#leads to a lot of moments where Sparky has to get her out of his turtleneck :3

[nikki-tine]

Have a Sparky with a quarter of a nest's worth of Joltik!

Dude's a bit of a lightning-rod for electric-type Pokemon thanks to his Double Charge (x2 Electricity, x1 Ice = yes he's gonna be bombarded lol), ESPECIALLY with Joltik perhaps because of his own shiny Joltik (Vi) squeaking the good word!

#Undertale AU #Undercharged au #Sparky #Pokemon #PKMNart #pkmn #art #sketch #doodle #joltik #sans #Charged!sans #UnderCharged!Sans #Shiny Joltik #(She's on top of his head if you're wondering which one's shiny) #Vi is Timid-natured btw and easily startles #leads to a lot of moments where Sparky has to get her out of his turtleneck :3 #nikki-tine

[islandofthemisfittoy]

While chapter 4 was by far the best chapter of G5, I was a little sisapointed by a few things.

Yes, this time the story was actually moved forward, but the things that actually moved the plot forward happened off screen.

Zipp figuring everything out

Missy capturing Sparky

Opaline retriving the dragon stone

...

It was really just those three things that happened

And while I liked the episode where Pipp was sick, I would rather have had an episode focusing on how how Zipp figured things out. And on top of it all happening off screen, it all also happened really fast. I was expecting to go over atleast two episodes, but no, she just figured it all out in a day.

As for Missy capturing Sparky, I do understand why they maybe didn't wat to do a whole episode about that, it could end up feeling very repetetive, but just a scene would have been nice. It really just felt like I missed a lot of stuff.

As for opaline stealing the crystal, that didn't even make sense. First of all, why did she waste all her magic going upp some hill, second of all, WHY DID SHE HAVE TO GET HOME BECAUSE IT WAS LATE? What does she need to get home to??? It's not like she cares that mucha about Missy. And again, she just suddenly had it, there was nothing leading up to it, noting hinting towards her going out to get it at that moment, she just had it. 😐

And can we PLEASE talk about how the fact that Missy appearently had magic all along wasn't a big part of the story... or at all a part of the story...? I was SURE she was going to realise that she did have meagic after all, and that she didn't need Opaline, but no, it was literally just that scene... 😐. In the last episode I was expecting Missy to use her magic to burst Oplaines bubble (that way they could have weaved in som message about the magic within.), but I guess a FUCKING STICK was all it took. And I do get that she had to earn her cutie mark so they could to that whole glowing-cutimark-elements-of-harmony thing, but I think 1. There were better ways to go about it, and 2. I don't know that she even needed her cutimark for it. Other ponies also get glowing cutimarks, it's not just the mane 6, so I'm not sure a cutimark was actually necesary for this, its clearly not exlusive to them.

I also find it interresting that Opalines "worst punishment yet" was house arrest, but she was fully prepared to drain Sparky, a BABY dragon, of all his energy and then LET HIM FALL TO HIS DEATH. Where has this side of Opaline been the entire time? If she was this evil and dangerous throughout the entire show it would have be SO MUCH MORE INTERRESTING.

Also, side note, what the fuck happened to Sunnys mirror? I thought that would play a bigger role.

I must also say that episode 2, Top Remodel, was TERRIBLE.

The factory WASN'T THEIRS! Sprout even comes in and say that it still belongs to his family, and EVERYONE, EVEN HITCH (I miss movie Hitch), KICKS HIM OUT. WHAT THE FUCK!?

Just the way that they for some reason thought that asking EVERYONE what they wanted, with the intentions of creating exactly what EVERYONE asked for, was extremely infuriating. And they didn't even have the intention of asking everybody! There were so many ponies they hadn't asked when they were ready to start redecorating. They could have just sent out a survey, or created a comitie or something and picked the most popular option.

I really don't get the point of the studio, and honestly, I tought it was a terrible use of the space (THAT WASN'T EVEN THEIRS), but that might just be me. I know everyone's supposed to be able to use it, but I just don't get it, where do the shows stream, when do the shows stream, how are you supposed to keep a scheduled if everyone can just book the space whenever, what if you find something you like, but you have to wait half a year for the next episode. There are just a lot of things that confuse me about it.

I honestly think that episode 2 (and therefore by defult episode 4) could have been scrapped, and they could have used those 40 or so minutes on things that actually move the plot forward or things that should have gotten more attention (like Zipp figuring things out, Missy realising she has magic, explaining/figuring out how cutimarks and magic work (we still haven't gotten a logical answer to why things make no sense), opaline retriving the crystal (wich I'm going to be honest, I think could make for some realy interresting character developement (background) and world building, DRAGONS (it boggels me that none of the characters wonder about where Sparky came from, if there are more dragons out there and why no one has seen them!) Missy capturing Sparky, etc.).

#my little pony #mlp #make your mark #my little pony make your mark #my little pony g5 #mlp g5 #mlp g5 chapter 4 #make your mark chapter 4

[aparticularbandit]

Finding Family: Part One: Epilogue

Summary: When America begins universe-hopping again to try and find her moms, she realizes that’s too much scope for her.  She looks for smaller scope, and instead she finds Wanda.

Warnings: Spoilers for DSMom.  (Not adding this past this chapter.  It’s been two weeks.)

AO3

Wanda does not invite America into her cabin.

There are a lot of reasons for this, the main one being that even if she had, she doesn’t think the girl will take her up on that offer.  A secondary one is that her cabin is not suited for visitors right now.  For the most part, Wanda doesn’t particularly care about this, but something deeper, something that probably comes from the sit-coms she first saw and then lived through, that says a good hostess does not invite someone into a house that looks like hers does right now. Then again, a good – whatever America is to her – doesn’t come to her house uninvited and expect an invite either.

Unless they’re still enemies, in which case there are significantly few social rules, and it’s all about social standing in those sorts of sit-coms – social standing and humiliation – in which case America would be fully within her role to walk over to Wanda’s house unannounced and…whatever it is she wants to do.  At that point, it would really depend on who the sit-com has determined is the heroine to see how that plays out.

In Westview, Wanda had always been the heroine, so the shows always played in her favor.  Mostly.

Here?

Wanda’s less certain that they will.  She doesn’t control the whole world, after all.

But she takes the offered ice cream, which looks just like the kind she’d eaten in her dream, and uses just enough of her power to shove America off of her property, which she does as gently as possible while still being as forceful as possible.  Like a parent tossing their child into the air, knowing that they will catch them. The earth will catch America at some point just as gently as a mother would catch her daughter.  It isn’t mean. It only is.

Something in her, unknown and unbidden, makes sure to hold onto the child’s hot chocolate.  Wanda knows just how much pestering she’d needed to do to get it, and yet she takes it anyway.  Call it a natural consequence of stepping into an illusion intentionally crafted to make her stay away.  Not harm, but a sort of loss.

Not that she would ever truly call it a loss.

(She won’t say it, but she enjoys the image of America, clenching her hand into a fist where there used to be a Styrofoam cup of hot chocolate, gritting her teeth together, and then turning on one heel, fuming in Spanish as she returns to Kamar-Taj.  It is nice to imagine the child acting just like a child should.  It’s normal. They need more normal in their lives.)

Once America is gone, Wanda drops the Scarlet Witch façade.  She doesn’t need to look intimidating, and while the clothes are not constricting and quite attractive, if she does say so herself, she wants something much more comfortable.  She wants her grey sweatpants.  She wants her hooded sweatshirt.  She wants her braid and to not have to worry about the wind whipping her hair into her face.

She doesn’t go back inside her cabin.  Instead, she sits on the porch the way she might have in Westview, as though about to gossip with her neighbors, should they have anything truly interesting to say, propping her feet up on one of the stairs leading up to her front door.  The illusion of the broken and dying trees disappears for the briefest of moments, and the sky peeks through, dark and studded with stars.  The light can reach from millions of miles away, even now, cold and effortless.  Her mother used to point out the constellations to her, and she wonders if they are the same in other universes, or if they have different names for them if they are.  Maybe, in those universes, there is a Sparky chasing his tail across the starlit sky.

That sounds too much like Lion King and the great kings of the past.

But Wanda lets the world stay as it is while she takes the first bite of her ice cream from another universe, sprinkled with crushed up bits of cheese crackers.

Her face scrunches up.

That other Wanda doesn’t have any taste.

She takes a sip of the hot chocolate and finds it much more to her preferences.  The lime is sharp against the white chocolate base, and the coconut is smooth and alluring. When she takes a second bite of ice cream, this time without the cheese crackers, she finds that it, too, is good. The lime is sharp and sour, and the raspberry is sweet with its own, special form of punch.  She loves them both, and she loves it all together.  It is only after everything else is gone, after she is overwhelmed with sweet and sweet and sweet that she eats the cheese crackers, the salt she needed to break everything up.

Perhaps the other Wanda isn’t too far off in her preferences.  Perhaps she, too, would prefer it this way, if she’d grown up with it.  Isn’t that the point of the other universe?  That, growing up with it, she does like it?  And her boys….

Wanda stays on the porch until the light of the sun just starts to crest the horizon beyond the mountains.  With their jagged peaks in the way, the light comes much sooner than any image of the sun – shoots of pink and purple and the softest of blues interspersed with even softer, frailer, thin white clouds.  Vapors, more than cotton balls, and nothing grey or dark looming in the distance. For a moment, she allows herself to sit in its beauty, in the image of what this hidden valley once was and might still have been before she took up residence within it.

Then she stands, stretches, and with a wave of her hand reinstates the other reality, the illusion of the broken trees reaching out for a sky they can no longer touch and scarlet everywhere, from the ash swirling between them to the gloom of the clouds cloaking the sky.  Perhaps she is lying when she tells herself that this is meant to keep everyone out.  Perhaps it is just as much to remind her of her own sins.

Inside, Wanda stares at her house, full of empty ice cream bins much bigger than the one she just finished, plastic bags of half-eaten chips, coffee mugs left out so long that they might as well be growing something for all that they stink.  She wrinkles her nose.  Bad, bad, bad.

Maybe, today, she’ll finally do something about it.

#bandit fic #finding family with wanda and america #wanda maximoff #scarlet witch #america chavez #queue #mcu

[holdingforgeneralhugs]

Emmaaa❤️❤️ may I request a headcanon where the easy boys fell in love with a shy reader? Maybe with Bull, Tab, Luz, Speirs Babe and Malarkey? Thank you❤️ love you

Aaahhh Fran my dear, what a great way to start off my birthday week tysm for sending one in💓

Bull Randleman:

Bull is super protective of you, always has been.

He got 10 million times more protective when he realises he's head over ass in love with you.

He's always there, always got your back no matter what.

He likes that you're most comfortable when you're with him, makes him feel like he's special.

When he was stuck in that barn in Holland, separated from everyone, thinking about you was the only thing that kept his strength up.

Its then he decides he has to tell you how he feels.

He's pretty direct about it, he doesn't want to beat around the bush with this.

"Look darlin', I ain't gonna mess around here, because to be completely honest I'm head over heels in love with you."

You get all blushy and stuttery and he thinks it's probably the most adorable thing he's ever seen.

He can tell you're flustered, so he grabs your cheeks in his hands and rubs his thumbs over them gently.

"Can I kiss ya darlin'?" He asks softly

You can't even speak you're so surprised, so you nod and he leans in and kisses you slowly, not wanting to rush anything and ruin the perfect moment.

"Hell Bull," you giggle, "I've been hoping you'd say something for ages."

"And why didn't you say anything, huh?" He laughed.

"Because I was too scared you'd turn me down."

"Well," he sighed, kissing your forehead, "I just can't quite believe I ever gave you the impression I'd turn you down. Guess I'll just have to prove to you how much I love you from now on."

Floyd Talbert

Tab is a total flirt

He's all cheesy pickup likes at first and they make you blush like hell but you'll never give him the satisfaction of laughing at them because they're so ridiculous.

But he takes your blushing as encouragement so he keeps going for weeks until eventually he gets a giggle out of you and it makes all his efforts worthwhile because you have the most lovely laugh.

After that you start getting to know each other a little better, and you start to get closer.

He's delighted when you start to open up and share more with him.

It kind of hits him like a slap in the face that shit, he's in love love you.

He's a total softie with you

He's quite subtle about it at first. He does small nice things for you; makes you coffee, gives you half his k ration when supplies are low.

He's surprisingly reluctant to profess his feelings for you. He thinks there's no way you'll see him as anything other than a friend.

Chuck tells him he's an idiot, that you've clearly got feelings for him too and be should just tell you already.

So he does...in the most muddled way possible. It all kinda comes out like word vomit.

"So-I-Just-wanna-tell-you-I-think-you're-wonderful-and-I'm-a-little-bit-in-love-with-you."

You're dumbfounded, and you can't quite comprehend what he's just said.

"Wait," you whisper, "are you being serious right now?"

"Yeah," he laughs, "I've kinda got it really bad for you."

You giggle and blush like hell, and he grins like an idiot because he loves that giggle so much

"How about I take you out for dinner sometime?" He asks cheekily, and his grin widens when you blush harder and agree to go.

He saunters over to you and plants a quick kiss on your lips, before putting his arm around your shoulder and leading you off, pointedly ignoring Chucks wolf whistles when the two of you walk past him.

George Luz

George is the biggest flirt around, and he makes no secret in the fact he likes you.

He goes out of his way to compliment you; tells you that you make Rita Hayworth look plain, that you make sunshine look dull.

The more he makes you blush, the harder he tries. He knows he can crack your shy shell and find the gem underneath.

He's a big fan of cheesy movie quotes, which you adamantly refuse to indulge him with, but he keeps trying nonetheless.

He's tried them all, so he decides this time to pull out all the stops and be as direct about his feelings as possible.

"See that's what's wrong with you," he starts smoothly, "you should be kissed, and often. And by someone who knows how."

He pauses for a second to judge your reaction, and when he sees you smiling he sweeps you into a dramatic dip and kisses you passionately, Clarke Gable style.

He quite literally swept you off your feet, and he knows it too.

Once he knows he's successfully gotten your attention for real, he softens. He dials down the flamboyant flirting and instead he just talks to you and gets to know you for real.

He loves to cuddle you in close and have whispered conversations for hours.

He's very affectionate too, always has to be holding your hand or have his arm around you.

He brings you out of your shell, his enthusiasm and fun nature is so infectious you can't help but be swept up by it and join in on the fun.

Ronald Speirs

Ron is incredibly different when he's with you, much to everyone's surprise.

He laughs with you, like....a lot.

At first you were very cautious with him. You'd heard the stories and weren't too sure what to make of him.

But when you get to know him you realise that he is totally different to what everyone said.

You found that he is really easy to talk to, and he has a wicked sense of humour.

He liked that you were a bit more quiet than others, it made you much easier for him to talk to.

He tells the most brilliant stories, and the two of you usually end up talking for hours about all sorts; history, movies, music, anything and everything.

Its obvious to everyone but you that he has feelings for you.

He thinks you must surely know, that it was completely obvious he'd fallen in love with you. I mean he spends all his free time with you, and he never talks to anyone else the way he does with you.

Lipton eventually realises that no, you don't actually have a clue how Speirs feels about you, so he tells him that you're oblivious.

Naturally Speirs is all action and matter of fact, so he decides to just tell you how he feels and see what happens.

He's kinda nervous despite outward appearances, but he'd never admit it to himself or anyone else.

So he literally just comes out and says it one day; no frills, no fuss.

You're disarmed by his straightforwardness. You'd hoped that he might return your feelings but you'd thought there was no way.

You've never seen him smile brighter than when you told him you returned his feelings.

He wasted no time after that; he wrapped an arm around your waist and pulled you in to a passionate kiss, his other hand cupping your jaw.

Everyone was delighted you'd mellowed out ole Sparky a little, but of course nobody was brave enough to say it out loud in case he found out.

Babe Heffron

Babe....is a bit of a mess around you.

He tries to act all cool and smooth, but he's really a total disaster because he's so distracted staring at you.

When you first start getting to know each other he does most of the talking. He's nervous as hell around you so his mouth just keeps going.

Lucky for him though you find it endearing, and it helps you feel more comfortable with him so you start to open up too.

After that he prefers to listen instead of talk, because he's fascinated by everything you tell him.

You're two peas in a pod, and everyone thinks you're a miracle worker because you've managed to get Babe to stop talking for 5 minutes.

Its clear to everyone that the guy is totally in love with you, they're just waiting for him to do something about it.

So of course Bill is the one to tell him to get his act together.

"Get your goddamn head out of your ass Babe and stop acting like a lovesick puppy. Go tell her you love her and get the goddamn girl."

It takes him awhile, and he really has to gear himself up to do it. He's attempted to say it so many times but he keeps chickening out.

One night you two are hanging out just the two of you and he manages to get it out.

He stutters like hell, but you think it's seriously adorable, and you're grinning like an idiot by the time he's finished.

"Well, don't leave me hanging," he says nervously, "do you feel the same or...?"

You say nothing, instead leaning towards him and kissing him sweetly.

You're both blushing like two cherry tomatoes, but you're smiling so much your cheeks hurt.

Then you're even more inseparable. Bill thinks you're joined at the hip or something.

You're really cute together though, always holding hands or cuddled up.

What you don't see is that Babe rarely takes his eyes off of you, and he still looks like a lovesick puppy but honestly he couldn't care less.

Don Malarkey

Don tries to act all cool when the boys are around, but when he's alone with you he's much quieter.

It's those quiet moments alone together that you enjoy the most.

He's a great listener, and he has a gentle way of pushing you to open up and be yourself with him.

You guys grow close pretty quickly, and start spending more and more time together.

He finds himself getting lost in conversations with you, and getting distracted staring at you.

He realises one day when you're telling a funny story about your childhood and he hears your wonderful laugh that he's totally in love with you.

He doesn't say anything for awhile, thinking it all over. He contemplates if he should even tell you or not because there's a chance you'll laugh I'm his face and tell him no way in hell.

Eventually he decides to screw it and just tell you. But he's not gonna just come out and say it, he's gotta do some kinda gesture. But nothing too overly dramatic because you wouldn't like that.

So he turns up to meet you with a bunch of flowers he picked himself, and he's been trying to fix his hair for the last goddamn half hour.

He's got a speech prepared and everything, but he's pretty sure he's forgotten half of it.

"Look I...I don't know if you feel the same or anything but...I just want you to know that I am head over heels in love with you. And I don't expect you to return the feelings or anything but I'm hoping you'll give me a chance."

You could tell he was nervous about the whole thing, and it was quite possibly the most endearing thing you'd ever seen in your life.

You took the flowers from him and placed them on a side table quickly before jumping into his arms and hugging him tight.

"Woah," he chuckles, "I'm taking this as a good sign then."

You pulled back your head from his shoulder and looked into his eyes happily, nodding your agreement.

He eyes crinkled when he smiles and he leans in, pressing his lips against yours firmly.

Its clear to everyone how perfect you are for each other; you calm his wilder side and he brings out your more outgoing side.

Well there you have it! Hope you all like it and ilysm Fran thanks so much for such a fun request to kick off the birthday week fun💕

Taglist: @tvserie-s-world @geniedocroe @generousdreamlanddestiny @sunsetmando @cagzzz107 @howunexpectedlyso @alejodi0nysus @sunflowerchuck

#band of brothers #bob #bull randleman #floyd talbert #george luz #ronald speirs #ron speirs #babe heffron #don malarkey #band of brothers x reader #hbo band of brothers #band of brothers fandom #band of brothers imagine #holdingforgeneralhugs #birthdayweekbonanza

[natsbaby]

Falling in Love at a Park

Pairing: Scarlett Johansson x Singer!Reader

Summary: You and Scarlett are in love and nothing can stop the both of you as long as you have each other, right?

Warnings: there’s a part that has sexual suggestions but it’s not super R18!

Word Count: 2.7K

A/N: here’s the second part of Symphony! This is inspired from Falling in Love at a Coffee Shop by Landon Pigg [which means Y/N will own the song for this fic]!

I decided to do one more part after this and there’s a hint of what’s the song inspiration for the next and last part! I hope you guys enjoy!!

part 1, part 3

“You may now board for flight BA0765 to London”

“Finally, I thought I’d pass out before we could board” you jokingly say as you stretch, yawning in the process. You hear a chuckle beside you making you smile. You stand up as you face the person beside you, offering a hand to help her up. “You ready?”

Scarlett smiles at you as she nods, taking your hand as she stands up. You spent the weekend getting to know Scarlett in between rehearsals and shows around LA. It has been the best two days for the both of you to the point that Scarlett decided to go with you to London for a few weeks. You were worried at first that you two were going too fast, but Scarlett reassured you that she needed a vacation anyway and that two weeks will be nothing since she has Hunter taking care of Rose and she doesn’t have anything to film till then. You reluctantly agreed with her reasoning after a little more negotiating on her end.

You both walk hand in hand to the gate and managed to check in with ease. You sit down on your seat while Scarlett puts your bags in the overhead compartment. You look out of the window, wondering what you’ve done these past years that lead you to this exact moment. You feel Scarlett’s hand gently holding yours, bringing you out of your thoughts as you face to look at her.

“You okay?” She asks curiously, tilting her head slightly to the side. You smile softly as you give the back of her hand a soft kiss. “Yea, just thinking about us”

“Hopefully not bad things” she teases making you chuckle slightly.

“I was wondering what I’ve done these past years that led me to today, that’s all” you explain as you fiddle with the ends of her bracelet, playing with the small rose charm it has at the center.

Scarlett pauses for a moment to think, holding your hand in the process. “I feel like it’s not on what we’ve done, but more of how long we had to wait till we finally got to meet. I feel like it was destiny, as cheesy as that sounds, but who knows right?” She smiles at you making your heart melt at her words.

“You feel that it’s destiny?” She hums in response as she gives the back of your hand like what you did earlier, making you blush in response. “Yea, I feel like it’s destiny”

You chuckle slightly and hear the pilot saying we’re leaving in a bit. “You ready to see my world?”

“I’m ready to be part of your world”

After a long flight and a horrible nap, you two finally arrive in London where you and Scarlett plan to spend your post-concert break together. You both walk to where you parked your car in the airport parking lot, putting your bags at the back. You sit at the drivers as Scarlett slumps at the passengers making you laugh.

“Tough flight?” You tease earning a grunt from the actor. It’s currently 9 pm and you know Scarlett’s dead tired and jetlagged so you quickly make your way back to your apartment.

“Oh I forgot to tell you something,” you say as you park your car in your flat’s parking area. “I have a dog in my apartment, I hope you don’t mind”

“You do?” Scarlett’s tired eyes light up at the idea of a dog, making you laugh.

“Yea, his name is Sparky” you smile as you both make your way to your flat. “He’s normally with my friend when I go on international tours but she just dropped him off at my place so he’s probably tired anyway to bother you”

“No please I love dogs I want him to bother me” you burst out laughing at Scarlett’s begging tone as you reach your flat, already hearing the little commotion Sparky’s causing inside. You open the door and get tackled to the ground by your corgi puppy, laughing as he licks your face.

Scarlett smiles at the scene in front of her, loving the idea that you got the most British dog you could get in the UK. You get up with your dog in your arms who are looking at Scarlett with curious eyes.

“You wanna pet him?” You offer with a smile as Scarlett lets the dog sniff her hand. He gives her a little yap in response, fidgeting in your arms as he wants to go to Scarlett. You pass the dog to her and he attacks Scarlett with licks and sniffs, making the actor giggle in glee.

“Oh my god I love him, I’d do anything for him” she says in a dreamy tone while hugging the little puppy. You chuckle, letting her go into your flat as you bring in the bags. You check over the things around the flat as Scarlett explores a little with Sparky in her arms who is getting comfortable around the actor.

“You can go freshen up first while I make something for us in the meantime. You okay with a bit of pancake?” You call out then proceed to cook some pancakes when you hear Scarlett’s approval.

Scarlett puts Sparky down so he could toddle around the apartment and starts to genuinely look around the apartment. You have a decent flat considering you live alone, not super fancy since you do go on tours a lot but nice enough that it’s comfortable when you do stay long enough. She noticed the various picture frames that range from concert stills when you go on tour to family pictures. You have older siblings, making you the youngest so you’ve always been close with your father and siblings. Your mother, however, is a different story. Scarlett could tell you’re not close with her since you barely have any pictures together, seeing as she’s only seen informal family pictures.

She gently picks up a picture of you and your siblings as kids at a birthday party, smiling at the dopey grin on your frosting-covered face. She didn’t notice you until she feels your arms wrapping around her waist from behind, your chin resting on her shoulder.

“I think we’re around 5 or 6 at the time. They thought it would be a great idea to smash my face onto the cake” you chuckle slightly, kissing Scarlett on the cheek softly.

“Where are they now?” She asks while looking at the picture.

“They’re living their own lives with their own families. We come to visit the parents a few times a year” you explain as Scarlett puts down the picture frame to get another. This time it's your family photo.

“You never talk about your mom” she mutters quietly, worried that she’d offended you.

“We’re never close, but I can tell you about her some other time okay?” You turn her around so she’s facing you, smiling at her. “Come on I’m hungry and tired, you probably are too”

She smiles at you, happy that she didn’t offend you in any way, and puts the picture frame in its proper place. You both make your way to the kitchen, Sparky following along and start to eat with Scarlett.

Scarlett sees Sparky eyeing at the bacon on her plate with the cutest puppy eyes ever. She looks at you for a moment to see that you’re checking something on your phone. She grins slightly, breaking a small piece of her bacon, and turns to look at the drooling corgi.

“You want?” She asks softly to the dog who nods excitedly at her with his tail wagging happily. She chuckles slightly, tossing the bacon piece at the dog who catches the bacon with ease.

“You did not just give my fatass of a dog bacon”

She jumps as she heard your accusing tone, smiling shyly at your mischievous look. “He wanted it”

“Of course he does, he’s a fatass for a reason” you jokingly say making Sparky yap happily. “He’s my dog for a reason, he can charm his way into anyone’s hearts to get whatever he wants, especially food”

Scarlett chuckles at your observation with the dog, resting her elbow on the counter so she can look at you with her chin on the palm of her hand.

“Oh really now?” She smirks slightly at you, making you grin.

“Isn’t that how I got you in the first place?” You tilt your head slightly, challenging her with a smirk.

“I thought it’s because I wanted a trip to Lon- ow!” She exclaims as you hit her on the side, laughing at your huffing figure. She pulls your chair closer to her so she could wrap her arms around you. She smirks slightly as you cross your arms, leaning in so her face is inches away from yours.

“Lemme change that. I thought it’s because you’re hot and I’d do anything to get into your pants” she says softly but seductively, making you gasp and blush furiously. You two haven’t done anything beyond making out since you two technically just met but it didn’t mean you never thought about it.

You push her back slightly as a smirk forms on your face.

“Keep it in your pants, Johansson. You need to take me on 3 more dates before you could get anything else” you say, challenging the blonde as she smirks back at you.

“Deal”

It’s been two weeks since you two landed in London and you’ve been taking Scarlett out to go site seeing. You’ve taken her almost everywhere in London from tourist attractions to hidden gems you love to visit with Sparky and honestly it has been the best week of your lives.

You’re currently walking in the park with Scarlett, enjoying the afternoon breeze and the first signs of fall coming to the country. You feel a blow of the cold breeze, making you shiver slightly.

“Jesus I wish I wore another layer” you grunt slightly making Scarlett laugh who proceeds to remove her scarf and wrapping it around your neck.

“You’re a stubborn brit who didn’t listen to me when I said that it’s gonna be really cold today” she teases lightly making you pout. She kisses your cold cheek gently, warming you up slightly making you smile.

“I think I saw a cocoa stand ahead, go sit down I’ll meet you back here?” She offers and smiles as you nod in agreement. She makes her way to get you two some hot cocoa as you sit down on the nearby bench.

You watch the kids play around with their parents making you smile at their giggles and squeals from the fun. You take in the environment you’re in, getting a sudden wave of inspiration for a new song to come at you. You quickly take out a small notebook you keep in your pocket for situations like this and start jotting down your ideas.

Scarlett walks back to you with the two cups of hot cocoa in her hands as she notices your hunched-over form, writing furiously through your notebook. This isn’t the first time she witnessed your writing process since it comes to you at random times. Although despite that, she still can’t help but smile and admire how good you are at your field, and no matter where you are, you can find inspiration anywhere.

She sits down beside you, trying not to disturb you as she takes a sip from her cup. You look to the side slightly, humming slightly to acknowledge her presence, and look back at your notebook to write down the last bit of inspiration from your mind down to the slightly wrinkled pages. You put your pen away as you finish, smiling at your progress.

“Sorry about that, I thought of something for a new song” you explain as you take the cup from her and taking a sip.

“It’s alright, is it a top secret that I can’t have a glimpse?” She grins cheekily making you laugh, standing up and offering your hand.

“I saw a public piano a little down the park, lemme show you?” You smile as Scarlett’s eyes lit up at the idea. She stands up and the both of you make your way to the public piano while you finish your hot cocoa. You throw your cups away before sitting down on the piano, playing a few chords to get the right tone in your mind.

“This is rough so no judgments okay?” You warn as Scarlett leans over the piano, resting her chin on the palm of her hand as she watches you play a bit. “Never”

You take a deep breath and start to play, a very sweet tone enveloping the two of you into a world you’re creating. Scarlett watches you in awe as you play the introduction of the song, feeling a strong sense of innocent love from you.

I think that possibly, maybe I'm falling for you

You start to sing as you look at Scarlett with a smile. Her heart melts at the look of your eyes, swimming with love and adoration you have for the blonde. You start to channel your feelings for the blonde as you look at her while singing.

Yes, there's a chance that I've fallen quite hard over you

Scarlett notices that you’re not as stiff as you normally play. You’re normally sitting up straight despite the gentle flow of your hands, but now you’re gently swaying through the music you’re creating. You look like you’re enjoying what you’re creating and it brings a smile to Scarlett’s face knowing that she’s the cause of it. Your fingers gently pressing down on the worn-down piano as you allow the music to flow through you for the first time in your life. You think about the time you two have spent together this past week, thinking how lucky you are to have met someone like Scarlett and wondering what the future has in store for the both of you.

I've seen the paths that your eyes wander down, I want to come too

You two didn’t notice a small crowd forming around the two of you, drawn by the beautiful piano you’re playing. Unconsciously, they were also drawn by the small bubble you two have created where they can visibly see the unspoken love you two have for each other just flowing and circulating you both.

I never knew just what it was about this old coffee shop I love so much

She chuckles softly at your use of a coffee shop, understanding that you’re using that instead of the park because of how cheesy falling in love at a coffee shop is, just like your meet-cute. You smile slightly as you hear Scarlett’s chuckle, making your heart melt at the beautiful sound she created.

All of the while I never knew

I never knew just what it was about this old coffee shop I love so much

All of the while I never knew

You play a little bit more, trailing the music since you didn’t get the chance to write more past that. You and Scarlett look at each other with loving eyes, floating in nirvana at how much you two love each other without saying I love you. You both jump in shock as you both hear claps from the crowd you two manage to create, blushing furiously at their cheers.

Scarlett chuckles slightly through her blushing complexion, walking up to you and bending down to look at you in the eyes and smile lovingly at you. “Gosh I love you”

You smile back at her, cupping her cheek gently. “I love you too Scarlett” you lean in and kiss her as the crowd cheers for the two of you. You both pull back to chuckle slightly, giving you a chance to stand up and taking Scarlett’s hands into yours.

“I may be imperfect, but you allow me to try. I was lonely and messy before I met you but you still gave me a chance and I can’t thank you enough for loving me. For making me believe that love is all true”

#scarlett johansson imagines #scarlett johansson x reader #scarlett johansson #celebrity oneshots #natsbaby song fic series

[elrics-inferno]

Why is one of the first things that we ever learn about Roy Mustang the fact that he is useless in the rain?

So at this point, I think we’ve all heard or realized that Roy Mustang’s rain/water motif is not just a physical limitation for his alchemy but also a symbol for his regret and “uselessness.” It’s a brilliant metaphor that elementally balances him out. 

And it’s introduced the moment we meet him. 

While it does serve as a bit of comic relief during the extremely intense first episode, the significance of it being in that episode is still important to Roy’s development and how the audience develops their understanding of him throughout the series. 

First, we need to contextualize it. The first episode is centered around Isaac McDougal, the freezing alchemist (as in an alchemist who freezes, not a really really cold alchemist, although “Isaac the Really Really Cold Alchemist” would be a fantastic name. Anyways). Isaac’s goal is to freeze over Central Command via a city-wide transmutation circle using a philosopher’s stone. 

The plot of the first episode is a parallel to the plot of the entire series, and it is full of foreshadowing. In terms of exposition, it isn’t very subtle. The basic exposition of characters like Ed, Al, and Roy is pretty much told to us through dialogue. However, that choice is justified. For people who are completely new to the FMA world, as I was when I watched this two years ago, the first episode has a lot going on. New members are not only meeting all the characters, but they are also trying to put together what alchemy is, where and when this is taking place, and who they should be rooting for. And THAT is where the brilliance (in my opinion) comes in. Watching the first episode through for the first time, the audience is rooting for Ed and Al (because they are the protagonists), and the military (because our protagonists trust them and are part of it). When our protagonists are told to capture Isaac and to view him as a traitor, we do, too. It’s only when Isaac confronts Ed about his beliefs about the military that we start to question our own. But even then, we aren’t given enough information to understand why we should question the military. However, watching the episode in hindsight, our loyalties are switched. Isaac becomes the hero trying to take down the evil military, and Ed, Al, and Mustang become the villains. 

So, back to Roy. During the first episode, aside from getting the basics of who he is and what he does, we don’t learn much more about him. Just these two things: 

1. He is a veteran of something called the Ishvalan War (and the Ishvalan War is apparently controversial based on conversations between Isaac and Roy and Isaac and Kimblee).

2. He can’t make things go sparky sparky when he gets wet. 

And those two things are arguably the most important parts of who Mustang is and what he has been through. 

First, let’s talk about Roy, Isaac, and Ishval. As the first episode unfolds, the audience knows nothing about what happened in Ishval. But Roy and Isaac do. In hindsight, knowing how Roy feels about the Ishvalan War and what he did there, why on Earth would he be calling Isaac a traitor? Roy knows that the military is corrupt (although not to the extent that he will). Roy’s biggest regret is blindly following orders in Ishval. Roy has his eyes set on becoming the Fuhrer and changing things. Roy is literally a genocidal war criminal who stages a coup from an ice cream truck and overthrows the military. And somehow Isaac is the traitor?

Roy is following orders because he has to in order to achieve his goal. He is putting on a loyal-to-the-military act and biding his time until he can admit to the world that Isaac was right. 

Er, that his ideals were.

See, Isaac is Roy’s elemental opposite. Isaac is water, Roy is fire. He is also Roy’s narrative foil. While Isaac’s plan lacked patience and was too rash to ever succeed, Roy’s plan has taken him and will take him years, and he has been extremely careful curating it. It’s ironic to me that the character associated with water would act more rashly and have less patience than the character associated with fire. That’s not to say that Roy doesn’t act rashly. Roy’s impulsiveness and vengeance-driven actions are some of his greatest setbacks as a character. 

But Roy is also intelligent and strategic in achieving his greater goals. His dependence is on his closest allies, while Isaac’s dependence is on a philosopher’s stone. And while the characters do not yet know the ingredients for stones in the first episode, Isaac’s use of one to accomplish his ultimate goal is what sets him apart from Roy and the Elrics. And yes, Roy does use a stone to regain his eyesight, but he does not depend on one during his coup. I would even argue that Isaac’s use of a philosopher’s stone could also be foreshadowing Roy’s eventual use of one in addition to foreshadowing the overall plot. It’s also important for us to see Isaac defeated in the first episode because it shows us that although philosopher’s stones remove the law of equivalent exchange, they do not make the user all-powerful. At the end of the day, the user can still be defeated.

Another difference between the two is how their limitations are presented in this episode. Isaac’s alchemy is unlimited because of the philosopher’s stone, but the first thing we learn about Roy Mustang’s alchemy is that he is limited by water. This leads me to the second point. 

Establishing Roy’s limitations in the first episode does a few things for us: 

First, it establishes that he is dependent on Riza and trusts her in his most vulnerable moments. That even though Riza knows how easily Roy can be overpowered, she still chooses to stay by his side, protect him, and help him accomplish whatever he sets out to do. 

Second, we get a peek at Mustang’s creativity and perseverance. His determination and intelligence is displayed in how he overcomes the limitations presented, and it makes us want to root for him. 

Third, it gives us some information as to how alchemy works. We see a few types of alchemy in this episode: Ed’s without a circle, Isaacs’s with a circle and elemental, Roy’s with his transmutation circle gloves and unique flame alchemy, and Major Armstrong’s forceful style. This helps us get an idea of the varying styles of alchemy, varying ways of how it can be used and manipulated, and the different forces that use it for their benefit or the benefit of others.

Lastly, it begins the “uselessness” theme. It tells us that even though Mustang is an extremely powerful alchemist, there are still things that he can’t control. That there are forces that can overpower him, and the best thing he can do is to get back up and try again until he accomplishes his goal. We also see Roy’s anger at those forces, the ones that render him unable to do anything. And we see him use that anger to fuel his alchemy and overpower them.

“The power of one man does not amount to much, but however little strength I am capable of... I’ll do everything humanly possible to protect the people I love, and in turn they’ll protect the ones they love. It seems like the least we tiny humans can do for each other.”

Roy Mustang, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood

#fmab #roy mustang #royai #riza hawkeye #fullmetal alchemist #fullmetal alchemist brotherhood #fullmetal alchimist brotherhood #fma #fullmetal alchemist: brotherhood #elrics-inferno

[cheri-translates]

[Analysis] The Importance of S2 Gavin’s Shooting Star Date

🍒 Warning: This post contains detailed spoilers for a date, 流星之约, which has not been released in EN! 🍒

Do check out @skyholders translation of the date here before proceeding!

If you’re taking the time to read this boring analysis, you should love Gavin enough to know just how iconic the planetarium is to them in S1, in which we witness a glorious, steamy kiss between Gavin and MC.

Which is why I was pretty disappointed when I first read this date (I gave it a 1.5/10 rating when someone asked) because it seemed so... stale. The karma got me hyped up for a fluffy date where Gavin would show his nerdy side to MC, not an investigation (-ω-、)

I refused to believe the writers would pick the planetarium as the setting for no reason, so I read through it again and identified some notable points:

1. A parallel to Blind Date

In Blind Date, MC didn’t tell Gavin the specifics of why she flaked out on him, which resulted in a misunderstanding and Gavin’s unforgettable line, “Too much of anything can get boring after a while.”

Afterwards, she didn’t clarify her relationship with Gavin, which resulted in Chandler inviting her to the planetarium. Gavin’s jealousy continued to fester, making the atmosphere tense. 

That is, until the searing kiss in the planetarium (i.e. non-verbal communication) led to a confirmation of their romantic relationship.

In sum: Lack of communication -> Misunderstanding -> Communication -> Confirmation of (romantic) relationship

In Shooting Star Date, MC was upfront with Gavin about the letter her company received, and Gavin also told her about the findings from his investigations.

Afterwards, when Gavin didn’t explain how he obtained the motorcycle, MC clarified it with him almost immediately, preventing any potential misunderstandings from taking root.

Because of how frank they were with each other, they were able to complete the operation without a hitch, leading to this confirmation:

MC: Haven’t we always been standing alongside each other, and walking in the same direction together?

Gavin nods lightly, exerting slight pressure as he grips my hand.

Gavin: Always.

In sum: Frank communication -> Mutual understanding -> Confirmation of (collaborative) relationship

2. Whether they realise it or not, they want to spend more time with each other

Gavin: Mm, there’s something I need to tell you. Are you free later?

I stare at the heap of documents on the table, and ponder for a few seconds-

MC: I’m free.

Gavin: That’s good. I’ll wait for you at the cafe near your office.

He pauses for a while.

Gavin: It’s almost time for dinner. We could have a meal together.

At this point, MC had no idea whether Gavin called her for personal or work purposes. Yet, she readily agreed despite having a pile of work. 

Similarly, Gavin offered to have a meal with MC despite having tons of work to do as a Commander. He even catered to her convenience, suggesting a cafe near her office.

Gavin: Let’s eat first. It’s already dinnertime. The dishes here aren’t bad, and they suit your palate.

Based on what he’s saying, it’s implied that MC has never been to this cafe before. Gavin might have picked this cafe not just because it’s close to MC’s office, but also because he knew MC would like the food 🥺 

3. How much closer they’ve become

[ Moments ]

Gavin’s Post: It’s more convenient to drive Sparky.

MC: Sparky: I think so too.

Gavin: It’s in a good mood tonight, probably because it had a change of motor.

-

Gavin’s Post: It’s more convenient to drive Sparky.

MC: It’s so late. Are you going for a spin?

Gavin: There are fewer cars in the night, so I can drive a little faster.

-

Gavin’s Post: It’s more convenient to drive Sparky.

MC: I suddenly realised that it’s been a very long time since I saw Sparky.

Gavin: You could tell me whenever you want to see it.

-

His responses are very telling of how comfortable he is with MC now. In the first few S2 Moments, specifically [R&S - Reunited Yesterday], Gavin gives painfully curt answers, for example:

MC: Is Officer Gavin on a mission?

Gavin: Just passing by.

Yet, he’s now giving her tidbits of information MC didn’t even ask for - Sparky having a change of motor, the reason why he’s going out for a night drive, etc.

-

4. What we can look forward to

[ Phone Call ]

Gavin: Have you heard of “Lonely Planet”? It’s usually called a wandering star.

Gavin: It can flit across fixed stars, but it won’t be bound by them completely.

Gavin: While it’s flying, it doesn’t emit light. It doesn’t reflect light either, and no one can see it.

MC: In that case... won’t it fly alone in the galaxy forever?

Gavin: That’s what other people ascribe to it. Flying could be its very meaning.

Gavin: Perhaps one day, it’d find a fixed star that it’s willing to be bound by, making it the destination of its wandering.

It’s a running gag in the CN community that S2 Gavin tends to disappear a lot and does his own thing. It’s a little frustrating, but this call hints that the plot is building up to the moment when Gavin, who is obviously the “wandering star” in this analogy, admits to himself / MC that he’s made her the destination of his wandering.

#this is more for my own reference so I can chart their progress easily :> #all I want is for them to reminisce on their fluffy high school days T^T

[the-evil-authoress]

GX Month Day 7: “Ojama Delta Thunder!!”

That’s right! You know what today is! Today we celebrate The Chazz, the one and only Manjoume Thunder! Give sparky boi a hug!

WE STAN SUPPORTIVE WORKPLACES IN THIS HOUSE. Also, tiny bit of Egoshipping at the end.

This monster is just over nine pages. What am I doing with my life?

“So you wanted to talk Pro stuff?”

It takes Chazz’s brain an extra minute to process the words, still reeling from the bombshell Jaden decided to drop on them tonight. Then he latches onto the chance to think about literally anything other than the fact that Jaden literally fused himself with the monster that tried to kill him! How stupid do you get?! “Yes, please, I’m desperate.”

“Alright, no need to grovel.” Aster holds a hand out to preemptively stop any further begging that admittedly would have happened. “Like I said, I’d be glad for the company.”

It’s still surreal to watch Aster be both honest and vulnerable even though Chazz has seen it a few times now thanks to these group talks Jim started. Chazz has actually seen most of his friends break down in tears at this point. This year has been a fucking trip. “Okay, what’s the catch?”

“You’ll be my assistant.”

“Sorry, what?” Chazz must not have heard that right.

“You’ll have the chance to see how the Pros work up close and personal, and I get an extra pair of hands on deck.” Aster shrug. “Win-win.”

That is absolutely not a win-win! “I’m not gonna be your lackey!”

Aster levels him a look that would be insulting enough even without the younger boy’s obvious lack of fear in the face of Chazz’s anger. “So you don’t want my help then.”

Oh this son of a- Deep breath in. Hold it. Exhale. Don’t scream bloody murder at the literal one person related to the Pro Dueling business giving Chazz the time of day. “Fine. What exactly am I expected to do?”

*

“You’ll be managing Aster’s schedule,” the woman says as she escorts Chazz up the elevator because Aster couldn’t be bothered to meet Chazz himself. Esmerelda, she introduced herself as, an employee of the Senrigan Group assigned to look after Aster. Purple curls spill over her shoulder and she’d be pretty if her smile wasn’t so...unnerving. Sharp green eyes bore down at him and Chazz wants to fidget in this stupid, uncomfortable suit. “Take this.” Esmerelda holds out a simple flip phone and Chazz accepts it with minimal confusion. “It’s a company phone and will be your primary method of communication.”

This gig sounds simple enough at least.

At the top floor of the company-owned skyscraper, the doors open to reveal a spacious and luxurious pad. Reminds him of home, honestly, and Chazz has to swallow down the confusing mix of emotions that brings. “I’ll be living here? Not bad.”

“Certainly not.” Esmeralda chuckles and gives Chazz a smile that - in one word - he would describe as plastic. Leading him through the entryway-living room space, she opens a door to a room that looks like a typical office space.

“That’s a lot of phones.” He stares incredulously at the appliances that line the desks.

“Of course,” Esmerelda says and Chazz finds it more than a little unnerving that she doesn’t deem it necessary to address why there are so many phones in this room. “This is your desk.” She taps a spot on the table top with an immaculate nail. “Make sure you arrive before seven.” Chazz nods and the woman leads him back out of the room to a set of narrow double doors that open onto a balcony. “You will be sleeping there.” She points down at a comparatively tiny, rustic looking building squeezed between the back of the skyscraper and the road. Is that a warehouse?

*

It’s a warehouse. There’s a couch and table on the landing near the door and a single bare bulb hanging from the ceiling. The power is out and a cloud of dust rises from the couch when Chazz sets his briefcase on the cushions. Sadly, this isn’t much worse than the Slifer Dorms. He’ll make it work.

*

“You put him where?” Aster looks up over his cup of chamomile tea, something Sartorius recommended after noticing his trouble sleeping and, like most of Sartorius’ suggestions, works fairly well. Setting the cup down, he presses his finger tips to his temple and doesn’t wait for an answer. “Esmerelda, you are evil.”

“With all due respect, sir, this boy is a Manjoume.” Esmerelda frowns, posture stiff where she sits on the other end of the couch and brows furrowed in an expression that speaks exactly how she feels about this situation. “The Manjoume Group is our biggest rival. He could be here to steal company secrets.”

“I highly doubt that,” Aster mumbles and picks his tea up again.

“To my knowledge, Chazz has an estranged relationship with his family,” Sartorius says from the armchair across the table, pencil tapping lightly against the clipboard on his lap. That paper is either Aster’s schedule or a crossword; Aster doesn’t care enough to squint. “Besides, he is a personal friend.”

Aster scoffs. “Chazz and I are not friends.”

“Friendly acquaintances then.”

“Acquaintances,” Aster corrects. “We’re just acquaintances.”

“Of course,” Sartorius agrees in that voice that implies he knows something he isn’t willing to share yet. Aster narrows his eyes at him over the cup but doesn’t press the issue. He’ll find out soon enough; Sartorius isn't that good at keeping secrets.

“Exactly,” Esmerelda presses. “Why are you sticking your neck out for him?”

Sighing, Aster sets his cup down to massage his temple once more. He knows Esmerelda means well, but she’s been watching him like a hawk even since he got back from the other dimension and Aster misses that small bit of freedom. “I don’t know. Maybe because I felt bad for him? Maybe because I wanted someone to talk about-” He lets the sentence hang and shelves the bulk of his bitterness and frustration before continuing; he doesn’t need to take it out on them. “-who actually understands.”

Esmerelda presses her lips. Sartorius stares at him with those damnably soulful eyes. Even if he could have predicted that whole fiasco, he certainly wouldn’t have been able to stop it. Aster doubts nothing short of the sun imploding could have stopped Jaden from chasing Jesse across dimensions; Aster had just been the idiot who got too close.

“It’s late.” Aster exhales wearily. “You should go home.”

Nodding, Esmerelda stands and bids him a good night. Only after the elevator has closed behind her does Aster allow himself to slump against the couch. Sartorius sets the clipboard on the table - it’s a crossword - and holds out his hand. “Shall we retire?”

“Yeah.”

It’s easy to be vulnerable around Sartorius, probably because of how long they’ve known each other, and Sartorius is still the only person Aster can completely relax around. He lets Sartorius pull him up off the couch and they head down the hallway to the bedrooms at the back of the suite.

“I’m in the next room if you need me,” Sartorius promises with his usual nightly greeting, and Aster has the distinct feeling he’ll be taking him up on that later. Today’s been stressful.

*

Chazz arrives at the office room at 6:55 sharp and freezes at the sight of the person already sitting there. “Good morning, Chazz,” Sartorius greets like they’re old buddies or something and not the guy who brainwashed him less than a year ago. “I trust Esmerelda already briefed you on the daily necessities.”

“No?” Chazz croaks. He’s going to be working with Sartorius? What happened to Esmerelda?

Sartorius’ expression falls into one of surprise and concern, but one of the multiple phones rings before he can respond and his attention immediately swerves. “Good morning, this is Sartorius speaking,” the man says with an uncanny level of grace and authority. Whatever is said on the other end of the line prompts him to pull up some kind of spreadsheet on the computer in front of him. Another phone rings as the conversation continues and Sartorius wordlessly directs Chazz to answer it with his hand.

“This is Weekly Duelist,” a voice chirps in his ear, a bit loud and on the edge of demanding. “Next week, could we have Aster...”

A third phone rings. Sartorius pushes a pen and paper at Chazz as he sets the first phone down and reaches for the next. “Write it down.” He’s on the next call before Chazz can ask for elaboration.

And so the morning goes. Chazz scribbles down the names of different dueling events and talk shows and gods-know-what-else that want Aster’s attention while Sartorius alternates between his own conversations and calling back the interested parties on Chazz’s list to fit them onto the spreadsheet.

Esmerelda shows up during a lull in phone calls as Sartorius walks Chazz through using the digital schedule, and Chazz’s brain is too fried from the last 2 hours of his life - has it only been 2 hours?? - to even care about the guy being in his personal space. “The first few hours of the morning are always the busiest. If you can’t confirm at the time of the call, write down the request and call back later. You must also always consider location and travel time- Oh.” Sartorius looks up abruptly. “Excuse us a moment.”

Standing, Sartorius pulls Esmerelda back out the room with him, and Chazz takes the opportunity to just sit and do nothing. A few names remain on the callback list. Should he get started on that or wait for Sartorius to return?

“You sent him in here with no instruction.” The conversation floats in from beyond the door.

“I told him to arrive before seven.”

“Before seven does not imply ‘in time to receive instruction’, Esmeralda. If you weren’t going to show him anything last night, he should have been here at least half an hour before hand.”

So that woman set him up for failure? Whatever, nothing Chazz isn’t used to. Reaching for the phone, he calls back the next event on his list. He’s got two more events scheduled before Sartorius and Esmerelda return and sits back in the chair smugly as he ends the call. Sartorius’ eyebrows rise as he glances over the schedule on his own screen.

“Well done! I’m glad to see you taking initiative.” The praise sends an odd thrill through Chazz like a half forgotten memory and he decides not to dwell on it. Sartorius turns back to Esmerelda with an almost smug grin. “And you worried.”

The woman presses her red lips together with a dismissive hum; Chazz prefers it to the plastic smile.

A tea and snack break later, Chazz finds himself fetching Aster’s clothing and duel disk - why the hell does someone need that many of the exact same thing?! - for a photo shoot, then hauling books from a truck to the table of a signing event - he didn’t know Aster wrote a book about duel philosophy. Admittedly, he’s curious - all while occasionally answering phone calls and penning new events onto his paper copy of the schedule.

The sun has set by the time he finds himself slumping back in his desk chair, Aster’s schedule neat and tidy on the spreadsheet before him. The phones have finally gone silent.

“Good work today.” Sartorius enters with a tray of soup and breadsticks and sets it on the desk adjacent to Chazz.

Chazz blinks at it. “You cook?”

Sartorius smiles. “Yes. Mizuchi and I lived alone for most of our lives, so we had to learn how to take care of ourselves.”

“Oh.” Chazz doesn’t know what to say to that so he doesn’t say anything as he reaches for the soup and spoons some of it into his mouth. It’s surprisingly good, mild, not too salty like most of the canned stuff.

“There’s an extra room up here for you,” Sartorius says and Chazz looks up sharply.

“I don’t have to stay in the warehouse?”

“Goodness, no.” Shaking his head, Sartorius presses his lips and continues at length, “I suppose Esmerelda wanted to test your resolve.” Chazz snorts. “I assure you, Aster and I did not approve.”

Didn’t stop them from letting him sleep there last night. Chazz can’t even muster the energy to glare at the man, only managing what must be a fish eyed stare. He dips the breadstick in the soup before taking a bit; oo, now that’s a good combination of flavors.

“How was your first day?” It’s still unnerving how calm and even Sartorius speaks even without the malicious undertones from the Light of Destruction.

“Exhausting,” Chazz answers without hesitation.

Sartorius chuckles. “I’ve put on some tea if you’d like to join us.”

Chazz considers this and shakes his head. “Nah, I’m gonna go get my stuff.” Still too weird, and honestly he wants nothing more than to crash in a real bed and stop existing for a few hours.

Nodding, Sartorius stands. “The room is at the far end of the hall. Mine is the second on the left if you need anything.”

Chazz really shouldn’t be surprised these two live together.

*

The following week is more of the same. Chazz follows Aster to all manner of events from meet-and-greets to fancy parties, always doing the heavy lifting and always answering the phone. During the precious few moments he has to breathe, Sartorius talks his ear off. The man is a surprisingly witty conversation partner and the complete opposite of Chazz’s sparse memories from the Society of Light.

“Of course I’m different.” Sartorius laughs good naturedly as Chazz curses his slip of the tongue. “That wasn’t really me, Chazz.”

No, Chazz supposes it wasn’t.

“He’s so good with people,” he mumbles, leaning on the balcony railing where they watch Aster mingle in the party below.

“Of course.” Sartorius sounds fond. “That’s what it takes to succeed. I believe you can learn a lot from watching him.”

Yeah, if Chazz can manage to find the time between everything else.

*

“You want me to what?”

“Organize the cards in here,” Aster repeats and Chazz baulks at the sheer number of stacks that line the shelves. “The power’s back on so that won’t be a problem. No specific deadline, just work on it when you have spare time.”

“What spare time?!”

Aster only raises his eyebrows with that unimpressed expression he’s so fond of giving, and Chazz clenches his teeth.

“Can I least get some gloves and a mask and a duster?” It’s filthy in here and Chazz doesn’t fancy breathing in whatever dust cloud he’s found to kick up.

“There should be cleaning supplies in the closet.” Aster waves a hand vaguely before turning to take his leave. “Good luck.”

*

A number of people make house calls with Aster; Chazz doesn’t pay much attention to them because he’s usually neck deep in phone calls and keeping Aster’s schedule straight - he does not need another double booking fiasco, thank god Sartorius had the charm to sort it out peacefully. One guy in particular, however, Chazz does get used to seeing; Mike something-or-other, a TV producer hell bent on getting Aster in on his comedy acts. Aster throws him out more than once.

“Why don’t you just cut ties with him?” Chazz asks after another such altercation. “You clearly don’t like him.”

“He’s good at what he does.” Aster frowns, annoyed if not outright angered. So are Slade and Jagger and that didn’t stop Chazz from telling them to fly a kite. Picking up his cup, Aster winces as his hand shakes and quickly sets the cup down before the tea can spill. Chazz zeros in on the movement.

“Hand,” he says, scooting over to sit by Aster on the couch without a second thought.

“What?”

Chazz doesn’t wait as he takes Aster’s hand and smooths out the joints between his own fingers before pressing gently and rubbing circles with his thumbs.

“You know massage??”

“Yeah.” Chazz still doesn’t get why everyone makes a big deal of it. This is something he’s always been able to do; used to find it weird that other people couldn’t because it felt so easy to him. A natural skill or whatever. “Jesus fuck,” the English expletive slips past his lips as he feels the knots and strained muscles in Aster’s hand. “I’m cancelling meet-and-greets and signing events for a while.”

“Excuse me?”

“So your hand can heal,” Chazz cuts Aster off before the other can work himself into righteous indignation. “You can’t duel without your draw hand. Two weeks of minimal activity and you should be fine. But we should tape this. Do you have a first aid-”

A white kit with a red cross hovers in the peripheral of Chazz’s vision. He stares dumbly up at Sartorius as Aster huffs with amusement. Cautiously, Chazz takes it. “Can you still see the future or something?”

“Predict,” Sartorius corrects as he takes his usual seat in the arm chair. “And not all predictions are accurate.”

“Riiiight.” Just gonna ignore that piece of information for now then. Chazz pulls the ace wrap out of the kit and turns back to Aster’s hand. “Tell me if it’s too tight.”

Maybe he’s imagining it, but there might be a sliver more respect in Aster’s eyes when Chazz finishes wrapping his hand and a tiny, genuine smile on his face.

*

This can’t be happening. This can’t be happening!

Aster’s going to lose his entire career just because one lousy card went missing?!

Chazz paces back and forth across the warehouse floor, gnawing on his fingernails. The cards have all been organized - monster, trap, spell, then by type, archetype, and alphabetical. Chazz could point exactly to which box a single card is in, but the one card apparently more important that Aster’s fucking career disappears from right under his nose!

They even know who took it! They have photos from the security camera! But they can’t prove shit because the bastard was smart enough to keep his face covered and away from the camera! If they can’t prove it, they can’t get the card back! And then Aster-

“Boss, breathe!” Ojama Yellow squeals. “I think you're having an angry attack!”

“Anxiety attack!” Chazz screams, suddenly aware of just how rapid and shallow his breath has gotten. Geez, he sounds like Jaden after-

JADEN!

Chazz dives for his school-issued PDA, yanks up the contacts, and rapidly taps his foot against the floor as he waits for the other end of the line to pick up. He dials twice before getting an answer.

“What?”

“Jaden, I need your help!”

“Do you have any idea what time it is?” The other boy sounds groggy and disheveled.

No, Chazz has absolutely no idea what time it is in Japan, he is on the side of the globe and that’s not important right now! “Listen! I need you and your freaky powers for help with something!”

Silence. The line clicks dead.

“DID YOU JUST HANG UP ON ME?” Chazz screams into the empty warehouse. It takes three more tries to get Jaden back on the line.

“And why should I help you?”

“SERIOUSLY? Wait.” Something about Jaden’s voice sounds off. The cadence? “Yubel? This is Yubel isn’t it? Put Jaden on the line! I don’t want you!”

“Jaden is asleep as I was before you so rudely interrupted me and will be returning to now,” Yubel snips.

“WAIT!” Chazz screeches before she can hang up again. He doesn’t need to waste any more time on callbacks. “Never mind! I just need help! Aster needs help!”

The silence on the other end stretches long enough that Chazz fears the monster already hung up. “I’m listening.”

*

Chazz doesn’t even question it when Jaden tumbles out of the shadows onto the warehouse floor, grumbling about fudged landings and never being at locations before, just snaps at him to hide the wings and drags him up to Aster’s apartment. “I brought help!” he announces as they barge in.

Aster’s head snaps up and Chazz watches the scathing remark die on his tongue as his eyes fall on Jaden. “Oh. That’s an idea.”

“Okay, what the hell is going on?” Jaden walks fearlessly up to the trio. “Cuz I got the basics from Yubel, but details would be nice.”

“Yubel?” Esmerelda asks with a weary glance between Jaden and Chazz.

Jaden blanks at her then turns away dismissively. “Not important.”

Aster tosses the security photos onto the table between them. “This is the guy who took the card. Mike, a TV producer who’s been trying to get me to go along with his comedy gimmick for weeks now. We know it’s him but these photos won’t hold up in court.”

Picking the photos up, Jaden holds his chin thoughtfully. “So you just need me to get this card back?”

“And maybe some proof that this guy stole it,” Chazz adds quickly, trying not to cringe as Aster’s eyes flicker over to him, but the pro silently nods his agreement.

“Alright. I’ll see what I can do.” Setting the photos back on the table, Jaden glances at the elevator, makes a face, and walks straight for the balcony. They all watch in confused silence until Jaden leaps off the balcony railing.

Esmerelda screams. “Is he insane?!”

Even Chazz charges toward the balcony, leaning over the edge in terror, only to find Jaden standing calmly on the sidewalk below like he didn’t just jump off the top floor of a fucking skyscraper!

“How?!” Esmerelda gapes, gripping the railing with white knuckles.

“I’m not even gonna question it.” Aster waves a hand as he returns indoors. Sartorius chuckles quietly, the only person who hadn’t made a mad dash after the reckless idiot.

Chazz sinks to the balcony floor, waiting for his heart to finally get the memo that they don’t need to be freaking out anymore. Gods above help them all...

*

Jaden gets the card back and manages to publicly humiliate Mike in the process. Win-win.

At the end of Chazz’s ‘employment’, Aster challenges him to an official PR duel. It’s the first time Chazz has gotten to seriously break out his deck in a while and he fears he’ll be rusty, but the plays come to him easier than they ever had. Oh, he gets it now. When he organized all the cards in the warehouse, he read each one’s effect; he thought about how to play them and combo them with each other. Aster’s deck is easy to read and Chazz pulls off a spectacular win.

Amidst the cheers, Aster holds out his hand. “Nice work. Guess you did learn a thing or two.”

Riding the adrenaline high, Chazz pulls him straight into a hug. Aster grunts, going rigid before awkwardly patting his back.

“Maybe not in front of the cameras.”

Chazz immediately backpedals. “Right! Sorry!” There’s an odd expression in Aster’s eyes as they shake hands properly this time.

*

“Sartorius. I have another problem.”

Sartorius sniggers as Aster predictably sinks into the seat next to him, flipping over the cards in his game of solitaire. “Oh, I don’t think this one is a problem,” he says with confidence, this morning’s card reading still fresh in his mind. “You should ask him out.”

It takes a second. “SARTORIUS!” Aster pushes away from the table, looking positively scandalized. “I don’t have time for a social life let alone a romantic one!”

Humming, Sartorius places a card on its designated stack. “I’m sure you can make the time. After all, you’ve been making time to visit Duel Academy quite frequently of late.”

“For my mental health!” Aster goes on the defensive, but there’s no denying the hint of flush on his cheeks. “And that's not the point! I don’t care if you read it in cards, I’m not just randomly asking him out!”

Sadly, Sartorius knows half of Aster’s reluctance to the idea is because the media would have a field day with any celebrity’s love life, let alone one with...less conventional preferences. That will not, however, prevent Sartorius from teasing his best friend. “How would you prefer to ask him out then?”

With a frustrated whine, Aster glares at Sartorius. “Not at all.”

“That’s a lie.”

“Shut up.”

#gxmonth2021 #chazz princeton #manjoume jun #aster phoenix #sartorius kumar #jaden yuki #egoshipping #ygo gx #yugioh gx #yu gi oh gx #long post

[scullydubois]

What about a time when mulder meets up with scully to go for a walk with queequeg?

i may have gone overboard here, but how could i not? this prompt is so precious, thank you.

----------------

Friday Night with Queequeg, 2.4k--set in season three

“I can’t, Mulder,” his partner insists, her voice dialed up a few intervals for dramatic effect. “I’ve got Queequeg to worry about.”

Mulder drops his Washington Nationals tickets on the desk in disappointment. How lame to be overshadowed by a dog. “That fluffy little guy?” he whines. “Or girl, I'm not sure.”

“He’s a boy.”

“Okay well, he reminds me of one of those Tamagotchi things, have you seen the commercial?” Mulder rambles while shuffling various stray papers from his desk into a single incoherent stack. He’s careful not to sweep the tickets into it. “It’s a pocket pet--”

“I know what it is, Mulder. I have a godson.”

“And is Queequeg not just a glorified version of one of those?”

“Yes, I suppose you could say that. He needs food and attention and care. But, in case you didn’t know, he is also real and capable of giving much of that back to you.”

“Eh, reciprocated affection is overrated,” Mulder jokes, though life would be a lot damn easier if he believed that. “And it’s one of the few Fridays where we’re not traveling or jet-lagged or wholly tired of each other.”

Scully purses her lips. “I see significantly less of Queequeg per week than I do you,” she mutters, and Mulder wonders whether some of her feigned contempt might be genuine. He’s used to being subtly disliked, but the thought sure makes him sad.

Seeing the passion in his face dissolve, Scully realizes that he’s backing down. It’s not like him to back down, no matter how frivolous the issue is. She knows this about him if she knows anything. It’s as if he’s giving up, and that strikes her more than anything.

“Haven’t you ever had a dog, Mulder?” she asks, ignoring the chair in front of her to perch on the edge of his desk.

“Once. After Samantha.” He laughs out of pure scorn. “I think it was my parents’ way of trying to replace her.”

Scully frowns. She should know by now that any journey into his past will turn into a probe of his eternal wound, and that’s no fault of his own.

“What was its name? And were you fond of it?” Scully feels like a therapist--hopefully a kind and supportive one.

“Sparky. I’ve got no clue where the name came from, or the dog for that matter. He was just kinda there one day when I got home from school. And then in a few months, he was gone in the same way. Taken to my uncle’s cause my parents couldn’t stand all the upkeep.”

A thought pops into Scully’s head that is evidently shared by her partner. “No, he didn’t “go live on a farm’ or whatever, I was old enough not to fall for that,” Mulder insists. “He really did go live with my uncle. Lived like seven more years.”

Scully raises an eyebrow. “But did you like him? Were you sad when he was gone?”

“I was sad about a lot of things at the time, Scully.” He opens his desk drawer and pops a piece of gum in his mouth. He’s out of sunflower seeds. “But about the dog? Eh, he was fine to have around but it wasn’t a quintessential boy and his dog moment. He was already a couple years old and well into his grumpy old man phase, if I remember correctly. And he was a mutt, so I think my parents hated him because he didn’t match the furniture.”

“Mmm.” Scully rolls her tongue over the roof of her mouth. It would be a shame to put Mulder through this whole conversation only to insist that she can’t attend the game. But she wasn’t just making excuses. Queeqeug has been home alone all day. and she always takes him for a walk when she gets home from work. He’s used to their routine now, sitting there at the door when she unlocks it like he’s got an alarm set. He gets his dinner when they get back home and falls soundly asleep. Scully’s convinced this is the only thing keeping him from rebelling for being on his own for ten hours a day, and she doesn’t want to test that theory.

Mulder glances at the office clock. 5:46. First pitch is at 7:05.

“How about this...” He props his feet up on the desk to give himself the air of confidence that he’s lacking. “I’ll run over to your place, walk him, make sure he does his business...the whole shebang. You can finish up here then take a taxi to the park, and I’ll meet you there. Sound good?”

The edges of Scully’s lips turn downward. Mulder notes that today, they are brushed over with a very nice coral. Must be a new shade.

“Do you really care that much about me attending this game?”

Mulder shrugs. Yes he does, but he’ll be nonchalant about it. “I bought the tickets cheap through a newspaper ad. I just thought it would be nice for the two of us to do something that’s not chasing phantoms.”

“Phantoms?” Scully’s left eyebrow arches. “Have I finally broken your spirit?”

Mulder smirks. “Sorry, I thought flattery might get me somewhere here.”

Scully taps a heel against the ugly linoleum floor. He’s so adamant about this...boyhood loves stick, she supposes.

“If it means that much to you, go ahead. But don’t come crying to me when you’re late for the start of the game. Queequeg takes his time.”

Mulder claps his hands together. “That’s fine, that’s fine!” Surely he can hurry the canine up. “You take one ticket and head to the seats, and I’ll find you.”

Scully pulls her lips into a thin line, a hint of humor gleaming in her eyes. “Okay, Mulder. Do you have your key?”

He nods, pulls on his jacket, and edges toward the door. “See you there, Scully!”

“Bye.” Scully smiles at the empty office. Her partner’s enthusiasm is endlessly endearing.

---------------------

Mulder has no time to register that he has no clue where Queequeg’s leash is, or if he’s supposed to bring some sort of bag to pick up any...ehm, droppings, or if there’s some special trick to walking a dog that makes it look easy when it’s secretly hard. In fact, he can’t recall ever walking Sparky. Thirty years old and never walked a dog before...surely that qualifies him for the Guinness World Record books.

Queequeg is alert at the door when Mulder opens it, and he’s glad the thing is more teddy bear than canine--he doesn’t have to deal with any barking or biting. He checks the coat rack for a leash, then begins rummaging around in the front table when he comes up short. It’s all old issues of girly magazines he never would have expected Scully to subscribe to.

Begrudgingly, he looks into Queequeg’s beady eyes. “Where’s your leash, boy? You wanna go for a walk? Show me where your leash is.” He uses a baby voice he didn’t even know he had.

Queequeg does nothing but paw the ground in annoyance.

“I know the feeling,” Mulder quips. He pulls out his phone and chooses Scully’s name from the speed dial list.

It rings and rings, then goes to voicemail. Mulder ends the call, grumbles, then tries the office number instead. She picks up after one ring.

“Hello?” her dainty voice projects through the line.

“Scully, you haven’t left yet?”

“I was just locking up the desk. Is there a problem?” she asks like she knew there would be.

“I can’t find Queequeg’s leash.”

“It’s by the pantry, next to his treats.”

Mulder sighs, heads into the kitchen. “And I suppose I have to take his treats too?”

“Uh-huh. And there’s plastic grocery bags in there that you can use to clean up after him.”

Mulder opens the pantry, sees the hoard. “I feared so.”

“We always go left down the block,” Scully tells her partner. “There’s a patch of grass that way he likes to chew on.”

“And how much does he pay you for such indelible service?” Scully doesn’t listen to a word he says, but she’s at the dog’s beck and call apparently.

There’s a bit of silence as Scully decides not to reply with a smartass remark. Then--”I’m leaving the office now,” she murmurs into the phone. “Better hurry up or I’ll beat you there.”

During this teasing, Mulder attached Queequeg’s leash to his collar. Now, as he tries to lead him into the living room, the dog refuses to move.

“Uh, Scully?”

“Yes?”

“I put his leash on, but Queequeg won’t budge.”

“Do you have the treats?”

Mulder shakes the treat bag and makes kissy noises to encourage the canine. (How humiliating.) Still, nothing.

“He doesn’t want to come with me,” Mulder says. “Even the treats won’t lure him over.”

“Are you sure it’s the right treats?” Scully asks.

“Since when are dogs picky about their treats? Treats are treats. And these are the only ones in the pantry.”

“Huh.”

“If you’re rolling your eyes, I can’t see it,” Mulder mutters.

“I’m not rolling my eyes, I just--we’ve never had this problem.”

“Has anyone else walked him?” Mulder wiggles the leash, which does nothing.

“My mom.”

“Well, maybe he doesn’t like men,” Mulder remarks.

“He lived with Clyde Bruckman…”

“Exactly.”

Scully takes a quick exhale. He has a point. “I’ll head over, okay? But I doubt we’ll make the game.”

“We’ll see.” Mulder sighs. He’s being...well, cockblocked isn’t the right word for it--but something like that--by a dog.

-----------------

Scully arrives half an hour later to find Mulder crouched on the kitchen floor rubbing Queequeg’s belly.

“Am I interrupting something?” she teases. The dog rolls over and leaps into excitement at the sound of her voice, abandoning Mulder altogether.

“Hi buddy.” She scratches his ears and dodges his attempts to lick her face. “You ready to go for a walk?”

Queequeg whimpers and sits as if she commanded him to.

Scully looks to Mulder with a brilliant, taunting smile. “I think he’s ready.”

Mulder stands up, every disk in his back rebelling against him. “That thing--” Mulder jabs a finger in Queequeg’s direction--”has a Jekyll and Hyde situation going on.”

“Really, cause you seemed to be having a great time until I came in.”

“No, no, no, don’t spin this. I had to get down on the kitchen floor because he wouldn’t move! What was I supposed to do while we were waiting for you, ignore him?”

Scully shrugs, tries to hide her smirk. “Well, if you were so bothered by him…”

“Whatever, whatever. Let’s just go for the walk, okay? I don’t want to miss this game, it’s against the Red Sox. It should be good.”

Scully takes Queequeg’s leash from her partner, gestures for him to go ahead. “After you.”

------------------

It’s a beautiful spring night--the perfect occasion for a baseball game, Scully will give Mulder that. The sun is drifting down the cloudless horizon, and the chill that has hung in the air for months is finally admitting defeat. The sidewalk is crowded with other dogs and their humans, eager to end the week on such a lovely note.

Queequeg trots blissfully in the usual direction. Scully lengthens her stride to keep up with him--for once she and Mulder are walking at the same pace.

“So this is DC on a Friday night, huh?” Mulder says, glancing around at their fellow pedestrians and bicyclists.

Scully nods. “If you got out of the office before seven, you’d know.”

“Doubtful. My usual impression of DC on a Friday night is the traffic on the 14th Street bridge, and I’m pretty sure I can witness that at all hours.”

Scully allows herself a sidelong glance at her partner. She had never realized someone could be too dedicated until she met Mulder.

“Have you ever considered getting a pet?” she asks tentatively.

His gaze snaps to her. He chuckles and sticks his hands in his pockets. “My complex has a hefty monthly pet fee. Rent is already bad enough.”

“Well it’s not like you go out often…” Scully starts, knowing this is short of a compliment. “You’re not a big spender, surely you have the extra cash on hand.”

“Ha, thanks,” Mulder responds. “Should I put that on my resume?”

“I just mean that…” Queequeg finds his beloved patch of grass, and they pause to let him chomp at it. “...you could use the companionship of a dog. Or cat, if that strikes your fancy.”

“I have enough companionship, Scully. More than I know what to do with. Have you heard my answering machine?”

“A woman from an 800 line is not companionship, Mulder. And you never actually answer any of your messages. Friends don’t count if you never see them.”

“Ouch.” Queequeg finishes up, and they resume the walk. “And what are your plans this weekend, Scully?” he asks, hoping to catch her in her own hypocrisy.

“As a matter of fact, I’m going to visit my mother tomorrow afternoon.”

Mulder busts out laughing. “You’re a real party girl!”

She ignores him, focusing on Queequeg. “But you get my point, don’t you? It’s not good to be alone all the time.”

“I seem to recall being told that we spend more time together than you and your dog,” Mulder wisecracks.

“That’s different,” Scully swears. “That’s work.”

“That’s the bulk of modern life, my dear.” He delivers this statement in an old-timey mid-Atlantic accent like some leading man of the 40s. It makes Scully smile.

“I have an idea,” she says, her eyes sparkling.

“Oh boy.” Mulder glances at his watch. 6:51. Damn it. “We’re gonna miss the game.”

Scully nods. “Let’s go to the animal shelter instead.”

Mulder stops. It makes Queequeg, and therefore Scully, stop too. “What?”

“You could make some dog very happy, you know. And Queequeg would have a playmate...I think it would be really good for you, Mulder.”

“Come on, I can’t just adopt a dog on a whim.”

“I did.”

“Shit.”

Scully laughs. “You’re realizing there’s no way out of this, aren’t you?”

Mulder grins. “Yeah, I--” He looks down and sees Queequeg taking a dump in the middle of the sidewalk. Scully readies the plastic bag she brought, then bends down and scoops the pile up like it’s nothing.

Mulder screws up his face. “On second thought…”

“Nuh-uh.” Scully ties the bag and taps it against Mulder’s arm. “You’re empty-handed, take this. It’ll be good practice.”

Mulder frowns but takes the bag. His partner’s huge smile is not lost on him, and it makes him smile despite himself. She knows how to get what she wants, and he has a feeling this one will benefit him too.

#txf fic #txf prompt #the x-files #txf #mine

[phoenixyfriend]

The MILFnevka AU

Once again something that was brainstormed en masse on the GG fanworks server.

I was... very much spearheading this one, but I dragged in @professorsparklepants for a lot, because Anevka, as well as input from @fenerismoon, @purronronner, @gelpenss​, and @whirlibird. The original conversation took place mid-September of 2019.

AU where Tarvek's side of the family squeezed in an extra generation or so.

Aaronev was still Lu's generation, but he had Anevka young, and she was an only child who was already an adult by the time Lu disappeared. As a result, Aaronev let her married before she ended up in the machine (because he wasn’t desperate yet), and he couldn't risk drawing the attention by the time Agatha’s gen is being born.

So instead of being Tarvek's SISTER, she's his MOM.

Anevka formed her own faction, separate from the Aaronev and vaguely aligned with Terabithia’s.

She insisted Martellus and his branch hang out with Tarvek because being an only child is lonely, and also it keeps Tarvek out of his grandfather's sights and vague plans of body-hopping.

She is a Protective Momma who is a little TOO down with murdering anyone who threatens her child.

Agatha: you're just going to listen to your evil mom? Because no offense but that's worked out really bad for me so far. Tarvek: She's not EVIL, just... Valois... anyway the Baron knows what she's like and mostly he just rolls his eyes and tries to keep her away from Queen DuPree.

Anevka is definitely the mom that uses her position as mother of the king/heir to stockpile as much power as possible and control everything behind the scenes. Tarvek is currently trying to undermine this and wrestle back control as secretly as possible.

Wine mom with eighty hidden stabbing implements.

When Agatha is discovered, Anevka still kills her dad, but it's not like she can steal Agatha's voice in this AU, so she just settles for aggressively matchmaking her with Tarvek.

Anevka's managed to rein her dad in, mostly, because she's a powerful spark with an Undefined Husband who nonetheless has enough good connections to cause a ruckus if he finds out about the Summoning Throne, and he's too sparky to wasp.

This did lead to his early death and no siblings for Tarvek, but not before Anevka managed to fight her dad down to ONLY trying to throne the girls who were legitimately likely to be Agatha.

And then Agatha's in Sturmhalten and Anevka's just like. Well. Time for plan A. And kills her dad.

Regarding Gil...  She kinda wants to pat him on the head and tell him to try harder.

I'm not wholly convinced Tarvek got kicked off of Castle Wulfenbach, depending on how Anevka married and decided to approach things. She might have warned Tarvek to AVOID stealing information, even, if she was worried about Aaronev trying to do something.

Less "do whatever you can to help us gain power" and more "do whatever you can to stay out of Sturmhalten."

Tarvek: My mom is a bitch and I love her so much

Klaus hates it when Anevka comes to CW because she acts like some unholy cross between Lucrezia, Terabithia, and Zantabraxus and she keeps hitting on his top enforcers but with knives and pretty dresses.

Unstoppable Divorce energies

Anevka: Do you like my new dress? Klaus: Your bodice is far too low cut, please stop visiting me dressed like my ex. I'm the same age as your father. Anevka: I know, it's really fun to watch you suffer as you fail to resist the urge to tell me to put on a sweater.

Tarvek: MOTHER YOU'RE EMBARRASSING ME IN FRONT OF ALL MY FRIENDS PLEASE STOP HITTING ON THE BARON AURGH. Anevka: I'm not HITTING on him, I'm trying to make his face turn puce. Anevka: I am, however, hitting on Von Pinn. She looks like she knows how to have fun. Tarvek: MOTHER.

Tarvek, to Gil: the baron can't be your dad, he's old enough to be your grandfather. Gil: He’s at a solid age for both.

Anevka and Klaus have zero actual attraction to each other but there's definitely A Dynamic that's eerily reminiscent of his relationship with Bang, with slightly less "I did a violence, be proud of me" and slightly more "I did a sexy and/or politics, be proud of me."

Tarvek: I have a problem. Gil: What's up? Tarvek: All of our friends want to fuck my mom. Zulenna: I don't. Tarvek: That's because she used to put you in time-out when we were five.

Anevka is prime Dangerous Widow material. She didn't actually kill her husband but a hell of a lot of people think she did.

Seffie thinks her Auntie 'Nevka is the COOLEST

Anevka having an intermittent fling with that "darlingly stupid young hero, Tryggvassen" makes me laugh way too hard and also dips into my nonsense love of Otharnevka.

At one point we did sidle over into “what if Single Father KB tho”

Like they met at some point on vacation while the kids were still kids, which does lose us the “Anevka aggressively ships her kid with Agatha” thing, so I’m not sticking with this but there’s some hella fun tidbits.

Anevka: Guess what. Klaus, very tired: What. Anevka: I'm getting married. Klaus: Again? Good for you. I hope this one lives longer. Anevka: He has the same name as you. Klaus: Get out of my house.

KB isn't a widower, things are just complicated and everyone blames Lu. There's time travel involved, of course.

"So your daughter--" "Sister." "...how--" "Just... just blame my mother."

He's LEGALLY Agatha's dad, maybe? Their dynamic is parent-child. Just, you know, as far as blood goes...

Anevka wants KB to help her bag Othar again. KB thinks she means finally killing him. Anevka: I might. Haven't decided yet.

Overall, though, including KB is too complicated without undermining the entire premise I want. Which is mostly canon but Anevka is Tarvek's embarrassing, mysterious, prone-to-assassination mother.

Seriously though, the entire attraction here is Anevka having the Dangerous Widow Whom No Man Can Tie Down vibe

She's a solo act. Some flings, sure, but overall? Chaos. Refined, elegant chaos.

Anevka as Bang’s sugar mom was suggested. We were obviously all on board.

Bang doesn’t need a sugar mom, but it makes the vein in Klaus's forehead throb, and that's very important.

Bang absolutely tries to get Tarvek to call her “mom” while she’s ‘dating’ Anevka. One time he does call her that and it throws her for SUCH A LOOP because no wrong.

Anevka occasionally daydreams of a world where she could have both Othar and Bang at the same time without them IMMEDIATELY trying to kill each other. Only occasionally, though, she has evidence to plant and blood to spill.

BACK TO ANEVKA SHIPPING HER KID WITH HIS POLITICALLY-APPROPRIATE CRUSH.

Anevka: Oh look, my future daughter-in-law. Tarvek, tired: Mother, she doesn't like me. Anevka: Whyever not? You're clever, handsome, politically apt, charming, sensitive, heir to a throne, you are EVERYTHING a maiden could wish for. Tarvek: You just think that because you're my mom. Agatha: No, no, she's not wrong. You're just not someone I trust. At all. Especially since you say you've been a honeypot before. Anevka: See? A simple hurdle, dear, I'm sure you could whip him into shape in no time. I could even loan you the whip. And the harness, perh-- Tarvek: MOTHER.

Anevka sends Tarvek out with Othar for “field trips.”

It’s great!! Multi-purpose! Absolutely helps boost Tarvek’s image if he’s associated with Known Hero, gets Othar out of her hair for a little bit, sometimes he can be pointed in a direction that’s useful to her.

Othar refers to this outings as “stepfather-stepson bonding times.” Tarvek absolutely hates it. Detests it, really.

Somehow something goes wrong and like 50% of the time and he ends up getting accused of murder, probably.

It’s so unfair. Especially since of the two of them, Othar is more likely to murder than him. (It’s because everyone knows what those Valois types are like, and Othar is a hero.)

Gil: What's so embarrassing about your mom? Your mom's nice. (To me.)

She gives him head pats and lollipops. His own dad certainly never gives him head pats OR lollipops.

Anevka: Well I WAS going to push him towards dear little Seffie, but he seems to be quite enamored with YOU, darling. Tarvek: Mother, PLEASE stop getting invested in my love life.

Anevka’s job is to meddle, he’s lucky she isn’t drawing up contracts and going Full Arrangement.

I also love the idea of Anevka having one of those "sunshine embodied anime mom" smiles as she says "Oh Tarvek, dear, look at all your little friends!"

She's genuinely enthused but Klaus is heavily disturbed by Anevka smiling like that.

"Is she going to sacrifice them?" "Uh, no, it isn't Sunday."

Human sacrifice is actually garish and passe these days, haven’t you heard?

Just imagining one of those Stately Child and Parent portraits with Anevka and Tarvek here.

When Tarvek was born, Anevka has an "I've only had my son for an hour and a half" moment... and then just shrugged and rolled with it.

Anevka "Hot Mom" Sturmvoraus is one of the MANY banes of Klaus's existence, but she's definitely one of the friendliest on the list... as much as he may resent that, at times.

Anevka: Is the Baron in? Boris: Actually... [Crashing noise] Boris: He just left. Anevka, pulling on the rocket boots she stole from Othar and heading towards the broken window leading to the outside of the ship: That's alright, I'll catch up.

(I love how Anevka's name just lends itself so well to AU portmanteaus.)

Anevka definitely susses out Gil's identity but she doesn't actually DO anything about it other than angling for Useful Connections.

She's always telling Tarvek to bring his friend along, and Klaus doesn't want Gil anywhere near that family but he doesn't want it to look like he has any particular interest in Gil.

Imagine Klaus actually encouraging Gil to persue Agatha with the idea that it will put some distance between Gil and "that damn woman and her spawn." Anevka for her part is pushing Agatha towards Tarvek. Meanwhile the three of them are working it out between themselves.

She just has This Energy, folks:

Tarvek: Oh no. Theo: Whats the matter? That's your mom, right? Tarvek: Oh NO, she's wearing her 'NEWLY WIDOWED BUT OUT ON THE PROWL' OUTFIT Theo: ????? She hasn’t been widowed- Tarvek: SHES AFTER THE BARON AND I'M GOING TO DIE OF EMBARRASSMENT, THEO

The one thing here is that Anevka's not into Klaus and he's not into her but by GOD is she going to fuck with his head about it.

She’s just doing this for the Big Dick Energy of trying to Get Baron Wulfenbach.

Embarrassing mom of the deadliest degree.

Tarvek: YOU’RE GOING TO RUIN MY LIFE. Anevka: Don't be so dramatic, let your mother have a bit of fun. Besides, he's not expelling you anymore, is he? Tarvek: I almost wish he was-

Also Gil and Tarvek reconciling early on due to the immense power of being Embarrassed By Your Parents.

Anevka and Klaus getting increasingly bitchy at each other at dinner, and Tarvek and Gil are just. Bright red and glowering at them.

They’re DESTROYING their COOL TEEN CRED.

Tarvek doesn't ever wants to marry a woman who has been married before, not because of some weird distaste of so-called "sloppy seconds," but rather that he's just scared that they're going to be like his mom, and planning to kill him for his money.

Tarvek, waking up in the middle of the night: What if they really do get married and I have to have Gil as a stepbrother. Tarvek: (screams internally for a few hours)

Anevka is also that Sailor J contouring video

While Otharnevka is... this thing

Some more relevant Vibes: Divorce Court Half-Mourning Upper East Side Widow

Everyone always assumed she had murdered her husband. It was a natural assumption, but ultimately wrong. She had had plans in place to kill him if the need arose, but in the end she hadn’t needed them.

Most people grossly underestimated how complicated it was to arrange for someone to be t-boned by a semi carrying flammable chemicals.

Othar as Anevka's second trophy husband and Tarvek's annoying stepdad has a very specific energy.

That energy is at least 20% "the lovebirds take anniversary honeymoons every year" and 60% "Tarvek hates being in the room with them because they're gross and embarrassing."

This is partly fun because Othar being Tarvek’s stepdad is... a lot.

But honestly, I'm also just enjoying cougar Anevka with Trophy Husband Othar. They're actually in love!!! BUT. Cougar with a trophy husband.

Anevka makes sly comments about Othar and Klaus having sexual tension.

Also I have headcanons about NB Tarvek and like

I think she'd be supportive up until the point of "you want to be Storm King, don't you?"

Less "this isn't natural and you shouldn't be this way" and more "this is going to cause you trouble due to social norms."

"Keep it under wraps until your throne is secure, then you can come out in a blaze of glory." No dresses in public until you're king, then do whatever you want. After all, “Your Majesty” is gender neutral.

Anevka caught Tarvek playing dressup in her closet one time and just criticized the color relationships.

And you must try to avoid wearing that particular shade at all, my dear, it really doesn't look imperial.

#Anevka Sturmvoraus #Girl Genius #Tarvek Sturmvoraus #Klaus Wulfenbach #Gilgamesh Wulfenbach #Othar Tryggvassen #Agatha Heterodyne #Otharnevka #GG OT3 #Phoenix Posts

[efrmellifer]

Where The Road Led

Seven Days of Estinyan: Day One

When she felt his gaze on her, Etien looked up to meet Estinien’s eyes. “Yes?”

“You had an odd look on your face,” he replied. “Are the flowers too heavy?” He reached out to take them from her.

She shook her head. “The flowers are the lightest thing I’m carrying.”

Estinien stopped walking along the pathway that led down from Zenith. “What in the gods’ name are you talking about?”

“I came here by myself after the war had been brought to an end.”

He nodded, signaling that he followed her so far.

“And while I was wandering around, avoiding Hropkens and hoping the Moogles didn’t see me, I had been doing some thinking about how much had happened over the time I spent here.”

Estinien came to her side. “Here specifically, or in Ishgard and Coerthas?”

“Well, both. More here, Churning Mists here, while I was up here, though. But I had been thinking about how much longer and heavier my job description had gotten when I added the tentative title of Savior of Ishgard.”

“Did it?” he asked, stopping again.

Etien sighed. “When I first arrived in Gridania, my most pressing worries were accidentally catching the soft part of my arm in my bowstring and losing track of a specific animal I was supposed to hunt. Even defeating Primals was a little less pressure, at least compared to ‘help us end a war that has raged on for one thousand years, while trying to reassemble the group of people who have given you this life.’”

“I suppose we did do that,” Estinien mumbled, looking at his boots.

“It led to this, so I do feel bad for complaining, but it was a long year to live, and the years just keep getting longer,” she sighed.

“Led to what?” Estinien asked. “Rather… I’m sorry we worked you so hard for a homeland not your own. To save a people who were not your own.”

“Well, when Haurchefant had been so hospitable, and Lord Edmont adopted me…”

“Still,” he rebutted. “House Fortemps treated you like the heroes and gifts from Halone that you are, and the rest of us were backbiters, suspicious, and all too eager to put you into service to prove your good intent.”

Etien made a noise that wasn’t quite either a snort or a laugh. “Now you sound like Aymeric.”

“Because he was right. We need to deliver these flowers, do we not?” He pointed to the structure to the east, still whirling with wind-aspected aether, but less tumultuously.

It hadn’t been the gale force winds in a fair while, actually.

Nidhogg had softened his heart to a mortal who loved him, had fallen in love with her as well, and as a result the skies had become that much safer.

Etien and Estinien still boarded their manacutters to get there faster, though.

While they flew, Etien took stock of the flowers again. She’d been thinking over and over about their arrangement as she harvested what she could and bought the rest, wrapping them earlier in moist paper so they would survive the journey through the Mists.

Now, she looked them over one last time. Spearmint for warmth of sentiment. Ivy for friendship. Irises for trust and wisdom. Daffodils for regard. Hopefully, this bouquet of high esteem would touch the hearts of the great wyrm and his greatest love. But that remained to be seen.

They landed, and Etien tried to lead the way after Estinien helped her from the miniature ship, but she made a poor leader in this instance. She was walking too hesitantly, stumbling as she tried to tread silently, but didn’t feel confident in her steps, leaving her ankles rolling and her body pitching.

“Is aught the matter?” Estinien asked from behind her.

“I… I know Dae won’t let him hurt or kill me, but I’m scared.”

He laid a hand on her back, feeling how cool her skin was from the wind, hoping to warm her just a little. “Do not be afraid. I am here. And I will also not let him hurt you. I will protect you.”

She gave him a look, just slightly distressed.

“Not like that. I made a pact and promise just like everyone else did. Moreover, I’m retired from that life. I don’t even have a knife on me, let alone my lance.”

Etien relaxed, then nodded, her boots clicking on the stones into the Aery.

“It has been a long time, hmm?” Estinien murmured as they stepped inside.

“Nidhogg of the first brood, hear me! ...please.” She called, hands cupped around her mouth, flowers in the cook of her elbow. “’Tis I, Etien. I come with a guest, Estinien Wyrmblood. We come in peace and friendship.”

There was a roar, then a thundering as the wyrm approached.

“Thou bringest him unto me and my home, when he was of the order who slaughtered my kin?”

Dae stroked his snout, hushing him gently and succeeding in soothing him. “He comes to our home with friendly intent, in the wake of the pact for peace. If they keep their end of it, we should keep ours. See? They’re both unarmed. Etien brought flowers again!”

She took them from where they were still cradled in Etien’s arms, offering them to Nidhogg to sniff.

When he’d had his fill of the flowers’ fragrance, he turned back to Etien, who had called him from the inner chambers to begin with.

“As thou hast come bearing gifts rather than steel, I shall allow thy visit. Come thou along, Dae will attend to thy comforts, as I cannot.”

For a time, they sat, Etien trying to ingratiate herself with the wyrm who so loved her friend, while said friend sat happily nestled in Nidhogg’s horns, stroking is snout and kissing the side of his face to prove just how relaxed a gathering this was.

Estinien was on the best behavior he could manage, though that did include making faces at the broodlings. Some liked it, giving sparky little giggles, while others flew off and hid at his “fearsome expressions.”

By the time they left, boarding the manacutters again, Etien’s heart was lighter, with tensions of the past eased slightly and on the path to dissolving more fully.

It helped that Nidhogg had liked the flowers.

But Estinien had questions. Not about relations with the dragons, that was his realm only when it came to Orn Khai. No, he was still curious about what Etien had meant earlier

They disembarked from the manacutters, and he didn’t let her hand go after he’d helped her to standing on the ground. As he guided her to the edge of the rock, with a quiet “sit with me?” he watched her scoot as close to the edge as she was willing to go, then stop.

Ah, right. Her fear of heights. Or perhaps, based on his observations, it was more akin to the fear of being too close to the edge of a long drop? She had no problem with flying, and even admired the views from the Last Vigil. But when she got too close to the edges of the Aetheryte plaza, or places like this, she was tense.

He’d noticed it most acutely the time he’d laid a hand on her shoulder as they walked along the path over the Brume, and she’d jumped, hair on her tail standing up and ears flattening.

But he let his legs dangle off the edge, and so she scooted a little closer, still holding his hand.

“You won’t fall,” he promised. She unfolded her legs to rest so her calves were halfway stuck out into the air.

“All right,” she said finally.

“So… led to what?” Estinien asked after a moment.

Etien tipped head. “What?”

“You said the war ‘led to this.’ What’s this?”

She blinked. “Oh! Us.” She shook their hands where they were clasped. “This. Well it was you, me, and Aymeric, more exactly. But you know. The final year of the war, the one I was there for, was hard, but at the end of it, I was endeared to Ishgard. And I ended up married to Aymeric before I left for Rhalgr’s Reach. In secret, of course; it was only that we were worried about what would happen if I happened to die on my way east.”

Silently, Estinien looked at her. She was wearing all black, but the brass buttons were a perfect complement. They, like her hair, were bold. He was only thinking about the black because in the moment that was swimming to the front of his mind—a moment he had thought about a lot since it had happened—she had been wearing much more white.

“Do you know it was here in the Churning Mists that I first began to feel for you?”

“I did not,” she replied. “When, when we were here with Ysayle?”

He nodded. “You tend to go quiet when people are having a heated debate in front of you. I had noticed it when Alphinaud and Aymeric were having their little discussion, but I thought you were just quiet.”

She laughed lightly, just a single harder exhale.

“I know now that you aren’t,” he added. “But aye. That night, I watched you sitting silently, watching the fire when you didn’t want to look at us, and how your eyes looked like emeralds.”

Now she giggled behind her hand. “How poetic.”

“I’ve had time to refine the comparison.” He felt his cheeks warming, and he was fairly sure it wasn’t windburn. He sighed. “I didn’t fully know the dimensions of my feelings until later. I struggle to recall when now, but before you won the day for Ala Mhigo.”

“I’m glad you figured them out,” Etien murmured, leaning in and kissing his cheek. “Because it led to this.”

#estinyan #fic #I say Seven Days because I'm just doing what I want re: prompts #mixing some skipping others #featuring Nidhogg and his lovely mate Dae #friend mention

[soopersara]

Do you think that if ATLA was not a children's show that Katara would have killed Yon Rha?

I'm gonna go ahead and assume that you mean if ATLA was a form of well-written adult media, not like... Game of Thrones-level gratuitous violence, we need more pools of blood and decapitation-type adult media. Because in the latter... yeah, that dude would be dead because shock value and gore reign supreme. But in a well-written adult version of the story (or my ideal version of the story regardless of demographic), no, Katara would make the same decision, it would just be a more nuanced handling of the story with fewer okay, NO heavy-handed and unearned AANG WAS RIGHT moments.

Fair warning, this is turning into a 'how SooperSara would rewrite TSR' post. Whoops.

Okay, so ideally, in an adult or child-oriented version of the story, I would change some of the pacing in Book 3. A lot of it, actually. Not going to list everything I would change, but the end result would be condensed filler episodes in the front half of the season (cutting Sparky Sparky Boom Man entirely would free up a lot of space to make the important stuff fit into fewer episodes, and that still leaves room for trimming, IMO) and give Zuko more time with the Gaang.

So the beginning of TSR is relatively the same, except for the fact that Zuko has had more time between life changing field trips to integrate with the group, and as a result, Katara, while still not pleased about his presence, is getting used to him. Not softening toward him exactly, but starting to understand that he isn't going to hurt them, and signs point to the possibility of her accepting him someday if things continue to go well.

Then she is separated from her father again, in a way that is very much the fault of Zuko's family, if not Zuko himself, and all of her resentment reawakens with a vengeance. Zuko is surprised, and justifiably so, since things were starting to improve between the two of them.

The next change comes when Sokka and Aang are trying to talk Katara out of looking for Yon Rha. Sokka is still opposed to the trip, but his reasons are different—rather than agreeing with Aang, Sokka is concerned about the amount of time this trip is going to take (Zuko knows how to find Yon Rha, not where, for all anyone knows, he could be on the other end of the world), and about his sister's wellbeing (she can take care of herself, but she's not entirely rational right now, and this man is a known killer).

Aside from the fact that Sokka isn't on Team Forgive & Forget, the rest of the arguments leading up to their departure stay the same (yes, even the infamous, "Then you didn't love her the way I did!" line—I'll get back to that later). The manhunt mission is also relatively unchanged, though it may be a tad clearer that Zuko is just along for the ride as backup.

Now for the point of your question—Katara doesn't kill Yon Rha. She might use her ice knives to pin him to the ground (and make him wet his pants because it looks like he's about to die), but ultimately, having his death on her conscience isn't worth it to Katara. But rather than being framed as a vengeance is wrong, Aang is right situation (which the episode didn't accomplish, by the way, Katara explicitly did not forgive Yon Rha), it's framed as a vengeance was the wrong choice for Katara, but Aang was equally wrong situation.

And rather than getting butt-pats for his "wisdom" in the sunset scene on the docks at Ember Island, Aang actually sees and is forced to acknowledge the fact that Katara didn't take his advice. She didn't forgive Yon Rha, but she didn't take his life either. She chose a different path, and it helped her to finally get on the road to healing from the loss of her mother. This, incidentally, is one of the moments that Aang thinks of when he is looking for a way to get out of killing Ozai—he learns from Katara that it is possible to find a different solution, but it may not be pretty, and it may not be the perfect, happy solution that he's looking for, and either way, he's going to have to work to make other solutions possible. Katara forgives Zuko, they hug (maybe it lingers a while, this is my playground, I'm making the rules), and she might also thank him for being there when she needed support.

And then, and only then, Katara goes to find Sokka. She feels bad about the "Then you didn't love her the way I did!" thing, but she doesn't apologize, not right away. Instead, she tells him what happened. She tells Sokka about finding Yon Rha and confronting him, and how she eventually left the pathetic old man alive. She tells him that she still isn't convinced that she made the right choice—a part of her wants revenge and probably always will. And then she tells Sokka what losing their mother was like for her. She knows that Sokka relied on her to take Kya's place, and she knows she did a good enough job that Sokka can't remember what Kya looked like anymore. But Sokka doesn't know what it was like to carry all that weight by herself at the age of eight, he never had to blame himself for Kya's death, or to try to fill the void she left behind because no one else could. Katara has never told him any of this before because she always believed that she was the only one who should have to carry that burden. But finally, finally, she's done doing it all on her own. She needs help sometimes. And when Sokka hugs her, she finally apologizes for what she said to him before she left.

#atla #atla meta #the southern raiders #katara #I kind of went overboard for a fairly simple question #but I don't care #I want this version of TSR and I want it NOW #too bad I'm nowhere near TSR in my fics 😭 #also the not gonna lie #I just thought of the 'Aang learns from Katara in TSR not the other way around' idea today #but I think it's genius #and I will fight to get this interpretation into as many TSR fics as possible

[servinglemonade]

WandaVision Review

BEWARE: SPOILERS FOR ALL WANDAVISION EPISODES AHEAD

Didn't WandaVision end over a month ago now? Yes. Wasn't The Falcon and Winter Soldier finale yesterday? Yes. Is that going to stop me from talking about this incredible show? No, it won't.

Hi everyone! I started writing this review while WandaVision was still airing, but got so swamped with life that I did not have time to finish it. But here we are, finally! I adore this show, it is a fresh and different take on the MCU and I personally loved every second of it. The concept should not have made sense, like Paul Bettany kept saying, it is bonkers! However, somehow, they just made it work and I just enjoyed it so much! The sitcom aspect, the different songs and score, the attention to detail, the new characters, and spending time with Wanda and Vision was just fantastic! Because at the end of the day, that was what this was all about, Wanda and Vision and their relationship! For a more in-depth and spoiler review of every episode, keep on reading!

Episode 1 - Filmed Before A Live Studio Audience

Many people expressed their annoyance with the fact that the first two episodes that aired were very slow, and yes they are. But that is not necessarily a bad thing. This is not a movie, it is a show, they are building the story, just enjoy the ride and the mystery because even the first episode left so many questions! I loved seeing Wanda and Vision as the stars of the show for once and I enjoy spending all this time with them. The production value of the whole show is amazing but the black and white episodes are something special. I have never watched the old school sitcoms they are referencing here in episode 1 (and 2) but I found it so charming and cute. The square aspect ratio, the black and white, the old school VFX, the laughing track from the audience. I thought it was really cool to see. One of my favorite moments in this episode was the dinner scene with the Harts. When Mr. Hart chocked and Mrs. Hart just kept saying stop it, and Wanda and Vision just kind of looked at each other like what is happening, was so tense. When Wanda looked at Vision and said to help him was so well done by both Elizabeth and Paul! So, I really loved this first episode.

Episode 2 - Don’t Touch That Dial

Episode 2 is where you really start to see that nothing is at it seems in this ‘perfect’ world. So, there is a talent show that day and our favorite unusual couple is preparing for their magic act. Wanda also tells Vision that is their home and she wants to fit in. Later, Vision goes to the Neighborhood Watch because of a strange sound he heard the night before, where we meet some more people from Westview and Vision’s co-workers. Vision mentions he does not eat food. However, when Herb offers him gum, he takes it but accidentally swallows it. This leads to a really cool animation that Vision might not be doing so well after eating that piece of gum. Meanwhile, Wanda hears a strange noise so she goes to check it out, and it is this little red and gold-colored drone with a logo on it... Which was later revealed to be the SWORD logo. But then who comes to visit... Agnes. She was suspicious since the beginning and we were right about that... So Wanda joins Agnes for a meeting with the Planning Committee. Here we meet, Geraldine aka Monica Rambeau, Dottie, and some more people from Westview. So, Wanda is trying really hard to fit in but is not really successful. They say the talent show is for the children but are not any children in Westview... Fishy! Then Wanda has to clean everything up after the meeting and has a really weird moment with Dottie. Someone is trying to contact Wanda through the radio which freaks Dottie out completely, the glass breaks and Dottie’s blood is red, while the rest is still black and white just like that little drone... So, when it’s time for the magic show, Vision shows up at the nick of time and appears to be acting a little weird or ‘drunk’ so to speak. So of course, everything goes wrong during the show and Wanda tries to cover it up. But everyone thought they were being funny so they won! And they go back home, and Wanda turns out to be pregnant! I thought it was a really cute reveal but it did not last long because there is some strange dude outside in a beekeeper costume coming out of the sewer and Wanda is like ‘oh hell no’ and rewinds time like it never happened. Badass.

Episode 3 -  Now in Color

In this episode, Wanda and Vision prepare for the arrival of the baby, which of course causes some trouble not just in the house but in the neighborhood of Westview too. I loved how Vision was making Dad jokes and was quite nervous about becoming a dad. Yet, Wanda was just like chill, we got this, so cute. The pregnancy goes very fast, which confuses Vision. He also starts questioning the situation they are in and how weird the citizens of Westview act sometimes. He even looks straight into the camera! So, Wanda looks a bit scared and rewinds again!! So, it was becoming very clear that Wanda is pulling the strings here and can alter what happens. Afterward, Vision runs to get the doctor and Geraldine (aka Monica) shows up. At some point, Geraldine realizes what’s up and she helps Wanda deliver her baby, or babies as we later find out. Twins! What a twist, as Darcy says in the next episode (although it was in the trailer that there were 2 babies, I just wanted to make that joke). So, everyone is very happy and as Vision lets the doctor out, Monica stays with Wanda. Now, this is where this episode gets super weird. So, Vision sees Agnes and Herb talking and they are discussing how Geraldine is an outsider since she just showed up in Westview with no home and family. Then, Herb wants to say something important, but of course, Agnes stops him. Meanwhile, Wanda and Monica are inside and Wanda mentions Pietro for the first time in a long time!!! I think since Age of Ultron. Speaking of Ultron, Monica then mentions that Pietro was killed by him. We do not see what happens next (just yet hehe) but the aspect ratio changes and we go outside of Westview where SWORD is monitoring the hex very closely...  This episode brought up a lot of questions, which is one of the things I loved about it. A scene I liked was when Wanda’s water broke and the house got all wet. So, Wanda used her powers to create some wind to dry off. She was standing there very gracefully and Vision was in the background struggling to keep his balance. I just thought that was funny. 

Episode 4 - We Interrupt This Program

Did I mention how much I love the titles for every episode, I think they are so clever. In this episode, we see the last 3 episodes but from outside the hex! So, we get a couple more answers to our questions. For example, that it is ALL WANDA! Wanda is creating a reality where she can live in a perfect world with Vision. We get re-introduced to some characters we have not seen in a while! Jimmy Woo, who has mastered close-up magic like he was practicing in Ant-Man and The Wasp! We love to see it. And Dr. Darcy Lewis, who is now an astrophysicist, just like Jane! I think it was really good to pair these two together because they had a great dynamic and quickly became such a fun duo! We also get introduced to one of the worst people in MCU history, the new director of SWORD... Tyler Hayward. The literal definition of a bastard. I mean this man is a liar and is sitting in Monica’s chair (who should obviously be the new director). This brings me to the beginning of the episode, which in my opinion is the best perspective on the Blip we have gotten so far. The VFX when Monica blipped back was incredible. I also thought that whole sequence in the hospital showed how chaotic it must have been for some places after Hulk snapped everyone back. For example, when this one guy said “Everyone is coming back, we don’t the capacity!” I think that is a really interesting angle to explore the ramifications of The Blip. But the most heartbreaking thing about that scene was Monica finding out her mother, Maria, passed away while she was blipped. That was just awful. A fun thing about this episode was that everyone at SWORD was kind of like us, trying to piece together what was going on! But the best part about the episode was, of course, seeing how Wanda took Monica out of the hex. She really looked and sounded like a villain. It was amazing, but the most creepy thing I have ever seen in the MCU was talking zombie Vision. Really good jump scare and very unexpected and dark! 

Episode 5 - On a Very Special Episode...

And we are back with Wanda and Vision living their ‘perfect’ life, trying to get the twins to sleep, which is not really working out for them. And of course, Agnes shows up to help them. Vision is kind of apprehensive and prefers if Agnes does not get too close. However, Agnes starts acting weird and asks Wanda: "Do you want me to begin from the top?" WHAT...?! I thought this sounded like she knew Wanda was in control. Wanda tries to talk some sense into her and lets Agnes do her thing. Vision starts getting really suspicious of the situation in this episode and I loved seeing that and how Wanda dealt with it as well. We catch up with SWORD and our favorite duo has become a trio!! Jimmy Woo, Darcy, and Monica! Hayward is briefing everyone about Wanda’s history, tells more lies, Monica actually sticks up for her (yas), and Jimmy & Darcy agree with the whole world that Hayward is a bastard. Back in the hex, we are introduced to Sparky the dog, and the twins age up to ten. Later, our favorite trio is on a mission to figure out what is going on. What I found most interesting about this scene was when Jimmy mentioned Captain Marvel, Monica was super dismissive... I smell some drama between those two. They then figure out if they can send something in the Hex to contact Wanda. While Vision is at work, they get a mysterious e-mail from SWORD trying to make contact inside the hex, which results in Vision waking up Norm from someone’s control!!! Such a cool scene, very well acted as well. Back at the Vision residence, Wanda has a little heart to heart with the twins about family, which I thought was very heartwarming. But then, a SWORD drone has come into the hex and Hayward actually weaponized it. And we get one of Wanda’s most badass scenes ever! She comes out of the hex and throws the drone right back at them and tells them to leave her alone since she has everything she wants. Then, she amplifies the hex with her powers and now it has this red glow around it. What I found really interesting about this was her Sakovian accent, which was so present here. The commercial for ‘Lagos’ paper towels this episode was very clever: ‘when you make a mess you did not mean to.’, which is obviously a reference to what Wanda did to that hospital in Civil War. So, Sparky is missing and they find him dead in Agnes’ hands. RIP :(. The ending of the episode where Wanda and Vision fight was amazing and SO WELL ACTED by both of them. Super tense! And of course, in the end, Evan Peters shows up as Pietro. I have never seen the X-Men movies (I know, I am sorry.), so I had no clue that he actually played Quicksilver in the FOX movies. 

Episode 6 - All-New Halloween Spooktacular!

This was one of my favorite episodes and it may or may not be because of the Halloween elements. I thought the twins talking to the audience in this episode was really cute and a great way for us to get to know their personalities as well. Wanda comes downstairs looking fabulous in her classic Scarlet Witch costume from the comics!! The kids and Pietro kind of think the costume is a bit meh, but they obviously do not know what they are talking about... Pietro then talks about trick or treating with Wanda in Sakovia and Wanda says she does not remember... Clue #1 that this Pietro is being kind of weird. Later, Vision shows up in his classic comics costume, which was funny to see him in that. So Vision tells Wanda he cannot go trick or treating with them because he is doing some stuff with the Neighborhood Watch tonight, while in fact, he is going to be doing some investigating in Westview. So Pietro joins the fam instead with his classic Quicksilver costume and Tommy has the same outfit on because it is later revealed that he also has super speed. I really enjoyed the trick-or-treating bit. So, Vision is nearing the edge of the Hex and seems as though people are either stuck in a loop but still conscious or just standing completely still. Back at SWORD, our favorite trio is taking matters into their own hands and are trying to figure out a way to go back into the hex and they find out that Hayward is tracking Vision and the decay of Vibranium. Which raised a bunch of questions for me, like is Hayward just after Vision? Darcy mentions that going in and out of the hex is changing Monica’s cells. Interesting and scary. When Vision found Agnes at the edge of the hex and got her out of the spell, she knew about the Avengers but Vision did not since he has no memory. She was acting really weird though... AS ALWAYS! The town square with all the Halloween decorations looked so cute and gave me serious Halloweentown vibes! Pietro is fishing for answers with Wanda and we get another jump scare with zombie Pietro... This was even worse than Vision. Then, we get this heartbreaking scene, where he is trying to get out of the hex and tries to tell SWORD the people need help and he is slowly falling apart and nobody tries to help him but Darcy. I really thought he was going to die again and I was not ready for that. Luckily, Billy senses his dad is in trouble and goes to Wanda. She then freezes the whole town and EXPANDS THE ENTIRE HEX. That was just crazy and what a cliffhanger. 

Episode 7 - Breaking The Fourth Wall

This is the Modern Family style episode and as a huge fan of that, this was sooooo well done! The humor, the confessionals to the camera, the camera work even. It was perfect. So, it’s not going so well in the hex. A lot of furniture and things in the house are switching between decades, like the twins’ game consoles and the milk. Wanda kept saying she was fine, while we can all see she obviously is not. Agnes suggests taking the twins so Wanda can have a little self-care time. Speaking of which, her confessionals to the camera were so funny! Vision seeks out Darcy and Darcy just thinks he wants to go on a date with her. All I kept thinking was: Vision, just take her out of the spell. Which of course he does later and Darcy says how she thought it would be fun to be on WandaVision but in reality, it was not, that was great. They then escape the circus by getting in a funnel cake truck. Meanwhile, Monica and Jimmy meet up with the engineer who turned out to be no one we knew. But she did bring a vehicle that Monica could use to get back in the hex. Which eventually did not work, so Monica literally runs in there without any protection really. But we got this beautiful sequence where Monica gets her powers and it was just stunning. She hears all these voices of her past and she is also ripped apart somehow with different versions of herself but she pulls them all together and she goes comes out on the other side in a superhero landing and GLOWING eyes, wow. Vision and Darcy are stuck somewhere in Westview like someone really does not want them to get to Wanda. Darcy basically tells Vision his whole story and he finally learns what Wanda had to endure concerning his death as well. Vision’s confessionals in front of that funnel truck were hilarious as well! Another thing I loved about that was that Darcy mentioned how she had been watching WandaVision (just like us hehe) and the love Wanda and Vision share is real, which I thought was really cute. Monica visits Wanda at home and she is NOT happy. Elizabeth Olsen is really selling the more villainous moments and Teyonnah Parris killed this scene as well, the emotion in her voice was on point. Agnes sees what happens and goes to stop it and takes Wanda to her house. Wanda sits in the living room and the twins are nowhere to be found, so Agnes says they are in the basement. Which has these really weird branches coming out of it, Wanda goes down and there are all these weird artifacts and this book, very WITCHY... And it is revealed that Agnes is Agatha Harkness, a witch!!! This leads to the instantly iconic smash hit, Agatha All Along!!! (which I am still very much obsessed with) So we see her messing with events like the talent show and it was also revealed that she was the one that killed Sparky... I had been following theories throughout the show, so some already suspected Agnes was Agatha but the way it was revealed was just iconic. 

Episode 8 - Previously On...

I loved this one too. This episode gives us some answers to our questions and a glimpse into Wanda's past. Hosted by none other than Agatha Harkness! (I love how she was giving commentary on everything this episode, Katherine Hahn is amazing!) In the beginning, we also see some of Agatha's past and I thought it was really cool, I love the magic section of the MCU and I feel like they are starting to explore it more and more. It was also a very dark scene, really great stuff. After that, Agatha is explaining to Wanda why she came to Westview, why is she is seeking her out specifically, and showcases her magic. She also explains how she brought FIETRO in the picture (cannot stop calling him that now lol). We then take a trip down memory lane. First up, Sokovia. I thought this was cute and gave us an answer to why they are referencing sitcoms. I did not expect to see the bombing that Wanda and Pietro talked about in Age of Ultron and as it turns out the bomb did not go off because Wanda put a spell on it! Then we move to the Hydra facility where Wanda and Pietro volunteered. So when Wanda was alone with the scepter, the mind stone went to her by itself, almost like it chose her or something. I thought it was really cool that it was showing her true self or her future self for that matter. Next up, the Avengers compound. I loved how when Vision entered he came through the wall, just like he did in Civil War and he is kind of confused about the sitcom she is watching. They have a little heart-to-heart about how Wanda is feeling after Pietro's death. I have to say the writing and lines here are great but Vision says this gorgeous one: "But what is grief, if not love persevering?" That is one of the best lines in the show and MCU, so beautiful. I mean even Agatha had to wipe away a tear. The last scene was incredible. So we find out that Wanda never took Vision's body from SWORD and that Hayward is a lying bastard (tells us something we do not know). I was on the verge of tears when Wanda went to Vision's body and said she could not feel him anymore. Gosh, that was sad and made me think of Infinity War. She then leaves the SWORD HQ and drives to Westview and she stops at this empty plot of land... Because Vision bought that for them to live there :( That is just so sad and Wanda her grief was so great that SHE created the hex out of nothing. On top of that, she even created a new Vision. That whole scene was so visually striking, it was incredible. So back to 'reality'. Agatha leads Wanda outside and she is wearing her costume (which looks great btw!) and her hair is blowing in the wind and she is holding the twins hostage and she tells Wanda she used chaos magic to create the hex, which makes her THE SCARLET WITCH!!!!!! SHE SAID IT! The way I screamed omg, it was amazing!

Episode 9 - The Series Finale

We've made it!! Congrats if you have made it this far, cause this a long post. Let me start off by saying that even though some people hated this finale because of all the theories that had been spread on the internet, I really enjoyed it! Yes, even I was convinced that some of them were true, particularly Mephisto and Doctor Strange showing up. It did not happen and at the end of the day, I was fine with it because they were just theories, it was not confirmed. Now, the whole Evan Peters thing... It was a bit weird that he was just a nobody, but I was honestly not that invested in that storyline, so yeah, I get why other people were disappointed. But to say it ruined the whole show, no way, it was never about him in the first place. With the mystery of WandaVision, I think we all looked too much into every single detail. WandaVision is about Wanda dealing with her grief and the love she shares with VIsion, which they delivered on in spades and I loved seeing that. Plus, it is not to say that Mephisto will never show up, there were a lot of clues here that he might in the future with all those devil references... The finale wrapped up this story and gave some teases for what is to come. It delivered some great action at the beginning of the episode with Wanda vs. Agatha and Vision vs. White Vision. I thought the little philosophy session with the Visions was so in character, it was great. Speaking of White Vision, now that he has all of Vision's memory... WHERE DID HE GO?! I am sure we will see him again. I thought the scene where the people from Westview surrounded Wanda and were blaming her for all their trauma these past weeks, which is totally within their right, was so intense and Elizabeth really sold it!! All the Wanda vs. Agatha scenes were awesome and loved seeing them use their magic in different ways. Now, my two favorite moments of this finale. I did not realize what Wanda was doing while fighting Agatha in the air, not until Agatha could not use her powers anymore... Wanda literally used Agatha's own tricks against her by casting those ruins inside the hex! Wanda accepting her destiny as the Scarlet Witch was such a beautiful moment, I had legit chills! AND HER NEW COSTUME LOOKS STUNNING! With her hair and the headpiece, omg yes queen. Also, I think we will be seeing Agatha again, they really established that her path will cross with Wanda in a future MCU project! Now, my other favorite moment. Wanda saying goodbye to her family. Some of the lines were just beautiful and the score was emotional. I thought it was chilling how you could just see the hex closing in on them, it felt very cinematic. I genuinely think it is among some of my favorite moments in the MCU. It was a beautiful ending to this story. So, what's next?! One post-credit scene was Monica being recruited by a SKRULL!! I love it when the Skrulls just pop up out of nowhere, it's great. So the Skrull tells her there is someone who wants to see her up there... That has to be Nick Fury right?! The last time we saw him he was on some sort of space station with Skrulls in Far From Home. Maybe Monica will also play a part in Secret Invasion?! I am excited about that reunion nonetheless! The other scene was Wanda settled in a secluded area in the mountains. Wanda has been confirmed for Multiverse of Madness with Doctor Strange and I am SO excited for that. This scene confirmed it too! If u listen closely you can hear a different version of Doctor Strange's theme!! I thought it was really cool and a little scary that Wanda could be awake and have her astral projection reading the dark hold at the same time! That was powerful!

So, here we are, we made it! I loved this show and I am so happy Wanda is becoming a very big part of the MCU and her future shines brighter than ever!! Thank you so much for reading this! I hope you enjoyed it :) Next up, The Falcon and The Winter Soldier! (spoiler alert: it was amazing!!!!) Hopefully, my review will be up before Loki has started ;)

PS. I loved all the songs and scores from the show so much, I put all my faves in a Spotify playlist! Check it out here

#entertainment #tv #marvel #mcu #mcu shows #wandavision #wandavision spoilers #wandavision review #disney plus #wanda maximoff #scarlet witch #elizabeth olsen #monica rambeau #teyonah parris #agatha harkness #agatha all along #kathryn hahn #paul bettany #vision #sitcoms #marvel cinematic universe #multiverse of madness #pietro wandavision #sword #doctor strange #servinglemonade #billy and tommy #darcy lewis #jimmy woo

[yukippe]

last day of summer

its officially piper week! day 1 is family so I wrote some piper n tristain w a bit of leo as a treat <3

piper grips the straps of her duffle bag tightly. leo’s sitting on the steps of the big house with her, but they don’t say anything to each other. its the end of the last day of her second summer at camp and she’s still not sure if she should be going home. her dad’s sending her to a regular high school for once, and it turns out one of the demeter kids is a year above her and leo there.

  she hasn’t been home since christmas break. she’d spent the last year at camp, holding on as tight as she could to all her siblings and friends. after losing leo she hadn’t really known what to do. besides, the year before the war was the best time piper had had since she was in kindergarten. she missed her dad, though, and camp was great but the past year had been so much more lonely than when she and jason and leo had been together and preparing for war. 

  it was leo crashing into the amphitheatre with the daughter of a titan on festus with him that lead to this, really. calypso had decided she wanted to travel the world with the hunters and leo wanted to try the real world in a home again. so, piper had called her dad on a phone leo had made her during the summer and he’d (somehow) agreed to let leo come live with them in the year.

  her dad hadn’t wanted to, but then piper had told him that leo’s family had pretty much abandoned him and his cabin was pretty empty during the year and her dad had smiled and told her he would get a room set up. he’s always let her take in stray dogs and cats off the streets before bringing them to shelters.

  leo is upgrading his own phone next to her. he claims to be about to make his own artificial intelligence. piper’s campaigning to have it named “siri ii”. leo’s coming around to the idea but everyone else thinks they should be more creative. piper’s phone buzzes as leo pops the battery back into his. 

DAD

Hey Pipes, I’m waiting in the car in the front. Can you and Leo bring me some of those strawberries?

  piper nudges leo and shows him the message. he laughs and gets up to walk over and grab a basket of strawberries. chiron always has free ones ready for campers that are headed home after summer. piper stands up and slides the strap of her bag onto her shoulder and breathes in and out.

  she’s still not 100% ready to see her dad. leo walks down the stairs to her and hip chcks her into motion. “asshole,” she says. 

  “yeah, yeah beauty queen,” he replies. they don’t use nicknames much anymore, partly because it feels weird without a sparky to make fun of and partly because they’ve sort of outgrown it. 

  they’re driving out to los angeles to begin their senior year. leo’s looking at engineering programs and piper likes the idea of charmspeaking politicians into voting for climate change bills. it’d be cool to be the “celebrities activist child!” that she sees in the tabloids sometimes. 

  “let’s go,” leo says. “you’ve missed your dad and i wanna see your fancy mansion, rich kid.”

  piper elbows him and leads the way to where her dad is waiting. they pass thalia’s tree and wave to peleus as they go. it feels strange leaving for a full year, but piper thinks it’s time. she wants to see what the real world is like again. 

  her dad waves, his window rolled down, sunglasses pushing his hair back as they walk up. “hey piper! and hi leo, i’m happy to be having you in la.”

  leo grins and piper knows this was a good idea, “hey mr mclean! thanks for letting me stay with you this year.” and then leo’s walking around the care and slipping into the back and her dad’s opening his door and smiling softly at her. 

  “it’s been a while,” piper says, like an idiot who doesn’t know how to talk to her dad. it’s just...it’s been a while. and she’s missed him. and she doesn’t really know how to say that it means a lot that her dad came down to pick them up and is letting leo stay and they’re now all going to go on this dumb roadtrip home that she’s been really excited for for the past week. 

   and well, her dad’s gotten better at understanding her. he grins at her and pulls her in for a hug. “i missed you too piper, i’m so happy you’re spending your senior year at home.”

  she relaxes into the hug for a few moments before she lets go. she smiles up at her dad, “does that mean i can drive first?”

  her dad laughs and leo must’ve overheard because he starts to threaten to slash the tires if she gets in the drivers seat. “just because you stole a bmw once doesn’t mean you can drive!” leo yells from the backseat. 

  piper’s eyebrows narrow and she moves to open the back door and and shove leo out of the car when her dad grabs her arm, she turns to look at him and he’s grinning at her, “you can drive last, if you really want, but only if you let leo and me out first so we don’t get hurt when you crash my car.”

  She throws her duffle bag at her dads head and stomps into the backseat, smile wide on her face. living at home for the first time in years is going to be a blast. 

  her dad gets into the car after her and carelessly tosses her bag onto the passenger seat. “oh, by the way,” he says. “i’m taking a break on all acting projects this year to be your personal chauffeurs.” 

  leo whoops and piper joins him. huh. a whole year of her dad at home and leo’s going to school with her. she still isn’t sure how it’s going to go, and leo’s guaranteed to be a pain in the ass, but it’s a year at home with her dad and her best friend and a new school that’s promising enough. she’s hopeful.

#hoo #piper mclean #tristain mclean #leo valdez #piperweek2020 #text #rey's writering

[aion-rsa]

Marvel’s WandaVision Episode 8: MCU Easter Eggs and Reference Guide

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This article contains WandaVision episode 8 spoilers and potential spoilers for the wider MCU.

“You didn’t think you were the only magical girl in town, did you?” 

Agatha Harkness makes good on that line from last week’s episode in WandaVision episode 8, which functions as a trip through Wanda Maximoff’s entire MCU history. Not only does it reveal previously hidden (and crucially necessary) depths to her character and her relationship with Vision, but it successfully adds new elements to her established origin story. These new wrinkles pull from Wanda’s entire Marvel history, and have massive implications for magic users and even mutants in the MCU going forward.

Here’s what we found…

Sitcom Influences

Among the bootleg DVDs Wanda’s father is selling we can see Bewitched, Malcolm in the Middle, I Love Lucy, Who’s the Boss?, I Dream of Jeannie, and The Addams Family, all of which have been major touchstones for WandaVision throughout its run. But Wanda’s favorite? That would be The Dick Van Dyke Show.

The Dick Van Dyke Show episode that the Maximoffs watch is season 2 episode 21 “It May Look Like A Walnut”, or as Wanda’s dad calls it “the walnut episode!” This installment finds Rob Petrie (Van Dyke) staying up late to watch a spooky sci-fi movie on TV, while his wife Laura (Mary Tyler Moore) tries to ignore it because it freaks her out. In the movie, aliens from the planet Twilo come to Earth in disguise to slow down humanity’s development by feeding us walnuts that contain the chemical element “absorbitron.” The walnuts take away our creativity and our thumbs – the two things that get us into outer space to challenge their Twiloian supremacy. The next day, walnuts seem to be the only food that Rob can find. He comes to believe that Laura is either playing a trick on him, or that the Twiloites have really invaded.

Why would WandaVision go out of its way to mention this episode in particular? Well, Wanda can certainly empathize with a protagonist who comes to believe his world is fabricated. And Marvel Phase 4 does seem destined to spend quite a bit more time in space.

The scene of Malcolm in the Middle that Vision watches but doesn’t quite understand has Hal build a deck, only for it to collapse on him. In the third WandaVision episode intro, Vision builds a swingset, only for it to suddenly collapse in front of him.

Wanda’s father sold DVDs as a trade and even had a Malcolm in the Middle box set in there. That’s pretty damn impressive, since he was killed by that bomb in 1999 and the show didn’t start airing until early 2000. That’s some Spaceballs VHS technology right there!

While at the HYDRA facility, Wanda watches The Brady Bunch. The episode appears to be season 1’s “Kitty Karry-All Is Missing.” When Cindy Brady’s beloved Kitty Karry-All goes missing, she thinks her brother Bobby stole her. The Bradys have a trial and everything! But it turns out the Bradys’ dog Tiger actually took Kitty Karry-All. Perhaps that’s why Agatha needed Sparky out of the way – dogs are unpredictable.

Wanda’s assurance that “He’s not really injured. It’s not that kind of show” is as much a commentary on superhero storytelling in both comics and in movies as it is about sitcoms.

Agatha Harkness

Kicking things off with an Agatha Harkness origin story is an inspired move…

Placing Agatha’s origin in witch-trial era Salem in 1693 ends up being a little piece of misdirection. She’s not on trial for being a witch, but rather by her own coven for seeking too much power. 

We get a sense of Agatha’s family here, with Agatha’s mother leading the coven against her while Agatha is still just a young witch. This doesn’t match her comics origin, where she was already centuries old by the time the Salem Witch Trials rolled around – she is old enough to remember Atlantis being above water. In the comics, she was a leader of the Salem community when the trials began. 

Agatha’s mother’s name is Evanora Harkness. She doesn’t appear to have a counterpart in the comics.

The Latin chant that the witches are repeating appears to be “mors monstru naturale” which would translate to “natural death is a monster,” which…given Agatha’s seemingly immortal nature, tracks pretty well.

The magical “crown” of energy that appears on Agatha’s mother’s head very faintly resembles the headgear that Wanda wears in the comics as the Scarlet Witch. Granted, it’s blue here.

Agatha’s use of “purple energy” may be the most damning sign of her intentions yet. In comics, purple is often coded as the color of villains.

We also learn the origin of the brooch Agatha has been wearing all through this series, with Agatha having taken it off her mother’s corpse. 

In the final scene with Agatha and the twins, she floats above them and holds them at will like marionettes. This is probably a reference to Master Pandemonium, whose reveal made the children look like hand puppets…except they were his actual hands.

Because comics!

Let’s dig into some of the spells Agatha says…is one of them “crystallum possession”. I also definitely heard an Imperio something in there, which calls to mind the Imperius curse from TERF High Harry Potter. The Imperius curse allowed the witch or wizard to control the victim’s body like a puppet.

The Scarlet Witch

Hoo-boy, we get a LOT of Wanda’s comics lore introduced in this episode…

This episode makes it pretty clear that Wanda was born with her abilities and that Strucker’s experiments merely amplified them. Should we officially welcome mutants to the MCU? If her powers were latent, then perhaps so were Pietro’s. The fact that Strucker’s experiments killed all the subjects except for Wanda and Pietro could be seen as further evidence of their mutant heritage.

We get some very different explanations of Wanda’s magical powers than we’ve had in the past, all via Agatha, and all of them referencing various ways Wanda’s powers have been explained in the comics in the past.

Why didn’t that Stark Industries bomb explode and kill Wanda and Pietro? She may have unknowingly cast a “probability hex” on it. For many years Wanda’s “magical” powers were explained as a mutant ability to alter the probability of outcomes, no matter how unlikely.

Later, it was revealed that she was a master of “chaos magic,” another term introduced here. Furthermore, now it seems that being able to wield chaos magic gives Wanda a specific magical title, that of “Scarlet Witch.” We…do not have to tell you where that comes from.

The vision (sorry) that the Mind Stone gives Wanda would appear to be one of her future, fully Scarlet Witch-ified self. This particular costume, which evokes a long jacket and crown, is very similar to the one she’s worn in the most recent Marvel Comics.

When Agatha finally discovers that Wanda is the Scarlet Witch, she says that the Scarlet Witch was supposed to be “a myth.” Big Buffy the Vampire Slayer vibes in this exchange! Buffy often faced off against foes who once thought she was just a fairytale created to spook demons and nothing more.

Agatha’s “That accent really comes and goes, doesn’t it?” is a terrific joke at the MCU’s expense. As well as her “so many costumes and hairstyles” also feels like a nod to Wanda’s changing looks in the comics just as much as it is about the chameleon-like nature of the WandaVision universe.

Vision

The scene of Wanda coming across the disassembled remnants of Vision’s body in the SWORD lab is taken from West Coast Avengers #43 into #44. Instead of dying heroically, Vision was taken out of commission by the world’s governments for trying to take over all of the world’s computers. He was reduced to nothing but metal and circuitry in order for writer John Byrne to drive home Vision’s lack of human biology. 

That disturbing scene of Vision being “dissected” with his body stretched out across multiple tables is a direct nod to a panel from those comics.

It also reminds us a little of how Thanos had Nebula pulled apart in Avengers: Endgame. At least Vision is offline!

Vision was then resurrected in the white form that we see here in the mid-credits scene, and brought back without his emotions or any connection to his past life as Wanda’s husband or Billy and Tommy’s father. This was one of the catalysts for Byrne sending Wanda into her Dark Scarlet Witch phase that abruptly ended when Byrne stormed off of West Coast Avengers for the cardinal sin of “being edited.” For more on this, type “Why did John Byrne” into Google and let autocomplete take you on a fun ride.

We’ll have more on White Vision in just a moment.

The Stark Bomb

The toaster commercial from the first episode was always supposed to be a reference to the Stark Industries bomb that tore apart the Maximoff household. That commercial also had the blinking red light of the toaster show up despite everything else being in black and white. We now see that the bomb itself had a very similar blinking red light and sound.

The popular running theory was that the commercials tracked to the different stones, and while that may still be applicable, do they also/instead track to Wanda’s memories or key parts of her life? 

We saw the toaster match up with the blinking light on the bomb.

We know the watch had the Hydra face on it. Could this match if future Wanda floating in through the stone was actually a paradox and not just a vision?

The paper towel commercial mentioned Lagos too prominently to not pair with that moment of trauma.

Does the fruit snack commercial match up with her conversation with Vision in the Avengers compound?

The anti-depressant commercial does track fairly well with Wanda’s visit to SWORD.

It feels like the only one that doesn’t have an obvious pair is the tesseract bubble bath. Give us a shout in the comments if you can figure out what that matches to.

Westview

When Wanda drives through Westview for the first time, she passes by the normal versions of Herb (John Collins), Mrs. Hart (Sharon Davis), and Phil (Harold Proctor). Notably, Harold is putting up an ad for piano lessons when in the second episode, playing the piano was his talent. It’s also when Wanda magically turned his grandmother’s piano into an illusion.

As Wanda transforms Westview, we see a billboard for “Super” paper towels become “Lagos” brand paper towels (ala the commercial from earlier this season), which “makes cleanup a snap!”

When the Coronet theater marquee transforms, it’s showing two Walt Disney Productions films of the appropriate WandaVision episode 1 era, Kidnapped and Big Red. But before that it’s showing Tannhauser Gate. Roy Batty, call your agent, please.

Fake Pietro

It’s revealed that “Pietro Maximoff” was indeed a complete fake. A “Fietro” as Agatha calls him. He became her “eyes and ears” and she refers to his manifestation as “a crystalline possession.” We sense there will be more revealed about this in the finale, as Evan Peters has been M.I.A. since his appearance in last week’s post-credits scene.

The Post-Credits Scene and White Vision

In West Coast Avengers #45, Vision’s personality was wiped completely, so by the time he was reassembled, he appeared as “White Vision”. He completely lacked emotion and didn’t even understand why Wanda was hugging him upon entering the room. This became the status quo version of Vision for a while until his old personality, look, and feelings for Wanda were eventually brought back. But hey, this version got to be a playable character in the 1991 arcade hit Captain America and the Avengers!

cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });

What are the chances that White Vision will have James Spader’s voice?

We wrote more about that post-credits scene here.

Spot anything we missed? Let us know in the comments!

The post Marvel’s WandaVision Episode 8: MCU Easter Eggs and Reference Guide appeared first on Den of Geek.

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[xxisxxisxxis]

Gateway Drug | Part Thirty-Eight

Table of Content or Part Thirty-Seven

Read here on wattpad

A/N: Question — what song do you think of when you think of Nikki and Viv? I'm trying to see something

Word count: 3.3k

Warning(s): Explicit language, Sexual situations, Drug abuse

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My bare feet hook underneath his thighs the second I realize he's about to  finish and he gives a crooked smirk up at me, his breathing beginning to shallow.

Nikki holds my hips still, groaning out as his cum coats the inside of me, causing me to let out a hazey moan, my mind cloudy from our rather lengthy round.

Once he's finished, I'm getting off of him and falling beside him, catching my breath as we recover is silence fore several minutes.

"Are you on birth control or something?" He asks me out of nowhere and I tense up, looking at him.

"Why're you asking?"

"I've been thinking about it since Vince and Sharise had Skylar, for some reason. I mean, I haven't used a rubber since we started dating and most of the time I don't pull out, and we've only had one pregnancy scare in the past, what, like, four years?"

"You've managed to keep track of how long we've been together?" I ask him, pretending to be shocked and he gently hits my arm with the back of his hand, and I chuckle, rolling over to face him, my lips pressing to his bicep for a moment.

I think I'm in the clear, dodging his question, but I'm not.

"I'm being serious, Viv, are you on something or...?" He asks and I lick my lips.

"Maybe my antidepressant affects fertility, I don't know." I shrug, lying through my teeth. "Drugs can cause issues on your end, too, so maybe that's another reason."

"Oh." He replies.

I avoid looking at him, sitting up, swinging my legs over the side of the bed before reaching down to grab his shirt by my feet.

You know those lies, that start simple and small, and then snowball more and more over time and explode in flames from hell that melt the snow and turn it into scalding hot water that leaves third-degree burns on the person that's being lied to? Yeah, we both had lots of those, and that was one of mine.

I

take a shower and brush my teeth, excited for my plans tonight, and as I start putting makeup up on, Nikki's getting in the shower.

"Are you and Robin going out tonight?" I ask him.

"Uh, yeah. Sparkie's coming, too." He replies and I roll my eyes.

I know they'll go out to a club and hide in the bathroom, shooting up and snorting blow a  majority of the time, only leaving to get some drinks.

"My doctor was really curious as to why I needed a refill so soon being that he gave me a month supply a week before Sparkie traded it." I comment to remind him Sparkie's a piece of shit.

"Sparkie learned his lesson, baby." He tells me in a half-chuckle and I raise my brows at myself in the mirror and turn the sink on.

"Jesus fuck, Viv!" He screams, being bombarded with ice cold water for a moment.

"Awe, I'm sorry, maybe Sparkie can sympathize with you." I reply smartly.

He's getting out of the shower, covered in suds, glaring at me, and I take off running with him chasing close behind.

"Spoiled brat!" He calls at me, the both of us naked as jaybirds.

"Trader bastard!" I say back, right before he catches me, pulling me against his wet, soapy body, his hands not skipping a moment to start tickling me.

I squeal, the both of us falling to the floor, my feet and legs kicking out of instinct.

"Don't you do it." He threatens. "Remember what happened last time."

"Not my fault you're a pussy." I reply, immediately regretting it when he starts tickling me again, this time, getting on top of me to pin me down.

He doesn't let up until I'm laughing so hard I'm in tears, and he's tired of struggling with me.

We look at each other for a minute, before he grins and kisses me.

"I gotta finish getting ready." He tells me, getting off of me and helping me up.

"Yeah, I do, too."

I decided a nice trip to Malibu would be a great thing for GN'R. I mean, go to Tansy's house there, have her invite over some of her single girl friends to mingle with the guys, stay over night so they don't have to worry about whether or not they'd be able to crash at their stripper friends' apartment and sleep on the floor that night, have a nice breakfast together the next morning, and just give Axl and Izzy time to really get to know Tansy, because they haven't hung out with her very much, while Slash, Duff and Steven see her almost more than I do.

I glance around the living room of Tansy's Malibu beach house, seeing beach bunnies all around with perfectly tanned skin, bombshell hair and perfect smiles, then look at Steven and Slash, who seem to be having a pretty good time.

They both look like they're in heaven, girls on either side of them, obviously fans of their work on the Sunset Strip back in L.A.

Izzy took a girl up to the guest bedroom long ago, while Axl's just nursing a bottle of Jack, with a beautiful brunette chattering his ear off while he's pretending not to care about what Tansy's doing as she talks to one of her girl friends across the room.

I do a mental head count, and notice my 6'4 blonde is nowhere to be seen.

Maybe he found a girl or two of his own and followed in Izzy's footsteps, taking over a spare room?

I brush it off, deciding it's none of my business and step to the kitchen to grab a Pepsi out of the fridge. 

When I pass by the doors that lead to the balcony over looking the ocean, though, I see the outline of someone sitting in the lounge chair. 

Recognizing the slender frame, I grab my soda and head outside, Duff looking over his shoulder to see who I am, before smiling at me innocently, bottle of Vodka by his foot and pack of Marlboros on one knee as a sketch pad and pen are being supported by his other.

"Hi." I say as he scoots over to make room for me. "Mr. Social Butterfly." I add, sarcastically.

"Hey." He replies, moving his Vodka over so I won't knock it down with my foot.

"I figured you be eating that up." I motion to the door, referring to the gorgeous girls inside and he chuckles a little.

"I don't know, I haven't really been feeling chicks lately." He tells me and I furrow my brows a little.

"Well, I'm sure she has some boy friends, too, if you're feeling something different." I inform him, knowing what he meant, but he laughs and shakes his head.

"Not like that, Viv." He tells me and I pull my red hair behind my shoulders to get it out of my face, before taking a sip of my drink. "I've been, uh, working on something new, kinda. The lyrics have been going off left and right in my head, I just thought I'd better get somewhere quiet and write them down before I lose them." He explains, holding up his notepad.

"Oh, I'm sorry." I feel like I've intruded, or messed up his groove, about to leave him alone to finish but he puts his hand on my knee to stop me from standing up.

"No, no, it's fine." He insists, taking his hand off of me, not thinking anything of it, despite me feeling warmth radiate from where he touched me.

I ignore it.

"I've already gotten everything I had in mind, so far." He explains. "Just a verse and chorus."

"What's the name of it?" I ask, and he scratches the back of his neck.

"I don't know if I need to tell you. I'm superstitious about this stuff, Viv." He tells me, even though he's completely full of shit.

He just wants to aggravate me.

"It's just the title, Duff. You let me hear you say 'turn around, bitch, I gotta use for you' and this can't be worse than that." I point out and he chuckles, licking his lips before looking at me.

His hand covers the lyrics, exposing the title line of the page.

"Paradise City" is scribbled in his writing and I smile when he moves his hand and let's me read  the chorus, and verse that he's gotten so far, a giant smile pulling at my lips.

"Who the hell inspired this?" I ask him, raising my brows.

"Nobody particular." He shrugs. "You like it?"

"I already love it." I tell him.

Not to compare two completely different bands who earned their names all on their own, but there are a few song parallels between Guns N' Rose's Appetite for Destruction, and Mötley Crüe's Girls, Girls, Girls albums.

Guns' Welcome to the Jungle was like Mötley's Wild Side. Paradise City was like Girls, Girls, Girls. Mr. Brownstone was like Dancing on Glass. But my favorite parallel has to be Sweet Child O Mine and You're All I Need.

I remember Nikki had given me a tape of You're All I Need after we got into a massive argument because he thought I was spending too much time with Duff. But he had practically accused me of having feelings for Duff, and even acting on them (which was pretty hypocritical being that he'd been screwing Vanity since 1986 at that point.)

A few weeks later, Nikki convinced me to come down to the studio so he could personally give me a copy of a song he had written me, and me--being excited--decided I wanted the guys to hear it, too.

I went to the Franklin Plaza where Steven, Duff, Slash, Izzy and Axl were hanging out, discussing a meeting they'd had with their label.

When I told them Nikki wrote a love song about me (thinking it was his way of trying to patch up our marriage and say to the world "I love this woman") the guys had to hear it, not believing me.

The ballad started beautifully, tears coming to my eyes, but my warmed heart quickly began boiling in my chest by the time the second chorus ended.

"I don't think this is a love song." Izzy stated, while shaking his head a little.

"Yeah, uh...he's talking about killing you." Axl had told me, everyone seemed slightly disturbed.

"Your girlfriends get Sweet Child O Mine and what does the dedicated wife that has done nothing but love this sick bastard get?! A song dedicated to his deep desire to murder me!"

"Dude, hasn't he actually tried to kill you before?" Steven asked.

Which made the song even more ironic, along with the last line of the chorus, "and I loved you but you didn't love me" which in itself was slap in the fucking face.

I didn't hear the full song at that time because Duff had took it out of the player and stomped it under his cowboy boot.

That pretty much set the tone for the months to come.

"You're also incredibly biased." He replies in the same tone and I nudge him with my elbow.

"You don't know how many songs I have actually had to tear out of Nikki's hand and hide them from him because they were so bad I just could not allow them to be recorded." I tell him.

"Oh, please." He brushes me off.

"Have you heard 'Theater of Pain'?" I ask him with raised brows.

"Yeah."

"Home Sweet Home and Smokin' in the Boy's Room were the only really good ones. And Smokin' in the Boy's Room was a cover. The other songs were songs I didn't know were written, or I would have hid them from him, too." I state and he tries not to laugh, but fails, making himself snort, which kickstarts my laughter. 

Once we settle down, he clears his throat, and gets a kind of serious expression on his face.

"I really wish he wasn't on that shit, Viv." He tells me and I don't even have to ask who he's talking about. "I mean, I'm not judging him or whatever because Izzy and Slash are in on that stuff, too, but...I just hate to see he's on it, because it's kinda hard to manage it once you hit a certain point, ya know?" He asks and I nod a little. "I think he's a pretty cool guy...so it sucks to see him act like that."

"It's not that bad, right now." I tell him, completely in denial. "He's still Nikki, he just does stuff he's not suppose to. That's nothing new to me."

"I'm just a little worried, is all." He admits.

"There's no need to be." I reassure him. "He's got a handle on things."

Dear God did I eat those words a week later in Dallas, Texas.

It's like watching a fucking car accident. 

Except instead of a car, it's my husband, and instead of a car accident, it's him losing his ever loving mind, crouched on the hotel room desk, as he babbles on, making absolutely no sense as he shouts at his parents who aren't even present.

I just came back from the pool, got a shower, and came in to him doing this.

"Nikki!" I try to get him out of whatever drug-induced show he's on.

"I'm not me! I'm not Nikki! I'm someone else!" He insists, hands yanking at his hair, his eyes completely taken over by an entirely different beast. 

I panic, immediately calling Fred.

"The fuck is wrong?!" He asks when I open the door, hearing Nikki's screaming and carrying on and I try to keep the absolute fear that's locking up my system from showing.

"I-I don't know. I got in from the pool and he was kinda jittery but I thought he'd done some blow, but then he started screaming when I was in the shower and now he's--"

Fred gets tired of hearing Nikki's meaningless shrieks at people who aren't in the room with us, and snatches him off the desk.

Nikki hits the floor, and a switch is flipped, sending him into strong convulsions, opting thick, white foam to pour from his mouth.

"Fuck, Sixx!" Fred lets out, turning him on his side. "Get me a roll of toilet-paper." He barks at me and I do as I'm told, saying a very colorful, silent prayer in my head. 

He tries to get Nikki to bite down on it to keep him from biting his tongue, but Nikki can't do it. screaming instead.

When I think I can't take the confused, scared, out-of-character shrill, it's like God himself knocks Nikki out, leaving Fred and I in complete silence, riddled with what just happened.

Fred checks his pulse and sighs in relief, looking at me.

"Viv, are you alright?" He asks me, taking deep breaths.

"Y-yeah." I say, nodding, even though I know it's written all over my face that I can't be further from "alright."

"Vivian--"

"I just need a second." I tell him, standing up to go to the bathroom, disguising oncoming tears in a strong, steady voice that's physically uncomfortable to push past the lump in my throat.

I lock myself inside the bathroom and turn the water back on, gripping the counter before I find myself in the floor, quiet sobs rocking through me.

I just want my Nikki back...not this tainted demon nesting himself in Nikki's skin, festering his bullshit in Nikki's mind.

By the time I'm worn down from crying, and tired from lying on the bathroom floor, I pull myself up and open the bathroom door, stepping into the room.

I guess Fred put Nikki in the bed before he left, because Nikki's still passed out, just tucked in the covers. 

I get pajamas on, scared to even touch him because I don't want him to start seizing again.

Cautiously getting closer to him, nestling my forehead against his arm, I thank God for the feeling of his pulse under my finger tips in the crook of his arm, and find myself passing out with utter exhaustion.

The next morning, Nikki's really quiet.

I'm not sure if he remembers what happened last night, but I'm not asking him. 

After finding a needle and evidence of an 8-ball of coke, he can lick my twat if he thinks I'm talking to him anytime soon. 

The video shoot for Home Sweet Home is happening today, and a limo picks Nikki and I up at the hotel, driving us to the venue, neither of us acknowledging the other. 

Once we get there, someone's dressing Nikki like a damn toddler, because he's too fucked from last night to dress himself in his done up stage costume.

Nikki was so, so, so, obviously, utterly fucked up when they filmed the music video for Home Sweet Home. 

The entire time, he was chugging Jack to try to calm himself down from a high he later described felt like, "being on acid and speed at the same time" and with the way he was acting like he couldn't see a damn thing, I believe it. 

He kept sunglasses on a majority of the time so people couldn't see how his eye were practically doing cartwheels. 

"Viv, we're about to start, where's Nikki?" His bass tech asks me and I glance around, furrowing my brows a little.

"I haven't seen in him about an hour. He went over there by the stage...at least I think he did." I tell him, stepping over to the last place I saw him. "He was here and..." I trail off, hearing Nikki having a full blown conversation, his voice coming from underneath the stage.

The two of us sit and listen for a moment, realizing Nikki's just talking, taking long pauses, then answering a question that was never asked by anybody, not even himself.

"Who is he talking to?" His tech asks me under his breath so Nikki won't hear.

I roll my jaw, getting fed up.

"Probably the fucking demon he sees and befriends every time he gets high." I state, fully believing that at this point, there is indeed a demon following him around, breathing down his neck, stripping him of his control and cheering him on with each grain of coke, bottle of Jack, cc of heroin and prescription-grade pill.

"Nikki," His tech starts. "Who're you talking to?"

"I'm talking. Leave me alone." Nikki argues.

"Nikki." I state, looking at him. 

It's the first time he's heard my voice all day.

"There's nobody there, baby. C'mon." I motion my hand for him to get out from under the stage.

"Leave me alone!" He snaps at me, nearly hissing.

"Dude, calm down, you're freaking out." His tech tells him. 

"Nikki, get your ass out from under there or so help me God, I will come in and drag you out by your dick." I promise him. 

He puffs up like a pissed off rooster and stomps out, passing by us, grumbling under his breath.

Do you wanna know what was really fucked up about that time? Vince couldn't have a beer without someone losing their mind. He was supposed to be sober. Nikki would bust Vince's balls if he even saw him looking at a bottle...but then Nikki would load anything and everything into his body, simultaneously.

Vince quickly became the odd man out, and had been ever since that night with Razzle. There was this vibe, this tension, that Vince was only kept in the band at that time, because they were getting hotter and hotter, and each member was the ticket to reach their full potential as a band. Each member was important.

Without Tommy, there was no band. Without Mick, there was no band. Without Nikki, there was no band.

And without Vince, there was no band...that was the one that really didn't sit too well with Sikki.

#nikki sixx #vince neil #mick mars #tommy lee #mötley crüe #the dirt