#bugebroph

Woe, Bugebroph be upon ye

In Case of Emergency, Break Glass (4/6) @whimsicalmeerkat @aparticularbandit @combeferres-mothematics @tamsinswriting

A ghost they didn’t even want to try to force her to capture.

She can’t shake the sickening feeling that it’s her mother.

It’s a possibility that’s haunted her since she learnt what Juno and Otho were really doing. What if, before they took Lydia, they captured her mum? Squashed her down and locked her in a jar to keep in the basement? And now, what if she’s evaded capture the last three years only to be taken now? Her hands tremble as she sets the jar on the table. Otho is pulling on his gloves.

“Otho?” she asks quietly. “Please?”

“Mouth shut, Lydia,” Juno snaps.

Otho slips a hand through the hatch in the soul box and lifts out a dazed, miniature rabbit. And then he puts his other hand in, and pulls out a mouse. It takes Lydia a moment to understand it. Two ghosts at once, and they didn’t even try getting her to catch them.

“Is that- Barbara! ADAM!”

She tries to lunge towards Otho as he drops them into the jar. Juno catches her by the hair.

“You wanted to see, Lydia, and you saw.”

Bugebroph @dreamed-for-not @eriquin

 She can already see Adam cracking.

“Well… If we can’t do it ourselves…”

“You’re sure you can do this carefully?”

Lydia nods enthusiastically.

“She won’t harm a hair on their heads,” Beetlejuice confirms. “Hell, you can sit in on it if you want. They aren’t gonna see you, evidently.”

bj/nimona crossover woo @twyrewolf @zyrafowe-sny

It occurs to her that it probably shouldn’t be a surprise that Nimona is just as interested in the only person her age as she is, but years of school canteens have taught Lydia otherwise. Nimona flashes her another grin, but is quickly distracted by her fork.

“Nim,” Ballister whispers again. “Don’t chew that.”

“I’m being gentle.”

“That’s not-”

He’s dragged back into the adults’ conversation before he can finish his point.

The Parent's Guide to the Young Conduit @kalira @noisesfrombeyondtheuniverse @tamsinswriting @meggiejolly @stonemaskedtaliesin

“I suppose that makes sense… Adam, did you catch that?”

Adam falters in his latest attempt to posses Delia’s arm. “Catch what?”

“Lydia doesn’t know we’re doing this.”

“Oh. Well, if I’m being honest, we’re currently not doing too much for her to know about.”

“Delia, dear, does your arm feel at all possessed?” Charles asks. Delia flexes the arm experimentally.

“Not particularly.”

Barbara rests her chin on her hand. “May I have a go?”

“Be my guest.”

Adam steps back, and Barbara steps forward. She takes a deep breath - not for any need for oxygen, but just to steady herself. Raises an arm.

Be Right Back @auburnlaughter @tamsinswriting

She’s sure Ballister can tell, when he asks if that’s okay with her, that her acceptance is begrudging. “I’m still going to be sleeping here,” he says. “I’ll be coming right back here after work. It’s just that Ambrosius can do some parts of his job remotely, and I can’t.”

“What, they haven’t invented remote controls for horses yet?”

“Unfortunately not.”

“Bummer.”

Ten Paces @zyrafowe-sny @dreamed-for-not @tamsinswriting

Lydia stays in her little shelter for hours. There’s no point going out and pacing, the ropes will trip her up the moment she stops focusing on them. So instead she lays on the thin bed of straw and slowly picks at bone marrow. Her body still aches from all the running in circles the day before. The rope itches.

It’s sometime around noon when the rain starts.

It’s just a drizzle, to begin with. A light patter outside, the occasional drip through the gaps in the roof. Lydia doesn’t react much more than shuffling further back from the door and grumbling to herself. But it only gets worse. The noise gets louder. The air gets colder.

Netherborne ch17 on @dreamed-for-not @twyrewolf @eriquin

“Right,” Beetlejuice says, clearly eager to move on, “now that’s out of the way. We’ve got other shit to figure out.”

“Other shit like what?”

“Other shit like how you’re gonna insist on coming with me when Rigel introduces me to Maxie Dean, aren’t you?”

(omitted chunk I’d already written)

“We can do that.”

He reaches into his jacket and pulls out the same notepad he wrote the house rules on. Rules for social events, he titles the page. And just like the house rules, he divides it into columns and labels each with a name.

“So. You gotta call everyone ‘sir’ or ‘ma’am’,” he says as he writes.

In Case of Emergency, Break Glass (11/6) @dreamed-for-not @auburnlaughter @kalira @tamsinswriting

“Aw, what’s wrong? Was the nasty lady mean to you again? Poor little wizard.”

Lydia grips her oversized sleeves tight. She wants to bite back at him, tell him exactly what Juno just did, but she knows he doesn’t actually care. It would only lead to more mockery.

“Shut up, jar boy,” she says instead.

“Oh, you really got me with that one. I’m wounded.”

“You wanna be shaken again.”

“You’re not scary, kid.”

Lydia glares at him for a long moment, and then looks away. It’s an empty threat, really. Her shoulders hurt too much. She hears quiet tapping on the glass as he paces about his jar.

“...So. What was all that with Otho?”

The Book in the Birdbath @dreamed-for-not @kalira @tamsinswriting @meggiejolly @whimsicalmeerkat

Before he has time for further thoughts on that, Skye is clambering onto the bench beside Lydia. She sticks out one small hand, the other twisting in her hair.

“Hello Mr. Deetz, it’s nice to meet you!”

Lydia can tell her dad wasn’t expecting that, but he readily accepts the handshake. “It’s good to meet you too, Skye.”

“We’re neighbours on the ward,” Lydia explains. “Skye’s in the next bed over.”

“Ah, I see.”

“I have a congenital heart disease!” Skye eagerly adds. Lydia’s dad’s eyebrows raise slightly.

“Right. And you and Lydia have been… hanging out?”

“Yeah! We go for walks in the garden and we talk about ghosts and we do our schoolwork together!”

The Running Iron @dreamed-for-not @stonemaskedtaliesin

Oscar’s hand hammers against the wall. She groans, hiding her head in her folded arms.

“Come on, get up! We’ve got a railway to build!”

“You’ve got a railway to build,” Lydia grumbles. “I still don’t see why that’s my problem.”

“Less complaining, more eating. I want you up and harnessed by the time I come back.”

From the Back of a Blood Red Mare @zyrafowe-sny @somefishycat @thefandomlesbian @oriharaizayadividesintoslytherin @nonepizzawithleftglitter

“That guy with the fancy hair who shot you?”

“Yeah. That’s the one.”

For a long few moments, Nimona watches him watch the flames.

“Must’ve had something going for him if you’re still thinking about him like that, after everything.”

He nods, clearly a million miles away. “He did. He really did. And I can’t help believing he still does.”

Nimona grabs up a spare twig and starts poking at the campfire. “Those are the worst ones. When you can’t hate them.”

Boldheart’s face twists into something painful. And then he looks over at her, and he finds a subject change.

“You took bullets for me.”

Nimona shrugs. “Yeah, and? I can walk it off, you can’t. ‘S just what makes sense.”

I'm Going to Live Twice @whimsicalmeerkat @tamsinswriting @kalira @phantom-z0ne @stonemaskedtaliesin

“Piano man!” she beams.

“Blue!”

She runs to him. He leans down. Emma lifts onto her toes slightly to affectionately knock her forehead against his.

“Miss me?” she asks.

“You know I did.”

The music is perfectly in line again, but the anger is gone. Or, at least, it’s buried. Paul’s arms wrap around Emma. They start to sway.

“I wasn’t sure they’d bring you back.”

“They know interfering with the other makes us more dangerous.”

Paul’s eyes are burning blue as he looks down at her. “You broke Schaffer’s nose.”

“I did, didn’t I?”

hadestaurs @eriquin @tamsinswriting @akumteir

“Orpheus? Did you lose track of time again?”She’s not all that far into town, and so reaching the back of the pub puts her right at the edge. And sure enough, there’s Orpheus. A light, long-legged centaur, laying in the dirt as he strums casually on the lyre. That’s far from unusual. What is unusual is his company. Another centaur, a smaller, scruffier one. A young mare. Her black coat is dusty, and it looks like there’s barely anything between it and her bones.

Netherborne ch17 on @auburnlaughter @tamsinswriting @twyrewolf

“It’s not going to be fun for you. We’re gonna need people to take me seriously, and you’ve seen what the guys think about how I treat you. You’d have to play the part, Scarecrow. Wear stripes, keep quiet, be respectful. Well-behaved housepet shit. It’d be a lot of sitting on the floor next to me not fidgeting and not making any noise.”

“It’s worth it. If we find anything out about my dad, I want to be there to hear it myself.”

Barbara gently takes Lydia’s hand.

Bugebroph @thefandomlesbian @phantom-z0ne @dreamed-for-not

Lydia wakes sometime later to a muffled conversation through the crack in the doorway. She rolls over, searching for Percy, and cuddles him to her chest as she listens.

“But these are the guest sheets!”

“If you wanna do classic ghosting, you gotta do classic ghosting. What the hell else are you gonna do with sheets, you’re dead!”

Percy’s tiny nose collides with Lydia’s face. She snorts, scooping him up as she sits up. “Alright, alright, breakfast time for Mr. Scary Harbinger.”

cw for the offering - discussion of child murder