Warnings: mentions of drugs, minor character death, child neglect
A/N:This was really fun to write. I went completely wild with Julian’s past – hopefully what I came up with makes sense for his character and explains why he is the way he is. Also, I’ve never written a fic that focuses on Robin and Julian before so that was fun as well. I hope you enjoy it!
Prompts are open,so if you want me to write a story for you as well just send me an ask with the fandom, characters and your prompt. I’m writing for Ghosts, Yonderland, Horrible Histories and Bill at the moment.
Six Idiots Whump Wednesday / Fluff Friday masterlist is here.
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Not Like Them
“Was quite sad, wasn’t it?”
Julian shot Robin a look. “Kitty’s story about her sister? Mhm yes, I suppose so.”
“And Thomas’s,” Robin said.
“That old sob story?” Julian laughed. “Please, he was a baby crying for attention. That’s what babies do. Thomas just happened to never grow out of it.”
To his surprise, Robin stopped mid-step to frown at him. “No, is not right to leave baby crying. Can be dangerous.”
Julian put a hand on his shoulder and said with all the patience and seriousness he could muster, “I don’t know how to tell you this, ape, but the time when sabre-toothed tigers came into our caves and ate our babies has long since passed.”
Ahh, this is so amazing, thank you so much! I love how they both are convinced the other is going to leave but for different reasons and it’s just so lovely seeing them make that promise to each other!
Ugh, it’s just so lovely and perfect and explains both their characters so well! Thank you again!!
I’m glad you enjoyed your prompt fic!
Robin sort of sneaked his way into it but I love the symbolism his presence creates - that the character who never stayed decides not to leave the person who always gets left behind.
Warnings: mentions of drugs, minor character death, child neglect
A/N:This was really fun to write. I went completely wild with Julian’s past – hopefully what I came up with makes sense for his character and explains why he is the way he is. Also, I’ve never written a fic that focuses on Robin and Julian before so that was fun as well. I hope you enjoy it!
Prompts are open,so if you want me to write a story for you as well just send me an ask with the fandom, characters and your prompt. I’m writing for Ghosts, Yonderland, Horrible Histories and Bill at the moment.
Six Idiots Whump Wednesday / Fluff Friday masterlist is here.
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Not Like Them
“Was quite sad, wasn’t it?”
Julian shot Robin a look. “Kitty’s story about her sister? Mhm yes, I suppose so.”
“And Thomas’s,” Robin said.
“That old sob story?” Julian laughed. “Please, he was a baby crying for attention. That’s what babies do. Thomas just happened to never grow out of it.”
To his surprise, Robin stopped mid-step to frown at him. “No, is not right to leave baby crying. Can be dangerous.”
Julian put a hand on his shoulder and said with all the patience and seriousness he could muster, “I don’t know how to tell you this, ape, but the time when sabre-toothed tigers came into our caves and ate our babies has long since passed.”
Robin shoved him away. “Me serious! Is only way for baby to communicate. Need to take seriously. Something could be wrong.”
“Or they could just be hungry,” Julian said with a dismissive shrug. “Parents can’t be expected to drop everything just because their offspring happens to be crying. Having to wait a few minutes for mummy to come and pick you up won’t kill a kid.”
“Is still wrong,” Robin grumbled. “Children always come first. They future of the tribe. Precious.”
Julian rolled his eyes. “They’re annoying little shits is what they are.”
He started to walk away but Robin’s hand on his arm held him back. Frowning, Julian turned towards him to demand to be let go but the look on Robin’s face made him falter. No one had ever regarded him with such an intensity before.
Well, he silently amended, at least not outside of court.
He felt like an insect under a microscope, something a scientist had been studying and trying to understand for years without success but was finally close to figuring out. It made Julian’s skin crawl, being looked at like that, and he had to resist the urge to drop his eyes to the ground.
“Is that what your parents tell you?” Robin asked him at last, his voice oddly, unnervingly quiet.
“What?” Julian snorted, stuck somewhere between laughing and the uncomfortable feeling of being stripped bare, and not in the fun way. “What the hell, Robin?”
Much to Julian’s annoyance, the expression on Robin’s face didn’t change. If anything, it grew even more intense, especially when Robin leaned closer and tilted his head to the side, almost like a curious dog trying to understand the colourful butterfly resting on his paw.
“It was,” Robin breathed, pulling back in surprise – as if he had any idea what he was talking about, as if he could possibly know anything about Julian’s childhood just from staring at him in a freaky way for a few seconds.
“Leave it be, Robin,” Julian all but growled, all humour now gone from his voice. He brushed off Robin’s hand and strode past him down the hallway, needing to get away. But Robin wouldn’t be Robin if he didn’t hurry after him like a lost puppy. He was probably doing that weird little skipping run, Julian thought; the one Julian usually found quite hilarious, sometimes even a little endearing. Now it just annoyed him.
“Go away!” he called over his shoulder.
He phased through the front door. Robin followed him only a moment later. “Julian! Wait!”
Why couldn’t that ape ever listen? Actually, no – why did he have to go and sniff around in things that were none of his business? Things Julian very much preferred to stay buried in the past, just like the Captain’s limpet mine and regrets.
Rounding a corner, Julian found himself staring at the little alcove Robin and him had spent the night in while the others had been camping in the woods. He stopped, just for a second, suddenly hit by the phantom warmth and comfort of the memory of Robin’s touch.
It was there Robin finally caught up with him.
“What part of go away did you not understand?” Julian asked, feeling suddenly weary. He dropped onto the bench and glared up at Robin. “Or do you need me to rephrase it so your tiny Neanderthal brain can understand? Leave me alone.”
Robin fiddled with the furs on his arms a little before he tentatively came closer. He sat down next to Julian in the narrow space, way too close for Julian’s comfort. The last thing he either wanted or needed right now was to be coddled. He just wanted to be alone – just until he could shake off whatever it was that made him want to crawl out of his skin and he felt like himself again. Was that too much to ask?
Apparently, it was.
“It only guess,” Robin began quietly, keeping his eyes firmly fixed on the ground. “But I think many people in your life left. Too many.” He shook his head and finally looked up, right at Julian. “Me not like them, Julian. Me stay.”
The words struck Julian to the core. His chest suddenly felt too tight and his lungs too small for the air he didn’t need to breathe. He squeezed his eyes shut in an attempt to calm his wildly beating heart but that only made it worse.Memories lit up like fireworks in his mind, making his whole life play out in front of him like some bloody pathetic feature film he had no desire of ever reliving.
There was his mother, way too skinny and young to bear a child; and there his father who had never wanted anything to do with either of them.
“It’s all your fault!” his mother was shouting in Julian’s face. “He’s leaving because of you!”
Julian had been three years old when his father had walked out on them. He hadn’t understood why his mother was angry with him, why her eyes had been wild and her hands shaking so badly she could barely hold a glass. She had been desperate for her next fix at the time; she always was. The next three years of his life had been an endless cycle of having to endure her accusations, the smell of alcohol on her breath, the sight of used needles around whatever run down place they were staying at and the ever present loneliness he’d never quite managed to shake.
Then, just after his sixth birthday, Julian’s life got turned upside down. His mother had been caught stealing and he’d been sent to live with his father, the one he could barely remember anything about except the fact that he’d broken up their family because of Julian. His mother had made sure he’d never forget that, and from the moment the tall man with the piercing grey eyes had led him into the big, fancy house Julian was supposed to call home now, his father made it perfectly clear that Julian was nothing more than an unwanted guest he just hadn’t found a way to get rid of yet.
“Just my luck to get stuck with that bastard,” Julian had heard him mutter one night when his father’s friends had been over. They had something of a party going on, and the music had been so loud Julian hadn’t been able to sleep so he’d sneaked halfway down the stairs to see what his father was up to.
“At least the little shithead doesn’t need diapers anymore.”
Everyone in the room had laughed and Julian had felt his face heat up.
He’d started wetting his bed that night.
Just thinking about it still made his neck prickle with shame and embarrassment. The whole thing had been utterly mortifying and only a few weeks later, his father had sent him off to boarding school – his way of getting rid of the problem. Out of sight, out of mind – or so his father had thought. It hadn’t taken long for Julian to start acting up. And he had acted up a lot. He’d never really stopped, he supposed – certainly not when he turned nineteen and his old man had died only a few weeks later and left him a small fortune.
Looking back on it, Julian was pretty sure he would have gone down the same road his mother had – ending up in some alley drugged out of his mind and dying of an overdose – if he hadn’t met Margot at that crucial point in his life. She’d been the best thing that ever happened to him and saved his life in more ways than one. Not that he’d ever told her that or thanked her for it. He’d treated her the same way he treated everyone else: like shit – because that’s all he’d ever known, that’s just what people did. They took one look at you, decided you were not worth it and then kicked you to the curb.
Only Margot had never done that. Instead of leaving him like she probably should have she had stayed by his side, through the bad, the worse and the worst. She’d called him out on his bullshit, sure, but she had still stood by him through scandal after scandal, no matter what he’d done, no matter how many times he’d disappointed and hurt her and made her cry in the bathroom in the middle of the night.
And now Robin was telling him he’d do the same.
Julian had no idea what to do with that … that promise. People like him rarely got lucky once, let alone twice, and he knew himself well enough to know he would go and ruin this, ruin them, just like he’d ruined his relationship with Margot all those years ago. Robin didn’t deserve that. Robin deserved–
The world, Julian thought, silently regarding his best friend who looked more ape than human but was perhaps the most human of all of them. He felt his heart in his throat.
“What if I want you to leave?” he asked quietly.
Robin shrugged and looked away, out over the grounds. “You leave first.”
At first Julian thought Robin was telling him to go – as if that would be possible even if Julian wanted to. But then he took in Robin’s hunched shoulders and the faraway look in his eyes and it suddenly hit him that Robin was talking about something else, something much sadder than all the lonely years of Julian’s childhood and decades of poor life choices put together.
He was talking about Julian moving on before him.
Julian’s chest tightened so suddenly he thought he was having another heart attack, ridiculous as that notion was. Perhaps for the first time since his death he looked at Robin and truly saw him, saw the insane number of centuries he’d been around and realised what that actually meant. Robin had seen whole civilisations rise and fall, ecosystems go extinct and reinvent themselves – hell, he’d seen mammoths roam these plains and still wore their fur today. The number of ghosts he’d seen come and go in that time had to be mind-blowing; the grief over their loss unfathomable.
No wonder Robin expected him to be just like them, Julian thought; in his experience, everyone inevitably left. No one ever stayed.
He swallowed around the sudden lump in his throat.
“What if I don’t want to leave?” he murmured without looking at Robin.
Robin shook his head, resigned. “Won’t be your choice. When time comes, you go.”
“No,” Julian said, shaking his head. It felt like a weight had been lifted off his chest. He looked up and met Robin’s eyes. “I won’t be like the others. I won’t go.”
He’d done enough of that already – running away, leaving people behind, hurting them by being absent. It was time he started holding onto what he had, and Robin – Robin was the one person he couldn’t imagine ever being without again.
“Julian,” Robin began, sounding old and weary and sadder than Julian had ever heard him, so he held up his hand to stop Robin right there.
“It’s not up for discussion. We leave together or not at all.” He held out his hand. “Deal?”
Robin glanced between it and his face.
“You mean that?” he asked gruffly. One of his hands was nervously fiddling with his furs. “Together?”
Julian nodded. “Yes. If you can imagine spending eternity with someone as brilliant and handsome as me.”
He winked and something changed in Robin’s face; or rather eased,giving way to a flicker of what Julian thought might be hope, or perhaps peace. Robin’s eyes softened and his shoulders relaxed, and when he reached for Julian’s still outstretched hand, he took it with far more gentleness then Julian would have thought.
“Deal,” Robin smiled.
Neither of them knew what that promise would be worth in the end but in that moment, that didn’t matter. The thought behind it counted, the knowledge that they had chosen each other and would do so again and again for as long as possible. For now, that was enough.
Julian squeezed Robin’s hand and, feeling Robin squeeze back, smiled.
[Image description: a transparent image of Julian Fawcett MP from BBC Ghosts placed onto the bisexual flag. Julian is sitting in a beige armchair with his legs crossed. He is wearing a dark suit jacket, a white shirt, a red tie and black socks with suspenders. He has no trousers on. Yellow hearts have been edited around his head and shoulders. The first image also has the words ‘Julian Fawcett’ in yellow, the next is blank, the next three have the words 'bi Tory rights’ in various places, and the last three are the same except a circle has been edited in causing the corners to become blurry. End image description.]
[Image description: a drawing of Julian Fawcett from Ghosts done mainly in desaturated tones of red, tan, and blue. He is seated in a chair behind a chess set at a small round table. He is wearing a dark suit jacket, a blue shirt, and a burgundy paisley tie. He is leaning his head on his left hand while his right hand phases slightly through a chess piece. There is a window in the background which is casting a white light, causing Julian to be mostly in shadow. There is text in the lower left corner which reads, “A Lot To Take In.” End image description.]
rest in peace julian fawcett. rest in peace. rest in peace you cheeky little man. it’s a shame you never watched love island. you would’ve loved to watch love island
Allison put love island on the telly for the ghosts challenge
I had another Thought - Thomas would get so/too into it
None of the ghosts were able to attend their own funerals because they wouldn’t have been held on the grounds. Perhaps Kitty and Fanny could have witnessed their wakes or after funeral gatherings but that’s it. None have seen their own graves(apart from the plague pit). Kitty, Thomas, Fanny, The Captain, Pat & Julian have gravestones out there somewhere.
Wouldn’t it be sweet to have Alison and Mike do some research and travel to their graves to take photographs so they can come back home to show the ghosts where they are buried.
Robin’s body was probably dragged off somewhere by a bear and most of Mary would have been consumed by fire and incinerated so no burials for those two sadly.
Of all of them, Fanny would be the most curious to see what epitaph her family made for her and if it looks regal and dignified enough.
At first I thought The Captain being an army officer during the war meant he would be buried along side them but since he died most likely AFTER the war was over, maybe not. It’s possible he was taken to be buried elsewhere if he had relatives that would claim him. That might have pained him somewhat because I think he felt the most comfortable in the army. We never hear him talk about anything else. No childhood memories or family. Clearly the army was his tribe.
Just thinking about how Alison has given these ghostly spirits “life” again. For decades, and (for half of them) centuries they haven’t been able to affect or influence anything new. They’ve haven’t been acknowledged or given anything just for them. Kitty’s birthday party, Mary learning to read, music they love to dance to, tv programmes and films that they want to watch, playing computer games. Crossword puzzles for crying out loud. She’s given them tangible things but also the comfort of not feeling trapped in limbo anymore. And with this comes the trust that the modern world isn’t passing them by. They can feel a sense of purpose again.
Hi! So I just wanted to introduce you all to my ghosts au, which I’ll hopefully be doing some fanart for in the future! If you have questions please feel free to ask! My inbox is always open
This au starts as normal, Allison and Mike inherit button house, move in, and Allison has a near death experience by falling out of a window. What’s different is that there are clubs using the house (similarly to the kitty centered episode) when they move in, and there are no ghosts at all. However, instead of ghosts, there is a lovely therapy group for people who have experienced near death experiences and are trying to cope with their narrow escapes of death. This group is the ghosts we all know and love, their near death experiences being related to how they died in show.
Allison decides to sit in on one of these meetings, as she is too coming to terms with her near death experience, and finds a family among this group of people. All of the ghosts we know and love attend this group (with the main ghosts being the regulars and the plague pit ghosts cycling in and out of the group) and they slowly work through their issues together with this found family.
Now, here’s a little bit of specific plot (featuring the Captain):
Captain and Humphrey both work to run the group, though Humphrey is more the person helping with the actual therapy portion, while the Captain is a sort of facilitator for this group. Allison initially was unsure if he just worked for this group or if he too had experienced a chance with death, however as the group has grown closer over the meetings she has determined that he has, but she doesn’t know too much.
What she does know is that the Captain used to have a boyfriend (Havers). While she doesn’t know much, she has heard from the other members and Captain himself that they never officially broke up, but rather Havers had moved. Allison has a feeling however that there’s more to the story than is being let on. (Her theory being he may have died in whatever accident the Captain had gotten into, but the Captain isn’t ready to open up about him yet)
Feel free to ask me questions about this au and the modern versions of the characters that would be seen in this au!
