#the tip of the zoidberg | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

mr-imagin8ion · 3 months

Text

A project 3000 years in the making: every episode of Futurama ranked in increasing order of sci-fi, from earthiest to spaciest

Tier 10: Insulting - These episodes are hardly even sci-fi. They just address realistic situations in a hardly even futuristic setting.

138. Stench and Stenchibility - The earthiest episode. It doesn't even feel like a Futurama. It feels like a "King of the Hill" that wasn't selling, so the script people crossed out the name "Dale" and replaced it with "Zoidberg".

137. Three Hundred Big Boys

136. The Luck of the Fryish - I hate the flashback episodes. They defeat the purpose of the show.

135. How Hermes Requisitioned His Groove Back

134. A Leela of Her Own

133. Zapp Gets Cancelled

132. I, Roommate

Tier 9: Antiquated - These episodes are better at employing 4th-millennium technology, but their plots are still unmistakably 3rd-millennium.

131. That's Lobstertainment!

130. Naturama - It doesn't even use technology. The only reason it isn't completely below the scale whatsoever is that it's implied the narrator is from Omicron Persei 8.

129. Future Stock

128. The 30% Iron Chef

127. The Silence of the Clamps

126. Attack of the Killer App

125. Bender Should Not Be Allowed on Television

Tier 8: Earthy - While incredibly down-to-earth, these episodes do have one pretty important bit that makes them qualify as sci-fi, like a robot Santa or a head transplant.

124. Jurassic Bark

123. Yo Leela Leela - It is nearly my favorite episode, no doubt there - but let's face it. Change a few things, and it could easily happen in this era.

122. Raging Bender

121. Rage Against the Vaccine

120. Xmas Story

119. The Route of All Evil - It's the 31st century, but there are still newspapers????

118. The Impossible Stream

117. Put Your Head on My Shoulders

116. Fry and the Slurm Factory

Tier 7: Humble - These stories are a little futuristic, but they still feel plain for their day.

115. Bender Gets Made

114. Cold Warriors

113. Saturday Morning Fun Pit - Mostly grounded in the 1980s, but spared from a lower tier because it does have clones and lasers and the like.

112. The Cyber House Rules

111. Bendless Love

110. Near-Death Wish - The expensive panoramic bits were pretty epic, however.

109. The Lesser of Two Evils

108. 31st Century Fox

Tier 6: Allegorical - These episodes use future crap as a metaphorical stand-in for present crap.

107. Bend Her

106. Into the Wild Green Yonder

105. A Big Piece of Garbage

104. Proposition Infinity

103. The Cryonic Woman

102. Mars University

101. Bendin' in the Wind

100. Love's Labours Lost in Space

99. A Head in the Polls

98. Children of a Lesser Bog

97. The Futurama Holiday Spectacular

96. A Flight to Remember

95. Fun on a Bun

94. Lethal Inspection

Tier 5: Type-Zero - Pretty standard sci-fi plots, unremarkable in their remarkability.

93. Anthology of Interest I

92. A Pharaoh to Remember

91. The Problem with Popplers

90. T.: The Terrestrial

89. Viva Mars Vegas

88. The Inhuman Torch

87. Amazon Women in the Mood

86. The Deep South

85. The Mutants Are Revolting

84. A Fishful of Dollars

83. Where No Fan Has Gone Before

82. Leela's Homeworld

Tier 4: Techie - Here's where it gets fun. These are the first plots to get out of this world. (As a bonus, we've hit the median point!)

81. The Tip of the Zoidberg

80. Fry and Leela's Big Fling

79. That Darn Katz!

78. Murder on the Planet Express

77. When Aliens Attack

76. The Devil's Hands Are Idle Playthings

75. Space Pilot 3000

74. A Clone of My Own

73. The Birdbot of Ice-Catraz

72. Where the Buggalo Roam

71. The Beast with a Billion Backs

70. How The West Was 1010001

69. Brannigan, Begin Again

68. The Farnsworth Parabox

67. A Taste of Freedom

66. Why Must I Be a Crustacean in Love?

65. Less than Hero

64. Spanish Fry

63. The Sting

62. The Bots and the Bees

61. Meanwhile

60. Related to Items You've Viewed - It feels like it should be a tier-6, but just isn't. There is no mathematical explanation for this.

59. The Butterjunk Effect

Tier 3: Otherworldly: The epitome of Futurama. These have the ideal blend of science and fiction.

58. Fry Am Fry Is the Egg Man - Grammar, Stanley.

57. Parasites Regained

56. The Prince and the Product

55. Kif Gets Knocked Up a Notch

54. Mother's Day

53. The Series Has Landed

52. Decision 3012

51. Hell Is Other Robots

50. A Tale of Two Santas

49. Anthology of Interest II

48. Bender's Game

47. Insane in the Mainframe

46. In-A-Gadda-Da-Leela

45. War Is the H-Word

44. I Know What You Did Next Xmas - A ponderance: does this episode nullify "The Late Philip J. Fry", now that they can go back in time the easy way?

43. Crimes of the Hot

Tier 2: Spacey - Mind-bending and heart-warping, these shows are good enough to make you (very, very temporarily) stop wishing Matt Groening would die.

42. A Farewell to Arms

41. Parasites Lost

40. Game of Tones

39. Overclockwise

38. Zapp Dingbat

37. Godfellas

36. The Thief of Baghead

35. Free Will Hunting

34. My Three Suns

33. Leela and the Genestalk - Fun side note: At first, it didn't used to occur to me that this episode was pronounced "JEEN-stalk". I'd been pronouncing it "JEN-ə-stalk", like the way it's pronounced in words like genetic, genesis, or generate.

32. The Why of Fry

31. Roswell that Ends Well

30. Calculon 2.0

29. Assie Come Home

28. Lrrreconcilable Ndndifferences

27. All the Presidents' Heads

26. Forty Percent Leadbelly

25. Möbius Dick - Some episodes are ranked so low only because there are so many that rank higher than them.

24. I Second that Emotion

23. The Day the Earth Stood Stupid

22. The Duh-Vinci Code

21. Obsoletely Fabulous

20. Fear of a Bot Planet

Tier 1: Unreal - Creativity personified; these stories are chariots to the stars, moving so fast that they make the other nine tiers appear to stand still.

19. Ghost in the Machines

18. Neutopia

17. 2-D Blacktop

16. Law and Oracle

15. Love and Rocket

14. Rebirth

13. A Bicyclops Built for Two

12. I Dated a Robot

11. Bender's Big Score

10. The Six Million Dollar Mon

9. A Clockwork Origin

8. The Honking

7. Teenage Mutant Leela's Hurdles

6. Reincarnation

5. The Late Philip J. Fry

4. All the Way Down - Infinitely better than I expected from a Hulu episode.

3. The Prisoner of Benda - Nothing says sci-fi like inventing a whole new math equation just to give your story a proper ending.

2. Time Keeps on Slippin'

1. Benderama - The spaciest episode. Now this is what it is all about: half-sized clones and microscopic microbrewing and sensitive giants.

Other notes:

The spaciest season is season 6 (weighing in at a high tier-2), and the earthiest is season 2 (a low tier-5).

This is intended as a ranking of the episodes in order of earthiness to spaciness, not as a ranking of my opinion on the episodes. A ranking of my opinion is over here.

Drafting this list took all night, and preparing it took all morning.

#futurama #ranking #list #episodes #fox animation

2 notes · View notes

cyhaitham · 9 months

Text

trans fry moments: -"thatll show him" (mars university) -covering up his chest after seeing morgan do it (how hermes requisitioned his groove back) -"i cant even find my uterus" (the tip of the zoidberg) -leaving his shirt on in the pool (fry and leela's spring fling...? I THINK?) -"i guess its cus they keep telling me to be more ladylike" "ive been there" (put your head on my shoulders) -"fry, this is the women's steam room" (why must i be a crustacean in love) -"with my body, i think you'll only attract one sort of woman" (put your head on my shoulders)

#the masterpost. someday ill clip all of these

3 notes · View notes

frauleinfunf · 2 years

Text

One of my favorite parts about Hooty is that he’s this absolute Zoidberg of a character with a side Eldritch Horror and pure dumbassery, but he’s also so good at giving advice and very emotionally wise? Like K3OHD proves this with the advice he wanted give everyone being right on the money, even if he went about it with crazy elaborate schemes bc he (very reasonably) thought no one would listen. This aspect of his character also shines in the more protective role he takes in Edge of the World and again in O Titan Where Art Thou when he immediately gets that King still wanted to be treated like a normal kid.

And you know what? I would like to see him swap parenting tips with Camila.

#the owl house #hooty #knock knock knocking on hooty's door #edge of the world #o titan where art thou

13 notes · View notes

ufolvr · 4 months

Text

God the comedy central seasons of Futurama r something else. There's eps that are genuinely good like Mobius Dick and The Tip Of The Zoidberg. And then there's Proposition Infinity and that one makes me want to commit unspeakable crimes.

#im still not over that monstrosity no matter what happens #📡 incoming transmission 📡

0 notes

futuramanerd · 7 years

Photo

#futurama #futuramanerd #the tip of the zoidberg #professor farnsworth #zoidberg #gifset #gif #dedicated to my best friend #our 9th friendaversary is today

651 notes · View notes

unfortunatelycorrectfuturama · 7 years

Photo

// friend? people actually like me?

#the tip of the zoidberg #futurama #zoidberg

2 notes · View notes

go4meme-futurama · 5 years

Text

component of good communication

#futurama #Best of Futurama #leela #zoidberg #fry #bender #Good communication #communication #tips #tips of the day #information #infographic #self improvement #self healing #self education #fan art #fanart #beautiful scene #baby Futurama

5 notes · View notes

f4liveblogarchives · 2 years

Text

Fantastic Four Vol 1 #283 & #284

Mon Jan 04 2021 [10:00 PM] Wack'd: I suspect "quotation book" is the correct answer here

[10:01 PM] Wack'd: So, uh [10:02 PM] Wack'd: Clearly something's off [10:02 PM] Wack'd: Spot the differences

[10:03 PM] Wack'd: The team approaches some kind of fortress and it fires a projectile at Johnny [10:04 PM] Wack'd: Sue tries to force field it but it breaks through, killing Johnny [10:04 PM] Bocaj: Jen is looking orange today [10:04 PM] Wack'd: Johnny uses his dying breath to ask why Sue didn't save him [10:05 PM] Wack'd: Ben storms off for revenge into an acid swamp that dissolves him. Sue does not force bubble him out because she's distracted by her dead brother [10:05 PM] Wack'd: Ben also uses his dying breath to blame Sue [10:06 PM] maxwellelvis: Boy, Byrne sure is on a kick of these bizarre dream openings, huh? [10:06 PM] Bocaj: “With my last breath I curse Zoidberg!” [10:07 PM] Wack'd: Reed is not dying except in the sense time claims us all I guess but he also decides to get in on the act

[10:08 PM] Umbramatic: geez reed [10:09 PM] Wack'd: I feel like this is the sort of thing Reed could stretch around but I guess not

[10:11 PM] Bocaj: Geez [10:11 PM] Bocaj: If this is supposed to be dramatic it’s tipped too far into farce [10:12 PM] Wack'd: You ain't seen nothin yet

[10:13 PM] Bocaj: She turned into a youth [10:13 PM] maxwellelvis: What's the tone you're going for here, Johnny? [10:13 PM] Wack'd: Anyway Psycho-Man is doing this for his own sick amusement [10:14 PM] Wack'd: Not touched Reed and Johnny though [10:15 PM] Bocaj: Huh [10:16 PM] Wack'd: Psycho-Man feels justified because Sue swore vengeance on him [10:18 PM] Wack'd: Meanwhile: this

[10:20 PM] Bocaj: It’s not a great look that it’s the women who get singled out here [10:20 PM] Wack'd: Noooope [10:20 PM] Bocaj: In a story where Sue is portrayed as irrational for wanting VENGEANCE [10:21 PM] Bocaj: After a story where she had to be slapped to her senses [10:21 PM] Wack'd: Noooooope [10:21 PM] Wack'd: Psycho-Man like an idiot didn't use the fear ray on Reed who escapes and defeats what turns out to be a giant Psycho-Man robot with another smaller Psycho-Man inside [10:22 PM] Wack'd: Anyway we cliffhanger on Jen being sent to the mines [10:22 PM] Bocaj: Planet She-Hulk [10:22 PM] Umbramatic: oh no [10:22 PM] Wack'd: I would [10:23 PM] Wack'd: Post a moment of emotional catharsis or revelation or anything for Sue [10:23 PM] Wack'd: Y'know [10:23 PM] Wack'd: If I had one [10:23 PM] Bocaj: 🙃 [10:23 PM] Bocaj: Didn’t Byrne start off his run trying to fix Sue’s character? [10:24 PM] Wack'd: It's all gone by real fast but that doesn't sound familiar [10:25 PM] Bocaj: Huh [10:25 PM] Wack'd: He's toyed a lot with the idea that she needs to be fixed but she's not gotten a focus story or any real extra attention I can recall [10:25 PM] Wack'd: Besides the interview shit. And moving houses [10:26 PM] Bocaj: During this era Janet van Wasp has effort put into fixing her character and it works decently well [10:26 PM] Bocaj: She dumps Hank on his ass and becomes the new leader of the avengers [10:26 PM] Bocaj: Dates Tony for a bit and then dumps him on his ass [10:26 PM] Bocaj: Maybe Jan can give Sue some tips [10:26 PM] Umbramatic: good for jan [10:27 PM] Bocaj: The best or at least funniest part of this concerted effort is just to have people constantly mention that her previously useless Wasp stings can blow up a house now, if she wanted

Mon Jan 04 2021 [10:29 PM] Wack'd: Posting mainly for the weird fish dragon

[10:29 PM] Wack'd: Why is it here? What purpose does it serve? We may never know [10:31 PM] Bocaj: So that’s where the fish went when Monty Python hid it [10:31 PM] Wack'd: Oh, it's very briefly fight fodder [10:31 PM] Wack'd: Alas [10:32 PM] Wack'd: I hate how rare it is to see women having conversations in a book with two female leads

[10:34 PM] Wack'd: So basically Psycho-Man invaded, dethroned Pearla's dad and enslaved her people, and Pearla has spent the ensuing year and a half being a lone freedom fighter [10:35 PM] Bocaj: Byrne is missing out. She-Hulk's attempts to help someone out with emotional crises so far have been: glaring at them from a second floor window trying to shoot common sense into them through sheer force of will [10:35 PM] Bocaj: She seriously glared at Jan and Thor and mouthed 'hug each other' at them [10:35 PM] Umbramatic: good [10:35 PM] Wack'd: Amazing [10:36 PM] Wack'd: Pearla's attempt to recruit Jen immediately fails when she is captured by a slaver [10:36 PM] Bocaj: Darn [10:36 PM] Wack'd: Her mistake was taking meaningful action on panel I guess [10:36 PM] Bocaj: Sigh [10:36 PM] Wack'd: Or in a Bryne book more probably [10:36 PM] Bocaj: Harvey Birdman saying sigh, sigh [10:36 PM] Umbramatic: BRYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYNE [10:37 PM] Wack'd: I guess a crisis it took one issue to get into could only be solved by a character you've known for five pages

[10:37 PM] Bocaj: "Simba, remember who you are" "Simba? What?" [10:37 PM] Wack'd: I could complain that it really should be Sue doing this but fuck, whatever gets us out of this plot cul-de-sac [10:38 PM] Wack'd: Jen spent an issue in psychological torment for, uh, no real reason I guess [10:38 PM] Umbramatic: the eds aren't even there smh [10:39 PM] Bocaj: I'm now annoyed that Byrne looked at what Stern was doing with She-Hulk in Avengers, which wasn't this, thought to himself, oo I wanna get some of that for my book, basically told Stern he was stealing the character, Stern went "ok”, and now this is how he's writing her [10:39 PM] Wack'd: Understandably so [10:40 PM] Wack'd: Back with the other three Psycho-Man has managed to escape. Reed blames himself and Sue tries to snap him out of it [10:40 PM] Wack'd: I guess he is actually being psychologically tormented. "Not intuitively knowing exactly what to do" is a good Reed fear

[10:41 PM] Wack'd: That or he's experiencing a moment of genuine self doubt, but probably not, because that would be interesting [10:41 PM] Bocaj: I don't love 'intuitively knows exactly what to do' as a Reed trait [10:41 PM] Wack'd: No but we're stuck with it so we might as well toy with it [10:41 PM] Bocaj: I guessssss [10:42 PM] Wack'd: "I still don't understand exactly when or how you did that, but you did that, I guess, and that's what matters"

[10:43 PM] Bocaj: Pfft [10:43 PM] maxwellelvis: "I mean, that one just sort of happened to us, we didn't even really participate in that." [10:43 PM] Wack'd: Anyway it turns out Sue gets her own "puts the pieces together in a way that's kind of stupid and manipulative and mostly involves guesswork" [10:44 PM] Umbramatic: yay sue? [10:44 PM] Wack'd: See Reed would never be indecisive so she deduced it was Psycho-Man, and then I guess deduced that he would try and confront Reed face-to-face so she invisibly followed Reed without telling him [10:45 PM] Wack'd: Okay so I guess Jen's stuff happened so Johnny would have to go find her so Sue would be more-or-less alone for her "what you are in the dark" moment with Psycho-Man [10:45 PM] Bocaj: Sure [10:46 PM] Wack'd: She opts not to kill him [10:46 PM] Wack'd: Because that would make her just like him [10:46 PM] Wack'd: So instead she psychologically tortures him with his own device that he made for the express purpose of psychologically torturing people [10:46 PM] Wack'd: Which somehow gives her the moral high ground [10:49 PM] Bocaj: "If you kill a killer, there are the same number of killers in the world" "Kill two killers" "SUE NO" [10:50 PM] Wack'd: Anyway the issue ends and here's your big Sue moment

[10:50 PM] Bocaj: I mean, I like the result. The journey and events therein were bad [10:51 PM] Bocaj: But if I just look at the last speech bubble its like Yay Sue! [10:51 PM] Wack'd: I am. Gobsmacked that this is what we were building go [10:52 PM] Wack'd: It took Sue going through a rape metaphor, becoming an evil racist, watching her loved ones die and blame her, and seeing her dead parents [10:52 PM] Wack'd: To get her to change a codename no one even uses [10:52 PM] Bocaj: Also she had a miscarriage. Not sure how that ties in [10:52 PM] Bocaj: Maybe that was just for the tone deaf pun [10:53 PM] Wack'd: On some gobsmackingly nonsense level, Bryne genuinely believes--what? That it would take some huge transformation of Sue's character to not want to be called "girl" anymore? That the crux of the complaints was that she was called "girl"? [10:53 PM] Bocaj: Yeah, I feel like its not a change that required this [10:54 PM] Wack'd: He's clearly consciously aware of all the other stuff, the way she's perceived as useless, the way Reed condescends to her, and so on [10:54 PM] Wack'd: But somehow concludes that the crux of a story dealing with all these issues needs to be that codename [10:55 PM] Umbramatic: wow [10:57 PM] Wack'd: The content of this speech, reading it again, is also nonsense. For starters, it puts the onus of all of this on Sue. Sue needs to come to some big epiphany about who she is and how she interacts with the world. Except she has been clearer-eyed about how people treat her and what she needs than anybody else. Johnny is scared when she asserts herself. Reed condescends, gives half apologies and promises changes that never come. Jen doesn't seem to notice any of this is happening [10:57 PM] Wack'd: The problem isn't who Sue is as a person, it is the fact that the people around her do not respect her [10:59 PM] Wack'd: And I really don't know what exactly she means by having to grow up or acknowledge things are different now. Sue has been a fairly static character, sure, but "innocence" and "naivety" have nothing to do with it [11:02 PM] Bocaj: "Things are different now. I got a haircut. And She-Hulk is on the team" "I am? Oh fuck, I am!" [11:03 PM] Wack'd: Alright well one issue left of 1985 [11:03 PM] Bocaj: Soon 1985 will be gone and can't hurt us anymore [11:04 PM] Bocaj: -looks at Essential Avengers- dammit i'm still in 83, 85 can still hurt me [11:04 PM] Wack'd: Oh also an annual [11:04 PM] Wack'd: And a non-Bryne Marvel Graphic Novel [11:04 PM] Bocaj: An FF GN? [11:04 PM] Wack'd: Which I hope I put in the right place because Marvel Wiki was unhelpful [11:04 PM] Wack'd: Yeah Marvel had a monthly Graphic Novel title in the 80s [11:04 PM] Wack'd: Thankfully the Fantastic Four only got one [11:05 PM] Wack'd: Oh hey Mar-Vell died in the first one of those [11:05 PM] Bocaj: Yup!

#1985 #John Bryne #The Main Book

4 notes · View notes

slurmware · 4 years

Text

futurama pride icons!!

alright! I have made a SHIT ton of icons just for u

each character has a few pride flags (gay, bi, pan, trans, nb, and lesbian for the gals) plus a transparent version! all are 1000x1000 and linked in my deviantart stash for ur convenience

ive made complete sets of icons for fry, leela, bender, and a few others!!

these are free to use! pls credit me somewhere on ur blog especially if u do ur own flag thank u!! also pls reblog if ur using <3

fry / bender / leela / amy / kif / zapp / zoidberg / others

commissions / tip jar

#futurama #pride icons #turanga leela #philip j fry #bender bending rodriguez #amy wong #kif kroker #zapp brannigan #dr zoidberg #john zoidberg #carol miller #ogden wernstrom #icons #pride #please reblog this i spent too long compiling them lmaooo #f2u stuff

75 notes · View notes

autie-j · 4 years

Note

What's your favorite episode and season of futurama ?

Some of my favorite episodes include:

The Luck of the Fryrish

Time Keeps on Slipping

The Sting

The Farnsworth Paradox

Lethal Inspection

The Late Philip J Fry

Ghost in the Machine

Law and Oracle

The Tip of the Zoidberg

Cold Warriors

A Farewell to Arms

Game of Tones

And the Bender's Big Score movie

And for favorite season, probably anywhere between seasons 4 to 7.

#futurama #these are definitely my favorites

8 notes · View notes

cyhaitham · 1 year

Text

the tip of the zoidberg single handeldly canonized zoidworth. gay old men !!

3 notes · View notes

collective-laugh · 5 years

Text

Detective AU - Muriel x MC Chapter 6

Chapter One Chapter Two Chapter Three Chapter Four Chapter Five

Tag List: @a-zoidberg-aesthetic@lesbiancountess @fartkittyonline@yaysam@y-all-dnt-ve@countgoatman-and-drleechboy @julians-chest-hair@vesuviass @caterpiller-tea @saltywerewolfrebel@obsessedwiththearcana@thatsaltyseaman@xburningwitch @i-dont-speak-wolf@missrabbitart @softarcana @ethereal—pisces @cfluffiness @lhm-2001 @dr-devorak-will-seeyounow @meanderingpoint

Let me know if you want to be added to the tag list!

Summary: Muriel and the Detective grow closer, in spite of the awkward tension surrounding them.

Chapter 6: Brundle and Inanna

Muriel decides that a brandy, no matter how tempting, wasn’t really appropriate to be drinking at nine in the morning.

He wanted to. God, he really wanted a drink.

Inanna rolls over on the bed and yawns, glaring up at him for waking her. He tells her that he’s sorry, in spite of the fact that it was far past her due time to wake up. The brandy taunts him, and the headache that’s coming on is bound to be terrible, but he decides that he’s going to be a functioning member of society and drink coffee instead.

Coffee tastes like shit.

But, he figures it’s a decent substitute for the breakfast he should probably be eating right now, and it’s doing its job of waking him up.

He can’t stop thinking of her.

There’s a reason for it, he’s sure, and he supposes that’s where the need for a drink comes into play. He just...doesn’t want to think, and that’s harder than it ought to be.

“You wanna go for a walk?” He asks, and, in response, Inanna rolls away from him, barely balancing on the edge of the bed, “Okay, time to get up, you lazy bum.”

She yawns in defiance and nips at his wrist when he tries to clip her leash on, but in the end, he manages to get her to stand. She commits, begrudgingly, refusing to look him in the eye.

He decides that he should probably punt the walk when he hears the knock on the door.

Inanna trots back over the bed smugly, and he only rolls his eyes, knowing damn well that whenever he got rid of whoever this was, he’d take her out.

He probably shouldn’t be surprised to see her. He knows that Asra probably told her where he lives, and that he told her that if anything went wrong or if she needed anything, to go find him.

The initial shock wears off faster than anticipated, melting away into concern. Something had to’ve gone wrong, something had to warrant her visit and -

“Hi.” She smiles at him, but he’s known her long enough to know that she’s hiding something behind it, “Oh, um, Asra had your address written on a note in…” She pulls the note card from her handbag, “in a filing cabinet.” She smiles again, looking bashful.

He looks the card over, front and back, written in Asra’s messy scrawl, his name haphazardly scratched below the address.

He’s only a little angry at the moment that she didn’t have his address at hand, but he doesn’t want to make her think he’s angry at him, so he only hands the card back to her and asks, “Is everything alright?”

“I was going to call ahead.” She says, as if it was an explanation, “But I wasn’t sure if you’d be in, and...I suppose I should’ve checked, right?” She laughs awkwardly, wringing her hands together, and sighs, “I’ve an appointment with Consul Valerius this afternoon, and I was...hoping you’d come with me?”

“No.” He says before he has a chance to think about it.

A great big mansion with people looking at him, and some stuffy rich guy looking down at him? He wasn’t too keen on the idea, but it was bound to be inevitable if the guy called himself a ‘consul’.

“Oh! Okay, well...sorry for bothering you, and,” She bites the inside of her cheek, taking a step back.

“Wait.” He panics on the inside and sighs on the outside, “Do you want to come in for coffee?” He hopes she doesn’t notice how he tenses his jaw.

She does, but she smiles kindly anyway and nods, “Coffee sounds perfect.”

He pours her a cup, vaguely remembering how she takes it, and she smiles at him gratefully, looking around the small apartment he called his own. The bed was pushed against the far wall, next to the door to the bathroom. The far wall passed for a kitchen, and she assumed that his bed had to double as a sofa.

She was used to cramped spaces, but this one was Muriel’s. She didn’t want to disrespect.

He clears his throat and grabs his own mug from the end table and asks, “Why’re you going to Valerius’?”

“Nadia thinks he might know something.” She blows on the lukewarm coffee, “I called ahead, and I’m heading up around noon.” He opens his mouth to respond, probably something dumb about how she could’ve just called to invite him, but they already covered that. Inanna headbutts her, panting heavily, and she immediately gives her her undivided attention.

“Oh, hello!” She says in that annoying baby voice people use with animals, kneeling before her, “What’s your name?” She’s immediately petting her with her free hand, and Muriel swears that Inanna looks at him with the intensity of a thousand suns, taunting him.

“Inanna.” He answers after a moment too long, realizing that Inanna couldn’t really answer for herself. “Her name’s Inanna.”

She turns and smiles at him, and it makes his chest flutter, and he can’t really understand why, “It’s fitting.” Inanna licks at her cheek, the traitor dog holding Muriel’s eye the whole time.

He pauses a second, finishing the last of his coffee, trying to ignore the grounds at the bottom, and sighs, “I’ll come.”

She stands, confused, “You don’t have to.” Her first concern was his comfort. Of course it was. “I can handle myself, Muriel.” She smiles, taunting him, and it’s only a little bit endearing. It’s more annoying than anything, because he knows that she can handle herself.

“Doesn’t mean you should go alone.” He shrugs, and then repeats, “I’ll come.”

She smiles, and takes another sip of coffee before saying, “You know, it’s the strangest thing. Talking to you is just…” She shrugs, “familiar, I guess.” She wipes one of her hands on her skirt and continues before he can even sputter a response, “Did...did you want me to come back or…”

He shrugs, “There’s no point. You can stay.”

Muriel didn’t think inviting her to stay through.

He was so awkward, and he wished he could channel the doctor or Asra or someone with an ounce of charm, and wished he wasn’t always on the verge of saying something that was bound to give her a headache.

He didn’t want to hurt her anymore than he already did.

But the train ride downtown isn’t that bad, and she sits a little too close to him, asking about his dog, and other assorted politely intrusive questions. She seems happier today, like things are somehow easier, and he’s almost glad to see her smile like that.

“Do you like jokes?” She asks, taking his hand as she leads him from the train station to the street. Hand holding was necessary, he decides, so she wouldn’t lose him in the sea of people, but even when the crowd thins, she persists. He doesn’t do anything to change that, either.

He shrugs, liking the way her hand fit in his, “Asra likes to tell them.”

She smiles again, and starts, “Okay, so, a drunk and his dog stumble into a bar -.”

“Dr. Devorak and Brundle?”

She laughs aloud, catching herself and cutting it short, “You’re terrible! Dr. Devorak stumbles into a bar, his dog behind him, and Jules bets the bartender that Brundle can talk.”

“He would think so.”

She shushes him through her laughter, and he notices the way her smile reaches her eyes, how light she seems to be, “So the bartender agrees, and Jules asks Brundle what the top of a house is. Brundle responds with -.”

“Roof.” Muriel rolls his eyes.

“And then,” She turns, pausing for emphasis, “Jules asks what’s on the bottom of a horse’s foot, to which Brundle replies with ‘hoof’. Finally, the drunk asks him who the greatest baseball player is, and the dog says, ‘rrrrrrruth!’.” Muriel chuckles at her animated enthusiasm of the dog’s answer, and she continues, “The bartender kicks the both of them out, and the dog said to the drunk, ‘maybe I should’ve said DiMaggio’.”

Muriel coughs out a laugh, the joke so unfunny he couldn’t help himself, and he shakes his head, “That’s awful.”

She’s laughing just as much as he is, shaking her head and wiping at nonexistent tears, “I read it in the paper this morning.”

“Sounds like something Asra would send in.”

She barks out a laugh at that, covering her mouth with her free hand like he said something controversial, and looks at him like he’s the funniest thing, “Goodness,” She fans her face, still laughing, “I haven’t laughed like that in a while.” He tries not to think about how a terrible joke is the cause of that, and definitely not how that was the first time he remembered laughing in...forever. “I’m starved...you hungry, big guy?” She squeezes his finger, and he nods, like a man under a spell.

She pulls him into a small diner that she claims she’s never been to before, but must be trustworthy because, as she puts it, “there’s people brave enough to sit and eat.”

She buys him pancakes.

The stack of pancakes is placed before him, and he practically tears into them, seemingly unaware of just how hungry he had been. The sides of eggs and bacon are sure to follow, and he wouldn’t be surprised if she pushed part of her meal to his side of the table out of pity. She probably thought he couldn’t afford food, given his living conditions.

He knew she really couldn’t.

She purses her lips, running the tip of her finger over the rim of her cup, before asking, “What do you think about all this? Really, I mean?”

He’s chewing thoughtfully, holding a fork in one hand and a knife in the other before he shrugs, trying to swallow prematurely, “I dunno what happened to the Count. Not a tragedy that he’s gone.” He finally manages to swallow, feeling embarrassed that he spoke in the first place.

“You knew him?”

He shrugs again, cutting away at his stack of pancakes, “Worked for him awhile. Fighting rings.”

She sighs, looking at him like he’s the most pitiful thing on the planet, her hand inching across the table like she was considering taking his, before she folds her hands together, resting her chin on them, and deciding to grab her coffee all in the same millisecond.

It was nice knowing she was just as awkward as he was, at least.

“What’s the, uh,” He pauses, trying to save the conversation, “what’s the plan with Valerius?”

She widens her eyes and sighs, shifting in her seat, “Hell if I know. I’m just...hoping to pick up a lead, I guess?” She shrugs, poking at her food, “I don’t really know what I’m doing, if you haven’t been able to tell.”

Muriel has half a mind to smile, to tell her that no, she’s doing fine, but the words catch on his tongue when she takes a drink of coffee, and he just wants to be able to tell her that he doesn’t think she’s a failure.

Instead, she pushes her plate of eggs toward him.

92 notes · View notes