence (more than a minute) i got home from work and literally.... read all of year two and year three. its 1:30am rn and i really need to not start year four but ouugh. year two was very good for me as a dinah fan. year three not so much however year three did have zatanna and i do love zatanna. (coulda been more zatanna in my opinion)

#comics anon #abby replies #anon #long post /

0 notes