Somewhere Out There is a multi-media music-narrative project. Dive into the OEA's onboarding website to discover the wonders of the Outvoid, the goals of the OEA, and the ever-growing instability of the Void's voice. Piece together the final days before an interdimensional storm breached into reality, and brace yourself for the noises that may follow after.
The original tags on this post actually did drive me a little insane
@kingofarchers idk how much you actually enjoy Howlett/Carmen but you gave me a brain worm so this is for you!
After a week of pining, Howlett finally meets Carmen a second time. The frustration pushes him to make a very normal request. ~1.3k words.
Howlett had stopped listening to the minister about an hour ago. The rest of Sandrock's ruin divers had gotten dinner and a handshake, but not Howlett. He had been treated to dinner, a handshake, and a lecture on the siren song of ancient technology, the allure of violence, and the dangers of chasing beautiful women.
Howlett didn’t fault the man– he was just doing his job, after all. And in fact, Howlett liked the monthly meetings Danvers put on to check in on those with the most dangerous job in town. The only problem was the extra focus. As a ruin diver, monster hunter, and vexed young man, Danvers seemed to think that Howlett's soul was in particular danger of wandering into a personal Age of Darkness and acted as any good minister would. Unfortunately, Howlett reacted to treatises on religion in about the same way oil did to water.
Howlett's attention only returned long enough to confirm that, yup, the minister was still talking.
“Look, Danvers,” Howlett cut in, punctuated by the squeal of his chair as he stood. “I've had a real long day and I gotta head out real damn– sorry– real dang early. Thanks for putting this on. I'll see you at the next one.”
Danvers made noises that sounded like protests, but by the time they registered, Howlett was already halfway to the temple doors.
When they shut behind him, Howlett sucked in a lungful of crisp night air. He closed his eyes to relish it, the faintest tinge of smoke pricking the back of his throat. Howlett sighed, head already tipped back to admire the sky above the oasis’ treeline. The city glow dulled the true black of the moonless sky, the stars reduced to a petty fraction of their true number. Still, it was enough to set Howlett's heart aching. Everything he loved– monsters, stars, ruins, dunes– made their home outside of city limits. Staying in town for as long as he had had been foolishness.
Then he spotted a curl of smoke out of the corner of his eye, and all thoughts of Howlett's escape seemed to float away with it. She hadn't been smoking at the town fireside, but she had left room for a cigarette as she pressed her fingers to her lips and gave Howlett the most thorough once over he had ever received. Before Howlett could hop down from the stage and squeeze through the crowd, though, she had gone.
Now, she leaned against the low wall, hair a cool white in the dark of the temple courtyard, an orange star the only light to reflect off of her pale face. The woman that had vexed Howlett for the past week took another drag before lazily glancing back at him. She winked, and Howlett almost laughed. If he vanished into the night right then, then that encounter would be exactly opposite to their very first.
And, to be a true opposite, she would never think about Howlett ever again.
Howlett mozied over to her end of the wall, crossed his arms, and leaned against it. Without pausing for thought, she offered him the cigarette.
“Bit late for a dart,” Howlett declined, scolding himself for wanting the filter more than the nicotine.
“A bit late for confession,” she countered. “I didn't take you for the church type.”
“And I didn't think you were the type to chicken out,” Howlett countered. “Guess we're both full of surprises.”
“I had somewhere to be,” she shrugged.
“For a week?” Howlett scoffed.
“Don't act like you weren't busy,” she hummed, tapping ash onto the wall. “Plenty of pretty girls behind me thought that wink was for them.”
Howlett narrowed his eyes. “You think if I was ‘busy’ I'd have spent all that time looking for you? Don't tell me you didn't hear.”
A sly smile crept onto her face, the very one that haunted Howlett even now.
“Forget it,” Howlett huffed, pushing off the wall. “Obviously, I misunderstood. Have a good night.”
He managed to take three steps.
“Howlett,” she called softly, yanking him to a halt like a dog on a leash.
“Ma'am,” he said pointedly.
“Carmen,” she offered.
Howlett ground his teeth, but with a frustrated sigh, he turned back. Once close enough, he snatched the cigarette and took a long drag. The smoke prickled, not quite as satisfying as he wanted it to be. As he offered it back, Carmen's smile softened, a shade away from affectionate, and Howlett's chest burned all the more.
“Trying to quit?” she wondered, fingers brushing his as she took back her dart.
“Something like that,” Howlett grumbled.
“Sorry to tempt you,” she said.
“No, you ain't,” he shot back.
She chuckled, all smug poise. For a week, Howlett had combed through Sandrock asking after a young woman with moonspun hair. For a week, he had laid awake at night, sighing and raking his brain for the step that would finally, finally take him in the right direction. For a week, this woman had tormented every one of his waking thoughts, and now she couldn't bother to even pretend to be politely embarrassed.
And yet, she'd called him back. And yet, she had once stared at him like a woman starved.
“I can still put it out,” she suggested.
Well. It was dark out. Maybe she just needed a little help.
“If you don't mind.”
Before she could move, Howlett popped a button on his shirt, pulled the fabric back, and tapped a spot on his pec.
“Right there.”
Carmen froze in place, staring at the area he had pointed out and then, very notably, beyond it. Howlett leaned in so she could have a better look.
“If you don't mind,” he repeated.
Her eyes flicked briefly to his, pupils wide even for the low light of the courtyard.
“You're sure?” she checked. Howlett tapped the spot again, and she did as he had asked.
Howlett hissed at the brightness of the pain, the mix of burnt hair and tobacco sticking in his nose. His hand shifted to grip the wall and he saw Carmen hesitate. He let go of his shirt to grab her wrist, digging the stub into his skin and sending fresh waves of electricity across his chest. When the butt finally cooled, Howlett took a breath and glanced at Carmen again. She stared at him with rapt attention, as unyielding as that first encounter, but now with a satisfying, dusty blush. Howlett smirked and let her go.
Only she didn't move away. With her little finger, she hooked Howlett's shirt to pull it aside again and puffed the lingering ash away. Then she kissed the spot, cooling the new burn with a wet lick.
“I– you– you–” Howlett stammered, wide-eyed as Carmen leaned back with her sly smile. She tucked the cigarette butt into his shirt pocket and took a step backward.
“Wait!” Howlett demanded.
“See you around, Howlett,” Carmen purred, turned heel, and ran around the corner of the temple. Howlett followed, but she was so damn fast and he was so damn– vexed! That he lost her in under a minute.
“Dammit,” Howlett huffed, a hand going mindlessly to his chest. He flinched as he found his new burn, his shirt still damp from her saliva. “Peach's piss!”
Howlett still needed to head out of town in the morning, and so made himself turn around and go home. He spent the time between arriving and leaving glaring at the ceiling, occasionally fingering the burn, and swearing furiously at the results.
“Maybe I'll disappear for a week,” Howlett grumbled. “See how she likes it. Then I'll–”
Howlett broke down into swearing again. It was going to be another very, very long week.
"hope this doesn't awaken anything in me" says man who just had something awoken in him
Marcy was NOT having a good day when her and Logan first meet, and he had to go and make it worse by kidnapping the minister...
This is Logan and Marcy's first proper meeting face to face in my AU. Since Marcy lives in the shack next to the arena and not at the usual workshop, she doesn't get the infamous water tower scene.
Immediately after this comic Marcy ends up realizing she has a big dumb stupid crush on the bandit because on top of the townsfolk all reminiscing about how kind he was, he's also HOT. It makes the fight extremely distracting, but Pen shows up to send Logan running, much to Marcy's chagrin.
Logan immediately stamps down any attraction because he CANNOT deal with that right now, surely he will not need to unpack it later. He does however look forward to their next fight, whenever that may be.
Logan also mistakenly believes she's angry because he kidnapped the minister, but in reality she's just really sweaty, hungry, and tired and couldn't care less about Matilda (she's never forgiven Matilda for taking Trudy's desk, seriously who DOES THAT!?)
sex is a distraction from your true purpose in life which is to go to the aquarium and look at the fish and go "wooooooaaah.... fishies". cmon guys we all need to lock in.
okay i've been playing Emoji Gacha on and off today and i've got a few ideas of what bugs to fix and which features i'd like to add next. unfortunately at least half of those features is just Cookie Clicker
