love hurts

[bossymarmalade]

Jason held the picture over the candle and watched as it burned to ashes in his fingers. A slight smile crept over his face. The first spell was cast, making Oliver Queen overpoweringly lustful towards anyone who was not wearing a special talisman that Jason himself just so happened to possess and who came within a 10 meter diameter of the Emerald Archer. His deed was almost done; he only had one more spell to go.

Jason wiped the paste from his chest and pulled on a shirt. He buttoned the shirt as he walked over to a hot plate on the other side of his room. The pot on top was bubbling, the water inside boiling. The mage flicked on a desk light and peered inside. He took a nearby fork and poked at the cucumber. It was almost soft enough for him to begin the second spell.

This was to be a masterpiece that the conjurer wanted to see up close. He resolved to pay a surprise visit to Queen’s compound just as soon as the the second spell was done, even if it did mean traveling on those awful zeta beams. As Jason snapped the clasp of the chain holding the protective talisman around his neck, he began to anticipate the controlled mayhem that he was about to unleash. He could barely contain his giggle.

It had been a long fucking night.

What seemed like it should’ve been a routine patrol had gone wrong halfway through. And not a wrong that was the kind of thing that happened once in a while on a bum night. It was the kind of wrong where Ollie’d been scrapping with some low-level, slightly meta bruiser in a rooftop garden, gotten knocked over the edge, shot a grapple arrow to catch himself … and missed. Fucking missed! A fucking grapple arrow.

( mojo not rising )

flame off/flame on

[bossymarmalade]

The new house had three bathrooms, two full and one half. It didn’t matter. It was an unwritten rule in the Kent home that, come 7:30 in the morning, both Zee and Billy were going to be crowded alongside Clark in whatever bathroom he occupied, and no one was going to be in a good mood by the time all was said and done.

"I am going to be late," Clark said through clenched teeth, and when Zee’s eyes flashed at him in the mirror, he added, “sweetheart."

"The lighting is better in this bathroom," she shrugged, one crystalline eye peeking through a slit as she stretched the lid to line it with a kohl pencil. “Go shave in the hall bathroom."

"The mirror’s not set up for me in there. Besides, the lighting is better in here," Clark said, checking his watch again. “And i was here first."

"I was here first!" Billy objected at once, head poking around the shower curtain, hair still matted with shampoo.

"This is our bathroom, Billy." Clark paced the linoleum (another home update to make) and gestured to Billy to go back behind the curtain and get on with it. “The hall bathroom is for you to use."

( stoking embers )

somniorum malorum

[bossymarmalade]

“My baby! Somebody save my baby!”

On the eighth floor of downtown apartment building, a frantic mother was holding her infant out of a window. Smoke poured out behind her as the building became more and more engulfed in flames. Firefighters below were working quickly to get their equipment up and reach the woman, but time was against them and the flames were their enemy.

“Somebody!” the mother screamed. “Anybody!” In an anguished move that can only be attributed to desperation, the mother tossed her infant out of the window. As the baby fell, it began to wail. Onlookers across the street pointed to the child and screamed for help. The firefighters below rushed to move equipment in place, but they knew that even the softest pad may not save this child.

And suddenly, he was there. He flew in, caught and cradled the babe in his arms. He flew down to the firefighters and handed the child to the nearest one. Then, without a second thought, he leapt back up to the window of the burning building and flew inside.

The frantic mother was curled on the floor, tears streaming down her soot-covered face. “My baby!” she cried. “My baby! My baby!”

( nightmare fodder )

rituals

[bossymarmalade]

Damian Wayne smoothes Mari’s hair with an antique wooden brush, its blonde oak face embellished with a fleur de lis raised against the smooth wood. He pulls the camel-hair bristles through Mari’s bounty of violet waves, keeping a quiet count of each stroke. “Wahid, ithnan, thalatha…"

Mari listens to Damian’s slow counting as the pieces of her hair dangling within her line of vision disappear back behind her one-by-one. His voice reminds me of something she heard in a dream once and she strains to remember what it was. A dream right after she was dislocated…Ibn was in it, but it wasn’t his voice. She pulls her knees up to her chin and rests her head down a little, trying not to disturb his task while she tries to draw that dream back into her memory.

Damian Wayne completes one hundred measured strokes, just as Mother taught him, the bristles combing through Mar’i’s hair from root to tip with each pass. He watches the light shimmer upon the natural highlights as the strands are pulled taut, deep plum bleeding into indigo, and he’s transfixed into silence as he envisions dark chestnut spilling over his fingers instead. But Mar’i’s hair is enchanting in its own right, and its unusual color brings him back to the moment. He sets the brush aside, small fingers plucking thin strands from the crown of her head and threading them into a tight braid against her scalp.

( ladies' falls )

kibitzes and knishes

[bossymarmalade]

Sounds great. Can you zeta to my place in Star City? - Oliver

Easier done than texted, she entered the code for Star City - Ollie’s home, not Queen Tower, when it gave her the option - into the zeta pad controls. It gave her small thrill every time to have her atoms teleported through a beam developed by aliens who comprehended quantum physics the way mankind comprehended high school algebra.

She materialized in a glow on Ollie’s private zeta pad, and stood in the warmth of the California sun, blinking and blinded from having come from the dark and cool of the Cave. She wasn’t sure Ollie heard the zeta pad activate or not, so she held her phone in her slinged hand tapped out a text awkwardly:

did. am hre now

Ollie came bounding out of the penthouse, his phone still in his hand, and made a cluck of sympathy when he saw Bette’s sling. “Augh," he said, giving her a swift one-armed hug against her uninjured side. “Nothing I hate worse than having my arms or hands incapacitated. I always feel sadder than if I’ve broken a leg, although that’s probably not so surprising for an archer, hey?"

He led Bette inside the house, nudging Kiki aside when the dog came trotting up for pets from the new arrival. “Shameless ploy for attention," Ollie said when Kiki protested with a winsome little whine. “Fine, say hello."

( half-sours and rye bread )

dr. who's coming to dinner

[bossymarmalade]

Guy stepped off the zeta pad with a steaming hot pepperoni, mushroom, capicola and extra cheese pizza, and a cheeseburger pizza with hamburger, cheddar, and onions. He wrapped it up in a construct pizza insulation bag, and atop it sat two six-packs of beer. He doubted they’d get through any of it, but it was better safe than sorry. Guy saw Kate coming from the other direction towards his quarters, and beamed a grin at her. “Right on time!"

Kate brushed her hair back with her fingertips over her shoulders and shifted the box with the clean glasses further under her arm. “Hey, if it’s a live broadcast, I am sure as hell not gonna be late, Gardner," she drawled, boots leaving just a faint resonance against the deck plating, before she reached his door and leaned against the wall. “Damn, that smells fantastic."

"Emilio’s - best pizza joint in Baltimore!" He opened his door and waved her in. The outer room was set up as a living area, with a Watchtower-standard loveseat and a very-much borrowed large TV installed on the wall above his desk. I snuck a few plates an’ napkins from the cafeteria…" he said, setting the pizza and beer down and turning on the TV.

Kate set the box (unfortunately not blue) down on the side table. “I brought you a present," she said, and gestured a little back towards them. “And hell, can’t blame you for appropriating cafeteria goods. They totally assume people will do it, you know." She flopped down on the sofa, kicking her feet out to cross at the ankles.

Guy grinned wide. “These’re for me? Aw, Kate!" He pulled one out of the box, turning it over in his hands. “I love ‘em. Thanks, Sweetheart." He bent down and kissed her cheek as she sat on the couch, then unpacked the other and gave them a good wipe inside and out with a napkin. "Think I got just enough time to fill these up before the show starts…"

( step into my tardis )

control

[bossymarmalade]

“Etrigan?” J’onn replied. “Sorting out? Yes. Thank you Oliver. I will get back to you. Stay safe on rooftops.”

“Rooftops?” Ollie asked. “What the hell are you ta-”

The Martian Manhunter switched off his communicator and was deep in his own thoughts before Green Arrow could complete his sentence. Etrigan? What did that mean? Not to mention that that he sensed unspoken tension in Oliver’s voice as well. These nightmares of his had been having were getting worse, and J’onn could not shake the feeling that there was more to them than he thought.

J’onn decided to resolve his troubles immediately. He could no longer wait. “Come in Batgirl” he said flipping his communicator back on. “Stephanie, the Monitor Womb is yours. I have an issue I must resolve. Martian Manhunter out.” He turned the comm off again and tossed it on the nearby desk as he walked briskly to his quarters.

Turning off the light to make his meditation session easier, the Martian sat down cross-legged on the floor and closed his eyes. Soon, he was deep in his own memories.

J’onn had dreamt he was Zauriel. And now that he thought back on it, he remembered a grotesque face in the crowd. J’onn had been Superman. But thinking back on it, one of the firefighters wore a crimson robe rather than his gear. In J’onn’s nightmare, he had been Kyle battling an old enemy. But he now remembered that Major Force was wearing a helmet that was out of place, but seemed strangely familiar. And as Oliver, J’onn fell to his death. But remembering it now, he remembered an odd smell present. He had been to Seattle many times but it had never smelled like that. In fact, there was only one place in the universe that smelled like that. And in remembering his most recent dream, his dream of being Jason Blood, J’onn confirmed it. The ruined buildings, the nightmare hell scape he had walked through, was not this planet.

No. But he did recognize it now. On reflection and thought, it became clear. He had not been walking through a post-apocalyptic Earth. He had been walking through Apokolips…

( out of it )

hero to hero

[bossymarmalade]

It’s almost enough to make him shut his eyes at the smell of the Pacific, wafting up all salt-bright and subtle. The winds were high, at midday, kicking up the surf into a frothy, foaming mess, the back-and-forth call of the gulls lapsing into musical, rather than just nuisance.
The staff at the hotel-resort had been overwhelmingly surprised at his unexpected visit—Bruce almost always announced, beforehand, his check-ins at any of his holdings or properties—but, like any good Wayne Enterprises employee, had accommodated, and fast. The sprawling, massive, private booth facing the seaside had been bussed and cleared, and he’d been seated within minutes. The drinks, within moments.

So far, Bruce—he was dressed in a white dress shirt, skinny tie knotted in a simple four-in-hand, black jacket and trousers— had been ignoring the sweltering flute of private reserve champagne they’d poured for him, the bottle sitting on ice, watching the coast. The Pacific had just begun to greet him back, when an attendant moved to inform him that Kyle had arrived.

Nodding in return, Bruce orders a coffee and folds his broad hands over each other, clasping his wrists in an entirely private moment, for once sheltered in fluttering length of white silk, tied onto the high wall that made the shell of the cabana booth, rather than his customary black. The sun reappeared through the clouds, the light racing over the waves, the briny smell lifting back up, comforting, to Bruce’s noise. It was almost enough to make Bruce shut his eyes, the wind pushing through his hair like lover’s fingers, but, of course, he didn’t. He never did.

Blue eyes that nearly put the sea to shame, scan the shoreline, mind skipping ahead of the meeting to come, and to what else lay on his agenda for the day.

The coffee arrives before Kyle does.

Kyle was a little surprised that Bruce’s choice was some sort of ultra-fancy hotel-resort sort of place. He was expecting some sort of ultra-fancy restaurant sort of place…Still, when he arrived and was ushered by a total of three different waitstaff, it slowly dawned on Kyle that this wasn’t just any old fancy-dancy place. It was one of Bruce Wayne’s properties.

( it comes with a slice of cantaloupe )