If Homelander ended up killing Billy first before the events of season 5, I think Homelander would hallucinate him instead of Madelyn BUT instead of giving him the delusion that he’d ascend into godhood, Billy would be like the Grim Reaper. He never speaks but he seems to always be watching. As Homelander grows more unhinged, Billy would appear more often. He’d be the dark figure in the crowd, at the corner of his reflection with that smirk, or the looming figure just before he falls asleep.
A little Sam and Dean fliclet I wrote after rewatching season 11's Into the Mystic and Don't You Forget About Me.
—
Sam flinched as something clattered noisily down onto the table, tearing his attention away from the book he'd been pouring over for the last hour. He blinked blearily at the small stack of ceramic plates and the assortment of silverware that were dropped next to it, the sight not quite registering through the fog that had taken over his brain.
Two beers were placed beside the plates, tops already off.
“Chow time.” Dean dropped a clear bag of dinner rolls on the book. “Time to give the research a rest, geekboy.”
“Right.” Sam sat back in his chair, closing his eyes and pinching at the bridge of his nose. He'd been so deep in the search for anything that could help take down the Darkness that he hadn't even noticed the headache building behind his eyes. “It’s not donut burgers again, is it?” He kept his eyes closed and rubbed at his temples, sliding his fingers down the side of his face to the hinges of his jaw in a firm pressure as he tried to release some of the tension there.
“It's called The Elvis, Sammy. And you should be so lucky.”
He snorted, not bothering to open his eyes as he massaged, listening to his brother's footsteps retreat from the library and then return, followed by a low thud as more was placed on the table in front of him.
When he finally did open his eyes again, they widened, brows nearly lifting off his face.
“Dean. What is that.”
“What's it look like?” Dean set down the two large bowls he had been carefully balancing—one filled almost to the brim with mashed potatoes and the other, Sam was astonished to see, with an actual salad. Even that wasn't enough to distract from the oval platter that held a real—perfectly golden brown and dressed with lemon, garlic, and some kind of greenery Sam couldn't name off hand—roast bird.
“It's chicken. Shaped like chicken and everything.”
“You cooked this?” Sam asked skeptically. The memory of the time Dean had electrocuted a whole ham with a hand buzzer suddenly popped into his mind and he had the urge to poke warily at the bird to see if it would suddenly start smoking or something.
“What?” Dean picked up a large knife and fork and started carving into the bird, the motions as he cut a little too rough, tone defensive as he spoke. “You knew I could cook.”
“Yeah,” Sam agreed. “Burgers. Grilled cheese sandwiches. Exotic variations of mac and cheese. But since when are you Martha Stuart?”
Dean stopped carving the chicken long enough to smack Sam across the back of his head. “Watch your tone when you say her name.”
“Really,” Sam said flatly. He ran his hand over his head, smoothing his hair down where Dean had messed it up. “You're a fan.”
Dean shrugged. “She's kind of hot. For an older woman. Besides,” he grabbed one of the plates and slid a few mangled slices onto it, “she has to be pretty cool to have Snoop as a buddy.”
Sam snorted and took the plate from him, spooning a ridiculous amount of mashed potatoes onto it and then a modest amount of the salad before placing it in front of the chair across from him. Dean frowned at the salad but looked mollified when Sam dug into the bag of rolls placed two on his plate. Dean loaded up the other plate and handed it over, rolling his eyes when Sam added more of the salad than Dean had given him.
“Alright.” Dean sat down, slapping his hands and rubbing his palms together before reaching for his fork. “Let's dig in.”
Dean did just that, cutting himself a huge bite of chicken and scooping up some mashed potatoes with it before shoving it all in his mouth with a happy groan. Sam was a little more careful, using his knife and fork to cut off a small piece and only hesitating slightly—aware of Dean's expectant gaze on him—before bringing it to his mouth.
Sam’s eyelids involuntarily fluttered closed as that first bite—tender and juicy and perfectly seasoned—hit his tastebuds. “Oh my god,” he practically moaned.
“Right?” Dean’s grin lifted the apples of his cheeks, crinkling the lines at the corners of his eyes. “I’m awesome.”
“You are,” Sam agreed, quickly following that bite up with another and then a scoop of mashed potatoes. He hummed at the perfect ratio of butter, salt and garlic that melted over his tongue, not even caring about the amount of calories that single bite must have contained for it to taste that good.
“Okay,” Sam said once he was able to force himself to slow down. He hadn't realized just how hungry he was. “What brought this on?”
Dean ripped into a roll with his teeth. “What d'y mean?”
“I mean this.” Sam spread his hands to indicate the platters and bowls currently covering the library table. “Since when do we sit down for a dinner like this? Hell, Dean, you made a salad and you hate salad. And it's not like it's some kind of holiday, it's just a random—” Sam paused, thinking. It was distressingly easy to lose track of the days when they were between jobs. “—Tuesday night,” he finished. “So what's the deal?”
Dean shrugged one shoulder, loading his fork up with potatoes. “I just figured we didn't have to go all the way to South Dakota and invade Jodi's house just to get a good meal.”
Sam stared at him, unconvinced.
Dean sighed and put down his fork. He reached for his beer instead. “I was thinking about something Mildred had said, is all.”
“Mildred?” Sam shot him a sly grin. “What, that you would be surprised at the benefits of her uh, experience?”
Dean snorted. “With her? I'm sure I would.” Sam huffed a laugh. “No, she had mentioned something about sunsets.”
“Sunsets,” Sam repeated. “Mildred mentioned sunsets and that made you want to spend hours cooking a meal that put our childhood Thanksgiving to shame, here… in our windowless bunker.”
“It wasn't about the sunsets. It was—” Sam raised his brows as Dean searched for the words, one hand going up to rub restlessly at the back of his neck. “It was about taking time to enjoy life. Outside of hunting, I mean.”
If anything, that just made Sam’s brows raise more. “So you are, what, saying we should stop and smell the roses?”
Dean rolled his eyes. “Just eat your chicken.” He picked up his own fork, grumbling. “I swear, you try to do one thing…”
“Hey, no,” Sam objected. “I'm really trying to understand here, man. I mean, we have Amara to deal with, who knows what her endgame is, and you want—are you wanting to take a break?”
“Not a break. Just—look.” He leveled Sam with a serious expression. “Yeah. There's Amara. And before that there was Metatron and Abaddon and the angels there's always whatever the hell Crowley is up to and on and on. It never ends. But—” He exhaled heavily through his nose.
“But?” Sam gently pressed.
“But I don't have the Mark anymore, thanks to you, and you—” Dean gestured vaguely at Sam. “—aren't possessed by a dick angel or dying from the trials or hell-crazy and it's not like we are going to live long enough to live in one of those retirement homes so I just thought—”
“You thought we should watch more sunsets,” Sam finished for him.
A quiet settled between them as they turned back to the food. It tasted just as good as it did when Sam first started to eat, but Sam noticed that Dean was eating with a sort of steady determination rather than the previous enthusiasm from before. He was staring blankly down at the table, a small crease between furrowed brows.
“You know,” Sam started, tentative, “there's a meteor shower in a few weeks.”
Dean's eyes shot up in surprise. “Yeah?”
Sam shrugged. “Lovewell State Park is a dark sky spot. We could pack up a case of beer, maybe even the tent. Go camping like we always talk about.”
The corner of Dean's mouth lifted in a small smile. “Yeah,” he said again. “Yeah, we could do that.”
Sam nodded. “Okay.” He stabbed a bit of salad with his fork, unsurprised that it was mostly iceberg lettuce. Apparently, even this newfound desire to experience life in between hunting couldn't push Dean to stomach a little bit of spinach or kale now and then. “I'm sure there will be other opportunities for uh, sunsets between now and then too,” he added.
Dean flashed him a small grin of acknowledgment and then paused, fork raised, eyes going distant. “You know, it's probably not that hard to make donuts. I bet I could make my own version of The Elvis right here.”
He scooped up a big forkful of potato and chicken and shoveled all into his mouth. “You like jelly donuts, right, Sammy?" he asked through his mouthful, eyes wicked. Bits of half-masticated chicken flicked out of his mouth and landed on the table in front of him.
Sam's stomach twisted at the thought. He looked forlornly down at his still mostly full plate.
This is loosely inspired by Of Things That Come Before by Zazibine on AO3.
In this world, Ingo is an only child. As a lonely, likely autistic child, an imaginary friend is nothing to be concerned about. Initially, his parents are even charmed by his imagination. As he grows, however, Ingo realizes that no one likes to hear about Emmet anymore, so he stops talking about him.
Emmet has been with Ingo for a long time, perhaps forever. His mirror image, no matter the age; Emmet is always smiling, encouraging Ingo, and getting him into mischief. He is Ingo's best friend. Still, Ingo knows better than to talk about him because, for all Emmet claims to be his twin, he knows that from society's viewpoint that's not true. Other people don't see Emmet. Whether he's willfully invisible, invisible by some twist of fate, or even a hallucination, Ingo doesn't know. (Occasionally, Ingo might slip up and respond to Emmet and his coworkers will give him weird looks, but no one has ever brought it up, assuming he was on the phone or something.)
In this world, Ingo grows up differently, obviously. It can be a world with or without Pokemon. If Pokemon exist, I imagine that Ingo would be a strong trainer but not a subway boss. (It's hard to speak up for himself without the confidence of a visible Emmet by his side.) Maybe his bosses even tell him that he has to take it easy on the trainers at the subway or gym where he works because they never reach the actual boss? Or, if they're lazy, Ingo becomes a defacto boss and only the incredibly strong get past him, just to completely demolish the "actual" leaders. He's a bit of a legend that way.
If it's a world without Pokemon, then Ingo is probably just a regular train conductor or something. Either way, he still disappears in this universe. Could be like in canon, or could be Team Plasma or Team Rocket or some other asshole causing shit, but Ingo goes missing. It's tragic, especially for his parents and if he's a popular trainer amongst his colleagues, but his disappearance is not a huge priority for most people.
At least until the man in white with the too-toothy smile starts showing up (maybe at work, maybe at the boss' house in the middle of the night, hell maybe at police headquarters or Ingo's parents' house) and introduces himself with "Hello! I am Emmet. Where is Ingo?"
Is he a fae? A Zoruark that became abnormally attached? An eldritch abomination from beyond the stars? Who knows! But he's not human and this is now someone's problem.
Might clean this post up later, IDK. Hope you all liked it! Feel free to comment or ask questions. I'm probably gonna call this the Inhuman!Emmet AU.
Jaskier is cursed so no one, including himself, remembers anything he did in the past 20 years or so. Post ep-6 so he’s not with Geralt. He’s doing well for himself, not knowing he once used to be famous, and is slowly building up his name again. He meets Yen while drunk and she just kinda doesn’t kick him out of the house she’s in. She doesn’t help him as he collapses onto a run, just shrugs and goes about business.
When he comes to, he isn’t sure how he got there or who she is but he just shrugs as well and just accepts it. And that’s how they become kinda sorta friends. Jaskier doesn’t follow her around like a puppy. Something about the woman actually activates his self-preservation instincts (he had no idea he had any) but he does stay with her. He’s much more like a cat. He hangs around, occasionally runs errands for her, and then bitches to her about his sorrows in the evenings, fully aware that she isn’t listening and is instead sipping her wine and reading a book. Sometimes, when he wants attention, he puts on a show of finding increasingly unusual ways to scare off the people she brings home to sleep with. Yen, in turn, pretends like she doesn’t notice him. Except when she does. His antics annoy her, but he preoccupies the people of the towns they stay in and she finds herself able to be free of harassment from officials. Ya know, cuz they’re all harassing Jaskier. Yen and Jaskier live a (somewhat) peaceful coexistence with the occasional cat fight.
When Yen goes to try and fight Nilfgard, Jaskier follows her. He flits about, talking to sorcerers, and no one has any idea where this chatty bard came from. It’s only when one of them gets fed up with him that Yen steps in, giving them all a deadly glare that says “don’t touch my bard.” She’s like the dad that says he absolutely won’t have a cat in his house and then becomes the cat’s favorite person. She does, however, send him away before the battle. He refuses to go but she takes off her necklace and puts it around his neck. While he stumbles over his words, attempting to tell her he’s worried about her safety, she opens a portal and shoves him through.
By the time he gets close to where the battle was, he’s learned that she’s gone missing. Triss tells him to find Geralt, that Geralt will help look for Yen.
So Jaskier does, because his friend is gone and yeah they argued and pretended like they hated each other but they grew to have a mutual fondness for each other. (Perhaps even familial love, although neither would admit it).
The thing is, most magic doesn’t work on Geralt. So when Jaskier shows up in front of the Witcher and his child of surprise, it only takes a moment for Geralt to push the curse’s effects out of his mind and remember Jaskier. He actually hugs him, but Jaskier goes limp. Geralt knows something is wrong, but he doesn’t realize how wrong things are until Jaskier begs him to help find his friend. The bard tugs a necklace out from under his shirt and Geralt recognizes it as Yennifer’s immediately.
"Every fucking morning exactly at 6 am there's a standard alarm ringtone blasting behind the wall and my stupid neighbor's cursing following right after."
-Sanji. Silently cursing his neighbor Zoro in return for even being allowed to live on planet Earth.
