hii helllo, i would love to know more about spark squad. could i get these from the oc ask game for each of them <3
3. Do they have any bad habits?
32. Whats the most valuable thing in their possession?
Spark Squad!!!! I was happy when I got this; I haven't had much interest in my boys lately, so this was great to wake up to! Thank you! <3
3. Do they have any bad habits?
Duke: He placed the lives of everyone is his squad higher than his own and would protect them with little regard for his own life. This is what ultimately led to the Kaminoans decommissioning him.
Sketch: His bad habits only really started to surface after they lost Duke. In order to protect them, Sketch initially started to distance himself to protect them like Duke had, but they refused to let Sketch have the same fate as him. He also tends to hide things from the others to keep them safe. This last one only really became a problem once he got to the Guard, but his lack of trust in authority figures (including brothers sometimes) meant he didn't respond well to the squad having to take orders from higher Guard members. He gets better, though.
Pillow/Throwpillow: When he starts to feel emotions like fear and sadness, he doesn't like dealing with them as they're presented, so he lashes out in anger instead. He's, uh - he's working on it. The other bad habit he has developed once he was with the Guard; he would snap his finger when calling someone over to him. He associates this with being a bad habit because he spent a lot of time with asshole senators who do this and he accidentally picked it up.
Ghost: His only really bad habit is getting lost in his head. If he feels like his insecurities are getting the best of him, he kinda shuts down or becomes sullen and moody.
Morale: Similar to Pillow, he doesn't really like dealing with emotions deemed 'negative'. Instead of anger, though, he buries those 'negative' emotions, covering them up with a happy facade and refusing to acknowledge the underlying issue. His only other bad habit started after he lost the other three while in the Guard: he started having trouble with alcohol. He was working on it, especially once he tried taking on the 'ori'vod' role to a shiny, but then, you know, Order 66 happened. :)
32. What's the most valuable thing in their possession?
Sketch: One valuable thing is a picture he drew after they lost Duke of their entire squad. Otherwise, just his art supplies.
Duke: Besides little drawings from Sketch, he didn't live long enough get something.
Pillow/Throwpillow: The picture Sketch drew of their squad is really the only valuable thing he wants or needs.
Ghost: The picture Sketch drew of their squad is one valuable thing to him. The other was a stuffed massiff given to him by Sergeant Hound.
Morale: The picture Sketch drew of their squad is one valuable thing to him. The other would have to be his datapad. It's where he has messages from his brothers saved and pictures he's taken with them all.
I have an old mutual who drew the picture I'm talking about and sent it to me. I don't feel comfortable posting it on here without her permission, but if you'd like to see it, Terra, message me on here or Discord and I can show it to you.
Summary: Starla moves in with her sister. Things get better. Then she notices her new neighbor and not in a good way.
Based off this prompt/idea by @caffeinewitchcraft
This one has been reworked a bit. Still the same story though, just fixed how Starla notices Duke, basically. That’s the biggest change.
*****
"That would be a literal blessing," her sister says, sighing into the phone with hope that pierces through the static of low reception.
"Well," Starla sighs, hand on her hip, looking at the stacked boxes in her apartment, artfully ignoring the eviction notice laying on the kitchen counter. "I kind of don't have a place to live past Thursday, so I don't have much of a choice."
"Well, you're always welcome to come take the guest room."
Starla rubs the bridge of her nose. "I can't afford any rent, though."
"You don't need to pay rent, " Melissa insists, words garbled by the piercing sound of a crying baby. There's some rustling, sound muffled as she deals with the crying newborn. "You're my sister,” she continues, voice softer as she soothes the baby, practically cooing. "It's no problem and you'd be doing me a huge favor anyways, with the kids."
"Okay," Starla says, nodding to herself, like she has options and a choice. "Let's do it."
So she moves in.
It’s what’s best for both them, what with Starla’s apartment block being torn down to place a strip mall, and with Melissa having two new babies that she was raising solo. This was better for both of them, and it would help restore their bond that had been neglected since they had both reached adulthood and thrown themselves into work and romance.
This was good.
Starla moves in easily, happy to be closer to her sister and niece and nephew, but missing the busyness of city life.
She’s a babysitter now. Glorified, with her lack of rent, and definitely overpaid, but still a babysitter.
It’s exhausting, so maybe not so much overpaid or glorified. Maybe she had underestimated the amount of work and attention two babies took.
Watching one baby is difficult, but two? It’s the only thing that fills her day, and it does a fantastic job of doing so. It takes time, and after only a few days, she’s become adept at holding them both at once and caring for both of their needs.
She’s becoming a good aunt, she thinks. A solid second parent to the tiny babies who will never meet the man tied to them by blood. It’s hard, but she loves them and that makes it worth it.
It doesn’t take long for her to familiarize herself with the neighbors.
Casey from down the block walks her two Shepherd mixes twice a day every day. Mat from across the street brings his sons to the park three days a week. Leslie jogs at six in the morning before work. Jake brought her a welcoming tin of muffins when he noticed that she’d moved in, a joint gift from him and his wife. Kay from the end of the road hosts a weekly hang out that she kindly sent her an invitation to alongside a welcome note.
None of them are who catches her attention, though. It’s Duke, who is her new direct neighbor who catches her eye. She’s never bumped into him or anything, but she’s acutely aware of his existence.
She’s-- she doesn’t mean to spy, but she’s sure that he’s no normal neighbor.
She’s fairly convinced that he’s a Super, actually.
No one in the neighborhood suspects, no idle gossip whispered when she questioned about the new neighbor who hasn’t bothered (or noticed) that someone new has moved into the house next door. He’s fairly secluded among everyone.
He doesn’t go to Kay’s hangouts. He’s just home to sleep, everyone says. He’s not a social guy. He does, though, travel into the city pretty often for hours at a time. Some of it is on a schedule.
Some of it is not.
Starla has... perhaps checked the news when he does, to see how often it lines up with city Super sightings, but it doesn’t enough for obvious eyebrows to be raised. But she knows that Supers don’t always go out in suits when they’re working, so it’s an iffy measurement from the start.
It doesn’t damn or clear him.
Not much would. But she’d find what she had to. If he was low-level, she’d be fine with it. It was the high tiers who couldn’t escape from their work. Who’s work followed them after they shrugged off the suit and the mask and the name.
It was fine if he wasn’t dangerous. She wasn’t planning on outing him. She just needed to know if he was safe.
After she learned that, she’d leave him be.
It’s his fault for being obvious. He comes home bruised and battered from an office job. He has odd hours. He’s left for the city at night a time or two, speeding out of his driveway in a hurry. No one has ever been in his house. No one has said anything more then hello or good morning to him. He was a ghost. A picture of what it looked like when someone was trying to be invisible.
It was suspicious. It had her gut rolling in unease.
Scones are how she decides to start. it’s polite to bake goods for neighbors and scones are bland enough he probably won’t hate them. It’ll open the door of her getting closer.
The twins are napping when she gets the chance to start throwing the batch together. She hopes they sleep for the hour or so it’ll take for her to throw it in the oven because she’s starting it from scratch. They don’t, of course, or more specifically, Cassie doesn’t.
She abandons the bowl of unmixed powders with liquid poured over the top like a faulty volcano to scoop up the crying baby. “Hey baby,” she coos, swiping a finger over a soft, velvet cheek as she bounces softly. “Whatcha crying for, huh?”
She settles fairly quickly, her large eyes drifting down. Carefully, Starla sets her back into the rocker and returns to baking, sacrificing time for silence.
They sleep through the rest of mixing and shaping into triangle-esque blobs. It’s after she sets the timer that they wake again, and she’s quick to go over and give them another feeding, and a diaper change for Benjamin.
Caring for them both had seemed impossible, at the beginning, but now it was as easy as breathing.
Her life is turning around, rising from the bland routine it had fallen into. A brightening comet that lights her night sky.
Things were much less stressful now. She enjoyed her day to day, which she didn’t before. She’d loved the city, but it hadn’t been kind to her and the eviction notice was just the straw that broke her. That sent her away. The suburbs were nice, too, though, and she was close enough to the city to be satisfied.
It was safer, too.
Or, it was statistically. She’d never suspected her apartment floormates or coworkers to be Supers. Now she was determined her neighbor was one. Now she was worried about it.
Back at her apartment, a ripped-up street was just another Thursday. Rubble blocking a road was normal. It hadn’t disturbed her too much. Life was boring.
It wasn’t now. And not just because of the twins. She had a mystery, too.
She likes mysteries. Puzzles and games and books. She likes to guess who the villain is, in thriller stories and in mystery books. She guesses right sometimes and she doesn’t on others, but she likes attempting. At trying to slot together all the little clues and dissecting the truth from a heap of mostly inconsequential evidence.
As a kid, she’d wanted to be a police officer. Her dad had watched a lot of crime shows and she’d liked watching them fit pieces together to bring justice. It looked fun, when it was on TV.
Then she grew up. She learned that police work was a lot more boring and restricting than the shows made it out to be. Cops were just second-rate overlooked heroes. They got all the paperwork. None of the glory. They did the stakeouts and the waiting. All of the parts that were a slog. Heroes got the benefits. Her fire had been snuffed out. but she still loved the idea of it.
She still likes solving mysteries. And even if she didn’t-- she doesn’t like the idea of someone dangerous living next to her family.
What if a fight followed him home and a Super battle broke out? If Supers started fighting that close, there would be nothing she could do.
It was best she figured out what kind of Super her new neighbor was . If she was lucky, he was just a nonpowered, try hard vigilante. Which was kind of illegal, but not particularly dangerous. But that was if she was lucky. If she was unlucky, then they were in danger just because of their proximity to him.
Living in the city, she’d seen too many new reports of mangled office buildings, smoking apartment buildings, has seen too much of the wreckage fighting leaves behind on the streets and the buildings and the people. It had so much impact on people. It was a very destructive thing to happen.
There was a reason why most of city budget goes to upkeep and repair. Super battles break everything and because they’re doing good, they don’t face punishment.
Starla is pretty indifferent to Supers. She knows that they’re expensive and destructive. They’re good too. Now she just doesn’t want that near her sister and the babies.
She was going to figure out just how much danger they were in. Exactly how much.
She was going to figure out Duke’s secret identity.
*****
Done! This one was a struggle to do for some reason. I think it’s a tad better now, though.
Martin had started getting worried. Duke hadn’t arrived from work since he left to. Sure, Dukes a grown man and knows what he’s doing. He could be hanging out with Spencer for all he knew. Just this didn’t feel right.. He decided to check just in case. He picked up his phone and called him. Luckily Duke gave him Spencer’s number. For emergency reasons of course. Since Duke didn’t pick up earlier, he decided maybe he’s just busy with Spencer? The line picked up. “Hello there! I didn’t think you’d call me since our last encounter” Martin rolled his eyes at the remark. “Yeah yeah. Whatever. I’m just calling you to check something” Martin said with a frown. “Check something?” Spencer asked. “Duke. Have you seen him? He talks about you a lot.. and you two also hang out a lot so I figured he’d be hanging out with you” Martin hoped that it’d be the answer. “Oh? Really? That’s actually-” Martin interrupted him. “Not the time. Is he with you or not?” Spencer paused for a second. Then he responded. “Last I knew he was going to the grocery store” Martin sighed. “Ok then.. thanks anyway” Then he hung up. He tossed his phone to the couch. “Goddammit. That didn’t fucking help at all. He can’t be at the store for what, 4 hours now?? He could literally be in harms way right now and I wouldn’t even know it” Martin said. Then, there was a ping. Martin quickly turned around and grabbed his phone. It was Duke! The message was… odd. It was coordinates to somewhere. But hey. At least all he has to do now is go there. He quickly got his coat on, grabbed his keys and phone. He ran out to his car. Once he got in Martin typed the coordinates in. It came up as… the woods? “What the fuck? Why in hell is he all the way there- please don’t tell me it’s one of those things where I have to convince him not to fucking burn something.” Martin said to himself. He turned on the car and hit the petal. He was off
He finally got there. Luckily enough there was some parking spaces. He got out and looked around. He’s never really been to these woods, though he does recall Henry talking about them. “Damn. Would’ve been helpful if I brought him on this” He said to himself. He took another look around. It was pretty dark out. Not too dark though. He turned on a flashlight just in case. He started walking into the tree ridden area. He could hear owls hooting, crickets doing cricket things, and even saw a deer pass by. The woods were pretty magical. To Martin at least. He stopped when he saw.. grocery bags. They still had what he had bought there. Martin started to slightly panic. He picked them up just in case. Then he started rushing forward. He then stopped quickly. In front of him was his brother. Duke. Martin smiled with relief. “Duke! I had been searching everywhere! I had to call Spencer, which wasn’t really helpful, and-” Duke turned around. The look that he had on his face stopped Martin in his talking. Duke had wide eyes and a big smile. It didn’t help with the fact that his eyes had this.. weird hypnotic look in them. “We’d like to stay with you two for awhile.” Martin raised an eyebrow at what he said. “Duke.. we live in the same apartment. And I don’t know who these “we” are, but they are absolutely not-” Duke quickly pulled out a knife. Martin backed up a little. Then, two people emerged from the trees. One of them was tall, had a purple shirt and strawberry blonde hair. The other…. Oddly looked a bit like a rabbit. Of course, the person more so has some features of one. The rabbit one then came behind Duke and put a hand on his arm. “Now, Martin.” Duke repeated. Martin now could tell what’s going on. The rabbit did something. Something like hypnosis? Martin sighed. “Fine.” The rabbit one smiled. “Thank you” The rabbit and Duke said at the same time. He looked at the tall one again. This person looked a bit nervous while following Martin back to his car. Off they went, back home.
Once they were settled in the home, everything was.. odd. Martin didn’t know who these two were, Martin hoped they didn’t rob Duke. The strawberry blonde was situated at the table. “Sorry about that… I forgot he could do that” Martin looked over. “It’s fine I guess…” Martin paused. “Who are you two anywho?” Martin asked. “He’s Doyle, I’m Radar!” He said. Martin raised an eyebrow. Radar took notice. “It’s what I’ve been called. Since I didn’t have a name originally. I was just called numbers or specimen” Martin then stopped in shock. He felt all those younger years catching up to him. Before he could say that, he heard a thump. Martin turned frantically. “Oh yeah, I forgot to tell you. Doyle’s mind control thing makes people pass out after awhile” Radar mentioned. Martin turned around. “Mind… control?” Radar nodded. “It’s complicated to explain,,” Martin then noticed. Radar himself had a tail. Martin could definitely tell what’s going on. “Here… I’ll make you a deal. You tell me what the fuck happened, and I’ll make you anything you want” Radar tilted his head. “What do you mean by that??” Martin shrugged. “It’d be your choice. Steak, whatever. You just have to tell me where you and your little rabbit friend came from, how you got here, everything.” Radars eyes slightly lit up. “I get to tell you about our adventure?” Martin nodded. He could tell that he seemed more into talking about it than the food. “Ok! I’ll do it!” He said with excitement. Martin there then listened.
