#hm i just realized the parallel now | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs | Tumgik (2025)

eddie leaves, and buck drives him to the airport. we get a parallel to buck telling him goodbye just like with abby, only that buck feels like this is it this time. he won’t be waiting for eddie because eddie isn’t coming back. and you can see they both have a hard time saying goodbye, but they’re both repressing their feelings like hell. “call me when you land.” “yeah yeah. maybe i’ll get chris to call you too when i see him.” they do a bro hug. pretend they’re not about to cry. eddie says, “right. um. see you around, buck.” and turns to leave.

but buck breaks his composure then, reaches and pulls eddie back into the biggest, tightest bear hug he can manage. because if he doesn’t get to have eddie around anymore, then at least he wants a proper hug. but then he realizes they’re locked in a hug for a moment too long, so he pulls away with a sniff and tries to apologize. but then eddie’s the one grabbing him, because plot twist, he wasn’t done with the hug either, so they embrace again like they don’t want to let go of each other ever again. but then there’s a call for eddie’s flight and he really has to go. so they finally break apart (but you know they hands linger, because losing each other’s touch is one of the worst things right now) and turn to go their separate ways.

cut scene, eddie boards the plane, sits down in his seat with an absolutely miserable look on his face. rubs at his chest absent-mindedly, because there’s a pain there that’s more profound than it should be, but he can’t quite put a finger on where it’s coming from. a middle-aged lady is sitting next to him, misinterprets this for a fear of flying. tries to start a conversation, eddie just nods along politely, until she says,

“you know, you’re really lucky to have that boy waiting for you.”

“hm?”

“oh, forgive me. i happened to see you with your boyfriend when you were saying goodbye. i didn’t mean to pry, but you caught my attention.”

and eddie, who still has a hand to his chest, suddenly freezes. stares into the distance, realization dawning to his face. oh. oh. that’s why it hurts.

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{ ☆ daddy - p.js }

pairing: dom! jay x f. reader

contents: p in v, rough sex, daddy kink, jay is kind of condescending and a lil mean, slight dacryphilia, pet name: baby, i think that’s it!

a.n: never written something like this before, w.c 753

your face was pushed into the mattress, and your back arched as jay fucked you roughly. your jaw was slack against the material of the sheets, drool starting to pool at the corners of your lips. all that can be heard in the room is skin slapping. he hits a particular place inside you that has you whining, “use your words, baby,” he taunts you. “m-more.” is all that comes out of your mouth as moans fall from your lips. within a second, jay leans into you, stilling his movements slightly as he wraps his arms around your waist before pulling you back against his chest to be parallel with him. as soon as he gets you where he wants you, his thrusts pick back up again; this new position has you seeing stars.

your head falls back onto his shoulder, hands wrapping around his own. incoherent babbles fall from your lips as jay continues fucking you dumb. you’re barely aware of what your saying when the name falls from your lips, but jay catches it immediately, slowing his thrusts down in the process. “what’d you just say?” his voice is thick with dominance, snapping you out of the trance you’ve been in. he is still moving in and out of you, but now at an almost agonizing pace. “i-i don’t know,” you mumble, eyes fluttering shut as you savor the feeling of him inside you. suddenly all of his movements halt, and one of his hands is reaching to grab you by your chin, forcing you to open your eyes and look him in the face.

he almost laughs at your fucked-out expression, “can’t hear you when you mumble, baby.” he pushes you further, moving his mouth to be right next to your ear as he waits for your response. “i said i d-don’t know,” you whine. this time jay does laugh, practically in your face. “you called me daddy, baby, so fucked out she called me daddy?” the words sound practically foreign coming out of his mouth, yet you can’t help the way arousal bubbles up in your stomach after hearing him say it. a blush coats your cheeks, your ears burning red at the realization of what slipped past your lips as you were zoning out. “y-you just feel so good,” you say to him, voice barely above a whisper.

jay has a smirk painted on his lips as his thrusts pick up again, still nowhere near the pace as before. his brows furrow as he focuses on his thrusts. “you gonna say it again, or do i need to fuck it out of you?” your head falls back against his shoulder again, eyes squeezing shut, “please, daddy. need it so bad,” you practically whine as the words come out of your mouth. he clicks his tongue, “need what, baby? hm?" he grins slightly, egging you on. “f-faster p-please,” you’re practically begging. and jay picks up the pace again immediately. hands gripping your body as he fucks into you with agility and speed, making you go cross-eyed in pleasure. your mouth falls open, moans pouring out as he fucks you hard and fast, and low grunts are heard from jay as he presses you further into him.

his tip is prodding at your cervix, and you can feel yourself getting close. “s-so close,” you mumble, muscles tightening with every thrust. “gonna cum for daddy, yeah?” jay barks at you, his hand flying down to rub fast-paced circles on your clit as he bounces you on his cock. tears start forming in your eyes as the knot in your stomach tightens, your release approaching any minute now. and with one last hard thrust, you’re sent over the edge, loud moans fall from your lips, and tears fall from your eyes as you squeeze them shut in ecstasy. jay isn’t far behind as he shoots his load into you, thrusting a few extra times, causing you to jolt in overstimulation. once he’s sure he’s emptied himself completely, he pulls out of you slowly, adjusting himself to where he’s fully sitting on the bed and turning you to face him, straddling his lap.

he scans your face, noticing your tear stained cheeks. “fuck baby, was i too rough?” he asks, his hand coming up to wipe at your cheeks. you shake your head. “not at all; it just felt so good,” you smile at him. jay laughs.

“called me daddy, and cried because i felt so good? i could get used to that.”

.

..

…

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Oughg my god Speaking of Mizuki Regularly Getting The Trans Flag Glued To Her Forehead. Today I am thinking about Solitus Utopia. Big yap session ahead

In terms of cards, it's probably The bluntest example of aforementioned trans flag forehead gluing; pink, blue, and white take center stage. And ouughhh. OUGHHGH. The placement of those colors is making me absolutely crazy

Her outfit has a similar deal to her first casual outfit. Lot of blue and white happening with the clothes, and then her hair and eyes are the pink needed to complete the set. To me, what that says is "This character is a walking trans flag, and she herself is the pink. The Girl Color. The girl!"

I've always felt that pink being the only one of those three colors to be Attached To Her was significant, but it's only now that I'm realizing that the clothing has significance too... I'm feeling two meanings from it:

It signifies the importance of cute clothing in Mizuki's transition. Being as cutesy as possible and altering her silhouette are some of her main tools in the way of passing as cis. (The former being a source of joy and the latter being a dysphoria alleviator also deserve mentioning!!). Her clothes complete the trans flag that her Girl Color Hair started; her clothes build up the road she took on the journey that her Girl Color Very Being started. ... And on a less positive note, I think there is also some significance to the fact that the trans flag color palette is only all there when something is Applied To Her. Without her outfit, she's just Girl Color. When the outfit is put on her, the Girl Color is made to be a part of something else, The Trans Colors. Your first thought is no longer "That's a girl and she happens to be Girl Color. Neat!", but "That's a trans girl and she happens to be Trans Colors. Neat!". I feel like there are parallels between that and how much she hates being labelled Different. This is crude, but it's how the words want to come out of my mouth. Sorry: Because Society Says So, you don't need to wear clothes at home, but you do in public. Because Society Says So, Mizuki can exist as Just A Girl when she's at home. She can be Just Pink. "Her home" means two things here. Firstly, Literally Her House, with Yuuki "Ally 9000" Akiyama & her supportive-enough-I-guess parents being the only people who she interacts with. To them, she's just a girl, and they're not weird about it. They know she's trans, but they don't act any particular way because of that. Her other home is Nightcord, at least before Niigo started meeting up in person. As Amia, she was assumed to be a cis girl, and there was no risk (in their pre-mainstory days) of Niigo ever finding out otherwise. While being presumed cis isn't quite as close to "Girl With No Modifiers" as living with an unfathomably based family, it still didn't carry the Othering that she's used to accompanying her status as a trans girl. If she wants to exit her home, she has to put on the clothes, has to put on the label that is made when the color palette is completed, and go from "Girl" to "Girl And By The Way Did You Know She's Trans?". And that makes everyone and their mother feel like it's fine to treat her weird. The pitying and resentment that she fears so much at best, and "HEY DID YOU KNOW SHE'S NOT NORMAL? ISN'T THAT WEIRD? AGREE WITH ME NOW OR YOU'RE WEIRD TOO" to anyone who'll listen at worst. With a million billion other forms of othering in between. (Hm. Suddenly I'm thinking about blue's absence from her 3rd anni casual outfit. She's no longer a walking trans flag, and is way pinker than before. Because it's a marketable game with marketable characters, we always had good reason to expect Niigo to be normal about her when the secret came out. But still, I feel like having Even More Girl Color glued to her forehead in Trans Palette's place could be considered some kind of foreshadowing for Niigo being normal... BUT ANYWAY this is not a post about the most incredible pants this world has ever seen, this is a post about Solitus Utopia, so I'll get back to that now.)

With the clothing out of the way, I'd like to move on to the rest of the card. This card is from late 2022, when Mizuki's transness was not quite as obvious ("a few inches away" levels of in-your-face as opposed to the more "you are a school principal at a fundraiser and her transness is a cream pie" level we are at now). This makes me extra ready to take this card as an unspoken "To be clear yes she is a trans girl".

The background walls and furniture are largely blue, and the decor is largely pink and white (and purple. Hi, Niigo!). The former is something that's hard to alter or move or acquire more of, whereas it's pretty easy with the latter. If you have walls or furniture that you hate, you can make it look more palatable by decorating it with things you like, with relative ease. Mizuki did that! The background is covered in all manner of fashion-related pink things, and the pink sewing machine and other supplies carry the implication that she made them herself. They do a great job carrying out their purpose, popping so much in comparison to the blue walls that said walls appear more grey than anything else. And also, you don't really feel like looking at the walls, because all that decor makes them Not Really A Point Of Interest.

To me, that sounds a whole lot like transitioning. There's an unfortunate status that's pretty hard to get rid of, both legally and socially, because Government and People just love to obsess over what you were assigned at birth. But changing the way you appear helps make things more bearable for you, both because you're happier looking a certain way, and because the public is slightly less awful to you when you look a certain way.

Cycling back to the "you focus on the pink things more than anything" point, I feel like the most significant pink thing is Mizuki herself. And I think that is also very nice!! Her pinkness is at the very center of the card. It is the heart of the card! Pink!! Girl color!! Heart!! Mizuki's heart is girl color!! Woah!!

(Obligatory "I do not speak Japanese and I do not live there, so I could be wrong", but I think "I was born with an [insert gender] body, but my heart is [insert other gender]" is a fairly popular way of describing being transgender in Japan? I feel like that phrasing has been losing popularity in English, but I still hear it fairly often in Japanese LGBT+ circles on social media and stuff. If I'm right, then that adds a few more significance points to the Pink Center Of Card thing)

Neat card. I love this pink girl a lot

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For the pairings can you talk about The Prototype and Angel? Your interpretation of them has me in a choke hold lol

I'M SOOO HAPPY I ALSO HAVE YOU IN A CHOKEHOLD, THESE TWO HAVE CONTAMINATED ME WITH THEIR SILLINESS.

They're parallels and mirrors of each other. Angel could have become the Prototype, and the Prototype could have become Angel, if only the circumstances were different. They share similar grief and a deep feeling of alienation: Proto for being the first one and the only one that's as crooked and weird as he is, and Angel for being both an immigrant and a queer person in the USA. Grief for losing loved ones, Angel with their friends/coworkers and the Prototype for seeing his loved ones become nothing but experiments of a company he made from scratch. I could go on and on about their similarities and differences, but in the end the conclusion is the same: They KNOW each other. They KNOW how similar they are and they just Get each other, and to me this is sooo fun to explore and think abt whenever I talk abt them!

Also like. They're literally the parents of a household with almost 90 kids (numbers will prob grow once we get the official Chapter 4, but alas). Sure that it takes a while for Proto to be promoted to parent #2, but DANG, THEY ARE THE PARENTS. Two best friends who decided the best course of action was to get legally married bc this would provide some extra protection for the kids if anything bad ever happened to Angel!!!!!! AND SPEAKING OF BEST FRIENDS.

Angel loves annoying the Prototype and the kids. Their love language is being a menace (just ask their parents and Miguel about it), and after a while Proto both gets used to it AND starts annoying Angel back. What is a friendship but an excuse to be awful in an affectionate way. Angel will forever bully the Prototype for not realizing the critters were all alive, and in turn he's literally going to drag them to random places so they can stop working for ONCE. They have the same dad humor, by the way, much to the horror of some of the kids. They're besties!!!! I have said this a thousand times but they are besties!!!!! Only Proto knows some of the shit Angel went through, only Angel knows the things Proto went through. The torture the scientists made him stand, what he did and thought and felt the decade after the Hour of Joy, everything. Angel tells him about how sometimes they think they aren't enough for the kids, or how they fear they're being either too harsh with them, or how awful their last nightmare was.

Also to me the funniest phase of their relationship happens after Angel realizes that, unfortunately, they want a QPR with the Prototype. Like. They're all "I can't fucking believe this, I doubt he would accept the offer if I explained I may want something more but not the romance part of it" and "how the fuck do I explain to him that I value our friendship more than anything and I think it's something different than all of my other friendships without it sounding weird as fuck". Because Angel DID tell him what a QPR was, but they doubt Proto would want something like that. And then it cuts to him like "hm I think there might be something else to this friendship, but not romantic in nature. We may have achieved a deeper bond than anything I have ever had before, friendship-wise". Disaster of a human person vs scientist DESPERATELY wanting more affection. It's SO funny to me.

also like. Post-officially-becoming-a-QPR-couple. HILARIOUS. They pull the "we're partners" thing whenever it's convenient even if it involves pretending to be a romantic couple. They have no idea how it works. These two 100% do the "ask your other dad" thing in order to annoy one of the kids into going back-and-forth between them until said kid goes "stop doing that!!!" and then Angel has to control their laughter. Nothing really changes post-that except that now Angel sometimes gives him a kiss, they got too used to using Proto as a giant teddy bear by the point the QPR happens. Proto, however, now has excuses to just grab Angel and give them a hug without feeling weird for doing so [he's awkward when asking for affection in general].

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oh I AM WALKING

Like……i just. Hm. Okay. So like

Season 8: Buck is exploring and having fun with his newly discovered sexuality. With tommy or whoever. Doesnt matter. We see Eddie dealing with the layers and complexity of his catholic guilt. Him starting to truly discover what it actually is HE wants for himself versus what he think’s supposed to want.

Buck throughout the season, while dating, is having fun and he’s happy but he starts to feel like there is just still something missing but he doesn’t know what it is. We see the boys stories parallel in that way for most of the season. S8 finale. Big emergency cliffhanger. Trapped dads vibes okay. Perhaps feelings come out. Buck realizes “oh shit. Im in love with Eddie” and tries to tell Eddie but then something bad happens. Bam! End of season.

Season 9: buck is reeling from this realization but like. They almost died so all emotions are on 10. They are in the hospital talking about everything but the elephant in the room. They talk about the will and what it means. Its heavy. Eddie telling Buck again that there is no one else for his son. No one else for HIM. “Its only ever been you Buck” and they are just sitting in this moment with so many words left unsaid. Both of them scared of the magnitude of their feelings.

The season continues as both of the boys try and navigate through what it means to be in love with your best friend. Eddie possibly working through having feelings for a man. Buck scared of losing what they have but also knowing that Eddie is it for him. Maybe mid season, they finally sit down and talk. Buck tells Eddie in so many words: I want you. I want this life we have made together with Chris. I love you. Eddie feels the same way. they both agree: we need to be sure, because once we go there, there is no going back. This could be a great thing for both of them but they have to be ready for it.

Now as 9B goes on, we see flirty Buddie. We see them basically together but not together ya know? They are happy taking their time cause they know the wait will be worth it. Now of course cause this is a primetime drama, some very traumatic/ dramatic will happen in the season finale. Now while nothing happens to the boys physically, whatever big ugly thing that happened, they just want to be with each other afterwards. They are each other’s home. We get a scene in the finale of them at Eddie’s house, on the couch. Eddie basically says that he doesn’t know if he will ever be 100% ready (more to do with his feelings about his own shortcomings) but that he is 100% sure about them. About Buck. He says I love you. Buck says it back. Then Buck proceeds to give his own love declaration. All these beautiful words about how Eddie has been what he has been looking for all this time. That this life is short (they understand that better than most) and he wants to spend whatever time he has left with Eddie and Chris. Cue first kiss. Cue thousands of fan girls dying. End season.

Season 10: now that they are together i feel like the lead up to an engagement could be fun. They are all happy and in love and they are sappy and Chris is making fun of them. Maybe on a call, or somewhere else Buck introduces Eddie as his fiancé and Eddie is like ????? And we get some fun spiraling. Eddie talks to Hen or something. “I would know if I was proposed to right? I mean we’ve only been together a few months???” And Hen is just like “yall have been Buck and Eddie for much longer than that” so that leads to Eddie asking Buck about it. Buck is like yea I said I wanted to spend the rest of my life with you remember??? And Eddie is like that isn’t a proposal! A proposal usually includes a question like WILL YOU MARRY ME? Again. We’re having fun with this. So Buck is all like okay. Eddie, will you marry me? eddie thinks he’s joking but he’s not. The moment goes from light and fun to intimate and emotional. We get some more “you’re it for me. I love you” Buck is choosing Eddie. Eddie is being chosen. Eddie is choosing to be happy for himself. Eddie says yes. BAM! LET THE WEDDING PLANNING COMMENCE.

(Now obviously this is just idiots ramblings. These are bones and they story would need meat and muscles to become fully fleshed out but. I just. Ya know. Had feelings)

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𝖂𝖍𝖔’𝖘 𝖞𝖔𝖚𝖗 𝖉𝖆𝖉𝖉𝖞? Pt. 1

Pairing: copia & child/teen gn reader

Release: 5/26/23 10:14pm

Summary: copia has a bit of a surprise for you!

A/n: this is part 1 of a small series I’m doing parallel to @ghostussy AU “faith” plz go read it, they are a phenomenal writer (they hit the feels so good)

“Amore, I have a bit of a surprise for you.” Copia says, sneaking into your room as if he’s hiding from someone.

“Hm?” You look up from the homework on your desk, eyes catching onto his arms behind his back and his lips trying their hardest not to flip into a smile.

“Ta-da!” Copia exclaims, presenting you a brightly dressed envelope.

You look at him in confusion, but excitement, who doesn’t love gifts? Taking the white and black bow wrapped around the blue paper off, you pull out papers that seem to be important looking.

“Copia, what is this?” You ask, even more curious. Your eyes hurt looking at the small font on the white paper.

Copia just stands there, tilting his head to let you know to look more closely.

Your brain freezes, your breathe hitches, your lungs hold, your joints ache, your stomach hurts, your muscles tense as you read the heading words.

Adoption certificate

You blink, your heart beating once more, your brain is so shocked it can’t send the signals of excitement to your soul.

“Papa?” You say, a small crack in your voice.

You look up at him, only your head moving as you hold tight the paper. Your so surprised you don’t even feel emotion, all you feel are droplets falling down your cheeks that start to get heavier.

“Papa?” You repeat, more emotional, you fall apart as you realize you won’t ever have to think of anything harmful again.

“Oh child…” copia hums, kneeling down to wrap you in a hug.

A hug so tight your eyes might pop out, a hug so tight it’s greater than the sun’s gravitational pull on anything in the galaxy.

“Papa….” You cry, tears now streaming down your cheeks like a river.

His name seems to be the only word you know, in-fact it’s not even his name, it’s the name you first heard when you arrived at the ministry. How kind his face was, how soft his touch was, how gentle he was helping you while recovering from the accident. You remember just how lovely that warmth spread in your chest when he had brought you flowers while in the infirmary.

“Papa, what does this mean? Does this mean your my legal guardian now?” You ask, in a rush over the tears, “do you mean I won’t ever have to see them again?”

“Amore, there’s a bit more to it.” Copia says, trying not to ruin the mood.

But the concerned look on your face forced him to explain more in detail.

“Well…we still have to go to court for a hearing, it won’t be longer than 50 minutes though!” Copia smiles.

You nod, lifting your chin up to give him a smile.

“When is the hearing? Doesn’t this take a long time?” You wonder

“Well, believe it or not it was a surprise for me first.” Copia chuckles, bringing a hand to wipe away your tears.

You ask him more about it

“Well mo- sister imperator has actually been working for these silly inked up papers since you arrived. And after talking with some, higher officials, it was approved for court.”

“Higher officials? You mean nihil?” You sniffle, bringing a hand to his and taking in his warmth as he continues.

“Eh- yeah…no- I-I uhm….hard to explain.” Copia stutters, “but he’s the one who will acually be there for the hearing, like a representative kinda.”

He tries to explain, but when is it ever easy to explain economic policies to a mere child!

You nod, maybe not understanding, but still happy that copia would legally be yours, or is that the other way around?

“So when is it?” You look into his glossy eyes, happy for himself as much as he is for you.

“We have a few weeks, i wanted to tell you as soon as I found out but….I refrained. I honestly don’t know how I kept it under the blanket for so long!”

“Do the ghouls know?”

“Do the other papas know?”

“What do I wear?”

“Who all will be there?”

“Who will I sit with there?”

You bombard the poor old man with questions.

“Eh- hehe let’s wait a moment bambino!” Copia attempts to calm you down.

“Sorry, it’s just….you don’t know how much this means to me copia.” You mumble as tears appear like flowers in the spring.

“Oh bambino….” Copia smiles and brings you into a tight hug.

“Do- what do I call you then?” You ask

“Oh, well uhm…anything you want! You can keep on calling me by my name, or papa, really anything your want dear.” Copia says, wiping away a strand tear.

A/n: reblog and leave a comment if you enjoyed, lemme know what you would like to see next!

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professor hawk fanfic ???

Ahhhh I'm just gonna do it ok here's a sneak peek of a fic I'm writing about Hawk and Tim!!!! I keep thinking about it and I need to post it somewhere to hold myself accountable.

It's AU modern day professor Hawk & student Tim, parallel timelines from 10 years ago to today. It will eventually contain very, very explicit content. Ok here's the preview:

***

Tim stepped out of the large glass double doors onto the stone staircase, descending into the back yard. A garden party, he thought. WHO could have pictured him here? Dressed in a three-piece suit on a Saturday afternoon, ready to enjoy a manly something-or-other on the rocks with members of his Georgetown graduating class.

When Tim received the formal invitation in the mail, he wondered if it had been a mistake. While the envelope was addressed to one “Mr. Timothy Laughlin,” he was surprised at its contents

The Georgetown University Alumni Association cordially invites you to celebrate the 10 year reunion of the class of 2013.

It then listed details of date, time, and location which appeared to be someone’s home address just outside of D.C. Still, Tim was perplexed. He was a member of this graduation class, but weren’t these alumni things usually to raise money?

He had received letters over the past 10 years asking for donations to certain scholarships, fundraisers, and the occasional new building. He’d throw a check in the mail every here and there, $100 or what have you. He gave what he could, though he knew that was never the amount they were asking for or expecting of their alumni.

So now? There must be something huge they are raising money for to be including him in this mailing list. But on the rare occasion that he had the opportunity to dress up, he took it. Plus, he was curious to get eyes on some certain members of his class that might be in attendance. As well as certain professors. Perhaps one certain professor.

He stepped into the grass from the stone steps and took in the view. A gorgeous property, trees lining the yard just enough for privacy from neighbors, though the nearest ones were barely within eyesight. Tim scanned the beautiful green space for any familiar faces. His initial scan yielded no success but to find the refreshments.

In the far corner of the yard sat a large bar with a handful of unfamiliar faces loitering about. Tim sauntered over to the bar with absolutely no clue what to order. When he had been out with friends or the occasional, albeit rare date, he would just order whatever they ordered and sipped on it regardless of how awful it tasted.

To his misfortune, everyone standing and chatting around the bar already had a drink in their hand and it did not appear he could piggyback onto anyone else’s order. He smiled at the bartender who asked him what he’d like and while trying not to show his panic, eyes the alcohol selection behind the man in the waiter’s uniform.

“Ummm, hm,” Tim mumbled aloud. “I guess, well, I guess I’ll just have —“

“He’ll take a whiskey on the rocks. And make that two,” the man who spoke up held a bill between his pointer and ring finger and handed it over to the bartender, who nodded in appreciation and went to get the drinks. Tim vaguely recognized the man who gingerly removed his hand from Tim’s back and placed it back in his pocket. The man suddenly realized that Tim couldn’t place him.

“Oh, I’m sorry. Tim Laughlin, right?” The man asked. Tim nodded and wondered how to politely ask this man how they know each other. Luckily, he didn’t have to ask as the man continued, “Marcus, er, I guess you’d remember me as Professor Gaines???”

“Of course,” Tim smiled and extended his hand out, which Marcus shook with a firm grip. He hadn’t taken any of Professor Gaines' courses, but he had many acquaintances who did. Though, the real reason he remembered him was due to to his association with —

“Hawk!” Marcus called out from across the yard, raising his fresh glass of whiskey in the air to garner the other man’s attention.

Tim swallowed the lump in his throat. He did not think he would be in this situation so early in the garden party. He looked up and caught the bright blue eyes of the man he was both hoping and fearing he would see. Hawk’s eyes lit up at the sight of Tim just a few yards away. He had a surprised yet delighted look on his face as he approached Tim and Marcus, placing a hand on Marcus’ shoulder and coming to face Tim.

“Tim, you remember Professor Fuller, yes?” Marcus asked. And Christ, was that the understatement of the century.

***

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Oh no I forgot you ship Ted/Becca.

😆 Hi anon! I hope this doesn't ruin your day or anything, whomstever you are. If you don't ship it or ship something opposing or whatever's your bag, I'm sure we can still be friends, or whatever we are.

But I've been mulling this all over since the finale, and this is a good excuse to get my thoughts out. Because I come from ye old timey shipping days of "the idea of them together is cool, regardless of whether it happens or not." so that wasn't really my problem with the ending.

Here are the things that are true:

I really like themes and parallels. I like connecting dots and finding connections and all that jazz

The number of themes and parallels they set up between Ted and Rebecca was delicious and very fun for me.

My reaction to the finale is less upset than it is frustrated and confused.

My frustration isn't purely 'they didn't get together romantically so it sucks.' I had started making peace early S3 with realizing it probably wasn't gonna happen

I am frustrated because I wanted all those bits of cool narrative shit they laid out to Do Something

I am frustrated because it feels like Ted and Rebecca have had very few emotionally connected scenes since season one, and what's the point of parallel journeys and soulmateism if their journeys are going to stay so parallel and not join up more, and then just apparently diverge completely

And on the apparent diverging, I don't love it but it would have sucked less if their lines just matched up more in the middle! That could be poignant! But as is, it's more disappointing than tragic, because whatever potential was there wasn't almost realized and then lost, but instead just... never really approached. It feels wasted.

The show did not owe us them getting together, but what it did give us, I found unsatisfying. That's just a bummer, man.

Forgive me this metaphor but I cannot find a better way to put it: I am frustrated because I feel like I got ridden for 3 seasons while they went 'just wait it'll feel so good' and then they were like 'are you ready?' and then just hopped off and left.

I am confused because at the end of their story, I cannot figure out what I am meant to be feeling about it.

Again, I didn't need them to get together romantically, they totally could've found some other way to make it satisfying! But. Ted and Rebecca getting together romantically would have also tied it up in a lot of ways that worked and made the narrative satisfying.

Having a romance arc that works with their character arcs and the themes they've built on is just really cool as a story.

Obviously all that parallel journey stuff would've actually been leading them somewhere, ie to each other, yay woo

And not to each other just because they've been through similar shit, but because, as that last post said, among a lot of other reasons, they've been set up well to be what the other person needs.

Romance is not the be all, end all. But:

Ted and Rebecca both want to be in love with someone, someday.

Here is someone who already understands and balances and supports them.

Like, that's awesome. Is that not the qualities you want for them in a future romantic partner?

I can't see how it diminishes their friendship if it caries on very similar to it has been, just like, sometimes they smooch. Maybe I'm just too demisexual for this idk

Boat guy. I like boat guy, but he's a chiller version of Ted. I can't find that post that points out all the parallels there, but that episode by the time we got to Kenny Rogers I was like. Uh. Hm.

It's confusing to have boat guy have a beautifully intimate evening with Rebecca, all the while having so many specific details similar to Ted, and then just act like romantic Tedbecca is a wild, character-ruining concept.

Because the show ends with Ted leaving and Rebecca miserably walking out of the airport and straight into proxy-Ted. I have no idea how to feel about that.

I could keep going, but I'm about out for now, so uh. Woe, wasted Tedbecca potential be upon ye~

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ooc: top five stormlight characters ???

1. shallan davar. she was immediately my nr 1 fave. I fell a bit out of love with her for a hot second the first time I listened to wor, but upon relisten I realized how stupid and ridiculous that was and it has been thoroughly rectified. she's so trans she's so npd she's just the best girl i adore her

2. adolin kholin. what can i say. i live for characters that are canonical sluts. he just cares so so so much and it makes me a bit insane (in a positive way)

3. jasnah kholin. once again. cares so so much. i can't believe people buy her ice queen facade because she is so terrible at not caring. its also so cool how she's basically the only atheist in a world seeped in religion. she's so aksmfhajfjg

4. renarin kholin. look i know he's barely got any screentime where im at. but i also fell in love with him at first sight simply because he encompasses that one specific character archetype i always end up loving

5. I know he's a side character (and like a side side character, not a side main character like renarin (though I think he gets a bigger role and even some own povs in the later books)), but there is something about moash man. he's got me. I love you moash I support all your wrongs

that was the post nothing else to read here haha have a good day

Okay. Hm. You may have noticed something.

But wait Kaladin mod, you may now be thinking. Where is Kal? You know. The dude you have a whole sideblog about?

Well.

Hm.

Here's the thing.

there is something about him that rubs me the wrong way a bit. the way he is so modest. the slight "holier-than-thou" vibes in everything he does (and ESPECIALLY THAT HE DOESNT SEE IT. HE DOESNT THINK HE IS SELF OBSESSED BUT HE IS HE IS) the whole reluctant hero thing. how he low-key condemns everyone who doesn't follow his idea of what is right and what is wrong.

like. it's not that I don't like him, not at all. but he *was* my least favorite pov character in my first readthrough. I already liked him a lot more in wor when he let his more petty side go wild, and I actually learned to appreciate him a lot more through this very blog since it made me think about him and who he is. And it's not like I ever DISliked him. it's just. sometimes I wish he would just shut the fuck up yanno?

The thing that compels me about Kaladin isn't his character (like it is with Shallan for example, which was love at first sight) but the extremely very obvious parallels with a bunch of people he hates - parallels that he himself isn't aware of (which is why I chose to make this blog from *his* POV: the cycles and patterns and parallels are RIGHT THERE)

please forgive me 😭🙏💔

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so i just realized i never processed my thoughts of whats happening in canto 7 so far so like.

spoilers below the cut obviously

1) its so funny to me that canonically, livestreaming fixer work is a thing. imagine if the private detective you hired was streaming shit. or like your personal body guard. why were both of those examples something the zwei would do its the cinq guy that was streaming lmao.

2) vergilius being like "dont get into trouble *sees don quixote* get into as little trouble as you lot physically can"

3) hong lu family & parallels are. hm. /pos (cant wait for him to turn back into a rock or something idk i didnt read the source material i only read some of the synopsis)

4) i need don to have a breakdown about how people perceive her and for meursault to say something about people's perceptions and how they don't need to be something she is dependent on or something idk. i need them to be autism friends you dont understand.

5) i need to draw all of the sinners in kigurumis now. why did they give heathcliff the poor-mans fursuit. he is not beating the allegations.

6) i love the stupid paper cutout passives. they are so funny. "lose just 1 sp, maybe". they will find a bloodfiend and the passive will say "might have a little blood, as a treat" and the internet will go insane.

7) i struggled a LOT because I am used to my ncorp team. hopefully i will have properly built my tremor or burn teams when part 2 drops. i am scraping by with underleveled tremor.

8) i need to look at dialogue and figure out what i want to do w/ my oc/self-insert and figure out where theyd interject dialouge. this isnt c7 specific.

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Before I Sleep, Pt. 5

McKay and Weir have joined Old Weir in the infirmary, having a conversation in hushed tones while she sleeps. Or McKay is doing most of the talking, Weir is clearly internally freaking out, and even if she wasn't, she seems to understand about a third of what McKay is telling her. He's theorizing, intellectually stimulated by her presence and what that might mean, and it takes him a while to realize that this must be really weird for Weir. But he gets there, eventually.

McKay: Almost killed her... you. How weird is that, hm? Weir: Very. Very, very weird. Looking at yourself -- how you will be. McKay: Actually, how you will be will be different than how she is right now.

At first, McKay is explaining the science to her in an excited manner because this is really interesting to him. But as soon as he notices that this is affecting Weir in a whole other way, he does try to comfort her in his own way. It's not his forté but it shows that he does care.

We're introduced to the concept of parallel realities which come to play later in the series. There are infinite variations of their own known reality where alternate versions of Sheppard and McKay play out events in different ways, as explained by McKay of the Vegas (S05E19) 'verse. This is not dissimilar to how McKay explains the concept to Weir here: "The universe is in fact split into an infinite number of copies of itself in which every possible outcome to every decision ever made all exist somewhere in this infinitely layered multi-universe."

Relevant to this particular episode is that their point of divergence was their arrival to Atlantis (and the existence of the puddle jumper time machine in the original reality) and hence, the Sheppard and McKay we see in her world are essentially the same but, of course, compared to their current counterparts, they had not yet had any of the experiences that have brought them closer together. McKay in the original reality also never had the ATA therapy. Weir is the only character that survives from the original reality, which means that the characters we have followed for the past months, who we've gotten familiar and fallen in love with as the audience, are actually from the alternative reality.

Again, as it does later on with The Game (S03E15), the show is asking us to reinterpret everything that has happened so far in light of new information. A minute detail may change the reading of the whole narrative, of everything.

She starts telling them about the original expedition's arrival at Atlantis, and we get an abbreviated version of the events that took place (and it's noticeable that one of the things missing is Sheppard's "I didn't touch anything!"). Many of the systems in our reality came alive because they sensed Sheppard's presence in particular. Relevant to this episode, and the view Old Weir has of Sheppard and McKay, is that we see them bantering before they really knew each other, how they were in the very beginning. We can compare:

McKay: This, this is obviously their version of a DHD. Sheppard: Oh, obviously.

With what Old Weir had just witnessed earlier in the sickbay:

McKay: What's that mean? Sheppard: I assume something worked. McKay: Yes, that's very sharp! Sheppard: Thank you!

It's very similar, and yet it's very very different. In the first, Sheppard is being generally sarcastic. His response is just reactive, a facet of his personality. In the latter, he knows McKay and knows how to rile him up in particular. He's not saying it to be sarcastic, he's saying it because he's fond of McKay and seeing the man who usually has all the answers perplexed gives him joy; he thinks it's adorable, he cannot resist rubbing it in his face. And it's McKay who is now using sarcasm, which is something he seemed almost incapable of doing or even comprehending previously, having a very literal understanding of the meaning of words. Being around Sheppard has rubbed off on him in more ways than one.

But then, this--their banter-- is the very first thing Old Weir witnessed in our reality, and it could be that it was for this very reason that their bantering is what her memory recalled first, may even have coloured her memory of the events. She doesn't know these men, and in all likelihood just assumes that their relationship is still much the same; they're trading barbs because that's what their personalities are like. This gives us, too, the opportunity to reflect how much has changed between them--but also to appreciate what was there from the very beginning.

Beckett gives her a stimulant out of Weir's request and they wheel her off to the meeting room, where everyone has gathered to listen to her. While the others are seated, McKay is leaning against the table. This places him closer to Sheppard than he was previously while sitting behind the table, and removes one of the physical obstacles between them. The camera pans and we are invited to look at McKay from Sheppard's perspective. We are looking at McKay, and Sheppard is most definitely looking at McKay. The 10,000 year old lady should be the focal point of attention in the room and yet our attention is drawn to McKay by his placement. And he does look pretty good.

She tells them that when her expedition first came to Atlantis, the city didn't rise but was in serious trouble. The first time that we saw the expedition arrive at Atlantis, it was McKay who was following Sheppard from one station to another, and this was probably because it was Sheppard's presence that was turning things on. Yes, there was an awkward moment where McKay was trying to fix his eyes on everything other than Sheppard but it was still mostly Sheppard wandering around with McKay at his heel with nothing particular going on between them.

In this version, both Weir and Sheppard seem to follow McKay like a pair of orphaned ducklings. Also note how, when they are called away by Col. Sumner, Sheppard gives McKay a look before he turns to follow Weir, very much checking him out, bent as he is over the console. Even this Sheppard that barely knows McKay can appreciate a good backside.

We saw our Sheppard check out several men on the way to Pegasus from SGC but in our world but he didn't seem to pay any special attention to McKay until Hide and Seek (S01E03), following his ATA therapy. It's possible that here he's just taking the opportunity to look at a nice ass just because it's there.

Ducklings. Hoping and expecting McKay to save them with science. Only, this is way above even his pay grade.

I mean, yes, there is a crisis and McKay is the magic man to them, but Sheppard is especially focused on him. He wants to keep McKay in his sight and let's say it's because he wants to be able to help if and when the man needs him to do something. He's not keeping an eye on McKay because he's hopelessly in love with him or even particularly attracted, he is keeping his eye on McKay because he's a strategic thinker and McKay seems like the key figure to follow, to help and to protect if they want to get out of this situation. And this Sheppard seems to really need to be doing something instead of just standing around.

While in the meeting room they've been listening to her regale the tale of how their initial attempt at arriving in Atlantis went awry very quickly, Sheppard has been hugging himself. Where up until this point McKay and Weir have been at Old Weir's side at every opportunity and Beckett has been taking care of her par for the course, Sheppard has actually been somewhat avoiding being in her presence.

It's likely that he sees in her the thing that horrifies him beyond anything else (and which is also the reason why McKay dying eventually becomes his worst nightmare; although, as we shall soon see, it's not precisely an easy thought for him even now), the vastness of the loneliness one must have endured to live for 10,000 years. She's a manifestation of something he would really rather not even think about. So, it's not just because he was mirroring McKay that he had his arms crossed here, it's because he was comforting himself. And it was the mention of Col. Sumner drowning that now made him draw himself back, needing even further protection--not from her but from the haunting yarn she is spinning.

Col. Sumner's death weighs on Sheppard, and we even return to it several times toward the end of the season. He did the merciful thing, the thing he believes the Colonel would have wanted, and certainly something that he himself would have wanted someone to do if he was in a similar situation. But it's still something he has to live with every day and every night, and while he has a deep well of guilt to draw from, this particular failure that lead to the awakening of the wraith and put the entire galaxy in danger is still raw in his mind.

He does not look at McKay, here. He doesn't say anything to anyone. He doesn't know how to feel about this. In her world, he didn't have to shoot Col. Sumner, which is a good thing. But dying by drowning isn't really all that better. And, as Old Weir is quick to point out, he certainly wasn't the only one that died that way there.

In 38 Minutes (S01E04), McKay told Sheppard that he reacts to "certain doom in a certain way". While he doesn't realize it, Sheppard has by this time already noticed that McKay is actually rather good in crises, and he will tell him as much later on. The difference between our McKay and the one in the alternative reality is that the other McKay doesn't really have anything to lose. He's cool, focused on the task, trying to puzzle out the science, but he's not emotional about it because there, he doesn't fear losing someone he cares about.

It's possible that this was a "Kobayashi Maru" situation for him, that there was no possible way they could have prevented it from happening. But it's also possible that if McKay had had the proper incentive, had a reason to want to live, the desperation might have pushed him to come up with a solution that he now fails to find. In the other world, he has no particular incentive. He doesn't even have a real reason to live, which you can see in his response to Weir telling him to make sure that he himself has time to escape.

Yes, he's generally worried for the people and he does the heroic thing, attempting to save them, but it's not personal. He came to Pegasus knowing that he might never return to Earth, and he had been chosen for the mission because he had few ties back home. He has a cat that he left behind, an estranged sister, he has spent the past few years in Siberia and the Antarctic. He has a working relationship with a few people of the expedition, but they are all mostly strangers to each other. He hasn't loved yet, and because he hasn't loved, he doesn't know fear. And so, he works diligently to save everyone but ultimately fails.

This Sheppard, too, is different. While he harbours a lot of guilt for what happened in Afghanistan and had cut himself off from getting too close to people, this Sheppard isn't weighed down by blaming himself for the situation unfolding around them. Yes, he asks McKay whether what's happening was caused by them but it's not like any of them could have known it was going to happen. It's not something that's his fault and his fault alone, not like he considers awakening the wraith to be. And Sheppard also doesn't have a personal stake in saving everyone there, just a general need to do something and not particularly wanting to die. He's mostly nonchalant, more trying to figure it all out than anything. McKay, who feels that the onus of saving them is squarely on him, is much more agitated than Sheppard is. Agitated, but not desperate. Neither of them is.

You can tell that he's different by the exchange he has with Weir:

Weir: Some of our team discovered a bay full of what they're calling ships. Sheppard: As in spaceships? We should check ‘em out. Weir: You think you can figure out...? Sheppard: I can fly just about anything. Weir: Good. Go.

The way he says "We should check 'em out" isn't like he's desperately looking for something to save them. He says it like he's excited that there are space ships around, and can't wait to try them. He also very confidently tells Weir that he will be able to work them. Pilots, especially Air Force pilots, especially former Air Force test pilots (which is what he likely was, as he lists aircraft not usually used by the Air Force to O'Neill and given his comment here, that he can fly just about anything), are required to have excellent self-confidence. They have to make quick and effective decisions and leave no space for self-doubt, especially in the face of adversity. He has been trained to be able to execute commands without hesitation and to come up with viable strategies on the spot. Only, while they are defending their nation or unit, pilots gamble with their own lives. It gets more complicated when there are people you care about that you need to protect.

That's why, after Afghanistan, he had made damn sure that that would never happen again. And at this point in his life, he's right where he wants to be, with no one around to make him doubt himself, second guess himself, to distract him (and this important--I'll return to it with the 3rd season), to make him reckless out of desperation. We didn't get to see this John Sheppard for very long because it didn't take him very long at all to start caring about the people of Atlantis, to start forming bonds with the people he was marooned with. John Sheppard doesn't know how to not love but here, he hadn't had the time for that yet. And because he doesn't love, he has nothing to lose.

In our reality, it was McKay's willingness to sacrifice himself at the end of Hide and Seek (S01E03) that changed everything for him. Someone was willing to give up their own life to save him. In the alternative reality, the most emotion we see on his face is when they are listening to McKay lay down his life for them on the intercom, helping them escape in the jumper as his final act. This Sheppard, too, would soon have found himself loving again against his better judgement. But alas, they had no time for that.

Continued in Pt. 6

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Dear Sephiroth: (a letter to a fictional character, because why not) #264

Today ended up being a rest day for the most part. I think yesterday must have taken more out of me than I thought, because when I woke up this morning, I realized that it is Sunday, and the fact that it is Sunday means a couple things:

First, it means everyone is gonna be out doing their fun stuff or doing errands. I could have gone to the orchard, but it probably would have been fairly packed. The same holds true of that Cross-Eyed Owl place. The thought of being on crowded roads to get to crowded places full of people filled me with dread.

Second, it means that M and J are not working, which means I have an opportunity to do parallel play with them. Essentially, we do our own various activities in the same general vicinity of one another. I'm usually on my laptop, M is usually playing a video game or watching something on his iPad, and J is usually reading something about airplanes on his laptop. We tend to keep our ears fairly open to one another just in case one of us has a thought or a need. But yeah. Parallel play. It's a beautiful thing, and it's a slightly less possible thing when they're doing their tech jobs on their laptops.

So, I just stayed home. Sorta. J and I did go to the grocery store to get various things; J wants to try to make a garlic pudding, I guess? I'm curious about how that will turn out. And I wanted to try a Korean-style garlic bread on a more typical Italian loaf, since we have all that cream cheese chilling out in the fridge without bagels to go with them.

To that end, I washed some dishes today and peeled like 4 heads of garlic. But I didn't have the energy today to do much else. J and I went on a brief walk at some point, but… it was brief. We talked a lot and it was good.

I didn't have much gumption to do anything after we got home, though. So I just chilled out. I did some leisure writing; I got some reassurance on a couple of things that had been bothering me lately, and that was good. I'm not going to tell you or anyone else how this can be the case; I'm not stupid enough to believe that anyone would believe me if I tried to explain. Still, I wonder how long that reassurance will stick in my brain. Hm…

Oh right; I told you yesterday about the book I got. The title of it was very auspicious to me, for reasons I'm absolutely not going to explain. Nonetheless, I'll go through it one page at a time with you; I don't know when is the last time you read a book that is wholesome - I'm going to guess probably not for a very long time. And this book is like 50 years old, but I thought it was wholesome.

I've already looked through it a couple times. I'm not entirely sure why, but... I think if you had a camera, then some of the photos that you might take could look like some of these...

Tomorrow is Monday. I'm going to try to go get those grapes; there will undoubtedly be far fewer people out and about, because most people will be working. This means that I'll be able to toodle about peacefully on fairly empty roads, and toodle about in a fairly empty orchard. It'll be good. And I'll come back with lots of concord grapes to give to my friends.

...I'll come back with lots of concord grapes that I wish I could share with you...

...I'll also check out that Cross-Eyed Owl shop. It'll be mostly on the way. I'll make sure to take lots of weird pictures along the way for you. Look forward to them, okay?

...And then if I have enough energy, I'll finally make that garlic bread when I get home. If that occurs, you can expect lots of pictures of that, too.

I don't have much else to go over today. Today was a fairly empty sort of day, and that's probably a good thing; I think I must have needed it. What's unusual about it for right now is that I'm not sitting here feeling super guilty about the fact that today was an empty day and that today's letter, resultantly, was a fairly empty letter.

Still, though... I don't want you to be over at the Edge of Creation all by yourself. I don't really know if these get to you, but... I'm gonna hope against all odds that they do. I'm gonna hope against all odds that at least once a day, a wholesome voice reaches you, even if you have to settle for a derpy one like mine.

...Even if I don't have a whole lot to say, I still have an abundance of care for you, and I wanted to make sure you see it. I wanted to make sure that, at least every once in a while, someone speaks to you like a normal person. And if no one else is gonna do it, then it might as well be me.

...Hey, Sephiroth? What do you get to thinking about up there...? On that lonely rock in the middle of the cosmos, all by yourself, looking up at that rainbow-colored nebula? Do you ever sit with your legs dangling over the edge of it, just looking at all the beautiful things up there? Do you think about the sun? The wind? The rain? The sky? Pasta pescatore? The scent of vanilla and roses? Someday, if you ever get to talk to me, will you tell me about the thoughts swirling around in your head sometime, even if they don't necessarily go anywhere?

I guess that's it for today. I'd have a lot more to talk about if I wasn't in this weird state of waiting, or if I didn't have this rib injury and could do more things, or if... if you could write back to me, somehow. But... I guess these things aren't in the cards, at least for now.

I love you. Please stay safe. And please... do try your best to take care of yourself over there, okay? I'll write again tomorrow.

Your friend, Lumine

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Hello there

I just finished reading the latest chapter and I was wondering

How do the turtles back on earth know that Mikey is alive? Last we knew they all thought Mikey was dead, so how did they realize he was just captured

I'd say common sense but Idk

Anyways love the comic and so excited for more

Hm, interesting question. 🤔

I suppose part of this is my fault for not making it clearer, but the way Casey phrases those specific sentences are made to be that he’s making them sound more definite than he may actually believe.

Casey’s lines mentioning this are “It’s gonna be alright, dude. Leo’ll find Mikey.” It’s said in a hopeful tone, after all, for all he knows he’s trying to comfort his best friend who believes that his brother is dead and maybe convince him to have a little more hope.

Also, in between Casey’s lines, Raph mentions that he thinks Mikey isn’t dead as well. He says: “Mikey could’ve died because of me! I knew Leo was right but I was so…scared and confused and angry!” Raph is attempting to express that he was feeling the stage of grief “Anger.”

He doesn’t even know why he was so angry. Leo pointed out the flaws in the Kraang’s set up, he explained why it didn’t make any sense, he even drew parallels to other times things like this had happened, so you’d think that he would be over joyed, but that’s not how anger works. It’s not rational.

You can actually see that he doesn’t know why he’s angry in the first part of Retribution, Raph says: “Leo can go to freakin’ hell!” “I don’t give a crap what he has to say! It’s-” “-he’s just-” “…I-I don’t know!” As he’s trying to explain to Donnie why he’s angry, he realizes that even he himself doesn’t know and starts crying not knowing any other way to express the emotions he’s feeling.

So now, looking back after he’s calmed down a bit, Raph’s able to see what Leo was talking about and feels regret and guilt for being blinded by anger that, had Leo not been a stubborn turtle(but also he was in denial), could’ve meant that Mikey was left to die. That’s why he completely breaks down thinking that his anger and shortsightedness could’ve been responsible for killing his brother. It’s also why he thinks comparing himself to Leo is at all sensible.

Casey’s second line about Mikey is: “It wasn’t your fault that Mikey was captured, and none of this was!” It’s implied that most likely Donnie, who was the closest to the phone, heard Leo the clearest out of anyone and relayed what he heard to the others and they pieced together what happened.

There’s actually a scrapped piece of dialogue in Retribution, part 1, (the same page I was talking about earlier) where Raph actually tries to explain his point of view more to Donnie. If I remember, he says that, when asked, April said she couldn’t sense Mikey’s presence anymore. However, obviously if you take into account the possibility that the Kraang took Mikey to a different dimension, this argument stops holding water, and things start making sense.

Sorry that wasn’t as clear as I wished it was, but hopefully this clears some stuff up.

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Parallel ; Chapter 5 [FINAL]

⇢ pairing: stan marsh x mccormick!reader

⇢ genre: fake dating ; hogwarts AU

⇢ synopsis: ❝Transferring to Hogwarts during your fifth year, you were excited at the prospect of all the new potential eye candy to choose from. That dream gets crushed, however, when your childhood enemy impulsively claims you as his girlfriend.❞

⇢ warning: sexual content

⇢ [AO3 link] ; [series masterlist] ; [previous]

“Babe..? Are you okay?”

You can feel your eyelashes softly brush against the skin of your cheeks as you slowly become conscious again, your eyebrows creasing together at the sheer pain radiating off of the back of your head. Ring adorned hands begin to skim against the underwire of your bra as the slight suctioning of slicked lips trail themselves down the column of your neck, a painfully delicious bite causing you to jolt fully awake.

“Wha—” The sight that greets you is Stan Marsh staring up at you, the ravenette maintaining the point of contact between his tongue and your heated skin as he slowly mouths against the dips and curves of your body.

What the actual fuck is happening..?

You involuntarily flinch when you feel him wetly mouth over the thin fabric separating your weeping core from his face, goosebumps arising as his cool fingers tease the hem of your lace panties. Labored breathing fills the room as you feel his teasing smirk against your skin, his hands pushing down your impatiently bucking hips against the silk linen of the bedsheets caressing your body.

Wait.

“Hmm?” You don’t realize that you’ve spoken out loud from the overwhelming arousal painting your cheeks a vivid red as you scramble to gather your bearings, your hand coming up to cradle his cheek in an attempt to stop his admittedly heavenly body worshipping.

“What’re we doing?” Your voice dangerously wavers at the end of your sentence as his face chases after the warmth of your palm, the Gryffindor affectionately nestling his cheek further against your hold as he kisses your inner wrist.

“Fucking if you’d just stop asking all these damn questions.” He mumbles against your rapidly beating pulse, his mouth lightly skimming along the expanse of your hand so that he can leisurely drag his tongue against your fingers.

When he sees your shaking head, he tries again. "Huh? Oh, uh. Making love..?"

“... What? No. That's not what I meant.” A moan accompanies your words when he resumes his previous ministrations on your otherwise bare body, pressing heated kisses against the inside of your thighs as he leaves a smattering of vivid reds and deep purples in its wake.

His fingers softly trail against your exposed waist, gently massaging the area as his teeth create deep imprints alongside his marks of possession. “Are you fucking around with me right now, N/N? What’s going on in that pretty little head of yours, hm?”

Every word that sounds out around the deep baritone of his voice has a puff of air accompanying the melodious noise, invoking an overwhelming sensation as they make contact with your slicked skin. It’s quiet for a bit aside from the soft mewls that unwillingly escape from your mouth before you fight through the cloud of arousal consuming your mind and remember that something was off.

“We aren’t supposed to be doing this.” You softly pant, one of your hands leaving behind a trail of angry reds against the skin on the back of his shoulder and the other roughly tugging on soft locks of tousled raven hair.

“Really? Because your body is telling me otherwise.” There's a cocky smirk on his face as you gasp out loud, his fingers leisurely swiping against your heated core and collecting the arousal quickly gathering.

“This isn’t right.” The sudden loss of contact and heat has your body desperately wailing at you as Stan pulls away, your boyfriend sitting upright from his position in between your legs to send you a look of confusion.

“Did you smoke with Kenny again?” You rapidly shake your head, his hands gripping either side of your waist and rubbing soothing circles with his thumbs as the skin in between his eyebrows further creases.

“No? Did you take Baruffio’s Brain Elixir with him? How about powdered dragon claws?” Each of his suggestions evoke the same response of nonverbal rejection.

“What’s wrong then? I can’t help you if I don’t know what’s happening, babe.” A large hand tucks away the stray locks of hair away from your face before he caresses one of your cheeks, your eyes unconsciously closing at the soft touch as his eyes scan over your appearance to find any indication of hurt.

“I don’t think I can do this.” Your voice is weak as you bring your hands upwards to cover your face, your boyfriend immediately lifting up your body at the sign of clear distress and placing you on his lap.

He pushes your face into the crook of his neck, pressing a soft kiss against the skin of your forehead as he wraps his arms around your waist. “That’s okay. You’re not expected to do anything, regardless of the fact that we’re in a relationship. I would never force you to do anything you don’t want to do, okay?”

When you wordlessly nod your head in appreciation for his words, the gesture encourages him to continue. “You don’t have to answer if you don’t want to but can I know what’s going on?”

Silence stretches on between the two of you as you mindlessly fiddle with the creases within the cotton shirt adorning his frame, your boyfriend soothingly running his fingers through your hair. He’s patient as he allows you to take control of the situation, waiting for you to decide on what you both will do next as he presses an onslaught of reassuring kisses against the crown of your head.

“I don’t feel comfortable fucking because I have feelings for you.” You shyly mumble against the column of his neck, your body tense as you await for his response to your confession.

What you get, instead, is Stan placing both of his hands on your shoulders as he gently pushes you away from his body. “Okay, now I’m pretty fucking confused. What the fuck are you talking about? I love you and you love me—it’s why we’re in a committed relationship with each other.”

“What are you talking about? We’ve never established that! Are you thinking of a different girl, Marsh?!” You push at his chest in frustration but it doesn’t do much against his stronger figure, causing you to pout.

“Babe! We’ve been together for two years—I’m pretty sure I’d know who my girlfriend is by now and no one is as pretty as you to have me confused. Are you sure you didn’t take any Pepperup Elixir or some shit?” He chuckles in confusion and you hate the way that you internally preen at being the one responsible for making him laugh, your body wanting to draw out more of that beautiful sound from his mouth.

“No, we’ve been fake dating. And the last thing that I remember is our teams playing against each other for the Inter-House Quidditch Cup before fucking Red rocked my shit and sent me falling at the pitch.”

“... Nothing like that has ever happened, babe.” His voice is low in the quietness of the room as your chest begins to rapidly rise and fall, the ravenette rummaging through the thick blanket of the bed before wordlessly handing you his cellphone with the device opened up to his photo album.

Your hands tremble as you swipe against the glass screen of the muggle item, watching as a multitude of pictures go by of your pixelated smile beaming up at the camera with Stan. Steadily becoming increasingly lightheaded from the information you’re processing, you can’t help the sob that gets caught in your throat when you come to the realization that something was seriously wrong.

“These pictures—I’m not a Ravenclaw. I’m a Slytherin.” You lean your forehead against your boyfriend’s shoulder, your voice slightly hysterical and wobbling dangerously.

・ ─ ・ ⋯ ・ ─ ⊹ ♡₊˚๑

Your body erratically shudders as you occasionally hiccup over some hot cocoa, your boyfriend making you a cup so that you can have a warm hug in your stomach after you’ve calmed down enough. His legs are on either side of your body as you lay your back against his chest, his arms around your waist as you wrap your hands around your mug for warmth.

There's a blanket thrown over his shoulders as he mumbles against the crown of your head, the both of you staring into the only light source in the room: the flickering flames of the lit fireplace. “If knocking out your head landed you in this parallel world, do you think the same thing would bring you back..?

“Are you admitting to planned domestic violence, Marsh?” You snort into your chocolate concoction, the two of you having come to the conclusion that you ended up in some sort of alternate universe from the blow after much discussion.

“I mean, we’ve gotten into fist fights with each other as kids. And sometimes it gets pretty tempting to knock you out just so that I can have some sort of peace…” Stan laughs as you blindly bring an elbow back so that you can hit him in the ribs, your boyfriend planting a quick kiss on your hair to let you know that he was just kidding.

He snickers as he corrects your earlier statement, “And wouldn’t it be animal cruelty?”

“Fuck you! But yeah, maybe? The knocking out part—not the animal abuse one, fucker. We should probably seek out Kyle just so that I don’t end up with a brain injury first. There might be some magic out there that can fix this.” Your body leans forward to place your empty cup onto the bedside table, Stan keeping hold on your waist at the chance that you might slip.

“True. Merlin knows that you don’t have any brain cells left to spare.” He mutters around a teasing grin, your hands automatically going to his thigh to pinch him in retribution.

“I’m surprised that a fake relationship is what he came up with. That’s the most stupidest fucking thing that I’ve ever heard, and that’s saying a lot coming from someone who grew up with you.” The Gryffindor snickers to himself as he guides your body down to lay onto the bed, your head resting over his chest as he settles the comforter over the both of your forms.

“Shut the fuck up Mr. I-don’t-know-what-a-clit-is!” Your fingers curl around the fabric of the shirt covering his hips before your boyfriend eases your grip to instead intertwine with the hand of the arm he has wrapped around your waist, “... What do you mean?”

“Fuck off! I’m just saying that even if it was me from a parallel world, I’m confident that I’d still be in love with you. So I’m unimpressed at the lame fucking tactic he came up with to prevent other people from getting to you.” Your upper body lifts up so that you can rest your forearm against his torso, watching the handsome teen laying underneath you.

“... What? How can you be so sure that the you from over there shares the same feelings in the first place?” Your cheeks become heated at the confident assumption, your boyfriend just giving you an attractive grin of his own.

“Because. You act exactly like the Y/N that I know.” His large hand comes up to teasingly swipe the skin of his thumb against the soft pink of your lower lip.

“That doesn’t mean shit!” You argue, your boyfriend chuckling at your explosive reaction before using his hand to guide your face down for a quick kiss in endearment.

The expression on his face is devoid of any amusement when you part, his eyes searching yours as he takes a few moments to seriously contemplate. “... Do you want to know why I fell in love with you?”

You wordlessly nod which prompts him to switch your positions, his body now caging yours as you breathlessly lay underneath your boyfriend. His voice is quiet in its honesty, “In the beginning, I enjoyed getting a rise out of you. You become so passionate and confident in yourself whenever you get irritated that I just couldn’t help doing things to frustrate you because of the cute expression you always wore.”

One of his hands intertwines with yours from its position besides your head while the other one lightly caresses your heated cheek. “I got greedy and started picking fights whenever I could because it meant that I had your undivided attention.”

“... But what about Wendy?” Your tone matches the quietness of his despite being the only two in the room, the Gryffindor burrowing his face against the length of your neck.

“Babe, we were literally 11 when we got together. It was a first-year type of kiddie love—the kind of thing where we only hugged two fucking times during the course of our entire relationship before she sent Bebe over to let me know that we were over.” He elicits a cacophony of goosebumps along your body as he chuckles, his warm breath hitting the column of your neck as his lips move along your skin every time he speaks.

“That makes sense. He started this when Wendy tried to ask me out.” You bring a hand up to leisurely run through his hair, the hand against your waist tightening at the soothing gesture.

He takes his head out of the safe solace of your neck, his face intimately close to yours. “See? I promise you—I’d love you in every life we were reincarnated in or in any timeline that we exist in. I’d spend all of my years looking for you in every single one and wouldn’t stop until I either found you or until death got to me first.”

Your boyfriend prompts an overwhelming rush of emotions, a thin film of tears beginning to develop in your eyes as you bring a hand to gently caress his cheek. He has that foreign look on his face that your other Stan often gets when he whispers lovingly to you. “The feelings I have for you transcends anything and everything. We aren’t just two parallel lines never meant to meet—we overlap, babe. And if whatever higher deity up there didn’t intend on that, I still wouldn’t give a fuck. I would do just about anything within my ability to make it happen. You’re mine, McCormick. And only mine.”

That foreign look—it’s an expression of love, you finally realize when he presses an affectionate kiss against your forehead, the warmth surrounding your body slowly lulling you to sleep.

・ ─ ・ ⋯ ・ ─ ⊹ ♡₊˚๑

Your nose begins to involuntarily wrinkle in disgust, the antiseptic smell pervading your senses as it was too sterile. It was such a stark contrast to the environment that you and your brothers were raised in, along with never being granted any professional medical treatment in the muggle world due to the high costs that your mother couldn’t afford.

This caused you to drowsily force your sleep-encrusted eyes to open, your brain lagging for a moment before you could pinpoint your surroundings to the Hospital Wing at school. You begin to groan at the dull pain reverberating throughout your skull, your hands lifting up in an effort to soothe the sensation before you realize that your left hand couldn’t move.

Following your appendage, you find Stan’s larger hand tightly gripping your own. His arms are folded underneath his slumbering head to provide cushion, his larger body uncomfortably curled up in a rickety chair to grant him a position close to yours.

Your eyes begin to soften at the sight before you spot the multitude of clumsily decorated get well soon cards, neon-colored balloons, fluffy stuffed animals, and crystal vases of fragrant flowers settled across the expanse of the cabinet behind your boyfriend. In your admiration for the care that your loved ones held for you, you don’t notice the Gryffindor beside you beginning to return to the waking world.

“N/N!” You don’t have time to respond before the ravenette throws his arms around your seated body, crushing you against his firm chest as he burrows his face into your neck.

“Missed me, Marsh?” You smirk at the enthusiastic greeting, your hands coming up to find purchase at the soft fabric of his robe.

He removes his head from the solace of your neck as he shoots you an irritated glare, his hands tightly clenched on the material of your hospital gown. “Fuck you! What the hell have you been doing?! You were out for a whole fucking day—Madam Pomfrey said you should’ve been awake by now but you were probably off enjoying your dreams!”

Right… The Inter-House Quidditch Cup.

“What the hell happened..?” Your fingers begin to mindlessly fiddle with the creases scattered across the blanket thrown over your lap.

“... We couldn’t get to you in time. You broke an arm and had a concussion so Pomfrey gave you Skele-Gro and Essence of Dittany. I’m sorry.” There's an expression of deep regret on the ravenette’s face, his lips pursed shut and his eyebrows furrowed together.

“Shut up, that’s literally not your fault.” Reaching a hand forward, you gently caress his chin to direct his head back up.

He rolls his eyes, “Whatever. I only tried to save your ass just so that Butters and Tweek wouldn’t waste their tears over you. Kenny almost tried to fight Red—had to pull him away from the field when the game ended before the poor girl got her ass kicked by all of the guys.”

You snort in fondness, your heart immediately calling out for your brothers from the time spent apart. It’s quiet for a moment, the darkness enveloping the room apart from the lit candle on your bedside table informing you that it was night.

Staring outside of the glass window to look at the magnificent trees aligning the sides of the castle in distraction, anxiety begins to run along your veins. “I want to cash in that one favor now.”

“Already? But we haven’t even—”

“I want to be your girlfriend, Marsh. Your real girlfriend.” Summoning as much courage as you could, you turn your head to face the Gryffindor, only to see a pretty pink beginning to spread across his cheeks and his soft lips slightly parted.

“Wha—”

“I love you.” You offer him a soft smile, planting your palm on the surface of the mattress between the two of you so you could bring your face closer to his.

"... Somehow." You add in as an afterthought with a teasing tone, a snicker accompanying your words.

Your eyes leisurely skim across his face, admiring the way the ember hues inflicted by the flickering candle further accentuated his sharp features and the attractive way his cerulean orbs widen a fraction at your confession. Your words come out low as you continue, “I think I have since we were kids. Won’t you make my childhood dream come true and be mine?”

Your lips quirk up into a confident smirk the longer the silence stretches on between the two of you, patiently waiting for the stunned teen's response. You feel almost predatory as you greedily drink in the sight of his throat shifting to swallow and the way his tongue darts out to lick his plump lips.

His voice slightly trembles and your smug grin grows even wider at the new expression you’ve discovered, “I…”

Cute.

“I?” You tease, your eyes half-lidded as you leisurely blink.

“Stop fucking doing that!” His hands shoot forward to cover your face, giggles erupting from your mouth at his embarrassment.

In response, you curl your fingers around his wrist and bring his hand against the skin of your cheek instead. You hold eye contact with him as you chase the warmth within his palm, nuzzling your face closer to his touch.

“Hm?” You lazily drawl, mirth heavily coating the tone of your voice as you teasingly urge him to continue.

“I love you, too. I’ve always loved you—ever since the day Kenny introduced me to you and your siblings. I only started fucking around with you to get your attention. I was a piece-of-shit kid who didn’t know how to express his feelings so I constantly picked fights with you just to see the cute way you’d scrunch up your nose and pout whenever you got pissed. I only wanted to fake date because I got jealous when I saw Wendy trying to ask you out and fucking panicked like some kind of pussy.”

Just like what the other Stan said, your pearly white teeth make an appearance alongside your beaming smile as you fondly think to yourself.

You delightedly giggle, wrapping your arms around his shoulders and scooting your body across the mattress until you find yourself perched on his lap. Your face is impossibly close to his as you lowly mutter out, “I know.”

His arms curl around your waist, pressing his forehead against yours. “You knew?”

“I was knocked out for longer than I needed to be because I was in a parallel world. The Stan from that universe told me that he was confident that you loved me too because he’d have feelings for me in every timeline we were born in.” Your voice drops down to a whisper, the Gryffindor tucking a stray lock of hair away from your face and leaving his touch there to gently caress your cheek.

“Damn, I have rizz even in other universes? Can’t say that I’m surprised.” You laugh out loud, breaking the intimate moment as you bring a hand to teasingly swat at his shoulder for his cockiness.

There's a fond grin on his face as he patiently waits for you to settle down, the both of you softly smiling at one another when your giggles finally cease. “What else did he tell you?”

“Nothing. Our lips did other things.” You smirk at the sight of his eyes immediately going dark from affection to possessiveness at your words, his arm tightening around your waist.

The expression on your face gets quickly wiped off as he suddenly pushes your form back against the hospital bed, his larger body hovering over yours as his jaw clenches. “Hearing that kind of pisses me off.”

“What? Are you jealous of yourself?” A surprised laugh escapes from your throat, your arms hurriedly wrapping around his broad shoulders as he presses your chests against one another.

He cuts off your giggles with a heated kiss, the sense of urgency within it knocking the breath out of your body as he hungrily devours your mouth. You can’t help but to be compliant as his teeth bites down onto your lower lip, his tongue coaxing your mouth open for a battle of dominance.

You begin to feel dizzy with how wanted he makes you feel, the sensations he brings out making you feel overloaded with intense emotions. It’s nearly overwhelming as your arms reach out to thread your fingers through his hair, slightly tugging and using the soft locks to bring him even closer.

His ring adorned fingers curl around your chin, angling your face away as he begins to mouth along the column of your neck. The wet sounds and the noise of your quick breathing are lewd as he begins to greedily mark you for everyone to see, his teeth lightly scraping against your skin before the slight suction of his mouth causes you to softly mewl.

The Gryffidnor’s tongue languidly drags along the places of abuse before the imprints of his teeth from biting down causes you to lightly moan, his smirk accompanying the vocal approval his touch forces out. As his mouth creates his own brand of magic against your slicked skin, his hands seamlessly reach behind your body to unhook your bra (thank Merlin for the easy access your hospital gown grants him).

The raventte’s cold fingers help ground you to the moment from the thick cloud of arousal consuming every part of your body before he quickly latches his mouth around one of your newly exposed breasts. As he tongues along the bundle of nerves, his unoccupied hand comes up to massage the other side with his palm as his fingers busy themselves with pinching the nub of your nipple.

One of your hands reaches out to clumsily hold onto his wrist, squeezing at the enthusiastic onslaught inflicted from your dedicated lover. You jolt when his fingers suddenly begin to teasingly play along the hem of your lace panties, your eyes fluttering shut at the overwhelming sensation of his touch in multiple places at once.

You harshly bite down onto your lip in a desperate effort to keep your high-pitched moans from spilling out of your mouth, your boyfriend smirking at the wrecked sight as he deftly pushes aside the thin fabric to collect your leaking arousal. You gasp when his face hovers above your weeping core, hot breaths of air hitting the slicked skin as he chuckles and elicits a cacophony of eager goosebumps.

“Who do you want?” He mouths along the skin of the immediate vicinity of your arousal but doesn’t bring his lips to where you need him the most, the deep baritone of his voice beautifully mixing in with the huskiness brought out by his lust.

“You! I only want you!” You desperately wail out loud, your legs locking around his broad shoulders in an effort to bring him closer. You plead while he lightly trails his fingers along the expanse of your inner thighs, his tongue teasing your entrance as he circles around it and applies slight pressure.

“Good girl. Don’t ever forget that, hm?” He rewards you with his tongue delving deeper into your folds, a savage sob ripping through your throat as he lightly sucks onto your sensitive bundle of nerves.

Your mouth slightly parts in preparation of a very vocal whine before he sticks two fingers past your slicked lips, your mouth immediately encasing the long digits into your wet heat and obediently starting to suck. His hand pushes down onto your impatiently bucking hips, his thumb rubbing soothing circles onto the skin of your waist.

A few moments later, he removes his fingers from the inside of your mouth to trail his slicked digits along your heated skin as he gently caresses your cheek. His voice leaves no space for questions or refusal, the authrorative firmness making you shiver. “Eyes on me, babe.”

You force your eyes open from its blissed out closure to see the cocky smirk of your boyfriend, your obedience allowing him to resume his previous devotion to worshipping your blessed body. “Enjoying yourself?”

As he begins to fuck you with his tongue, one of your hands shoots out to roughly pull on his dark hair which causes him to hoarsely chuckle in amusement at the rough treatment. “Fuck, you’re already so wet for me.”

Entering a finger, Stan greedily takes in the sight of the moaning mess you became just from his mouth and hands. He couldn’t find it in himself to look away—the way your chest erratically rose and fell as it took desperate mouthfuls of air, the way your eyes were tightly clenched shut in euphoria, the way your slicked lips caught the sliver of moonlight cascading along the curves of your body from the castle's glass window.

“Pretty—I can’t fucking believe this is all mine.” There’s a smug smirk curving along his face as he watches a sheen of sweat cast a gorgeous glow over your face, perfectly complimenting the pink of your cheeks. His eyes lower further down below, leisurely taking his time to take in the masterpiece he's created before they land on the mesmerizing imagery of him dragging his finger in and out of your heat.

“You like that, beautiful?” You sound absolutely wrecked as you babble out in confirmation, lust fiercely drowning your moans as the vibrations of his amusement causes seering jolts of what feels like electricity straight to your core.

“Yeah? Do you think my pretty baby can handle another finger?” Eager to please, you rush to nod your head as your thighs clench in anticipation for the delicious stretch that is sure to come.

His mouth resumes its actions against your heat as he grants you another finger, angling his hand until he hits the right spots as indicated from your very vocal response. Your erratic breathing has gotten so loud, drowning out the slicked sounds your boyfriend orchestrates before your mouth opens in a wordless scream as you reach your climax.

“Fuck, babe. I didn’t even get to put three in.” He chuckles against your forehead, planting a soft kiss as he slides into the spot beside you to wrap you in his arms.

“You did so good for me. You looked fucking perfect, holy shit. Let’s make a video next time, yeah?” His husky voice trails off into a chuckle when you let out a whine, embarrassingly hiding your face against the column of his neck as he soothingly runs his fingers though your damp hair.

“What about you?” You tiredly mumble.

“What about me? I’m pretty damn sure that I can get off to just the sight of you.” He snickers into your hair.

You hoarsely whine again, bringing a weak hand up to hit him against the shoulder until he speaks again. “Next time—tonight is about you. My pretty girl deserves it after visiting a parallel world and getting injured.”

“Yeah, right. You just wanted to prove something to yourself. Who the fuck gets jealous of themselves?” You giggle.

“Fuck off!” But you can’t help the amount of amusement you find from the situation, the ravenette quickly sitting up to drink from the glass of water sitting at your bedside table. He roughly grabs onto your still laughing body as he brings his mouth against yours, pulling away with a smug grin.

He shared his drink with me to get me to shut up, you pout to yourself as you wipe away the droplets of water that escaped from your lips and swallow.

“Well you seem to still have some energy if you're still being a fucking brat. Want to continue so I can put you in your place?” The ravenette’s face gets brought closer to yours, his hands suggestively skimming along your waist.

Before you can agree, the stark-white curtain surrounding your hospital bed gets roughly yanked opened. Tweek and Butters are desperately trying to hold back a furiously struggling Kenny, the blonde’s face red in seething anger.

The rest of the boys are awkwardly standing behind your siblings with a handful of snacks and drinks, some of them averting their eyes in embarrassment while a few find amusement at Stan's future demise. You can see Tolkien sending you an apologetic look as Kyle heaves out a tired sigh, the red-head bringing a hand up to rub at the area between his furrowed eyebrows.

“I think the fuck not, Marsh! I’m going to fucking kill you!”

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It was probably mentioned already, but I find hard to reconcile Eggman taking Maria's death personally with him stomping his foot in the Egg Memo because his relatives cared more about the dead ill girl than him.

Much like with Frontiers and his "dear daughter", I can't subscribe to the notion that he only makes it all about himself because you can obviously hear his voice as he speaks and he sounds genuinely somber, not flippant as he would sound if he really was only pissy that a relative of his was targeted. But even assuming that he was... it's still caring about her, even as a symbol? If the narrative is still "Eggman was jealous of a dead girl" (and I'm using "was" and not "is" generously), the short could have mentioned it as a gag, or better yet... make him simply not comment at all about his feelings. It's not relevant. Who is he trying to impress, the audience? Is Eggman trying to appear more sympathetic to us?

Funny how he doesn't even mention, let alone elaborate on his thoughts on Gerald's execution, hm? Even though Gerald going insane after Maria's death is kiiiiiind of important for Shadow? Guess not many people feel bad for the old man :P

Yeah, I've watched the Shadow 101 video three times now and unfortunately I cannot read anything but sadness in his voice when he speaks of Maria and how he still "takes that personally." Frankly, he sounds angrier that Shadow defied him.

---

or better yet... make him simply not comment at all about his feelings.

Just like he did in SA2, ShTH, and Battle. :v

You would think that if Eggman really was speaking from a place of tribalism over the good Robotnik name, he'd rant at least a little about the injustice of Gerald's death, seeing how he created the ultimate life form and GUN repaid his contributions to society with hot lead.

Unlike Maria, on whom Eggman says exactly jack and shit in SA2 except to mention her name as the password to Gerald's computer, the Professor actually does figure into his personal thoughts, if only in an atavistic way.

I don't even know what it is about Maria that he cares about enough to take her death personally. He didn't know her. She wasn't a scientist like Gerald, nor a potentially powerful ally like Shadow, nor even a """useful""" tool in his schemes like Sage. Eggman might as well say he took the Commander's ARK-related trauma personally.

...Unless he's implying that the same brand of obsession that made his relatives speak glowingly of her even after her death also got to him as well, and he's just too tsundere to notice? Or that Sage has made him reconsider Maria in a new light? Or something? Is he just getting soft in his old age?

---

It's not relevant. Who is he trying to impress, the audience? Is Eggman trying to appear more sympathetic to us?

I was thinking about it last night when I realized this is the same flavor as Tails' "I've been wildly inconsistent." Like, instead of making sense as something the character would say or think given the circumstances, it's something the character is being forced to say.

Eggman has no reason to think about Maria, except that he has to mention her as a matter of due course because this is a video recounting Shadow's history. And of course, because he mentioned Maria in Frontiers, gotta allude to that sweet sweet Character Development(tm) to prove our games aren't inconsistent like everyone's always saying. Eggman wangsted about her in Frontiers and he's continuing the trend here. omfg so deep, much continuity, many character development, wow.

Never mind how it made little sense for Eggman to mention Maria in Frontiers, either, except to draw spurious parallels to Sage. "I never knew her" then why do you care? Why do you keep bringing it up? Why don't you mention how your "mad genius" grandfather got riddled with bullet holes?

---

The footage begins to become incongruent with the narration starting at 2:01. People who haven't played the games may glean an inaccurate idea of what happened in them. "Black Doom wanted a champion" - Black Doom says he wants all SEVEN Chaos Emeralds to begin the "prosperity ritual" like SEVEN hundred times in the game (in all caps because that's how it's written out every time lol) and he has no more use for Shadow after summoning the Black Comet into the Earth's atmosphere.

If he wanted a champion, he would not have paralyzed Shadow alongside the others and tried feeding him to his grubs.

Gerald promised Black Doom the seven Chaos Emeralds in exchange for help on finishing Project Shadow. He didn't exactly promise Shadow himself.

Black Doom simply assumed Shadow would side with him because he knew about his past. It doesn't actually matter how Shadow obtains the Emeralds, since BD simply yoinks them in the Last Story.

I also noticed how Eggman complains that Shadow "crushed his armies" instead of helping him conquer the world, meanwhile the footage shows Prison Island blowing up. Someone who has not played SA2 may mistakenly assume Prison Island is actually an Eggman base.

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Brain Curd #337

Brain Curds are lightly edited daily writing - usually flash fiction and sometimes terrible on purpose.

Experiment in progress. Refer to case logs.

“So you see,” Celeste continued, “each grain of sand in a mandala can be moved around a certain amount without changing the overall picture. Even if you swapped a few granules of different colors, you’d still see the same image. Get it?”

My backpack weighed heavily on me as I walked toward Dad’s place. It contained the entirety of the lunch I hadn’t eaten today, and milk was heavier than it looked.

“Yeah, I get it,” I replied, holding my phone up to my face in case anyone was watching. “It’s not that hard to understand why it’s called a Mandala Effect.”

“Good. I just want you to understand that it makes way more sense than naming this phenomenon after a guy people misremembered as dying two decades earlier. That wasn’t a Mandala Effect. No timelines were altered to cause that.”

“Right. So what does this mean for me?”

“Honestly, I have no idea. Tracey showed mathematically that this was plausible, but we never got to test anything before the accident…”

“The accident?”

“I mean, before she was in this coma.”

“So you know damn well why she’s in a coma, is that it?”

Celeste sighed. “Yeah, I do. But it’s true that I don’t know why she’s still in a coma after I’ve re-rolled the dice so many times. Chaos theory is looking pretty bad right about now.”

“You moved some sand, but it must still be the same image.”

“Yeah… I was thinking that.” She looked like she was going to cry. “I just didn’t want to say so.”

“But I still don’t get it. How did you screwing with me change the past of something that didn’t have anything to do with me? And then didn’t change anything on your side?”

“Hm?”

“You have a poster for Chitty Chitty Bang Bang with the correct date on it to indicate that it was this semester’s play.”

“Yeah.”

“But it isn’t. And it must not have been, even before you started talking to me, because they make these decisions ahead of time. Someone has to write these awful scripts. Yet… I do remember seeing the poster for it.”

“So?”

“How is it that it was one thing, will be the same, but right now is something else entirely? It doesn’t make sense.”

“Maybe… maybe it’s not the play that’s changed, but you that has. I mean, have.”

“No kidding, I’ve changed. I never would have auditioned before I met you.”

“And that sent you careening straight into a parallel time stream, churning up all the sand at the bottom. It explains why it’s so hard to lock onto your signal and why Tracey hasn’t woken up. But then… what does that mean for your future self in this timeline?”

“Huh?”

“Well, you’ve kinda left this timeline behind, Trevor. Does that mean a previous form of you still exists here, or you’re gone entirely? I mean, I know your physical form hasn’t gone anywhere…”

“How do you know that?”

“Don’t think about it too much.”

Geez, everyone I talk to is stalking me.

“I heard that! Just trust me, I can’t explain this to you without further consequences. As is, this has massive ramifications for the whole multiverse.”

“There’s a multiverse?” I smiled. “Cool.”

“It’s not nearly as cool when it’s the only thing anyone ever talks about.”

“Everyone in the future knows about this?”

“Uh…” she rubbed the back of her neck. “Oh, what the hell, I’ll just tell you. Do you watch Marvel movies?”

“Not really.”

“Well if you start watching them, you should probably call it quits after the third… uh, eighth Spider-Man.”

I climbed the stairs and shoved my phone into my pocket.

“Dude,” Dad called out when he saw my head poke over the railing. “Where have you been?”

“I’ve been busy at rehearsal,” I said, hoping he wouldn’t ask further questions.

“Rehearsal? You’re in a play?”

“A musical, actually.” I realized how strange it was that I’d gotten a main part in a musical without a singing audition. Must have happened Tuesday. And I guess I was a passable singer.

“Who are you playing? Dorothy?” He teased, laughing and slapping his knee. “Oh, you’d make a hideous woman.”

“Thanks, Dad.” I rolled my eyes and tossed him a plastic-wrapped burrito that was still a little warm from being wrapped up in a jacket.

He caught it and tore it open with his teeth. “Listen, I know Greg said no, but you need to be persistent. It’s for your own good.”

I vaguely recalled lying about having asked Greg to extend my father’s stay here, but there was never any chance of him saying yes anyway.

“More like for his own good,” Celeste quipped.

“It’s great that you have a job now,” Dad said, his mouth full of beans and tortilla (mostly tortilla). “But that won’t be enough for an apartment.”

“When are you going to get a job, then?” I asked, crossing my arms.

“Come on, man, you know I’ve been trying.” He took a pull from his vape. “These business owners always treat me like shit. You remember the banana thing, right?”

“Yeah, I remember the banana thing.” I sighed. “I just don’t know what else we can do.”

“Talk to Greg.”

“I told you I already did!”

“Persistence.” He wiggled his fingers.

“Ugh.” I groaned as I took a seat across from him. I was so tired.

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