#this fic infected my brain and i wrote it in like two days

[direwombat]

🎃🍂 the howling | a witch!sybille x werewolf!jacob au | ~2.1k | ao3 🍂🎃

Sybille had known them for what they were the second she stepped foot inside the church. She would have known them even if the cards and her Sight hadn’t explicitly told her. 

The preacher, as far as she was aware, was human. A warlock tapping into powers he didn’t fully understand, but human nonetheless. His siblings, however -- his Heralds -- were from her world. The immortality, the magic, the curses had hung so thickly in that sweltering chapel, that she could barely breathe. The cloyingly sweet perfume of fey magic radiated from the changeling woman; the darker curses of the preacher’s blood brothers threatened to consume her whole. 

She knew humans, vampires, and changelings. She’d encountered them all walking the streets of her former home of New Orleans. It’d been her coven’s job to make sure everyone behaved, that the tenets outlined in the old treaties are adhered to, and to punish those who broke the rules. 

It was the rougarou that catches her attention. Werewolves tended to avoid the city, preferring to lurk in the surrounding swamps. They were wild, dangerous, and powerful creatures who preferred isolation over interaction. She understood why she would find one in the rugged wilderness of Montana. What she didn’t understand was why he chose to run without the traditional pack. 

The warlock had his acolytes, the vampire had his thralls, and the changeling her indentures. 

But the werewolf was the only one of his kind here. She would smell it if there were any others. Lycanthropy is a particularly potent curse. The overwhelming scent of wet fur and blood would have been offensive were it not undercut with pine, cedar, and just a hint of peppery gunpowder.

She stared past the warlock as he preached of God but satiated the hunger of something much Older. There was something about the rougarou that called out to her blood. They were both servants to the moon, and her magic responded, dancing off her skin, and clearing the clouds from her spirit and preparing her for a Vision. 

His eyes locked on hers, reflecting fiery white light that cut into her like a knife. Whatever she sensed, he felt it too. All of the creatures of the Night stared at her, but it’s the wolf-kin’s gaze that bore down on her with enough intensity to steal the air from her lungs. All she wanted was to walk past the warlock, the man she was supposed to arrest, and stand before the werewolf behind him. Her fingers twitched for the tarot deck humming in her pocket, and she wondered what card she’d pull with him as the question in her mind’s eye. 

She sensed something between them. A connection bound by blood under a full moon. She sensed a future. But whether that connection was made to be severed, whether the future she saw was a good or bad one, she couldn’t tell. Not without touching him. Not without reading the lines of his past and present and tying her threads to his to see how they weave together and intertwine. 

“Cuff him, Rookie,” the Marshall barked, and Sybille was forced back to the human world, where her coworkers remained blind to the power and destiny threatening to tip the cosmic scales off balance. 

She slid the steel cuffs around the warlock’s wrists and she didn’t miss the way the changeling shuddered and recoiled as she did. 

What’s left of that night remains a blur. 

The helicopter went down in a blazing inferno. A wolf’s howl cut through the night, and she ran with the weight of a Cursed One bearing down on her. And right before she lost consciousness as she was dragged from the river, she recalled seeing the blurry outline of a large wolf standing on the bridge and staring down at her, its eyes bright white in the pale moonlight.

***

Sybille avoided venturing into the Whitetails for as long as she possibly could. It wasn’t so much out of fear of the werewolf himself, but rather the fear of what would happen between them. He’d called out to her on long dark nights where she straddled the lines between his territory and those of his brother and sister. It was a long, pure tone that rang out like a bell in the darkness, carrying with it the somber loneliness of a creature waiting for a loved one to return. 

Come home. Come home, he seemed to cry. Why do you run from me?

It sent shivers up her spine. She dipped her hand in the clear waters of the Henbane, demanding it show her the beast that sings for her, but all she gets is the chiming laughter of the changeling and the image of Boomer playing fetch. It was then that she learned that the waters belonged to the fey, just as the air belonged to the vampire and his thralls. The river would give her no answers. 

She must go to the werewolf herself. 

Decked in silver and carrying wolfsbane, she finally embarked on her journey into the mountains. It didn’t take long for him to track her down.  

She stood amidst a copse of trees when she felt his presence, warm and heavy, start circling around her. 

“I know you’re there, wolf-kin,” she said into the darkness.

The wind rustled the leaves around her and it carried with it the scent of wet fur and pine. A low growl vibrated the air and from the trees emerged a massive wolf with piercing blue eyes and fur the color of rust. Sybille’s first thought was that he was beautiful. Her second was that he was terrifying. He stalked towards her, and as he drew nearer, he stood on his hind legs, rising to a towering height. 

She stood up a little straighter, a feeble attempt to look braver than she felt. Trying to hide her fear was futile. He could smell it on her, just how he could hear the way her heart hammered in her chest. “Ah, Big Bad himself,” she said, and she slipped her cherry-wood wand from her sleeve. She held it defensively in front of her. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“I’ve been waiting for you, Goddess born,” the wolf rumbled.

She rolled her eyes at the archaic term. “Witch is fine,” she said. “Though, generally I prefer to be called by my name.”

“You have a tendency to trespass where you don’t belong, Deputy La Roux.”

“You have a tendency to take what isn’t yours, Jacob Seed.”

“I take what I’m owed,” he said and he lifted a large, meaty claw towards her chin. 

Before he could grab her, she flicked her wand with a snap of her wrist. She’d never been a terribly skilled physical caster -- she’d always been more proficient at divination -- but a spell that should have sent her opponent flying away from her only sent him skidding back a few feet. She muttered an incantation, clawing her free hand, and with the gusto of a conductor, tore the roots from the ground beneath him. Gnarling and twisting, she commanded them to wrap around his limbs. She didn’t care for the entitled way he reached for her, but she still had questions. It’d be easier to talk if she could restrain him. 

But he just tore right through them. Raw, animal strength overpowered her roots, and as he shook himself free, he roared, something primordial and angry. He fell back on all fours, his eyes flashing dangerously as he rushed her. 

She ducked and rolled out of the way before he could crash into her, but before he went barreling into the trees, his flank brushed against her arm. A jolt of electricity shot through her, her eyes flying wide open and rolling back into her skull as a Vision seized her. The boughs shook and trees sundered with ear-splitting CRACKs but Sybille heard none of it. 

The future came to her in flashes, fractured pieces like she was viewing it through a broken mirror or scrying glass. But she felt everything. 

Wild heat. 

Fangs and claws digging into, but never piercing, her flesh

The weight of his body against hers and the way he felt, so hot and so big, inside her. 

He claims her from the inside out, and she wraps herself around him, squeezing him tight. She claims her as his, her magic flaring as it entwines with the weighty darkness of his curse, unable to lift, but certainly capable of sharing the burden. 

She landed on her back, the wind knocked from her lungs, as she found herself jolted back to the present. The beast loomed over her, caging her in with his paws on either side of her head. His breath was warm and wet against her face, his teeth bared, lips curled into a ferocious snarl. Her wand lay just out of reach.

She stared up at him, but even in the face of a monster so dangerous, her heart rate slowed. Her hand reaches upwards, her fingers threading into the soft fur of his neck, just below his powerful jaw. “You aren’t going to hurt me,” she said, stating it as the fact it was. He won’t kill her. Won’t sink his teeth into her tender flesh and rip her throat out. She’s his mate. 

He growled, but didn’t argue. 

“You will make me yours,” she said, pulling her hand away and letting it fall back to the ground on the other side of his paw. “But not tonight.”

She remained calm even as Jacob leaned forward, taking the slender column of her neck between his jaws. His teeth brushed against her pulse, making it flutter. With a gasp, her eyes fell shut, and a quiet moan slipped between her lips before she could stop it. She feels the gentle vibrations of another rumble deep in his chest, and he pulls a louder moan as his tongue laps at her sweaty skin, tracing the line of her jugular. 

“It could be tonight,” he said, pulling away from her. He kept her pinned to the ground, looking down at her with a deep, bestial hunger swimming in those piercing blue eyes. “I could take what’s mine.”

“You will take what is given when it is given,” she said firmly. There were rules and rituals that must be observed. She was a witch. He was a werewolf. Historically, courtship hasn’t been easy between their kinds. They must prove their bond worthy under the silver eye of the full moon. “Samhain still approaches. It is on that night that you will face me and prove yourself worthy to be mine. Do this, and only then may you take me.”

“You are my mate,” Jacob snarled. “I will not let you leave.”

“You’re gonna have to eventually, cher,” Sybille said. 

Jacob stared at her for a long moment. “It’s dangerous to walk the Whitetails alone,” he said. “Joseph’s acolytes will leave you alone if I am at your side.”

Sybille pursed her lips and considered his offer. “The night is still young, I suppose. And the Witching Hour has yet to pass. If you promise to behave, perhaps I’ll walk with you. 

He moved off her, allowing her to rise to her feet and circled tightly around her, his tail swishing happily. He pressed as much of himself as he could against her and she had to fight to keep herself from leaning into his warmth. “Climb onto my back. There’s a place I wanna show you.”

She quirked a brow. “You gonna take me to a wide open field so we can play fetch?” she asked

He shot her a side-eyed glare, and she had to stifle a grin because it reminded her of all the times Boomer has given her the same look when she’s faked him out on throws one too many times. “No,” he said. “Just get on.”

Sybille hummed, but acquiesced, gripping his fur and throwing a leg over his back. “This ain’t gonna hurt you, will it?” she asked. Riding on the back of a giant wolf was different from riding bareback on a horse. He shifted beneath her, and she felt herself slipping. 

“I’ll be fine,” he reassured. “Just hold on tight.” 

He didn’t have to tell her twice. He broke into a sprint and she had no other choice but to press herself flat against his back and hold on for dear life. They raced through the trees, branches whipping past, and as Jacob bellowed out another howl, she couldn't help but join him in laughter.

#jacob seed x female deputy #jacob seed x deputy #far cry 5 fanfiction #fc5 fanfiction #jacob seed #happy halloween y'all #this fic infected my brain and i wrote it in like two days #so excuse any mistakes #i just really wanted to get this out in time for halloween #also yes i know that there wasn't a full moon on halloween in 2018 but it was close so whatever #oc: deputy sybille la roux #r: fragile creatures #my fic #wombat writes

[caffeinatedowlbear]

the hours of becoming: January (1 of 1)

Brief intro

What this is about: an attempt to chronicle my writing efforts.

Why: both for my own records (because I'm a stats nerd), and to add some transparency to the writing process (because I feel that a lot of writers despair at their own perceived slow pace and lack of progress when exposed to others' highlight reels).

What's with the title: it refers to a quote from Grit by Angela Duckworth:

Nobody wants to show you the hours and hours of becoming. They’d rather show you the highlight of what they’ve become.

Personally, I don't mind showing those hours. Writing can be lonely, especially when it feels like you're the only one struggling, while everyone else is knocking out NaNo-worthy wordcounts in one sitting.

(For full disclosure, these updates will cover exclusively my creative writing, which is non-commercial; whatever writing I do for clients comes under the heading of 'work'.)

So here we go.

Weeks 1-5

I might do weekly reports in the coming months, but January is always a slow writing month for me, both by necessity and by design. This year was no exception, with a lot of work and family care packed into what was a tough month following a tough year.

Week 1 was designated to decompressing from the holidays and family care. Week 1 writing summary: none.

Week 2 featured a really bad sinus infection that put me out of commission for the duration. Week 2 writing summary: none.

Week 3 had a tight schedule of commitments, but I made a point of showing up to my (usually) weekly writing stream, because I realized that failing to do so would mean neglecting the one appointment with myself that I had that week. I hadn't written for two weeks, and it showed. My brain was unwieldy, and every word felt like I was chiseling it out of bedrock. Still, I persevered, and got around 2,000 words of a draft down during a 3-hour stretch. That was all the writing done that week. Week 3 writing summary: 3 hours, 2,000 words (draft).

Week 4 was, basically, week 3 with a vengeance, with the only thing that kept me going being the knowledge of a two-day break by the seaside coming up on Sunday. I showed up for the writing stream, during which I edited rather than drafted. On Sunday evening, a few hours into my break, I was finally able to sit myself down to jot down a 'primer' of the Borderlands series plot, for a friend who can't play the games, but wants to read my fic set in that universe. It proved unexpectedly fun, and the c. 3k words I put down on it was probably the first bit of writing I actually enjoyed this year. Week 4 writing summary: 2 hours, 2,000 words (edit) + 2 hours, 3.3k words (writing-adjacent)

Week 5, which strayed into February, saw me leaning into my excitement for the Borderlands primer, which had morphed into a unauthorized biography of Handsome Jack (with an occasional comment from the man himself; the fictional character, that is, not actually Dameon Clarke). I wrote more of it on my seaside break (which had turned out to be more of a working vacation, because f*** me), and then on the weekly stream. I also found myself very excited about recording snippets of my own writing as the universe's most basic podfic, so that's something I might end up doing more of. Week 5 writing summary: 3.5 hours, c. 4k words (writing-adjacent) + a few hours of podficcing myself.

January writing summary: 12 hours spent on writing and writing-adjacent pursuits, resulting in 2,000 words of draft, another 2,000 words edited, and 2/3 of the Very Unauthorized (But Heavily Annotated) Biography of Handsome Jack (7.5k words and counting). Curious about my excitement re: podfics, which is worth exploring further.

#writeblr #writers on tumblr #the hours of becoming

[koscheicore]

*appears*

(imagine that one random time-lord in The Autons, floating mid-air)

Greetings once again,

Some more questions for you, because THOSCHEI, THOSCHEI, THOSCH-…..

Prepare yourself for a barrage of questions! (No pressure ofc)

Commencing in three, two, one..

*explosion*

1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 9, 11, 12, 17

21 - Headcanons for your favourite ainley pairing

24 – gimme more info about the thoschei fan incarnations that occasionally pop up on your feeds. It is vital information!!!

*looks around at the impact caused by the questions*

Whoops

Have a good day/week! :)

*disappears*

SO IT WAS YOU ALL ALONG, THAT TIMELORD... That makes sense! Thank you so much for all the quest- (loud explosion) AAAAH!

(sooo prepare for a very long post 🤣)

1. How did you get into thoschei?

(gets out from under the table) Uhhh has the noise stopped? Yea. Okay. So it all started when I heard a rhythm of four beats?? And then I think my brain got infected. All I could think about is some sad pathetic aliens hugging each other and I guess one was dead and??? then he wasn't? Yeah so I saw tensimm and I got obsessed. That was, if my calculations are correct, about 8 years ago.

2. What is your favourite thoschei flavour?

At the moment it's fiveainley! Or sevencrispy...

3. What is, in your opinion, the most toxic thoschei dynamic?

Why did I even make this question. All of them there's no salvaging the toxicity. Uhh imma go with tensimm or spydoc though

5. Any fan content recommendations?

Honestly THBU it's just. Sublime. Okay so I might have been about to cry just one chapter in? Yeah??

Also Please Attend Carefully if you want podcasts abt the Master because who doesn't.

Now, that's all sfw but on the spicy smut side, here's a fiveainley fic that plays with hypnosis. I found it interesting how the author wrote it in first person, and their Ainley voice is just fantastic. Make sure to read the tags first though!

Do also check the ppl I reblog from's profiles some of them have AO3 accts I plan on munching on when I can!

8. Favourite thoschei story?

Honestly the Master audio atm. Or the Five Doctors cuz it's really funny to see Ainley TRY... just really try... Btw 1st Doctor x Ainley!Master when

Ngl I have to rewatch all the nuwho episodes w the master on it so my thoughts might change. These two stories are consuming my brain rn

9. Favourite thing they have said canonically to each other?

"Wonder what I'd be without you"

"Yeah."

And this

11. Song that reminds me of them?

I want to make an animatic with this so badly

12. Any thoschei headcanons?

My most heartfelt headcanon for them is this if it even counts as one 🤔

17. What's an underrated thoschei pairing?

SIXAINLEY FFS SIXAINLEY IS SO UNDERRATED. More of them pls...

21. Headcanons for your favourite Ainley pairing

No I'm not picking just one >:0

Fiveainley:

-In my head the Master contacted Fivey after the whole cheetah stuff in hopes he could help him. Not talking abt how good or bad that went but Fivey can't remember anyways.

-The Master loves the smell of Fivey's sweaters. Anytime he's entered his TARDIS he's stolen a few. Fivey still doesn't know where they went.

-Oh it's definitely Ainley!Master's fault the Doctor's regenerations became weirder. Yeah after what he did to Fivey he just messed them up. Like Fivey's legs. Hey, if the Master is having trouble being in a Trakenite body it's only fair, right?

Sixainley:

-The most likely pair to do spicy stuff actually. They're both into BDSM although probably not in a sexual context exactly. No I won't elaborate

-The cat pin? Yeah that's something the cheetah Master left in the TARDIS during that Fivey visit. Six just doesn't know. The Master finds it amusing.

-The Rani has tried to block all contact with the Master because he keeps calling her to talk about his latest plan to kill the Doctor. She's so tired.

Oneainley:

-The Master actually visited 1 on a few occasions during the Doctor's past after the events of the Five Doctors, wearing disguises of course so he wouldn't recognise him later.

-He invited him to lunch and they conversed. The Master finds this Doctor kind of endearing in a way, he's the closest he has to things being alright between them anyways. Just some quiet conversations, no mention of the Master or Gallifrey. No murder intent, they just were. Two "strangers" sharing lunch having candid intellectual conversations.

-Eventually, he stopped. Why? I leave that to your imagination.

24. Talk abt your fan Doctor and Master incarnations

OKOK IM GLAD YOU ASKED... So I met this classmate who's a dw fan and as we became friends he told me he had his own fan Doctor incarnation. Eventually we started LARPing for fun and I made my own Master, then we started making up tons of stories and that's how they came to be!

ONE DAY HOWEVER... He said. What if the Master and the Doctor were bigenerated?? Yeah from the same entity but the Time Lords erased their memories. And Dhawan!Master knew this but that one bit he never told, the Doctor never uncovered it, and this is part of why Dhawan wanted to become the Doctor. And boy this broke my heart because thE IMPLICATIONS. That'd mean the Master is ALSO the Timeless Child. So now that's canon for my Master and surprise, it's been selfcest all this time except not exactly because they are not the same anymore and they can never be.

So based off that, my Master loves to make a point on how different they are whilst his Doctor searches for similarities instead when he learns this. My Master is convinced that they're destined to be the worst parts of the Doctor forever, whilst the Doctor got "the better part". So why would they make it easy for him? Gallifrey is gone anyways so let's prove they can never be the same. Let's prove they're DONE. And they're immortal too I guess so why conform with having nothing no. They're owed the Universe and they're not sharing. Meanwhile the Doctor is wondering what would be of the Master if they had lived anything similar than what they did, if they're actually the same, if there's any kindness left on them, if they could have become the Master... He's stuck on his past in a way, too, missing companions and simpler times and stuff. And I intend to destroy his hopes of truly enjoying his current self you know?

...so yeah uh we also have companions we're making and we're slowly developing all of this + some random "episodes" (plots. that is) and one of them is Dak. Dak is well, kind of a Dalek kind of not. I have no idea how this happened he hasn't told me yet but apparently Dak has the genes of one of his companions? His mind when he was a child. So he's like a curious kid travelling with the Doctor except he's got Dalek Issues (tm) and I have such awful plans for him I'm so sorry little Dak ily but Daleks can never be good you know ☺️☺️ And I also have my subconscious eating beings that hate the Master for reasons but shhh. My friend doesn't know yet.

Anyways here's my Master treating the Doctor with love as usual

-----

Hey... hey. Wait. Don't go! *looks around* Uh... who will help me pay for all the repairs??? 😭

ALSO thank you so much for that twogado recommendation I will proceed to scream

#thoschei #lux rambles #etcetc #this was very fun aha #answers

[notgrungybitchin]

Twenty Questions for Fic Writers

Thank you for the tag @theoldmixer !!!

How many works do you have on ao3? 10

What's your total ao3 word count? 26,197

What fandoms do you write for?

Currently only The Beatles. In the past Boardwalk Empire. I also wrote some Good Omens fic that I never published way back in 2011

What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

The Great and Powerful (Boardwalk Empire, Charlie/Meyer)

I Don't Care Too Much (The Beatles, John/Paul)

Was I So Unwise (The Beatles, John/Paul)

A Cup of Kindness (Boardwalk Empire, Margaret/Arnold)

All The Odds Are In My Favor (Boardwalk Empire, Margaret/Arnold)

Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

Yes! There might be a few times I forget to, especially on old fics, but I always try to. They genuinely make my day and keep me motivated, so I want to say thank you!

What is a fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Probably I'm No Good at Aiming (Boardwalk Empire, Benny/Meyer) I was a lot more committed to pure angst writing in Boardwalk fandom because the show was so dark. Now that I'm into rpf I still love angst, but I always try to give them a happy ending. (I realize that my Boardwalk fic was also partly gangster rpf, but I guess I wasn't as attached to happy endings because gangsters? Or maybe I've just gone soft.)

What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Probably I Don't Care Too Much. It's a very sweet and hopeful ending.

Do you get hate on fics?

I haven't yet thankfully. Although when I get a comment from that one troll that pops up on Mclennon fic every so often, I'll know I've made it!

Do you write smut?

I didn't until I got into The Beatles and J/P! I used to be a little uncomfortable writing it, and usually just had a steamy makeout session or fade to black. But something about those two idiots just gave me the bug and now I plan on including smut in all my fic.

Do you write crossovers? What's the craziest one you've written?

I never did, though I had an idea for an overly complex Star Wars/Boardwalk Empire AU back in the day.

Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I know of.

Have you ever had a fic translated?

I don't think so.

Have you ever co-written a fic before?

No but I think it would be fun!

What's your all-time favorite ship?

John Lennon/Paul McCartney. It's infected my brain and taken over my soul. And it's the only thing to get me back into writing after years AND to get me writing smut.

What's a wip you want to finish, but doubt you ever will?

I have some fun Good Omens ficlets that I never published because they are just dialogue. I just doubt I'll ever get around to them again.

What are your writing strengths?

I always find it way easier to write dialogue than anything else. Sometimes my very early drafts just look like scripts with no description added yet.

What are your writing weaknesses?

I think it comes out okay, and I've gotten better at it, but I find writing descriptions and internal monologues difficult. I often get frustrated trying to get my characters from points A to B. I always get bored writing anything but action and dialogue. I used to think I would like to be a screenwriter for this reason.

Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic?

I wrote some lines in Yiddish for Boardwalk Empire fic, but I always ran them by my Yiddish-speaking friend to make sure they made sense. I also had a few French lines in I Don't Care Too Much, but they were mostly spoken by non-French speaking characters so I worried less about them. I don't think I'd try writing more than a few lines without a native speaker's input though.

First fandom you wrote for?

Good Omens! I wrote some fluffy Aziraphale/Crowly ficlets but I never published them.

Favorite fic you've written?

I think probably Was I So Unwise. It holds a special place in my heart as my first fic in eight years. It's for last year's Beatles Secret Santa, which I associate with the first time I really joined the community of the Beatles fandom, and it's hurt/comfort, one of my favorite subgenres!

I'll tag @aquarianshift, @goatsandgangsters, @meyerlansky, and @muzaktomyears if you want to!

#thank you so much for the tag! #it was fun to go back and look at my fics from my past fandom #especially since I barely remember writing my most kudos'd fic!

[ice-and-starlight]

It's been a few days, but if you were still interested in that ask meme....

M: Got any premises on the back burner that you’d care to share?

=D Yeay! An ask!

Hooooo, okay, so, I have a LOT of fanfic that I'm theoretically working on/daydreaming about that doesn't get shared, but, uh, lets see what's not too horrifying to share...

I spent a couple of weeks a few months ago binge-watching Criminal Minds, and got infected by a plotbunny of Dean Winchester/Aaron Hotchner(/Haley Brooks) as a sort of... fix it crossover where, because they're both protagonists from rather different genres, their different approach manages to fix things in the other 'verse.

As in, Dean kills Foyet in proper I'm-fresh-out-of-hell-and-you-did-WHAT-to-my-boyfriend?! style. With added bonus 'you think you're good with a knife? Boy, have I got some things to show you. Say hello to Alastair for me when you get down there'.

And Hotch (and the team) profile the fucking devil so well they manage to talk him down from trying to wipe out humanity. (He goes off to fuck up heaven instead.)

I've gotten bits and pieces of, well, backstory written up, plus some 'Dean meets the BAU' and 'Hotch meets hunters' scenes that I love, but I've gotten stuck on something really stupid and just haven't managed to get my brain to move past it, so I haven't actually written the parts I started writing the story for yet ^^" (this happens to me a lot).

What else?

I have been working, on and off, on a Critical Role Time Travel AU that's actually kind of a spin-off of my very first Critical Role fic which is 'Molly lives rent-free in Caleb's head for the entire rest of the campaign' because as I was watching it I was constantly thinking 'but how would Molly react to this?!' so I wrote it (some of it).

And then I thought 'okay, but what if, okay, I know time-travel is supposed to be semi-impossible, but what if it is technically POSSIBLE, it's just that going backwards through time essentially destroys the soul/spirit/whatever, EXCEPT, of course, that when Caleb does it, he has a BONUS SOUL coming along for the ride, and it's basically enough for Molly to get through more or less intact?'

And then the Moonweaver is like 'fuck, you are my Most Troublesome Worshipper, what am I going to do with you?' and Molly is, you know, themself, so the Moonweaver, also being a goddess of lovers trysts, nudges things until Lucien ends up with twin baby brothers (Molly and Kingsley are both Aspects of the same being, and thus inextricably linked, so bits and pieces of Kingsley got dragged along for the ride, only not enough for him to have more than Weird Instincts) and a bonus Moonweaver Cleric mum.

Was this an excuse to write canon!verse Tealeaf triplets? Yes. Yes it was.

Did it turn into a Ridiculous Epic Saga of the Tea Leaves (Molly, Kingsley, Caduceus, Keg, and Ophelia Mardun) treking across all of Wildmount trying to save people from the future and stumbling into messes along the way? Yes. Yes it did.

Did I actually manage to write any of the actual story? No. I wrote backstory instead, and ended up mostly writing about the adventures of two separate Parent Squads that are probably... 40-60% OCs? doing a tiny little Molly's bidding. It very much became a And You Get A Parent And You Get A Parent And You Get Three Parents story.

I have Such Plans for this AU (including, importantly, a Shadowidomauk endgame), but, alas, actually writing it is proving... difficult.

One more for luck?

Hmm... I have Ideas for a Peaky Blinders AU based on my Little Sallyanne fic? It's not very well fleshed out yet, but it definitely results in Sally murdering the shit out of her brother's terrible wife, adopting her nibling, and going on to severely fuck up nazis when WWII rolls around.

This one is Percolating, and I'm really not sure what I want to do with it, exactly. Just general Vibes of Tommy being the feral gremlin mentor to my beloved feral gremlin child. (Also, Sally getting semi-adopted by Alfie Solomons, maybe, because here's this child going around claiming to be Jewish when she's not, and Alfie's like 'no, either you fucking Stop That, or you commit to the fucking bit' and Sally's like '-starry eyes- Okay Dad'. I would have to do a lot of research to do this justice because I'm aware that I don't know enough to know how to write this properly ^^" Basically, I just want everyone adopting her like a starving feral cat who will absolutely bite the hand that feeds her)

Technically, I think you can say that things like Never Simple, Not All Who Wander, and the various other unfinished things on my writing blog are all on a backburner right now? As well as the next instalments in my Somewhere Just Beyond My Reach and Gramarye and Trapped In The Amber series also count. I am Thinking About Them a lot, but there's either not enough for me to get my teeth stuck into, or my teeth are stuck and I can't chew on them properly =P

#Ask meme response #Supernatural #Criminal Minds #Critical Role #Peaky Blinders #Dean Winchester #Aaron Hotchner #Mollymauk Tealeaf #Alfie Solomons

[postapocalyptic-cryptic]

ABR for fanfic writer asks!

Hi Cal!!

A. what’s your favourite fandom to write?

Right now, it's Transformers! Ever, across all the fandoms I've been in, probably Star Wars. I've had a wonderful time writing for Star Wars and I've made a ton of friends, and most of my negative experiences have been one-off and/or very minor.

B. what’s your favourite fandom to read?

Again, right now it's Transformers. Overall, Transformers or Marvel (mostly the comics). Something about comics fandoms is just comfier for me, and I tend to have an easier time finding fic I really enjoy reading, even when the fandom is smaller like Transformers. Comics also have so much going on that there are always niche characters to get into and usually at least one other person who's also into them. And, you know, I just love Clint Barton a lot.

R. link your favourite fic of all-time.

Oh man. Of ALL time? There are a few fics from my early fic reading days I wish I could find again, but they’re probably not as good as I remember them being. I’m going to go with two fics that, while more recently read, are literally in my head all the time. Fics I wrote fic about.

One of them is very familiar to you, because it’s their days are darker!

The other one is a Transformers fic which is also familiar to you bc I infected you with its brain worms: Too far (I don’t know if the author has a tumblr or else I would tag them)

#alright that's it for now back to research #ough #ask tag #calamity-aims

[beckface]

It’s 1am and brain go brrr so i’m gonna just. Talk about a realllly self indulgent wg and twobrains au for a bit don’t mind me

context- I wrote a fic one time that was like the city turned on WG a bit and her secret identity got revealed after a really bad battle, like Becky overheard some conversations out of context of people she cared about and assumed that their mixed emotions were them completely shunning her. Then TB comforted her in the woods and the ending kindof implies that she bitterly decides to stop protecting the city.

So thats the backstory for whatever saccharine family bullshit i’m about to start saying idk I didn’t plan this

warning this is aggressively Becky hurt/comfort

Twobrains goes home and eats his dinner but keeps thinking about Becky, like he’s all discombobulated because he’s getting weird fuzzy memories of her secret identity and realizing that he has a lot repressed of warmth and love that the two shared

He talks to his henchmen and tells them everything, Squeaky is just kindof quietly listening and observing like the stone cold embodiment of evil the weird mouse tumor is. He’s like “this could be a beneficial development” and Tb is like “I am in so much pain”

Anyways a couple days go by and things go back to normal except wordgirl (now known to be Becky Botsford) is no where to be seen. Everyone is worried sick but really hesitant about expressing it or going to look for her because they feel like she’s now alienated (pun. laugh. laugh at my pun.) from everyone else

And they don’t really understand that she’s really vulnerable right now because everyone has it in their heads that they don’t really see Wordgirl as a full fledged person, and more like a godly beacon of power. This is infecting their view of Becky, and the people who knew Becky are being very standoffish and weird about it

So TB is thinkin his thoughts and goes through old tapes of Steven and WG interacting, stuff he refused to watch before. He goes to a villain meeting and all the villains talk about how it’s been nice that they haven’t been caught doing crimes but they’re all really hesitant to do anything too big.

Some like Granny May and Mr. Big are just doing their thing as normal but keeping it lowkey, some like Butcher and Chuck feel too guilty to do any crimes while Wordgirl is sad and MIA, and Tobey is just out here losing all villainous motivation because Wordgirl isn’t showing up and, he along with Victoria and Eileen miss Becky a lot.

Kid Math IS here and stopping some villains, but he’s in the city over so he can’t be at Fair City all the time!

Twobrains considers all this and decides to take some action under the guise of being annoyed at everyone being all melancholy. He goes to her spaceship hideout (he knows where it is from that one episode where she procrastinated and took him there) and finds her there sulking as expected.

Becky is laying on the couch, the tv on but not really watching it. She’s knows that her family and friends probably miss her, and she should probably talk to Bob because he’s in just as deep as she is, but she’s stuck in her own head still.

When she hears a knock on the door, or rather, on the window, she goes to check it out. Twobrains somehow climbed his way up to the window and is now very clearly regretting that decision, and almost falling off

She saves him and he’s like “Are you just gonna mope forever” and she’s like [emo music] “you’re not my dad you don’t understand!” and he’s all “Thats it. You’re coming with me.” and he just kinda scoops her up like you would a wet cat and she’s too preteen angst to care, and thus begins the “Wordgirl hides from everyone and lives with Twobrains for a bit” au

He makes her a little pallet in the guest room and puts in some toys and stuff she left in his lab when he was Steven that he never gave back to her before (I am holding on to that headcanon for dear life I bring it up so much) and over time the guest room stops looking like a guest room and starts looking like an explosion of 11-year-old-girl happened in the middle of this evil lair

He gets her some civilian clothes at some point so she doesn’t have to just wear the uniform all the time but like he has no idea what little girls wear so it’s just his outfit but smaller. The henchman go out and get Becky some actual outfits and stuff

Twobrains starts to grumpily bond with Becky and the Henchmen find it funny how he goes out of his way for her but acts like it’s such a horrible burden.

“Boss aren’t we committing a crime? Why are we stopping at the pretty princess sale?”

“You imbeciles, well OBVIOUSLY this pretty princess special edition deluxe wallpaper color-by-number kit isn’t going to buy itself?? I swear, having Wordgirl around is so annoying, she doesn’t even know that this is out yet and still won’t leave the house anyways, so I have to be the one to get it for her! Ugh.”

“Boss why. Why do you need to get it for her.”

“Do I pay you to ask questions?? Go get my wallet!”

She pops up while he’s building his evil rays and EVERY single time she makes a big deal about how she could stop him if she was still a crime fighter and goes into detail about how she would do it. Like she’s so bored she makes up crimes for herself to stop. Eventually he’s like “I need some peace while building. Clearly the reasonable solution is not to ask her to leave me alone for a bit, so I’m going to build a room dedicated to hologram battle scenarios.” And it turns out to just be a battle training sort of deal but Becky thinks it’s the most fun thing ever

Mousebrain convinces TB to spread a rumor that Wordgirl has gone back to Lexicon, just for safety purposes. TB can tell that Squeaky has a plan, but is keeping quiet. For now. TB can guess pretty easily where this is going though.

one direction this could go is Becky thinks she’s just gonna stay away from everyone but as she and TB get closer she gets more and more into the things he does, she starts negotiating with her moral code a bit and begins by being curious about his work, and is genuinely interested when he excitedly infodumps about his projects

Then she starts helping him build his gadgets, evil or not. She even gets to wear one of his spare lab coats, but she has to tie up the sleeves and cape of the coat so it fits on her. He does have some goggles that fit her. One day when going to work on the lab she wears the outfit he bought that was just a copy of his, and combined with the lab coat and goggles it looks like Twobrains and his mini-me (who other then the outfit looks nothing like him so it’s silly) working on some sort of contraption together

He feels all proud when she wears the mini-me outfit and alcjakdjalxlckd im sick in the head someone help me but no yeah he’s like “Look. My child. She has arrived.”

“Y’know kid this is really fun, Why couldn’t we have just done this sooner instead of you pestering me about my schemes all this time”

“Doc. Arresting you for committing multiple felonies is not ‘pestering’”

“Ehhh you say potato I say pestering”

“No you say potato, I say felony-hey haha stop it!”

“Whats that? I can’t hear you over this pillow in your face.”

*murmurring*

“Come again? I think you might have- hEY-“ [twobrains is thrown on the ground by an aggressively tossed pillow]

“Muahaha! You think you can defeat me? I am Wordgirl! Master of the art of pillow fighting!”

“Oh ho ho- you may have mastered the arts, but don’t forget who taught you! Never understand an old pro with some tricks up his sleeve- HENCHMAN, NOW!”

[The Henchmen and Twobrains all bombarded Becky with pillows. She gives up quickly with a giant smile, and she and Twobrains fall on the pile of pillows laughing hard]

“HAAH- hah hah- Oh god, I haven’t done that in years, I feel like a little kid again!”

[he turns to see Becky’s eyes shining and a thoughtful grin stretching across her face]

“?”

“Whatcha lookin at me like that for”

“Nothing I just- I’m really happy right now”

He tells some of the other villains at some point, not all at once just the ones he’s closest too. He avoids telling the kids, something tells him that they would tell her parents where she is, and mouse brain doesn’t like that idea.

He tries to remain unbiased because she’s clearly hearing everything with the worst intentions right now, but from everything she says about how everyone from her life is supposedly talking about her they all seem pretty heartless just because she’s different and powerful. He doesn’t really want to have her go back to that either.

Chuck and Butcher have both been worried sick since they’re both really soft and have grown to care about Wordgirl a lot, so they’re happy she’s okay, and doubly happy that she’s not stopping their crimes of her own accord now. The two come over for lunch often and hang out with TB and his gaggle of people he accidentally adopted

TB has started to use her real name around the house because “Wordgirl” feels awkward. Becky at first is weirded out by him calling her Becky, and it feels strange for him too, but over time it starts being more comfortable and almost nostalgic, because WG remember everything from the steven time ofc and TB is getting more and more memories of Becky now that the truth is out

Sometimes Kid Math comes over to stop an evil scheme. Becky keeps her distance but is always overtaken by this intense self-hatred and guilt, but she feels too paralyzed to go do anything either way.

Becky, pointing at her feelings of inadequacy whenever she’s not doing something to serve others even if it’s too much for her: Damn g my cut is insane shoutout to my barber (camera pans to childhood trauma)

She basically really hates not doing anything and it makes her feel worthless or like she’s actively doing something wrong, or like it’s her sole duty to take care of other people and she’s failing at the point of her existence somehow

She ends up talking to TB and the other villains/henchmen that know where she is about this, because who else does she have right now? and they are all like “F that, you don’t owe anything to anybody!”

Between this, bonding with her villains, and becoming dangerously comfortable with avoiding seeing anyone she knows after the attack day she kindof becomes a villain in the shadows

She’s petrified of being seen in public again, but she helps some of the villains now. Mostly TB. She starts out by assisting with rays and such, but ends up wearing a cloak and breaking through walls for them or superhearing things etc

One day it gets to the point where she wakes up from a nightmare and in a angry, panicked haze goes and just wrecks a nearby building all on her own. She realizes someone might see her and rushed back to the warehouse, finding Twobrains awake. She apologizes, thinking she woke him up, but his sleep schedule has never been and will never be normal so he was just up on his own doing god knows what

He at first doesn’t think much of it other then that it’s weird she’s up so late, but catches on that she’s off when she keeps hanging around him but not talking.

She wants comfort and is just highkey affection starved but he’s not really the one she would go to for it and she doesn’t feel that she deserves it after doing something bad but she doesn’t want to be alone and he’s like the main adult in her life now and she just keeps spiraling until Twobrains who’s just been 🧍‍♂️ this whole time decides he doesn’t have time for the Becky-overthinking thing and picks her up in like the proper holding a child way

She’s very confused and he goes “You can tell me if you want. You don’t have to though, but you’re alright kiddo. Don’t start thinking you’re not n’ all that jazz.”

She just kind of leans into his shoulder quietly and he holds her with one arm while grabbing cheese snacks and stuff and then sits down with her to watch some late-night tv. They end up falling asleep on the couch together like that

So yeah Becky kindof does similar crimes to Tobey, rage/pain/panic-induced destruction but she’s not public about it, so no one knows who’s doing it. The regret she feels afterwards becomes less and less, and after spending so much time with villains the way the city treated her badly not only becomes clearer to her, it exacerbates SOOO much to the point where she starts internally hating the city a bit. She doesn’t want to but she gets in these mental spirals a lot and starts nitpicking every little time something has happened that she felt stressed or unappreciated by people in her life, and it makes it worse

Her mental state isn’t exactly getting worse, she’s healing previously repressed trauma in a lot of ways, but it’s not really improving because as much as they want to help and as good of listeners a lot of the villains are, and as nice it is to be apart of their support system now, they don’t really encourage healthy coping mechanisms

this is kindof where things go static for a bit. WG is a secret villain in the city but like not really, she’s living with Twobrains who’s getting really attached to his new child and they’ve got a sweet relationship but it’s still built on a very rocky foundation, especially with Squeaky purposefully trying to turn WG evil

Okay goodnight AKFHAJDH

#wordgirl #hc/au #dr two brains #becky botsford #dadbrains but like not really #its my birthday I’m allowed to be self-indulgent on Wordgirl ansgt and fluff with tb #tobey mccallister #I like… to imagine fluffy scenes…. with them… they’re just livin together all happy aidjajs

[jpegjade]

Physical Therapy - Ch. 1 (Spencer)

WELCOME TO PHYSICAL THERAPY!! in honor of this bish starting physical therapy in real life (and missing it bc i can’t drive and my mom and i’s schedules not being synched on google calendar all the time) i’ve decided to write a fic about it. it will be a little series with a goal (yes, an end game) and it’ll be cute. some of it is based on actual things that happen and some is literally just the story. ENJOY.

gender: neutral

tw: nothing that i can think of

genre: fluff | angst

Description: After getting shot in the leg, spencer goes through physical therapy before he can get back in the field completely. What happens when he starts to fall for his physical therapy assistant? 

__________________

Two honks at 6am meant that it was time for Spencer to get going. Derek was downstairs, in the car, waiting on boy wonder to crutch his way out of the apartment complex. Derek wasn’t sure how to feel about this trip considering he missed his early morning run for this but he knew how nervous Spencer was for his evaluation today so he didn’t mind as much as he could have minded. 

Spencer was patiently waiting in a pair of very short shorts, mismatched socks, and running shoes. He threw on a t-shirt and looked in the mirror, noting how tired he looked. He hadn’t been sleeping well lately for some reason but he couldn’t be sure why. He combed out his hair one more time before he and his crutches headed to the elevators. 

“Ready, kid?” Derek said, opening the front door for Spencer like a world class chauffeur would if Spencer was a celebrity. 

“Ready as I’ll ever be,” Spencer mumbled.

In truth, Spencer was more than ready to get started on his physical therapy journey. He wanted to get back in the field full time, adrenaline pumping, connecting with victims, walking again. He didn’t mind the assisted mobility but it was hard for him to know that the best he could do sometimes was stay back in the office or hang out in Garcia’s batcave. 

The car ride was filled with a comfortable silence between the two men. Derek was thinking about how he could make up his missed morning run by doing another type of high cardio workout while Spencer was just trying to figure out why it had to be him. He wouldn’t wish the frustration of his recovery process on anyone else on the team but the frustration of the recovery process just got to him on some days. Today was one of those days. 

Derek pulled up to the physical therapy clinic sooner than Spencer hoped. Part of that was because Derek was a very fast driver while the other part was because Spencer wasn’t paying attention for most of the drive. 

“You owe me one.” Derek said, completely joking. Well… Partially. That morning run was what kept him awake during the day, energizing him for work. 

“Do you want to come in?” Spencer said, looking down at his hands in his lap. 

Spencer’s hands were tapping his leg as he awaited Derek’s answer. He was nothing short of a nervous wreck on the inside. All he could think about was how much pain he would be in once the evaluation was over and the physical therapist had finished poking and prodding at his knee. He hated to think that it would be worse than everything else going on. Plus he still had to go to work today. 

“Sure, kid.” Derek said. 

Derek wasn’t going to sit in the car and do nothing the whole time so he might as well support his friend. 

Climbing out of the car, the boys slowly made it to the sliding glass doors of the physical therapy clinic. Much to Spencer’s surprise, it was nothing like he originally imagined it to be. Some part of him thought it would somewhat resemble the clinic where his mother resided but it was completely different. There were floor to ceiling walls for over half of the first floor building. High tech equipment was stationed everywhere from anti gravity treadmills to hand bike motors, medicine balls and so much more. Spencer stood in the doorway, leaning on his crutches, while he took everything in. There was so much light in the air, it was almost like the feeling of recovery was airy and not meant to bog him down. This was a strange feeling for him to comprehend...

“You coming, pretty boy?” Derek called, taking a break from chatting with the pretty receptionist. 

Spencer and his crutches walked over to the front desk and grabbed the paperwork that covered how much pain he was in today. He filled it out quickly, hoping to get everything over with sooner than later. He was already here so he might as well just finish everything quickly so he could get out of the place. 

When he finished writing everything down, he returned the paperwork to the receptionist who slipped him a piece of paper and pointed to Derek. Spencer already knew it was the receptionist’s personal phone number and he didn’t even need to look at the paper. Sitting down, Spencer handed Derek to a very confused Derek before it hit him what it was. Derek winked at the receptionist, who blushed before answering the phone. 

“Spencer?” A voice called his name shortly after he sat down. 

It was nice to know that here, he didn’t have to be a doctor. He was just another person healing. He didn’t have to be smart, he could just exist. 

“Good luck.” Derek said, noticing that Spencer’s hand was shaking in the slightest bit. 

“My name is Nora and I will be your lead physical therapist.” The woman said, walking Spencer to a vacant padded table. It reminded Spencer of the types of tables you lay on when you get a massage. 

He only got a massage once when Garcia got stood up on a couples’ massage date. He spent half of his part of the massage giving the masseuse facts about how their job could actually give them an infection from the amount of germs in the air and on the table. His delivery of facts caused the room to be incredibly uncomfortable and bleach the table very thoroughly. By the time he and the masseuse finished, only 5 minutes were left in the massage and Garcia was left horrified and amused at the same time. 

“Don’t worry. We bleach the tables every time someone finishes a session.” Nora said, noticing the look on Spencer’s face. Spencer visibly relaxed and sat on the table. 

“So, Spencer, tell me a little bit about yourself.” Nora followed up, pulling up a backless roller chair. 

“Well, I was on a case and the unsub, unknown subject, shot at a dad but it ended up hitting me in the leg instead and…” Spencer paused, looking at Nora’s amused face. 

“No, I mean tell me about you. Your hobbies, what you do for fun, things like that. I need to do a complete profile for you so I know how your quality of life has been affected and which exercises you can do at home so we aren’t pushing too fast.” Nora smiled at Spencer. 

“I work.” Spencer said in a matter-of-fact tone. He didn’t really have anything else to say. 

“Okay. So you’re a workaholic.” Nora wrote. She was about to ask a new question when you came quickly walking to Nora. 

Spencer was left dumbfounded. There seemed to be a halo of light radiating around you, making you glow. He knew it was the sun finally rising but his brain short circuited as he continued to gaze at you. 

“Hey Nora?” You said, looking down at your boss. “Mrs. Gillespi wants to know why you haven’t come back to check her form. She doesn’t trust me because, her words here, I ‘look like a child who doesn’t know their left foot from the color orange.’” 

“Sure. Here, you can take over Spencer’s evaluation.” She handed you her clipboard.

You looked at the detailed notes on the paper and then up at Spencer, who looked like one of the youngest people here. 

“It’s not often we get cute guys in this place. Other than Kyle. But Kyle’s an asshole who could almost be my dad.” You blurted, not realizing you said it outloud as soon as Nora left. 

You noticed that he started blushing and looking at his converse and you realized that you said something. You usually spoke your thoughts out loud but the people you worked with were used to it so no one bothered to say anything.

“What?” You asked, confused. 

“You called me cute.” Spencer said. “Which is fine. I don’t understand the appeal but I do believe that your blurting of what you perceive as a fact is a coping mechanism. It can also be tied to ADHD, which is a common mental disorder that causes your brain to impulsively say things.” Spencer paused, looking at your face. 

“What?” You asked, again, confused. 

“I’m not saying you have ADHD. I’m a doctor but not that kind of doctor. Although I could get another Ph. D. Prove my father wrong. And…” Spencer realized he was rambling. 

“Cute and a talker.” You said, writing that down. 

You wrote something down on the paper that Spencer couldn’t see but he was curious about. 

“Let’s check out that leg.” You said, pulling out an instrument that looked like a compass. 

You asked Spencer to move his knee certain ways and it wasn’t as bad as Spencer thought. You were gentle, soft even. Your hands were delicate and you ended the session massaging his leg and smiling at him. 

“You were a good patient today, doctor Spencer.” You said, smiling at him. 

Spencer blushed, unable to meet your eyes. 

“You… I mean… I enjoyed our session.” Spencer said. “Which I don’t normally enjoy. Not that I’ve been shot before. Or had physical therapy. Or been here. Or even worked out really.”

“You’re funny, doc.” You smiled. “Your next appointment is Tuesday of next week according to the schedule so I guess I’ll see you then. I can’t wait.” 

Spencer stared at you as he wondered why you were so excited. 

“Why?” Spencer asked. 

“It’s not every day I get the case for a cute guy who is smart and awkward. It’s almost like the heavens have answered my hopes and prayers.” You joked, looking up at the ceiling and putting your hand on your heart. 

“I believe in science.” Spencer stated, grabbing his crutches. 

“A man of science. Does it get any better? What’s your star sign?” You joked. 

“Scorpio.” Spencer stated. 

“Oop. All the scorpios I know have been some hoes. You better not be a hoe, doc.” 

“I’m definitely not a gardening tool, if that’s what you’re referring to. Otherwise, I’d like to thing my lack of dating skills doesn’t qualify as being a… hoe? Although, I don’t believe in the use of the word to describe someone who enjoys spending time with multiple people. I’d like to think the use of the word is meant in jest and fun for a term of endearment.” Spencer stood up, balancing on his crutches. 

“I’ll be the judge of that.” You said, walking slowly with Spencer to the front desk. 

“What’s your name?” Spencer asked, turning to you. He realized that he never got your name.

“Y/n.” You smiled. 

The clouds must have parted again because as soon as you turned to walk away from him, towards Nora, you were covered in another halo. And just like that, you were gone again.

_____________________

Future tag list: 

@ellvswriting @sageandberries-png @l0ve-0f-my-life @rexorangecouny @kennedywxlsh

Want to be added? Tell me!

#spencer reid #spencer reid x reader #spencer reid imagine #spencer reid fluff #cm

[worryinglyinnocent]

Fic: Forged Through Fire (7/13)

Summary: Amestris. Once democratic, now a military dictatorship. Prohibition is strict; personal freedoms curtailed. All alchemists must be state-licensed or face imprisonment. Foreigners are met with suspicion. It’s a grim place and a grim time, but there are some people able to bring a little light to the world. Behind an innocent-looking bookshop, speakeasy proprietor Chris Mustang has formed an unlikely alliance with unlicensed alchemist Van Hohenheim to provide alcohol to those who want it and medical care to those who need it. When Riza’s newly complete tattoo becomes infected, Roy brings her into this underworld, little knowing the way it will change their lives in the future – uncovering the secrets of the mythical Philosopher’s Stone and the schemes of a Fuhrer hell-bent on achieving immortality, all whilst navigating what they mean to each other.

===

Rated: T

[One] [Two] [Three] [Four] [Five] [Six] AO3]

===

Note: So, just in case you read the previous chapter before I edited it, a note on timing. I managed to  mix up centuries and millennia because… wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey stuff. To clarify, Xerxes was destroyed about 450-500 years prior, like in canon. Not 50 years prior, like my brain decided to originally write…

Also, Atticus was picked as a random Ancient Greek name, there’s no deeper reasoning behind it.

===

Forged Through Fire

Seven

Riza looked up from the counter as the bell over the shop door tinkled and Gracia entered. 

“Hey Riza. How’s he doing today?”

Riza laughed. “He’s stopped rambling and he’s now annoying everyone, so I think he’s getting better. I know that Chris can’t wait to get him off her hands, but we’re a bit concerned that someone might try to shoot him again if we let him out of our sight.” She went and flipped the closed sign, locking the door. The speakeasy was still doing limited trade in order to keep the money coming in, but it was only open to trusted regulars who had forewarned that they would be coming in advance. 

Gracia followed her down into the bar. For all she could joke about it, Riza could feel the tension in the place. Hughes had stumbled upon something so big and so secret that it would affect all of them in the long run. 

As suspected, it now appeared irrefutable that Bradley had the military alchemists working on creating the Philosopher’s Stone. So far, they’d had several failed attempts, but a recent covert expedition to the ruins of Xerxes had uncovered some interesting documentation. Barely anyone could read it, but it was nevertheless causing a lot of excitement among the upper echelons of the military. 

Or, to put it simply, Fuhrer Bradley was trying to make himself immortal. 

“Can you think of anything worse than an immortal Bradley?” Hughes was saying as they entered his sick room. Roy was in there too, sitting in the office chair with his feet up on the end of the bed. There were papers scattered everywhere. 

“No, right now I don’t think that there’s anything worse than an immortal Bradley. Hi Gracia, hi Riza.”

“Hello Roy. Shouldn’t you be at work?”

“I’m very hard at work attempting to bring down a conspiracy in the military!” Roy protested, gesturing around at all the papers. “And no. Officially I am taking a leave of absence to care for my sick aunt.”

Madam Christmas, who had entered the room behind them, gave a pathetic cough. 

“See, my sick aunt. I’ve got Havoc and Breda running interference and Fuery’s been sending all kinds of mixed message telegrams. The top brass are so concerned with trying to work out whether or not Hughes is dead that they shouldn’t be paying too much attention to my whereabouts.”

“Right.” Riza shook her head in despair as Roy swung his feet up off the bed, leaving the room with her and Madam Christmas to give Gracia and Hughes some time alone together. 

She waited until he had poured himself some coffee from the large pot that had been left on the bar and they’d settled down at their usual table before she spoke again. “Have you found out anything new?”

“Bradley nearly declared war on Xing as an excuse to get in there and try to find the Philosopher’s Stone, but even his closest allies decided that would be a bit much and it would be better to try and create their own.” Roy took a long sip of his coffee. “You know, I wouldn’t put it past him to just lead a one-man charge on the place, he’s certainly bonkers enough.”

“Is it even the kind of thing that can be created twice? I mean, I know we should all take myths and legends with a pinch of salt, but at the same time, all the bits and pieces I’ve read about it talk about it as The Philosopher’s Stone, as if there is and can only ever be one.”

“Well, I think the military are certainly testing that theory.” Roy sighed. “The worst thing about it is that I have no idea what kind of unethical experiments they’re getting up to and as an alchemist I could be dragged into them at any time. I mean, my specialism sort of keeps me safe unless they need to burn a bunch of stuff but considering the lengths they seem willing to go to in order to both keep the secret and try to succeed, I don’t want to rule it out.” 

Riza inched a little closer to him, chancing to put an arm around his back, and he leaned into her side, head drooping onto her shoulder. 

“I’m so glad you’re here,” he mumbled to her. “Thank you.”

“Any time.”

He gave a little huff of laughter. “That’s my line.”

“Well, maybe it’s time for me to take care of you for a little while. You’ve taken care of me enough in the past.”

“Thanks for following us out the other night, as well. I was so frantic; I don’t know what I would have done if you hadn’t been there being calm and wonderful.”

Riza laughed. “I’m sure you would have survived somehow.” She held him a little tighter, and he burrowed in closer. 

“It feels like everything’s been turned upside down. Except you.”

He looked up at her then, his dark eyes so sad and tired, and Riza’s heart went out to him. 

“We never got to finish our conversation from yesterday,” he said. 

“The ‘What happens between us now?’ conversation.”

“Yeah. That one.” Roy sighed. “I know that we’ve just ended up in a potentially really dangerous situation, and I know that this is the worst time ever to be talking about it, and thinking about it, and God forbid thinking about the future. But I also know that you’re the only person I would ever want by my side throughout this whole thing, and if we all end up skewered through with one of Bradley’s not-at-all ceremonial swords tomorrow, then I know that not taking a chance with you would be my only regret.”

“Oh, Roy.” Riza leaned in to kiss him softly. “There’s nothing like people being shot to put things in perspective, is there?”

“Nope.” His hand came up to cup her cheek and he returned the kiss, gently and a little hesitantly, but with definite hope and want behind it. “Perhaps I’m starting to see that sometimes the universe just really wants to screw us over, and there’s nothing we can do about it.”

“Exactly. It’s time to let go of the guilt, Roy. There’s nothing anyone can do about it.” She found herself stroking his hair as he resettled against her shoulder. 

“We make quite the pair, don’t you think? Both broken up in our own ways.” 

“Perhaps.” Riza kissed the top of his head. “But we’ll stick ourselves back together. I think that’s the one thing that I’ve learned the most since leaving home and coming here. The sticking myself back together part. Because I haven’t been sticking myself back together, not really. I’ve had you and Rebecca and Madam and Hughes and Trisha and Hohenheim and all the rest of the crew helping me stick myself back together. And when you get broken, I’ll help you stick yourself back together as well.”

“Thank you, Riza.”

They stayed like that for a long time, and although her arm was going numb, Riza didn’t mind at all. She was enjoying this easy closeness. They had been so close back when he had first known her – perhaps they had never been this physically close, but they’d been so close as people. A part of her had always known that they would end up like this somehow. Maybe not as romantic partners, but definitely as friends. 

It was only when Madam Christmas came out into the bar to take over serving and gave them a knowing look that Riza realised Roy had fallen asleep on her, and she just smiled. They’d had a fraught couple of days of it, what with everything Hughes had found out and the aftermath of that; she wasn’t really surprised that it had taken it out of him so much. She was just glad that he trusted her enough to be this vulnerable around her. Well, she trusted him that much, and she guessed that it went both ways. 

Madam Christmas came over with a glass of wine; Riza took it with her free hand. It was her favourite, and she savoured the rich taste. 

“On the house.” Madam Christmas winked. “I think we could all use a little pick-me-up right now. It’s been a day. I had Rebecca on the phone earlier, she’s been picking up all kinds of stories at the paper.”

Over the last few months or so, Rebecca had become a great friend to them in giving inside information as to what kinds of propaganda were about to be sent out to the general population. Of course, most of what she wrote herself ended up cut and censored by the government-employed editors by the time it appeared in print, but the unredacted versions were always circulated through the speakeasy to great interest. Riza had been happy to set her up with Havoc.

“Good stories or bad stories?”

“A bit of both. Everything’s being swept under the rug, though. As far as Central City’s citizens are concerned, absolutely nothing out of the ordinary happened in the park two nights ago.”

“Huh.” Riza felt the uneasiness beginning to creep back in. “I don’t like how that implies that people do know that something out of the ordinary happened in the park two nights ago.” She thought back to Hohenheim and the frighteningly powerful alchemy that he’d performed on Hughes, something unlike anything she’d ever known before, and in turn she found herself thinking back to the day she’d burned her back, and his warning that removing her tattoo completely would be too traumatic. 

If that was what he would have had to do, she could well see why. Hughes had been unconscious and on his last breaths; she wouldn’t have wanted anything like that to happen if she was anything other than at death’s door. 

“No,” Madam Christmas agreed. “It’s worrying. I’m just hoping that there’s nothing that can tie it all back to this place. Rebecca doesn’t think that there is, and she’s running as much interference as she can. Still, I think keeping a low profile for a couple of weeks will be a good idea.” She glanced at Roy. “Are you comfortable like that?”

“Not really. My shoulder’s gone dead. But I don’t mind.”

“Oh, to be young and in love once more. Don’t deny it, Miss Hawkeye. I’ve known you long enough.”

Riza shook her head, but she didn’t respond. Something good would come of it all. It had to.

X

“Do you really think that Bradley would risk wiping out the entire population of Amestris in order to gain immortality? I mean, surely the whole point of him gaining immortality is so that he can remain Fuhrer and rule over us forever. It wouldn’t be much fun being immortal if he was literally the only person in the country.”

Two more days had passed, and the rag-tag bunch of investigators had become a full-on research force, although they weren’t any closer to finding out what was going on in Central Command than they had been before. Every new piece of information they uncovered just seemed to be adding to the confusion without clearing anything up. 

“I mean, if the legends of Xerxes are anything to go by, then he’d get wiped out too.” Hughes brushed some peanut shells off the table and slammed down another piece of paper. “Take a look at that.”

Riza looked up at the clock; it was almost eleven but none of them showed any signs of stopping. The entire crew of Roy’s friends from Central Command were gathered in the bar, and Madam Christmas had closed up shop temporarily to allow them more space to spread out in the main area rather than everyone being cramped in the office that had been Hughes’s recovery room. Hohenheim had given him the all-clear earlier in the day, but he still hadn’t actually left the speakeasy and gone home. Gracia and Rebecca had joined the party as well, and although Madam Christmas was trying to remain as aloof from it all as she could, more concerned with keeping them all safe in the bar than with the military conspiracies going on, she was offering insights wherever she could. 

Hohenheim and Trisha had gone home. Riza hadn’t seen all that much of them since the night Hughes had been shot, and she got the impression that Hohenheim was trying to avoid everyone in the wake of what he’d had to do. Not that anyone who had been there and who knew what had happened held his strangeness against him, quite the opposite in fact; they were all extremely grateful that he’d managed to save Hughes’ life. Still, if he wanted space then they would give it to him. 

Riza craned over the others to take a read of the paper that Hughes had put down, but the writing was too small for her to make it out. 

“What is it?”

“It attributes the creation of the Philosopher’s Stone to an alchemist named Atticus, who was the King of Xerxes’ personal alchemist. But it also says that Atticus died in whatever catastrophe wiped out the rest of Xerxes, so even if Bradley does succeed in creating the Philosopher’s Stone again, it won’t leave him any better off than when he started.”

“Just another hunk of rock in an empty country waiting for some Xingese merchants to take it home to Tim Marcoh,” Roy mused, and Riza couldn’t stop herself from bursting into laughter.

“Sorry, sorry. I know it’s really not that funny. I think I need more coffee.” She extricated herself from the gaggle around the table and went over to the coffee pot. Considering the vast array of alcohol that was available behind the bar and the fact that the coffee pot had never seen all that much use before the night Hughes had been shot, it was certainly earning its keep now. They’d been refilling it almost constantly all day. 

“Hey.” 

She looked up to find that Roy had followed her over. They hadn’t really had the chance to spend all that much time together since they’d had their talk. Well, that wasn’t strictly true since they’d spent most of the intervening two days in each other’s pockets whilst trying to work out what on earth was going on in the country, but they’d always been surrounded by other people. This moment leaning on the bar was as close as they had come to having a moment to themselves. 

“Hey yourself.” She smiled at the memory of the other night. Roy had been so embarrassed when he’d woken up, and it had been sweet to see him so flustered. Naturally, she’d had to kiss him to stop his litany of apologies for falling asleep on her. 

He helped himself to another cup, draining the pot. “How are you holding up?”

“All right, I guess. It’s just so surreal that I’m having trouble believing that it’s all happening and I’m not in some kind of crazy dream. More like a nightmare, actually. How come none of this has ever come to light before? Something this big and all-encompassing, surely someone would have found something out.”

“Someone probably did,” Roy said grimly. “And that someone, and all the someones who came before and after them, probably met the same fate as Hughes would have met if he hadn’t had a handy Hohenheim around.”

“It just boggles the mind. Who would even want to be immortal in the first place? Can you imagine having to live on and watch everyone around you grow old and die?”

“I don’t think psychopaths like Bradley really see it in that way.”

“But what about his wife? Their child?”

Roy shrugged. “I don’t think he sees it that way. If you want something badly enough, then everything else falls by the wayside.” He paused. “I… No. Sorry. That’s not an appropriate train of thought.”

Riza raised an eyebrow. “Well, now you have to tell me.”

“It’s about your father. Are you sure you want to hear it?”

Riza nodded. Although her feelings for her father remained complicated, the time and space between them made it easier to look at things through a more neutral lens. She didn’t think that she was ever going to forgive him for what he had done to her, but at the same time, she was no longer wasting her energy being angry at either him or herself. He simply wasn’t worth the emotional investment she had given him for so long. 

“I was thinking that I can see certain similarities between Bradley and your father.” Roy glanced at her, but she nodded for him to continue. “There’s something about them both, that single-mindedness and that disregard for others. Your father’s desire to protect his complex array above all else, his willingness to completely destroy your life in order to achieve his own ends… I can see that same drive in Bradley, and I dread to think what would have happened to you if Hawkeye’s goal had been immortality instead of anything else.”

Riza shuddered. “Yes. When you put it like that, I can see why Mrs Bradley and Selim wouldn’t cross his mind at all. I don’t even want to think about my father being immortal. He did enough damage in the fifty-three years he had.”

Roy reached across and took her hand. He didn’t apologise; perhaps he knew better than that now. After so many years of carrying guilt around, Riza had hoped she’d made it clear that he didn’t have to anymore. 

“At least it’s over now.”

Riza nodded. “Yes. It’s over now. And in the end, I don’t think my life has been completely destroyed. I mean, it might be if Bradley does something drastic, but I can’t lay that one at my father’s door. I think that I’ve still found something good in spite of him and his disregard for everything.”

Roy smiled, and Riza could see the colour coming up in his cheeks. It was sweet to see it; the persona he wore within the military and when he was around the rest of the customers in the bar was always confident and self-assured, an easy-going ladies’ man, but Riza had known him long enough to know that the real Roy was just as flustered around her as she had been about him when she had first realised that she liked him as far more than a friend. 

They were settling now, having put the cards on the table the other night, and Riza knew that, if the circumstances in the outside world had been easier, they would have been moving ahead with the relationship without any concerns. But the circumstances were what they were, and with danger lurking in every corner, it felt premature to be making any kind of long-term plans beyond the fact that they wanted to be together right now in case they never got the chance in the future. 

Roy’s fingertips brushed her face, touching the frown line between her brows. 

“It’ll be all right.” He leaned in and pressed a kiss to her cheek. “Somehow, it’ll be all right.”

It wasn’t the firmest or most confident of statements, but it gave Riza some hope, and she smiled, knocking her coffee mug against his in a toast before they went back to join the others. Breda and Fuery were pouring over a book so old it was practically falling apart, and Riza wondered if it was stock from the shop upstairs. 

“Can you make out this transmutation circle?” Fuery thrust the book at him. “Armstrong doesn’t recognise it, but he thinks it’s a forbidden one.”

Roy grabbed the book and turned it this way and that, before his eyes widened.

“I think that’s for human transmutation.”

“Ah.” Breda and Fuery exchanged a worried look. Even the layman most ignorant of all things alchemic knew that human transmutation was the ultimate taboo, not just in Amestris but in general. 

“So, once we get our hands on someone who can read Ancient Xerxian, that one could prove to be a game changer,” Breda muttered. He shoved it on the ‘keep’ pile of documents, and Riza went to sit beside him and take a look at what they had so far. 

She had only just settled down when she jumped out of her skin as a pounding against the door began. It was the back door that led out into the alley with the garbage, the door that Madam Christmas brought all the booze in through; the door that would serve as their emergency exit if the speakeasy ever got raided. 

No one used that door on a regular basis, and Riza felt her blood going cold. She looked over at Madam Christmas, who, although as guarded as ever, looked genuinely concerned. She gave Riza a nod and reached under the bar, grabbing the rifle that was always kept there in case of problems and tossing it to her, and the two of them made their way through the bar towards the door. Roy followed them, pulling on his gloves and getting ready to strike. The pounding was not letting up, a steady and frantic hammering, and as tense as the noise was making her, Riza thought that the fact it wasn’t being punctuated with ‘open up in the name of the law’ and threats of the door being blown in meant that they weren’t being raided. 

“Please!” The voice was muffled through the thick wood and obscured by the constant pounding, but Riza could recognise it in an instant, and ice ran through her veins afresh. “Please let me in! Please!”

Madam Christmas unbolted the door and threw it open, catching Trisha as she fell in through the doorway. 

“Trisha? What’s going on?” Riza rushed to help her back on her feet.

“They’ve got Hohenheim!”

#FMA:Brotherhood #FMA Fanfiction #Royai #Riza Hawkeye #Roy Mustang #Fic: Forged Through Fire

[greywindys]

I had a fic I was working on for 2Doc week, but it betrayed me and turned angsty when I wanted something softer. So instead, I thought I could share a fic I never published, and I believe the first fic I ever wrote (dated in Google as complete on June 17th, 2016. Holy moly!)

It fits into day 3′s prompt of firsts - the first night the spent together on good terms. The beginning of the bond, I guess. It could also be considered the first head massage (lmao), as I like to think 2D is good with his hands in various scenarios 😉. (I adapted the head massage into scenes in later fics, but this was the first time I worked with it as a concept.)

If there are any “M” or “D” I apologize! When I was starting out, I was too self-conscious to write their entire names (lmao @ me). Oh, how things have changed. Hopefully, I corrected them all, along with most of the typos...

The rating here is T. Essentially, Murdoc encounters 2D late at night when he can’t sleep, and ends up watching a movie with him. They begin to form a tentative bond, head massages are had as much needed sleep. Takes place during P1.

Also happy bday again, Murdoc 😭

For Murdoc, sleeping is a daunting game of chance. First, there are the good nights, when he drinks enough to remain in a complete stupor until daylight. Then, there are the bad nights when his body’s need for genuine slumber catches up with him. On these nights, he dreams. More often than not, they come to him in the form of nightmares ranging from painfully specific to vague and unsettling. Like a flood, all of the emotions and thoughts he had intended to leave behind in Stoke return.

Tonight is one of those nights.  

This one, in particular, is the reason he’s left the grimy safety of his Winne, head still aching. He intends to rummage through the studio mini-fridge for the half-consumed bottle of rum he started that morning. (after all, his anxiety wasn’t going to fix itself). Instead, he's thrilled to discover the fridge has been restocked, and he's about to grab an unopened bottle of rum when he's interrupted by a crash coming from the direction of the lobby.

The noise is coming towards the kitchen now in slow, shuffling steps. Murdoc presumes it could either be one of the wayward demons he summoned the other day, or it could be another one of the building's many intruders looking for a blank wall to vandalize. Nothing he wants to deal with now in his anxious state. Murdoc considers making a run for his Winnebago but decides against it. ‘You’re Murdoc Niccals” he thinks to himself, ‘Bass god and creative genius. You're not ten anymore and you don't get scared.' With that, he braces himself and he turns to face the unknown figure that was now in the doorway.

“Oh...Hi, Murdoc.”

It’s 2D.

“I've got half a mind to lob you through another car window,” he says trying to mask his surprise. “What the hell are you doing walking around with the lights off in the middle of the night?” That must have been the source of the noise. Typical. It’s as if 2D is intentionally searching for a way to get injured.

2D scratches his head. “No need to get so steamed up about it. I, uh, well, I guess I was trying to keep to the ambiance and all that. I didn’t think anyone else would be awake right now.”

“I don’t know what’s so unexpected. I get more done in a night that you would in a year,” Murdoc replies. He takes a sip of one of the bottles of rum he’s assembled on the counter. “So long as there are still songs to write, the siestas can wait.”

“Not sleeping well then?” 2D asks blithely. Murdoc can’t tell if the singer has seen right through him or failed to comprehend a word of what he just said. He finds him very unreadable at times, and in the most infuriating way.

“No. I was working. Being productive. You ought to try it once in a while,” Murdoc grumbles in response. “Anyways. What’s all this about the ‘ambiance’?” As if 2D is that deep. “And why here?”

“That new zombie movie, you know the one I was telling you about? Well, it arrived today,” 2D says with a grin. “And now I’m watching it. It’s a lot scarier when you do it the dark.”

“Well you have a TV, no, THREE TVs in your room,” Murdoc retorts, exasperated. “Just go away and watch it there.”

“Yeah, uh, l thought about that, but the special effects in this one are supposed to be wicked good and the screen in the lobby has a clearer picture than the screens in my room. I would have watched it this afternoon, but Russel said Noodle shouldn’t be watching all the blood and guts, so I waited until now. It’s better watching scary movies late at night anyway, you know?” 2D is looking at Murdoc now, a tinge of hopefulness in his voice. “A couple blokes on this forum I was reading were describing it like a Romero meets Raimi type film, really over the top.”

“Sounds like a real Oscar winner you have there,” the sarcasm in Murdoc’s voice is palpable.

“Actually, it was a straight to video release, but you should check it out,” 2D says. “I’m only about ten minutes in now...if you have...time,” he trails off awkwardly.

The band had faced many inexplicable and absurd situations, but it is 2D’s consistent attempts to be friends that confounded Murdoc the most. His first inclination to tell the singer to fuck off. Yet the thought of the solitary journey back through the car park gives him pause. He isn't sure he can handle being alone right now. He needs an immediate distraction, a mood lifter, and making fun of 2D has the potential to be a two in one solution. At the very least, it was a safer gamble than going back and running the risk of falling asleep again.

Murdoc makes 2D wait for an answer in uncomfortable silence before replying. “Fine,” he says, “This better be entertaining.”

2D brightens at his response. “Just let me grab some snacks and then we can go back.”

“Yeah, yeah. Oh, and this time turn on the damn lights.”

With some newly acquired light and a bag of crackers in hand, 2D leads Murdoc to the lobby. A collection of pillows and blankets litter the floor. All the while, and to Murdoc’s annoyance, he takes the time to tell him every detail of the conception of his setup. He had been in the lobby for the past four hours watching movies. According to 2D, doing so in such an open area was much scarier than in his room or even in the building’s cinema. He was also sorry because they would have to turn the lights off again when the film starts. “Because well, you know, Muds. The ambiance.”

“Just start the bloody movie will you,” Murdoc replies from his spot on the floor. The size of Kong is intimidating at night, and it’s not helping him calm down. He hates how much his dreams still affect him. Physically, he had left all the bad energy behind ages ago, but mentally it follows him like a low-hanging mist, threatening to completely engulf him daily. He couldn't seem to make it go away, but he could control how much he thought about it. Alcohol was typically his mainstay but right now, that job belonged to an unwitting 2D. If he didn’t start the movie soon, Murdoc was going to set his entire movie collection on fire.

“It’s the little triangle that does the trick, right?” 2D asks as he studies the remote. “Never mind. I think I have it. There we go.”

The scene starts with a group of young adults in their twenties hiking through the woods as night falls. Occasionally, the camera switches angles. It shows the group from alternate perspectives such as the bushes or the tops of trees.

“The director wanted to flip the whole slow zombie portrayal on its head,” 2D explains. “There’s already been talk of fast zombies in the indie horror community, but he wants to take that one step further. In an interview, he said that not only were his zombies going to be fast, but they were also going to fly.”

“That’s stupid. And you thought this was worth the twenty or so quid you blew on it?”

“He’s ahead of his time. You’ll see. Look,” 2D says through a mouthful of crackers. He points to the current scene. One of the protagonists had wandered away from his group in search of a good place to set up camp. “See what he does with the camera there? We’re watching the main character from the perspective of a flying zombie. The director wanted to make a movie about an outbreak that emerges in the wilderness, not because of some virus. It's meant to add to the impossibility of the situation. How do we fight against something not man-made? Watching the film through the eyes of the monster emphasizes how alone and insignificant we are in the face of well, everything. Man versus nature, nature versus man.”

Murdoc grabs the bag of crackers from 2D. “Oh please. This is hardly cutting edge. We all know they’ll all be dead in the end because nature is bigger than man. Duh.” He takes a handful for himself and continues watching.

2D ignores him and continues his reflection. “It makes me wonder whether it would be better to be a zombie at the end, rather than survive. Not sure I would want the loneliness that comes with it.”

Murdoc is beginning to realize that 2D is in one of his chatty, philosophical moods. He attempts to tune out the singer’s blathering with another drink from the bottle of rum he brought with him from the kitchen. He came here to watch a ridiculous movie. Instead, he's stuck listening to banal musings about the true nature of humanity from someone with a half-functioning brain.

“Well if there’s ever a zombie apocalypse here, I’ll be sure to let them eat you first if you’re so eager. You’re already halfway there anyway, and certainly no better off than these divs on screen.”

“Thanks, Muds. If I ever get infected, I’ll make sure not to bite you...unless you want me too,” 2D replies.

This time, it’s Murdoc's turn to ignore him. “Anyways, as far as I’m concerned, anyone who’s too pathetic to fight against a zombie apocalypse deserves whatever is coming to them.” He gets a twisted sense of comfort from blaming.

“I dunno...I don’t see any shame in being afraid of a monster bigger than you. That’s what makes these movies so scary. We all have our own monsters that seem impossible to overcome,” 2D says sagely. “It’s not anyone’s fault, it’s just how it is.”

Murdoc scowls. “Does watching movies at this hour always turn you into a half-braindead Socrates? Or Plato? Hippocrates? He's just naming names now. He fidgets.  

On-screen, another character screams as one of the zombies bites her arm.

“Are you alright there, Muds?” Why did 2D have to pick up on everything? “Movie too scary for ya?”

“No!” Murdoc snaps. “It’s not that… It’s just...” Neither 2D nor the rum he grabbed from the fridge earlier had done anything to dull his current bout of nerves. Instead, all the tension has been gathering at the base of his neck. The throbbing in his head from before is even worse. He groans in frustration.

“You just seem a little on edge, that’s all.”

“...It’s my head.”

“Oh, you have a headache,” 2D says, seemingly pleased that it’s an issue well within the breadth of his expertise. “Do you need any help with it? I was talking with my mum about mine just last week; she gave me something good.”  

Murdoc perks up. He could count on one hand the number of scenarios where he would place his trust in 2D. Pain medicine was one of them. A strong painkiller could change everything. “Do you happen to any of those buggers with you now?”

“Sure,” 2D says, smiling as he moves closer to where Murdoc is sitting.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m um, well for this to work I’m actually going to have to touch your head.”

Immediately, Murdoc jerks away. “You what?!”

2D shrinks back in response. “It’s just a head massage, Muds.  My mum’s worried about the number of prescriptions I have so we cut one of the stronger ones out and replaced it with this. We wanted to see if it made a difference. I’ve been going to a massage therapist for the past two weeks or so. It doesn’t quite do the trick but it works well enough, I picked up some technique myself, uh, I think.”

“You can take all that geeky zen rubbish and sod off,” Murdoc mutters.

“Okay, Muds...alright.”

They continue watching the screen as victim after victim gets infected. 2D continues to interject with overlong descriptions about symbolism, zombie lore, and film technique. Murdoc weighs his options. If he’s being honest, he’s at a point where he would accept anything that might make him feel better. But why did it have to be 2D? On the other hand, the singer wouldn’t stop talking. Considering it was just the two of them, and no one else would ever have to find out, Murdoc makes his decision. Allowing 2D to touch his head in this scenario was justified. Interrupting yet another explanation about the folly of man, he asks, “Hey uh...2D? You know that massage you were talking about? Will giving me one make you shut up for more than ten minutes?”

“Oh..uh,” 2D sounds surprised. “Yeah. Yeah, we can give it a try.” Hesitantly, he moves behind Murdoc and begins.

2D’s fingers send tiny sparks along Murdoc’s scalp as he kneads the muscles in his forehead, moving downwards along his hairline. He dwells on how amazing it feels but pushes that thought to the side with haste. He keeps his eyes locked on the screen and the excessive depictions of gore and chaos. It’s an apt representation of turmoil he is currently feeling inside. What he finds so maddening about 2D, even more than his inscrutability and empty-headedness, was his willingness to be kind to Murdoc. Murdoc had spent the past twenty or so years convincing himself that kindness was not meant to be a part of his life. There was something inherent to his existence that repelled it from him. And he had come to accept that until 2D had to come along and mess it all up. It had to be because he was just too stupid, there was no other answer. Murdoc wasn’t sure he would be able to handle any other answer.

As 2D moves his hands to the back of Murdoc’s head, he begins softly humming. He begins following along to the soundtrack of the movie but soon trails off on his own. Evidently, watching the movie without any sort of verbalization was not going to happen. However, the melody he’s come up with is wistful and soothing. Murdoc makes a mental note to ask him about it in the morning to see if it would fit with some lyrics he had drafting. Slowly, and a bit self-consciously, Murdoc feels himself begin to relax.

“How does it feel so far? Is it working?” 2D asks.

Oh, it was working. More than that, Murdoc realizes a significant amount of his tension had abated. The darkness of the lobby no longer looks so menacing, the unpleasant memories that were hovering over him seem to have floated away. He's never been able to settle himself down from a bad night without copious amounts of alcohol. It’s an unfamiliar but pleasant sensation.

“I think the movie is almost over. Didn’t quite live up to the hype but it was still pretty entertaining after all. How about you?” 2D asks, still looking for a response.

Murdoc yawns. “I’ll give this director you were so excited about some credit. He knows his way around a good death scene. I don’t think I’ve ever seen fake blood used that way before.”

“The fake blood actually cause a lot of controversies because some of it was real animal blood. I almost didn’t buy it myself.”

“Ah. A man after my own heart.” 2D’s hands are still kneading the back of his head when Murdoc moves to lie down on his stomach.

“Oh, are you going to sleep now?” 2D asks.

“No. Keep going.” He would have never considered it earlier in the night but, as the singer's fingers continue to run through his hair, Murdoc muses that sleep may not sound so bad after all. Even though it was just 2D, it’s comforting to have him there. 

“So I guess it’s been helping then? My mum will glad to hear,” 2D says. “But you might want to run a comb through your hair a bit more often, it’s all greasy...also a bit tangled in the back.”

“Just...shut up.”

So he does, returning to the reflective melody he had been humming just minutes ago. It’s the singer’s soft croon that sticks in Murdoc's mind as he finally drifts off completely.

-------

When his eyes open, the first thing Murdoc notices is the half-empty bottle of rum he had left by his side. The next thing he notices is that he's still in the lobby, surrounded by blankets. He must have slept there the entire night. 

“Oh, morning, Muds,” comes a familiar voice just to the right of him. “You’re awake.”

Turning quickly in the direction of the voice, Murdoc finds himself face to face with 2D. “What the hell are you still doing here?” M demands, mortified, “Why didn’t you go back to your own room?”

“Well, I was going to do that, but once you laid down, I wanted to lay down too, and you rolled over on my arm and wouldn’t budge. I tried to tell you, but all you did was try and elbow me. You missed though,” 2D mumbles. It sounds like he’s still half asleep. “Then I guess I just nodded off.”

Murdoc feels his embarrassment beginning to morph into anger but decides to ignore it. He's pretty comfortable right where he is. “You’re lucky you’re my lead singer.” 2D was also lucky that he gave good head massages. “Because otherwise, you would be on some really thin ice right now.”

“We’ll be lucky to see any ice at all this winter what with all the warm weather.”

Usually, an obtuse response from 2D would have earned him a string of insults or a swat on the head. Today was not going to be one of those days. Murdoc turns again so that he’s facing away from the singer, pulling the blanket over his head to block out the light. He was going to savor the moment a bit longer. Despite 2D being 2D, it’s rare that he’s ever felt so at peace.

“Hey, Murdoc? Wait,” 2D says, “You never gave me my arm back.”

“Too bad. I’ll check back in a couple hours,” Murdoc grins beneath the blanket. He still couldn’t pass up a chance to inconvenience the singer at every opportunity. It was too much fun.

“Don’t be such a wanker,” 2D says as he attempts to jerk his arm out from underneath the bassist. “I was nice to you!”

He was right. And he was probably nicer than he deserved, given their history. For that reason, Murdoc would roll off his arm soon enough. He still wanted to talk to him about that song he had been humming.

The singer had surprised him last night. Murdoc knew that 2D had an uncanny ability to figure out how to annoy him to maximum effect, but he never would have expected him to also know what to do to put him at ease. Underneath the covers, he ponders what exactly this realization means to him. He isn’t sure, but he knows it means something. It wasn’t going to eliminate the underlying resentment he still clung to, nor was it going to solve his infinite list of issues. But at the very least, he could rest assured knowing that he wasn’t completely alone.

#ficpost #2doc week 2020 #it's interesting to reflect on what's changed #anyhow! just a little thing to close out the week

[branwyn-says]

2020 fanfic review meme!

Thanks to @livenudebigfoot for tagging me and providing me with a legitimate excuse to reflect self-indulgently on my special interest: writing obsessive amounts of fic for Michael Emerson vehicles. What fic did I disgorge from my brain maw this year? This was the year I started writing for Person of Interest, the fandom that changed my life! I found a fannish community on the Subway discord and joined a whole bunch of exchanges, which I’d never done before. 

In February for chocolate_box, I wrote 7 stories:

The Life of the World to Come (Person of Interest, Reese/Finch): Canon compliant fix it in which Reese wakes up in a lakeside cabin about 6 weeks after he died. Unspecified magical bargains were involved.

Arctic Flower (POI, Grace/Jessica): An AU in which Jessica rushes to assist Grace when a cyclist knocks her down in the park, and their friendship enables her to leave Peter before it’s too late.

A Bird of Foreign Tongue (POI, Reese/Finch): A sequel to Arctic Flower in which Harold finds still-in-the-CIA Reese and offers him an escape route.

Objet d’Art (POI, Finch/Grace): During a coffee date early in their pre-canon relationship, Harold has a guilty conscience about all the secrets he’s hiding from Grace.

Kintsugi (POI, Finch/Grace): The longer sequel to Objet D’art. Grace gets sick. She doesn’t have health insurance. Harold panics and decides to take care of her himself.

Incentives (POI, Reese/Fusco): John’s in the trunk. 

Fixer-Upper (POI, Reese/Zoe Morgan): In every fandom, I write gender AUs. This one is Zoe Morgan taking always-a-girl!Reese under her wing.

Then in the spring, I wrote one story for the Hurt/Comfort Exchange and two for Exchange of Interest:

Line of Duty (POI, Reese/Fusco) 14k about Fusco making really self destructive life choices thanks to low self worth and unresolved trauma, while Reese is forced to stand back and wring his hands. And then, you know, exact a lot of vengeance. Harold has soup.

Number Every One (POI, Reese/Nathan): AU in which Nathan saves Jessica, and Reese comes asking questions.

Eden (POI, Reese/Jessica): A perfect, ordinary moment in John’s relationship with the one person who connects him to the world.

And then I wrote some stories for @livenudebigfoot because I enjoy making her happy.

An Indulgence (POI, Finch/Fusco): Fusco is having an emergency and Finch is there for him. My first foray into ABO and literally all they do is hug; is this my brand?

Bunnymoon (Lost, Ben Linus/John Locke): I acquired this whole new fandom/OTP without meaning to, and then I wrote 8000 words of animal shelter AU for it.

Shipoween was next, and I was very proud of the two stories I wrote because both of them are short and this is hard when you exhale novel-length plot outlines instead of carbon dioxide. Also they are both creepy and kinda experimental, like back in my Buffy days. It was also my first time pinch hitting for an exchange and I got a nice little buzz off pulling that off with one day to deadline.

a lucid dream (Lost, Ben Linus/John Locke): Ben is having a very bad dream, and it’s all his own fault.

One In the Eye (POI, Finch/Fusco): Harold’s a monster. Fusco’s a cryptid.

This was my first year doing a Big Bang exchange and the story I wrote for it is, in my own opinion, the best thing I have ever written.

Kingfishers (POI, Reese/Finch/Grace): An AU in which Harold didn’t introduce himself to Grace that day in the park. Years later, after Harold starts working with John, they receive her number. 

I wrote a popular Star Trek fic in 2019 and then went more than a year and a half without updating, two chapters before the end. I’m sorry, I’m a monster. Now there’s only one chapter left before the end. I’m shooting to get it finished by the end of January. I’m sorry I suck so much.

K’diwa: A Steamy Novel of Interspecies Romance (Star Trek AOS, Kirk/Spock) And then, after a swift crash course in participating in fics and exchanges, I took on managing the POI Advent 2020 Calendar. I needed to write a five-parter in order to plug holes in the posting schedule, and a Muppet crossover was born.

A Muppet Christmas Carol, Starring Harold Finch (Person of Interest, Muppets)

Takeaways from reflecting on your kick-ass writing, or kick-ass lack of writing, during a year more focused on survival than perhaps any other:

I’ll be 39 next month. I’ve been writing seriously since I was 15. I was a very good writer for a 15 year old, for a 19 year old, but I could never have dreamed of writing the way I do now. No amount of hard work, practice, reading, conferring with other writers, editing manuscripts, or thinking about craft could have made me the kind of writer it’s possible for me to be in my late 30s. Youthful geniuses are a myth. I’m really grateful my agent couldn’t sell my novel 10 years ago--when I finish the next one I will get to introduce myself to the world as the writer I am now.

Most surprising fic you wrote this year:

Oh, definitely Bunnymoon. I had no idea I would be writing fic for Lost at all, much less that I would be writing a mundane AU with comedy and my first E rated scene in years. It is entirely the fault of bigfoot, who infected me with the fandom in general and the animal shelter concept in specific.

How you’ve grown as a writer this year:

I’ve learned a lot about what not to say--when to trust the reader--and I have benefited hugely from thinking hard about formal structure. Every idea used to turn into a novel whether I wanted to or not, but revisiting high school English lessons about short story structure vs 3 act structure has changed my whole game.

What’s coming in 2021:

I would really like to write one more story in my Harold & Grace series, another story in the Jessica Lives AU, and I’ll def. sign up for HCEX and Shipoween. But also, this year I am writing a novel.  Tagging @theimprobable1, @liz-squids, @argylepiratewd, @sidewaystime

#meme #person of interest

[twokinkybeans]

Love Me ’Til My Life Is Done

Summary:  “I wish you didn’t have to do this for me, Peter…” Tony mumbles staring at the floor. Droplets falling from his silver hair. The strands thin and frail, like the rest of his body. Peter shakes his head.

“No no no, Tony, we’ve been over this. I love you. I chose to be with you and I knew what I got myself into. This-” Peter gestures at the both of them and continues drying off his body, “-is part of that choice. I’ve never regretted it, and I never will.”

-

In which it's the year 2052 and Peter and Tony deal with the new struggles of their age difference and Tony's deteriorating health.

Find it on AO3

Warnings: Old age, dementia, angst, hurt, feelings, medical conditions.

Author’s Note: This work is inspired by a mixture of things, such as my own job and this Tumblr post.  The fic is bittersweet, so please be prepared or leave if you'd rather not read that. I honestly don’t know why I wrote this as I gave myself all the feels too but, ah, here it is! - xx Kim

Peter smiles when he turns off the shower. He takes the large towel from the grab bar behind him and wraps it around Tony’s shoulders, gently rubbing the skin dry. Tony sighs and looks up at the other man, his troubled smile giving away exactly what he’s thinking about. Peter knows how much he hates this. Of course, the intimacy of the situation is nice. But that’s it, really. It’s bittersweet. “I wish you didn’t have to do this for me, Peter…” Tony mumbles staring at the floor. Droplets falling from his silver hair. The strands thin and frail, like the rest of his body. Peter shakes his head. “No no no, Tony, we’ve been over this. I love you. I chose to be with you and I knew what I got myself into. This-” Peter gestures at the both of them and continues drying off his body, “-is part of that choice. I’ve never regretted it, and I never will.” Peter understands where Tony’s coming from. It’s not easy. Nothing about the situation is. Last week, they celebrated Tony’s 82nd birthday. Eighty-two. Tony’s old. Peter isn’t. He’s not the youngest, obviously, but his own 50 years are not even close to catching up with his lover. “I know you and May have been secretly plotting your escape to - what do they call it nowadays - community living? I’m not letting some random strangers take care of either of you.” Peter’s done volunteer work in elderly care a few years prior to Tony’s deteriorating health, and they were so thoroughly understaffed that no one got the attention and care they needed. Peter will not do that to them unless absolutely necessary for whatever reason. “You’re not a nurse though, Peter.” “And you’re not my patient, Tony. You’re my fucking husband. You wish I was a nurse. I’d be the sexiest one you’ve ever seen.” Tony snorts at that and shakes his head. “You’ll never change.” “Nope, now come here,” Peter chuckles as he rips the small package and presses the fentanyl patch onto the man’s shoulder blade, “-look? All done, Sir. Now let me, ‘nurse Peter’, make you pancakes for breakfast.” “Oh, mh- That sounds lovely. Maybe I don’t want to move out after all.” “That’s what I thought.” Peter presses a soft kiss on the man’s cheek and ruffles Tony’s hair. Let’s get you dressed first.”

Ten minutes later, they find themselves in the kitchen. Tony walks over to the chair and grunts as he lowers himself onto it. Aunt May’s already there, reading a book. She puts it down and turns her wheelchair around, beckoning Peter to lean in for a kiss on her cheek. He smiles and does so, squeezing her shoulder as he stands back up.  “Morning, Pete, did he put up a fuss in the shower this morning, took you long enough.” “You know I like making it hard on him,” Tony jokes, making Peter chuckle. These two... May has lived with them for two years now. The woman, despite her age, still as bright and quirky as she’s always been. She’s never been able to regain the required strength needed to walk after the infection that came with her total hip replacement. She didn’t have the money to buy or rent a wheelchair accessible apartment, so Peter and Tony decided she could just come live with them. Not soon after, Tony had a series of transient ischemic attacks. Neither of those ever left too much damage, but it was clear that aside from the desensitization in his left arm, his brain had taken a hit due to the reoccurrence of the attacks too. A near eight months after his first TIA, the doctors diagnosed him with the first stage of vascular dementia. The last TIA occurred more than three months ago and he seemed stable now, but Peter knew it could change at any given moment and that scared him sometimes. It’s tough. The entire situation is. But at the same time, he feels so blessed that he had the time and means to help them. That he has people he cares for so deeply. Peter’s determined to make the most out of every single second they’ve got left.

“Peter, do you think we could eat pancakes for breakfast?” Peter’s heart clenches when the man speaks those words, but he musters a bright smile onto his face. He sees May glance between them, and he knows she knows this was yet another one of - as they’ve started to call it - Tony’s glitches. She keeps her mouth closed, for now, and Peter is glad. Tony is still very much in denial about his illness and talking about it didn’t make it any better so far.  “That’s a great idea, Tones! Let me see if we have the ingredients we need.” 

-

Another.

Tony had another TIA yesterday. Peter’s lips are quivering as he stares at his husband, the sleeping man so small and vulnerable in their double bed. He trails his fingers past the man’s upper arm and sighs, lowering his head. The doctor visited a few hours earlier, checking up on him. He’d sighed. “You know the drill, Mr. Parker. We have to be patient and see which functions come surging back. I’ve prescribed him the same meds as usual.��

Wait and see.

Wait and see.

Peter hates to wait and see. He can’t stand not knowing how much of Tony he’s lost this time. Which memories have been wiped from the man’s existence. Would he still be able to walk? Write? Speak? He knew that TIA’s, as opposed to having an actual stroke, usually came with small losses. One could never be sure though. “Peter, can I come in?” Peter looks up to see Aunt May in the doorway and he nods slightly. The squeaking of her wheelchair familiar and grounding as she rolls towards him.  “I hate this,” Peter croaks and he can no longer keep the stinging in his eyes at bay. His vision becomes blurry when his tears flow freely. “I fucking hate this. I know, I know you’re both going to die one day. And- morbid as it sounds that’s okay. But I can’t lose him while he’s still here, May… I can’t… I can’t…”  “I know, Peter…” May rests a hand on his shoulder and leans in as far as possible. Peter does the same, hugging her carefully and sobs into her embrace. He can deal with Tony forgetting the day of the week. He can deal with Tony mixing up memories. He can deal with Tony wondering where exactly they are.

He’s not sure if he can deal with more losses. But he has to. He has to and he loves Tony. Even if Tony won’t be there, he’s going to love and cherish him. As promised all those years ago. As a good husband should. Because he doesn’t want to leave the man all by himself. He knows, knows that even if a day would come where Tony doesn’t remember his face, he can still provide him with warmth, a gentle touch. He will do exactly that for as long as it takes.

“He’s strong, Peter. We both know that. Don’t give up hope just yet.”

- 

“Jarvis?” Tony mumbles and he squints his eyes at the piece of paper in front of him. A gentle and somewhat familiar female voice answers him. “Yes, boss?”  “Where is Peter? Do you know?” Tony folds the paper carefully and looks for the envelope he fetched himself earlier. He sighs as he can’t find it on his desk and shakes his head. It’s okay, he tells himself. It’s okay. He knows his brain isn’t cooperating but getting angry won’t help him in this situation. He wants to get angry, he does, but he forces it down. There will be a time where he won’t be able to calm himself so he wants to do it now. As long as he’s still aware of his own actions. He stands up from the chair and walks over towards the large closet on the other side of the bedroom to get a new envelope. “In the living room, boss. Watching that old movie from 2019 that May loves so much.” Tony snorts and shakes his head. May sure loves old movies. “Frozen?” “Yes, the second one,” the AI says. Tony smiles, putting the note in the envelope and licking the sticky stripe to seal it. May watches that movie at least twice a year. Every single song, every bit of dialogue stuck in his head forever. No matter how forgetful he’ll get, those images will never escape his mind.

Tony takes a deep breath and carefully slips the envelope under Peter’s pillow to find later. He should go and join Peter and May for the movie. As much as he thinks it’s ridiculous, he’s grown to love it over the years. He readjusts the arm support strap around his wrist to keep it from cutting off his blood supply and stops in his tracks. Did he put the envelope under Peter’s pillow? He turns around and sighs in relief when he sees the edge off the paper sticking from underneath it. Good. He did what he had to do. He turns to the door again and sets off towards the living area.

-

Peter sighs as he crawls underneath the blankets. He helped Tony get to bed earlier, but then as he’d wanted to get in himself, May had called for him to help her go to the bathroom. He did, she was in bed again, and now he was too. Finally. He readjusts his pillow, shifting it closer towards the middle so he can spoon Tony when his hands brush past something. He frowns and reaches out for it. It’s an envelope. He turns it, but both sides are white and empty. “Open it,” Tony breathes quietly. Peter looks at him for a moment, his heart pounding in his chest.  “Is it from you?” “Yes.” Peter takes a deep breath at the answer and carefully tears the envelope open and pulls out the small note. His fingers are near shaking with anticipation when he unfolds it. It’s a handwritten note. Before he reads it, Tony speaks again. “I know it’s not easy, Peter. For either of us, but- I’m forever grateful that you chose to be my husband and…” Tony’s eyes fill with tears. “I want us to enjoy what we have while we still can. I- I found this poem online and I know it isn’t fully accurate yet, but- Dammit. I love you, Peter. I love you, and you’re the best thing that’s happened to me.” “Tony, I-” “Read it first, please. Just read it.”

“Do not ask me to remember” by Owen Darnell Do not ask me to remember, Don’t try to make me understand, Let me rest and know you’re with me, Kiss my cheek and hold my hand.

I’m confused beyond your concept, I am sad and sick and lost. All I know is that I need you To be with me at all cost.

Do not lose your patience with me, Do not scold or curse or cry. I can’t help the way I’m acting, Can’t be different though I try.

Just remember that I need you, That the best of me is gone, Please don’t fail to stand beside me, Love me ’til my life is done.

Peter’s sobbing before he even finishes reading it and once he reaches the end, he rolls over to bury his face against Tony’s chest.  “I will. I will, Tony. I’ll love you ‘til the end and beyond.” “I don’t want to not remember you, Peter. I know my brain is derailing and I sure fucking hope that day never comes. But even then- knowing that you will love me, it’s... It’s more than I could ask for and all I know I need.” “Always. Tones. Always.”

#starker #tony stark #peter x tony #tony x peter #ironspider #iron man #iron man x spider man #spider man x iron man #ironman #spider man #spiderman #tw: dementia #tw: medical conditions #tw: sickness #dementia #fanfic #fan fic #fan fiction #fanfiction #ao3 fanfic #mcu #marvel #peter parker #adult peter parker #angst #emotions #old age #kinkybeankim

[twentyghosts]

End of Year Fic Meme 2020

Totals:

Grand Total Fandoms: Just 1, the greater Marvel Cinematic Universe Grand Total Stories: 12 Grand Total Word Count:  215,370

Overall Thoughts:

Earlier in the year I thought I might take a bit of a break from fandom, especially since there hasn’t been any new Marvel content and nothing new has grabbed me in a ficcish way, but as the pandemic dragged on it became more of an escape.

Looking back, did you write more fic than you thought you would this year, less, or about what you’d predicted?

More.

What pairing/genre/fandom did you write that you would never have predicted in January?

I was extremely predictable this year. Even when I signed up for the @marvelfandomscramble​ and got randomly assigned characters + scenario, I ended up with Peter Parker and Carol Danvers and wrote something that was very in my wheelhouse.

What’s your own favorite story of the year? Not the most popular, but the one that makes you happiest?

Hmm. Maybe Take Two? It’s hard for me to say--I tend to enjoy what I’m writing on while I’m writing it and as soon as it’s posted all I can see is flaws. 

Did you take any writing risks this year? What did you learn from them?

No, this year was not at all about leaving my comfort zone. (I guess signing up for the scramble was a potential risk but my assignment ended up not being particularly risky.)

My best story of this year:

Must a story be good? Is it not enough to simply contain pleasing tropes? But I guess I am proud of my gen Nat & Bruce Endgame story.  (For Now) I Have This

My most popular story of this year:

Never A Breath You Can Afford To Waste by hits (which makes sense since it has 25 chapters),  Take Two by kudos.

Story of mine most under-appreciated by the universe, in my opinion:

Well,  Weathering is my least popular this year, which isn’t surprising since it’s a gen story focused on Valkyrie. I like it though.

Most fun story to write:

A New Day Has Begun, the birthday fic I wrote for @godlessondheimite. It was enjoyably unhinged to combine the world of Cats (2019) with Avengers (2012).

Story with the single sexiest moment:

Never A Breath You Can Afford To Waste, which has a non-fade-to-black sex scene although it is clumsy and awkward. I’m not a very sexy writer!

Story with the single sweetest moment:

I only write fic as an excuse to get to the sweet moments. <- this is my answer from last year and it remains true

But if it’s not Bruce and Tony sitting through Cats (2019) for each others’ sakes, it might be  By Any Other Name with teen flowershop assistant Bruce.

Most “Holy crap, that’s wrong, even for you” story:

"Wrong even for me” would probably just be like someone buying non-fair trade coffee. I did allude to off-screen zombies in Getting Better All The Time, and I hate zombies.

Story that shifted my own perceptions of the characters:

Peter, Peter, Pumpkin Carver was my first time writing a vaguely canon-accepting post-Endgame Peter? I don’t know that it really shifted my perceptions but made me define my perceptions.

Hardest story to write:

Maybe just  Never A Breath You Can Afford To Waste because it was so long, I lost some steam in the middle for awhile.

Biggest Disappointment:

I was happy with my output ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I guess it was disappointing that my MTH auction winner apparently never read the fic they commissioned from me (Salad Days)? Or if they did they didn’t respond in any way. But they gave the money to charity and some other people enjoyed the fic, so, whatever.

Biggest Surprise:

Mostly just that I wrote so much at all? Also it’s a nice surprise that anyone is still interested in reading my boring AUs when the Marvel Cinematic Universe was on pause.

Most Unintentionally Telling Story:

I mean, I was open about  Never A Breath You Can Afford To Waste being semi-based on my own illness a few years ago, with an extra-intense dose of hurt/comfort.

Plans for the next year:

I have another @marveltrumpshate fill to write and after that, who knows? Every time I write another boring Bruce/Tony AU I think it must be my last one and then some fresh idea infects my brain, so I’ll never say never. I do want to turn another eye to my Ladies of Marvel bingo card and see if I can squeeze out a bingo.

OK bye, thanks for reading (this meme and also if you read anything I wrote this year, I appreciate you!)

#end of year meme #dumb stuff i make up

[sircarolyn]

for the wip meme: ahh I want to ask about all the dw ones....how about i contain myself to um. three? “as you sparkle in the sky (vxl)” and “laughter lines” and “will you be my future or just an escape”?

please feel free to ask about any of the other ones too, if you want! you’ve probably picked three of the most coherent documents i own though, aha <3

as you sparkle is the veega/leela document, of course, and it’s made up like three half finished fics, and every thought i’ve ever had about them 

laughter lines is a little 13/river concept i’ve had for ages and ages and ages that i never got round to finishing because other stuff kept grabbing my attention instead

and will you be my future is the most self-indulgent sarah jane/kate stewart nonsense ever that i wrote feverishly some time last year before gallifrey infected me

more details under the cut because i rambled on, aha

as you sparkle in the sky 

this is a lyric from the shinedown song ‘miracle’: as you sparkle in the sky / i’ll catch you while i can / cause all we are is all i am / i just want you to see what i’ve always believed / you are the miracle in me

this is the place where all my veega/leela(/romana) ideas have settled, so it is kind of a mess, and i keep getting new snippets of ideas that i have to note down - and because i’m incapable of writing fic longer than 5k, it’s more or less manageable to keep all the different bits i’m trying to work on at once in there

i went on about the ot3 the other day, but i have since off the back of your tags been thinking more about narvin in this au because more and more i’ve started to enter the galaxy brain shipping space of leela/romana/narvin - and i still don’t think that’s the angle i’d approach for this fic because i am specifically interested in how it’s all going to tear leela into teeny tiny little bits (me thinking about leela? audible gasp...) - but anyway, unfortunately in the set up I’m angling for where romana has to be comatose for a while, I think I am going to have to make narvin really sad… because as you say, he and romana have been through so so much pre-unity and this whole circumstance is a whole lot harder and more complicated than any of them really expected which really feels like saying something

but yeah, as for the other stuff in this document – a lot of notes on the dynamic between veega and romana, a whole list of song lyrics I intend to steal for titles, a frankly alarming and somewhat revealing amount of comments to myself that read like ‘leela’s so strong and buff’ ‘leela’s strong arms’ ‘leela fighting off raiders looking glorious’… like ok me! someone’s got an agenda…

there’s also two half formed fics, one which is about rayo and his relationship with the fact that he never knew his father, and that leela’s always a bit weird about him looking up to her as a mother figure because she’s got a shit ton of motherhood trauma, which is something I sure wish they’d stop doing to her :/

the other is like not that deep, it’s just veega and leela being kind of soft, as well as just trying to pack in a little bit of backstory just because I can but I also want them to be gentle and kind to each other – may well end up down the ‘you never said you were from gallifrey, how am I meant to trust you?’ route at some point, but for now, they’re soft and I love them <3 here’s an extract (though I wrote this before I thought about the language thing so it might change, but whatever):

Veega cannot look away. Their first coherent conversation goes round her head again, Leela proclaiming I will protect you even though she could barely get up from the bed. I will get better and I will not let anyone hurt you. I owe you that.

It had felt funny at the time – after all, Veega had picked her up on the dirt plain looking hours from death. Veega has seen too many people lost on the plains, convinced that the city is closer than it really is, condemned to perish out of stupidity or confusion. Unity is not a friendly world.

And until now, seeing her there fighting the raiders off as easily as if she were picking flowers, Veega hadn’t been able to decide if Leela had been foolish or not to be wandering alone. She had seemed so lost. 

laughter lines

my most beloved and longest held doctor/river song <3 by bastille: i'll see you in the future when we're older / and we are full of stories to be told / cross my heart and hope to die / i'll see you with your laughter lines

so the concept is like, post silence of the library and it’s 11, then 12, then 13 going back to the library in some attempt to get river back out, and like 11 and 12 both fail of course, because the time is not right or whatever, and then 13 realises that it’s not about trying to get her out – what she really wants is the chance to say goodbye properly, to say sorry for uploading her and abandoning her like that, so 13 uploads herself for a little while so she can see river again properly

looking at it, actually I wrote way more than I remember doing – it’s been easily a year since I last opened this document, and indeed far longer since I started it, so it probably needs a real revamp before I were to post it – look at me talking about proofreading! that’s something that does not happen with me as often as it ought to… it’s a miracle any of flowers for tardises actually makes sense…

maybe I ought to finish this fic after all one day. i’m coming up on husbands of river song on my rewatch, maybe that’ll get me going for it again (or maybe not. I think I’m firmly living in leela/romana land for the foreseeable…)

will you be my future or just an escape

another bastille song...  those nights when you crave someone / to be there at dawn, to wake with 'cause aren't we all just / looking for a little bit of hope these days?

this fic is about 17k long and it is the most stream of consciousness bullshit i have ever written in my whole life - it is entirely entirely unpublishable and i wrote it over like three months last year after binge-listening to a bunch of the unit audios and when i was very strongly on that sja kick, and i made the ill-advised decision to watch downtime again and i just said to myself ‘i need to write something with them right now or else’

and then i did... it’s just sarah and kate trying to pretend they’re too professional to be falling in love even though literally everyone else can see it and they’re doing a terrible job of hiding it, and it’s all like, the stresses of a high-pressure world-saving job and the fact they both have trauma about losing the people they were meant to be protecting and therefore believe they can’t allow themselves to actually commit to letting someone else in, because that becomes a Responsibility then and they can’t deal with the idea of letting someone in only to get them killed. and also they kiss a lot <3 it’s peak ‘write what you want to see’ and i think that’s pretty sexy of me

will i ever finish this fic? who can say… 

#tagged whatnot #<3 #magicofthepen #i got an asking

[wizisbored]

@hatchetober day 2 - universe

basically this promt remids me of a fic idea i had a few months ago - the gang are camped out in hidgens’ bunker after the events of black friday, and some wiggly portal shennanigans led to a connection to the tgwdlm universe and now theres 2 pauls - paul and musical paul - and 2 emmas - LXIX and CDXX

so anyway, i typed up one of the scenes i wrote in my notebook while i should have been paying attention in class

"She… wants to speak to you, Emma."

Emma freezes momentarily. She did kind of expect this - and she's been curious to properly meet her too, honestly - but you can't blame her for being fucking freaked out by the woman. An exact copy of her from an alternate reality? That's some weird shit.

Taking a deep breath, she nods to Becky. "Alright. I'll talk to her, that's fine." Looking around, it's clear that nobody believed that.

"Are you sure?" Paul asks.

"Yeah."

"Do you want me to come with you?"

"I don't think that would be a good idea, Paul," Becky tells him. "She's still a little… on edge."

"Oh. Yeah," he says, gently knocking his fists together.

"Don't worry, I'll be fine," Emma tries to reassure him, "if she's an exact copy of me, then she's going to be just as great as I am, isn't she?"

"I guess so," he agrees, smiling. "You are pretty great."

Emma gives him a quick kiss on the cheek - she has to go on tiptoes to reach - and turns to follow Becky to the 'sick bay'. Gently opening the door a crack, the nurse peers into the room to address her patient.

"Emma? Your… the other Emma is here."

"Okay. Thanks, Becky."

Hearing her speak sends shivers down Emma's spine. The two of them even have the same voice. She starts to follow Becky into the room but stops short just inside the door, stunned. Sure, she's seen her before, and she knew she was going to see her again now, but there's a difference between remembering she looks exactly like her and seeing she looks exactly like her. It's almost like looking in a mirror - the double looks about as freaked out as Emma feels. There's a long pause.

"Uh… hi?"

They speak at the same time, and see each other's eyes widen as their own do. That must've been a coincidence, right? Slightly more freaked out now, Emma glances to Becky and back to her double, seeing out of the corner of her eye that she does the same thing. "What the fuck?" It's whispered, but once again simultaneous. "What the fuck?" They both look to Becky for help, though they don't really know what they expect her to do.

"Well this is… Unexpected…"

"No shit!"

"Alright, I think you both need to take a few deep breaths,” Becky suggests, a little sterner than she sounded before. Closing their eyes, both Emmas do as she says.

“I understand that this is a strange situation, but panicking won’t help. Now, how about we try this again and I’ll help you make sure you don’t speak at the same time.” She places a hand on the nearest double’s shoulder. “Alright, Emma?” She looks the woman in the eye as she says it, trying to make it clear who she’s addressing. It works - only one of them replies.

“Yeah, okay. Thanks, Becky.”

The nurse flashes her a smile, then turns to address them both again. “Do either of you particularly want to speak first? Do you have anything to ask the other?”

Neither of them speak. It’s not that they don’t have questions - they have millions of questions - but neither knows where to start. The nurse resorts to turning to the nearest one once again. “Well… Maybe you could go first?”

“Um… Okay…” She turns to look at the woman sitting on the camp bed. “Hey… Emma. How… how are you doing?”

She shrugs. “Not great, honestly. Leg’s fucked... But hey, at least I’m going to live. Oh, and this whole alternate universe thing is… confusing, and… I’m kinda scared.”

“I’m confused and kinda scared too. I mean, this is the weirdest fucking conversation I’ve ever had.”

The Emma on the bed chuckles. The other is a little unsettled - she has her laugh too. But there’s something off about it. It’s not a ‘that’s funny’ kind of laugh. It’s a ‘this is fucked up and I’m uncomfortable’ kind of nervous laugh. The standing Emma looks closer at the other’s face and, since she sees it every time she looks in a mirror (well, minus the scars) it’s easy for her to notice everything off about it. This isn’t an exact copy of her, she realises. This is a version of her that’s trying to pretend she’s not terrified.

“I’d thought you’d feel the same way,” the one on the bed says, “since… you know…”

“We’re the same person,” they finish together. For a while the two of them just stare at each other, not knowing how to move past the first real acknowledgement between them of their situation. And then it clicks - for both of them.

“That’s why we’re speaking at the same time,” they say together, “we’re reacting to things in the same way.”

Becky looks from one to the other in disbelief. “You must be having identical thought processes, at least when you say the same things.”

“Woah.”

It’s completely surreal, but it’s starting to make sense.

“We must have had the same experiences, up to a point,” they say together, “so our brains developed in the same way. But then…”

The Emma on the bed drops off, and the one by the door continues alone. “Something must have changed.”

She looks again at her double’s face, at the fear she’s trying to hide. All she’s told the inhabitants of the bunker so far is that the creepy version of Paul that came into this reality with her is ‘infected’, and that her leg was injured in a crash. That, and the fact that she thought she was dead for sure before the portal opened.

“Emma?” the standing one asks. “What happened to you?”

“What, you want my whole life story, or…?”

She’s trying to laugh it off, avoid the question. Shaking her head, the other continues: “something fucked up your reality, didn’t it? I’m guessing it’s got something to do with whatever’s wrong with your version of Paul. And I think you’re still scared of it. More than just ‘kinda scared’.”

There’s a long pause.

“Your reality’s fucked too,” she eventually mutters, “we wouldn’t be in this bunker if it wasn’t.”

“Yeah, but I managed to avoid most of the fuckery. Hell, I spent most of it watching shitty kids’ films with Paul and Tim. My version of Paul didn’t start spitting up blue shit and try to kill me.”

The Emma on the bed shrugs. “Fair point.”

“So what happened?”

She sighs, looking down at the bandage wrapped around her thigh. “Becky, could you leave me and Emma alone for a bit?”

The nurse nods slowly, though she looks uncertain. Turning to the one by the door, she tells her to find her if they need anything, then leaves.

The Emma by the door steps a little closer to the bed. “Why did you ask her to go?”

“I don’t-” She pauses and sighs. “It’s not that I don’t trust her. She saved my life. But I don’t really know her, you know? I know you - I know that’s weird to say, ‘cause I just met you a few minutes ago, but after all that synchronization shit I figured you’ll react the same way I did, so I can figure out how to explain it so you’ll understand.”

“I guess that makes sense.”

The sitting one nods, then takes a deep breath.

“This isn’t going to sound scary but it was fucking terrifying. You have to think about the implications. Seriously, think about them. I didn't at first and that didn’t go well.”

“Okay. I promise I’ll think about it.”

“The world… turned into a musical.”

She says it with a gravity that stops her double from laughing, but she’s still confused. This doesn’t go unnoticed. “Please. Think about the fucking implications.”

She tries to figure it out. Sure, people randomly bursting into song would be unnerving, but terrifying? Not really. Maybe it was what they were singing. Did people spill their darkest secrets? Or maybe people had to sing and dance, like they were possessed. And then, all of a sudden, she remembers.

“That creepy version of Paul… You said he was infected. The musical was a disease?”

“Yeah, well that’s what we called it. But it wasn’t really. That thing that came through the portal with me wasn’t just Paul with a virus. That was - is - his corpse being puppeted by an alien hivemind. It was trying to kill me so I could join it.”

Her double stands in silence, shocked. The injured woman draws her right knee up and hugs it to her chest, resting her chin on it, tears welling up in her eyes.

“He died trying to kill it,” she spits bitterly. “But it got him too.”

As carefully as she can, her double perches herself on the edge of the bed. She’s almost surprised to find they’re the exact same size - the other looked so small crying there alone, wrapped in one of Tom’s flannels. Putting an arm around her feels strange, but right.

“You probably know this reality’s Paul better than I ever knew mine,” she sniffles, “but I cared about him.”

“I know you did. If it’s even a tiny fraction of how much I care about him, I know how much you cared. You have my s-”

“I don’t need your sympathy Emma,” she chokes out.

“I know you don’t, we’re-” the other begins,

“-the same fucking person-” they continue together.

“I know.” The injured woman finishes alone.

“I was going to say you have my support, Em,” the other explains gently. “I know sympathy does jack shit on its own, I... “ Her voice drops to almost a whisper. “I lost Jane too. So I know what it’s like for me- uh, you? ...us? I know what it’s like for us to grieve. I can help you.”

“Thanks. Some help would be good right now.”

Her double offers what she hopes is a reassuring smile. “Hey, look on the bright side. I know you came close, but you managed to escape dying in Hatchetfield.”

The injured one chuckles. “God, you don’t know the half of it. I almost died in Clivesdale.”

They take a simultaneous breath. “Fuck Clivesdale.”

#hatchetober #hatchetober 2020 #double E au

[why-this-kolaveri-machi]

Fic: stabbed

This is a fill for the Whumptober 2019 day 8 prompt: stabbed!

yes, i’m still doing this! it’s been AGES since i last wrote and i’m more than a bit rusty, so i’m trying to ease my way back with some good old straightforward h/c :)

Summary: Set after the flashback in 2.04. Dick’s first mission in Gotham after the Titans disbanded doesn’t go well. At all. 

WARNINGS: SPOILERS for Titans s2, especially 2.04. Some swearing. Moderately graphic descriptions of a serious injury. Passive suicidal thoughts. Not really much comfort to be had here--Dick’s spiralling, and he will continue to spiral (in the show’s timeline) for many years to come.

stabbed

“Robin. Status report.”

For godssake, B, Dick wants to snap, it’s just the two of us working this job. You don’t have to talk to me like I’m your soldier. The words crowd against his teeth, pushed there by a now-familiar swell of resentment in his chest. Instead, what comes out is: “Everyone’s been rounded up and handed over to the cops on my side. I’ve passed on the coordinates and date of the next big meeting with their boss.”

There’s a brief pause on the other side of the communicator. “Next meeting?” Bruce says, with the same sort of delicate scepticism that he might employ when Dick’s reaching for his third slice of butter sponge cake at the dinner table.

Dick grits his teeth. “Maroni got away this time,” he admits.

“I see.” There’s a snap and a click, and the distinct low hum of the Batmobile powering up. “I expect a full report at the Cave this morning.”

“I’m—” Dick shifts, swallows a gasp.

“… do you need me to pick you up?”

Dick looks down at the blade stuck in his gut and the blood seeping through between the armour plates of his costume, and thinks about it. He definitely needs medical attention but the thought of going back to the Cave, to sit there alone at the centre of its yawning blackness to convalesce, stewing in the ways he had failed—well. Dick can’t even stand the thought of it.

“I’m good,” he says. “Catch up with you soon.” With that, he turns off his communicator before Bruce can reply.

It’s like a string that’s been holding him upright has been cut. He slumps back against the grimy alley wall, breath stuttering with every inhale. The mesh of his uniform and the armour plates are doing a good job in securing the blade and to prevent, well, torrential bleeding, but that’s not going to hold if he starts moving. But if he doesn’t move and get some goddamned help, he’s going to bleed out anyway. He’s fucked unless he can get help to come to him, which—

which—

(we’re over, dick.)

No. No. This is fine. Things could’ve been worse—he could’ve been shot, which could’ve caused a perforating injury instead of merely a penetrating one, more tissue damage, and a greater chance of infection. Given the angle and position of the blade, it likely didn’t hit his liver or his pancreas, which means fewer chances of imminent death-by-exsanguination or auto-digestion. That the knife was able to penetrate him at all through the miniscule gaps in his armour must mean the blade is very fine and thin, so if he can just keep it in place long enough for him to seek help, he might be able to prevent the one complication with the power to kill him: infection.

So, you know. Bar a contrast-CT scan or two, Dick is very optimistic about his chances. He might as well get a headstart on writing that report for Bruce in his head:

In my first mission after losing a close friend and losing my team, I managed to lose a straightforward fight, lose the crime boss I could’ve normally captured in my sleep, and I’m probably going to lose a little bit of my intestine and shit in a bag for a little bit. Just an all-round loser losing things.

Very punchy, off-puttingly whiny, and utterly unprofessional. Bruce would absolutely hate it, but at least it would be something other than the vaguely disapproving looks he’s been giving Dick ever since he crawled back to Gotham like a pathetic thing.

Taking as deep a breath as he dares and securing the blade in his abdomen with one hand, he grabs the lip of a nearby dumpster with the other and begins to pull himself upright. Every inch of movement is like being stabbed all over again—an icy, electric pain that shoots up into his chest and squeezes his lungs. The pain makes his breathing progressively fast and shallow, which just worsens the pain, and by the time he’s able to extricate his mind out of that vicious cycle he’s sprawled on the ground again and the knife in his gut is smearing his blood on concrete approximately a foot away from him.

Well, fuck.

Dick thinks briefly, giddily, about putting the knife back in to plug the hole in his gut, wastes a few more precious moments berating himself for even thinking that, then removes his communicator from his belt. His fingers leave bloody, webbed smears all over the keypad and the screen wavers in and out of focus; he squints and pants and steadily scrolls past his long list of contacts.

To call any of the Lanterns or Superman would mean the Justice League would know about this, and that would mean Bruce would know about this. The Titans… well, clearly they’re out of the picture. (Donna would probably come and help him if he asks but the thought of facing her after letting her down so spectacularly feels like someone’s flaying the inside of his chest.) Roy can’t possibly make it on time.

That only really leaves Wally. He’s another bridge Dick’s managed to burn, but maybe—just maybe—

This number has been deactivated.

Oh, Dick thinks. His mouth feels dry and slimy, and blood trickles steadily around his now-slack fingers covering his wound. I didn’t know that. He can’t remember the last time he actually called Wally (or Wally called him), when he last remembered to properly sync his communicator with the Batcave and JL servers, can’t remember the last time he remembered to do things other than breathe through the ball of guilt and stress that had taken residence in his chest and smile and fight and eat and wake up the next morning to do it all over again.

Dick presses his forehead to the crook of his elbow, takes a shaky breath, feeling suddenly, soulcrushingly alone.

Minutes pass like hours, and more of Dick seeps out over Gotham pavement, his blood black in the moonlight. His heart is pounding in his chest, his head is gripped in a vise of pain, and he barely has the energy to keep pressure on the hole in his gut. Nausea crashes into him in waves, and at some point, he does throw up bloody bile, his throat burning, his guts feeling like they’re being stirred with a white-hot poker.

He still doesn’t call Bruce.

It’s… it’s probably not a terrible idea to fade away right here. He’s fucked up so much, much more than he’d ever realised, fucked up in ways that seem irreversible, and if his punishment for that is to die, alone and cold, in a dirty Gotham alleyway, then so be it.

so you’re going to roll over and give up. i thought i taught you better than that.

The familiar voice drags a chuckle from Dick. His eyes are open to slits at this point and what he can see is blurry, but he can just about make out Bruce, dressed impeccably in a suit, bending and peering at Dick like he’s a particularly interesting piece of roadkill. “I was wondering when you’d show up,” Dick rasps.

you summon me for a personal crisis at least every other month. Bruce grins sharply. i wouldn’t have wanted to miss this doozy, would i?

“Nothin’ much you can do,” Dick slurs.

that’s true, Bruce agrees. but i wouldn’t be here if some long-suffering survival instinct in that brain of yours isn’t throwing a hail mary so that you don’t kill yourself.

“You’ve never been the reason I’ve tried to stay alive,” Dick says.

oh, good, Bruce says. then what’s the reason? the glorified friends’ club you called a team? the memories of all the people you’ve gotten killed? or maybe the so-called friends who are still alive, when you can’t even bring yourself to even bother to keep in touch with them?

“I—” Dick blinks, long and slow. When he opens his eyes, Bruce is gone. “I don’t know,” he says.

He blinks again, and when he opens his eyes this time, it’s daylight, he’s lying on something warm and soft, and the pain in his gut isn’t nearly as sharp. He can hear a faint, steady beeping. He stares at the ceiling for a long moment before looking to his side and meeting Bruce’s steady gaze.

“You’re in Gotham General,” Bruce says. “It’s been two days since I found you, nearly dead, just off the docks. It’s really unfortunate,” he picks delicately at his sleeve cuff, “that you were mugged like that.”

Location, time, cover story—Bruce is nothing if not efficient and to-the-point. Usually Dick strives to match that discipline with his own, but his thoughts are too scattered, his chest too hollow, to really try. He just grunts in response.

Bruce frowns and leans forward. “You were bleeding out for hours and you didn’t try to call anybody for help—in fact, you lied to me about being injured at all. This is beyond being irresponsible, Dick—this is outright reckless.” He pauses. “I thought I taught you better than that.”

Dick thinks he knows the response to this. It’s not usually difficult to get out, even when he’s injured like this. But there’s something devastating about going to sleep thinking you’ve lost everything you’ve ever had to lose, and waking up to find that you were wrong about that last part.

i thought i taught you better than that.

Dick’s eyes burn, and tears drip steadily into his hair.

Bruce looks stricken, just for a moment—he reaches out, touches Dick’s hair—says, “Dickie,” like Dick’s twelve years old again and desperately, shatteringly alone and Bruce is still visibly trying—

He gets up, a little abruptly. When he speaks, it isn’t with the Batman growl, but with the mildest quaver, something that goes well with his rapidly-greying hair and deep lines bracketing his eyes. “I’ll go fetch Alfred—I’ll let him know you’re awake.” With that, he leaves the room.

Dick closes his eyes.

#titans #dick grayson #bruce wayne #my fic #a byronic cupcake #whumptober 2019