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ayybtch · 3 years

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You’re Worth A Perjury Charge

Bucky Barnes x Reader

Part of A Mutual Weirdness

Summary: Bucky finds a kitten outside of your apartment and brings him inside. You make him be a responsible adult and take the cat to the vet to find out if it's microchipped, but Bucky is so head over heels for his newfound furbaby he’s willing to risk legal repercussions.

Word Count: 2,422

Warnings: None! Bucky being absolutely adorable with a cat

A/N: So I didn’t previously have a tag list for this series, but I started one for my Wanda fic and a couple people asked about it for this so I’m starting one! Let me know if you’d like a tag! Additionally, you don’t have to have read the part before this but it’s a little funnier if you have given that the script is flipped between them.

“Uh, Bucky, what the hell is that?” you ask, eyes wide at the wet ball of fur poking out of Bucky’s leather jacket.

Bucky looked down at the little white cat, smiling as it meowed softly. “I found this little guy by the trash cans downstairs. It was raining so I couldn’t just leave him there.”

You stared at him in disbelief. “If that’s where you found him, how do you know he isn’t one of my neighbors’ cats? I get wanting to get him out of the rain, but the heart eyes you’re giving him makes me think you want to keep him.”

Bucky frowned at you, “Of course I’m keeping him. Look at him, he’s soaking wet and looks half starved! Clearly, he’s not being taken care of if he does belong to someone, so really I’m just doing everyone here a favor by taking him in.” He glared at you as you started to laugh.

“Oh, I can just see the headline now: ‘Former Winter Soldier Locked in Cat Custody Battle’. Some little old lady who just adopted this cat - ” you laughed too hard to speak for a moment, “- is going to go berserk and sue you for everything you’re worth just because you like her cat.”

Bucky huffed and opened his mouth to respond, but was cut off by the cat meowing. The smile on his face as he stared down at the little bundle of fur made you melt, though you did your best to hide that fact from Bucky.

Bucky nodded along attentively as the kitten continued to meow. “I know, she’s being so inconsiderate of your well-being, isn’t she? She’s worried about some little old lady suing me over you. Well, guess what? She can sue me all she wants, I’m not letting you go. Even if I have to lie to a judge and say ‘I plead not guilty in case of the missing cat. Please ignore the gentle meows coming from inside my jacket - ” He paused again as the cat continued to meow. “Mhm, you are absolutely right. You’re worth a perjury charge.”

What on Earth was happening here? You are the animal crazy one, not Bucky. Yet here you are, being the reasonable and responsible adult in a situation involving an animal. The irony of the situation hit you and you couldn't help but chuckle.

Your laughter eventually died as you noticed the heart eye expression on Bucky’s face. He was already completely enamored with the kitten. Sighing, you knew you needed to find a middle ground and fast.

“Bucky, baby, would you at least be willing to take him to go see a vet? We owe it to whoever might own the cat to see if there’s a microchip. If there’s not one, we can get a check up on the little guy while we’re there and make sure he’s good to go.”

Bucky stared at you suspiciously for a moment before responding. “What do you mean ‘good to go’? You don’t mean to get rid of him, do you?”

You shook your head. “No baby, I just want to make sure he’s okay so you have a happy, healthy kitty in your life.” You almost didn’t get your sentence out before he was squishing you into a hug. A small gasp escaped his lips and he pulled away abruptly.

“I could’ve squished the baby! Are you okay?” Bucky pulled out the cat and examined him anxiously. A small squeak left the cat, confirming he was okay.

While he agreed that a vet visit was in order, the new challenge was figuring out when to take the cat. Bucky refused to take him back into the rain, claiming it was going to make him sick. You conceded and agreed to let the kitten stay until the weather broke. That was all Bucky needed to start trying his hardest to convince you that he should keep the cat regardless of what the vet said. Every time the cat did anything cute, Bucky was gasping and pointing out how cute he was. He almost started crying when the cat pounced on a random sock laying next to the coffee table, swearing up and down he had never seen a more precious sight in his life.

The number of pictures Bucky was taking of the kitten as he explored the apartment was hysterical. Any time he took an exceptionally cute picture, he immediately sent it to you. You currently had 18 unopened messages from Bucky, each one a different picture of the cat. You finally had to put an end to it once the kitten curled up on a pillow in the living room, settling down for a nap.

You tugged on Bucky’s hand and led him over to a barstool and gestured for him to sit. You made two sandwiches, handing one to him once it was done. The two of you ate in silence. It wasn’t until you were almost done eating that you spoke.

“You know, it’s kind of refreshing having you be the one that’s animal crazy for a change.”

Bucky smiled at you sheepishly. “What can I say, you’ve rubbed off on me.” His voice was teasing as he spoke, but the slight blush on his face suggested this was all just as unexpected to him as it was to you. A second silence fell over you, but this time he was the one who broke it.

“So what should we name him?” he asked, pulling out his phone and scrolling through the new pictures on his camera roll.

You sighed and put your head in your hands. “Baby, I know you’re excited but remember what we talked about. We don’t know if he belongs to anyone yet. Let’s not go getting ahead of ourselves.”

Bucky sighed and nodded slightly.

Four days later, the two of you walked into the vet’s office hand in hand. It was the earliest appointment you were able to make without it being an emergency and you were worried that the extra few days did nothing but increase Bucky’s attachment. The kitten was adorable, you couldn’t deny it. There were times you thought about how nice it would be to finally have a little furry companion but you refused to keep an animal that could belong to someone else.

Once the three of you arrived, you were checked in promptly by the receptionist and were led into the exam room by an overly peppy vet-tech a few minutes later. Once inside, she gently grabbed him out of Bucky’s arms and made kissy noises at him as she began her portion of the exam.

Watching the kitten refuse to hold still during the weighing process was amusing to say the least. He kept moving around and trying to jump off the scale. It took several attempts, but she was finally able to record his weight. She fared a little better while taking his temperature given she was holding him, but the kitten still wiggled trying to escape her hold.

“I wonder why he’s being such a spaz right now. He had no issues with me holding him yesterday. At least, none that I noticed.” Bucky paused and turned to face you, confusion written on his face, “Did he give you a hard time when you held him?”

The vet-tech chimed in before you had the chance to respond, “He’s probably just decided you’re his person. Cats are a lot like people in that they pick their person and trust them to do things they don’t trust anyone else with. He doesn’t know me, so it makes sense he’s being a little fussy.” She set the kitten back on the exam table and he jumped into Bucky’s lap.

Bucky stared down at the little bundle of fur that was now purring as he rubbed his face against Bucky’s stomach. His expression was a mixture of shock, joy, and love.

For the first time since Bucky had walked in with the cat, you truly contemplated helping Bucky keeping him even if he was microchipped. He was going to be crushed if this cat belonged to someone else. Your stomach twisted at the thought. If we can’t take him home, we’re immediately going to the animal shelter and Bucky can pick out as many cats as he likes, you thought.

A knock at the door pulled your thoughts back to the room. A new woman in a white lab coat walked in with a smile on her face. “Good morning everyone, I’m Dr. Brown. I hear you guys were lucky enough to find a cat, is that right?”

Bucky nodded and looked down again at the cat with a smile, “Yes ma’am. I found him in the alley next to our apartment.” He carefully picked up the kitten still laying on his lap and handed him out to her.

Dr. Brown smiled again as she reached out to grab him. “Why hello there handsome, how are you doing today? I’m gonna check to see if you’ve got a microchip which won’t be too bad, but I may have to give you a couple of shots -” her sentence was cut off by loud meowing from the kitten, almost as if he understood what she was saying.

She chuckled before continuing, “I know, I know. Shots aren’t fun for anyone. But let’s find out about your microchip and finish the rest of the exam and see if they’re needed before we start complaining too much.”

Bucky reached out and gripped your hand tightly as she set him down on top of the exam table. She held a small rectangular device just above his shoulder blades for a few moments before setting it down and continuing with the exam. She spent the entire time talking to the cat as she went about the exam. She checked both of his ears and his mouth before moving on to checking on the various limbs in his body. Once the exam was complete, she turned to face the two of you.

“Well, good news on all accounts. Mister Man here is a perfectly healthy kitten. He looks to be about 16 weeks and is in great shape all things considered. He does not have a microchip though, so that leaves us with some options moving forward.”

You let out a sigh of relief you didn’t know you were holding in. Bucky remained silent, though his grip on your hand grew slightly tighter. Dr. Brown didn’t wait for a response before continuing.

“If you want to keep him, we’ll microchip him and start giving him his first round of shots today since we don’t know if he’s had any so far. We’ll also send you home with a little goodie bag with some treats, a small toy, and a packet with some basic information about caring for a new pet. If you don’t want to keep him, you guys are free to go and we can take him to a shelter from here. Fostering is another option if you’re not interested in keeping him but also don’t want him to go to a shelter.”

Bucky, who almost seemed to be in a daze after hearing there was no microchip, was suddenly brought back to life. “We’re keeping him,” he said firmly. The smile on his face was contagious and soon everyone in the room was smiling just as wide.

“Very well then, let me go get what I need so we can finish up here. I’ll be right back,” she said. You waited for her to leave the room before turning to face Bucky.

“Well, since he’s officially yours now, I think it’s finally time for you to start thinking of names.”

Bucky chuckled, “Yeah, about that... I kind of already named him. I decided on a name after you went to bed the first night he was in the apartment with us.”

You faltered for a moment, unable to hide your shock. “O-okay. What are we calling him?”

“Alpine. It seems like a good name for a cat.”

Twenty minutes later, you and Bucky were walking out of the vet's office feeling lighter than you did when you first walked in. Bucky was beaming as he looked down at Alpine, who was now officially his according to the paperwork stuffed inside his jacket. His joy was contagious and you were starting to feel the same sort of excitement Bucky had been feeling ever since he came across the poor thing in the alley.

“So what do we do now?” you asked, moving closer to Bucky. He wrapped his free arm around your waist and thought for a moment.

“Well, now that there are no foreseeable perjury charges over a cat in my future, I think it’s probably time to focus on my newfound fatherhood.”

You groaned as he spoke, “Does this mean I’m going to have to put up with Dad jokes from now on?”

The shit-eating grin on Bucky’s face answered for him.

The walk back to the apartment was quick. The two of you spoke occasionally, but mostly enjoyed the quiet comfort of just being close to the other. Once you arrived at your apartment building, the doorman greeted you. You were ready to wave and keep walking, but Bucky held you back.

“Hey man, could you get a picture of the three of us? We just adopted this little guy and I’d like a picture to commemorate it,” Bucky asked, letting go of you to pull out his phone. The doorman nodded and took the phone.

Once he was done, Bucky thanked him and the three of you finally made your way back to the apartment. As soon as he was inside, Alpine jumped out of Bucky’s arm and made his way to the couch. He curled up in what was now officially his spot, making your heart swell. You turned to see if Bucky noticed, but he was too focused on his phone.

“Already sending pictures of Alpine to Steve and Sam to brag about your newfound fatherhood?” you teased, arms wrapping around his middle as you spoke. He shook his head no and remained focused on the phone. Just as you were about to ask what he was doing instead, Bucky turned his phone around so you could see his screen.

You were stunned, completely unsure of how to respond to what you were seeing. Slowly, you opened your mouth and tried to find the words, “Bucky, please explain to me how our cat already has a verified Instagram account?”

#bucky barnes x reader #bucky barnes x y/n #bucky barnes x you #bucky barnes fanfiction #a mutual weirdness masterlist

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mystery-star · 3 years

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Wherever you go – Spock

Pairing: Spock x reader (gender neutral)

Warnings: mentions of blood and injury

Words: 3943

A/N: I had to write this after discussing the quick idea of it with @elysiansith

Please do not repost my work on other sites or platforms.

“No, I’ll do anything but that” you insisted, shaking your head

“Come on, you lost the bet, you agreed to this beforehand”

“It was agreed that I would do something that involved Spock”

“And I didn’t tell you what exactly so you’ve gotta do it”

“Come on, search something else. Make me spill a drink on him, sing a song in front of his quarter but not this”

“Nah, that won’t be as funny”

“No please” you begged

“Oh come on, he’ll ask you right away. I don’t think he likes it if people are following him around” you sighed

“But what do you mean with everywhere? I can’t go to his quarters if he doesn’t invite me in. What if he’s on the toilet?”

“Okay well that are exceptions”

“What is while I’m on my shift? I can’t just get up and leave the bridge whenever the Commander does”

“Fine, then you’ll need to say that you need to do something and then go to the toilet or something. Or just ask if you can go with him” you shook your head

“No please choose something else, this is ridiculous. Besides, when he does ask me why I’m following him, what am I supposed to say? He won’t understand the bet thing”

“Then tell him the truth”

“No”

“I bet he’ll find your declaration of love logical”

“Yeah sure. But what if someone else asks why I’m following Spock everywhere?”

“That doesn’t count. You’re not relieved then”

“Oh come on! You know exactly that Spock won’t address the matter until some days later”

“I know. Which’ll make it funnier for me”

“You’re the worst”

“I know”

As you had agreed with your friend, you would start with following Spock as soon as your shift started on the next day. But before you could start, the Captain came to you and said there was something he had to discuss with you.

“Am I in trouble?” you asked after the doors of the turbolift closed

“No, not at all. Just wanted to say that your friend informed be about the betting debt you have to honor”

“Oh God please no. I’d rather be in trouble”

“Well anyway, I just wanted to say that you’re free to leave whenever Spock goes. I might even send you with him from the start”

“What crime did I commit?”

“Now come on, Lieutenant. Almost everyone on this ship knows about your crush on Mr Pointy. Except for him but he doesn’t notice anything that has to do with others and their feelings. But something tells me, he cares for you too in a way that is more than just a professional relationship”

“Great and I just thought this couldn’t get any worse” the lift stopped and the Captain ordered to bring you to the bridge again.

“Oi, others would be happy to hear such news. Considering it’s Spock it’s almost as good as a ‘he loves you too’” you let out a groan.

“Just great” you repeated and the Captain only chuckled “I hope I die from embarrassment”

“Now come on, maybe it will quite alright”

“Yeah and you surely believe in the Easter bunny and Santa Clause?”

“Most did as a kid” you shook your head. When you finally were back on the bridge you were more or less pulled to the First Officer’s station “Mr Spock”

“Captain, Lieutenant (Y/L/N)” he greeted back.

“You know, I’ve been thinking about how you could use help sometimes”

“I doubt I have ever addressed such a matter and I do not know what could have given you the impression I would…”

“That is why I decided to name (Y/N) as your assistant”

“No” you moaned

“So I think it would be great if the two of you could get to know each other a bit and spend time together”

“No” you groaned, knowing that it meant it would only prolong your betting debt because it would deter the Vulcan from asking you why you followed him

“Very well” Spock answered after having eyed you “Please have a seat, Lieutenant” he slightly nodded his head to the vacant chair that was at an empty console.

“You know I wouldn’t mind if we collided with an asteroid today” you muttered to yourself as you sank down in the chair. It kinda looked like maybe you had to follow him to the toilet anyway to have him ask what you were doing.

As he had announced, the Captain kept sending you after Spock whenever he left the bridge and although Spock kept insisting that it was not necessary you followed him, Kirk too insisted on you accompanying him since he could also make it an order. So in a way, you were glad when your shift was over. Since Spock stayed a little longer, you too wanted to do this so that you could go with him but then you remembered that you only had to follow him, it had never been said that you had to wait for him to move. So you said goodbye and wished him a nice evening after five minutes and returned to your quarters. Of course your friend called you to hear how it was going and was delighted when you mentioned what the Captain was doing.

Also the following day was quite the same but fortunately this time Spock only had to leave once. But this evening he left with all of you and since you found it would be creepy to just follow him you took a deep breath you asked him if he would like to have dinner with you. To your surprise he agreed. But it also relieved you because otherwise you’d still have to follow him, which would have made it even more awkward. On the other hand, then he probably would have asked you about the meaning of it.

“I’m sorry by the way. For being around you all the time. But we don’t have a choice during work and I think it would make sense if we got used to it. Maybe it would help to get to know each other better” you gave a shrug

“You do not need to apologize”

“But… don’t you wonder why?”

“You mean if I wish to learn the reason that you decided to spend time with me?”

“Yes”

“No. After all you have just explained your reasoning” shit. That meant he probably wouldn’t ask you for the reason that. Of course unless you passed boundaries in a way. Which was something you were not willing to do. Not only because he was a superior officer and a colleague but also because you didn’t want him to think negatively of you “If you want, you can search a suitable table while I get food from the replicator”

“Hm” he had allowed you to leave but the rules of the lost bet said that you had to ignore that and still stay with him “Or what if we both got food and then search a place together? I don’t know maybe you have something like a favorite table or you find that there are seats that are better than others” he raised an eyebrow

“Having a preference towards a seat seems illogical but I agree to your suggestion”

“Great” you smiled.

For some reason, a part of you was surprised that you had a very nice evening with Spock and that you enjoyed it more than you thought. Of course you had to accompany him to his quarters afterwards and he had only said that you did not need to do this and but you had just insisted that you hadn’t noticed and thought it wouldn’t make sense to turn around now. But what surprised you most was that he thanked you for spending the evening with him, even though you had asked him to do so. Maybe your friend and the Captain were right. Maybe all of this wasn’t so bad. Which didn’t mean you were happy about it.

On the following day, however, you were quite glad about the fact that you were following Spock around. He was scheduled to go on a planet mission and or course Captain Kirk insisted that you went with him, as his assistant. A part of you wondered what would happen once the whole betting debt was resolved. If you would still be his assistant then. Maybe you should talk to Kirk about this. Because somehow you didn’t know if that was what you wanted. What if it meant you would be promoted? It didn’t feel right if that would just happen because of a bet. But it would be cool and a great way to pay your friend back in a way. Once you arrived on the planet, Spock started to put you into small groups in which you should explore the planet. And in the end, you were left but all teams of two were already formed so he just told you to join one of the groups

“Actually…” you said “Since I was made your assistant, I thought I could go with you?” right now you didn’t even know if you just wanted to be around him or if you just did it because of your bet. Your stupid friend had been right that you would enjoy following him at times

“Very well, Lieutenant, you may come with me” you gave a nod and took out your tricorder to get started with work. On your little tour, you finally came to a cave. While Spock stayed away from it you went closer and closer, curious to see what was inside. “Are you certain you wish to go inside?” he asked

“I just want to have a look inside. I won’t even go in far. Maybe there is something really interesting inside” he gave a nod and came closer, walking past you and entered the cave

“It actually was my cave” you muttered but followed him. He kept walking and walking until you reached a huge kind of hall “Okay wow that is awesome” you breathed as you started to make even more recordings while Spock must have seen something else. It turned out to be a nest with five big, turquoise eggs. Your superior had to squat down and started to examine them while you were not so happy anymore. What if suddenly the parents came and got mad? You doubted it ever was a good idea to get to close to animal’s babies. But the Vulcan didn’t seem to worry at all and he even touched one of the eggs with his palm. Shaking your head you walked away and started slapping the cold stone, trying to get a tricorder reading on them to determine the material. Suddenly you felt Spock look at you “Something wrong?”

“Can you try not to make any sounds?”

“Why that? Is something…”

“Shh” you were surprised that he actually shushed you. But it made you react and you were quiet, trying to listen to what he could have been hearing. Then you finally did hear something and you did not like it. It sounded like something screeching and rather loud thumps

“Maybe we should leave?” you asked Spock who gave a nod and you were trying to get back to the tunnel you had been coming from but it was blocked by a huge grey-brown animal that looked a lot like a pterosaur. “Okay I suppose Mommy is back home. And she’s blocking our only way out”

“We cannot be certain if it is a female” the animal screeched at you and started coming at you

“But we can be certain that it is mad” you growled as you jumped aside and regretted that you had no phaser with you.

“As soon as it unblocks the entrance you need to run”

“And leave you behind with this Pteranodon? It looks like it could swallow you whole”

“Judging by its size I suppose that the term Quetzalcaotlus would be more fitting”

“This or that, it’s mad and you don’t stand a chance” luckily, he took out his phaser and tried to shoot the alien but it didn’t seem to deter it a lot “Just great” you muttered as it came closer to Spock and when he tried to dive away under it, the being still managed to dig his claws into his back. When the animal moved away you saw that it had torn quite a piece of Spock’s uniform and his back was quickly covered in green blood. Unfortunately, the animal didn’t seem done and tried to pick at the Vulcan with it’s long beak, only narrowly missing him because he had rolled onto his back and then back to his stomach and was trying to get up. Not knowing what to do, you ran towards the nest and heaved one of the eggs out of it, kicking it away from it. Of course that caught the alien animal’s attention and it was slowly coming closer to you after it used it’s beak to stop the rolling egg. Quickly, you took another egg and rolled it into the other direction and then a third one in yet another direction. As it seemed the being decided that the eggs were more important than you and went after them so that you hurried over to Spock, pulling him back to his feet. He didn’t seem to be in best form, so you draped his arm over your shoulders, trying to support him

“Leaving me behind would increase your changes of escape and survival by 76.2…”

“Shh” you said “It was my idea to go in there and we both will get out. Now come on” you started pulling him back to the tunnel and he complied. Much to your luck, the alien was not following you anymore and you hoped it would stay like this and that not a second one of them would come. Shortly before you reached the exit of the cave, your superior took out his communicator, drumming up the rest of the landing party but you just snatched it out of his hand and then contacted the ship, telling them to beam Spock up right now because he was injured. “And don’t you dare saying something like ‘it’s just a scratch. I can do this’”

“Seeing that the being has hit me with three of his claws it would be incorrect to claim that I only obtained one scratch” you rolled your eyes when you felt the transporter beam and then were back on the Enterprise with him.

“Dear God, what happened?” the man behind the console asked

“We got attacked by an angry Mommy pterosaur”

“Well shit but the fact that it was a dinosaur is cool”

“I doubt it was a real dinosaur”

“Yeah whatever. All I hope is that this being wasn’t poisonous somehow because that looks quite bad like this already” you didn’t even dare to throw a glance to his back, knowing you’d regret it. You shifted your hold on him a little and wanted to bring him to sick bay when you met some doctors and nurses that probably had been on their way to you. Of course they were taking over for you and started asking questions about what had happened while they ran scanners over the two of you. Finally, you reached Medbay and one of the nurses told you that you couldn’t come in but much to your surprise Spock said that it was okay if you stayed with him. Needless to say that it flattered you and made you happy. Of course you couldn’t be in their way as they treated his injuries but afterwards you were allowed to move closer and looked down at him, not sure what to say. “Does it hurt?”

“No, the medication I received is still effective” you gave a nod

“Do you think they’ll give you more?”

“Should I request for some, yes” you gave a nod and were not so sure what else to say but luckily he continued “(Y/N)”

“Yes?”

“While your choice to help me escape as well was not entirely logical since it endangered your own life, I still appreciate your actions” you chuckled

“I suppose this is your way of saying thank you?”

“No. I merely wanted to tell you that I appreciated what you did. However, I do thank you for helping me”

“You’re welcome. And I’m sorry I even wanted to go inside this cave. If I hadn’t, this wouldn’t have happened”

“As you surely know, I have taken the lead upon entering the cave therefore you do not need to feel responsible for what has occurred for it is not your fallacy in any way” you gave a nod “I would have explored the cavern even if you had not been with me”

“So a good thing I started following you around, huh?” you chuckled. Maybe you should thank your friend anyway.

“I suppose so”

“And you still don’t wonder why?”

“I do. However, the Captain has asked me not to inquire the reason”

“He did what?”

“He requested I did not ask you for the reason that you are following me around”

“That idiot” you muttered

“Why does this bother you?”

“Uhm… just because”

“Perhaps it has to do with the fact that you wish to be around me as much as you can due to your affection for me”

“My what?!”

“Is it not true that you hold romantic affection for me?”

“I-I…. How the hell did you know that?”

“Dr McCoy has informed me about it three months, two weeks and five days ago when he has been intoxicated”

“Wait you knew for almost four months and never said a word?”

“I was thinking you would wish to tell me about it yourself”

“Fuck that’s embarrassing”

“Why do you think so?”

“Well uh, here you are, telling me you knew and you don’t even seem to care. Because you surely don’t like me the same way”

“Your statement is correct” you stood there like struck by a lightning. Of course you had suggested it but hearing it like this, in such words, made it even worse. You really had to ask your friend to stop the stupid betting debt because it did not have the effect as you both wished. “Yet I have considered the information in an attempt to determine what you mean to me. I have come to the conclusion that I care about you in a way I have never cared about another but I cannot say if this is what humans would consider as loving someone, which is why I have found it better to not tell you since it could disappoint you”

“So you say you care about me? But why would this disappoint me?”

“While I am not certain which answer humans expect after the confess their feelings, I do believe that what I have just said is not it”

“Well it wouldn’t be nice to hear this from a human but from a Vulcan it is different. I-I mean I probably have already known you would not ‘love’ me. Or well maybe you do but you would suppress it. I mean… I didn’t even know what I was expecting when I was thinking about telling you how I feel. I never really thought as far as your answer, you know. My mind just always kinda skipped that part”

“If you say that you have skipped my answer, might I inquire the outcome you have imagined?”

“Well there were different scenarios of course. In most of them we just decided to be friends, sometimes we came together as a couple and sometimes it just ended in the most logical way”

“If you would clarify, which is the most logical way?”

“Okay good back then I thought that you’d just tell me you feel nothing for me…. but now you told me that you care for me, whatever exactly that means. So maybe I was right about the friends vision one” you gave a shrug and let out a sigh

“(Y/N)?” he said after some seconds

“Yes”

“I personally would prefer one of the scenarios where we start courting” you stare at him in disbelief.

“But… what if it turns out that you don’t love me or something?”

“(Y/N), as I have already assured you I care about you. And it is a different way of affection than the one I hold for my mother or Jim. Which is why I am certain that it must be a romantic affection”

“Oh” you looked down, then started smiling “Well that sounds awesome” you said “But you don’t even know what I have planned in all my scenarios” he raised an eyebrow

“I am certain you will let me know and I am willing to try out different things since I do not know much of human courtship. Maybe I can use the time I spend on sick leave to carry out some research on the topic” you chuckled

“Only if you want. After all, you live the Vulcan way and I could do some research on that as well. And maybe it’s best if we just do whatever we both are fine with”

“That sounds agreeable” you gave a nod and considered if it was appropriate if you took his hand but then you just decided to do it and see how he reacted. It seemed, like he was a little surprised but then squeezed your hand back, making you smile.

“I suppose that dissolves my betting debt as well”

“Which betting debt?”

“Oh… well” you chuckled, not sure if you should tell him but then grinned “I’m gonna tell you the real reason I followed you around. I lost a bet and because of it, I had to follow you around until you asked me why. But since the Captain heard of it, he made sure to give me a logical reason to follow you around by making me your assistant and asking you not to ask me why I’m following you” he raised his eyebrow again

“Please remind me to offer my thanks to him and your friend”

“No that would be so embarrassing!” you protested “But that doesn’t mean I’m fired?”

“Fire?”

“Well, I only was made your assistant because of the bet”

“I would not have agreed to the proposition if I did not believe you were suitable for the position. If you prefer your previous occupation, however, I will…””

“No! I mean I like it but working with you is fun too. I just thought you would be fed up with me or what do I know. Or that you would not want me as your assistant after I told you the reason why I became it in the first place”

“I have believed humans would enjoy to work with their partner if possible?”

“Well yes, but you’re Vulcan”

“I am also half-human” you chuckled

“So you’ll half enjoy working with me?”

“No, I suppose I will fully enjoy it” you smiled at him

“I’m just asking for my own safety” you heard McCoy call suddenly “Are you two decent so I can let Jim in? Or he’ll rip off my head”

“No you may allow him to come” Spock said “There is something that I and (Y/N) must inform him about” he added with a look to you that could be described as soft. At least for his standards. Well Spock probably was right about one point: you owed your friend a big thank you.

Taglist: @softsapphicideals

#spock #spock imagine #spock x reader #spock x you

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maxwell-grant · 3 years

Note

Speaking of Tod Slaughter... any thoughts on Grand Guignol theater..?

Looking back on it, the first time I encountered the term Grand-Guignol was also the first time I looked at Fantomas, when I picked up the book above titled The Theater of Grand Guignol, which is all too fitting as Fantomas is Grand-Guignol to it's core. It's also a term that I've seen applied a couple of times to The Spider as well as some darker fan reinterpretations of Batman. Like film noir and sword-and-sorcery, it's a term for a type of storytelling that's associated with dime novels and pulps, influenced and was influenced by them in return, but isn't really the same thing and is, in fact, a separate "genre" (not quite the right term).

Indeed, if the common cultural association of pulp is that of something trashy and violent and darker than it's contemporary culture, one can see Grand-Guignol as perhaps the darkest of it's adjecent family, the Dario Argento to pulp's John Carpenter, the cracked mirror to all that exists.

Short and full-length plays were based on the hot topics unseen onstage at this extent before, from graphic scenes of murders, tortures, sexual violence to psychological thrills like resurrections of the dead, incest, suicide, characters being hypnotized, trapped or guilty of their loved one’s deaths. In most cases, it was a combination of several of those themes in one piece, which of course, multiplied shows’ popularity - AngryFishTheatre's article

‘At one performance, six people passed out when an actress, whose eyeball was just gouged out, re-entered the stage, revealing a gooey, blood-encrusted hole in her skull. Backstage, the actors themselves calculated their success according to the evening’s faintings. During one play that ended with a realistic blood transfusion, a record was set: fifteen playgoers had lost consciousness. Between sketches, the cobble-stoned alley outside the theatre was frequented by hyperventilating couples and vomiting individuals.’

Despite of its scandalous nature, for France Grand Guignol was more than a theatre: it was a tradition, an institution, and an attraction like the Eiffel Tower or the Folies Bergères, and Maxim’s... It was then highly fashionable. Celebrities of the day, South American millionaires and errant royalty went there assiduously to be scared out of their wits.

Going to the Grand-Guignol was less a social act than a private one and certain audience members preferred not to be seen. Some witnesses reported that the iron-grilled boxes in the back of the theater encouraged a certain ‘extremism.’

The cleaning staff would often find the seats stained - — Mel Gordon, The Grand Guignol: theatre of fear and terror.

It lasted almost the exact same time period as the American pulp era (from the late 1880s to 1950s), and even in it's origin, as the theater itself was built out of the ruins of a church, and it would attain fame and legacy as the shadow opposite to Moulin Rouge's glamour and spectacle. It's original intent on being focused on naturalistic theater led to breakthroughs of horror that made it the whole selling point, and much like the pulp lords of terror I talk about, their staged and spectacled terrors were still no match for the horrors of reality that followed.

“We could never equal Buchenwald,” the Grand Guignol’s final director, Charles Nonon, told TIME magazine that year. “Before the war, everyone felt that what was happening onstage was impossible. Now we know that these things, and worse, are possible in reality.”

And of course it goes without saying that the Grand-Guignol's influence on storytellers long transcended it's original lifespan. Gore for gore's sake is hardly something I enjoy, but I've definitely enjoyed many, many films that reached to extremes of horror and violence and gore for horror and comedy alike. I would not claim the Grand-Guignol started this because I could very well be missing out on something, but they are undeniably a huge part of the history of horror as we know it, along with the German Expressionist works of the 1910s that were as well both inspired by, as well as influential, on the Grand-Guignol.

Time and time again we see the pattern emerge, of creators or outlets or mediums that emerge as cheaper and less critically-reputable alternatives to the mainstream attain extraordinary and influential success both in their circles as well as those who would never admit to looking at them for inspiration otherwise. In fact, you could very well argue that it’s alive not just through films and comics and so forth, but in newfound forms of media created by people with all the freedom to put together whatever their imaginations and limited resources and lack of restraints can create.

Like Youtube Poop.

Now maybe I'm biased here because I grew up with YTP, but really, the main intent behind every YTP is to twist the media it's using to provoke a new reaction from you, every YTP is varying levels of a rollercoaster of jokes and edits and little narratives stacking up and flowing together, references and poop jokes and murder jokes and slurs and parody and criticism and SuS and literally anything the creator thinks is gonna get a reaction that wasn't in the original material. And it doesn't even have to be exclusively about jokes, there's a lot of YTPs that are centered on horror or drama or even are just completely original narratives using the assets at hand, sometimes even clocking in at almost movie-length.

There's no filter or censors or teams making sure it's tested to the audience, it's just as much chaos as someone with video editing skills can manage to create, and more so than anything else nowadays, it's the medium that abides and amplifies the same principle that ruled and defined Grand-Guignol: "The Hot and Cold Shower"

Grand Guignol, was not the inventor of this concept, but probably the first performing arts company that used it as its main programming principle. Every evening at the theatre was programmed with plays heavily contrasting in their nature. In the 6 plays presented on a regular night, every 2 horror plays were followed by a light comedy and the light comedy by another horror play or two. Using this contrast the creators aimed to give their audiences a fuller range of emotions. They called it a "hot and cold shower".

You could also make a similar argument for creators that used Garry's Mod or Source Filmmaker to create Youtube content, many of whom either followed the styles of YTP or created their own which ended up influencing others in return, and you can definitely see how YTP as well as these have influenced our current generation's taste in comedy as well as the editing styles of many prominent creators. It even seemed for quite a while that GMOD and SFM content of this type was dead, but it definitely seems like it's gotten a revival recently, and really just never went away. Likewise, a lot of people think YTP died circa 2012 or 2015, which is completely false, it just changed a bit, as things tend to do if they are to stick around.

The entire approach of extreme hot and cold, extreme horror and comedy shuffling per second and extreme absurdity overriding is something you definitely get nowadays a lot more out of these newer forms of media than anything that film and television's capable of giving, and just as Grand-Guignol started out relatively ordinary (focused mainly on naturalistic horror) before it completely spiraled into a perpetual race for excess, we've gotten so desensitized so quickly to surprises that you can see in real time the growing needs for content that's faster and more chaotic and funnier and more dramatic and more absurd and more well-produced but also worse produced and, yeah.

I definitely wonder how we may see future filmmakers and cartoonists and creators be influenced by, not just the above, but also the rapidly changing landscapes of meme culture and social media and the gradually less-funny theater of the absurd that reality's become. I definitely imagine we'll be in for some interesting times.

Y'know, if we make it that far.

Alternatively you could also argue Jackass is also a modern Grand Guignol and they just cut out the narrative middleman to get straight to the "people getting fucked up for your amusement" part, but at this point I'd just be inviting a retread of all the "Is -X- pulp" questions I got for "Is -X- Grand Guignol", and I may have stepped straight into a rake with this one.

#replies tag #grand guignol #fantomas #pulp fiction #tf2 #team fortress 2 #poultrygeist #youtube poop #ytp #sus

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dropsofletters · 3 years

Text

how to lose someone in seven steps? | ten

— summary: when she gets the opportunity to record her first music video, she doesn’t expect the director to be this enigmatic and vain. ten throws his head back, squinting his eyes at her mere presence, inspecting her every move, and she feels like threatening him. it shouldn’t be that hard to fulfill her promise of breaking his heart.

— title: how to lose someone in seven steps? — pairing: ten x reader — genre: music video producer!au ; bet!au ; strangers to friends to lovers!au ; love experiment!au — type: fluff ; romance ; humor ; drama ; angst — word count: 10,850 — playlist: no blueberries – dpr ian (ft. cl and dpr live) ; diamonds – rihanna ; love me less – max ; my my my – troye sivan ; fever – dua lipa ; ex – sik-k (ft. chacha malone) — note: you have to read the prologue before reading this route.

One would say that she has never gone through heartbreak. One meaning…she says it all the damn time. It’s what she manages to let out with a cramped smile on her face, hands expanding for further emphasizing. Heartbreak is not my thing.

It’s the thing she told herself with one of the last men she dated (Or is it ‘saw’, ‘went out with’? This generation has changed the terms exponentially), when she pulled the straps of her dress up her shoulders, knowing that inside his heart there was someone else. The blood of a singer told her to go for passion—to fight the competition like a champion would, but love is not a matter of winning. It never is. It’s about how much you can lose in one go, and if you’re smart enough, you’ll rationalize the pieces to share with several people. Give out one? Forget it’s ever coming back.

The hairstylist—and it’s so weird to say this without a giddy feeling inside her chest—pulls at her hair harshly enough for her eyebrows to raise the slightest. A face lift wasn’t necessary, but she might as well start thinking about one in the future with the amount of stress that has piled up inside her at the mention of a music video recording. The short woman manages to smile, cheeks puffed out in ways that makes the speckles of pink on her cheeks glisten under the harsh lights of the preparation room. Staff goes around and comes around, like flies on a summer day, while Hao, her manager, keeps looking down at his phone like a maniac.

She reaches forward, trying her hardest not to confuse her migraine with the headache induced by the pull of her hair. This ponytail is so high up her head that she may as well start using it as an antenna, old school style, to get some signal. Instead, her fingertips wrap around Hao’s hand, pulling it down to have him looking at her. “Hey, care to be my friend and my manager at the same time and help me feel less like…?” Looking around, she lowers her voice. “Like shit?”

For the first time in a while, Hao doesn’t look like a father. His khaki shorts have been exchanged for something far more presentable—a suit that fits him like a glove, his hair pushed away from his face in elegance. His hand comes forward to rub her cheek softly, only to hear a hiss from the stylist.

“Don’t touch her makeup.” For someone as small as the stylist, she surely has some bite to her. Hao’s hand pulls away as if she was made of electricity, rubbing his fingers together in hopes of not having any leftover makeup on his fingertips. The makeup, however, makes her feel different. It’s the vision of the director, she knows this much, of the new record label that had taken up on her with the promise of a contract only if this song does well. The thick eyeliner on her eyelids looks much better than anything she had tried—eyes elongated, almost cat-like, as if she’s ready to eat the world just by glaring around.

“You’re going to do fine.” Hao instructs, a wave of his hand coming soon after. “Besides, I called one of your friends to come here and support you through all this,” One of her many friends, whose tears have become one with her skin, whose smiles are glimpses of her soul—whose tastes have come merged with her in some way or another. Friendship is such a beautiful thing. “Since I’m shit at it. Don’t ask me who it is, though, because I literally can’t tell the difference between any of them.”

“Genius.” She replies, feeling once again a tug at her hair before an elastic band wrapped around the strands. Harshly. “Ah, Siyeon…could you try to go softer on me?”

“No.” Siyeon says, a tiny smile to her face. “This ponytail has to stay in place so the director sees if it’s a good look. I need to do my best so I don’t have to think about any other styling.”

“…Good.” Though, she can’t say anything else. At this point, the director sounds awfully like a dictator. “If you don’t know who is coming to support me, how did you contact them?”

“I just press one of the many numbers I have.” Hao turns his screen to showcase it to her, and she can’t muffle the laughter that escapes her lips.

“Who the fuck is ‘Friend Number Three’?”

“She was parking, so I imagine we’ll figure it out in a second.”

“Hao,” Her voice is tiny as she starts, eyes drifting to the person in the mirror. It’s not her—it’s a version of herself she hasn’t seen often. Thick leather jacket draped on her shoulders in a way that tugs them down, accompanied by a floral button down that were pushed inside her—surprise, leather—pants. Well-hidden, stylish, with no flaws flourishing just yet; she looks different, all thanks to Siyeon’s work. “How is it that you manage a bunch of artists but can’t remember the name of my seven friends? I’m your favorite represented artist.”

Not that he had openly said it without being in a drunken blur, but he doesn’t deny it. She is, indeed, his favorite. Perhaps, reminding her of his daughter that lives with her mother, far away from the country, never once sparing him a glance for not having a future. It’s been years since Hao has tried to demonstrate his broken family that he is a good manager. “They’re just too chatty. I can’t remember any of their personalities exactly.”

“Look at those thighs! Damn, girl, we’re going to have to get you on Tinder before all that beauty is wasted.”

When the opportunity rises to run away, she always opts not to. The world is harsh at it is, but it seems a hell of a lot less like a burden when people like Angela made their ways through her life. With her bangs perfectly placed over her forehead, a blue sweater cladding her body, she holds a cake on her hands. Pearly white but with sprinkles in blue, the same shade as the icing on top that reads ‘congratulations!’ along with her name.

Because, relationships end in heartbreak—they are unnecessary findings that we thirst for because they are, apparently, much different from friendship, but friendship is exponentially better. Angela came to her life in the form of a baker in one of the first spots she performed in for some money—her guitar case was opened as she played miraculously, and just when Angela went out to ask her to cut it out, she stopped herself. Instead, they relished in a deep conversation about music that sooner than later translated into meetings as friends.

“You’re friend number three!” She utters with a smile on her face, though not quite being able to move her face with the tightness of her hairstyle. Instead, Angela holds the cake on one hand, the other wrapping around her shoulder to press a kiss to her highlighter-coated cheek.

“The makeup!” Siyeon screeches, both hands reaching her face comically, and the blinding lights by the vanity make her look even funnier. Angela pulls away with uncertainty on her face, widening her eyes comically before humming.

“I understand…sorry.” She whispers, soon after recomposing herself to let Hao hug her from the side. Her eyes look up at the older male, her straight teeth perched in a shy smile. “You didn’t know my name, right?”

“…Angela?” Hao hesitates, and the woman in question groans comically.

“Hey, at least he remembered!” She defends her manager, feeling one last tug at her hair until Siyeon pats both hands on her shoulders.

“You’re ready.”

When standing up from her seat, she watches as Angela and Hao talk comically. The woman must be at least thirteen years older than Angela, if not more, and yet she argues with him as if he’s one of the workers at her bakery. “Name all our friend group, come on!”

“Too many people.” His lips wrap around the words comically, lowering himself slightly to come face to face with this cake. “And what is this cake for?”

“Our star is finally getting her first music video. I’m just getting on the bandwagon before she rockets into stardom.” Angela’s trust goes over the roof. She’s stubborn—even for the good things. No one can get through her mind when an idea has settled inside her brain.

“Oh, stop it.” She says, silently licking her lips as she watches the dulcet treat in front of her. Would it be a good idea to eat cake when her lips are tainted in the deepest shade of red? She can already hear Siyeon screaming inside her head. “You’re talking as if I’m the next Lady Gaga.”

“You’re not the next anyone,” Angela says. “You’re the new you.”

“Poetic.” Though, she can’t quite imagine herself to be more than she already is. For one, she has been practically living off having her guitar case opened anywhere she goes, singing to her heart’s content, never once meeting the deadlines of her life. Planning done a mess, she roams this world like an archive, searching for the will of continuing with this dream. Hao is one of the few people that reminded her she has a future in this, and maybe, that has to deal with the fact that he actually gets paid from what she does. “I don’t think I can have a slice right now, though. Got my makeup done and all.”

“It’s okay.” Angela chirps, putting the cake down on a vanity before sighing. “I’ll keep it here until you’re over with the recording.”

Hao shakes his head then, letting go of Angela. “Oh no, the recording’s not today.”

“You said recording.”

“I didn’t.”

“You did.”

“Look it up,” Hao indicates, pointing at her phone. “I didn’t say recording.”

But Angela, as always, never once wanting to be wrong, shakes her head. “I don’t need to. I’m sure you said recording—”

“Either way…” She interrupts, knowing damn well that Angela is an excellent friend, and even better at baking, but extremely bad at having anyone try to change her mind. “I’m just going to meet the director and see if my styling is right for his vision. He’ll explain the schedule today and whatnot.”

Angela’s brown eyes become anchors to her body, pulling away to squint at her. “You look cute.” She says, though, she hears that from every single one of her friends. Sometimes, when she’s feeling her worst, she starts to believe everyone in a liar—you’re a nice singer, you have a great future ahead, you’re beautiful. All fucking lies when the time is wrong. “I feel like you’re one of those…one of those grunge kids.”

“Oh no, this is not grunge.” She answers, pointing at her outfit. “This is something very movie-esque. Not grunge, definitely.”

“Maybe, you have a future as a movie star.”

She rolls her eyes at Angela’s antics. Her positivism meets that of a mother’s sometimes. “Where? A porno?”

“Oh my God, no!” Angela swats her hand over her shoulder, only lifting her gaze when they hear her name being called. Not by Siyeon, but by one of the staff members—if she recalls correctly, the director’s assistant, Hong. With a twirl of his fingers, calling her over, she starts moving, Angela following right after her. “You’re learning a little too much from Yifei.”

She chuckles, knowing damn well that Yifei is the jokester of the group. “Maybe, I have more of a future as a comedian.”

“Hold your horses, Joker.”

“…Are you trying to tell me I’m going to go batshit crazy if people don’t laugh at my jokes? Because, that’s what the Joker did.”

“I’m telling you…” Angela trails her voice, her sneakers a nice companion to the click of the heels in her boots. “That you’re going to do fine in whatever you put your mind into.” The warmth of her words reaches her in a way that has a smile appearing on her face. Praise isn’t that bad after all.

“Thank you, Ang—”

“Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck—”

“What?”

Angela’s hand tightens around her own when Hong opens the door to the director’s office, her nails digging into her skin as she watches the man in front of them. A black button down leaves the first few buttons open to welcome his taut chest, a leather jacket half thrown over one shoulder, falling off the other for the zippers on the sleeves to meet his ripped jeans. His long black hair curls a bit onto itself at the edges, damp from humidity, though his face is the most impressive. A nicely structured nose that makes the edges of his face even better to look at, twinkling eyes and thin lips. Rosy, at that.

“That’s my ex.” Angela whispers, only to have looking over her shoulder. Hong, whose bleached blonde hair barely reaches his ears and stands at least a foot taller than the director, may be her ex in this situation.

“Hong?”

“What? No.” Angela frowns deeply, lifting one hand in the air to greet her past lover. “Ten, how’s it been?”

The covers are blown at that moment—actually, shot away and straight through her heart when she watches the director stare at Angela in recognition, battling to put a smile on his face that doesn’t look panicked or angry. He moves forward the slightest, crossing both arms over his chest before replying. “Angela, long time no see. May I ask what are you doing here?”

Ten.

Wait.

That name sounds like something she has heard before…

Four months ago, drunken night, Ten was in a picture Angela had showed her on her phone and she had promised to break his heart at the time. Not that she was thinking straight, really, this man probably shatters the souls of millions of people on the daily—someone that good looking is, at least, a Greek god of sorts.

“I’m supporting my friend, considering she was about to meet the director of her new music video.” Angela replies, watching as Ten’s eyebrows lift on his forehead, albeit a bit stuck in his own thoughts.

“Mhm, alright.” Ten says, opening the door of his office with delicate motions of his body, as if balance exists within him, only to continue his train of thoughts. “But Angela can’t come inside. I have a recording in an hour and I have to make this quick.”

“That’s okay.” Angela replies quickly, pulling her hand away from her before mumbling softly. “Get ready to deal with the most stubborn asshole you’ve ever met.”

And that, coming from Angela, baker bridezilla that is not actually getting married to start with, just is the first big, twinkling, red light that comes with Ten.

###

Magic died the day sentimentalism did. When break-ups started to happen though texts, or when kids stopped living the best ages of their lives to be on social media, or try to be adults. Magic relished on its death when people stopped caring for others, when seeing someone falling on the floor was more of a call out for laughter than a reason to help them stand up. Magic died within her, somehow, someway, in a road to utter lack of empathy. She knows that, in order to come out of life as a champion, she had to protect herself over all.

So, why is it, that when seated on that elongated table at Ten’s office, she feels like there is some mystic power that is held over her? Beauty in the form of him, in the white and black decorations but how he spices them up. There is good and there is bad. There is sadness that meets his happiness, in the somberness of the black and the speckles of colors that he has in family pictures and in some drawings that he holds up on the walls. Something about him…something about him calls out for interest, even when the last time she saw him, just one week ago, he was quickened with his words, never once looking at her, never once stopping to breathe.

This time around, her face is not pulled by a ponytail and she remains as makeup-less as possible, tapping her fingers against the table and watching Hao and Hong speak within themselves about some music videos that they enjoy. On the other hand, she has kept herself quiet, letting herself relish on the feeling of just not feeling at all. It’s the limbo of life, when she doesn’t know if she should be happy or sad, and she decides to be numb. Comfortable, sure, but not exactly good for a musician.

The doors open at that moment, a little bit over the time they were supposed to meet—twenty-four minutes, if she’s getting technical here—, but she can’t help but think that Ten is, truly, a favorite of destiny and the world. The speckles of rain that patter against his coat, gray to be exact, almost look like snowflakes, glistening under the harsh lights of his office. His hair is pulled away from his face by a ponytail, some of the strands falling on the back of his neck or his forehead, though his eyes are left a mystery as he keeps a pair of red and retro sunglasses perched on the bridge of his nose.

“I’m sorry for being late,” Ten says, a rumble to his voice as he moves further inside the office. “I was looking for my sketchbook and my drawing board for the music video. We need to go over the visuals, the cameras, and everything of that sort before we start the recording in three days.”

Not even a ‘hello’ from him, as unreachable as possible. The icy walls of Ten’s heart somewhat make her feel more intrigued, like the tattoos that scatter on his slim arms when he pulls his coat down and is left on his tank top. He turns on the heater without asking, and she decides to be the polite one in the situation. “Good afternoon, Ten. How are you?”

“Mhm, I don’t know. I asked for an iced coffee after waiting in line for twenty minutes, and the ice has melted off so now it’s dirty coffee water in my cup.” He instructs, putting down his sketchbook and putting up his drawing board on a stencil to be able to showcase it. He pulls his sunglasses down, then, settling them on the table before sighing. “There was no parking spot…because someone decided to park on my designated parking lot—” He cuts himself short then, lifting an eyebrow when he looks at her. “What about you, superstar?”

There is some edge to his tone, and she doesn’t know if it’s a challenge or an annoyance. “I’m good.”

“Good, because I had a whole epiphany when we talked last week—” Ten moves the stencil closer to the table, showing the drawing board with expertise. The style is one to envy, intelligent and complicated in its drawing form, showing different shots, words written to further indicate the details of the music video. “Your song is very pop-y. I liked it, don’t worry. But I think that to make you stand out more in the pop stance, we have to hit the scene with something strong. Maybe, the absurdity of life for someone whose head is locked onto itself. Very science-fiction, mind-based…”

Something about Ten when he has his mind roaming is that, at times, he stops to smile at himself. Pride fills the imagery of what he has imagined, and she’s captured by the way he has twisted the vision of her song into a whole daydream. The kind of nightmare that people love to watch in the form of a music video, but would be a heart-taker if only they went through it. Ten’s idea speaks about losing one self in the middle of our own thoughts, when it’s hard to divide regret from deciding, love from hate—and it’s her. So much that she finds herself enraptured in his thoughts, and for a moment, she thinks she can give her little penny.

“I think we shouldn’t make the music video that dark, though. Like, the idea of a filter on the entire music video would only further emphasize what we’re already showing. It’s a bad idea.” Her tone is serious, leaning over the table to speak properly to Ten, and the man stops pointing at the drawing board to chuckle.

“If we leave everything in a light tone, it’s going to look like a trip dream. We don’t want people to think it’s a video about the aftermath of cocaine, but something serious instead.” Ten replies, eager to open his mouth and explain the end of the video, but she still holds onto her thought.

“It’s a pop song, if we make it too dark, it’ll be too risqué for a debut—”

“But if we make it too light, the idea of the song will be lost and you will be one step closer to being a LMFAO wannabe.”

The stare-off continues for a few seconds, and she has to laugh as she shakes her head. “Listen, I know you’re the expert here, but I don’t think it would look cute.”

“You’re awfully like Angela when you want to, you know that?” Ten spits out, annoyance creeping up on him when he breathes through his nose and speaks again. “I know what I’m doing. I’ve done videos like this before and people love a good storytelling music video.”

Though, her mind is not in that argument anymore. “Why would you say that? You dated Angela, that’s not my fault. You don’t get to diminish people just because they don’t think exactly like you do.”

“A—Alright! Let’s all calm down.” Hao is already up on his feet, ready to launch herself forward if she keeps running her mouth to put one hand over her mouth to stop her. She doesn’t.

Ten gives her one of those smiles that will forever be engraved inside her brain, perhaps for being annoying or for being breathtaking. “That’s exactly what she does. Mrs. Perfect just loved saying everything I did was not good enough, and you’re doing the exact same thing even though you’re just a newbie.”

Ouch. “W—Well, I haven’t seen your name around a lot either.”

“Really? All the music videos I’ve directed in United States and Asia beg to say otherwise.” Ten breathes out, patting his ponytail before clearing his throat. “Listen, I don’t want to fight with you, but the filter is staying. Otherwise, it will look poorly done—”

Four months ago, Angela spoke about how much of a vain asshole he was—and there is nothing she wants more than to show him how much power she could have over him if only she put her mind into it. Make his life difficult, insufferable, just as he’s doing right now for her. “You’re insufferable, aren’t you?” She whispers, well aware that Hao has finally gone to her side of the table and already placed a hand over her mouth.

“I—I’m sorry, she didn’t mean it!” Hao’s apologies are already background music to the tension between Ten and her. She looks at him. He stares right back. Brightness and darkness becoming one, the twinkle on his eye danger beyond all.

“Don’t apologize for her. It’s okay.” Ten indicates, swatting his hand in the air to lay it on the table, leaning his weight forward. Instead, he talks directly to her. “I’m insufferable?”

Pulling Hao’s hand away from her mouth, she replies: “Why? Want me to say it again?”

“No.” Ten adds. “I just want to remind you I’m insufferable now, but I can be even worse.”

Going on with his explanations, she finds herself speechless—but mentally, she’s chatting herself up about how much she hates Ten. How the fuck did Angela date someone like him?

###

“You know,” Hao’s hair is already gray—with some hair-dye, sometimes, he tries to return it to its dark color, but the gray strands appear every once in a while—but it may turn bone white with how much stress is read on his expression. Their usual café does not serve him as a relaxation method, much more when he continues with his dilemma. “I’ve done all I fucking can to get you here, and now that we’re two days away from getting you to record your music video, you decide it’s a good idea to drink lemonade like a maniac and fight Ten in the process.”

The straw in between her lips slips from her hold when she looks up, and it’s true—this is her second glass of lemonade, relishing on the sweetness and sourness of it all, and it may damage her throat, but it’s what she craves right now. “Hao, it will be fine. I’m just not letting that asshole talk to me as if I’m stupid.”

The white and cream walls of the café contrast with the harsh sigh that rips from his throat, running his hands over his face, playing around with his cheeks a bit. “Listen, stop drinking lemonade and listen to yourself for a second,” He says. “He’s one of the most famous music directors at this moment…and he does a damn good job at it. You’re set to succeed and, still, you want to fuck it up.”

“That man is crazy!” She completes her sentence with some hand motions, looking down at her lemonade and pondering if she should drink another one. Does she want to go to the bathroom for the entirety of the night, or, would she rather just control her nervousness? After all, she’ll have a big shoot in two days. “I’m all about self-confidence and positivity, about self-love, too, but I’m sure if Ten could be cloned, he’d choose to date himself.”

Hao tilts his head to the side at that moment. “I mean, if I looked like him, I would definitely date myself, too.” He replies, laughter following his statement before he places one hand over hers, stopping her from taking her glass of lemonade once again. “Hey, hear me out. I’m serious. I don’t want you to fail on your dream only to end up giving a hand-job for five bucks in some bar downtown because no one wants to listen to your voice anymore.”

Harsh, the hostility in his voice comes from a place of deep worry—but there is nothing to worry about. If Ten is as sensible as a flower when it comes to honesty, then that’s his fault. “Why am I the one that ends up giving a hand-job in some bar downtown when he’s the one that treated me like shit?”

“Because you weren’t so polite, either!” Hao replies. “You could’ve easily lifted your hand,” And he does. “And said—” Then, he changes his tone to one that matches hers. Maybe, a bit lower. “Excuse me, Ten, I think we could arrange a lighter tone in the filter because it would look better, in my opinion. May we add some colors? I’m not too experienced in this, but I would like for my opinion to be taken into consideration for this.”

She blinks. Once. Twice. Three times and a few more before she says. “And that is what I would never say. What do I do after? Kiss his feet? Call him my master?”

“That’s being polite. You’re at a workplace.”

“I’m the artist.”

“And you’re a newbie.”

“And?” She drags her voice, eyes widening. “Madonna was once a newbie. Beyoncé was once a newbie. Do you think Beyoncé has no say in what goes in her music videos?”

Patience is Hao’s best virtue, maybe, or he really is mostly like a father figure to her. “Well then, produce something as good as Lemonade or as Single Ladies, and we won’t even need Ten to start with.”

She throws her head back, looking up at the white ceiling with anger flushing from inside of her. Ten, a masterpiece from the outside, a piece of garbage on the inside. A trashcan has less odor than his personality. Whatever. “Why are you so in love with Ten all of the sudden?”

“I’m not in love with Ten. I’m in love with the opportunity that means having him as your director. You’re set to a good start, that’s all I want for you.”

Her heart melts, dripping onto the center of her body, leaving her with a smile on her face. Why ask for richness when she already has the best, she could ever ask for right here, in her life? “Thanks, Hao.” She replies, wrapping her fingers around his hand and tightening her hold. “We’re going to skyrocket in this business, just—just let me sit Ten down in his place when he really needs to. Just some ass-flatting so he knows how to treat me.”

“Watch out—”

She rolls her eyes then. “I’ll be fine. I won’t attack him if he doesn’t attack me. I’m a revengeful person, not a stupid one.”

“Questionable.”

“Hao.”

“So, now that we’ve settled that.” The man stands up then, downing the rest of her lemonade in one go before snapping his fingers together. “I’m getting you some tea for those vocal cords. I need a high note.”

###

Wild hair, dampened almost romantically, makes her skin glimmer with goosebumps as the coldness of the night hits her in the abandoned building that Ten has set his mind recording the first scene into. Everyone knew that it was going to be this cold, sporting coats over coats, sweaters, holding cups of hot chocolate or coffee. Instead, she’s the artist that has to stand looking at Ten from up-close as he explains to Hong and herself what they’re going to do for the first scene.

The sleeves of Ten’s sweater trail down his hands, keeping him covered even past the jacket on his shoulders. With his gelled back hair, he’s an ode to trouble. The kind of people most lovers run away from in fear of being caught up in his trap. With his tongue in between his lips, Ten concentrates on what one of the staffs talks about—the lights and how they’re going to fall on certain angles to make the shadows more appealing and more fitted for her face. She doesn’t understand much, but what she does understand is the beauty of Ten’s features when he brings his cup of coffee up to his lips.

Ten is a poem made person—those that twist in between the good and the bad, and sometimes, when she looks at him, she can’t tell if he’s deeply saddened or in love with the world. Not that she should care, if anything, Ten is bitter about people not painting the world how he wants it. Or, that’s what she wants to believe when he catches her staring at him.

“I want you to act as if your song is stuck in your head and it…you want it to get it out of there. Dance to your will, but I want you to touch your head a lot, maybe play with your hair?”

“I wasn’t given a choreography, Ten.” She replies, silently cursing the cold as she blows raspberries onto her hands. With an eye-roll of his own, Ten’s cup is given to her with one brief movement, the man moving his shoulders a bit as he speaks.

“We’re recording the first verse here, I’ll tell you when to stop, but I had thought something like this. Not a choreography, just common sense. Feeling the music, as one would say.” The wind blows on his hair when Ten lets his voice romantically wrap around the lyrics of her song, motions matching that of a dance as he makes it visually perceivable that he can’t stand whatever is going on inside his head—this insecurity, this limbo that she talks about in her song. With his legs strutting as if he’s on a runway, she hums.

“I’ll see what I can do,” She answers, taking a sip of Ten’s coffee before being delighted by the taste. He makes good choices when it’s not iced coffee. “You can sing, though.”

“…A normal amount. Anyone can sing.” Ten says, ready to go over to the staff in charge of the fans that will blow at her hair and make her seem the slightest bit more stylish. She doesn’t know, she has never been in front of the cameras, and maybe that’s why she goes after Ten.

“No. You actually sing and dance. How—?”

“I used to watch MTV a hell of a lot when I was younger.” Ten breathes out, the wind curling onto his words and leaving an imprint of white onto it. A kiss from him that is visible for the world. “…And I would sing along to all these songs, learn some dance steps. I was in dancing classes for a while, but I got more interested about the behind-the-scenes stuff. Art meets art, you know.”

But he never does look at her, not even when she lowers her face to look right at his eyes. He only inspects her for a second before returning his gaze to the fans, checking them one by one. “It’s even more surprising that you learned the lyrics to my song.”

“You’re not a shitty artist. At least, not as shitty as you get when something doesn’t go your way.”

Fuck this dude.

Honestly.

Or, rather, don’t think about fucking this dude, because she feels her knees buckling up a bit when a smile appears on the corner of his lips.

“Speak for yourself!”

“I am.”

“You are so conceited.”

“That’s the Angela in you speaking. If you go meet someone with the predisposition of feeling like you know them and their flaws, you’ll find them.” Ten shrugs his shoulders then, turning around to look at her without noticing how their chests flush together, pressed to one another and yet, powerful enough to make her give a step back. “I’m confident about what I’m talking about. Never conceited. If I know what I’m doing, I just say it out loud.”

“First and foremost, my opinions about you are not levelled by what Angela has said about you to me.” But they do play around to certain extent. After all, she initially thought Ten was vain without even getting to know him. Fuck him and his nice logic. She puffs her chest out to defend herself, one hand on her waist. “And secondly, I am also confident about what I think about, thank you very much.”

“Good for you.” Ten answers, and the curtness of his reply has her pressing her lips together. This man will make her end up in anger management. “Anyways. Are you a fan of Christina Aguilera?”

“Her voice…” She has to breathe in for a second. “To die for. Why?”

“I need you to have the confidence she had for the ‘Dirty’ music video.”

The gasp that leaves her in unexpectedly loud, making some of the staff look at her as if she’s a fish out of the water. “She is fucking Christina Aguilera, how am I going to challenge Chris—?”

“You’re you. Challenge your inner diva.”

She quirks an eyebrow at him. “Ten, do I look like a diva to you?”

“No, your inner self is a denied track for ‘Nevermind’ by Nirvana—but hey, I need some troubled diva to come through. Your outer self is badass right now, keep that.”

“What do you mean a denied track?” She asks, though, she can’t help but show a smile on her features, and Ten simply has to laugh at her antics.

“As troublesome as Kurt and Courtney together, but somehow, it’s appealing.” Throwing her head back, she lets the sarcasm in his voice get to her.

“I am not troublesome.”

“All musicians are.”

“What about music video directors, huh?” She asks, moving over to the center of the cameras as she throws a look at him. The redness of her lips captures his attention for a second, or maybe, he’s just concentrating on what she is saying. “I’m sure that there’s some emotional, Panic! At The Disco scene era, loving asshole under all that bite you have.”

He hums, sitting down on his director chair before speaking loudly. “I don’t know, figure it out, Christina.”

“Maybe if you weren’t so difficult to talk to, Brendon.”

“I’d rather be Ryan.” Ten corrects, and a smile appears on her face. Huh, so he really did watch MTV back in the day. “He wrote all the songs in the first album. That’s more of a mastermind for the era you’re talking about.”

“So much for telling me I’m the Nirvana denied track made person.”

“…Well, I got the bite and the diva out of you, didn’t I?”

That’s the day she realizes that Ten has more than just a vain side to him, that when he’s seated on his throne in the shape of a director’s chair, he’s much easier to talk to. That his knowledge in music, for the first time in a person she has met, matches hers and she doesn’t quite hate talking to him when it’s about that. It’s annoying, sure, but it’s better than what they started with.

###

“How much do you think I would make if I sold pictures of my feet?”

Shishi’s questions are always something to look forward to, much more when her face is stained in red and a glass of wine is on one hand, checking her phone while talking to Angela and her. Her YouTube video is uninteresting in this girl’s night-out turned sleepover, mostly because all three of them are too tipsy to go anywhere else, and Angela’s place is always the tidiest of the bunch.

“Depends.” She says, lifting her own glass of wine and taking a sip of it. “I don’t think I’ve openly talked to someone about foot fetishes, but…like, is it sexier if the toes are stubbier or like, is it hotter if they are slim toes? Do they have to be hairy toes?”

Angela puts her glass of wine down with a continued, harsh slap against her thighs. “You say toe one more time and I’m going to put my actual toe down your throat for being so disgusting.”

Shishi raises her hand slowly, as if she’s in the middle of class and wants to ask a question, so Angela can look her way. “If you do put your toe down her throat, can I record it and sell it on the internet so I can buy a Levi Ackerman body pillow?”

The answer comes from both Angela and herself at the same time: “No, Shishi!”

With mostly silence overtaking the room as Shishi roams the deepest of information about foot fetishes and the cost of feet pictures online, and Angela says she’s going to prepare some food to take some of the tipsiness away, she opts to enter Instagram. Not that she does that much often—and she can already hear Hao scolding her for it inside her head, for she should have a social media following, but the standards of normality that exist in such social media site really do get to her. There’s only so much she can stand before it actually starts playing with her head.

She brings her thumb up to her mouth to nibble on it softly, rushing through her scrolling to get to the latest picture and clicking her tongue when only seeing one picture of her interest. Though, to be unexpectedly convenient, Instagram suggests some people to follow for her, and much to her lack of knowledge, the appearance of Ten’s name and a small, circular picture of him is enough of an invitation for her to tap on his profile.

The last time she saw Ten was three weeks ago, and in less than a week, her music video would be released for the world to see. With some promotion, of course, not that she has quite paid attention to that without feeling like bawling. But, something about his profile makes her feel more connected to him. Only because he’s as immaculate on his social media as he is with his music videos, and he does look damn fine in every picture that she taps onto.

Now, one of the finest things that could be created in this life is the combination of fries and ketchup…and Ten challenges that. Head on. Face first. He puts all foods to shame, even the wine on her hand, with how fine he seems to be on every picture, and maybe it’s the liquid courage trailing after her actions that has her clicking the follow button and looking through his stories.

Because, let’s be honest—he’s annoying. He was annoying as all hell. But there is a double standard to that…he’s awfully uncapable of making himself be liked personality-wise when he’s working, but if he shuts his lips for one single second, he’s a dream come true.

He is asking for questions on his story, and her fingers move fast simply to jot down an innocent inquiry: “Favorite MV to direct?”

The answer comes less than fifteen minutes later, when Shishi’s head is laying on her lap and the smell of pasta has her stomach growling and asking for garlic bread as soon as possible. Her mouth watering, imagining the perfect bread siding past her lips for her to take a bite—

The image is black, but the answer is enough of a hit on the face for her to sit up straighter. “Yours.” He replied, with a tongue-out emoji after.

This man is the sole reason she doesn’t know the difference between sexual tension and absolute hatred.

To: @tenlee_1001

You’re joking.

And the three dots that appear soon after have her biting down on her lip.

From: @tenlee_1001

Maybe, stalker.

To: @tenlee_1001

I’m not stalking you.

From: @tenlee_1001

Said, the liar.

To: @tenlee_1001

You’re lucky I’m too drunk to reply to that.

How’s it been?

From: @tenlee_1001

Good.

How have you been?

To: @tenlee_1001

Hungry.

Angela’s making pasta right now and I can’t wait.

From: @tenlee_1001

Are you and Angela always tied to the hip?

To: @tenlee_1001

Not really.

Does that bother you?

From: @tenlee_1001

She’s nice.

Sometimes, two nice people just can’t be together.

To: @tenlee_1001

Are you meant to be the other half of that statement?

From: @tenlee_1001

Yeah, haha.

I’m nicer than you think.

To: @tenlee_1001

Prove it.

From: @tenlee_1001

I don’t have to prove anything to anyone.

To: @tenlee_1001

Said, the nicest guy on earth.

From: @tenlee_1001

Ah, fuck you.

All the people I’ve dated said I’m the nicest guy they’ve met.

Maybe, it’s the garlic in the air, the wine on her hand, or Shishi’s heavy head on her lap that dizzies her when she says:

To: @tenlee_1001

Then, take me out on a date.

Or, are you chicken?

It’s been a while since she has talked to a man like this, and, for fuck’s sake, she’s supposed to be hating this man. Throwing her phone on the cushion beside her, she tries to stifle her screech. Okay, sure, it will be okay, things could be worse—

And then, her phone vibrates and it takes her a second for her to check it.

From: @tenlee_1001

Okay. Let me just plan something.

I’ll take you out next Friday.

It’s a date, Aguilera.

To: @tenlee_1001

…Okay, Ryan.

And not exactly Gosling.

From: @tenlee_1001

Is that supposed to hurt me?

To: @tenlee_1001

No.

Because not all guys can be Ryan Gosling.

Maybe, she’s too tipsy to be having this conversation, but when she sees Ten has just followed her on Instagram, she knows it’s game over for her.

###

Eloquently dangerous is the worst kind of trouble a lover looks for. In the shape of Ten seated on the driver’s seat, legs parted and both of his hands resting on the lower part of the steering wheel. When he picked her up, the stiff conversation tightened around their necks, leaving them speechless—but music unites them again. After all, it’s the reason why they met and why they’re going out on this date to start with.

According to Ten, whose long hair is enough of a call-out for her to lean herself to the side to be able to talk to him from a closer position and still, wish she could rake her fingers through it, there is a restaurant forty minutes away from her place that is to die for. Thai, he said, and she’s not about to contradict him on that. On the way there, Ten’s conversation lingers within her with interest, enough for her to nod her head along to the beat of ‘Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down)’ by Nancy Sinatra.

“This song makes me feel like I’m in a post-apocalyptic world and I’m looking for revenge.” She says, eyes staring at his profile. What a blessing it would be to call the smile on his face hers, but it isn’t. His short-sleeved button down moves a bit over his collarbone, just when he throws a glance over his shoulder.

“That’s the mentality of a director.” Ten indicates, though he licks his lips and waits for the last few seconds of the song to pass by. “I don’t listen to it that much, even when it’s in my playlist, but it mostly reminds me of this scenery…an ex going to a wedding and killing the bride just because of jealousy. The secret to not letting go and how twisted it can be.” He shrugs soon after. “That’s the meaning of the song, in my opinion.”

“Damn.” She replies, a hiss following her statement as she sits down straighter. “Are you that type of ex?”

“Of course not.” His voice is rapid to defend himself, before clearing his throat. “But you should know more about me as an ex, considering you’re good friends with Angela.”

She remembers Angela being full of Ten’s shit, the way she deleted all their pictures in the blink of an eye before locking herself in her job. She doesn’t exactly recall anything else other than knowing Ten is— “She told me you were vain.”

“…Fuck.” He chuckles then, though a bit dark in the process. “I am not vain, we were just two stubborn people who got into a relationship without really knowing each other.”

The last part hits home, and she has to bite her bottom lip when she starts to hear the tune to Alicia Keys’ ‘Show Me Love’, perhaps featured by Miguel, but her mind can’t come up with the truest answer at this moment. “I understand that. Relationships are really fucking difficult. You ignore all the red flags just to get with someone.”

“That sounds awfully like someone remembering their ex.” Ten says, a hum to his tone in the form of a song.

“I don’t remember him much. Too overconfident for how bad of a lover he was.” She tells him, and a smile spreads across his face when he passes a green light.

“Is that a connotation for what I’m thinking about?”

“You know, I’m just saying, at least you had something serious with Angela.” For a second, her mind lingers in the nights in hotel rooms, always being picked up by a man simply to end anywhere but a place to have a date in. Tangled in between his sheets, getting lost in his physique, in the way his lips wrapped around her and how much he seemed to desire her. Desire is not the same as love. “You didn’t have to deal with a guy who seemed to like everyone and you. I was a little toy for a guy and that’s the thing I regret the most.”

“Shit.” Ten curses, raising both eyebrows before shaking his head. “What made you fall for an asshole like that?”

“He was a web designer. I thought that a nerdy guy mixed with a gym-rat body is what I wanted.” She answers, bringing laughter up Ten’s chest, his eyes wrapping up in their magic, enigmatic stance. “He was afraid of commitment, I think he had daddy issues, too. I met him because he went to one of my shows in a bar downtown.”

“And you became friends with benefits?”

“Are we really friends if I know nothing about him other than his body?”

“Damn.”

The lyrics embrace her ears and enter her brain when, indeed, Miguel’s voice fills the air and much to her surprise, she does know this song—

Without realizing, she tries to remember the lyrics, mumbling some of the words and jumbling the others, and Ten hates this enough to shake his head, lifting one hand in the air to instruct the tempo to her. “It’s ‘you gon’ show me love like, like you tried it—’, two likes, honey.”

At the mention of such a nickname, she has to push his shoulder sightly. “Honey?”

“Why? Did your little asshole ex call you that?”

“He was not my ex.”

“He’s an ex if he got to be with you.”

“Why? Jealous?” Quirking an eyebrow, she is surprised when she sees Ten shrugging.

“I shouldn’t be jealous when I know that, if I really put my mind into it, I can do a much better job than him at winning you over.”

She has to hiss at this moment. “I don’t buy it; I feel like you still hate me.”

The car starts going slower by the time Ten gives her a reply. “If I really hated you, would I have taken you out on a date?”

“Maybe, you’re just planning to take me out to this horrid place and—”

“Oh, no, no, no, no.”

The car comes to an abrupt halt at that moment, and Ten’s head lulls against the steering wheel at the same time that a groan creeps up his vocal cords. “What happened?” The car is still on, however, so it must not be the engine fucking their date up.

“Didn’t you feel that?” She shakes her head then. “You’re dead inside. I think one of the wheels has, I don’t know, like a nail piercing through it.”

When Ten gets out of the car, right after turning off the car, she’s left in complete darkness—and she hates it. Why is it that when everything is going well for them, a wheel decides to just fucking deflate and almost kill them? At least, they’re in a somewhat safe street. “Ten, hold up—” She says, taking her phone out of her pocket to shine a light onto the wheel he is inspecting, trying not to let her eyes trail down to his toned legs. “We can call someone and they’ll get here in no time, it’s not that big of a deal.”

“It’s a Friday night. It’s even more difficult to get someone to help us at this time.” Ten instructs, and she decides to lighten things up in the worst way possible.

“It seems like you’re not that good of a driver, considering you know what to do in this situation—”

Ten sends a glare over his shoulder, some strands of his hair passing over his face, and she has to give him a cramped smile. “I am a good driver.”

“It was a joke!”

He manages to give her a short laugh before bringing his own phone out of his pocket. “I’m calling a friend that can come help us out.” And he does, his back becoming the main image he sees, his slim body but nicely squared shoulders making her scrunch up her nose and close her eyes tightly. There’s always something going on between them, ain’t it?

Sitting down on the sidewalk, she lets the coldness seep through her jeans, staring at the city lights that are even more beautiful than the harsh one from her phone. She turns it off, but uses her phone to distract herself in a different way. Music must be the only way she can relax herself, a breath in and a breath out as she looks through her playlist.

But nothing sits right with her, only listening to a few seconds before she switches the song to something else. However, a presence makes itself known by her side, no longer talking to his friend but, instead, sending an eye over to her phone and letting his finger roam over the screen.

“I like this one.” And she has to cackle at the choice of songs. Definitely something of the like that is expected from him, ‘34+35’ by Ariana Grande fills the air in between them, and much to her surprise, Ten knows how to sing along to some of the lyrics.

“Are you trying to hint at something?” She jokes around, dipping her feet in the water just because she can, and the warmth of him by her side isn’t quite as unpleasant in this winter blues.

If she could see his cheeks, she would be able to tell that they are tinted deep red, and that the small, almost inaudible laugh that leaves him is one of the most beautiful sounds she has ever been welcomed to. “I’m not saying anything. You’re the one being dirty-minded.”

“Oh, come on, the song is definitely about—”

“She says: ‘love me ‘til the daylight’.”

“What the fuck? No!” She corrects, giggling a bit when Ten drapes his coat on top of both their bodies, mingling closer until his perfume becomes a drug she can’t get enough of. “She says: ‘fuck me ‘til the daylight’.”

“Too much to say on a first date, you know?” Ten conquers, and she has to laugh directly at his face.

“We’re not getting it on tonight, Ten.”

“I didn’t—I didn’t say we were going to! You brought it up.”

“Whatever.” She replies, resting her head on his shoulder before sighing deeply. “When is your friend coming?”

“In an hour, if he’s lucky.” Ten instructs, and she doesn’t want to look disappointed, but Ten had painted the restaurant they were going to go to as the best thing in this world—

“I’m hungry.” Her lips puff out in a bit of a pout as he speaks, and Ten takes this as a cue to take the car keys, lock the device before standing up, leaving his coat over her shoulders.

His hand extends, an anchor for her to take, messing up with her temper when he waves his fingers and invites her in a way that makes her heart beat like a fool’s. It’s been too damn long since she’s felt like this. “There’s a convenience store nearby…and, I don’t know, maybe we could buy some burgers and fries in the way there? Eat somewhere less cold, too.”

When their fingers interlock, she thinks she gets a grasp of exactly why Angela had rushed into a relationship with him. He’s magic in its truest form. “Fries sound amazing right now.”

They start walking, though the conversation never dies down. “Do you like do dip them in ice cream, ketchup or mayonnaise?”

“People dip it in mayonnaise?”

“That’s less chaotic than the ones that dip it in mustard.”

“…The end of the world is near.”

His laughter is nicely welcomed, a blanket for her to keep herself warm in this cold night. Though, his hands and his coat do as much, as well.

###

With Angela’s Yorkshire Terrier held up on her arms, the dog licking up her face for the umpteenth time and probably doing his best to take off the rest of her makeup, not managing to steal a kiss from her when she moves her face around in the way to the vet, she continues talking to her friend with intention. Five days after her last date with Ten, and the first one at that, and she can’t seem to stop running her mouth about it.

“Really, Ange. I don’t know why you thought it was a good idea to break his heart when he was an absolute sweetheart—” She says, the harsh sunshine falling on top of her face, and this dog is adorable, much more now that he doesn’t know that he’s going to get his mandatory shots, but if he continues licking her face, she may lose the skin of her cheek. “Did you know that he loves Alicia Keys? And that he loves drawing? He’s so stylish, too, and he’s so open about talking about himself.”

“Because he loves himself.” Angela interrupts, placing the keys of her car inside her purse before sending a smile her way. Before she could say anything, Angela speaks up. “But I’m happy for you, babe. We both know that you deserve someone who treats you right. Even if it’s my ex.”

At the mention of such a title, she has to stop her rambling. “You’re okay with it, right?”

“Of course.” And the truthfulness of her tone has her releasing a sigh from the depths of her worry. “I’m not insecure, honey. Not even jealous. Ten is nothing for me now. I don’t like him, but I don’t like him for me. As long as he treats you right, we’re okay.”

Though, she does feel a bit of curiousness about the relationship that ensued in between the two, but maybe that’s too early to talk about when she has only been talking to him through the phone, planning dates, meeting up in the briefest of moments when they both have time. After all, her song is doing good and now, she’s recording an album—

Her phone rings at that moment, eyes opening widely when she hears the specific ringtone she has for Hao. “Angela, take your dog. That’s Hao calling.” Though, the woman doesn’t relent when she passes the sweet dog over to her. Her phone fits her hand perfectly when she picks up the call, ear welcoming the sound of Hao’s familiar voice. “Hao, Hao, what’s up?”

“Nothing much…” His voice trails, but it’s unusual for him to call just because. Just when she continues walking in the parking lot, Hao decides to say something. “But you’re going to be opening show for the tour of one of the biggest artists in this country, that’s all that’s happening right now. Not much.”

If she could scream right now, she would.

Her hand spreads on top of her face, jelly on toast, made to be there. Shivers going up her neck, body paralyzed in her spot, her free arm going up to raise into the air—feel the wind, the sun, let it ravish her as her dreams give a glimpse of becoming true. The fever of stardom and success rips a squeal out of her, twirling on her own spot as words of thankfulness become one with the air around her. For once, she feels like an artist—like her voice can be heard, heart healed by the heel of the world and how it twists around to her favor.

“I’m going on tour!” She finally screams, happiness meeting her lungs, breathing in a way that doesn’t feel cramped. The world is good for once, and Angela’s smile matches her own.

###

The worst part of it all is saying goodbye to something that didn’t happen.

Her friends know about fashion more than she does, a red jacket draped over an almost all-black outfit, while they all wear clothing that seems to be fitted for the party in her honor. Well, not in her honor at all—but for the main artist of the world tour that will start in no less than a week from now, such short notice, and she was invited in the process. The elongated hallways of the hotel the party will take place in, extra expensive at that, barely do much to conceal the laughter that bubbles from her friend-group or the sound of their singing to their latest single, well over a million views in YouTube as of now, and directed by then.

She hasn’t told him. It’s that one thing that she doesn’t know if she should talk about or not. Whenever they eat together, she feels like telling him…but she stops herself for some reason. It’s the brink of not knowing if he cares or if it would hurt him, but the world knows what it is doing. With her boots hitting the tiles with expertise, she doesn’t expect to hear her name being called, with such a soft and nice tone that she already knows whose it is.

When she looks over her shoulder, her friends stopping their singing and laughing to stare at the scene displayed in front of them, Ten rests his back against one of the bathroom doors near the entrance to the main salon for the party. With a bun laying on top of his head, the strands of his black hair falling behind his neck, she’s surprised to see him so put together—white button down, trousers, and a poised look on his face when he says:

“Congratulations. Not that you told me but…I’m so happy you’re going on tour.” Her heart races at that moment, not caring that Angela is there, that her friends are glancing at Ten and speaking between themselves as she moves with certainty, taking her place in front of him and grasping his hands in both of hers, eyes shifting to every portion of his face. The face of a man she wants to have, but can’t.

“T—Ten, uh, I didn’t tell you because I thought you wouldn’t care. It’s nothing against you, really, but since we don’t have anything serious yet—”

“I’m not mad.” He says, a small smile on his face. “Why would I be mad when this is all you have ever asked for?”

A halo exists over him, and she doesn’t know why she hated him on the first place at this moment. Perfection in the form of a man that she can’t get to know so well right now, simply because her career is launching and so is his. “Well, you’re more used to travelling than I am. After all, you’re always all around for shootings and director stuff that I don’t know about—”

“It’s damn fun. Seeing the world that way…you’ll love it.” Ten whispers, sending one look over to her group of friends before lowering his voice. “Can you just tell them to leave?”

“Yeah.” She says, looking at her friends before speaking up. “Get it going, there’s a party waiting for you!”

In between whispers of their own and some looks at them, she doesn’t realize that Ten’s hands have taken place on her waist, bringing her closer to inspect her features. Looking at her as if she’s the only woman in the world, when she had thought he had only seen himself all along— “I wish you would’ve told me, though. I was invited by Hao and got the news thanks to him.”

Hao is either really blessed or the unluckiest man alive. “I just didn’t know how to tell you. After all, I—” She mumbles, swallowing thickly after. “I wanted to try things out for you. With you. Ah, you know—”

“There’s always ‘later’. Maybe not now, but maybe, we’re just meant to connect in some other time of our lives.” His words make her cling closer to him, fists tangling onto his shirt, taking more of him— “And until then, live your dream and I’ll live mine. The gratitude of being the best version of ourselves is more important right now.”

When she leans her head forward, his lips come in contact with the bridge of her nose, breathing softly, a silent confession, a plea to let go of the world for one night and be there with each other. One of their latest nights together, of the impossibility of minutes as they glare at them from the clock and ask them to pull away.

“I wish we could’ve gotten a real chance.” She whispers, laying her head on his shoulder, arms wrapped around his waist as his thumbs draw on her back.

“We’ll get to try later.”

Later sounds like forever when he is right there, within her reach, and yet so far away. The promise of a goodbye is shadowed by the trials of continuing with their connection. That, maybe, losing time with him was her worst mistake, the reason why it shatters her heart—

But later is also a moment, a moment that will welcome her after tour.

#ten scenarios #ten #wayv scenarios #wayv #nct scenarios #nct #writing #wayv angst #wayv fluff #wayv au #ten angst #ten fluff #ten au #how to lose someone in seven steps?

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magics-protector · 3 years

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Mountain Sound

Soulmate AU: Soulmates have one song that connects them - when one soulmate listens to it, they both can see each other.

The Song: Mountain Sound - Of Monsters and Men

(which I think fits Merlin absolutely perfectly)

Spotify, Apple Music, Youtube

A small kind of crack fic from my Everlast series - which will start up sometime this week because it’s Reading Week and I finally have time to write it!

With a soft sigh leaving her lips, Y/N fell into her chair, dropping the books she carried down onto the table. A long start to an already long day, if you asked her.

First, she had to help Jack get his hand out of a cookie jar (because apparently her adopted little brother couldn’t just ‘magic’ his way out of it). Then, her Uncle asked her to “help” with work on Baby’s engine - and by “help” she meant that he made her stand there while she held all his tools and wasn’t allowed to touch the engine itself.

Not that she could complain. It was nice having everyone home for once - not that it was going to last long. Hence the reason for all the books. A new day would bring new cases and as always, Y/N was responsible for research - being her father’s daughter had it’s disadvantages in that way.

Speaking of her dad, he sat across from her, eyes trained on the laptop in front of him as he searched and typed, falling into the same pattern quite easily. Pulling her knees up to her chest, Y/N opened the first book on her pile and began to research - so it seemed Dragons were the big enemy of the day.

As she read, Y/N started to notice writing she hadn’t seen in over a year. Language she hadn’t seen since she disappeared. It was the old language of the Druid People. Something she had learned to read over the years.

As she read on, Y/N noticed the old phrasing of the common Soulmate connection: “Songs and stories of different melodies and tunes. That is what shall lead thy heart to its destiny”.

“Huh, well that kind of sucks.” She said, meaning to think it but it just came out.

Sam pulled his head out of his computer and looked up. “What sucks?”

Y/N looked up from the book, motioning to the page. “The language in this book. It talks about the soulmate connection. You’d expect it to rhyme, but it doesn’t.”

A laugh like breath came from Sam as he shook his head. “Not all old texts have to rhyme, you know?”

Y/N scoffed with a smile. “I know that. I just think it would have been funnier and more romantic if it did.”

Then Y/N’s smile faded. “Hey, Dad?”

He hummed in acknowledgement as he looked down at his laptop again.

“What was your song? You know, your song with Mom?”

Y/N could see Sam tense at the question. Y/N had known for so long that her parents were in fact soulmates, but Sam never talked about her. The memory of Will was almost to painful for him to remember. Not the relationship itself, but what happened to her.

He shifted in his seat, looking down as he nodded before he stood up, moving around the table to sit next to Y/N, wrapping an arm around her shoulder. “It was Rebel Rebel. That was our song.”

Y/N turned her head, her face shocked. “Your song with Mom was Rebel Rebel? Dad, I did not take you as a David Bowie fan.”

Sam chuckled, moving closer to the edge of the chair and placed Y/N’s head on his shoulder. “He grew on me, only because of your mother. She loved to listen to his stuff. Rebel Rebel may have been our song but I can still remember her screaming the words to Space Oddity like there was no tomorrow.” He moved his head to look down at her, placing a small kiss on her head. “You remind me of her. Everyday I can see her in everything that you do and I know how proud she’d been if she could see you.”

Y/N smiled sadly. “Have you ever tried to see her again? Maybe if you listened to the song again you’d see her..”

“It doesn’t work like that, Bug.” Sam chuckled sadly. “Your mother has been gone for a while. I don’t think it’s possible to see her again until I get to her myself.”

Y/N could sense that the conversation was getting to him, so she stopped. She would have much gathered leaned in and enjoyed the moment, which is what she did.

“Woah, didn’t realize we were interrupting a moment.”

Sam and Y/N looked over to the archway of the library where Dean walked in, followed by Cas and Jack.

“Where the hell have you been, Dean?” Sam shook his head. “I called you like an hour ago to help with research.”

Dean scoffed, taking Sam’s old seat. “Yeah, well, I had to pick these two up from the Gas Station.” He pointed at Cas and Jack with his thumb. “And what’s this about research? You two obviously aren’t doing any - OW!”

Cas whacked Dean across the back of his head. “Don’t be rude, Dean.”

Dean didn’t argue, he couldn’t argue with Cas, so he just grumbled.

Y/N giggled as she watched her Uncles interact - it was honestly so surprising how long it took for the both of them - well mainly Dean - to come to terms with their connection.

“Hey, Dee?”

Dean looked at Y/N with a hum.

“If you don’t mind me asking, what’s your song?”

Dean sat up, leaning back in his chair while Cas took a seat next to him. Cas had a smile on his face while Dean gave off a rare cross between a smirk and a smile. “Well, that’s easy. It’s --”

“You Shook Me All Night Long.” Both Dean and Cas said at the same time, which made the both of them smile at each other.

Y/N nodded her head, almost as if in agreement. “How did I know?” She giggled.

Jack smiled too - he hadn’t found his song yet, but he was waiting, knowing he’d find it one day. He looked over at his ‘sister’ with a curious face. “Why do you ask, Y/N? You’ve never been interested in Soulmate songs before.”

Y/N felt all eyes on her. She thought for a moment, before she answered. “Well.... I kind of want to find my song.....”

Dean looked at his niece with that bothersome uncle look. “I thought you had no interest in finding them.”

Y/n looked down at her hands, rubbing them together. “But I did. At least, I’m 99% sure I found him.”

Everyone’s faces erupting with smiles and cheers - Sam gripped her tight in a side hug. “That’s amazing, Y/N!”

“What’s the kid’s name?”

“Where’s he from?”

“What’s your song?”

Y/N put her hands up to stop them.”Woah! Woah! I never said I found my song. I just said I think I found him.”

Cue the confusion. “But,” Jack tilted his head. “if you haven’t found your song, then how do you know?”

Y/N took a breath before she stood up, walking towards a pillar of the archway and leaned against it. “I just feel it.” She laughed with a smile. “When I was with him, it was like.. nothing else mattered....” She shook her head. “What we went through was a lot for two people to handle, but with Merls, it was like.... it was like we could take on the whole world and no matter what the outcome was, as long as I had him, I won.” She seemed so lost in the memory, so lost that when she came back she went pink with embarrassment and she held her arms. “If that makes any sense....”

Sam, Dean and Cas looked at each other with knowing looks. “Well then,” Dean said. “Looks like we have a song to find. After all,” Y/N looked at her uncle in confusion. “We don’t want to leave him waiting.”

*******************************************************************************

“Ugh, this is hopeless!”

Hours and hours of music and nothing. They tried it all - Bon Jovi, Hozier, My Chemical Romance, Lana Del Rey and countless other bands and still nothing.

The team sat there for hours, playing music from Dean’s collection, random bands they found on YouTube, but nothing was working.

Y/N slumped in her chair, defeated. She ran her hands over her face before she stopped and sat up quickly. “Wait!” She looked at her dad. “Dad, you said you weren’t very fond of Bowie but Rebel Rebel was your song with Mom. How did you find it?”

Sam sat for a moment, his hand over his mouth as he thought, before his eyes went wide. “There was something that connected it to me. I would see the record or hear it faintly on the radio and that’s basically how I found it.” He leaned forward to pull his laptop towards him. “Is there any song that just stands out to you, Y/N? One that you can think of without hesitating? Like you’d see the album and feel a pull?”

Y/N thought for a moment when her eyes went wide. She raised her head slightly and mumbled under her breath.

“What?”

She looked up at her family. “Mountain Sound. It’s a song by Of Monsters and Men. I’ve never really thought about it til now, but there’s something about it.”

Sam quickly typed it into his search engine and pulled it up, handing it and the headphones over to Y/N.

With shaky hands, Y/N put the headphones on and started the song and it was like the world had stopped. Swirls of gold filled the void in the archway capturing her gaze and she smiled. Those golden swirls soon started to form the shape of a man sitting with a book on his lap. That man, Y/N knew him better than anyone did. Tears pooled in her eyes as her smile grew wider. “I knew it.”

Sam, Dean, Cas and Jack all smiled. They did it.

As the swirls finished forming the boy, Y/N moved to the floor, carrying the laptop down with her as she moved closer to his form. The boy seemed to enticed by his book until he looked up and over her way. He looked around hearing the music himself and then he looked at Y/N and a smile broke out on his face, tears in his eyes.

“Y/N?” His voice was eery, but that was normal for this kind of thing.

Forgetting she was in the presence of her family, Y/N laughed, tears streaming down her face. “Hey, Merlin.”

The young Warlock smiled, lunging forward to touch her, and through the power of their song, he hugged her for the first time in over a year. “I never thought I’d see you again, My Love....” He lamented.

Y/N held him close. “Takes a lot more than a glassy portal to keep me away from you, you Cabbage head.”

Merlin pulled back, but made sure to keep a hand on her shoulders. “Where are you? We looked everywhere for you. I thought Arthur was going to take off my head if you weren’t found.”

Y/N looked up at her soulmate and smiled. “How badly did you irritate him this time?”

With a look of pride, Merlin answered. “I going to be honest, I nearly had the Knights turn on him.”

“Pft, hahaha! Merlin! You can’t just lead a coup against Arthur! That’s my job!”

Merlin laughed, he laughed so hard that he leaned forward and turned, resting his head on Y/N’s legs. “Honestly, to be fair, it wasn't his fault. All those Lords had been quite vocal about their disapproval over your rescue mission. I thought Gwaine was gonna tear off someone’s ear.”

Y/N giggled, playing with Merlin’s blackish brown locks which had grown out since the last time she saw him while her other hand ran over his cheek, where a small stubble had grown as well. “I wouldn’t put it past him to do that.”

“No. But I think the others would have let him if Arthur hadn’t been in the room.”

Y/N looked down into his eyes and smiled. “It’s just nice to know I’ll have a huge welcoming when I get back.”

Meanwhile, as Y/N and Merlin continued to ramble and talk away as the song repeated and repeated over and over again, Sam and the rest of Team Free Will decided to leave Y/N alone with her soulmate and as they left through the back door, Sam watched as Y/N smiled the brightest smile he’s ever seen. Silently, he vowed that he’d make sure Y/N got back to wherever she had disappeared to.

#BBC merlin #bbc merlin imagines #soulmate #soulmateau #soulmate au #spn #supernatural #supernatural x reader #bbc merlin x reader #merlin #merlin x reader #sam winchester #dean winchester #castiel #castiel winchester #jack kline #jack winchester #destiel

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nyxravessnow · 3 years

Text

Rambly Patalliro stage review

Stage Patalliro 2021 Foggy London Airport Arc Review

Today I finally managed to see the delays of the first and last day of the new 2021 Patalliro stage.

Overall, I will rate this show as a 9 out of 10.

I don't know if I'm giddy just because I watched the show today and have been really looking forward to it, and especially since I didn't enjoy the last 2.5D show I was looking forward to I might be projecting a bit onto this show. But I did enjoy every second of this show and can’t wait to buy the dvd.

While there were things, I was very nervous about for this show, I was also very excited as a lot of actors I really love are in the show.

I just wanna say anything I say about negative fan reaction is of course not most fans. Most fans stayed quiet and just did what they wanted, I’m just talking about a few fans whose comments I have seen floating about.

I was very nervous about the hostility to the new cast which I felt was unwarranted. Obviously, this wasn’t from most fans but was just from a very small amount of them. Hostility to the company and how they handled the graduation of the previous cost and the handling of the bringing in of the new cast is completely justified. However, this new cast is full of people who truly love the show and were very excited to be in it and no one had seen them on stage as those characters and so I feel like hostility towards them was undue.

The main reason this made me nervous was that I was worried if the show was bad the director and the company would not be the ones blamed but the actors who merely were doing their best in roles they were cast in.

I am so glad to say that I believe the show was fantastic. I believe that they lived up to the legacy of the previous cast and have started a good new tradition for their next shows and any cast that follows them.

One thing that really shocked me but also spoke to me about how this show most likely wouldn’t have happened without a new cast, was Kato Ryo Crying out of happiness on the final day of the show. Kato Ryo is known for never breaking character and not breaking down on stage which shows how much this show means to him. He was truly happy to be on the stage performing as Patalliro again, and it did seem as if he had also bonded to this new cast as Dai instantly went to give him a hug which he returned. He spoke about how it was amazing they could make it to the final performance as he didn’t think they’d even make it to a first one. I believe it is not too far-fetched to say that he might be referring to the fact that Nelke and the 2.5d association mostly likely said that they would not continue the show with Tsune onboard. As before Kato Ryo said he would only continue the show if the cast didn’t change and that seemed like a serious change.

I have seen comments that Maaya-sensei didn’t like the new cast and that he was completely unaware of the change in casting which I would be very surprised by. 2.5d shows have to sign off for new shows with the creator of the original and also you could see that Maaya-sensei’s family had bonded the new cast greatly. Giving the show a standing ovation and kept waving to the cast on the final night.

I know the re cast is a very difficult topic for people who likes the old cast and don't want to see a new cost, for people who liked the old cast and are willing to see the new cast, for people who didn't see much of the old cast but excited for the new cast or for people who like the new actors coming in and so getting into Patalliro for the first time.

I believe that as long as you are not attacking anyone your thoughts and feelings are completely valid and if you only liked the show for the previous cast then you have every right to just ignore the new shows and just watch the three amazing instalments from the old cast. You are valid and I hope you have a lovely day/week and hope that this awful situation (covid and the such) isn’t being too bad to you.

In my opinion if this show was the result of the recast, and that if it hadn't happened we wouldn't have gotten another show, then I'm very glad it happened because I think this show was excellent and another fantastic instalment under the name of Patalliro stage. Under the cut I will include a spoilered review of the stage but before then I just wanted to say some of my basic thoughts for anyone who doesn't want to be spoiled for what is in the show.

Acting: All the acting was fantastic. There wasn't a single actor who I wasn't entranced by and I was enthralled and engaged the entire show. I think every actor performed their roles perfectly and to the best of their abilities.

Singing: Obviously the big stand out for singing in this show was the transgender actress Nakamura Ataru as she was hired for her singing voice, her being a professional singer. However, I think everybody performed extremely well. I continue to be a little frustrated with the use of recorded singing for everybody except for Ataru, as I believe the music they have on it is too loud and it makes it harder to hear a lot of the singers and I also feel it's not necessary to record the songs as all of them are professional actors who can definitely sing on stage. That being said, I fell in love with every single song in the show and thought they were all amazing.

Directing: I think a lot of very very wise decisions were made about this show. I was worried this show would either reflect too much on the previous cast or just not mention them at all and pretend it didn't happen. Luckily the stage did neither. I will get into more specifics and my spoiler review, but I think they handled it very well with having stuff for new fans, old fans and fans who would be irritated by seeing knew actors continue on jokes that previous actors started. In regards to other sides of the directing, I believe it was same as always, very good for the type of show it is. The comedy was very good but due to only having seen two shows I can't say how much was the directing and how much were the actors just being funny, because this is a very funny cast.

Casting: I believe every actor in this stage was perfect for their roles. This may be a controversial opinion but after seeing Dai and Yuuya act opposite each other I am very glad that Sana wasn’t brought back. They couldn't continue to have Tsune in the show as 2.5D does not have the kind of reputation yet where they can have an actor who has committed crimes in their shows and back him for if he ever did something again then it could do a lot of damage to the industry. Nelke and the 2.5d association are companies and in order to keep putting on shows and paying actors and all the staff they need money. And to have money, they need a clean reputation, at least while it’s still relatively low in popularity. I do not wish Tsune ill at all, I think he is an excellent actor, and I really hope that he does continue acting but I completely understand why he was not cast in this show again and why that led to a recast of most of the cast. I think that Sana was excellent as Maraich in every way he embodied the character. But having been in quite a few previous shows together Yuuya and Dai already had excellent chemistry, and I think it would have been quite odd to see Sana as Maraich acting opposite a different Bancoran. I can't imagine any actor having better chemistry with Dai’s Maraich than Yuuya’s Bancoran and visa versa. And I really hope that with the end of lockdown and quarantine, and everything calming down a lot in terms of physical contact on stages they will be able to show the bond between their Maraich and Bancoran even more. (They didn’t actually kiss, converse to what I’ve seen some people reporting about how Nelke wanted to pretend everything was fine by making them kiss.)

Well enough on them, the Tamanegi. I think all of them were completely perfect for their roles and they all handled it with enough seriousness to make the comedy different enough from the past cast and therefore make it their own but also for it to actually be funny. I cannot wait to see this group in more shows together and see how much funnier they can become. My only slight complaint, and it is very slight, is that one of the Tamanegi is 19 years old, therefore underage, and it made me slightly uncomfortable when he took his shirt off. as I am now an adult watching the show. Having not been an adult when I watched the previous two, I do rather approach it with different eyes and that was something that I wasn't very comfortable with but I do understand that everybody isn't me and it would have been a bit strange if only one of them didn't take their top off.

Other cast members included Damian, the Maaya man and Ataru the ‘singing princess’. Again, all three of them were amazing, I was especially impressed with Shouta as Damien as I believe he carriage the emotion that came with that role excellently. Knowing what kind of personality Shouta has off stage, it still makes it slightly weird for me to see him playing less-good characters but I cannot fault his acting. I will cover the other two cast members in my spoiler review.

Anything else: I think the staging was excellent, prop work was very good and they obviously worked very hard on this show.

That will do it for my spoiler free review underneath I will get into a lot more detail on things that I liked, disliked or just wanted to comment on.

If you're stopping reading here thank you very much for reading and I really recommend if you weren't sure about this cast and weren’t sure how much they'd put into these roles and how much they would love them I can assure you that these roles have been trusted to people who really love this show and are working very hard. If you are considering getting the DVD but aren’t sure, I really recommend that you do get it if you like Patalliro and don’t just want to see only the old cast.

If you have any more specific questions about the show, I will be happy to answer them so just drop me an ask.

Spoilers under cut (Warning, it is very long)

God, where to even begin. This show was so good. They combined old stage Patalliro, with new directing, a new cast, and a really interesting arc. I'm going to separate my review into story, acting, singing/songs and directing, as well as mentioning some extra stuff that I might think of at the end.

I will illustrate bits I’m saying with pics but pics cannot do this show justice. And I’ve bolded where I begin each section so it’s more easy to find.

So first, the story. As someone who doesn't know the exact intricacies of this arc, I do know roughly what happens I just couldn't remember all the specifics, I think the show was set out in a very non confusing way compared to other Patalliro content. They did make the story a lot more linear and wasn’t showing stuff that happened at the same time as other things too much which can sometimes hurt my brain. Even with all the flashbacks and flashforwards I felt it was really easy to keep track of what was happening when. The story had a very clear and defined beginning, middle and end, and I just thought it was very well done.

Acting, with occasional dips into directing and story when appropriate. As I said before the acting was amazing. I had chills, the entire scene with Damien, Maraich and Bancoran. I think they balanced the comedy and tension very well and didn’t try to undercut all the serious scenes with comedy which is my main complaint with a lot of gag manga/anime/stages. Except during Maraich’s more emotional song where one of the Tamanegi was still wearing bdsm gear which I thought was a bit hmmm. I’m not rly gonna cover Kato Ryo bc he just is Patalliro at this point.

Maraich and Bancoran, despite having very few scenes actually talking to each other, had undeniable chemistry. Dai and Yuuya, sold me on them being a couple immediately with the way they looked at each other and how they held each other. Their final scene before the end together where Maraich lay in a hospital bed and Bancoran was clutching his hand gave me so many emotions (First night he held his hand and final night he kissed him). I was 100% sold on how much they cared about each other, even if they might fight a lot in the end no one will ever love the other more than they do, and I think that that is what makes this couple so special. They have a true unconditional love for each other and they would, quite literally in Maraich’s case, throw themselves on a bomb for the other one.

Bancoran. I think Yuuya played Bancoran so well. You could see the character maturing before your eyes as we moved from 15 years previously to 12 years previously, to 10 and onwards until the normal time. And you could see the vulnerability he had with Damien and how that was still there but how he truly loved Maraich and that the vulnerability he has with Maraich is different. While Damien didn’t tend to let his guard down around Bancoran, his relationship with Maraich is a lot more give and take and I think he played all of that expertly. I know how much Bancoran cares about Maraich is a lot more vague in the original but I think that was partly as a product of its time and they somewhat had to make some humour out of these two men being in a relationship without flat out making fun of that aspect. So, I am very happy that the stage lets these character’s be in love and despite everything, truly show that they care about each other. Also, he did make me cry a few times when he saw Damien broken, Maraich with Damien as his heart broke seeing that happen to the man he loved but also breaking for the trust he put in a man he had once loved as well in the final scenes where he has clearly decided to kill Damien but is still holding onto a feint hope that maybe, he is not completely lost.

Mariach. Wow, just wow. He was not super present in the beginning, but he was the standout in the show in my opinion. His Maraich was so so different to Sana-chan’s Maraich and yet he was absolutely true to Maraich. He approached Mariach from a very different angle and I am so glad we are lucky enough to get both of them playing Maraich. He seems a lot more mature, like he has definitely been with Bancoran longer. He gives him more trust and isn’t as quick to be jealous as well as very quickly understanding Damien and how important he is to Bancoran, asking Patalliro not to tell him anything until they were sure which is different to how he acted about Bjorn/Andersen in the last show, they are different situations but I do think it represents character growth. He was a lot more aggressive in his fighting and anger though, as shown by his heavy metal solo as opposed to the softer ones of Sana’s. Despite all that he still was clearly in love with Bancoran and still showed his cute side. As well as expressing more deeply about his love for Bancoran with one of the Tamanegi but more on that in the Tamanegi’s bit. The scene with Damien was done so well by everyone involved. They clearly condemned Damien’s actions, showed how disgusting what he did was and created incredible pathos for Maraich while also showing Maraich somewhat unaware of what had happened and during the sex scene with Maraich and Damien, Dai showed Maraich’s desperation to hold on Bancoran and love Bancoran, so well, and it broke my heart.

Damien. I don’t remember too much of Damien from the original but Shouta played him excellently. He showed the progression of this man who loved Bancoran to a man who was willing to throw him away and murder him so well and it was believable despite not seeing almost anything except his interactions with Bancoran or Bancoran/Maraich’s feelings about him. When he held Bancoran at the end, asking why he was fighting so much and why he wanted Damien to kill him, despite Damien obviously being the villain you couldn’t help but feel sympathy for this man despite everything he’d done. (Also I think there is meant to be a parallel between him holding Maraich and him holding Bancoran)

The Maaya man. I thought the actor himself was very good, but I am a bit confused about why he was in the stage. All the Tamanegi played multiple roles, changing costume, and there is only one of him, so I am not too sure what the benefit from having a single Maaya man was but it’s a very small complaint and mainly about logistics rather than show quality. Especially as it certainly didn’t take away anything from the show having him there.

Nakamura Ataru – The singing Princess. Oh. My. Lord. Her voice was phenomenal, and she was gorgeous in every single outfit she was in, reaffirming to me that I am very pan (Not just attracted to the men in the play but also this gorgeous woman. I am not saying I am pan because she is trans). What was a surprise to me is that she was genuinely really funny. In the scenes where she was meant to be funny, I laughed a lot and she definitely has expert comedic timing.

The Tamanegi. I am going to separate a few of them who were reasonably important and group the rest in together.

So, the ones who did not play major roles in the show were: Emoto Koki, Ookubo Tatsuki, Sagawa Daiki and Hoshi Gouki. They were all very good, played their parts well and I don’t think they could have done better. It was very interesting to see Koki in a bdsm outfit but besides that there wasn’t anything super memorable about these actors’ parts.

Harashina Motohisa. Motohisa played the Black Tamanegi and served as somewhat of a leader for the Tamanegi in their scenes. Given that he was the only 2nd season Tenimyu actor in the cast and was the first name in the list of Tamanegi this was pretty much the role I expected him to play. He was very good, and his high voice was super adorable to hear after not hearing it much from his roles.

Okuda Yumeto. It was very surprising for me to see that Yumeto was the Tamanegi who travelled back into the past with Patalliro to see Bancoran’s past. Not only is he the youngest of the Tamanegi but he was also last on the list of Tamanegi names, I might be putting too much onto that list, but I did think it was gonna be kinda going from highest ranked to lowest and from most importance in the show to lowest. I was kinda right and wrong about that as the four most important were the two first names and two of the three last names. He did get to sing a little in the Bancoran and Damien jazz sex song, more on that later, and I thought what he did was good.

Nakata Ryouta. (Yes I am saving Tsukasa for last bc I love him). Out of the four he had the smallest role but still had a solo bit in their trio song (trio is the name for a song where 3 people harmonise and have solo bits if you didn’t know, bc lol I didn’t) and was somewhat important to Maraich. I thought he was very good despite it being his first stage show and he had a lovely voice. He and Tsukasa made such a cute couple.

Taguchi Tsukasa. Warning, he is my favourite actor, and I am extremely biased. He was the best actor in the show, no question.

Joking, he didn’t have too much to do so obviously he didn’t shine more than Dai-chan, Yuuya or Shouta for example. He had two scenes with Maraich and while he didn’t do much in the stage overall it was clear how much of an impact his character, Tamanegi no.35, made on Maraich. He confessed to Maraich his love for his fellow Tamanegi, no.19, and spoke of their love and how special they were to each other which was never ridiculed or made fun of but was an exceedingly human moment and as a lgbt person it really touched me. He saw the love Maraich had for Bancoran and he and 19 did everything they could to help him. Without them, Bancoran and maybe Maraich as well, would most likely be dead as they picked Maraich up and brought him to Bancoran as well as getting Plasma X’s armour to protect him. Maraich, so far in the stages, hasn’t really had a friend. He always has just had Patalliro, shown by Patalliro being called in the 2nd stage to help them with their argument despite Maraich not liking Patalliro that much and this Tamanegi offered help to Maraich without judgement, just empathy, and I thought that was really special. I know, due to the nature of this being based on a gag manga and knowing Patalliro, that in the next stage they will likely not get another scene together but I can hope as their second scene with 19, 35 and Maraich might be my favourite scene in all of Patalliro content.

I know Tsukasa is a massive Patalliro fan, in a live he said he went to the previous show between 4-6 times and I have rarely seen him smile as much as he did in the finale of this show. It obviously meant so much to him to be in a show he loved and I’m incredibly happy for him.

Singing/songs.

There were 9/11 songs in this show. (9 if you don’t count Cock robin and Foggy London Airport which Ataru only sang a little of on stage but is an album exclusive)

These were:

1. Wow Patalliro

2. I can’t see your

3. Maybe we could meet again? – Mata Aeru Kashira

4. Foggy London Airport

5. Sexy dudes!

6. To leak out – Moreru

7. Kiss me Bancoran

8. Cock Robin

9. Don’t overlook me – Misugosenai

10. My special person - Tokubetsu na hito

11. Forever Patalliro ~ Grand Finale

1. Wow Patalliro

This opening song was such a bop and I don’t think I will ever get it out of my head. It was very different to the previous first songs, much higher tempo and energy which I think was interesting as this show felt slower than the previous two shows which I thought was interesting. Shouta, Damien’s actor, was having so much fun dancing around in the bg and it was adorable.

2. I can’t see your

God Ataru’s voice. Her voice was gorgeous in this song. This was my favourite of the 3/4 songs she sang and this is from a person who doesn’t usually like ballads. The contrast between the fast pace of the first song and the slow pace of the 2nd song was so well done. And it was such a good song to have the cast list play during as kinda a more formal opening as the first scene doesn’t do much except to show that Bancoran is acting strange and so isn’t super related to the rest of the stage.

3. Maybe we could meet again? – Mata Aeru Kashira

I love the club singer vibe of this song and Maraich was so cute with Ban clapping along in the back. It was a nice soft scene before all the angst and trauma in the rest of the scene and it was really nice to see them on a date together.

4. Foggy London Airport

Don’t have many thoughts as I didn’t really hear much of this song, about 2 lines, but I’m sure it’s amazing if Ataru is singing it.

5. Sexy dudes!

I love all the Tamanegi songs so much and I rly liked how different this one sounded, much like all the songs in this show, I like how the Tamanegi are built up in this song to seem so good then they having the dumbest dance ever, it was amazing and the final day with all of them stripping killed me. Of laughter bc of Daiki wearing a shirt that made it seem like he had abs and of other things bc of Tsukasa stripping. (I think Daiki might not have been comfortable showing his fully chest so I’m glad they allowed him to just wear a pretend ab shirt)

6. To leak out – Moreru

I never imagined a sex scene in Patalliro would be shown by a woman dressed like a bush singing a jazz song as screens showed the characters sex faces as they were on a spinning bed or doing poses but here we are. The song itself was very good and I think it worked weirdly well representing what happened.

7. Kiss me Bancoran

God all the songs in this stage were just so good. Another absolute banger. Yuuya’s voice as Bancoran is divine and the choreography and everything work so well for this song. I also think he looks super pretty in his past Ban outfit and love that the song was done in that.

8. Cock Robin

Pretty much as normal. Maraich’s little leg lift is so cute

9. Don’t overlook me – Misugosenai

This was not what I expected from a Maraich solo in any way shape or form. But it works so well?? Maraich screaming into the mic as Bancoran plays the guitar and the Tamanegi do back up dance is just phenomenal, Dai’s voice works for the song so well and him pretending to be Damien and Bancoran and impersonating their voices as they had sex was hilarious, omg. This song was the song we didn’t want but we needed so much. By far and away my fav song in the show. I have listened to it so many times already and I am never gonna get bored of it.

10. My special person - Tokubetsu na hito

A trio song between Maraich, 19 and 35 about what you do when with the person you love the most and what you would do for the one you love the most, with the other Tamanegi as back up singers. Despite looking a bit silly with Koki in his bdsm gear in the bg, the emotion was there, and the three actors are such good singers. /not at all biased. Honestly, I died when I heard Tsukasa start to sing. I didn’t expect him to get a solo bit in this show and I was so happy that he did.

11. Forever Patalliro ~ Grand Finale

I rly like the new ending song. It’s upbeat and fast like the first song and has a different feel to the previous cast. I’m kinda glad that the final bit with the circle head things that look like the headframes from the manga was the only song they kept. They’re showing that they are moving on from the previous cast without erasing what they did.

Overall, I think this show has my favourite soundtrack. In the past two shows and the film there were a couple songs I didn’t love but in this one I loved all the songs!

Directing

Like I said before I think there were a lot of good calls in the direction. They had I think two or three references to Stardust, I think this was to partly reassure fans that they weren’t completely resetting the world and that this was a continuation and from what I remember maybe four or five recurring things.

1. Patalliro at the start being asked who he is, this definitely makes sense tho and I’m super glad they didn’t change it

2. Maraich’s legs shaking when Ban looked at him with his beam. I kinda liked though how they even changed the beam for Yuuya. Tsune’s was a contant beam whereas Yuuya’s beam is more short bursts. (in terms out sound and the projection of the beam light)

3. Patalliro recreating the most tragic scene from the play again at the end. I was a little unsure about them keeping this at first as it felt like a joke of the old cast but it was mainly something Kato Ryo did and he is still here to continue his joke so it makes sense to keep it. Also, in the finale he gave Damien. Maraich and Bancoran characters from tv to impersonate while doing their lines which made the scene very funny.

4. The final bit after the finale song with the head frames but I think it would be weird to remove this song in retrospect bc it is the song that mainly relates back to the manga. Also, they did change what the head boarders look like.

5. And obviously the two mangaka that are referenced in all the stages are still there bc that is something that came from the original. (Micchan sensei and the shojo mangaka one)

Except for that stuff, from what I can remember, mostly everything was new jokes which I rly liked. That they’re making new stuff for the new cast.

That’s it!

I still have so many other thoughts but the best thing I can say at this point is pls watch the stage! It is just as faithful as it was with the original cast and the quality has not dipped at all.

Thank you for reading my rly rambly thoughts and I’m sorry it trailed off at the end, it is quite late now.

I hope it inspired you to look into getting a DVD or CD or supporting the stage in some other way.

Have a good day/week/month/year/life!

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thanksjro · 4 years

Text

More Than Meets the Eye #22- If You Don’t Love Thunderclash, Get Better Soon I Guess

One last issue before we reach Comic Event Hell.

Time to use a dead man to set up the rest of the nonsense that’s got to happen, because apparently 14 issues of setup, including six issues of literal prelude, wasn’t enough.

The first bit of information we’re presented with is the fact that Chromedome and Swerve are on the opposite sides of the camera-shy scale. I guess that’s bound to happen when your spouse has had his video-cam literally connected to his brain for at least several thousand years.

The art may look really gritty and hardcore here, but this is actually due to a filter Rewind has over all his footage that he’s neglected to take off, because it made all the wartime propaganda he would stuff into people’s heads all the more brutal-looking.

No, this is the style of our artist for this issue, James Raiz, who we’ll be seeing a fair bit of over the next several issues. Raiz has worked on the Transformers franchise over the course of multiple license-holders, as well as contributed to both Marvel and DC comics. He also works in special effects, including matte painting and VFX. That’s just neat.

Anyway, the reason Swerve’s completely frozen in place isn’t because Rewind switched out his head-mounted camera for a gun that goes off if it hears you make a self-deprecating joke, but rather because he’s conducting interviews with everyone in the main cast. We get all their introductions, Cyclonus makes a statement about his political stances, Drift sounds like he’s high as a kite, First Aid strikes a sassy pose while not being bitter in the slightest, and Ultra Magnus makes a move that would get him murdered on any given film set in the universe.

You do NOT use your bare fucking hand to clean a camera lens, mister. Go get a microfiber cloth and try the fuck again, you complete and utter duffel bag of a creature.

We get a quick cut of the speech Rodimus made back in issue #1, with an angle that implies that Rewind was in the front row of the front row, then cut over to Rodimus asking Rewind to document their Capital-Q Quest. This is where we establish that this film doesn’t only contain footage from Rewind’s personal camera, but also that of the Lost Light’s security system.

Which feels like the sort of access you maybe wouldn’t want to give some nosy little film buff, especially when you have a secret giant serial killing sadist living in your basement like a disappointing adult child.

See? He was given the job to record the adventures of the Lost Light not five minutes ago, and he’s already using his powers for evil. Eavesdropping evil. Absolute power corrupts absolutely, Rodimus, and you just handed it to the guy with a massive Dominus Ambus-shaped chip on his shoulder.

So Rewind’s got permission to film just about whatever he wants, and Rodimus figures it’ll be nonstop action from here to the finish line! Fights! Intrigue! Mild hijinks and peril! Explosions aplomb! Oh man, I can’t wait to see what kinds of crazy shit will happen on this absolute roller coaster of a Quest!

Smashcut to Swerve literally falling asleep in the middle of a conversation. Yeah, as it turns out, no quest, capital Q or not, is nonstop action. Which is good, honestly, because that kind of seems like it would be exhausting after the first week or so.

Swerve, Tailgate, and Rewind are discussing cool alt-modes, which seems like an odd topic, seeing as Tailgate and Swerve have basically the same situation going on there, leaving Rewind alone in the camp of “does not have wheels”.

I worry about you sometimes, Rewind. Internalized Functionism is a very real problem. Uh, well, in your universe anyway. Us humans have to deal with regular ol’ classism and racism.

Rung gets brought up, and it’s revealed that the wheel on his back is almost purely cosmetic; it doesn’t even actually attach to his body. The lads decide that they’ve got nothing better to do, and set up a gentlemen’s wager- first one to figure out Rung’s whole deal gets 100 space-dollars.

Throwing shit at people’s heads will be a major plot point in the climax of this comic series.

Swerve’s go at trying to win the bet involved tossing a grenade at Rung to hit him in the neural cluster, which is rumored to be able to force an involuntary mode change if done correctly. Obviously, it didn’t work this go around. Then our narrative focus switches over to the crew’s hobbies.

You were listening to Prince, weren’t you, Magnus? Not even deep space is safe from the Cease and Desist.

Skids’ hobby is meeting new people, because he suffers from the terrible curse of being so fucking good at everything he tries, he always ends up dropping whatever he picked up, because what’s the point? This acts as a segue into another flashback, to even MORE bullshit that the fellas got roped into on Hedonia.

These are the Stentarians. They’re like the Cybertronians, if they were better in every way.

And by “better”, I, of course, mean “more bloodthirsty, warmongering, and driven enough to make their civil war last about as long as the Jurassic Period”. Also, they’re all combiners by default, and Whirl seems a little TOO into their whole situation. So much so, in fact, that when the Imperial Guard of their race show up to kill them, he decides to do them a solid by single-handedly ending their entire war.

You know, in most cases you’re supposed to show and not tell for visual media. This is way funnier, though, so it can be excused.

We jump back into the interviews, and Rewind’s just asked everyone if they’re happy. This might seem like an odd question, until you remember that everyone on-board this ship has crippling depression and PTSD, and Rewind’s married to one of the saddest motherfuckers to ever exist, so he probably has this question loaded into the proverbial chamber at any given moment. We won’t cover all of the answers here, because they’ll be more poignant to reflect back on later in the comic run, but let’s take a gander at the characters who’ve completed the first leg of their character arcs this season.

Drift, is that perhaps… an honest expression of your inner thought processes happening right there? Has Rewind broken through your carefully crafted persona, if even for just a moment, with his question? Perish the thought!

Because Tailgate outed himself as being baby in issue #21, I have zero doubt he’s not exaggerating here. He was a janitor, then he fell in a hole and became Dirt-Nap Supreme for six million years; even the most boring day on the Lost Light’s got to be better than that.

And it’s nice to see Chromedome on a good day for once. Hopefully he reveled in it while he had the chance, because this interview takes place maybe a couple weeks before he fucks everything up big time and has to blow up his husband with a missile strike.

Getting back to the Mystery of the Rungian Alt-Mode plotline, we see Rung using his backpack as a wheelbarrow- no idea what he’s actually pushing in the damned thing- and wearing the most disgruntled face I’ve seen him pull in a hot minute. Someone yells for him to come down the eerily unlit and sinister-looking hallway, which he does. Rung would not do well in a horror film.

He winds up at Swerve’s, where Tailgate, Swerve, Brainstorm, and someone who is most likely Trailcutter, given the colors, are hanging out in their alt-modes. Tailgate’s ploy to find out Rung’s deal is to do what he does best- lie! They’re having an alt-mode party, and wouldn’t Rung like to join in? There are, of course, logistical issues with being a car in a bar, especially when your drink is on the table and your head is tucked up somewhere in your torso, but never mind all that! Let’s get crazy!

This doesn’t work either. Maybe we should cut out the middle man here and just get Rung drunk enough to agree to a wet alt-mode contest.

No, I don’t have any idea how that would work.

In our next vignette, Rodimus comes into the comms room, Rewind trailing behind him like a grim shadow of death, to see what the hell Blaster wants, other than just the hugest glass of water.

Raiz’s work is very detailed, and you really feel the weight of these giant metal space robots, but everyone looks like they’ve been put through a food dehydrator.

We get a lot of build up to the character who’s about to be introduced, with a common opinion being shared amongst everyone- even Tailgate, who hates successful people like his life depends on it.

Lovely readers, put your hands together for the ideal male partner for Autobots, Decepticons, and Neutrals alike:

A man with so much charisma and charm that only Rodimus could hate him, Thuderclash brings to IDW what everyone wishes Optimus Prime would, making our disappointing space dad even more mediocre by comparison. He fights for justice, and freedom, and the good of the universe- and he does it all while having a chronic medical condition that forces him to stay within a certain distance of his ship that is also a life-support machine, otherwise he will die. Despite his handicaps, Thunderclash seemingly brings to others what they need most, even if they don’t even realize that they needed it in the first place.

He also, in this one scene, appeals to Drift’s religious sensibilities, does a secret best-friend dance with Ratchet (who he helped to pass his medical exams- yes, Ratchet), and congratulates Rodimus on his questing so far.

Thunderclash is one of those characters that everyone in-universe is supposed to love, and I completely buy it- because he’s completely genuine and humble about all of this the entire time.

Compare this to the last time Roberts wrote Thunderclash, in Eugenesis.

Where he was an ex-Decepticon.

And kind of an abrasive asshole.

And then he died.

Y’know, now that I think of it, Eugenesis Thunderclash and MTMTE Ambulon being basically the same character makes a whole lot of sense, even without the horrors of Roberts’ Twitter getting involved.

Thunderclash reveals that he, too, is on a quest to find the Knights of Cybertron, much to Rodimus’ chagrin. But first he needs the Lost Light to break out the jumper cables, and then for his second in command to stop threatening his life.

Turns out, not everyone is as obvious as the Cybertronians with their naming conventions. Whirl assassinated the wrong folks; I’m sure the Galactic Council is utterly thrilled. Paddox wants to steal the quantum engine technology for the good of his people, so they can kick the ass of the up-and-coming Terradore leader.

Completely unaware of the situation unfolding here in the lab, Swerve is directing Rung towards the warm, loving aura of Thunderclash for another go at winning the gentlemen’s wager- through the power of lying about having friends, Swerve’s “agreed” to get Rung Thunderclash’s autograph, in exchange for getting to check that Rung’s transformation cog is still working. Then they bump into the nightmare currently unfolding. My, whoever will save us from this dreaded menace, who holds a gun to the head of the Autobots’ greatest warrior, confidant, friend, and perhaps even lover?

How about a bartender and a giant vape pen?

Okay, so Rung doesn’t actually turn into a vape. It turns out that the Mystery of the Rungian Alt-Mode is also a mystery to the man himself. Because Rung is old as shit, the Functionists got to see this bullshit for themselves, and ended up testing him over and over and over trying to figure it out, lest he prove to be a flaw in their fascist ideologies. Fun fact: fascists HATE it when people they’re trying to oppress don’t play to their expectations.

The Functionists were the ones who gave Rung his little wheelie backpack, to make him at least appear useful. This sort of treatment tends to warp one’s head a bit, which would explain why he’s bothered to keep it for so long- internalized functionism’s a real bitch.

At least he’s not giving teenagers nicotine addictions under the guise of being somewhat better than cigarettes.

Back with Rodimus and Cybertron’s Autobot of the Year for 40,000 consecutive years, we get the unfortunate news that jump-starting Thunderclash’s ship is going to make the Quest go a bit slower for the Lost Light, much to Rodimus’ horror, though he does his best to put on a brave face; after all, that’s what heroes do, isn’t it?

It’s at this point that it’s revealed that “Little Victories” was being screened to all the Circle of Light members who didn’t get murdered or turned into Legislators on Luna 1, and man are these guys pissy. What was meant to be a recruitment video turned out to do just the opposite, because none of these guys want anything to do with what the Lost Light’s got going on.

Too bad Rewind didn’t have time for a cleaner cut for showing. Maybe they could have at least snagged a couple of these guys to tag along.

As all of the Circle of Light leave the theatre to go call everyone’s favorite Autobot to see if he needs a more crew members, the film plays on behind Skids, back to the interviews, as everyone promises more adventures just waiting on the horizon.

You’re not even on this trip anymore, you dork.

Chromedome gives us the title drop for the movie and issue, and we cut to Rewind organizing a group photo of all the interviewees.

And then Rewind died horribly like a week later. Thus ends season one of More Than Meets the Eye!

While I’m here, I’d like to take the time to cover a little bit of cut content from this issue, a scene between Drift and Ratchet.

Drift, during his interview, recalls the time that Ratchet called him into his office for a very serious discussion about his/Pharma’s hands.

Yeah, turns out they’re haunted.

Well, no, not really, because this is a prank. But Drift doesn’t know that yet.

Ratchet demonstrates this hand-haunting by punching Drift in the face, as he screams damnation at Pharma’s ghost. Drift, because he is a spiritual man, knows exactly what to do to deal with this possession; he draws his sword and chops Ratchet’s hands off, then throws them out the airlock.

This, too, is a prank, not that Ratchet knows it right away, yelling at Drift that he’s crippled him.

Clearly, these two belong together.

This bit of cut script was lucky enough to have gotten drawn by the colorist for MTMTE Season 1, Josh Burcham. Burcham’s line art is iconic- you won’t mistake him for anyone else. It’s rough and angular, and honestly just very charming. I’m a sucker for this sort of style. If you want to see his adaptation of this chunk of script- and trust me, you do- the link’s right here:

https://dcjosh.tumblr.com/post/107665292031/its-done-the-mtmte-22-deleted-scene-in-all-its

#transformers #jro #mtmte #issue 22 #maccadam #Hannzreads #text post #long post #comic script writing

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takemebacktowheniwassane · 3 years

Conversation

Oh, Incorrect Quotes Generator

Alana: Anyone d-

Connor: Depressed?

Jared: Drained?

Evan: Dumb?

Alana: -done with their work... what is wrong with you people...

This one's a bit more?? Um?? Non-kid friendly TTvTT

Zoe: Guys, is having a penis fun?

Connor: It has its ups and downs.

Evan: It's gets a little hard sometimes.

Jared: IT'S A PAIN IN THE ASS!

Zoe: Jesus fuck, you guys.

Evan: You're a loose cannon, Jared.

Jared: No, I'm not. I'm a cannon, maybe. But a loose cannon? Is that what you think of me?

Alana: I think you play by your own rules.

Zoe: No way, he thinks rules were meant to be broken.

Evan: Those are all attributes of a loose cannon.

Jared: No, I'm just a reckless renegade. Connor is the real loose cannon.

Connor: *Smashes a chair*

Evan, trying to convince Connor to join the group: You know... I just thought it'd be good to have someone to come along who's... strong!

Alana: And loud!

Zoe: And grumpy!

Jared: And oblivious to reality!

Connor:

Alana: What did you guys get in your yearbooks?

Zoe: 'Prettiest smile!' :)

Evan: 'Nicest personality!' :)

Jared: 'Most likely to start a bar fight.'

Connor: 'Least likely to start a bar fight, but most likely to win one.'

Zoe: Bridge the generation gap by combining old and new slang into one!

Evan: Tubular AF!

Alana: Mood to the max!

Connor, annoyed: Groovy, I hate it.

Jared, just as annoyed: If she breathes she's a square.

Evan: You KIDNAPPED Connor?! That's illegal!!

Jared: But Evan, what's more illegal? Briefly inconveniencing Connor, or destroying our dreams?

Evan: Kidnapping Connor, Jared!!

Zoe: Evan, listen, whatever I may think of you right now- these people need you to inspire them!

Evan: What, to KIDNAP PEOPLE?!?!

Zoe: To work together!

Evan: TO KIDNAP PEOPLE!?!?

Jared: Evan, I thought we both agreed, a stoner is not a people.

Alana: Evan, stop! This isn't you! You've gone mad with power!

Evan: Well, of course I have.

Evan: Have you ever tried going mad without power?

Evan: It's boring.

Evan: .. .----. -- / ... --- .-. .-. -.--

Jared: What was that??

Evan: Remorse code.

Jared: I'm even angrier at you now.

Connor, high off his ass: I'm at least 10 times funnier and sexier than you.

Evan: But 10 times 0 is just 0.

Zoe: Then I guess the jokes on you, because he can't do math.

Jared: I can explain.

Evan: Can you?

Jared: If you give me 30 seconds to think of a lie.

Jared: If you were to vacuum up jello, it'd make a neat noise.

Evan: I beg to differ.

Jared: Then beg.

Jared: This is such a bad idea.

Evan: Then why are you coming along?

Jared: One of us needs to be able to talk the cops out of arresting us when this all goes terribly wrong.

Connor: *Accidentally hits Jared in the face*

Connor: *Can't decide between saying 'I'm fucking sorry', and 'Are you okay'*

Connor: ARE YOU FUCKING SORRY??

Evan: What is wrong with you?!

Evan: This is bothering me.

Jared: Well, you are digging up a corpse.

Evan: No, not that. That's, uh, pretty par for the course, actually.

Jared: You're the love of my life, and my best friend. I would do anything for you.

Evan: I want you to eat three meals a day and have a decent sleep schedule.

Jared: Absolutely not.

Jared: I was arrested for being too cool.

Connor: The charges were dropped due to lack of supporting evidence.

Jared: Name a more iconic duo than my crippling fear of abandonment and my anxiety. I'll wait.

Evan: You and me.

Jared, tearing up: Okay.

Jared: God, give me patience.

Connor: I think you mean strength.

Jared: If God gave me strength, then you'd be double dead.

Connor: I prevented a murder today.

Alana: Really? How did you do that?

Connor: Self control.

Jared: I am not out of control! I am a law abiding citizen!

Evan: Name one law.

Jared: Don't kill people?

Evan: That one's on me. I set the bar too low.

Alana: Whaddaya call a fish with no eye?

Jared, not looking up from his phone: Myxine Circifrons.

Alana:

Alana: A fsh

Evan: I turned out perfectly fine!

Zoe: This morning you thought a ghost made your toast!

Evan: I DIDN'T PUT THE BREAD IN, Y O U DIDN'T PUT THE BREAD IN-

Jared: WHAT'S YOUR TYPE

Evan: Anything, honestly. But nerds especially.

Jared, desperately as Evan bleeds out: YOUR B L O O D TYPE

Evan: Oh! B positive.

Jared: DON'T TRY TO CHEER ME UP, JUST TELL ME YOUR BLOOD TYPE

Evan:

Evan: It's dark in here...

Jared: Don't worry dude, I've got this

Jared: *Stomps his foot on the ground*

Jared: *Heelies light up*

Evan: Treat spiders the way YOU want to be treated!

Jared: Killed without hesitation.

Alana & Evan, simultaneously: nO-

Miguel: Let's watch Sharkboy and Lavagirl.

Connor: Okay?

Miguel: And make out during the scary parts.

Connor: The-

Connor: The scary parts-

Connor: Of Sharkboy and Lavagirl?

Evan: Can you PLEASE be serious for 5 minutes??

Jared: My record is 4, but I think I can do it.

Evan: So that's my plan.

Jared: Are you fine with constructive criticism? I don't want to sound mean.

Evan: Sure, go ahead.

Jared: It fucking sucks.

Evan: That's not constructive criticism.

Jared: Fuck.

Alana: We've got to work on your cursing.

Jared: Why? I'm pretty good at cursing already.

Connor: Lol heads up if you try to make a candle with food coloring, the food coloring will just sink to the bottom of the glass, and when the flame eventually reaches the bottom all the food coloring will catch fire and become one giant tall flame that you cannot possibly blow out and the glass will start to crack and then you'll throw your tea on it in a panic and then the extremely hot food coloring will boil and sizzle horribly and then the glass will shatter. Please take my word on this lmfao

Evan: What did you do-?

Connor: A MISTAKE-

Larry, with his back turned: I've been expecting you.

Connor: How did you do that without turning around?

Larry: I'm gonna be honest, the first couple of people I did that to were not you.

Evan: How petty can you get??

Jared: I once edited a Wikipedia article to win an argument I was wrong about.

Jared: Today is a day of running through hurdles.

Alana: Aren't you supposed to jump OVER hurdles?

Jared: Whatever. Fear is only something to be afraid of if you let it scare you.

Jared: May I sit there?

Evan: That's my lap.

Jared: That doesn't answer my question, Evan.

Jared: So.. are we flirting right now?

Connor: I'm LITERALLY stabbing you.

Jared:

Jared: That does not answer the question

Aftermath of the last one- lmfao-

Evan: I'm begging you, please go to the hospital-

Jared: Oh, i'm sorry, is this OUR stab wound? Stay out of it.

Jared: Do you have any skeletons in your closet?

Connor: Do you mean literally or figuratively?

Jared: The fact that I have to specify...

Evan: Jail is no fun. I'll tell you that much.

Connor: Oh, you've been?

Evan: Once. In Monopoly.

Evan: Your right.

Jared: That's... an unusual phrase for you. Did you just learn it?

Jared: Petition to remove the 'd' from Wednesday.

Connor, high: Wednesay.

Jared: Not what I had in mind, but i'm flexible.

Alana: Man.. I only ever see you awake. Don't you ever shut down or stop running?

Jared: Oh, i'm always running.

Jared: The question is from what.

Evan: Top 30 reasons why Evan is super sorry! ..Number 5 might surprise you!

Jared: Top 30 anime deaths. Number One: YOUR FUCKING ASS RIGHT NOW!!

#deh dearevanhansen evanhansendeh connormurphydeh jaredkleinmandeh alanabeckdeh migueldeh zoemurphydeh larrymurphydeh kleinsen #conman kleinphy incorrectquotes lol

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himbeaux-on-ice · 3 years

Note

Who are your top five NHL teams and why?

Ooooo this is fun! Thanks anon!

Short list:

Habs ❤️🤍💙

Pens 🐧

Canucks 🌈🌊

Caps 🦅

Leafs 🟦🍁🟦 (no really! I know I don’t talk about them much but its true!)

Over-wordy explanations/backstory for my relationship to each of these teams below the cut for those interested!

Montreal Canadiens. My dearly beloved Nana, who half-raised me, is a lifelong diehard Habs fan who grew up listening to their games on the radio and then later as an adult watching them duel with the Leafs on Saturday nights on a black-and-white tv (also a BIG Carey Price stan). Needless to say she rubbed off on me immensely, and I remember saying to myself at some point “well, if that’s Nana’s team, that’s gonna be my team too” and it stuck for life. I also had a friend in middle school who was a RELIGIOUS Habs fan who also worshipped at the altar of Jesus Price in those early 2010’s, so I heard a LOT about all of that every lunch break as he argued with friends who were Pens and Bruins fans lol. We went on the Bell Centre tour during the annual 9th grade French class trip to Quebec, and while I was mostly focused on getting to the gift shop to buy Nana a souvenir, I swear my friend’s eyes were the size of quarters the whole time lmao. (Would LOVE to go back now that I care a lot). Basically the Habs are the closest thing to a local NHL team our region has bc we get their broadcasts (though people choose their own team allegiances for various random personal reasons), and I grew up absorbing through osmosis both the legends of yore and the latest updates on whatever Carey and PK and the lads were up to. (Also I’ve been quietly in love with Price myself since at least the 2014 Olympics lol. My first best fav ❤️) Bottom line the Habs are My Team, the “I’m gonna be here even when it sucks, even when players move on, this is attached to me in a way I can’t quite explain” team that every hockey fan has in their heart. GO HABS GO!

Pittsburgh Penguins. If you were an elementary school kid in Nova Scotia when Sidney Crosby was first released and up through the 2010’s, you had two options: love him, or hate him, but you better accept you’re gonna be hearing about him a LOT. I settled on “vague fondness” and followed Sid from a newspaper-scanning distance and vaguely rooted for him because when he brought the Cup home it felt like we all won. And like I said, lots of passionate Pens fans in my grade school classes to hear from (he’s also the only non-Habs player my Nana likes lol). Then I got into hockey properly last year and learned about Geno beyond just knowing his name, and my chronic affection for large loveable Russians got combined with my longstanding vague “I hope the Penguins win” feelings and my “time to get the full story on the Sidney Crosby’s Penguins narrative I only ever watched from a distance” research, in a manner not unlike the creation of the PowerPuff Girls ([chemical X] etc etc lol) to create a potent adoration for this team that rocketed them to second place in my heart. Also the fandom is just so damn fun and makes such great content, and that definitely feeds my level of engagement with the Pens!! Sometimes, when I want an emotional pick-me-up I watch one of their last 3 championship films just to remember what joy and optimism is — I would love to be present as a real-time fan for another adventure like that. With how much I know about them and how much I care, they’re my #2 for sure. I love those flightless fucks!!

Vancouver Canucks. So I started watching live NHL hockey games last summer around I think game 2 of the Habs’ first round series against the Flyers (I saw Price’s “Miracle Save” on twitter while following along bc I was intrigued by the fact that they made it through the play-ins, and was like “OKAY NOW I GOTTA SEE THIS SHIT LIVE”). That was really fun! Riiiight up until the Habs got eliminated. :/ And I was like “well, shit. I’m enjoying this hockey thing too much to stop now. who else is still around I can root for?” And the Canucks were the last Canadian team still in it, and there was buzz about their miraculous first-round win but also uncertainty I believe Markstrom had *just* got injured. So I started watching, ended up witnessing the Bubble Demko Miracle unfold live, had my heart charmed off me by “whatever the hell those two lil blonde bitches have going on” and a delightful underdog story, and here I am. Hitched to the Canuck wagon whether I enjoy it or not. Here for whatever happens! (Doesn’t hurt that I love me some Elton John too 😉)

Washington Capitals. I’m a person who is more likely to be really engaged with a team that has super interesting personalities, characters, and narratives around it — and my GOD are the Capitals good for that. I absolutely definitely started down this road with that mic’d up video from the 2018 final of Ovi telling Nicke “after me, I give it to you baby!” re: the Cup. Like I can pinpoint that there was a day I saw that for the first time in a gifset, squinted at the screen, said “you’re fucking with me...”, went to youtube, watched it be for reals, and was like “well. now I need to know more about ALL this.” After watching games and learning more about the team, I really enjoy the Caps’ “big dumb found family of stone-cold total weirdos” energy, their fun collective chemistry, their Cup story, etc. And oh BOY the fandom is fun during game lb’s! I love all the in-jokes and player nicknames, our delight with the quirks of our colourful wonderful broadcast crew (shoutout Wine Uncles & Co), the way we cheer for record-breaking milestones like they’re a first NHL goal! Being a fan of the Caps AND the Pens can be a bit awkward sometimes, and the team certainly has its blemishes, but my heart is big enough for two Metro teams for sure, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Toronto Maple Leafs. So like, as you can imagine from my previously described upbringing in Hab Land, “haha Leafs suck” is a punchline I have long been familiar with and trained to recite. I got a solid 3 days of laughter and entertainment out of the whole Zamboni Driver Saga last February, oh boy did I ever. But the thing is.... I have the Leafs to thank for the fact that I watch hockey now. See, the entire reason I started paying proper attention to the playoff bubble last summer was because one day, I happened to see the phrase “WHAT IS HAPPENING” trending at 16k tweets on twitter, and clicked on it like “huh?”. Turns out the Leafs were in the middle of their miraculous 3-minute comeback against Columbus and the country was losing its mind. And when they won, I was like “huh... the Zamboni Team is doing THIS??? I may have to start paying attention to this playoffs thing, because if they go All The Way I think that might be the only thing funnier than the Zamboni Incident”. Aaaaand when they immediately lost the next game and were eliminated I was like “lol, sounds about right” and was then immediately distracted by news of the Habs winning the play-in round. So then I spent several months watching playoffs and forgetting about the Leafs. And then one day in early October, looking on YouTube for more hockey to watch after the playoffs ended, I stumbled across something called a Hat Pick, and boy I actually enjoyed this shouty man’s sense of humour and takes on the game... and then when I ran out of Hat Picks and Dangits I watched some Trade Trees, which pulled back the curtain on the business side of the game... and then I discovered LFR’s, which were good background noise for doing tasks... and then I was recommended the episode of the Steve Dangle Podcast about Mitch Marner and The List... and next thing I knew I was listening to more of this podcast, because I found Steve and the guys to be insightful and funny and there was no hockey to watch, and I was trepidatious about accidentally stumbling into the more toxic corners of hockey fandom if I branched out for other content... and, well. If you spend enough hours listening to people passionately analyze every facet of a team, shout and cheer over a team, make fun of that team, nearly cry over that team... it’s really REALLY hard to not start to care about it. Leafs analysis was basically how I learned most of what I’ve learned about hockey this past year! And kudos to Steve and Adam and Jesse, their passionate investment in the Leafs and great content has got ME invested in the Leafs mainly because I want to see things go well for them. I want Charlie Brown to kick the football! I love a triumph over adversity story! Also, I think if the Leafs did Do The Thing it would basically be the combination of “Cubs win the World Series” and “Raptors are the champs” and I wanna watch the city of Toronto go fully apeshit from a safe distance. I don’t adore many their individual players as much as I do some other teams higher on this list, and I still laugh far too much when things go super comically impossibly badly for them, but I am actually pulling for the Leafs!! I want to see it all pay off for them. I want them to go all the way. Gimme that “LEAFS WIN!!!” (Unless it’s against someone above them on this list lol)

#if u get the joke in the Canucks emojis bless u #long post #asks #anon #actually I would root Leafs in a TOR vs WSH playoff series but it would break my heart to do so lol #Washington has a Cup already ya know?

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hoardcloneheadcanons · 3 years

Text

Rhack Story P 4- Nisha and Spite

That was the part that Rhys was desperately trying to leave out when talking to Moxxie. Hitting on Jack may have been one of the dumbest things that Rhys did out of pure unbridled spite.

When Rhys first started working for Handsome Jack, he’d had hope. Yes, Jack’s P. A. was a disposable list job, but it was given to idiots, people who were nearly fired anyway. Rhys was only there on a fluke. He could make something out of the position. It was still working with the CEO. If he did his job right, he could still get power, and then rub sweet irony in Vasquez’s face.

All he had to do was do his job correctly, and then pick up jobs as they came along until he was too useful to kill. For the first three weeks he let himself believe this delusion. At the time his job consisted of:

1. Cleaning up the remains of the earlier P.A. from the spike pit of Jack’s office. Rhys still remembered the smell.

2. Filling out order forms for new shipments of weapon parts.

3.Taking notes during board meetings.

4. Making fancy presentations for the board meetings using the notes on new developments Jack gave him.

5. Picking up Jack from a bar one time when Jack didn’t feel like getting a shuttle service or teleporting

6. Talking to the freaks in RnD for Jack so that Jack didn’t have to get near them. He was mostly avoiding a scientist named Nakayama who, to be fair, was unsettling, and obsessive when it came to Jack.

7. Looking over code Jack had written to find where Jack had missed a bracket.

All of which Rhys had done to the best of his ability, and the best of his ability was pretty damn good. His robotic enhancements helped him look through code and record meetings. Rhys made sure to be on time and attentive for every random task he was called for. He didn’t even bother Jack with the fact that Nakayama had (pathetically and unsuccessfully) tried to kill Rhys.

But then three weeks passed, and Rhys got to meet Nisha.

It was a hunting trip. A date. Jack and Nisha wanted to go to a hunting reservation on Eden-5 and kill drifters with some high-tech slag rocket launchers. Rhys was brought to take pictures and carry equipment.

Nisha was curvy, had muscles, and could shoot a rocket launcher with frightening precision. Rhys had heard of Jack's outlaw, vault-hunting girlfriend before, but reality was more frightening than concept. She was different then Jack. Jack killed people, put he was also a wise-cracking, nerd with a cheese puffs addiction. Up close, you could forget his aggression, but Nisha wore hers like a high-fashion cloak.

Despite all that, it went well-ish. Jack and Nisha killed three drifters with relative ease and had a good time.

Mid-way through the day their luck ran out and the area seemed to be empty of creatures. So, after consulting with Nisha a bit, Jack sent him to go find a drifter's egg and bring it back to camp to attract more monsters. After all, Rhys hadn’t been hunting. He still had energy, and none of the creatures would be scared of Rhys and hide their nests from him.

The order sounded stupid when it was given. But he couldn’t say that to Jack. Not when he was so desperate to prove he was useful and competent.

So Rhys did it.

He had to bribe a local with a third of his week’s paycheck to get a location of an egg, and then wit another third to tell him how to hide from a drifter. He’d climbed into a cave in the center of a mountain, scratching his body and tearing his clothes. The bugs around had smelled his blood and bit at him. Then, with a tiny flashlight, he’d found drifter’s nest in the darkest corner of the cave and picked up a bowling-ball sized egg.

He heard an adult drifter scream from somewhere in the dark when he touched the egg. He’d run out the cave with it and dove into a mud-pit. The local he’d bribed told him that drifters sensed prey through smell and motion. Staying still in the muck was the only way to hide. So he lay still hours watching the giant spider-looking creature hunt for him, memorizing every detail of its form as he hugged its egg to his chest.

But then the drifter meandered away, lost, and Rhys went back to the car he’d parked at the foot of the mountain, drifter’s egg under his arm.

When Rhys got back to the camp he found Jack and Nisha napping together under a tree with disheveled clothes and hair.

When they realized he’d come back they laughed with shock and amazement.

They hadn’t expected him to come back at all. They didn’t even hide it.

Nisha had said something about Jack’s current stooge being more rugged than the last one.

They spent the next 15 minutes poking at his bug-bites and asking about the drifter’s reaction as he’d stolen the egg. He described it half heartedly as his eyes drifted over to where the rocket launchers were completely put away.

He remembered thinking, “They aren’t even going to continue the hunt, are they? I did all of that for nothing.”

And sure enough, before he could even finish his story, Jack started loading the equipment into the transporter dock for them to go. Jack briefly considered turning the egg into an omelet before deciding it would be gross and throwing it into the air for Nisha to shoot.

And Rhys’s hope shattered with the egg.

He’d done everything right, and he was still as disposable as he ever was. They would have thrown his life away for a joke. They’d wanted to have a romp in the grass together, and instead of sending him away like a normal person, they sent him on a death-near-guaranteed task because they thought it was funnier.

He hated them both for it, but he always associated that revelation with the meeting of Nisha.

_______________________________________________________________

It didn’t get better between them after that.

Nisha sometimes came up to the Hyperion offices to visit Jack and it did not make Rhys like her more.

For one, she ordered him around as much as Jack did, but wasn’t paying him, which got under his skin.

For two, she just didn’t remember his name. She didn’t pretend to forget to belittle him, she actively did not know. To her, Rhys was another Hyperion cog indistinct from all the rest and wasn’t worth remembering. She barely looked at him. It was worse.

Then there was the little issue of the intercom.

Nisha sometimes visited Jack in his office for… conjugal visits. Rhys was all for this. It distracted Jack so that Rhys had free time. It’s just that there was an intercom between Jack’s desk and Rhys’s that Jack used to quickly give his P.A. orders. It turned on and off on Jack’s side, there was a button he’d hold down while speaking, but it couldn’t be controlled from Rhys’s side.

Sometimes when they were together it would accidentally get pushed.

He remembered politely telling Nisha that it would be great if she could just avoid the little green button with INT on it.

Every successive time after he asked the button was constantly on whenever Nisha and Jack were visiting. She must have been sitting on it. She couldn’t remember his name but she could remember his pet peeves.

_______________________________________________________________

So maybe, just maybe, Jack’s attraction to Rhys, wasn’t completely caused by Rhys torturing people. Maybe, Rhys had actively hit on Jack after Jack started showing interest because he’d wanted Nisha to feel every bit as replaceable and disposable as he always did.

He should have been afraid when Jack had started paying attention to him. People who had Jack’s attention died.

But all he could think about was that he’d taken something from Nisha and how after it all was over, Jack would be the one suffering the fall-out from having replaced her with a no-name Hyperion cog.

Rhys would be dead. But he was going to die anyway, so he was going to go out petty.

#Petty Rhys #Borderlands Pre-Sequel #Tell Tale Borderlands #Borderlands 2 #Rhack #Rhys #Jack #Rhys x Jack

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magistralucis · 4 years

Note

Are you really taking Rammstein prompts for the soft summer prompts? 🥺 Can I ask number 3 'sitting on the porch at night' then please?

3: Sitting on the porch at night // Till/Richard

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

Richard awakens in the dead of night.

He turns his face towards the door. From the porch he can hear wisps of music, interspersed with crackles of analog static. These are the same noises that cut through the fabric of his sleep every night, but tonight, they feel like a suggestion. He wraps himself up and tiptoes out of the room.

“Till.”

Every night the same routine. As Richard names the dear name he knows what he’s going to see: his friend sat on the porch, a battered radio by his side. He’ll have it on the lowest volume, but his favourite music tends to cancel that out. Richard sits beside him, and when Till turns his head, raises his hand in greeting. Till nods back, then they both turn to gaze at the stars, weighing the silence between them.

They like their silences.

The radio fades to white. Till adjusts the dial, and Richard watches, until the sound comes in clear again. A local punk rock station. “Were we on earlier?”

“Much earlier. Wait and see, you may come back on.”

Till’s voice is low and thoughtful. Richard smiles wryly. This station often goes offline, sometimes for repairs, or to escape scrutiny, or because the authorities snatched up whoever was manning the station. Public opinion on punk rock is still such that he may have to wait up to a whole week to hear himself on the radio again.

He would barely put up with it if not for his pride, and for the fact Till would wait that long. Richard cranes his head and sees what he was doing: stringing his guitar and weaving a handle for a new basket. All this he has seen before, and all this Till will do again, a beacon of Schweriner steadiness. Richard can relax with him because he’s stable in a world constantly shifting about them.

“Which track?”

“‘Geh zurück in dein Buch’. More to come, they said.”

Richard laughs. Feeling B’s first album came out a fortnight ago. “Josch will be pleased. Paul and Flake, too, even if Flake doesn’t show it. They did a stellar job.”

Till tilts his head. Their eyes are equally dark in the night. “They?”

Maybe it was really the summer heat that disturbed Richard’s sleep, or the chirping crickets, or the news earlier. But whatever it was, it’s clear he needed to be at Till’s side tonight. He raises his head and meets the other’s gaze.

“Till, I’m planning to jump the border.”

A glimmer of something alights in Till’s eyes, then is gone.

It wasn’t just Aljoscha, Paul, and Flake who produced that album. Till drummed for a track, and although Richard’s role didn’t extend as far as the credits, he jumped in to smooth out the lyrics and organize the recording sessions. He also plays in another band full time. So really, Richard’s situation is not one that merits a they, when he’s been saying we all this time.

He’s glad Till noticed the change, but it doesn’t necessarily mean Till will approve. Richard expects he won’t, for no other reason than that Till may be able to talk him out of this. Till leans forwards, resting his chin on his hand, and thinks for so long Richard begins to fidget.

He eventually sighs. “Do your folks know."

Richard’s smile is not so wry this time. ”Do you let your old man know what’s going on in your life nowadays?"

"Sometimes I wish I could.” He says, which surprises Richard. Till pulls the basket to his lap and plucks at the reeds poking out from the handle. His tone is brooding, but he is very alert, perhaps more than he was with Richard’s plan. “He used to be a lot funnier, then he gave up drinking. Used to think that was great, because, well. More for me. (He grins guiltily.) But now I am old myself and all I know are conversations to have over a stiff drink, and he can no longer join me at the table. He made his commitment and he’s a free man; me, I can’t imagine doing the same, so I am not free.”

“You’re way too young to quit, anyway. You’re only twenty-six. Before you’re forty you can do just about anything, you can even sin.”

A little smirk. “And after that, Scholle?”

“Oh nein, not afterwards.” Richard grins, and brushes his mohawk back. It’s usually peaked up, but the combination of lying down and the heat has laid it out flat. “After forty you have to repent. Then God will forgive you, if Honecker hasn’t done it first.”

Till laughs out loud, his teeth gleaming white. Richard laughs too. The clouds have split and revealed the moon above their heads, still a sliver short of being full. The breeze smells grassy and tickles their hair. Soon, Richard thinks, soon he’ll be able to smell the first bite of the autumn chill; soon, if he’s still here for it. He straightens his back and sits up.

“No, my folks don’t know. Not about my life, and definitely not about wanting to cross the border. I’ve been thinking of doing this since I was sixteen. I didn’t do it then because I was scared, and I’m scared now.”

“What makes you less scared this time?”

Richard looks at him. “You heard they opened the border between Austria and Hungary?”

Till’s fingers tighten briefly on the basket, then relax again.

“I don’t know how long it’s going to be open,” Richard continues, watching closely, “but I know things are boiling over here. There will be an exodus.” He shakes his head. “None of us have connections in the West, Till. If things get really bad, we all ought to consider leaving. It’s already happening. Remember when Flake got arrested?”

“You think he can’t get out a second time.”

“I never assume the best-case scenario."

Till opens his mouth to speak, but stops. Slowly, he lies down, first on his side then fully onto his back, his legs dangling over the porch. Richard joins in. The basket lolls on Till’s stomach and the moon drowns out the starlight. Immersed in the loamy smell of the earth Richard waits, considering the conversation to follow. He can think of so many questions and has answers for so few of them.

When are you going? He doesn’t know if he ever will go, let alone the when. He has the uncomfortable feeling he’ll be forced into it when the time comes, and he at least wanted Till to know. I can’t go with you. Richard knows that already. Till’s daughter needs him. Why are you abandoning us at this time? He’s not abandoning them, he wants to set up a safe house to receive everybody in. Richard has never said this out loud, but he has always felt of little importance; better he go and be useful, rather than someone like Aljoscha leaving and destroying the band overnight.

Surely someone would buy into this response? Surely Till would?

But Till doesn’t ask either of those things. He doesn’t ask anything else Richard was expecting, in fact. After a long time, he merely asks: “Want some coffee?”

“... In this heat?”

Till heaves himself up on his arms and pads silently into the kitchen. Richard stares after him until he leans out from the doorway, shaking a jug he pulled out from the fridge. “Oh. Please.”

Soon they’re sitting side by side once more, glasses filled with cold coffee brew topped with ice and sweet creamy milk. One would think they were here to shoot the shit if not for the severity of their conversation. Thankfully, Till doesn’t let it descend that far. “Will it be cold when you go, do you think?”

“I...” Richard nurses his iced coffee anxiously. “I don’t know.”

Till nods. “My coat is real wool,” he says, and pushes his glass aside. Richard gasps as the other’s cool hand rests upon his own. “It’ll help in a pinch. You know where I am, Scholle, write to me. That’s all I ask.”

“...”

“Tell me if the moon is as bright over there as it is here.”

Richard looks at him. Slowly, he sets down his glass. With resigned finality, Richard sinks into Till’s shoulder, sliding down until his head is resting on the other’s lap. He need say nothing, not even to express his gratitude, for Till has touched his shoulder to indicate he understood. The radio crackles again; Till twists the dial; all over to the other end the pointer goes, until they hit a classical piece drifting silvery strings into the night. “Till.”

“Yes.”

He prays there will be moments this beautiful on the other side of the fence. However long it takes Till to join him, anyway. “This is good, isn’t it?” He whispers, and closes his eyes.

“Yes.” Till’s fingers play over Richard’s hair. “It is good.”

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

13: Watching the sun rise // Till/Richard

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

Till awakens to a cool breeze against his cheek.

He wonders where he is. For a moment he wonders if he’s still backstage, or staring up at the bold white lightbar of a tour bus, before he registers the noise of flowing water and a faint mist about his head. Just as he raises his head he hears the sound of footsteps, which come to a rapid stop next to him.

“Till.”

He blinks and looks into Richard’s face. Richard looks back at him just as carefully. Slowly, he yields his gaze, and turns to see where he is.

The airport lounge. The exclusive lounge, complete with bars, showers, and the fountain that’s currently misting up his hair from a distance. It is dark outside. They are the only people remaining. The pieces of the journey that exhausted him fall into place as Richard offers his hand. “Shall we go?”

“Yes.” His voice feels foreign to him. “Let’s go.”

Past the subdued halls they leave together. On the way they walk along a row of duty-free shops and Till glances at them all. It seems so long ago his world was littered with Intershops and other such outlets, duty-free and Ostmark-free and just free, generally speaking. He has grown into modern comforts, but sometimes, he still thinks about his youthful familiar life.

And to think he disliked it so much, back in the East. Nostalgia is the ultimate nullifier. Flake would have a field day if he knew.

The summer heat hits them like a blast to the face as they exit. All of their limbs are weighed down with lethargy. One look at each other, and they agree silently that they’re too tired to drive home. They need not wait long for the sunrise, they’ll endure until then. Their bandmates are long gone. Paul and Schneider went to an overnight hotel and Olli went to stay with a friend. Only Flake, a stubborn homebody, insisted on driving back. If Richard hadn’t parked here, maybe they’d have hopped a ride with him, Till and Richard curled up like overgrown cats in the back seat while Flake listens to one of his esoteric audiobooks. Richard is staying with him until the tour reconvenes, so they don’t need any stops on the way home - but oh, how far home seems from here.

And still the heat. Even away from the bustle of the airport it is suffocating. It’s a blessing when Richard points out an overnight cafe in a nearby kiosk. “Iced coffee?” He asks, referring to an old tradition they began thirty years ago, and chuckles as Till nods with eyebrows-raised desperation. He hands Till the keys. “Wait for me in the car.”

This Till does, happily. He sinks his head back in the passenger’s seat. The leather of the headrest is smooth and cool, and makes him sigh. But he’s a polite guest first and foremost, and so he affords himself only a brief rest before adjusting the environment to Richard’s liking.

First the A/C. Richard likes the overhead lights on when it’s dark. Till pulls out a new pack of cigarettes from his bag and puts it on the cup holder, his unspoken thanks to Richard for putting up with him tonight. And, of course, the radio:

- and now we meet in an abandoned studio, we hear the playback and it seems so long ago-

Till drowns that one out with the slider. But he’s smiling; the self-referencing parts of life are the best ones, they taught him all he knew. But he’d prefer the affirmative tonight, and before long he hits on something he and Richard both likes. He knows this because Richard knocks on his window the moment he sits back, and when he looks over, he finds the younger man smiling broadly.

- einfach fort mit der Musik, Schwebe so durch helle Räume, Keine Grenzen, keine Zäune!

Just in time.

Richard doesn’t need to say anything. Till rolls down the window; he passes Till’s iced coffee through, as well as a hot buttered pretzel. (He knows him so well, that Richard.) Till murmurs a thanks and takes a bite of the pretzel. The hot salt of butter floods his head and Till almost blacks out from the pleasure, every sense kickstarted by the taste. Richard chuckles as he climbs in beside him, timing a luxuriant sip of his frappé with the slam of the door.

“They know we’re coming to them, huh?”

“Must do. We have been quiet for many years.”

Richard removes the lid and gulps his coffee thirstily. With a relieved sigh he rolls down his window and rests his elbow upon it, wiping his brow with the side of his coffee-holding hand. Condensation drips down his fingers.

“I agreed with you, you know. That this ought to be the first single.”

The words sink like honeyed balm into his heart. Till laughs quietly. Promoting ‘Radio’ to first single was an idea overriden early in the planning process, and neither Till nor Richard protested at the time, but the sentiment means a lot to him.

The song ends. Promises more from ‘Rammstein’s new album’, then moves swiftly onto a prog rock track. Till finishes the pretzel and gulps down the iced coffee. It goes down sweetly, drives the heat from his brain, makes him alert.

Iced coffee is done so sophisticated nowadays. Some wouldn’t look out of place in a luxury ice-cream parlor. Till has no opinion on whether sophisticated coffee is good or bad, only that it’s a tie to his and Richard’s shared memory, much like moonlit summer nights and the radio. He didn’t exactly write that song about Richard, nor did Richard write his parts with Till in mind (he thinks, anyway), but they know they were referring to the same thing.

He looks at Richard. Richard, who’s just excavated Till’s gift for him, notices him looking in the midst of putting the cigarettes in his pocket. His blue eyes are pale from the light glancing off them. He seems to expect Till to say something, but is content to return the gentle gaze when Till does not. Yes, Till loves that. He loves that Richard is still by his side. He loves the taste of cold coffee, the dewy warmth of summer; especially the radio, which for so many years brought them the news, meted out hope and despair, and celebrated all the nights that couldn’t become the future. Their country is gone but they are still here.

They see what they only heard before.

The dashboard clock ticks four. The sun is rising in the horizon; it brings only with a pale blue light, rather than the expected gold or red, but the sun rises fast and early at this time of year. Soon that gentle blue will streak over Richard’s car, and then he’ll start the engine, and then they’ll go. Slowly, Till leans to the side, finally resting his head on Richard’s shoulder. Richard doesn’t mind. He moves in to make Till more comfortable. “Risch.”

“Yes.”

His eyelashes flutter shut as his friend strokes his hair, as if he were awaiting this moment since before the tour, before Rammstein, before the fall. “This is good, isn’t it?”

Richard’s hand cups his cheek. Till lifts his hand to press it close, his long eyelashes soft against calloused fingertips.

“Yes.” Richard whispers. “It is good.”

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

NOTE: The set is done at last! I don’t usually append notes to drabble posts, but this turned out to be not-so-much drabbles as a doubleshot, or part of a longer fic. I really wanted to take my time on those because I hadn’t written for Rammstein in a very long time, and I got this for the effort 😂 You also gave parallel prompts, so I figured I might use that to reflect both perspectives of a Tillchard relationship!

The second piece is at some loose point during the summer of 2019, but the first has a definite date of the 27th of June 1989. This was the exact day when Austria and Hungary finished cutting their border fence, though the actual removal had begun some time during May. Cue many East Germans, whether on holiday or for this specific purpose, jumping the gap and rerouting through to West Germany; I think this must have been the same border Richard crossed when he fled the East, although he did it much later than he planned here. Flake was also definitely arrested at one point (and dodged several other attempts) by the authorities - for failing to get out of the way at a protest, if I remember correctly. I don’t have the exact quotes/page numbers for this event as described in Mix Mir Einen Drink, but I do remember reading it.

I hope you enjoyed this. Maybe I can expand this into something bigger or maybe this is it. But I enjoyed writing it a lot 💖

#ghostlovesc0re #rammstein fanfiction #fanfiction #tillchard #rammstein fic #drabble #summer prompts #long post under cut #i spent the longest time on this aha i hope it was worth it #thank you for requesting!!! <3 <3 <3

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