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just-dreaming-marvel · 2 years

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Lessons In Love ~ 2

LESSONS IN LOVE MASTERLIST

< previous chapter

Word Count: 2,180ish

Summary: Obi-Wan tries to help you the best he is able.

Notes: Please share reactions!! The reader’s arthritis and teaching position (and many of the situations) are heavily based on my real life so please be kind.

The bell rang and students filled the hallways, rushing toward the nearest doors to finally be finished for the day. You pressed a smile on your dash as you wished the students goodbye and slightly waved to them. As soon as the last student left, you shut and locked the door. You needed a moment. Leaning back against the firm wooden door, you closed your eyes and allowed yourself to dwell on the exhausting day you had and how much pain you were in.

Your students hadn’t been good. Your worst student, though you loved him dearly, was giving you a run for your money. Due to spending so much time trying to manage his behavior, you felt that you couldn’t actually teach and that the behaviors of your other students worsened because of it. This, on top of your arthritis, was the reason you were not doing well.

You heard the door knob turn and the door jostle slightly against your back. Someone was trying to get in and you should probably let them, but you were so exhausted.

“Y/N,” you heard Obi-Wan softly call through the door. “I know you’re on the other side. I can see you through the window.” You cursed yourself, forgetting the window running alongside the door. “Just let me in.”

“I’m fine,” you told him through the door. “I’m just working on something for tomorrow—hanging something on the door.” You cringed at your own words, not believing them yourself.

You could hear Obi-Wan sigh from where he was standing on the other side of the door. “I’ll be in my room if you need anything.”

You stayed put while you listened to Obi-Wan’s footsteps disappear into his classroom. You needed to get to your car and go home. You needed rest and medication. Peeling your back off the door, you achingly limped toward where your backpack was sitting near your desk. You packed up, walked back to the door, and slipped out of it. You walked as quickly as you could so that Obi-Wan couldn’t see you.

~~~

Obi-Wan was working in his classroom. He did a double-take when he saw you outside, heading for your car. His brows furrowed at your limp, wondering what happened.

“Hey, have you seen Y/N?” Padme wondered, standing in the doorway. “Her lights are off and her room is locked.”

“Yeah,” Obi-Wan responded, watching you get in your car and start it. “She’s leaving.”

Padme walked over to see you drive away. She could tell—especially since you left so fast—that it hadn’t been a great day. Glancing over that the man beside her, Padme noted that Obi-Wan was keeping his eyes where he saw you drive off. There was almost a heavy air of concern around him. She knew that Obi-Wan suspected something was up with you and she was desperately wishing that you would just tell him about your illness.

“She’ll be okay,” Padme said, trying to comfort her friend. “It was just a long day. She needs some rest.”

“Yeah…” Obi-Wan responded, still staring out the window.

Padme gave Obi-Wan’s arm a light squeeze as she turned and head back toward the door. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Obi-Wan.”

~~~

Obi-Wan’s foot was nervously tapping as he sat in his car and waited for your car to pull it. It was ten minutes past the time you were supposed to arrive (per your contract) and there was no sign of you yet. He sighed as he glanced down at the two cups in his cup holder. He had wanted to surprise you with the drink you so often showed up to school with and walk you inside but now he wasn’t sure you were even coming today.

With a shag of his shoulders, Obi-Wan got out of his car. He slung his bag over his shoulder and grabbed the two cups before closing the car door with his hip. He began to head into the school when he noticed your car turning into the parking lot. Relief flooded him as a smile grew on his face.

It had been a rough morning, more mentally than physically. Your body was feeling better this morning but you were still dreading coming to work. Honestly, the only way you were able to get yourself out of bed is because writing sub plans was more work than actually showing up to work.

As you pulled into the parking lot, you immediately noticed Obi-Wan standing there. He had two cups in his hands and he seemed to be waiting for you. You knew he would ask you what had happened yesterday and you hated the thought of explaining anything to anyone at this moment. Once you parked the car, you took a moment to take a few deep breaths. As you did, Obi-Wan walked over. He waited near your car, slightly rocking back and forth on his heels.

“Morning, Obi-Wan,” you said, shooting him a smile as you finally exited your car.

“Good morning, Y/N,” he greeted, stepping closer. “I brought you a drink.” He held out a cup to you.

“Thank you.”

You took the cup from Obi-Wan, fingers brushing against his. The simple touch sent shockwaves through the two of you, but you weren’t going to say that to each other.

“Rough morning?” Obi-Wan wondered as the two of you headed toward the building. You nodded, opting to stay more silent. “I’m sorry. Anything I can do?”

“You’ve already done enough.” You held up the cup he had brought for you. “Thanks again.”

“Anytime.”

Obi-Wan escorted you to your room, silence filling the walk the rest of the way. He really wished to ask you what had happened that made you leave so quickly the day before, but he didn’t want to pry into anything that you weren’t comfortable sharing. You were secretly thankful that he didn’t ask you about yesterday. You actually might have cried and just collapsed on the floor because you were still overwhelmed and dreading the day.

“Y/N,” Obi-Wan softly called before you could disappear into your room. You turned your head to look at him. “Please let me know if you need anything today.”

“Thanks for the offer, Obi-Wan,” you responded, pressing out a smile. “I’ll be fine though.”

Obi-Wan sighed and shook his head as you quickly unlocked your classroom door and slipped in, letting the door shut behind you.

~~~

By the time lunch had rolled around, you were going to quit. The Vice Principal had to come down to your classroom again. Your hardest student was running around and screaming as well as throwing items at you and the other students. It was not acceptable, so Mace had to come down and bring him to the office. You let out a long sigh as you slumped into the chair at your desk. A soft knock sounded on your open door. You looked up to see Obi-Wan standing in the doorway.

“Another rough first half?” He asked.

Your exhaustion was written all over your face, which concerned him. He came in with his food, pulling up a chair to sit at the other side of your desk.

“He threw things today,” you answered.

“That’s not acceptable,” Obi-Wan quickly said.

“Yeah, well, the parents believe that I should just ask him how he’s feeling and that will solve everything. How am I supposed to even try to ask when he’s throwing things at me?”

“Did he hit you?”

You shook your head. “Thankfully he wasn’t able to hit me or any of the students.”

“Y/N, this child might be more than you can handle. He needs more help than our school can provide.”

“I know… we’re working on getting him more help. Until then though he will be in my class.”

Obi-Wan stayed silent for a moment, observing you. You were slowly losing the light you had around you. Your shoulders shagged more and more each day, like the weight of everything grew heavier on you. Obi-Wan had never been more worried for someone in his life.

“If you ever need a break,” Obi-Wan said, carefully placing one of his hands over yours, “feel free to send him over to my classroom.”

You pressed out a smile. “Thank you for the over, Obi-Wan. I just don’t know if that’s a great idea.”

“You never know until you try.” You nodded. “Did you bring any food?”

“Unfortunately, I was more focused on getting out the door and not being later than I already was going to be, than getting a lunch put together.”

“Here,” he pushed his container of food over to you, “I’ve finished all I’m going to eat.”

“No, Obi-Wan,” you shook your head, “I can’t take your food.”

“You’re not taking it, I’m giving it to you. Besides,” he stood up, “I’ve got to go pick up my students anyway.”

“Are you sure?”

“Always.” Especially when it comes to you, he thought.

“You’re too kind, Obi-Wan.”

“Only to you.” He winked as he backed away. “See you after school?”

You nodded. “Yeah.”

~~~

After Obi-Wan left, you finished his food and then picked up your students from the lunchroom. You were so grateful for Obi-Wan’s visit during lunch as it really did make you feel better. The rest of the school day was better due to your hard student being suspended for the rest of the day and until the end of the week. You hated how relieved you felt. Even though the student was hard, you still cared for him and there were times when you saw that he had great potential, if only you could help him focus some of the energy he stored in his little body.

When the last bell rang, you wished your students goodbye before going to find Padme. Upon reaching her room, you could hear her giggling inside. You peeked in to see that Anakin’s hands were on her waist and he was whispering something in her ear.

“You know that children could still walk in on the two of you right?” You quested, standing in the doorway. “Or just your single friend?”

“Y/N!” Padme exclaimed, pulling herself from Anakin’s grasp and heading over to you. “How are you feeling? I’ve been meaning to check in today. I am so sorry I haven’t.”

“You’re fine, Padme. Besides, Obi-Wan has been taking care of me.”

“He has?” Anakin questioned with a sly smirk.

“Stop that. I know that look. He’s just being a good friend.”

“Yeah, a good friend who wants to get it on with you.”

“Anakin!” Padme exclaimed, hitting his arm. “That wasn’t okay.”

“What? It’s not like Y/N here doesn’t feel the same.” Anakin’s eyes bored into yours. “Right?”

“Well— I— You know—“ You stammered, trying to come up with something believable since Anakin wasn’t necessarily wrong.

“There you are,” Obi-Wan said, coming up from behind you. “I’ve been looking for you.”

“Perfect timing, Obi-Wan,” Anakin smirked. “We were just talking about you.”

“Anakin!” Padme exclaimed again, hitting his arm once again.

“Oh, really?” Obi-Wan glanced at you, seeing that you were avoiding his gaze.

“It was just that you have been a great help to Y/N today,” Padme quickly covered.

“It’s nothing really. What are friends for, right?”

“Yeah, friends,” you muttered, trying not to be hurt by the relationship title. “I think I’m going to pack up and head out, guys. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

You turned and started back to your room. It didn’t take you long to notice that Obi-Wan was walking beside you. You looked at him out of the corner of your eye. Obi-Wan noticed.

“I was thinking we could walk out together,” he suggested.

“I’d like that,” a small smile grew across your lips.

The two of you quickly packed up and met each other in the hallway between your two rooms.

“Ready?” Obi-Wan asked.

“Uh-huh,” you nodded. The two of you began walking out. “Thank you for the drink this morning and the lunch. It truly meant a lot to me.”

“Of course. It was really no big deal.”

“Well, it was to me.”

“I am just glad that I could be of any help.” When you reached the doors, Obi-Wan held one open for you.

“Thank you.”

“Do you have any plans for tonight?”

“Sleep.”

Obi-Wan chuckled. “That sounds like a great plan.”

“What are your plans?”

“I’m going to try not to do any work at home.”

You nodded. “Very good plan.” The two of you stopped once you arrived at your car. “Well, I guess I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Bright and early,” he smiled at you. “Have a good evening, my dear.” You bit your lip as he turned and headed to his own car.

“Yeah… you too.”

next chapter >

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achronichome · 8 months

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My Coding Journey

as a chronically ill nana 👩‍🦳 🛌 💻 💊

I've been thinking about learning to code for a while now. It's a skill that I could use in many ways to benefit my family and others. The problem is my chronic illness symptoms get in the way of everything. Trying to code while face down on the keyboard probably wouldn't work. On the other hand, if I wait until I "feel better" I won't achieve anything.

So, I've decided to record my journey of learning to code while maintaining my baseline. Hopefully it'll keep me on track and help someone else in my situation.

Day 1: 🥄🥄

I only looked after the grandcritter for an hour, with the husband's help, so I had a tiny bit of energy to Do Things with. I hoarded it at first, doing what I call Productive Rest, listening to YouTube videos while crocheting a new snack mat for my desk.

One of the videos I watched lit a fire under my 🍑 -- How I Learned to Code in Six Months and Got a Job Offer by Smoljames. He laid it all out very clearly and concisely, with the steps he took, where he oopsed, and what he did right. He fast tracked his coding education, but the video got me thinking that maybe I can slow it down while still making progress. I listened to it a couple of times, then dragged myself upright and took action.

Step one, sign up for GitHub. And right away I ran into a problem. I didn't receive the verification email. I had it re-sent, and still nothing. I squinted at the form and yep, in my brain fog I misspelled my email address. Irkitating, but fixable. But fixing it took my spoons and chucked them down the garbage disposal unit.

Long rest, during which I hung out with my husband, finished the snack mat, took care of the grandcritter again, and gathered my spoons. Then I set a timer for twenty minutes to prevent sitting long enough to flare my arthritis, and moved on to...

Step two, I signed up for FreeCodeCamp.org. I meant to just poke around, but before I knew it the timer went off and I was 15% through the first lesson. The dopamine! I didn't want to stop! But part of the point is doing this while staying within my current baseline.

Day 2: 🥄🥄🥄

I didn't sit down to code until late, and spent the entire twenty minutes stuck on one problem because of a 🤬 typo in the example they gave me. (Maybe learning to code during Mercury Retrograde wasn't my brightest idea.)

Day 3: 🥄

And now there's no example, or instructions even. Thankfully I found the answer on the forum and got it on my second actual attempt.

Either the instructions are vague/nonexistent or my brainfog is bad. I couldn't figure out the next one, either. We're told to do the thing but now how to do the thing. But there was an article on the site.

That's how it is now? Bugger. Maybe it's building on the previous lessons in ways I haven't been able to see? Part of the problem is it's all typing, and I learn best with a pen in my hand. I need to figure out how to proceed.

On the plus side I'm getting a streak going, of spending twenty-ish minutes a night studying coding.

#september 2023 #chronic illness #learning to code #nontrad nana #wtfery

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injuredcyclist · 4 months

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Fixes and Shifts

About 15 years ago when I was living in Spanish Harlem in NYC I bought a carbon fiber road bicycle. It was the kind of bike I wanted terribly as a kid. We used to drive two hours to Rapid City and I'd stare at the $1k+ bikes they had for sale at Scheels in the mall. It was a Specialize Paris Roubaix Compact. I rode it constantly when I lived in the city.

I had owned it maybe three weeks and I commuted from my apartment on 110th to the office I worked at on Wall St. I was riding on the West Side Greenway with my hands in the drops (for some stupid reason) and there were a lot of other people out. I wasn't paying as much attention as I should have been and didn't have as much fine control at that point in that riding position. Another cycling commuter and I crashed head-on. I went head-over-handlebars and came down on my helmet and right shoulder. I don't even think the impact knocked him down; he was riding an old, beat-up steel everything mountain bike. It probably weighed twice what my ride did and was the kind of thing you wouldn't care too much if it got stolen.

The shoulder hurt like hell but I was miles from my apartment, the bike was in ridable condition, and I didn't want to walk in clip-ons or call a cab so I slowly rode home, not able to put much of any pressure on that shoulder. Hurting the next day I went to the ER, where an x-ray turned up no broken bones. It kept hurting so an MRI followed. Diagnosis: small labral tear. Treatment: for some fucking reason, just physical therapy and no surgery.

Fast forward 15 years. I've just turned 40 and am closing in on two years sober, having swapped my carbon road bicycle for a 3 cylinder 900cc Yamaha motorcycle. My shoulder still bothers me, and has at a low level for all of the intervening years. I can many times very accutely feel where the tear is, and with moderate exercise (shoveling three or four inches of snow for example) or if I move just right or lean against a wall or door jam too long it hurts.

A new MRI and evaluation, because I want to put 20k miles on my Yamaha this year, I want to go back to Ontario camping, and I want to hike more. Can't have this keep lingering, and recovering and body upkeep is only going to get more time consuming as I keep getting older. Also, its fucking cold here in mid Michigan, and the days are short. It was -1F when I woke up today. If I'm going to have a useless right arm for a couple months now is perfect time.

Tear is still there, with some arthritis sprinkled on top. I'm having surgery this time, scheduled for the day after I get back from a work trip to Corporate. My pre-op appointment is in 10 days, at which time I'll know how long recovery will be. Could be in a sling for a week, could be a month. Sorta oddly hoping for the month because I want them to not just clean up stuff, but actually anchor and repair the tear.

This change is leading to another. Cleaning up who I follow and what I post, and blocking some followers I think were bots the whole time but left around so I'd feel better about myself. I still have no memorized idea of what the rules and culture are here anymore. I'll be reblogging political posts a lot less. maybe just liking them more. Shift toward riding and moto culture, with stars/astronomy, and animals. Those three represent the longest held, most continuous interests I've managed to sustain in my life, along with two or three sci-fi universes (Dune, Star Wars, and Battletech). Best I can do with my ADHD-addled mind.

Looking for a new pharmacy where I can get generic Vyvanse consistently. Meijer isn't going to carry it for at least six months because they aren't nationally cost competetive for the available supply, per one of the pharmacists where I get my stuff filled. Also going to finally see about that professional autism screening. I've taken two or three self tests/evaluations that float around online and I've come up with positive results on each one.

Here's to changes, and learning how to do a lot more with my left hand.

#life stuff #surgery #labral tear #changing up how i run this silly thing

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crystalliniti · 1 year

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Autoimmune Sucks

In the fall of 2019, I started having unexplained pain in my joints and low fevers of 99.7-100.7 Fahrenheit. I remember it started after a long 8 hour drive to the Oregon coast to see family. I went to a chiropractor there, thinking it was just from how I slept during the drive. I worked as a CNA at the time, and I had just gotten off work at 10PM. My husband picked me up and we drove straight to the coast with the kids asleep in the backseat. The chiropractor set everything back to how it was, but he told me based on the type of pain I was having, it could be something more like an autoimmune disease.

I remember sleeping a lot during that short weekend trip, because the pain was so bad. It was weird to me that an autoimmune disease would've kicked in that quickly. If I had an autoimmune disease, surely I would've felt it prior to driving to the coast. I ended up putting it off as bad weather due to the rain and being next to the ocean.

Fast forward 6+ months later, the pain had gotten worse, and the fevers continued. I started seeing a DPO who would put me under every test under the sun to find the source of my pain and fevers. There was enough blood tests to feed an army of vampires for a year. Ok, probably exaggerating... She had me do some x-rays and ultrasounds of my hands as well. She thought I had Rheumatoid Arthritis or Sjogren's. Everything just kept coming back negative. The ONLY things that would come back high were my white blood cells. She said it was obviously I had inflammation somewhere, but nothing was showing us why. She had me start seeing a rheumatologist, who also couldn't figure it out. This was about 1.5-2 years of my life just trying to get answers. I tried so many types of medications and nothing worked. I tried physical therapy, but my body still continued to hurt. I ended up giving up on doctors. I left my DPO and stopped seeing my rheumatologist.

Fast forward to the last few months of 2022. I started getting new symptoms. My hands, wrists, and arms started to weaken. My shoulders to my fingers would go completely numb when I was a sleep. It would feel like fire. Just burned so much, it would wake me up. By January 2023, I'd go numb even when awake and driving. I just kept getting worse. I was still getting the bone ripping pain throughout my body, but I was also getting serious nerve pain. I started having shortness of breath just talking or just getting in and out of bed. I started getting heart palpitations and weird pressure in my chest, like my sternum was out of place. I decided to start seeing my rheumatologist again.

I got in with my rheumatologist the end of April. This time, I actually got to see him in person. The last times were all over a video call, which made it difficult for him to see what I was talking about with swelling and etc. We talked for a good hour and looked at all my x-rays and my bloodwork over the years. He looked at my skin, listened to my lungs and heart, and just did a thorough check up. He noticed my raised tattoos, which are all older. He got suspicious. He then had me go do a bunch more blood work. Finally, after 3.5 years, I was diagnosed with both fibromyalgia and sarcoidosis. I finally am starting treatment for the sarcoidosis as well. Starting with a steroid, and if doesn't work, I'll be going on most likely Humira.

It was bittersweet news to get a diagnosis. Bitter, because it's not curable and it may be a rough life for me if I'm having so many issues this early on. Sweet, because now I have the evidence and explanation for my "ghost pains" for all these years. People treated me like a drug seeker or hypochondriac for years. If I would lay in bed all day, I was lazy. If I didn't want to move much or do anything around the house. I was a bad housewife. The list goes on. Now, I have answers.

#auto immune disease #auto immune disorder #sarcoidosis #fibromyalgia #chronic pain

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hollow-human · 2 years

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Ranting 'cause I'm really sick and tired of this life right now.

All my life I've been in pain. From the moments of my childhood I can still remember to today. Every fucking day SOMETHING has to make my life hell. I'm tired. People really don't understand how badly your health can affect your depression. I don't just have a day of feeling bad. I'm always hurting. I feel like I'm a child stuck in a frail body of some 90 years-old grandma. My joints hurt so bad I lose sleep nights and nights again. Arthritis? Probably. Migraines are almost a daily occurrence. Not even gonna mention the nausea and burning throat from all the acid I get in my throat. Endometriosis pain? A regular thing now. Being able to sleep for 12 hours straight or having insomnia for weeks? Always a thing with no in-between. Gaining a shit ton of weight due to being hypothyroid and making everything above worse? Ya bet.

Combine these with the overall stress and having not even a day without being woken up, annoyed, upset. Crying my eyeballs out on the daily because I never get a quiet moment in my apartment. Never.

And now take into account the fucking BPD gifted to me by my parents and trauma. Always on the verge of a mental breakdown, always prone to hurting myself out of the absolute despair I feel daily. Always feeling like I will never get better. Always feeling like I should just end it.

I am so, so, so tired. People of my age are out there enjoying their lives at the beach, festivals, parties. I'm here mourning a life that was taken away from me way too fast. Wishing and praying I find a quick and easy way out. The peace I crave is one knot away and I have to fight with myself against every fucking thing to not put an end to it. I'm tired of having autoimmune and chronic diseases I am not responsible for. I did not do this to myself, the shitty genes in this dumb family did. I'm tired of suffering for something my parents did. To bring children into this world knowing how shitty the DNA in the family is and what diseases they have is top notch.

I wish for once I could have a normal fucking life. For one day to know how it feels to be healthy and not cry yourself to sleep because you are so very drained. "Everyone has the same 24 hours" no the fuck we don't. My shitty 24 hours are all painful as fuck, unlike most of my friends' who don't have anything like that. Imagine the fucking privilege to not understand how hard life is for someone who is being betrayed by their own body. Just imagine.

Imagine having to still give your all and try your best despite knowing you will never be okay. I will never recover. I will never live enough to grow old with someone. The pain will get too much and I will want out. And I will get out. But I don't know if that moment will come in 2 years, 5, 10. So I still have to play house, go to uni, work. I still have to pretend I am like everyone else. With all the pressure put on me to become something my body will never allow me to be. What a fun, lovely life.

#chronic illness #chronically ill #autoimmune

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phoenixyfriend · 3 years

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Uncle Ben and Little Luke

AKA we combine several types of time travel for maximum Soft Chaos, let’s go

EDIT NOW THAT I’VE WRITTEN THIS UP: jfc this ended up much angstier than initially intended uhhhhhhhhhh sorry

So a common enough thing I’ve seen in time travel fics is characters getting de-aged when tossed back physically, to neither the age they should be in that time, nor the age they were from the time they left, but whatever is most convenient. This is usually de-aging OT Obi-Wan into his TCW self, for reasons relating to, chiefly, removing the damage of Tatooine absolutely destroying his body alongside PTSD-driven alcoholism, but also because fic writers are horny, and Ewan McGregor playing a late-thirties negotiator is on average more appealing to people than Alec Guinness playing a vaguely feral desert hermit.

So, here’s how it plays out:

We take Luke and Ben from some point in the OT. There are a variety of options depending on how angsty we want it to be. My first instinct is ‘right after Owen and Beru die’ but I want to have that sweet angst where Luke knows that his dad is Vader and that Obi-Wan was trying to convince him to kill his own father without telling him that.

We’ll go with shortly after Bespin, and then they end up significantly before TPM. The Obi-Wan of the timeline proper is, eh, let’s say eighteen. Not really ready to be a knight, but old enough that we don’t have to worry about “if we go save Shmi, do we somehow wipe out Anakin?” which is absolutely a worry. Anakin is a toddler, and is in no place to be evil, on account of being literally two years old. He can’t even explode people with his brain yet.

Now, Ben finds himself mid-thirties, as is traditional. He’s not upset at this, because his joints hurt so much less than they used to! His knees aren’t exactly teenage-perfect, but by the Force are they better than they were in the years before he died! His hair has color! He doesn’t have arthritis! And, goodness, no physical withdrawal symptoms! The psychological aspect is still there, but nonetheless, he’s in much better shape than he last remembers being.

Luke looks like he’s about six. He was recently twenty-two. This is not an upgrade. Ben keeps having to carry him. He can’t see over the counter when they enter a bar for information. He can’t enter the bar in the first place. He’s very annoyed by all of this.

Ben is not annoyed. Ben is having a lot of emotions, actually, but annoyance isn’t one of them. He didn’t get to help raise Luke the way he might have if Anakin hadn’t lost his shit, okay, he sees a small Luke and he wants to hug him and cry.

Luke would like to be able to purchase a speeder part without the lady at the stall asking him if he needs his “dad’s” permission.

Once they figure out when and where they are, they need to decide where and how to leave. There are general shenanigans to gamble their way into enough money to hire a ship. They are in the ass end of nowhere, but definitely not Tatooine. There appears to be a jungle. There appears to be a significant variety of man-eating creatures. There appears to be a temple to the Force of questionable origin. None of this is actually helpful, except for the moment they find a “baby’s first lightsaber” in the temple.

Luke only has one hand and, being a six-year-old, his body is growing too fast for him to bother with getting a wired-in prosthesis the way he could as an adult. He can get a more basic prosthesis, but nothing that attaches to the neurons. He’ll outgrow it too fast.

He’s tiny and he’s not used to doing things with just one hand. He uses the Force to do what one hand can't, and every time someone tries to tell him he's misusing the Force he whaps them with the empty sleeve.

So, you know, they find out what year it is. Ben has a breakdown. Luke is upset that he left behind his friends. Ben admits to him that Leia was his twin. Luke stares in horror because dude, she kissed him, you couldn’t have mentioned this earlier???

Ben points out that Beru and Owen were keeping Luke away from him for nineteen years, and then they had about three days of awkward travel to find Leia in the first place, and then Ben died. He didn’t have a whole lot of time to figure out how to tell him.

(This sparks an argument that lasts several days. All onlookers assume that Ben’s son is throwing a tantrum. He doesn’t correct them, even though this is a very valid reason to be upset, because the truth is much harder to explain.)

Sooooo they travel. Mostly, Ben plays Sabacc, cleans house, and pays their way towards Coruscant. Luke still really wants to learn to be a Proper Jedi, even though Ben is pretty sure that Luke would have... a lot of difference of opinion with the Temple, but sure. Coruscant. They can at least stop by, and see Qui-Gon, and Mace, and Quinlan, and Bant, and everyone else that’s still alive and not tragically deceased in the horror following the start of the Clone Wars and then the birth of the Empire, and Ben can have a nice sob over all his dead friends being alive again.

Ben is only barely holding it together while Luke is in the room with him at any given point. But it’s fine! It’s fine. He’s fine. All of his loved ones have come back to life! It’s great! HE’S FINE.

He is not fine.

Luke is also grieving all the people who haven’t been born yet, but he’s... significantly more okay than Ben is.

The closer they get to the Core, the more often people just assume Ben is Luke’s father, and then look shocked and uncomfortable when Luke flatly calls him by his name, and they just... compromise. This is the point at which Luke starts calling him “Uncle Ben.”

Ben cries in his bunk later that night. Luke overhears it and wonders how the HELL Ben is more unstable now, when there’s a chance to fix things and no Vader or Empire trying to kill or capture both of them, and all his friends are alive.

(Luke will later learn a lot about PTSD and realize this is actually a fairly normal situation, to process significant events and emotions only after gaining safety or catharsis.)

(Twenty years on a ball of sand with an alcohol addiction and debilitating fear of the man you raised as your own brother is not, in fact, safe or cathartic.)

At any rate, they’ve settled into that pattern by the time they reach the Inner Rim. The Inner Rim is the part of the galaxy at which they’ve collected enough money (and mental stability) to travel a little better, and to take a few more risks.

Risks like “manipulate people with those baby blues.”

Ben tells Luke that he’s a menace, after he pouts so cutely that he gets a free scarf added on to a purchase that Ben makes. Luke responds that Ben has no room to talk, since he flirted a free breakfast out of that one inn owner.

Also, Luke is currently physically six. That is objectively a situation that sucks. He deserves to use it for all it’s worth if he’s stuck like this.

“You know, if you keep wearing all-black and looking longingly at the velvet cape and Space Chanel boots, the temple is going to worry that you’re a darksider.”

“Uncle Ben... you told me, yesterday, that I sparkle so brightly in the Force that it’s almost blinding.”

“Yes, but the gloves--”

They don’t agree on this, but Ben relents. He does actually understand good fashion, unfortunately, and he’s not unaware of how much Leia taught Luke about such things.

Luke’s about forty years ahead of the curve, of course, but Skywalkers are prone to such things. It’s usually in regards to technology, granted, but...

They get to Coruscant. Ben is very obviously a Jedi. He knows all the right words and walks like a Soresu master and feels warm and comforting in the Force. They let him in with minimal questions. They note down “my first padawan left the order to have a child, but died shortly after; I consider Luke here to be my nephew, and have raised him as such,” and move on.

Luke is vaguely annoyed because he already had an uncle (and aunt) that raised him, but he admits that a person can have more than one uncle. He can live with this. Ben was more family to Anakin than Owen was, in some ways, so it’s kind of true. Luke is even working on feeling more childish affection for Ben instead of the complicated mess of emotions that come from being lied to about some very large and important subjects, and then seeing the person saying those lies have regular emotional breakdowns due to something as small as Luke saying he likes the curve of the hull on that freighter.

(Apparently he sounds just like his father did as a child. This is almost heartwarming.)

The thing is! The thing. The thing is, they almost make it to the Halls of Healing to get looked over for weird viruses, or Outer Rim Parasites, or whatever the hells needs to be happening. They almost make it without Ben having a flashback to dead younglings or brainwashed troopers or the declaration of a Sith Empire. They almost make it without incident.

Then Ben sees Qui-Gon, and freezes, and does not move again.

Luke cannot get him to restart.

People are staring.

They haven’t even made it to Medical, Uncle Ben, come on.

Young, local Obi-Wan comes over and asks if there’s something he can do to help. Or maybe this “Ben” knows Qui-Gon? Master Jinn doesn’t recognize Ben, but maybe Luke knows more?

Luke does know more, but what Luke actually says is “he probably needs a mind healer.”

(Ben will not appreciate this.)

(Ben is unfortunately standing in the middle of the hallway and completely unresponsive, and is unable to argue with this assertion.)

(Ben is pretty much proving this assertion entirely correct, actually.)

Obi-Wan is helpful, if a little bitchy in the manner of most late-teens individuals, and offers to help get Uncle Ben down to the Halls of Healing. It involves Obi-Wan gently pushing on Ben’s shoulders, and Qui-Gon offering to carry Luke so he can be in Ben’s sights (because Ben is a Mystery, and Qui-Gon is quite fond of those, so he wants to stay involved). Ben kind of just... shuffles on down.

There are medical tests. They ask about how Luke lost his hand. He refuses to talk about it. They ask how Ben got all his scars. Luke says he doesn’t know. They ask if he knows why Ben looks like he’s been through a war. Luke says it’s because he probably was.

They check for foreign viruses. They find evidence of thus-far-unpatented vaccinations. They ask Luke if he knows what he’s vaccinated for.

“How would I know? I’m six.”

They agree that this is a good excuse.

(It is not. He’s lying. They do not know this.)

They do some more tests. They find a lot of questionable medical bullshit in Ben’s body. Most of this is from the clone wars, but they don’t know this. Someone realizes they haven’t gotten a ping back from the Shadow Network regarding “do we have permission to pull the medical file of a Jedi that isn’t in the normal database? We’re assuming you know who he is, since we don’t.”

The Shadow Network does not know who Ben is.

The healers, of course, go “huh, that’s weird, but maybe the name he gave his nephew was fake. We can’t exactly ask ‘Ben’ for more details right now. We already had to sedate him. Let’s check the DNA!”

The DNA pulls up as Obi-Wan Kenobi.

The padawan who brought this guy in two hours ago.

“Huh, that’s weird. Let’s call in Kenobi and ask if he knows what’s going on.”

Obi-Wan absolutely does not know what’s going on.

They ask Luke.

“Oh, I don’t know,” he says, lying through his teeth and not even pretending otherwise.

“You’re not a very good liar,” teenage Obi-Wan tells him.

“I’m not trying to be,” Luke says. “Can you get Master Yoda? I feel like we’re going to need him.”

They normally wouldn’t get Yoda on the request of a six-year-old, but they also normally don’t have a catatonic thirty-something Jedi who looks like he’s been through a war popping up in the medical database as the pimply teenage padawan that broke his pinky trying to do a Badass Ataru Flip last week.

Or... whatever Luke i... is... oh dear.

“Young one,” Qui-Gon asks, while people whisper-shout behind him, not realizing he’s cutting the Correlian Knot and just asking the kid himself. “Do you know why your midichlorian count is so high? It’s almost unheard of.”

“Uncle Ben said my dad was the Chosen One,” Luke says, because he is capable of being a little shit and is actually really eager to let Ben deal with some of the fallout. He feels for the man, really, but he’s also tired of being the one to field every single question.

Also, the expressions that pass on Qui-Gon’s face are hilarious.

(Luke may or may not be more affected by his six-year-old brain than he would like to admit.)

“Thank you,” Qui-Gon says, sounding more than a little strangled about it.

It takes another three hours for Ben to wake up.

He listens to the questions. He hears what they say his ‘nephew’ said. He looks at Luke.

“Is this revenge for not telling you about Leia?”

“It’s not revenge,” Luke does not lie. “I just don’t know how to explain it.”

“It’s pretty easy to explain.”

“It’s not my secret.”

“This is revenge for the Leia thing.”

“No,” Luke says. “Revenge for the Leia thing was when I ate a live frog in front of you.”

This is the point at which someone interrupts and points out that they appear to be stalling.

“Oh, he is,” Luke tells them. He gestures at Ben. “I can’t tell you more, because it’s more his story than mine.”

“I’m afraid, Master, that I am very likely to have an emotional breakdown if I allow myself to consider the reality of this situation for longer than the fraction of a second I already have,” Ben reports, full of false cheer. “Suffice to say, I am far from stable and have only held out this far for Luke’s sake.”

“Can you explain why you have my DNA?” Obi-Wan asks, as the person who’s most concerningly involved in this situation.

“You can,” Ben says, smiling like there is absolutely nothing wrong in the slightest, ever. “I’m you, from the future. I actually died and spent a few years dead before coming back. I’m not sure why I’m younger than I was when I died, but I appreciate being able to put on my shoes without my knees attempting to mutiny.”

“He needs a mind healer,” Luke reiterates, in case the strained grin hasn’t made it clear. “So do I, but not as much.”

“I have felt literally every person in this Temple save for Luke and Yoda die,” Ben reports, looking a shade more manic than a few seconds earlier. “It’s very overwhelming to feel you all being alive again. I may be approaching a mental breakdown, and I’ve been rather strictly advised against using alcohol to treat my traumas again.”

Luke kicks him in the thigh. It’s not a very hard kick, because he is very small, and he does actually like Ben. “I’m not letting you turn into an old drunk again.”

After several seconds of silence, a healer quietly suggests that everyone clear the room, and asks if someone could fetch Master Yoda as the youngling requested.

(THIS IS ALMOST THREE THOUSAND WORDS. I started it less than two hours ago. Why am I like this.)

#Ben Kenobi #Obi Wan Kenobi #Luke Skywalker #Qui Gon Jinn #Time Travel #De Aging #Phoenix Posts #Uncle Ben and Little Luke

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prof-peach · 3 years

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Out of all of the pokemon you have taken care of, which one do you think it was the hardest to deal with? Be cuz they were in a pretty bad shape, or just personality wise?

We get rumbunctious and rowdy Pokemon all the time, our works nature brings them to us probably more than any other issue, outside of grass Pokemon care and management. Anger and nervousness is something we have a good hold of here, and try to help iron out of various species. I do a lot of that work, and on occasion, Grey will do the odd water type with these problems, as I tend to shy away from those. For the most part, they are short stint stays, a couple months, to a couple years helping them to rewire their anger into a more productive feeling or energy. That being said, there’s alwasy the odd Pokemon who comes our way who’s just a step above the rest. So here’s some stories of the ones who have had to stay with us, for their temperament and behaviour.

On the north side of the island, we house the biggest, meanest Pokemon, and the individuals who are very timid and nervous around people. We do this to ensure they have space to live undisturbed in peace, but also to protect guests and visitors from being eaten, crushed, blasted, or otherwise harmed. Some of the northern residents are difficult yes, but most are just stroppy or uncomfortable with the majority of humans, but there are a handful that are actively engaged in harming or hunting people.

One such Pokemon is a rather nasty tempered Drampa, he came to us about five or so years ago now, kindly donated by being abandoned on our shores, it’s original trainer leaving the ball and hopping on a boat without alerting us, or letting the individual know. We figured it would be possible to rehome it, they’re usually a rather reasonable Pokemon to handle, considering their typing. We were wrong. This Pokemon when let out of the ball, went on a monsterous rampage for four days, destroying forests, toppling buildings, blasting holes in the mountain to try to burrow away, and picking fights with anything it’s size or bigger, often causing great harm to others. The island didn’t rest for that entire time, most Pokemon cowering from it, bigger species trying to halt them, all in vain. It took an entire troop of grass Pokemon using sleep powder to knock it out, the Drampa moved about so fast, one single grass type didn’t stand a chance to produce enough spores in time. It took a lot of work but we knocked the old boy out, and got a good look at him. His body was riddled with arthritis, not medicated, he would thrash about and cause himself so much pain and discomfort. He had overgrown nails, the feet hidden in the fur they have around their torso, often overlooked, and it’s ability to fly was limited because of its general condition and state. We began helping it, medicating it’s aislments, aiding it’s inflamed joints, but it never really calmed down, so now it chills out alone on the coast of the north side, left well alone, it doesn’t even like the company of other Pokemon.

We’ve done our best to interact with it, to socialise it, to generally get it use to people enough to do medical checks, but it’s still very resistant. We have decided that after two years of hard work, and it being tolerant to me, at least to check it’s health and wellbeing, that it’s best to let it live it’s life unbothered. Many would push a Pokemon to be a perfect social being, but we don’t believe it’s necessary for happiness. Some species are happy to be away from others, I wouldn’t push a human to be social, I know how awful that can be, so we didn’t force the individual to be around others either. It’s not that it’s unhappy, we spot it from time to time sitting on the rocks by the ocean, humming to itself, and the small pidgey and tailow that come by don’t bother it, and even give mild brief conversation. He seems ok, the medicine given means he’s in less pain, despite still having stiffness, and in the winter we’ve built him a unique space, rocky cover much like a cave, just above a Macargo hide where they lay eggs. The heat from those Pokemon keep its cave very hot, and help in the cold to ease the joint aches. The two species have different entrances, making sure they never meet within the hide at any point. There’s a good slab of rock dividing them, so it’s not an issue, and saves us having to pipe hot water over that far for him. He eats well, has a few items he’s kept from the labs, a toy sentret, and a large red ball, and generally is in a good place to live out his life in peace now.

Another difficult member would be a particularly timid Slazzle, gifted to us by a police member who had confiscated it from a rather mean individual close to her home town, they had been hurting the poor Pokemon, forcing it to produce an insane amount of poison liquid, throwing water on the poor thing every time it tried to ignite to retaliate, generally abusing the poor thing for its life, apparently it had been locked away since it was a young unevolved Pokemon. They’d been harvesting the poisons from the Slazzle and dropping it into various water sources to try to control the local Pokemon population, as they blamed the wild ones for the state of their land, and diminished crops yield from their allotment. Jokes on them, that water poisoning affected them too, and their garden died very quickly, and made the man quite sick through consumption of the crops he grew there. The slazzle is still very skittish, will hide at any given moment, we’ve seen her ignite an entire building in one move, and then bolt away through the flames to lose our line of sight. She managed to stay hidden for two weeks on the island, before we caught sight of her again. Generally she’s just a case fo neglect but we have been working with her now for a long while, 3 ish years, and her temperament is at least manageable amongst our staff. We have found her others of her kind to help her settle, and she’s become good friends with a Wartortle who came from the same area, they bond over memories of the place, and seem very happy in each others company.

We’ve found ways to keep her grounded, but she never goes near people when we have open days, slinks off through the big fence to the north side, and waits out the visiting hours until night. They’re not usually nocturnal but she likes the night, and spends her time looking about, foraging and feeding in the later hours. If you’re quiet you can catch her moving around the forests and the base of the mountains here, talking with the occasional individual, she seems to enjoy Murkrow too, their company seems to keep her quite social, as they usually move in large flocks here. She may never be rehomed, but for now we try to socialise her, we don’t battle her, and she has a very calm and peaceful nook to go to when she’s having a rough time. We make sure to provide support where possible, and though she’s a little skittish she’s somewhat happy to have myself and Grey, even Pari take a look at any wounds or scrapes she may gain while living here. She’s become trusting enough to come to us if we call, and who knows, maybe someone will come our way who she takes an interest in. There’s hope for her yet, we have however become quite fond of her, and she’s part of the furniture now. It may end up that she never leaves, and lives her life in peace here, surrounded by people and Pokemon who love her. Her panic makes her very difficult to pass to another trainer, and she’s prone to spitting up huge quantities of toxic liquid when spooked, and bolts at a slight bang or rumble.

One I have kept back for a number of reasons, is a rather mean tempered Aerodactyl. Normally we get Pokemon sent to us, but this one I ended up finding myself, some circus had her chained up in a box hardly big enough to turn around in, an attraction to the masses as they travelled through the area. The leader of that troop was particularly awful, treating Pokemon as commodities, items to be bought and sold, used as toys in his big performances. Boiled my blood. We called her Zeplin, and after 12 years she has still got a nasty temper on her, when not focused on a task. Her condition when we first found her was quite something, tattered wings, unable to fly straight at all, and she was littered with cuts and bruises, not in good health. Val has melted the chains that bound her, and the lock in her cage, and she just went, like a bat out of hell, flew off, blasting the tent that hid her quarters, burning a lot of the circus as she went. Little did I know, my foot was in one of the chain links, and I got dragged off with her, the ground, Val, all my other team mates, falling from my pocket, or being left on the floor where we had once been standing. She flew, and kept going, not aware I was still attached, you could see her wings were having a hard time catching the breeze, littered with holes and tears, she went for about two hours, I nearly froze that high up, trying to get a good grip on what chain was left so I didn’t come falling from that height. We came to a very sudden crash landing, she hadn’t had much chance to practice the whole take off - land thing from the feel of it, we both ate dirt, and she became very aware that I was there all of a sudden.

I had about three seconds while she assessed my presence, to get out of the chain, and dive behind a rock that gave me cover from an almighty blast of energy, chipping away bits, catching my arm a little. Trust me when I say, it’s terrifying coming face to face with something that stands a fair few meters taller than you, with more teeth and claws than you’re comfortable with dealing with, with none of your Pokemon, no weaponry, no real plan or cover other than a rock. How she didn’t eat me, I don’t know. Perhaps she knew it was me that let her go, maybe she just ran out of energy, but for whatever reason, she made a few bits and tail lashes at me, missed the lot, and gave up, turning to stomp off into the forests around us. She was still shackled with heavy irons, one on the neck, two on the legs, and was in serious condition, so I did the stupid thing and followed her, tried to sneak my way behind, though every now and then she would look towards me, and try to focus on my form in the dark of night now. It was a few days, she had stalked some prey, fed, and was starting to ooze from some wounds. Though the circus was unkind, they were providing her with medication that stopped further infections occurring, perhaps a scarred beast of great size drew more punters, maybe they were just making sure she survived to make them money, I still don’t know.

I hunted herbs, dug out roots with rocks, used river water, and common berries and managed to fashion some kind of salve, nothing amazing, especially back at that age, but it would work, I knew it would because I used it on my own wounds first. Just had to convince her it was a good thing to let me get close. Not an easy task. We physically brawled, she was clearly spent, not able to use any attacks, just thrashing about, I managed to trip her with the chains still attached to her legs, and once downed, you can jump on the head of these Pokemon to keep the jaws shut, just long enough to lather the wounds you can reach, then bolt fast. It was a small act, but she took off running again. With some wounds sort of cared for, I followed again, fishing for dinner, forraging roots to chew on. It wasn’t much but it kept me going, then one night, where I had climbed to a crook of a large tree, using my jacket to tie myself in for a nights sleep, I was awoken by loud rustling, thudding of feet, and a mighty huff.

Below where I sat, the Pokemon had returned, being no doubt well aware of my presence, following the smell of human, she had noticed the salve do a good job on the wounds I managed to reach, but the ones I couldn’t get near had become far worse, red, inflamed and weeping terribly, no doubt hurting and itching. I’d seen her rubbing her sides in the day, itching gasinst rocks and trees, smearing blood and ooze along her path as she trudged. So here we were, alone in the woods, I veeeeery carefully climbed down, staying in cover as much as possible, and over the space of an hour or two, she let me come out into the open, teeth bared yeah, but she hadn’t attacked, and other than a very uncomfortable, low growl, she allowed me to creep closer, some more of that salve made more for my own wounds than hers, being sniffed at, she licked it too, but wasn’t happy with the taste, very bitter, and I was cautiously optimistic, allowed to help her heal the rest of the cuts she had acquired from her old home. So we began our....I want to say friendship but that wasn’t it, it was a collaboration to survive.

We had landed somewhere far from others, I missed my team, and she had never experienced anything outside of the cage, and so we banded together, tentatively. We caught dinner as a team, and climbed for fruits, foraged for berries, reapplying what loose form of medicine I managed to make, before coming to some kind of comfortable companionship together. A week passed, wandering without a clue where we were, before a path was found, she seemed to want to avoid it, and while I wasn’t keen on people much either, it was impossible not to want to find my team again. They needed me, and I needed them. If they had been found, a police officer or the likes may have sent them to my original professor, waiting to be called from the PC system again, but knowing Val, she had grabbed the balls, my things, and bolted to hide, waiting for my return. In desperation I tried to explain this to the Aerodactyl, who had not experienced a trainers care before, and seemed reluctant to return.

It was only upon mentioning revenge, to burn the circus to the ground, that I regained her attention, and we came to a slow agreement to get aid, gather items, and return to where she had been released from. She waited in the forest while I went to town, checking my PC space to see if my team had been handed in, which they had! It was lucky, I was reunited with Val (vulpix), Booker (teddiursa), and Potato (bulbasaur) who I took back, and returned to the woods with.

We had to get some revenge, and in turn we devised a plan to free the Pokemon first, sneak in and pick the locks, melt the chains and gates, and then finally, let the aerodactyl do her thing once the vulnerable individuals were loose. I did my best to hold back my own personal rage, and simply aid the demise of a group who were awful towards Pokemon through this one big flying type. I wint go into details but no one perished in the fire, they were arrested and charged for unsafe work conditions, and abuse towards Pokemon, not to mention false advertising, having no worker’s Compensation in pace for injury, which many staff complained of, and several incidents of sexual harassment in the work place that were brought to light.

Once one started to talk, the others all joined in, and the fire was put down to unsafe working conditions and a lack of health and safety. From what I heard, the whole circus worth of Pokemon were rehomed, helped and generally lived much better lives after that. However now we had one very mistrusting angry Aerodactyl on our hands, a Pokemon I had not worked with before, who had seemingly become quite tolerant of me, but would snap at just about anyone who clocked eyes with her. So I kind of just kept her, no ball, not for a fair few years, we both didn’t think it was important. She was nursed back to health, and we had to go through a lot of training together, she bit booker once quite badly, but we’ve all put that in the past, and have worked on it together.

She is still testing, she won’t be ridden by anyone else, she doesn’t care for other Pokemon much, crowds will spook her, she doesn’t like when people talk with raised voices or hostile tones, and gets real irritable if you come at her in any kind of way that isn’t open handed, calm and slowly. She’s now a very capable flier, wings healed up, spending her first half of life locked up made her long for the open sky, so now we take time together to go off and ride winds when work is slow, and she’s helped in many ways to make the island functional, by moving logs, clearing paths, helping lift building materials around, and generally being there for me when I’m full of rage, which is actually annoyingly often. We’re anger buddies hah, kind of get on the same level with it. She’s become so much part of my family, and I feel like i’m part of hers now too, so I doubt she’d be rehomed, but should she find somewhere she would rather be, we wouldn’t stop her going. She is difficult, angry, snappy, tempermental, difficult, won’t be touched by strangers, likes to fight, but I’d not change her, she’s our testing monster, who we love and adore.

Went off a bit, but I figured why not, I know her, and can write more about her life and story than the others.

#pokemon #prof.peach #peach talks #long post

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sometimesrosy · 3 years

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Hi, Rosy!

I know this is more a random fact, but I saw your anon ask about From Blood and Ash which is by one of my fave authors, Jennifer Lynn Armentrout. She IS a speed writer, but out of necessity as she has a degenerative disease that is slowly making her go blind, and she wants to get out as many books as she can before she looses her vision. From her website bio:

“In early 2015, Jennifer was diagnosed with retinitis pigmentosa, a group of rare genetic disorders that involve a breakdown and death of cells in the retina, eventually resulting in loss of vision, among other complications. Due to this diagnosis, educating people on the varying degrees of blindness has become of passion of hers, right alongside writing, which she plans to do as long as she can.”

Figured that might help your asker a bit too. JLL is writing that fast because she’s in a race against her health. They’re absolutely fine if they don’t write that fast!

Wow. You know, I read that in my google search, but didn't make the connection.

That is a total nightmare. As an artist and writer, I would hate to lose my vision. I mean, it's already going. I've become very far sighted in the last ten years in addition to my slightly near sighted as usual. Which means near is very fuzzy and far is kinda fuzzy. And it does seem to be speeding up, so you know, I never even realized that was something I should be worried about.

Although I did have a professor in college who was legally blind and whose vision was degenerating, and that didn't mean he couldn't write. He, however, uses someone to type for him, I think. So, while I understand the urge to write all her stories as fast as possible (which I respect a lot, actually) and it probably gives her a sense of urgency that most of us don't have-- she's writing against a ticking clock-- she will probably be able to find some accommodations to keep writing. Not that I'm saying what she SHOULD do, just imagining myself in her situation. (actually starting to worry about it, not with vision, but with my hands [I probably have the beginning stage of rheumatoid arthritis, yay auto immune disease.]) I wonder how well voice to text programs work.

Well, I'm sorry I said she might have hired a ghost writer. Now I feel bad. Although I tend to think the people who DO have ghostwriters speedwriting for them are self publishers. Not sure a trad publisher would be okay with that? I mean I KNOW people are doing that, because I'm one of the ghostwriters who is hired to do it. I just don't know who they are. And the people who ghostwrite are people who have a lot of facility and ease with words, because you simply can't write a publishable story that fast unless you do, never mind the drafting process or narrative depth or subtext or poetic language.

But you're right, nonny. The OP of that ask shouldn't worry about not writing that fast. No one HAS to write that fast unless something is compelling them. Like a degenerative disorder, or a deadline or empty pockets and low $/word, or a compulsion.

And I still want to emphasize how LONG and how much practice and learning it takes to learn how to write that fast. If you WANT to write that fast, start giving yourself a daily word count goal. Write every day. Learn your process. Get comfortable with writing stream of consciousness. Honestly also switch to outlining if you're a pantser. Because while it's possible to WRITE fast from the seat of your pants without an outline, it's pretty hard to keep a story on track, and get all that info into the story and tie it up together, because writing so fast means you have less time with each element of the story, and, for me at least, those elements slip out of my short term memory and I don't remember what I wrote. So I have to write it all down in my outline.

Ahh. I'm writing with my short term memory. THAT'S why all my ghostwritten stories are no longer with me, unlike my original fiction, which I continue to think about, even if I wrote it years ago.

I was thinking about making a class, or maybe some posts first, about how to speed write/power write. Is that actually something people want to learn?

#writeblr #power writing #speed writing #disability awareness #outlining #rosy writes #writers #writing process #ghostwriting

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andromeda612 · 4 years

Text

The writer vs the liar

So, remember the prompt from a few days ago? You can chek it here

Well, I made a draft for what would be the whole fic, I'm gonna start it soon and will post it in Ao3, I would make a post when is ready and with every update, if you are interested make me know, so I can tag you.

I apologize for any mistake, english is not my first language, I hope you like it!

After Mari is expelled Nathaniel and Alix are worried and confused, because there is no way Marinette did those things (Alix defended Marinette in Reverser and I like to think that Nathaniel learned his lesson, so they are less likely to believe that Marinette would do anything of what Lila said) but all the mess is confusing. They talk but can't get a good answer. They decide to relax a little in the art club, they can't.

Marc noticing their mood ask what's wrong. So they tell him, and Marc is fast to point out all the wrong things with the whole situation. The "evidence" is circumstancial, superficial and easily planted, Damocles should have called Lila's parents too, no just Marinette's, Lila should had at least some bruises but there is no one, the protocole says that they needed to make an investigation, Mari has the right to prove her innocence, but Damocles just expelled her then and there. So yeah, the school messed up, because that failure in protocole and lack of professionalism can be addressed as neglect.

Thinking a little more they come to the conclusion that Marinette had been framed, but by who and why? If you think about it the only suspect is Lila, after all she was in the middle of the fire, but why would she did that? Marc asks for more background about this girl, because he only knows her because he had seen her sometimes in school and because Rose mentioned her once or twice, Nathaniel nor Alix have ever talked about her, Marinette either (and that interview on the Ladyblog is not that famous, so he missed it)

Alix explains the drama between those two, the seats thing (Marc tells them that it was wrong to move Mari to the back without asking her, maybe Nathaniel never had problem with being alone but he is not Marinette, they admit it was thoughtless from them and make a note to apologize later) and Marinette claming that Lila is a liar.

That catches Marc's atention, he knows Marinette, for him she is like a sister in everything but blood, after all she was the first person who was nice to him in school and despite not knowing in the time being that he has social anxiety she always was patient and kind with him until he was comfortable enough talking to her. Misunderstanding aside, she was the one who introduced him to Nathaniel and the rest of her friends from the art club, and they introduced him with the rest of their friends. Now he has two best friends (Mari and Alix) is dating his other bff (Nathaniel) has other good friends and is working in what he loves with his partner, all thanks to Marinette, so is no wonder that the two of them grew closer.

He knows that Mari hates liars, so if she thinks that this girl is a liar she must has a very good reason. Then Alix says that it just her being jealous because of Adrien. And yes, that may be true, Marinette tends to get jealous of any rival for the boy's affection, and can do crazy and, honestly, pretty bad stuff for him but again, he knows her and knows that at the end Marinette always admits her wrongdoings, apologizes and does better. He also knows that jealousy for itself is not a strong motive for dislike someone that much, because Chloe? is a brat, Kagami? He knows that Marinette actually helped Adrien in a date with her and now both girls are very good friends despite her knowing that Adrien actually is interested in Kagami, so if this Lila is really that good of a person then why Marinette seems to dislike her and think that is a liar? She has to has a reason.

When he says this Alix and Nathaniel have the decency of look ashamed, Marc is right, they (Alix and the girls the most) should have asked for her reasons instead of brush it off as simply jealousy, Marinette is better than that.

With his point clear, Marc asks for more details, maybe they can discover why Marinette thinks Lila is a liar. Again is Alix who talks (Nathaniel never had been one of Lila's admirers and he pays not much attention to the drama) and tells every story Lila told them (I'm not including the napkin incident because either Nathaniel nor Alix were there, Nathaniel was alone in another table and Alix wasn't in the cafeteria at all) and once she is done Marc is fast to point every single hole, contradiction and nonsense in Lila's claims.

Being a writer and a very active reader makes this kind of thing easy for him, it also helps that some of Lila's claims can be debunked with a little knowledge (arthritis doesn't work like that for example) and him has plenty of that, he likes to read about different topics, not just stories and comics, also is the fact that he makes lots of researching for his stories (the comic is not the only thing he writes for) even if they are about fantasy he likes them to be coherent and solid, so if he is going to use some topic he research to support his writing, so yeah he knows a little of many things. He also points out all the times Lila manipulated them so they did things for her, and how.

Now they know the truth, Lila IS a liar and a manipulative one.

HOLY SHIT MARINETTE WAS RIGHT! First they feel bad, they should have listened to her! They are also ashamed because now that they think about it most of the lies are dumb! They are idiots!

Marc is fast to comfort them, after all some of her lies are believable at least from their point of view, their class is not a normal one they have some famous people like Adrien a famous model, Chloe the mayor's daughter, Nathaniel is the ilustrator of one of the most popular comics in Paris, Marinette is Jagged Stone's favorite designer and has been prized by Gabriel Agreste and Audrey Bourgois, Max is a genius with his own AI, there is Kitty Section and the list goes. So, one more student with conections and awesome claims is not that difficult to believe. Also, they are being manipulated, Lila use pity to make herself look vulnerable and fragil, so they would not question her or her claims, she also takes advantage of their kindness. Being fooled and manipulated is not a crime, they are victims too.

That make them feel better, but now they are pissed, because THEY ARE BEING FOOLED, MANIPULATED AND TAKEN ADVANTAGE OF! AND MARINETTE IS EXPELLED AND ALL IS THAT WITCH FAULT!

Marc is pissed too, being the patient and quiet person he is there are just a few things that makes him trully angry, but messing with his loved ones is the top of that list, and that little bitch is messing with all of his friends and his boyfriend! She is not just liying, manipulating and using them, she also gives them false hope with all the false promises she made, they are gonna be hurt once she fails in fulfil them. And MARINETTE IS EXPELLED so yeah, that brat crossed many lines.

For now they decide to talk to Marinette, Alix and Nathaniel need to apologize, and to make her know that the three of them know the truth and are by her side.

Later they discover that Marinette's expulsion is revoked, aparently all was a huge misunderstanding and Lila herself clarified the mess. Yeah, something is off here and they are not going to let their guard down, but at least Mari's name is clean.

The next day they are in the bakery with Marinette's favorite ice cream and two draws made by Alix and Nath, a -forgive-us-for-not-listened-you-and-for-being-bad-friends- gift. Marinette is relieved and actually cries of joy for having her friends by her side and free from Lila's claws, and of course she forgive them, after all they admitted their errors and apologized, also despite the evidence against her they gave her the benefit of the doubt, and for that she is grateful.

They talk and Marinette tells them how she found out the truth the same she told Alya and Nino (Marc tells her that it was not ok to follow Adrien and Lila but unlike them he still listened to her side of the story) she also point out that she ACTUALLY KNOWS Jagged Stone.

But hey! That doesn't mean that Adrien also knows the truth?

Yeah, she also tells them that Adrien is aware of Lila's true nature and also talks about the 'high road' advice. "HE TOLD YOU WHAT?"

But before any of them could get angry with Adrien she explains that he really thought her lies were harmless, also he believed that expose her would be bad because he called her out in a friendly way and still she was akumatized, but now that she was expelled he recognized that his advice was a bad one and that her lies can hurt people, he already apologized to her, and explained that he made a deal with Lila, he will be her friend and she will be a model and in return she will bring Mari back to school. He also admited that the best is to expose her, becasue netiher of them actually believe that Lila is going to let Marinette alone.

That makes them calm down, and forgive Adrien, he apologized to Marinette too and admited his error, also they think that a deal with the devil is punishment enough, and if they think about it, probably the poor boy didn't knew better, but he does now, so it's ok.

Then they learn about the threat in the bathroom and her almost akumatization. And they are even more pissed HOW DARE SHE? They apologize again for making her believe that she couldn't trust them with that. She says is ok, that she didn't take her too seriously, and she has faith in them, and so far they proved her right. Though, Marc wish that she could have talked to him at least, maybe they would have prevented all of this, but it doesn't matter.

Well, now they have one thing clear: they need to take that bitch down. But how? Lila could lie her way out, or twist the situation in her favor, they are trying to come up with a plan, but Marc is quiet, his mind working and then he has an idea.

With a calm and cool tone he says them "Just help me with some research, I'll take care of the rest" and replacing his usual sweet and shy demeanor there is a smirk and a cold determination and confidence in his face that surprise them (Nath actually finds it kind of hot)

They don't know what is he thinking, but they have seen him angry before (and thank god they have never been the cause of it, because Marc is a cinnamon roll but is very scary when is angry) and they know what his wrath is capable of. Whatever his plan is, they know is gonna work and dammit if it doesn't. They almost feel bad for Lila. Almost.

The next days they spend time together doing the investigation (they have some fun time and an awesome sleepover too), and finally they get solid proof to expose Lila, thanks to Marinette they get a video interview with Jagged Stone where the singer claims that he never had met Lila, and thanks to Marc's general knowledge in health and some help from Nathaniel's parents who both are doctors, they also get proof to debunk Lila's claims of illnes or other disabilities (specially the lying disease bullshit) and since Marc is a good researcher they manage to find some interesting stuff, like Mrs. Rossi contact information, is all in the embassy page.

With the investigation done, all what they need to do is wait for the perfect moment to expose the liar, and the oportunity comes two weeks later in the form of a picnic that Bustier's class organize just to hang out together, naturally Marc is invited and helps to organize said picnic, almost all of the class consider him a friend and one of them despite him being in Mendeleiev's class. Mari, Alix and Nathaniel still don't know what is his plan exactly, but they trust him. Adrien is aware of his plan but he doesn't know what exactly is either.

So here they are, in the park, in a cute blanket, with some delicious food and with great company (that doesn't include certain people, aka Chloe and the liar) and of course Lila is charming their friends with other of her lies, it takes all of their willpower to not roll their eyes. And then, listening carefully Marc takes the perfect moment to interrumpt the tale, social anxiety or not, that witch is hurting his beloved ones and he is not going to tolerate it, so even if he never has talked to her, fuck his shyness, that girl is gonna face the consequences for her actions. (It also helps that he is already friends with the rest of his boyfriend's class)

So, to everyone suprise he interrumpts Lila in middle sentence to point out the holes in what she is saying.

Alix, Nathaniel, Marinette and Adrien froze in panic, what is he thinking?! A direct confrontation was a bad idea, wasn't it? Marc locked eyes with the four of them and give a look thay says 'I get this' so they let him be, but now they are really uneasy.

What they didn't know is that the last days until now Marc has been doing more than just research, he was studying his enemy. Marc is a good listener, and being someone who likes to go unnoticed he became a very good observant too, he can notice little details and patterns, also he is a sensible and sympathetic boy so is easy for him to put himself in other's shoes, that combined makes him very good at reading and analysing people. He also made extra research in psychology and behaivor. So now, he knows how Lila works, he knows what to expect and how to answer. It also helps that he is very good with words, not just the ones he writes for his stories, but the ones he says and also he is very good with other's people words, he knows how to use them. That is his plan, he is going to use all his skills and knowledge to trap Lila, she thinks that she is smart and can control the situation, but Marc is going to prove that she can and will lose in her own game. Her lies are gonna be her downfall.

Lila of course tries to make an excuse or another lie to save face, but Marc refutes her again and again, and the rest of the class? Some are confused and others seems thoughtful shit! She is losing control! She tries but this black haired boy seems to be smart, he gets her cornered until the point that she can't lie her way out, and her classmates are starting to look suspicious. She tries to change tactics, the tears worked against Marinette, they will work now. She hides her face in her hands and starts to sob.

"I just was trying to share some of my wonderful experiencies with my friends, so I could give them some advice to help them in the future. Why are you being so mean? I haven't done anything to you! " That make people like Rose or Mylene to softened and go to comfort her, and between her hands she can see Alya ready to confront the boy, but Marc is ready for this kind of tactic, is his turn to make a move.

"I'm sorry but, How does this make me mean? I just pointed some facts because honestly, I'm a bit confused. At first I thought that you just made a little mistake, but then you just said another nonsense! Why would YOU do that?"

And then she is losing the little control she manage to regain. Because no matter how much they want to comfort her, Marc has a point and what he said so far actually makes sense, at least more sense than what she said. The others start to look torn between comfort or question her.

"Well... how would you know that what I said is wrong? Where is your proof?" Lila crosses her arms and look to other side, just to hide the smirk in her face, that would be enough and that annoying nobody will learn to not get in her way.

But, much to her surprise Marc actually has a good answer to that.

"Uh... comon sense? I mean, If I'm being a little honest if you think about it, some of the things you said have no... logic. Also I like to read a lot and about different things, including what you were saying so I know for a fact that some of the things you said are wrong. And my proof? Well a quick search in google is enough to prove me right"

Lila pales, she was not expecting that answer, and to her utter horror she can see some of her classmates typing in their phones, probably fact checking for once, she need to fix this now! She looks around trying to find some sympathy or something that would help, but she only see her classmates reading something in their phones and some of them are starting to frown, then she looks to Marinette and has an idea, this would break her little deal with Adrien but is ok, she wasn't planning to leave the brat alone anyway and her model career is in his father's hands, and she already has him tied around her finger.

So, before anyone could say something she sobs more louder and points a finger to Marinette.

"This is because of Marinette, isn't it? She put you into this! I-" but she couldn't finish because Marc interrumpts her, he also is ready for Lila trying to blame Marinette and he is not having it!

"And what does she has to do with this? Is not her fault that you have your facts wrong" and now the others are starting to narrow their eyes towards her, Damn it! Well she made the baker a threat, is time to fulfil it.

Lila makes the best she can to look pityful and scared. "Well... I didn't want to say this because I thought that nobody would believe me but... Marinette threatened me in the bathroom the day I came back from Achu!" She cries to everybody's shock.

"WHAT?!" Everybody screamed that. Marinette and her we-know-the-truth squad are frozen and can't believed it, THE NERVE OF THIS GIRL!

The rest to their friends are equally stunned, because they just can't believe what Lila said.

Lila using the shock continues with her sob story.

"She cornered me in the bathroom and told me that she would turn all of you against me! And all because she is jealous! And now she is using this boy to make you think that I'm a liar, just like she said!" Lila hug herself in an attempt to look small and is crying full force now.

Marc has to use all his willpower to not scream and call her a hypocrite, but he has a perfect answer for that too.

"Marinette would NEVER do that!" And to Lila's surprise and Marinette's glee is not Marc who says that, is Alya.

"Marinette is the sweetest girl, and she is not a bully!" That was Rose, who walked away from Lila like she burned her. And the rest of the class make their agreement known.

Lila really did NOT expect THAT reaction! They are supose to be comforting her and screaming to Marinette, not defending her! It's ok she can fix it.

"See? Is this why I didn't want to say anything! You don't believe me!"

Marc takes the word again "We know Marinette, we know she has flaws but she is one of the best people we know" again everybody agrees with that.

Lila is getting desperate, this is not what is supose to happen! And where is an akuma when you need it?! But Lila refuses to lose!

"Look I know you all thougth that you knew her and that she was your friend, but the truth is that Marinette is not what she seems to be, she is a manipulative liar and is just using you!"

Again, is not Marc who talks, this time is Kim

"No, you look Lila, I have known Marinette since diapers, and I know she has flaws but she is NOT a bad person"

"Yeah, and using us? She is the one who goes out of her way just to help us! She is a caring friend! Heck! We actually had to convince her that it's ok to pay to her everytime we comission something from her!" That was Nino

"And still, she gives us discounts everytime she can, but jus for the record, we have no problem in paying the whole price, Marinette, your job is awesome and you deserve to be fairly rewarded" that was Ivan, and Marinette gives him a very grateful smile, the rest of her friends agree with him and she smiles to them too.

"But-but" Lila is in trouble, she tries to think fast, but then Max just dig her hole deeper.

"Also, what Marc just said about your story is also true, all the wrong facts and holes, I asked Markov to fact check and the evidence supports Marc, the only conclusion is that you were lying to us!"

Nonononononono NO!

"And since you told us this lie like you did with any other of your stories I wondered What else was a lie? I also asked Markov to confirm every thing that you had said to us, and nearly the 86.65% was a lie"

Marc smiles, the game is going exactly according to his plan, even some of his moves were made by others, he is happy that Marinette has friends with such a faith in her, ready to stand up for her just like she does for them. But he knows that the game is still on, Lila still has some pieces, but Marc already steal her big ones, she just has some pawns to defend her King and Marc has his army intact.

Well fuck, she is doomed, the rest of the class looks ready to attack her... and then she remember her last card, it's a wild card, her lies will not work the same way anymore but she could save face, she will, eventually, come up with something to regain her control.

Well it seems that there is a limit, so I make a part 2

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nobodyfamousposts · 4 years

Text

Missing - Part 3.3

There will be one more part to finish this chapter.

“Thank you for coming on such short notice. We just have a few questions to ask you.”

“Of course! Anything to help!”

“I guess to start: What is the nature of your relationship with Marinette Dupain-Cheng?”

“She’s a cool kid. She works hard, goes above and beyond, and is really creative. She’s got talent, let me tell you!”

“I see. So you’ve had interactions with Marinette? Perhaps even meetings?”

“Well, sure. I’ve commissioned a few things from her. She’s one of the only ones who gets my style, you know?”

“Were these meetings generally private?”

“Yeah. We kind of have to keep them on the down low. She’s just a kid, after all and the last thing anyone wants is for her to be hounded or bothered by the media. So it’s just me and my team and her and her parents.”

“Wait—and her parents?”

“Of course! Have to get the parentals’ okay before asking their little girl to make anything, regardless of what I’m paying for it. It only seemed right since my requests are taking up her time. She’s just started working on a new jacket that includes an accent that is supposed to glow in the dark!”

“I…see…”

“Yeah. Plus Tom and Sabine are awesome. Even if they put their foot down about allowing her to try and make a jacket for pet—”

“Sir, are you aware of Miss Dupain-Cheng being in a relationship?”

“You mean that blond kid she’s crazy about? Did she finally ask him out?”

“Well, no. There have been some reports of her having an...um...older boyfriend?”

“...what?”

“And that he looked like...you?”

“WHAT?!”

_______________________

Paris was a lovely city. Full of equally loving people.

“Here!” Andre held out the ice cream with a joyful note in his voice. “A magical treat for our magical savior!”

Ladybug started in surprise. She tried to decline politely even as she couldn’t help but eye the ice cream with longing. “Oh, I couldn’t—“

“Nonsense!” He reassured her, pushing the cup to her. “It’s the least I can do after all you’ve done for Paris!”

Well, if he insisted...

She accepted the offering, feeling the chill in her fingers even through her suit. “Thank you.”

“But of course! And who knows? Maybe it will help bring love to your life.”

She highly doubted ice cream could accomplish that.

“You never know.” He told her as he gave her a conspiratorial wink. “There is all sorts of magic in this world. You are proof enough of that!”

She simply smiled and bade him a good day before leaving with ice cream in hand.

Such a strange man, she mused. But the offer was nice of him. And the ice cream was rather good.

The people here were quite kind. Upon seeing her, many of them had wanted to give her such treats or other foods for free. Part of her felt bad for accepting the offers, even as they insisted it was out of thanks for helping them so much.

But as much as she wanted to decline—and probably should have at points, she kept accepting. It seemed likely for the best though. And now she wasn’t sure she should refuse.

She hadn’t realized how tired she had been getting until after that first incident of a civilian insisting on giving her cookies. While she had reluctantly accepted at the time, she had noticed a marked difference after ingesting the first one and almost inhaled the rest afterwards.

It was…unusual. She didn’t remember being like this before.

But it became more clear over time that she was losing energy. And food—particularly sweets and confections of that like—would be enough to recharge her strength.

When she first realized she was able to stay out longer after a battle, she had taken to patrolling and trying to track down any potential akumas before they could reach their target in hopes of determining their origin and where Hawk Moth may be hiding. But she hadn’t made any progress after the first couple of days, and didn’t realize just how much energy she was using up.

Now, she was trying to be more cautious and conserve her strength. After all, Hawk Moth was bound to send out an akuma sooner or later. And while she hoped to find the butterfly before it could akumatize anyone, Paris was a big city and it was not logical to expect she would just happen to be in the right place at the right time to find it before an attack could occur. In that event, she needed to ensure she still had energy for the battle. So while she would still patrol regularly, she had been making a point to take breaks and rest more often throughout the day.

But why was she still out? What normally happened once the fights were over to restore her strength? And why wasn’t it happening this time?

Something felt wrong, but try as she might, she couldn’t figure out what it was.

She paused for a moment, considering.

Perhaps Hawk Moth was planning something?

It had been a good few days since the last akuma. And he had yet to try anything since.

She frowned. It was rational, but something felt wrong.

She drew out of her musings to look around the park. It was rather empty, but it was also getting late so there were less civilians around. There were only a couple of people in the area. One was a young woman walking a dog. Two kids who were cutting through the park to get somewhere. And a single elderly man in a Hawaiian shirt who was seated on a bench nearby and appeared to be having tea.

Noticing her gaze, the man smiled and nodded to her in greeting.

“Hello, Ladybug. It is a rather lovely evening, is it not?”

“I suppose.” She replied, more out of politeness than any real agreement. It was just another day in Paris, as far as she could tell. Though the lack of an akuma was nice.

The man smiled, not at all put off by her response. “It is getting later, though. I imagine many people are are returning to their homes.”

She nodded. That made sense. And explained the growing lack of people in the area.

He looked up at her, seemingly curious. “Should you not return to your home as well?”

Ladybug blinked at that. “Home?”

“Certainly. I am sure that even a hero of Paris has a place she can rest at the end of the day.”

She frowned, trying to consider his words.

She had been active for days. Probably a week or so by this point. Whatever was supposed to happen after an akuma fight hadn’t this time, so she didn’t have a place to go.

“I have nowhere else I need to be.” She replied simply. It was true enough at any rate. Clearly dealing with Hawk Moth was the priority, and this was as good a chance as any to try and gain some advantage or intel.

The man, however, appeared concerned.

“Do you not have a life to return to? A family waiting for you?”

A life? A family.

How bizarre.

Such little things. So pointless. They would only hold her back and distract her from the mission at hand.

“Of course not.”

Homes and families were for the civilians she protected.

She didn’t need those things.

Why would she? She was Ladybug.

Just Ladybug.

_______________________

Kim liked to think he had grown some since the school year started. A bit at least.

He would admit he wasn’t the smartest person—that title belonged to Max and he was quite proud of his friend for it. After all, not just anyone could make a working robot that could live and feel.

But nonetheless, Kim wasn’t stupid. He just liked to believe the best in people.

Granted, that didn’t always work out—like with his attempt to ask out Chloe on Valentines Day.

But then there were the times it did—like when he sacrificed himself to save Chloe and his other classmates during the whole ‘kissing zombies’ incident.

Well…sort of. Chloe was still Chloe either way. But at least the zombies were dealt with. And Chloe…did seem to be trying to do better.

Emphasis on ‘trying’.

But in that regard, Kim had been trying as well. He had undergone some changes since the start of the year. He didn’t like to think it, but he hadn’t been the most observant or empathetic guy. He was self-centered in a lot of ways, not out of any malice, but simple ignorance. He had often done things without thinking. And while he may not have intended to be mean, he would still act in ways that would upset others without realizing he was doing it.

But having a friend turn into a stone monster and try to kill him made Kim reevaluate his idea of friendly teasing or just how he interacts with people in general.

And his idea of gentle ribbing may not be so gentle or friendly to others. It was…something he’d had to learn the hard way. And even relearn, given the panther incident. And again with Odine…

It was something he was still working on. And had to catch himself at times. Whether or not he intended harm didn’t matter. That he had been trying to be helpful in his own way also didn’t matter. Because Kim’s idea of tolerance and what was okay or too much or not enough was different than other people’s. It was something he still struggled to be mindful of.

That was why he didn’t comment on the strangeness of Lila’s injuries.

A sprained wrist should have been in a brace of some sort. Some of her reported injuries should have had indicators like scratches, bruises, or red marks. Her claimed arthritis should have involved swelling or tremors. But there was often nothing.

There were points when Lila’s claims of being in pain made him raise an eyebrow.

Kim was an athlete, and had his fair share of experiences with people who had injuries and how they worked. So it was strange to him that Lila could be lacking any of the common indicators. But some injuries couldn’t be seen easily, and he also had experience with what could happen if they weren’t treated appropriately because of assumptions based on that.

Lila’s symptoms were strange and all over the place. But Kim wasn’t a doctor. It wasn’t his place to judge or determine.

Not to mention that people were different. She could just have a lower pain threshold. And it was possible her body could just outwardly heal fast as far as appearances go.

Kim had no way of knowing for sure without either questioning her or becoming invasive. But he wanted to take her word for it, so he continued to help her out. He didn’t mind, really. What was a lunch tray or an extra bag to carry for a few minutes anyway?

He understood Marinette’s anger at the idea of being used. He didn’t like the thought either. But if it did turn out that she was lying, what did he really lose? He still would have helped out. There didn’t need to be any injuries involved. Honestly, he would have done the same if any of the other girls had asked. Heck, even if one of the guys had.

There was nothing he lost by a few minutes of kindness here and there. In the grand scheme of things, it wasn’t worth questioning or trying to argue over.

While he could understand why Marinette might be upset if she thought Lila was lying, he didn’t see any reason to actively try to disprove it.

It was like people with allergies or unseen medical issues. Just because you couldn’t see where they had a health problem didn’t mean it wasn’t there. Even if there isn’t necessarily active proof, it was safer to treat the person like the condition was real because you don’t know for sure. And you could just be making yourself out to be a jerk either way if you did act on it.

Even if the napkin incident was kind of lame.

He saw the way the class almost got up in arms over Lila’s claimed injury by a napkin. He saw the way Max clearly wanted to say something to correct them. He also saw the way Marinette only got upset because of it. Maybe he should have spoken up then, but he didn’t want to be dismissive of Lila’s health issues regardless of how real he thought they were.

Maybe catching the napkin WAS enough to bother her? It could have been the movement of her arm rather than the weight of the napkin. He didn’t know. And he’d had enough instances of being a jerk because he questioned and pushed things instead of simply accepting them.

He did feel bad for Marinette though. If she was so distrustful of Lila, he was sure she had reasons. But trying to disprove someone’s medical condition in such a blatant show wasn’t really the best way to go about things if she didn’t believe they were real. He agreed with her that it was fishy, though, and considered that if it kept happening, maybe they could try some other way of finding out for sure. Talk with the teachers about their concerns. Check with the nurse to confirm if any of this is in her medical history. Maybe see if as the Class Rep, Marinette couldn’t get in touch with Lila’s mom to determine her needs. That way, they could at least be sure and have all the information straight.

He figured he could talk to her about it at some point when there was time.

He thought they’d have time.

But life happens.

People act without thinking.

Akumas go on a rampage.

Friends go missing.

And suddenly little things like whether a classmate is faking injuries for perceived special treatment he would happily have given regardless seemed a lot less important.

He had to have priorities.

His main priority at this time, other than schoolwork and sports, was to try and find Marinette or any clues on what happened to her. Which was why he was still going out on the streets after school to search.

It had been something he started since the class initially discussed plans to try searching themselves. And it’s something he hadn’t stopped since then either.

Admittedly, it wasn’t the brightest move to go searching alone, but that was why he had Max on speed dial in case anything happened to him. His parents were informed and knew where he would be each outing. And he also had his phone set up to keep track of his location, which his parents could easily find and Max was no doubt keeping track of even at this moment.

They made a good team this way. Not just brains and brawn, since Max wasn’t weak anymore than Kim was stupid. But they both had their strengths and they worked best as a team when they each played to their strengths.

In this case, Max was searching as well in his own way, even if that way was from his computer rather than in person. Kim could get farther faster on foot whereas Max could span miles in minutes by computer. That way, they could coordinate and cover more ground.

They kept in touch constantly though. Which is how Kim knew something was wrong.

“Max? You there?”

There was only silence.

He looked at his phone in worry. Of the two of them, Kim was the one who was supposed to be more likely to encounter some sort of trouble. What could possibly happen to Max in his room?

“Max? Anyone?”

“Kim?”

That wasn’t Max.

“Markov?”

“Oh thank goodness!” The AI spoke from the phone screen, clearly frazzled. “An akuma appeared and took us!”

“Wait—what?! Why?!” Max had been in his room! Why would anyone try to go after him and Markov specifically? Kim frowned, eyes narrowing as he took charge. “Do you know who it is?”

“From my data, the akuma was a match for Lady Wifi.”

Kim gasped. “Alya?”

It made sense, now that he thought about it. He hadn’t been there for the incident, but he had heard from others in the class how Alya had apparently been suspended after supposedly attacking Lila while they were alone in class. He wasn’t sure he believed it, as that sounded particularly out of character for the blogger. It was now with a sickening realization that he remembered the last time Alya had been suspended in what was later revealed to be an unfair manner.

If Alya had been wrongfully accused and punished—especially if she was suspended a second time for a similar reason—they should have figured that Lady Wifi would be likely to make a reappearance.

But why go after Max? He hadn’t even been involved!

“What should we do?” Markov asked. “I’ve routed myself to Max’s phone to contact you, but I don’t know how long it may be until she realizes it.”

“Do you know where she’s taken you guys?” Kim asked, glancing around his own location and already starting to work out what would be the best course to take.

“We appear to have been taken to a cellphone tower. One near the TVi station.”

“But why there?”

It didn’t make sense. If Alya was Lady Wifi, wouldn’t she go after Lila? Or the school? Or really anywhere that has more cellphones around for her to make use of?

“I am uncertain.” Markov replied, all the more worried. There was a pause, seemingly as something was happening on Markov’s end that Kim couldn’t hear. “She wants us to hack the tower. What should we do?”

Okay, this was time for action. Alya was the akuma, meaning the Ladyblog wouldn’t alert anyone of the attack. Quickly, Kim sent out a mass text to the class to give warning in case Lady Wifi would try going after them as well.

“Do what she says for now and keep an eye on her and Max. I’ll try to see if I can’t find help.”

Ladybug had been patrolling more actively lately, hadn’t she?

He just needed to find her.

Kim: Need to alert LB nd CN. If anyone gets ahold of them, let us know!

A few minutes later, he had a response.

Adrien: Just spoke to Chat. He’s on his way.

_______________________

By the time the two came down from the roof, school was already over.

Nino noticed the time and groaned once he realized how late it was. “I’d better check in with Alya and let her know we’re okay.” He pulled out his phone and started up a text as the two continue walking out of the building, passing other students. Nino gave a mutter about how he was already going to have one lady angry with him once his mom found out he’d skipped the rest of his classes for the day.

Adrien smiled sympathetically, but knew he wouldn’t be much help. He was pretty sure his father would be furious with him as well once word got back to him. So focused on their encroaching doom, neither noticed that they had passed Ivan and Mylene, getting their attention.

“Wait, Nino? Haven’t you heard?” Mylene called out to him. Nino and Adrien drew to a stop as the couple approached. There was something about Mylene’s terseness and Ivan’s frown that made them worry.

“Did something happen?” Nino asked. He and Adrien had been on that roof for a while, so there was no telling what they may have missed.

“Alya’s been suspended for fighting.” Ivan told the, looking distressed.

Both boys gaped.

“What?”

Mylene nodded, upset. “Rose and Juleka came in and told us that Alya attacked Lila.”

“WHAT?!”

“Where is she?” Nino demanded.

“Lila’s at the nurse’s station.” She continued with a gesture back towards the school. “She had a mark on her cheek but wasn’t hurt otherwise.”

But Nino only shook his head, appearing more frantic. “No, not her! Where’s Alya?”

“She left, man.” Ivan answered, drawing the attention to himself. “She was taken to the Principal’s office and her mom came to pick her up.”

Mylene shuddered. “I’d never seen her so angry before.”

Nino and Adrien shared a look, both worried and feeling a sense of foreboding.

“This is bad.” Nino moaned.

Adrien wilted in on himself at the news.

“It had to have happened just after I left.” He murmured in dismay.

Was this his fault?

Would it have been prevented if he had stayed?

“Wait a minute. Adrien, were you there?” Mylene asked.

He froze at that. They...they wanted to know, right? They wouldn’t be asking if they didn’t. Part of him wanted desperately to tell the other two what had happened.

But would they believe him?

“Go ahead, man.” He heard Nino say from right next to him. “They’ll listen.”

Both Ivan and Mylene nodded encouragingly.

He didn’t want to say it.

He didn’t want to revisit that moment of heartbreak, even as he tried to convince himself that none of it was true.

“Lila said that Marinette ran away.“ Seeing their horrified expressions, he steeled his resolve and continued. “Because of us.“

Mylene gasped.

Ivan clenched his fists, his smile dropping in an instant. “She what?!”

“They were already arguing by the time I got there.” Adrien explained. “Alya was angry. Lila was taunting her. Saying...all kinds of hurtful things.” He took a breath. “She admitted to lying about everything. Insulted Alya and everyone else for believing her. And she said…” He felt Nino’s hand come to rest on his shoulder, encouraging him and emboldening him to continue.

“She said we were bad friends and it was no wonder Marinette ran away.”

“Are…” Mylene hesitated, looking pale and stricken. It was clear she didn’t want to believe it. “Are you sure you didn’t mishear? Or maybe misunderstand?”

Adrien started to shrink in on himself, uncertain and beginning to second guess everything he’d witnessed. Maybe he had misunderstood? Or Lila meant something else? Or—

Nino’s grip on his shoulder tightened—not painfully, but enough to remind Adrien he was there and that he had support.

“That could explain one or two statements, but not everything.”

But it wasn’t Nino’s voice that spoke up in his defense.

Mylene wasn’t the only one to look to Ivan in surprise. The bigger boy looked angrier than they’d seen him since the start of the school year. Adrien was half worried he would become akumatized again.

It wasn’t long before Mylene appeared angry enough to match him. It was to Adrien’s relief though that both seemed to be angry on his behalf rather than with him.

“If that’s true, then it’s no wonder that Alya slapped her.“ She said darkly, sounding as though she wished for the chance to do so herself.

“I don’t think she did.“ Nino said flat out, drawing everyone’s attention back. “Alya texted me about that time to let me know what happened and asked me to look for Adrien. If she was rational enough to put a friend first after a comment like that, I don’t think there’s much else Lila could have said to make her react violently.”

Ivan started in surprise. “So you don’t think Alya attacked Lila?”

Mylene even looked to Nino, almost hopefully.

Nino shook his head. “Adrien said that Lila’s been lying about a lot of things. She was probably lying about that too.“

“No wonder Marinette didn’t like her.” Ivan murmured. “She’d been trying to counter any of Lila’s claims all this time. She probably knew they were lies.”

“I thought it was jealousy.“ Mylene admitted, guiltily. “Or maybe that she had just gotten the wrong impression like she did with Adrien at the beginning of the year.“

“I think we all brushed it off more than we should have.” Ivan took her hand in his own, giving a gentle squeeze in comfort. He straightened though as he remembered something.

“But what about the mark?

Nino scowled at that. “I’d be willing to bet Lila did something to make it look like Alya slapped her in order to gain sympathy and discredit Alya if she tried to tell anyone the truth.”

Adrien’s mind flashed to his initial meeting with Lila. How she expressed an interest in superheroes only after seeing him reading about them and the disappearance of his father’s Book shortly afterward. How Lila went so far as to get a necklace to try and pass off as a Miraculous in order to convince him she was a superhero.

“I wouldn’t put it past her. She’s certainly done it before.” He admitted. “But what can we do about it?“

Alya was already suspended. Lila had no doubt spun her web and shared her “version” of events with everyone. The teachers, the administration, the rest of the class...she probably had them all hanging off her “sob story”.

To everyone’s surprise, it was Mylene who stepped up to take charge.

“Adrien, you need to go to the Principal and tell him what really happened.”

He balked at that. “But I wasn’t there for the actual incident.“

“But you were there for what set it off.” She gently reminded him. “If nothing else, that gives context and at least shed some doubt on Lila‘s story.“

Ivan grinned. “That’s right! If you tell him that Lila instigated the incident, he may reverse the decision—or at least the suspension.”

“Do you really think so?” Adrien asked. He wasn’t used to authority figures listening to him and changing their minds about things like this. He was still half convinced his father’s agreement to letting him attend school was a fluke. His father’s response to the loss of the Book during the Volpina incident certainly hadn’t helped with that.

“It’s worth a try.” Nino said, encouragingly. “I know it’d be at least one more voice in Alya’s corner than she had.”

“And Alya’s parents would know if nothing else.“ Ivan added. “Even if the school decides to keep the suspension, it would certainly make a difference to her parents to know the full extent of what really happened. They may lessen her punishment at home, or at least not ground her.“

Adrien fought with himself.

There was that part of him—an admittedly big part that wanted to stay out of things. It would prolong the conflict. Lila was dangerous. She had some sort of influence on his father. She could get akumatized again. She could hurt him. Nathalie could find out. His father could find out.

But…

He’d told Marinette once that he was in her corner and hadn’t followed through.

And regardless of the reason she was gone, if he did ever see her again, he at least wanted to be able to look her in the eyes.

He didn’t think he could do that if he just abandoned her best friend—HIS friend when she needed him.

“Okay.” He agreed at last. “Principal Damocles is gone for the day, so I’ll come see him first thing in the morning and tell him what I know.”

The other three beamed at him. And for a moment, Adrien actually felt like things might just work out.

Then a text came that brought everything crashing down.

Kim: AKUMA ALERT!!! Lady Wifi is back and kidnapped Max and Markov!

_______________________

It had been a peaceful evening. Ladybug appreciated it and resented it at the same time.

Appreciated it for how the peace meant that the civilians of Paris were safe.

But resented it because it meant she had no akumas to track for leads to Hawk Moth. And if things were peaceful, it was likely that he was plotting something. Like the calm before a storm, knowing something was bound to happen but not necessarily what or when.

It also meant she was stuck with nothing but her own thoughts. About her presence here outside of akuma battles. About her general lack of purpose outside of fighting. About the inexplicable sense of longing though she knew not what it was for. And now about that elderly man she had met.

Asking questions that made no sense. Bringing up concepts that didn’t apply to her. Making her wonder things that didn’t matter.

And worst of all was that expression he had. There was a look in his eye as he gazed at her. Concerned and sad and disappointed all in one.

And she didn’t know WHY!

It was irritating. An intrusive, niggling feeling that just wouldn’t go away. And for all that she tried to brush it off, the strange thoughts and the man’s expression kept flickering back into focus as soon as she let her mind wander.

So she was grateful for any distraction by that point, even if it was a message from Chat Noir.

At least it was something useful for once.

“Ladybug! I just received word that Alya has been akumatized.”

Well, that was a relief. There was an akuma at last. However, the way he said that made it seem like the akuma was the lesser issue than who the akuma was. Which led to a problem on her end.

“Who?” The name sounded vaguely familiar, but didn’t stand out to her.

He paused at that, frowning in confusion. “Uh...Alya? From the Ladyblog?”

“Oh, that little fan site?” It was cute for what it was.

Chat’s frown only grew at that. “It’s not just a fan site. You’ve done interviews with her before, remember?”

Did she? She didn’t know why. It seemed silly to indulge something so inane. Not to mention dangerous to encourage the blogger’s antics and insistence on getting footage of akuma battles. The last thing she needed was for a civilian to jump into the fight, distract her, and get in the way. Not to mention how much more difficult it would be to deal with the akuma while trying to protect the civilian who lacked the sense to leave the area.

She shrugged.

“It doesn’t stand out.”

He gave her an incredulous look and mouthed the words to himself like he wasn’t sure what he was hearing. She didn’t know why this came as a surprise to him. Or why he would have such a reaction over something so frivolous.

“Okay…” He said, uncertain. “I got the report from a classmate that she’s taken hostages to the TVi station. I’m already on my way there now.”

“I’ll head that way as well. Stay in contact just in case.”

Chat seemed perturbed, but didn’t argue.

That may have been because he didn’t get the chance, as a sudden yelp from nearby caught Ladybug’s attention. A passerby dropped his cellphone just as the screen sparked and a figure appeared.

The akuma.

“Lady Wifi is here.” She muttered into the communicator.

That was rather fast. But at least it didn’t mean wasting more time than necessary.

It seemed she didn’t need to go to the TVi Station after all.

“Hang on! I’m on my way!” Chat’s voice exclaimed before the call ended.

However startled Ladybug was by her sudden appearance, the akuma even seemed just as surprised at seeing her there.

“Ladybug?!” She gasped out. But her eyes narrowed. “No. I don’t know how you found me, but you are not getting in my way!”

Wait. Found her? But she hadn’t even started looking for her yet!

There was no time to question it, however, as Lady Wifi proceeded to go on the offensive. Ladybug ducked out of the way just in time to avoid the multiple symbols being flung at her from the akuma’s phone.

She flipped backwards and landed on the lower roof behind her, breaking line of sight with her enemy. Taking advantage of the moment, she then jumped from to a ridge on an adjoining building where she would have cover and not be easily viewed from above. Glancing up, she frowned when she noticed that she could not see her foe. It was like she had disappeared.

Or...had she simply left altogether once Ladybug was out of sight?

Strange, shouldn’t Lady Wifi be looking for her? They had only just crossed paths. Normally, akumas would attempt to continue pursuit.

She jumped down to street level and kept looking around, warily. Perhaps the akuma had gone into one of the buildings?

There was a sudden outburst of screams from a nearby store as several civilians ran out of the building. She rushed over and noticed that...yes, it was a phone store. And sure enough, the akuma was inside and the cause of the scare that drove all potential customers away. Without hesitating, she ran inside to continue the fight.

Lady Wifi growled in frustration at her appearance and sent more attacks at her. Ladybug dodged them easily enough, but to her surprise, Lady Wifi simply took off shortly afterwards, rushing out the back and out of the building altogether. Her attempt to follow only drew her further into the busier part of the city. And soon enough, she had again lost her target.

Until there was another flash followed by a shriek from a nearby civilian who had been hiding from the chaos. Sure enough, Lady Wifi was once again present, only looking all the more agitated once she appeared and saw Ladybug already there.

“How do you keep finding me?“ She demanded as she swiped at her phone again.

Ladybug didn’t bother to respond as she simply ducked, dodged, and jumped out of the way.

But the angry accusation kept ringing in her head. Because the truth was that she didn’t know. Really, she had thought it was the other way around. Why would Lady Wifi leave just to keep coming back? It wasn’t even a fighting tactic as she wasn’t utilizing any element of surprise it could grant her.

A purple glow appeared over the akuma’s face. No doubt Hawk Moth was trying to give her orders.

But...Lady Wifi just blew him off?

“No! I’ll get you your stupid jewelry, but right now, I need to keep looking while I still can!”

Looking? For what?

The glow only increased in response. The akuma seemed to shudder under an unknown force.

“All right. Just to get her out of the way.” She agreed before switching symbols on her cell and sending them flying at Ladybug.

Unimpressed, she prepared to move. If she jumped, she could go over the symbol and even Lady Wifi herself. She was close enough that she could land behind her and then try to take her out. Just keep her yoyo at the ready to tie her up and—

“Look out!”

Something slammed into her from the side, sending her and whatever the force was rolling towards a nearby truck. There was at least partial cover between them and the akuma now, but it ruined her plan and now she was on the defensive.

Who?

She looked over to see...sure enough, Chat Noir had interfered.

“Are you blind?!” She hissed, pulling him fully behind the cover.

“She was attacking you! I was just trying to help!” He said, defensively.

“You can help by not getting in the way.”

His ears lowered. He looked genuinely hurt. “Sorry…”

“Look, let’s just get this over with. I’ve been stuck playing ‘Hide and Seek’ with this akuma and I’m tired of it.” She pulled out her yoyo. “We’ll split up and come at her from both sides. Then I’ll tie her down and you can break her phone. Ready?”

There was a pause.

But he didn’t move.

She raised an eyebrow in annoyance.

“Well? What are you waiting for?”

He simpered, gesturing pathetically at her yoyo. “Uh, aren’t you going to use your Lucky Charm?”

DONOT

She gave him an incredulous look.

“Why would I do that?” Really, the Lucky Charm was useless and a waste of her energy. It only served to force her out of the fight sooner.

“Well—” He stammered. “I mean—you usually—it’s always…” He seemed to realize it was a stupid question and looked away. Whether in understanding or embarrassment, she didn’t particularly know.

“Just go already.”

Honestly, the flinch was unnecessary. It wasn’t like she’d struck him.

She wasted no more time worrying about her partner and whatever his latest antics were. Instead, she put her focus back on the akuma where it should be.

It wasn’t a very complicated plan. And it didn’t need to be. They had fought this akuma before. It wasn’t like it was that hard. With Chat charging from the front and taking her attention, Ladybug leapt out from the other side and had Lady Wifi trapped in her yoyo wire, forcing her arms to her side and sending her cellphone clattering to the ground.

For all the trouble and annoyance, the fight was over disappointingly quick.

Within seconds, the phone was broken and the akuma released. A simple flick of her wrist and the butterfly was purified and sent on its way. And soon enough, Lady Wifi was a normal human teenager once more. Ladybug sighed in relief that the latest upset was dealt with at least.

“Miraculous Ladybug!”

The Cure did its work per the usual. But something seemed off. And there was a small amount of the ladybugs that seemed to hover around her before she waved them away. Honestly, she shouldn’t have to keep doing this every time.

Taking no notice of her state, Chat bounded up to her, fist out.

“Pound—”

Except Ladybug had already turned away, leaving Chat feeling put off and especially alone.

“...it?”

He frowned, uncertain.

“Uh...Ladybug? Is everything okay?”

No. She was lost and confused and that strange man’s words wouldn’t leave her mind.

She had no home. Nowhere to go.

So why did she feel she was supposed to be somewhere? And ‘where’ was she supposed to be?

“I’m fine.” She told him as she turned and walked away.

She was fine.

_______________________

He ran down the street, cursing himself the entire time. He should’ve known something would happen! Alya had clearly already been upset. While he had talked to her about not confronting Lila, he knew very well how Olea was and that there was only so much she could hold back if directly confronted.

Alya had been the one to text him to warn him to look out for Adrien. His focus has been on finding his friend at that time, that he had completely neglected to consider how she would even know about the situation or what her knowing had to mean.

If he had been there, he could have backed up Alya. Been a witness to counter Lila’s lies about being attacked—if a single slap she more than deserved could even count as that.

No! No. Not the time! Alya now. Deal with Lila later.

Because of that, Alya had been suspended. Her parents had no doubt been given the wrong version of events by the school thanks to Lila, and probably grounded her on top of that. Right now, Nino must have been the only one Alya knew was on her side. She wouldn’t know that Adrien knew the truth or that he would even speak up in her defense. She only knew she was alone and everyone was against her.

And now Lady Wifi was back. And while he knew that Lila was responsible, he could not help but blame himself for failing to be there for her.

That was why as soon as he got Kim’s message, he had taken off for where the alert said Lady Wifi was attacking. Maybe he could calm her down? Or at least be there for her once it was over.

Because surely the heroes would be fixing all of this soon enough.

It was the Ladybugs that led him to her. A small group that seemed...a bit detached from the rest. Following them, he found the aftermath of the battle. Both Ladybug and Chat Noir were moving away, leaving Alya just...sitting there on the sidewalk.

Wait. What?

Didn’t they normally talk to or try to comfort the akuma victims?

Glancing over, however, he noted that both appeared to be rather tense. And Chat in particular seemed worried. He didn’t know why. They were a distance away and quiet enough that he couldn’t hear. But neither seemed happy. Maybe the fight was harder on them than it seemed?

His focus, however, went to Alya. She seemed almost out of it by the time he reached her.

But when he called out her name, her eyes met his immediately. And her face crumpled into a sob.

“Nino!”

He was there by her in an instant, holding her as tightly as he could and whispering reassurances.

He’d lost one friend.

He didn’t want to lose her, too.

_______________________

Alya didn’t know what happened when she was an akuma. Nobody ever really remembers, after all.

But she knew...she’d been looking for something.

Desperately trying to find something.

And she half believed that something was her best friend.

She hoped, at any rate.

It was dark out by the time the fight was over, and Nino was walking her home. He promised that he would also talk with her parents to let them know what’s going on with Lila and that she was lying about everything. Neither of them knew just how much good it would do since it was their word against Lila’s, and anything he tried to say might just be construed as solely a defense due to being Alya’s boyfriend. But it was something and it was certainly more than she’d had when she was on trial at the school.

But…

The worst of it all as that her thoughts kept going back to Lila and those damn words.

“Don’t blame me just because you’re a bad friend. Honestly, it’s no wonder Marinette chose to run away.”

Maybe...maybe Lila was right?

Maybe she did run away?

…

...

No.

She took a breath and forced herself to focus.

Facts, Alya. Think about the facts. She had made enough poor decisions without bothering to get information. Now was the time to not repeat those mistakes. The first thing to do was look at the facts of what she knew.

Fact: Marinette was her friend. Even at times when Alya wasn’t the best friend to her in return, Marinette still cared. This was clear in the way that Marinette still tried for her—continuing to try to warn her or look out for her and yet going along with her even after the way Alya acted.

Fact: Marinette was stubborn to a fault. If she knew there was something she could do about a problem, she would keep trying. And it would take something pretty severe for her to give up.

Fact: Despite how strained their relationship had become, things had not become so broken that they would stop being friends. That tension was nowhere close to being severe enough for Marinette to give up.

Fact: Marinette was not one to seek attention. She never needed to. She never did anything to intentionally draw attention to herself and if anything, had willingly given up chances to get attention if it meant helping or supporting someone else.

Fact: Even if Marinette was having trouble in the class, she still had support. And more importantly, she had her family. She would never allow her parents to be hurt because of her.

With these facts in mind, Alya knew with some certainty that Marinette would not run away.

She just had to hold onto that.

“Marinette wouldn’t have done it.”

Nino started at that. “What?”

She turned to him, looking tired and weary, but so very certain.

She looked up at Nino, resolutely. “We made the mistake of not believing in Marinette before. We didn’t trust her when we should have. But just because we didn’t believe in her doesn’t mean she ever gave up on us.”

Alya smiled. “That’s just the kind of person Marinette is.

She rested her head on his shoulder.

“That was why she was our Everyday Ladybug. Because big or small, no matter the problem, she was there. Trying for us.”

She wouldn’t just leave.

Alya couldn’t expect Marinette to always be there. That wasn’t fair to her. To be required to keep trying despite the futility of it all was a burden that no one should ever be expected to continue to carry, especially if it was only hurting her. She knew that eventually even Marinette, as kind as she was, could have enough of the strain and move on. But she also knew that in her kindness, Marinette would never just disappear without a word.

She would never leave without saying goodbye.

“That’s why I know she didn’t run away.”

Because Marinette hadn’t said goodbye.

Nino took a breath, hesitating.

“You know that means that...something...probably happened to her.”

Alya nodded, barely holding back the tears as that horrible truth fully presented itself.

“I know.”

#ml fanfic #miraculous ladybug #tales of ladybug and cat noir #missing #marinette dupain cheng #adrien agreste #ladybug #chat noir #alya cesaire #lady wifi #nino lahiffe #lila sucks #missing au

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blackroseraven · 3 years

Photo

So we got there on time, but most stuff was already done and it was just time to get horses out. I helped with a few of them, checked on Brie and Lulu in particular, since Teacherlady mentioned last night to make sure Lulu wasn’t too lame and to take Brie’s wrap off and poke her leg.

They both looked good. A lot of the horses were weird, though, but it was probably because a short storm rolled in early this morning, then quickly moved out. Just enough to make things wet, cool them off for a moment before the heat came back, so all the horses were like: “YEAH ENERGY” followed by “no move leave me alone.”

So speaking of troublesome horses, I went to get Jaeger, and things were fine at first. And then Hale just. Barreled into his ass and slammed through the closing door and ran me over, and I spent a good five minutes shouting at him and smacking him and going in circles around the stall, squished between two one-ton horses, trying to get this stupid Percheron asshat to go back outside.

I finally got him out, got Jaeger in, and the door closed, but I was very grumpy.

Jaeger was a little difficult. Hooves took a lot of extra work to clean because he was sore and fidgety, but even though he was lame, he had so much energy I took him up to the arena anyway.

He did really good up there, actually. I mean, apart from trying to jump away when I was climbing on his back and then attempting to buck me off, like the asshole he is.

frick

But once I was on him it was. Really nice. Just. Easy riding around the arena, wearing off that energy. And as he moved he loosened up, which was really really nice, because it made him a lot less lame.

That’s the thing, right? Arthritis-related problems require a balance. If you do nothing with yourself, then it gets really bad and everything seizes up. If you do too much, it gets really bad and everything hurts and seizes up. Gentle, easy movement is really good for this kind of thing.

That’s why a lot of our lesson horses, in spite of being older, are still in really good shape. I mean, hell, look at Dakota, she’s frigging blind and 28 years old and just this morning she yanked her way out of my hand to trot into her paddock, just a go-go-go pony.

Compare her to poor Dazzle, who can certainly be a bitch but does nothing, and thus is alway lame, always sore, has some really bad days.

Gotta keep moving.

I had no idea where Jaeger and Hale were supposed to go, but. I ended up just going down to get Hale. On the way up he decided to lurch right in front of another horse and smash his face into the hay bales, took one TINY bite, and then allowed me to keep pulling him on.

Gods above everyone else has problems with Jaeger and I’m the one Hale hates.

So i get them out into D, which is just outside the arena and accessible through a small door, right? Well, after I go outside to toss their halters up by the gate, the door slams shut, and locks itself. So I had to go all the way around the arena to get back inside.

A sign it was going to be one of those days.

I got Quattro. He was pretty good for his hooves being cleaned: I should hopefully be able to trim them and stuff tomorrow. It looks like his puncture and bruising have healed a lot because I can poke the area much more.

We rode inside and he did really well. He was energetic, followed by grumpy and pawing the ground a lot, but he listened... relatively well. Ultimately I was pretty happy with him, even if we got super sweaty.

We went for a short trail ride, just down and across the creek: Quattro actually did. Really really well. He only kind of spazzed once at the scary toolshed, then just walked by it calmly with Zara, and that was really nice. No problem at all with the creek: I actually think both of them liked splashing through the water to cool off.

We came back and I gave him a rinse. Then he ran away and I had to snag him and drag him back to dry him off. I hate how normal its become for people to watch as I stomp after the fast-walking horse. No one even reacts anymore.

Also, so like. I brought blueberries in today because I’m turning into an old person and now I’m like “oh these blueberries are a wonderful treat!” I figured I’d find what the horses thought.

Jaeger liked them but. Jaeger is a giant draft horse who will eat anything. Quattro liked them: not super surprising, because he enjoys sweet things. Q, however, spat it out and then utterly refused to eat any more: again, not super surprising because he hates sweet things.

The surprise was Zara, who ate one, made a face, and then spat out any others given to her. So she’ll eat freaking meat but not blueberries.

So yeah. We had a day. I’m trying not to linger on the whole “I feel like I should have done more” or anything like that, because we got a lot worked on, and not every day has to be. Maximum potential, right? I don’t want to treat Quattro like a machine, and I don’t want to burn myself out, even if I have a small break coming up because partner is going to Kentucky for a few days for work.

Just gotta focus on what we did get done, and remember that there’s always tomorrow to do more.

#horse #quattro #jaeger

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just-dreaming-marvel · 3 years

Text

Invisible Pain

MAIN MASTERLIST

Tony Stark x Reader

Word Count: 3,050ish

Summary: You haven’t told the team something important about you out of fear of what they’d think.

Notes: This is based on me in my life. This is a very personal one shot for me, so please be kind.

Illnesses take on many shapes and forms. There are those that are physical and those that are mental. Some are clearly visible, some are not. You were in the category of physical, but not visible.

You were 17 years old when you were diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis, in every joint of your body. This meant that you had pain in every joint, that would only get worse with time. Your arthritis was the worst in your shoulders making backpacks, lifting, and even getting dressed the extremely difficult some days.

Like any other illness, you had your good days and your bad days. You and your doctors were still trying to figure out how to help you, nothing seemed to work well or for very long. But you continued on, cause that’s what you had to do. Especially because your job very rarely left you have a bad day.

How you became an Avenger is really quite unknown and confusing to you. But here you were, on the world’s greatest team of heroes, saving the day from anything and everything, almost everyday. No one on the team, but Fury, knew about your arthritis. Even your best friend, Tony, didn’t know.

You didn’t want them to see you any different or take pity on you, or compare you to old people (which happened way too much when you were first diagnosed). Then there was the chance that they wouldn’t believe you, which happened too often as well. Because people couldn’t see you were in pain and you did a good job at hiding it, so how bad could it really be?

Most days, you just fought through the pain, pushing yourself harder than you knew you probably should. But you had too. It was your job.

You woke up one morning, immediately knowing it was going to be one of those very terrible, bad days. It a been a few years since a day like this, so this one came as a little bit of a shock. Just breathing seemed to take a lot of your energy and tears built up as you tried to move your arms.

“Agent L/N,” FRIDAY called, “it seems that your heart rate is elevated, would you like me to fetch someone for you?”

“No, FRIDAY,” you responded. “I’m good.”

You didn’t want to let anyone see you like this. Weak, fragile. Or the chance of them not believing you after a while. You just didn’t want to go through that again. After pushing yourself through the pain to sit up, you reach over and turned on your shoulder heating pad, resting it on both your shoulders. Everything was screaming at you for every little movement. So you tried to not take too deep of breaths or move at all, leaning against the headboard with your eyes closed, focused on the heating pad, slowly heating up.

“Hey, Y/N!” Tony exclaimed, knocking on your door. “You in there? Breakfast is ready and we have a mission briefing in ten.”

Crap. You had forgotten about the mission briefing.

“Thanks for the reminder, Tony!” You replied. “I’m not feeling like breakfast today, but I’ll meet you in there for the briefing!”

“I’ll save you a seat!”

Hearing his footsteps leave, you sighed. Did you need breakfast? Yes, especially if you were going to take some pain killers. But did you have the strength to get there? Not a chance. Clenching your eyes shut to prepare yourself for the fire of your joints, you moved over to the edge of the bed. Looking down at your attire, you knew you should change but there was no way you were going to be able to take off the shirt and put another on.

Biting your bottom lip, you slowly stood up. Waiting there a bit to balance yourself before taking that painful first step. Today, your right hip was worse than your left, though they both still hurt like hell, so you were limping towards the door.

The stares you were getting as you limped down the hall just confirmed your thoughts. You looked as trashy as you thought you did. By the time you reached the briefing, Steve and Maria Hill had already started. Thankfully, Tony had sat in back, saving you a seat.

“Agent L/N,” the Captain said, making your presence known to everyone. You could feel all their eyes. “Nice of you to finally join us.”

You gave more of a grimace than a smile before he started the briefing back up again. All the others turned their focus back onto the front but Tony. He was watching you with worried eyes. You let out a quiet groan as you sat beside your best friend.

“Y/N,” he leaned over with a whisper, “are you okay?”

“Fine,” you breathed out, eyes clenched shut.

“You should have said something, I could have covered for you.”

“I’m fine, Tony. Really. It will pass.”

He was unconvinced but decided not to continue bugging you about it through the meeting. You had tried your best to focus on what people were presenting, but it was extremely hard when everything was on fire.

“Agent L/N,” Steve continued through the assignments, “will go into the base and retrieve the information needed.” He looked you dead in the eyes. “Are you up for it?”

“Of course, sir,” you responded, trying not to sound so strained.

“Okay, then I think we’re all set here. Everyone meet at the jet in an hour.”

Everyone began disbursing, but you couldn’t move. Once everyone was gone, Tony turned his chair to face you. He leaned forward, elbows on his knees and hands clasped together.

“Y/N, don’t try to lie,” he began, “I know you better than anyone. What’s wrong?”

“It’s nothing. It will pass. I just need some pain meds.”

You slowly and shakily began to rise from the chair, using the chair and the table in front of you as leverage. Tony stood with you, quickly placing a hand on your hand to help steady you. You winced at the touch, the pain from your joints radiating everywhere.

“Seriously, honey,” Tony worried, “you aren’t fine.”

“I’ll be fine,” you swatted him away, instantly regretting it because of the pain though. “I’ll be back to normal by the time the quinjet touches the ground.”

~~~

The pains meds had failed, mostly because you had failed to hear where the base you were heading to was located. Cold weather made your arthritis worse. So having a mission in the North Pole was not helping the flare up you were currently experiencing.

It had taken you almost the whole hour you had to prep to change. And now, you were about to land, and you were failing to put your coat on.

“Here,” Tony offered, grabbing the coat and holding it behind you. “Let me help.”

“Thanks,” you responded quietly, slowly slipping in one arm then the next.

Tony hurried around to your front and zipped you up. He then grabbed your gloves and carefully pulled them onto your hands.

“You know,” Tony said, grabbing your beanie, “I could help you if you stopped lying to me.” He pulled the beanie onto your head and fixed your hair. “And I really want to help.”

“I’m fine, Tony,” you replied.

“You know that’s the biggest lie, right?”

“I learned it from you.”

He sighed. “Just be safe in there, okay? You’re going in alone and you’re clearly not fine.”

“Tony…”

“I’ll be in there as soon as you call. Okay? I don’t care.”

You gave him a small smile. “Okay.”

He placed a gently kiss to your cheek before his suit form over him and he was called out, with you not far behind. The cold wind against you made your joints feel like thousands of tiny needles, even though you were bundled up. You were trying so hard not to cry, yet one tears escaped and froze as it ran down her face.

“We’re all in place, Y/N,” Steve called over the comms. “Get in there and get the information, we’ll keep everything clear.”

“Copy that,” you responded.

You knew you needed to rush this, but you could barely walk the speed you were going, which wasn’t that fast. Inside the bunker wasn’t much better. It was a small bunker separated from the main base. It was a single hallway, with four labeled doors on each side. You were incredibly grateful when you realized the main control room was one of the first doors. Opening the door, you counted two heads. You slipped out your gun and shot them both, letting out a small whimper each time with the kickback.

“Y/N, was that you?” Tony quickly fretted over the comms. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine, Tony,” you replied, limping further into the room. “Cap, I’m in.”

“Good job, L/N,” Steve responded. “They’re rushing out of the main base, so hurry.”

You nodded, knowing they couldn’t see you and went over to the computer. Your wrist and fingers screamed as you tried to type as fast as you could, but you pushed through. Even when your watch was screaming at you to slow down cause your heart rate was escalating. Unfortunately for you, your watch was connected to FRIDAY, informing Tony of your condition.

“Y/N, sweetheart, talk to me,” Tony called.

“I’m… fine…” you panted, trying to focus.”

“That’s not what FRIDAY’s saying. What’s going on in there? Are you being attacked?”

“I’m… almost done…” you pushed through the pain to press send. It quickly sent to FRIDAY and you erased the main frame. “Done.”

“Good job, L/N,” Steve said. “Now, meet us back at the quinjet. Quick.”

You turned, getting dizzy. Taking a few unsteady steps, you knew you wouldn’t be making it out of there on your own.

“Tony,” you called weakly, “help.”

“I’m on my way, honey,” he immediately responded. “Don’t move.”

Suddenly, the doors slammed open and HYDRA agents stormed in, giving you no other option but to fight. Crying out in pain with every move you made, you fought off the agents as best you could. But it wasn’t enough. An agent snuck up behind you, grasping your shoulder and pulled you around. You cried out, letting the tears finally free fall down your face. Tony finally entered, shooting down the agent holding onto you. You feel to your knees, trying to curl in on yourself. Once Tony had stopped all the HYDRA agents, his helmet folded into his suit as he came to your side.

“Y/N? Are you hurt?” He worried, checking you over. You sucked in a breath as you nodded. “Where?”

“Everywhere…”

“I’m going to pick you up and fly you out, okay?”

All you out do was give a small nod. You groaned as Tony picked you up. Flying out to the quinjet, Tony tried his best to hold you as steady as he could. Sadly, his touch wasn’t helping at all. The landing jostled you, causing a small cry to escape your mouth.

“What’s wrong?” Steve asked, rushing up with the rest of the team.

“I don’t know,” Tony answered, laying you down on the cot.

“Barton, get us in the air.”

“On it,” Clint replied, rushing to the pilot’s seat.

Tony’s suit disappeared from around him as he knelt next to you. Bruce and Natasha began to work together to hook you up to machine and get an IV in you. You whined with each touch, worrying your teammates.

“Y/N,” Tony said softly, “what’s going on?”

“I’m… sorry,” you cried quietly. “I’m so sorry…”

“What are you apologizing for?”

“I… I have…” But you weren’t able to finish, losing consciousness due to the medication Bruce had quickly gotten into you.

“FRIDAY, pull up Y/N’s medical history now,” Bruce requested.

“My apologies, Dr. Banner,” FRIDAY responded. “But it seems that Agent L/N’s medical history has a restricted access.”

“By who?” Tony asked.

“Director Fury. Only him and Y/N can access the files.”

“Get Fury on the line. Now.”

The team waited anxiously for Fury’s voice to come over the quinjet, but nothing.

“Director Fury has requested that I tell you that he will meet you back at the compound,” FRIDAY finally said.

“He damn better,” Tony growled.

~~~

“Rheumatoid arthritis?” Many of the team members repeated after Fury had told them about your condition.

The team was in the common room, while you had been tucked into your bed for some much needed rest. Fury was standing in front of them, stoic as ever.

“Since when?” Tony asked. He was beginning to grow angry at you for keeping such a secret.

“Since before I knew her,” Fury answered. “Y/N was diagnosed at age 17.”

“You can get arthritis that young?” Steve questioned.

“It’s not that common,” Bruce answered, “but it happens.”

“Why hide it?” Nat asked.

“Now that is a question Y/N must answer,” Fury replied. “I’ve already said too much. Right now though, Y/N needs some serious rest and not a lot of stress.”

Tony clenched his jaw and stood up, marching out of the room.

“What’s up with him?” Steve asked.

“Seriously, Steve?” Natasha questioned. “He’s in love with her. He’s mad he didn’t know sooner.”

“He’s in love with her? Are you sure? I’m pretty sure they’re just… best… friends… okay, yeah, I’m old.”

~~~

Tony was mad at you, no question about it. You two supposedly told each other everything, then this happened. Though his wasn’t happy with you, he was still very concerned. Locking himself away in his lab, Tony studied everything there was to know about rheumatoid arthritis. He absolutely hated feeling this helpless, especially when it came to you. Tony didn’t want to feel that way again.

You slept until well into the night. Slowly waking up, the pain was definitely still there, but more bearable. With your eyes not fully open, you looked around your room. You were surprised yet a little relieved to see that you were alone. Pushing yourself to sit up, you let out a small groan and a long breath. The mission definitely didn’t go as you had planned, and you were embarrassed because of it.

With a deep breath, you slowly moved over to the edge of the bed. As you pushed yourself off to head to the bathroom, your bedroom door opened.

“What are you doing?” Tony fretted, hurrying to you. “You should be in bed still.”

“I need to pee,” you replied, sleepily, with your eyes squinting because of the light streaming in from the hallway.

“Then call for help next time.”

“I’m not injured, Tony. I can walk.”

“But you—“

“Need to be able to pee on my own. Wait out here if you want to but I don’t need help.”

You slowly went to your connecting bathroom, sighing as you sat on the toilet. When you were done with your business, you walked out to see that Tony had shut the door and was now staring out your window. You walked to your bed, the tension slowly building.

“Tony—“

“Why didn’t you tell me?” He was quiet and hurt, which hurt you. “I thought we told each other everything.”

“I just… I’m sorry, Tony. I really am.”

When he turned to face you, the look on his face broke your heart. It was hurt, loud and clear, shining through his eyes. Tears slowly began building up in yours.

“I—“ your voice broke slightly. You took a deep, shaky breath. “There’s just so many sides to this… so many sides people can react to finding out… they believe me and worry too much, believing that just by breathing I could break. There’s those who don’t believe me at all and those who spend every waking second comparing me to their grandparents… and then there’s those who don’t believe… but that’s not even the worst one…. The worst one is those that believe but slowly think I’m overreacting. That I can just push through, like I don’t do that every freakin’ day already.” You let a tear slip out of your eye. “Like I don’t feel pain every damn day… when I complain, when I say it’s too much, I mean it’s too damn much… but people still don’t believe that I’m trying my best… that’s why I didn’t say anything. I was terrified about what people would think… about what you would think…”

Tony didn’t quickly move. He stood there, staring, while his mind was clearly turning. You closed your eyes, turning away from Tony. Your throat began to tighten, emotions building. Tony’s footsteps were heard, and you swore they were heading towards the door. So it surprised you when you felt a dip in your bed and a gently hand under your chin. Tony guided your head to face him as your eyes slowly opened, glistening with tears.

“It hurts that you kept this from me. It does,” he started. “But it doesn’t hurt as much as knowing that you’ve been hurt so many times because people didn’t believe you. That you’ve been pushing your body to the absolute limit to protect yourself.” He moved his hand onto your cheek, catching the tears from your cheeks. “You didn’t have to protect yourself from me, honey, cause all I want to do is protect you… I believed you were the strongest woman before this, and now I know it. You can depend on me, Y/N. I will be there when ever you need help, or when you believe you can do it on your own. But you don’t have to, cause I want to be there… I… I love you.”

“Even knowing the truth?”

“Honey, that only made me love you more.”

You quickly put your lips on his. He willingly welcomed it. When you separated, Tony rested his forehead against yours.

“I love you, too,” you breathed out.

He pressed a quick kiss to your lips. “Now, I’ve researched everything there is to know about RA and I think—“

You shook your head. “Okay, mama bear, do you think we could get some sleep and talk more about it in the morning?”

“Yes, dear.”

Part 2

Again, this is a very personal story with very many real elements of my life in it. Except that I’ve never had a boyfriend. I scare many potential boyfriends away due to my arthritis and other health problems.

Please be understanding to those will unseen, chronic issues. They push themselves harder then they have to. I would know, I do it every day.

Not everyone experiences Rheumatoid Arthritis the way I do, keep that in mind.

#tony stark x reader #the avengers x reader #avengers x reader #tony stark imagine #tony stark #Iron Man #iron man x reader #iron man imagine #avengers imagine #marvel x reader #marvel imagine #marvel imagines #Avengers

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scaryscarecrows · 4 years

Text

Get Me Out of Gotham

AN: Self-indulgent bullshit written, partly, while logging ‘cat-social-hours’, a phrase which here means, ‘sitting outside with a semi-feral cat to get him acclimated to his new home’. (The cat is nice, just skittish around people. He’s getting there.)

* * *

Nicole was going to see a therapist. She’d hit it off with a really nice man that had come in one night, even. He’d been a tall, thin man with a quiet demeanor and with nothing but five minutes and a few soft sentences, she’d been convinced he could help her with the nightmares and the paranoia.

But then she’d popped into the kitchen for somebody’s order and the chef had told her to stay away from him, that he was some freak called the Scarecrow who scared people literally to death for shits and giggles and science.

“But he said he’s a psychiatrist,” she’d said helplessly.

“Yeah. Used to be one, over at Arkham. Look, you wanna claw your own eyes out, that’s your business, but I’d stay away from him.”

So no therapy. She’ll get some, she decides, when she goes home. Six more months. She’s made it this long, right?

Six months, though. She still wakes up three nights a week. Sometimes the man shoots her in the head, sometimes the Red Hood advances on her next, intoning, “Let the punishment fit the crime.”

Sometimes she just has to run from him, but that faceless red mask is always a few steps behind her, like Michael Myers.

But. She’s. She’s doing okay, all things considered. She bought some pepper spray. She followed Batwatch and the GCPD on Twitter to help avoid anything major. Most people, her coworkers say, don’t see the vigilantes that often. Robin’s the most common one, then Batman, then Red Hood. Batgirl hasn’t been seen for years, she’s probably out of action. Sometimes someone (something?) called Nightwing pops into town, but he mostly operates in Bludhaven. So odds are she’ll be fine, right? Go to work, then stick to nice, normal places like Starbucks and Wal-Mart. Chains, she thinks, are key. Don’t be a local and it’s safer.

But she still hates walking under the skylight.

Taking out the trash sucks, too; the alley’s dark and cramped and it smells like death and rotting McDonald’s. And there’s rats, big ones that don’t scatter when she shakes the bag at them. Sometimes there’s a raggedy old cat with a torn ear and one eye, but it’s mean.

Tonight the lighting’s worse than ever. Their bulb’s out, apparently, and the neon sign across the street has a few letters not working, so all she’s got is a flashing purple girl and three blue ‘M’s. But that’s okay, because the dumpster’s literally ten steps from the door. It’s okay.

It’s not okay. She’s just hefting the bag up to try and hurl it in when the flashing neon goes sort of red in the corner of her eye. She drops the bag, already trying to tell herself it’s nothing.

It’s not nothing. The Red Hood’s slouched against the wall not three feet away. He raises his head, slow and deliberate, and rasps, “Who are you.”

Shit.

“I just. I just work here--I wait tables! Just tables! Please--”

“I’m not gonna hurt ya.” He sets his head back against the bricks. “Finish whatever you came out for and go back in. I was never here.”

Okay. Okay.

She bends down, picks up the bag, and inches towards the dumpster. Hood doesn’t move, but she thinks he’s watching her. She heaves the bag into the dumpster and steps away from him as fast as possible. And then she trips over her own feet and lands on her ass.

“Shit--”

“You okay?” The head moves again, still slow. “Need help up?”

Fuck no.

“No! No thank you. I’m. I’m just clumsy, I swear, I--”

“Breathe, kid.”

She shuts up, scrambles to her feet and tries to brush herself off. She’s just feeling for leftover gravel when the door opens and Dove’s annoyed voice says, “Hon, what are you doing out here--Hood?”

He waves.

“Hi, Miss Marquis.”

“What’s up?”

“Think I scared, uh…”

“Nicole.” No! No! Don’t tell the scary man her name! “Out-of-towner.”

“Oh.” He sounds like he’s trying to be nice when he tilts towards her and says, “Sorry.”

“What are you doing out here?” Dove demands. “It’s late as it is.”

“Flouting authority,” Hood says, shrugging towards the No Loitering sign behind him. “Yknow. Stickin’ it to the man.”

Nicole flashes back to the robbery. Can she go in? He’s not talking to her anymore, will he care? Is it safe? Maybe she should tell someone to tell Penguin. Or, like, the cops.

Dove coughs. Or maybe that’s her trying to hide a laugh, Nicole can’t tell.

“What else are you doing out here, kiddo.”

What.

That thing is no kiddo. He’s huge! He kills people!

Why did I think Gotham University was a good move? I got accepted into two other ones, why did I come here?

Hood’s silent for a minute, like he’s nervous or something. Nicole wonders if she can sneak back inside and hide in the bathroom.

“I got Pyg. Like. He won’t. He can’t hurt anyone else.”

Pyg? Who’s Pyg? Is he dead? Is he human?

Whoever he is, Dove must know, because she goes very still before saying, voice rough and ten years older, “You’re sure?”

“Pretty sure he’s not gonna grow a new head,” Hood says quietly. “So. Yeah. M’sure.”

So it was another person. That Hood murdered. Great. How many freaks are in this town? Pyg was not in the warning brochure she got with her college acceptance letter! He wasn’t even in the Google search!

Dove sighs and fidgets with the brace on her left wrist, and right about now Nicole wonders, again, where that came from. She’d asked, initially, but Dove had waved her off, said something about a mugger and goddamn meat-packing district with lazy beat cops, and she’d let it go.

“--sure you’re good? You’re movin’ kinda careful.”

“Storm’s coming.” So what, he’s got arthritis or something? “M’good. Just crackly.”

“Then go home before you get shot. Or worse.”

“M’fine--”

“I am going to worry and I am going to be upset and if I have to, I’ll call Harvey and have him tell Jim to call Batman on you.”

“You wouldn’t.”

“See what happens.”

Nicole has no idea what’s happening here.

Hood’s silent for a few seconds, like he’s thinking things over.

“You would.”

“I would.”

He sighs, slumps a little more, and grumbles, “I’ll turn in early. Promise.”

“Thank you.” Dove turns to Nicole, jerks her head towards the door. “C’mon. Back to work for us. And you.” She jabs a finger at Hood. “You take care of yourself for once.”

“I always take care of myself!”

“Bullshit. Go home, kid. I mean it.”

He tips his head like he wants to shrug but can’t, says, “Thanks for the tip on that bastard.”

“Kinda wish I hadn’t picked it up,” Dove says dryly. “Home. Or I really will get Batman called on you.”

Nicole blinks and Hood’s just gone, like he was never there at all. Dove gives her a nudge back towards the door.

“Um…”

“Hm.”

“Mugger?”

“Always carry mace in this town.”

She does. But still.

You know what, no. No. She doesn’t wanna know, she’s not gonna go home and Google ‘Pyg’ or anything at all, she’s gonna go home and lock all the doors and hide under the covers and try not to have nightmares about rolling heads and gunshots.

Christ, why did she come here?

THE END

#fic #Jason Todd #Red Hood #Dove Marquis #Nicole the Non-Local

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secret-engima · 4 years

Note

Please consider, FnF Gladio meeting Reborn post lung-incident. Please, consider.

Ohhhh. Oh boy. OH BOY. Ummm I’m assuming you don’t mean Reborn as a reincarnation because he’s not gonna show up in Fangs and Feathers but hypothetically Imma bout to do a ficlet so buckle up-

Hypothetically Gladio is an adult, a Shield and a brother to Noctis, loyal and protective and FIERCE. Who trained himself to the ground, then pestered Cor for more because he was NEVER failing Noctis again, not in anyway. A Gladio who, when he was eighteen and finally had a motorcycle of his own, ran away to fight Gilgamesh and by the time Xanxus and Cor had busted their way through, found him bloody and tired and TRIUMPHANT, scarred and defiant and VICTORIOUS as Gilgamesh laughed, hollow and inhuman in his shell and presented Gladio with the sword Cor had lost when he tried the same at fifteen.

Hypothetically this Gladio is now 25 and strong and SKILLED, skilled enough to win against the famed, immortal Blademaster at 18, skilled enough to protect his king (he hopes, he prays, he trains because he is never going to fail this duty again, not in any way).

Hypothetically this Gladio has known for years that Noctis is a reincarnation, and that his original name was Tsunayoshi Sawada.

Hypothetically this Gladio, one day, sees his king stumble over air and catches him instinctively, and in the touch is pulled along as he falls through into another world. A parallel version of his past life. And while Noctis looks at the small town around them and pales, pulls his magic in until it’s totally hidden as if AFRAID, Gladio becomes angry. At the strange trip into another world, at Noctis’s reaction. At his FEAR.

They wander town, looking for a way back, and then Gladio hears a louder, more frightened version of the soft “hieeee” Noctis used to say as a child when startled, followed by a smooth, male voice that says, “A mafia boss doesn’t give up, Dame-Tsuna. Get up and do it again.”

Gladio sees Noctis flinch deep and visceral because even if Noctis had loved his tutor for freeing him, for teaching him (for eventually being ... not a father, but the only thing like it Tsuna had, after Reborn realized why Tsuna was so “hopeless” and actually apologized for all the terror he’d put Tsuna through, even if he never completely changed his methods), that is not the voice of his Reborn. For one, that was a man’s voice, not a cursed baby’s, which means things are already wildly different in this world. For another ... that was not the voice of the Reborn who had stood at his side until the end of his life, the one who had retired only when his head of hair was pure silver and his hands slightly shaky from arthritis. The voice that said “Dame-Tsuna” the same way others said “Son”.

This was the voice of Reborn before he cared. Hard and businesslike, borderline cruel as he forced his student to get up and try it again, to do it right this time or else risk being shot, who had forgotten what kindness was and indulged in pranks against the people who should have been in his care without a thought. This was a Reborn who had never been humbled, never seen his “helpless student” stand up to the one thing Reborn was terrified most of and say “No. You Can’t Have Him.”

Noctis does not want to see this Reborn. Doesn’t want to be anywhere near him.

Gladio sees the flinch, the expression of conflicted misery and fear and love and ... puts it together. Puts together the stories Noctis told him as they grew up and grew closer. Of his teacher who he loved, but who he had feared for years because of his too hard methods. Of being fourteen and shot again and again until he lost his ability to flinch at the sound of gunfire. Of being fourteen and forced to crawl to his feet and keep going even when his mouth tasted like copper and it hurt to breathe because Reborn wasn’t satisfied so Do It Again.

Gladio’s sword is out and he’s going for Reborn’s head before he can realize he’s moving.

Reborn, this one younger, this one not a cursed baby, this one who’s title of Arcobaleno is just a fancy label that marks him as one of the Mafia’s Best rather than someone who must carry a cursed artifact, barely ducks in time to avoid being beheaded. His retaliatory gunfire is swatted aside with obvious and open contempt, the sword slashing through sun-enhanced bullets like they were butter and not things powerful enough to rip through tanks. His student screams in fear and Reborn assumes the swordsman is an assassin come for the Vongola Heir, so he tries to lead the man farther away (not too far, in case the man had backup waiting for Reborn to be busy) from his useless student. The man follows easily, something hard and venomous in his gaze and Reborn inwardly scoffs because ah, the employer picked someone with a grudge against Reborn. How quaint.

It stops being quaint when the man launches on the offensive again and Reborn finds himself overwhelmed. Any attack is dodged or swatted aside like a fly, any feint is seen through and matched, the blade moves effortlessly in the man’s hands (Cloud? The sword looks heavy but he handles it like a paperweight), slicing through trees like frost, the shockwaves nearly sending Reborn flying the first time before he compensated. He catches a glint of Red flowing up the blade right before another unnaturally sharp and fast strike and realizes he’s up against a very strong Storm that is COMPLETELY ignoring Tsuna in favor of trying to take off Reborn’s HEAD.

Lovely. Just what he needed. Normally he would delight in this kind of thing, a nice break from trying to get train a useless civilian boy into a half-decent Mafia Boss.

But normally Reborn wouldn’t be giving ground and increasingly alarmed and afraid for his own life. The man just won’t STOP and none of Reborn’s tricks or tactics are working. Not diversions, not a flashbang shot to blind, nothing. He just keeps coming with a snarl on his face and speed that a Storm really shouldn’t have (the man fights like a Cloud, all unfair tanking and speed and power, but he is clearly a Storm in temper, in the red on his blade when his strikes split and devour the earth milliseconds after Reborn dodges.

Normally, Reborn would not be so hard pressed as to MISS the hunched figure that steals over to his student and starts gently talking to him before pressing a hand against the boy’s stomach.

The sudden EXPLOSION of Sky Flames, rippling out over the training ground, the park, the town, heck, probably the entire REGION definitely reclaims Reborn’s attention. His head snaps around to see, has a moment to be stunned by the sight of his student, his Weak Sky, Lazy Sky, Civilian Boy, wreathed in pure, pure amber Flames that make Luce’s look like guttering embers-

“Gladio, stop.” Says the stranger next to his student, eyes flashing from blue to bright red and Reborn feels steel stop just touching his neck, feels the wind of the halted blow send his hat flying, and pales. He’s slipped up for just a moment-

And if that stranger hadn’t spoken, that moment would have cost Reborn his life.

“He’s Reborn,” snarls the Storm, thick and furious and hateful.

“I know,” says the other man, “That’s why I want you to stop.”

The Storm growls feral and angry, pulls his sword away from Reborn’s neck, still ready to defend if Reborn tries to fight again, “He doesn’t deserve it. Any of it,” he spits and Reborn has the distinct impression he is missing something, because this ... doesn’t feel like disgruntled hitmen that want his fame and title.

The stranger near Reborn’s still wreathed-in-flame-student sounds ... sad. Nostalgic, is watching him with eyes that seem to see right through him and into his quietest, deepest parts, “I know,” the man repeats as he calmly helps Reborn’s student stand, “but I can’t help it.” A pause, a flicker of buried, ancient fury and hurt and suddenly the man is right next to the Storm in a flicker of sparks (Mist then? He doesn’t feel like a Mist). Reborn steps cautiously back, opens his mouth to demand answers (who were they, who did they work for, what had they just done to his student to make him for from a guttering Flame to a Sky Flame Reborn is almost getting FLAME DRUNK on right this minute).

He doesn’t see the man move. Just feels a touch on his stomach with gentle fingers.

The world goes grey. Grey and cold and deaf and dumb and blind and the world is spinning and he can’t get his feet under him, can’t keep them under him because he has no ANCHOR to the world, like its all just mist around his ankles. He drops his gun, falls over trying to get it back, curses as he stumbles to his knees because nothing is WORKING and he can’t THINK and what did they do? WHAT DID THEY DO? His Sun Flames are gone-gone-gone and he’s shaking and there is fog in his head and-

“Get up, Dame-Tsuna,” says the stranger softly, “a Mafia Boss doesn’t trip over his own two feet. Get up and do it again.” And it sounds like a quote. It is a quote. It’s him.

Reborn hisses a curse but STILL can't get his gun to stay in his hand long enough for a shot (he’s so cold so cold so cold)

“Stop it! Stop it!” Amber, burning and searing hot, curling around him as his student- as TSUNA leaps in the way, grabs the Mist’s (?) arm and pleads, “Don’t do it to him! He doesn’t deserve it, no one does! No one deserves that! Please!”

The man gently ruffles Tsuna’s hair, “You’re right. No one deserves it. It’s only temporary. It will wear off in just a few more seconds. I just ... wanted him to understand what it was like-”

Something inside Reborn shatters and his Sun Flames rush back, the world rushes back, sound and color, touch and taste and stability, the world stops sliding away from him and the fog clears just in time for him to hear-, “to be a completely Sealed Flame.”

Reborn lunges to his feet again, gun in a shaking but firm hand, mind whirling- “There was a seal on my student,” he hisses. Then he blanches, because this man just- that feeling had been- all this time his student-.

The stranger with the blue eyes shrugs, “Yes,” he says simply. “I removed it. Gladio, come on. I think our ride is here.”

The Storm scoffs but starts following the man away. Reborn takes a step after them, freezes when the sword comes to bear at his neck again, “Who are you?” he hisses, humiliated and humbled and wary for the first time in over a decade, “How did you know all this? What Famiglia are you sworn to?”

The Storm snorts and pulls his blade away, the other man pauses, sighs.

Unfurls his Flame like the rising of the dawn. It stretches and curls, strange and oddly crystalline, forming little shards of amber and blue diamonds in the air, but it’s powerful, it blankets the area, tangling and clicking effortlessly with Tsunayoshi’s almost like-

Almost like they were-

No.

No that was impossible.

Blue eyes are now amber gold as he smiles sadly, “Just a Sky who saw your student and knew what was really wrong.”

“I want your name,” Reborn rasps past the heady feeling of being surrounded by two Sky Flames (identical Sky Flames) that made Luce the Arcobaleno Sky look like a mere spark of fire.

A blink, a near mischievous (tired, bitter, nostalgic, conflicted) look, “We both know you already know my name, Reborn.” He turns away again, one hand tangling with the fingers of his Storm to keep the bear of a man from attacking Reborn again and somehow Reborn knows that there is nothing he can do to stop them from walking away.

Just as they reach the borders of the park and start to round the bend, the Sky lifts a hand in a lazy wave and a flippant, “Chaos, Reborn!” Then they’re around the bend and the crystalline Sky Flame is gone. Vanished from the air like it had never been.

Reborn stares, processing and staggering under the weight of ... everything that just happened. Looks down at his shivering student who leaped to his defense (poor defense, begging defense but still DEFENSE) even though Reborn has done nothing to win any sort of favor.

Even though he’s been pushing a Sky child past the breaking point without even noticing that the boy was sealed and not just weak from inexperience.

He needs a drink.

But first ... “I think that’s enough for today d-. Tsuna. Let’s take you home.”

Ask me in the next life, whispers in his ear over his whiskey late that night.

We both know you already know my name.

He’s Reborn

I know, that’s why I want you to stop.

He doesn’t deserve it. Any of it.

I know, but I can’t help it.

Ask me in the next life.

We both know you already know my name.

Reborn mutters a curse as he slugs back his drink. Buries the knowledge that just tried to behead him with a sword for another day. Or never. Preferably never. He has a training regime to drastically rewrite. And .... possibly. MAYBE. An apology to make to his student in the morning.

...

“You didn’t have to try to kill him, you know.” Noctis murmurs as they lounge in the sunshine of the Citadel garden. Safely returned to their home dimension with a little help from Umbra and Gentiana.

Gladio tightens his arms around his king, letting the smaller man sit in his lap like the cuddly cat his king-brother secretly is, “He deserves it. He hurt you. He hurt you so badly you’re still messed up in an entirely different lifetime.” He made you afraid of me. Even more than I had made you afraid of me. Gladio doesn’t say.

Noctis just sighs like he already knows, then murmurs, “At least I got the Seal off. I always wanted someone to come take the Seal off. Even before I knew what it was.”

Gladio growls and lets the matter slide.

But if they ever wind up back in that dimension, Gladio is going to track down Reborn and kick his tail again. Not kill him, that would upset his king-brother, but smack him around?

Yeah. That sounded good.

#SE asks #anon asks #Secret Engima Rambles #Fangs and Feathers verse #gladiolus amicitia #this ran away like crazy #now my hands hurt #oh well #also noctis stole the scene #but it was that or let gladio kill reborn out of RAGE #and we can't have that

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macgyvermedical · 4 years

Text

Email From My Parents’ Former Chiropractor, a Medical Review

I had to read that and now so do you. But guess what? I also get to tear it apart line by line with extreme prejudice. And not the bad kind. At. All.

This went out to probably close to a thousand people.

People will die because of this email.

“We have been keeping up with the true data from the CDC and WHO that is giving very accurate information on this virus.“

I’m relatively neutral on this. The CDC and WHO are probably some of the most official sources. They’re a little behind (1-2 days for WHO, and both only update every 24 hours), but overall no one would fault him for citing them as sources. Here’s the source I’ve been using.

My biggest problem with that beginning is that the sentence structure is... alarmingly presidential.

“First, this is not a new virus. It's been known to cause respiratory problems since the 1960's.”

The group of viruses called “coronavirus” have been identified since 1965. But there are hundreds of unique viruses in this group, and 7 of them infect humans at very different severities. The most recent one, identified in December 2019 and now named SARS-CoV-2, is definitely a coronavirus, but it’s also definitely not one we’ve seen before.

“So far, the new coronavirus has led to more than 100,000 illnesses and more than 3,000 deaths worldwide.”

I mean, he’s technically right that it’s “more than” 100,000 cases. But this email went out today, when confirmed cases were a lot closer to 784,400 and deaths were 37,780 (see source above). Even the WHO numbers today are 693,224 and 33,106 respectively. So my best guess is he was writing this on March 7th (per WHO sitreps) and didn’t bother to update it before sending it out March 30th.

“In the U.S. alone, the flu has caused an estimated 34 million illnesses, 350,000 hospitalizations and 20,000 deaths this season... Per the CDC data, the flu virus as far more contagious and deadlier.”

This info is also substantially out of date. Currently, these numbers are 38 mil, 400,000, and 24,000 respectively.

I have to say, I did fall for the corona vs flu false equivalency once upon a time, but I’ve learned and grown a lot since then. We’re prepared for the number of hospital beds we need for (seasonal-not-pandemic) flu. We know how fast spreads and we have a vaccine that offers at least partial protection from it. We have widespread testing for it. We’re relatively comfortable with it’s severity and mortality rate.

But you heard it here last: with the data we have right now, none of those things apply to covid-19. We don’t have the beds, ventilators, or PPE to take all of it’s excessive illness on, which leads to higher mortality rates. It's more contagious than flu (infecting 2-2.5 people per infected person, vs seasonal flu’s 1.3). We don’t have a vaccine or significant natural immunity. We don’t have adequate testing, so we don’t know enough to know if anything we do know is close to correct. All of that makes it much, much worse than seasonal flu despite numbers.

“What to do? First, all patients are responsible for their own immune system.”

I mean, sure, okay, you have the responsibility to make the best choices you can for you in the situation that you’re in. That’s fair. And generally people do. But saying you’re responsible for your own immune system seems to imply that if you get covid-19, it’s your own dang fault because you weren’t responsible enough?

If that stresses you out, rest easy in that you don’t control nearly as much of your health status (look up the Whitehall Studies) and immune status (look up the Pittsburgh Cold Studies and a paper that came out of them titled “Types of Stressors That Increase Susceptibility to the Common Cold in Healthy Adults” by Cohen et al, 1998), as people like to think you do.

“When a bacteria or virus enter the body, your bodies natural immune system will attack this foreign body by creating an antibody that will destroy these foreign viruses or bacteria's (sic)...”

Okay, sure, that’s not a bad explanation.

“...So, when someone isolates themselves, the virus will still be "out there" and vaccinations will not stop the spread of any virus. A vaccination will force your body to make antibodies, which is the body's natural response to a virus. In other words, the virus will populate the world.“

I’ll be honest, I don’t entirely understand what he means with this passage, but I’ll give it my best shot.

If you never come into contact with a virus, it’s certainly true that you won’t ever get antibodies from it naturally. You also won’t get sick, and won’t have the opportunity to spread it to other people. That’s, like... the entire point of isolation.

But if a vaccine exists, that gives you the opportunity to have the best of both worlds- you get to make antibodies, and you never have to get sick! Score!

And if a lot of people have the antibodies, the illness can’t spread through the population (”herd” or “community” immunity), meaning that very few people get sick. You don’t have to be exposed to the virus after being vaccinated in order to become immune. The vaccine is literally the part of the virus the body needs to be exposed to to learn how to create antibodies.

He then goes on to list the ways in which you can build a strong immune system to fight covid-19. These suggestions include:

“Eat Healthy Natural Foods: These foods have the vitamins and nutriatiants (sic) your body needs to build its immune system.”

Sure, healthy food is good for you. No one’s arguing with you there.

“Get Adjusted: Every tissue in the body depends 100% nerve supply from the brain. These nerves carry all the cells information to repair and regenerate injured tissue. When the nervous systems is interfered with, this communication system between the brain and the tissue cells is weakened, therefore causing decreased immune response.”

This isn’t wrong so much as poorly worded. The brain (and vagus nerve) is involved in healing injured or infected tissues, particularly as part of modulating inflammatory response and eliciting reactions like vomiting, mucous production, and coughing to get rid of irritating substances. The inflammatory response kicks off the healing process, and we know that if the vagus nerve has been cut or in some other way interfered with, there is not as much inflammation across the board (which is why vagus nerve simulators have been shown to work against arthritis).

I’m not sure if there’s literature on chiropractic care improving this, but I certainly don’t think it’s impossible.

May I, however, suggest an editor at this point?

“Sleep 7-9 hours per night: Cellular regeneration happens mostly a night. Drink enough water: Dehydrate causes stress in the body, that will weakened the immune system.“

Great!

“Take natural supplements: These will help your immune systems, if you are not getting enough nutrients and vitamins through your healthy diet.”

Supplements generally aren’t necessary for most people (unless they have a diagnosed deficiency), but if you just like taking a multivitamin no one’s stopping you. Just don’t go overboard.

“P.S. Our team at [redacted] Chiropractic is super healthy. We follow the above guidelines!! We are asking anyone who may be ill, to stay home, or even more important get adjusted in our office [emphasis added]. Just let us know you are not feeling well and we will get you in and out with minimal contact with others. We take pride in cleanliness with all our patients. Hope to see you soon.”

I just... felt the need to leave that last paragraph in it’s entirety. If you’re all the way at the end of this post, you really deserve to read it again and let it sink in that he’s ASKING SOMEONE TO GO OUT IN PUBLIC WITH COVID-19 IN THE MIDDLE OF A PANDEMIC, IN AN AREA WHERE A “SHELTER IN PLACE” ORDER HAS BEEN ISSUED.

As medical facilities, chiropractic offices are allowed to stay open. I don’t mind this generally. A lot of people rely on chiropractic care for pain control and I would never want to take that away from them if there was another way.

But I work at a doctor’s office (sometimes). We are all but refusing to see patients in the office unless absolutely necessary to comply with social distancing rules and conserve PPE. If I were a chiropractor right now, I would be limiting my services to emergencies or people who really can’t get along without it, and encouraging people to NOT COME IN IF THEY KNOW OR SUSPECT THEY ARE SICK HOLY CRAP MAN STAP.

That’s like, the bare, bare minimum.

Thank you for reading.

#medical review #chiropractic care #vaccines #covid-19

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