#>long walk to the gallows >lives anyways. SAD! well there will be other people to hang

[meirimerens]

playlist title: "it's a long walk to the gallows"

"it's a long walk to the gallows"

track #1 — BALKON, Відьми

track #2 — Dead Can Dance, Persephone (The Gathering of Flowers)

track #3— Amigo the Devil, The Weight

track #4 — Delta Rae, Bottom of the River

track #5 — Shawn James, Burn the Witch

track #6 — Black hill, Entwining with Darkness

track #7 — Johnny Cash, Ain't No grave

spotify link

ask me for a playlist :3

[hellishhin]

Unfamiliar Servitude

Length: ~3,100 words

Content warnings: Very mild servant/master interactions

Post themes: High fantasy, found family, friendship tension, unkind master, new friends, frustration at being ordered around, homesickness, devout friendship loyalty

Summary: Tensions are high after Sadie pledged her servitude to the cold and unforgiving Taerand Calentavar. Kireen is angry and believes her sacrifice was unnecessary but Brimir is grateful she saved his life. Sadie has a soft moment with K'lai'a'la and makes a promise she won't do anything stupid to get in trouble with Taerand but her first day on the job makes that difficult. His vague instructions and barking orders gets on her nerves and she finds herself scolded regularly. It's only the first day and she's already struggling to hold her tongue but she must do it to fulfil her promise to her beloved friend.

Intro with links to all previous posts

[next post]----[previous post]

The eyes of the entire room felt like pinpricks across their skin while three guards escorted them briskly out the front door. By that time, the remains of the vase were nowhere to be found and the party had not quite returned to its previous vigor. Once they were free of their escort and well away from the manor, Kireen let it out. “What in the nine hells, Sadie! Did you really just turn yourself into a slave to save someone we don’t even know?!” by this point she had stopped walking, towering over Sadie and glaring down at her. This was matched by an equally fierce glare from the halfling, fierce enough that their size difference did not seem to matter quite as much.

“I know him well enough to know he doesn’t deserve to die. Also, are you forgetting that K’lai’a’la’s neck was on the line too? I don’t care if he decided to not execute her, she could have been flogged and that’s way worse.”

“That part hadn’t even been decided yet and now you-”

“Stop,” once again K’lai’a’la’s soft voice cut through the tension like butter. “Do not yell. I do not like yelling.”

Sadie’s face flashed through a range of emotion starting at annoyance and ending at tight-lipped resignation. “She’s right, it’s already done. I will move to his manor in the morning.”

Brimir then dropped to a knee and pulled Sadie into a tight hug, “thank you, Sadie. You are a true hero,” then he began to sniffle, drunken emotions taken over as even the threat of death had not sobered him up sufficiently.

“You’re welcome, Brimir. I’d do anything for a friend,” she said soothingly then looked up at Kireen from behind his back and gave her a sour face. Kireen just narrowed her golden eyes at her.

“Then to make it up to the rest of us you’re going to help us with the favor we still have to do for Taerand,” Kireen said to the back of Brimir’s head then reached down to pry him off of Sadie who was sagging under his drunken weight. When he stood, he looked at Kireen through tearstained, blood-shot eyes.

“Anything. I will do anything. I owe it to all of you,” he sniffed and wiped his nose across the back of his hand, smearing snot unattractively over his face. “I just froze. That man is… well he’s scary. I shouldn’t have snuck in.”

“Yes thank you for stating the obvious, too bad you couldn’t have had those thoughts earlier today and none of us would be in this situation,” Kireen’s face was still taut but she was slowly coming to terms with the fact that there was no changing the situation now and it ended better than it might have otherwise. She turned and led the way as they continued toward the Stag in awkward silence.

Once they turned onto the street and saw the warm firelit windows of their home, K’lai’a’la touched Sadie gently on the shoulder, bending down to do so.

“I come in to get dress off. Then I go to my tree.”

Sadie nodded and looked up at Kireen who did not look back. Instead, she entered the Stag and made right for the stairs. Sadie turned to Brimir who was swaying on his feet and sighed. From the bosom of her dress she procured a key and handed it to K’lai’a’la.

“Go upstairs and wait for me, I’ll be right up,” then she approached the bar where Dwinain was wiping the counter off. “Did ye have a good time Blaze?” he asked jovially and glanced to Brimir who was following Sadie like a sad, lost puppy.

“It’s a long story but before I tell it I need you to know I’m moving out in the morning,” the rag froze in place.

“But where’ll ya go?” behind his beard he looked quite perplexed.

“I am going to live with Ser Calentavar. I work for him now. But not right now Dwinain I have an elf in a dress who wants out of it and I need to get a room for my friend here,” she rubbed a hand across her face while the other hand gestured in the vague direction of Brimir. Sadie had seen Dwinain’s face contort in a frown before but not quite to this degree. His eyebrows and moustache almost touched.

“Number seven then. But we are going to speak of this before you go,” he hopped off his platform and brought a key out to them. Wordlessly, Sadie gestured for Brimir to take it and then he was stumbling up the stairs toward his bed.

“I’ll give you the money for his-” but Dwinain clasped her hands in his before she could continue.

“The night is on me. I know ye can take care of yerself but that won’t stop me from saying be careful,” he pulled her in for a tight but brief hug and Sadie returned it, melting slightly into the embrace. But then it was over.

“Thanks Dwinain, I’ll explain before I go. Promise,” he nodded and wordlessly went back behind the bar.

K’lai’a’la was waiting awkwardly in the center of her room when she entered and was surprisingly quiet even as Sadie removed the pins from her hair. It wasn’t until she was back in her normal mossy clothing that she finally spoke.

“You should not have done that,” K’lai’a’la has never been truly angry around Sadie but the slight furrow between her brows showed she was nearing upset.

“Can you please just drop it? I feel like I did what was best and I want to go to sleep now,” her tired features really showed her age and the candles seemed to shine extra off the silver streaks in her hair.

“No. Do not leave tomorrow. Stay here.”

Sadie hopped off of the chair and pushed it back in its place then started to undress herself, keeping her back turned to her friend.

“I can’t. I already made the promise and I can’t break it. Why do you two even hate him so much anyway? He only tried to…” She trailed off as she pulled a few pins from her hair.

“He try to kill me. He try to kill storyman. He try to kill you,” she said with a little more heat than Sadie was expecting which made her turn to her friend and look up at her.

“Hey, tonight was just a couple mistakes and he’s really strict. He wasn’t going to kill you in the end so I will be fine. I can’t break my promise to him but I can make one to you that I won’t make any mistakes while I’m there, ok?” she smiled and held her hand up, palm facing outward. K’lai’a’la knelt down and sighed but put her palm against Sadie’s and their fingers interlocked, sealing the promise. Sadie gave an extra squeeze.

“You can stay here tonight if you want,” but that made K’lai’a’la shake her head. “I go to tree but be back at sunrise.”

“How about… sometime after sunrise?” That made K’lai’a’la frown. “Ok fine I’ll leave the door unlocked.” The elf nodded and quietly left Sadie alone with her thoughts.

She haphazardly tossed some of her clothes and trinkets into her trunk but wasn’t fully finished before she fell into a fitful sleep.

***

When dawn broke with her rosy fingers, the click of the door opening pulled Sadie from her light sleep. K’lai’a’la looked quite awake but quietly watched and waited as Sadie began the process of getting out of bed. There were not many words to be had as she finished her packing. When she went downstairs there was a modest breakfast for her that she only poked at. Kireen was finishing her plate already and also didn’t have much to say.

“Can you all not act like I’m walking to the gallows? I’m literally getting a job as a servant, something a lot of people actually wish they could do,” the early morning made her extra bitter.

“You have a point,” Kireen actually sounded sincere “but when he treats you poorly and you complain about it to us, I get to say I told you.”

Sadie rolled her eyes and was going to respond when the door opened and Taerand’s majordomo entered with two other male servants in tow. He approached and gave her a polite nod. “Good morning, Miss McRimmik. I have come to collect you. Where might my assistants find your things?”

“Room four. It’s unlocked,” something churned in her stomach as she set the key on the counter where Dwinain put his hand over hers for just a moment before taking the key. The two servants went upstairs and the majordomo procured two letters from his tunic and handed one to Kireen, the other to K’lai’a’la who did not take it. Kireen took it instead.

“Ser Calentavar would like to meet in two days' time, once Miss Sadie is settled in.”

“About time,” Kireen grumbled and just tucked the letters away without opening them. The majordomo nodded at Sadie and she hopped off her stool and made for her new home.

***

The manor had a different air about it than the night before. It was a lot more subdued and seemed less lived-in, almost. But soon Sadie was back in front of Taerand and his large desk that was starting to seem more like a judge’s bench than a desk. With a nod, the majordomo left, leaving only her and Taerand. He was sitting, shuffling through parchment on his desk while she stood there. Finally he looked up.

“Take this to the kitchen and give it to Jordo,” he handed her a folded piece of parchment. She slowly took it, looking more than a little baffled.

“Okay… who is Jordo?”

“I do not have time to introduce you to every one of my staff,” then he went back to looking at the papers on his desk. Sadie just stood there for long enough that he looked back up at her.

“If I was not clear before, you are to leave now to deliver that message to the kitchen. Go.”

Remembering her promise to K’lai’a’la, she silently left the room with the parchment in her hand. She hadn’t been told what to do with such authority since she was a child and Ethna was ordering her about. Even then it got on her nerves. Once she reminded herself that this was only temporary, she focused on finding someone to ask, ignoring the glaring question of just *how* temporary this would be.

An older woman was carrying a basket of laundry toward the main staircase and she approached, clearing her throat.

“Excuse me, I’m new here. Can you tell me where I can find Jordo? I have a message from Taerand.”

The woman pursed her lips “you have a message from Master Calentavar, child,” she corrected “the kitchens are down the far hall, last door on the right,” and she continued up the stairs with her basket.

“Thank you! I’m Sadie by the way and I’m not a child, I’m a halfling,” but the mistake didn’t actually bother her.

“Sigrun,” was all the woman responded with. Sadie followed her instructions and did indeed find the kitchen and could probably have found it on her own had she caught a whiff of the delicious smells which seemed to be dying down after breakfast. The kitchen was spacious with a large wooden counter in the center of the room. An oversized oven took up one corner which was next to a large cookfire. Shelves of more kinds of food than she could identify lined one wall. From the ceiling hung pots and pans of so many different sizes and shapes she couldn’t begin to fathom what one could need with such a variety. Even just the sight of the pans had her halfling stomach rumbling. Peeling her eyes away from the vast culinary expanse, she saw a fairly large man with his back to her. He was dressed in a well-worn but clean linen shirt with an apron tied around his waist. Sadie cleared her throat.

“Excuse me, are you Jordo?”

“I should think you wouldn’t have to ask if you’re in this kitchen,” he said coolly and when he turned around, his eyes were centered three feet above her head. It took him a moment before he looked down and realized she was there. “Well hello there, my apologies, I didn’t see you. I suppose we haven’t met, have we. You have the right man. I’d shake your hand but I’ve got raw lamb all over,” he gestured behind him to a beautiful rack of lamb he had been rubbing seasonings and butter all over, presumably to let it age. Her mouth started watering.

“I’m Sadie. I’m new here, just started this morning.”

“Well then it’s nice to meet you. Set the letter just there if you don’t mind,” he gestured next to him, between the lamb and a plate of biscuits. He turned back around to continue his work and when she set the letter where he asked, she eyed the biscuits long enough that Jordo chuckled and bumped one on top of the pile off with his elbow. “Oops, look out below,” the biscuit bounced off the counter and Sadie managed to catch it. “That one was burnt anyway, wouldn’t do to be served.” It was, in fact, very slightly darkened along one edge as though it were too close to the wall of the oven.

“Thank you,” she bit into it and even though it was a simple biscuit it was the best she’d ever had. Jordo chuckled at the noises of pleasure emanating from the small halfling.

“I’d finish that here if I were you. Nothing wrong with havin’ it just don’t want to get crumbs on the carpets.”

“Thank you for the advice and the biscuit. Do you like working here? Is Taerand nice to you?”

“Master Calentavar? He pays me well and I get to cook, can’t go wrong with that I don’t think,” his tone was genuine enough that she believed him but he wouldn’t be the last person she asked today. She was going to be cautious since Kireen and K’lai’a’la were so worried.

“Do you cook for the servants too? Is food included?” She asked after another bite of biscuit.

“I do and it is but there’s a budget for it. We don’t get lamb that’s for sure. Well, I get to taste it but I don’t get my own portion at least,” he didn’t seem too bothered by that.

She chewed and nodded, “so what do I do now? I did the job I was asked to do.” This time he turned to look over his shoulder, his thinning hair slipping into his eyes.

“If you were not given a second task you better get back and ask him what he wants next. He’s probably expecting you to return to him once you deliver my message.”

“Oh. Okay. What does the message say?” she asked, not picking up on his advice.

“Just a meal list for a private dinner in two nights,” he didn’t seem concerned that his advice wasn’t heeded. Sadie just did not want to leave the kitchen. To her it was one of the most magical places she’s experienced. But it finally sunk in that he had a point.

“I’ll go now, thanks for the biscuit Jordo. It was nice to meet you!” She stuffed the rest of her biscuit in her mouth and he just chuckled as she left.

She returned and entered Taerand’s study, finding his icy gaze upon her. Only when the door was shut behind her did he speak.

“I did not realize my kitchen had moved across Stawold,” he said flatly.

“Well you didn’t tell me where it was so I had to ask,” she did not like how upset he seemed, she knew she hadn’t been gone more than ten minutes and that wasn’t long at all.

“Five minutes is far too long for a message to be delivered within my own manor. Do you understand?” Sadie had no idea why he was so stern and why that message was so critical. Jordo didn’t make it sound critical.

“I’m… sorry?” Once again, she found herself baffled and it wasn’t even midmorning yet.

“Two more rules you have disobeyed that I shall correct just this once. You will always knock before you enter a room and you shall address me as Master Calentavar. I will ask again, do you understand?” The hint of threat in his tone gave her pause and Kireen’s voice was in her head I told you so.

“I understand, Master Calentavar. I apologize.” She also had a promise to K’lai’a’la to uphold.

His frigid demeanor warmed up slightly. “Good. Now deliver this to my page.”

***

The day was long and by the end of it, Sadie was tired and her feet sore but she barely noticed. He had her running around the manor all day and listening to him barking commands at her was starting to wear down the filter between her mind and her mouth. Luckily, she was dismissed to her room before it broke fully and it helped when she found out she was given a private room. Maybe he was just testing to see how she did under pressure. Maybe she could put up with this, but the weight of that maybe would get significantly heavier if the next day was anything like the last.

The more she thought about how many times the word ‘master’ came out of her mouth over the course of the day, the more disgusted she became until she was just throwing the clothes from her trunk into random drawers. She was Blaze, the hero of Stawold, the best performer in the whole town and she was calling someone else master? Her blood started to run hotter in her veins and she felt it burning her cheeks. What’s worse is she never kept her promise to tell Dwinain what happened and he hadn’t said anything to remind her. Not to mention, she missed her bed at the Stag, she missed the sound of drunken laughter floating through the walls; there was no laughter here. Only obedient silence. A knock at the door caught her before she started knocking candlesticks off of surfaces.

“Yes?” The door opened and a younger servant girl peered in. Sadie recognized her but if she had asked her name, she promptly forgot it.

“Master Calentavar would like you to sing while he has his supper.”

Her promise to K’lai’a’la was the only thing that had her snatching up her dulcimer and attempting to plaster something resembling a polite look on her face. She is the great performer of Stawold, after all.

Taglist: (adds/removes always open!) @betwixtofficial @taerandcalentavar @talesfromaurea @faelanvance @definitelyquestionit @drippingmoon @dontcrywrite @a-wild-bloog

[constancecunningham]

Safe as Houses || Constance & Remmy

TIMING: Current

LOCATION: Gallow’s End Estates

PARTIES: @whatsin-yourhead & @constancecunningham

SUMMARY: Shaken by her actions at the docks, Constance goes for a walk, but she isn’t alone. Remmy makes a proposition.

CONTAINS: Brief references to past abuse.

Remmy had a decision to make.

Life was still moving and they’d been standing still so long. It was time to decide if they were going to keep moving, or if they were going to stay still. Sure, they had forever, but that didn’t mean the people around them did. And forever wasn’t even guaranteed, was it? As long as slayers and hunters existed, nothing was guaranteed. Not that Remmy blamed them, but they had to accept the fact that even if they did nothing wrong, even if they presented no threat, did nothing bad, there would always be people like Alain who would cut them down anyway. Though he had agreed not to go after them until they hurt someone for real again, that didn’t mean he wouldn’t change his mind again. Or that someone else would come along who wasn’t willing to compromise. There were too many variables in forever, that was the one thing Remmy knew was true.

And so, it was with that in mind, that Remmy found themselves strolling through town, coming upon old places that they’d found comfort in in the past. Mooseventure, Al’s, the Commons...and lastly, the Bend. And the awful, dirty, shitty apartments they’d first lived in when moving here. And while the place had been just horrible, they’d met two of their very best friends while living here-- Blanche and Nora. And while Nora was off doing...who knew what, Blanche was still here. Still fighting. And Nora was around, she made sure maintenance came to the house to keep it in working order for the residents that did still live there, even if they were undead. They deserved a nice place, too.

It wasn’t until Remmy got closer to the building that they realized the person they’d seen standing out front wasn’t standing at all-- they were hovering, just above the ground, and Remmy could see straight through them. A ghost. Thoughts of Nadia flooded their head and Remmy hesitated a moment before they realized, again, that they recognized this ghost. She had been the ghost sitting next to Remmy on the bench in the park that day-- the day Morgan had died. This ghost was Constance. Remmy would never forget her face.

They walked up towards her nervously, but kept their demeanour calm. “You’re um...you’re Constance, right?”

Constance had fewer and fewer places left to her where she felt safe. Everywhere she explored, there Morgan was and there her rage blazed, weakening her grasp on her own soul, narrowing her vision to the size of a pinprick. And yet the sun rose and the sun set and she could not sleep. Perhaps, all this considered, returning to the outskirts where she had been born and the woods where she had played alone. Constance glimpsed the gray sunlight cut and scattered like flour through the many branches. She imagined that the sun remembered her, the trees remembered her, and the creatures she cared for and buried and the treasures she was so afraid to lose she buried them too and touched them not at all until they were useless--those must remember her too.

Drifting forwards, she explored further, searching for the way back home. Or what she had called and cursed as home. It had to be right around--

Oh.

Constance was no fool. This world had no love for brittle things like the excuse of a house she had been born in. No markers or ruins signified the life of her or anyone else she had crossed paths with. And yet, there were still ruins before her. Chipped and peeling print, exposed bricks of gray rock, falling shingles, a faint drip of a leak, somewhere. It almost brought a smile to Constance’s face, to know that this world, and this spot, was one still riddled with leeks. Inside people were cold, they cried, they hated, they starved. And most likely, no one would remember them any more than her. How to think of such a miserable life, now rendered into multiples like some catastrophic math riddle. Was it cursed ground? Was it her, or just the twisted bend of this world and the wickedness of the people who moved it?

She heard a voice call her name and turned. She knew the face, but its place didn’t come to her at once. “...Good day,” she said curiously. “You’re solid, real solid. I don’t have many of those that know my name. How are we--” And then it came to her. That day at the beach. Constance stiffened. “If this is another one of Morgan’s blessed stomping grounds, I can take my leave without being threatened,” she said. And she should leave, if this was true. She was so weak, and so angry. She wanted Moran’s death to be something precise, even elegant. She couldn’t manage that if even looking at the woman riled her to snapping light bulbs.

“What? No,” Remmy said, shaking their head. “It’s not-- it’s not. This is uh-- I used to live here.” They motioned to the apartment building down the way, as ragged and decrypt as the houses surrounding it. This had nothing to do with Morgan, and Remmy found it all the more quiet when they realized that, too. They turned to look back at Constance. “Why are you back? You know she-- she wants to hurt you, because of what you did, what you’re...doing.” They weren’t sure what to feel yet, only that they knew they could sense a deep sorrow coming from the specter, and the idea of one of her closest, best friends wanting to harm someone simply to harm them. That wasn’t the person they thought Morgan was, but it terrified them, deep down. And they weren’t sure if it was the thought of her hurting someone or the thought that Remmy hadn’t known her capable that scared them more. “It’s not safe here for you.”

Constance grew more confused. For people who were determined to align themselves with the Bachman family, Morgan’s friends demonstrated a strange amount of concern for her. “I never left,” she said carefully, waiting for the subterfuge to reveal itself. “I saw her bleeding on the street, and there was so much noise I thought even you wouldn’t hear how I screamed with relief. I was sure I had never done anything more perfectly. Did you know that there were only two other casualties? I regret them as sins and doubtless I will be punished eventually, but all those machines, all that glass and noise and screaming, and she was gone by her own doing with only two more people caught in the crossfire.” Constance’s voice softened, wistful. “And I thought, I want to stay to see the moon and the stars and a new sun, in a world with no more survivors of the Bachman line. And I saw it. And then I thought, alright, that must be enough now. Only I didn’t fade. And I think I’ve tried rather hard at it, but no one I ask can tell me the secret, because if they had it, they wouldn’t be here still. But here we are. I can only think that some part of me suspected the truth all along. I did nothing perfect. I only made her into more of a monster.” She went quiet, regarding the strange figure again. “I don’t care about being hurt. And I don’t care about what she wants to do. I want what I asked for.” What was so very hard to understand about that? “Why is this not safe? If you’re not going to beat me with iron or tell her where to find me, why wouldn’t I be safe? Why is it any concern to you in the first place?”

Remmy wasn’t good at this part. There was a struggle going on in their heart and it made them feel sick. Morgan was their best friend, they should be on her side for this-- but Constance was clearly suffering, too, and even if she’d been the one who’d put Morgan’s death into action, did she not deserve a chance at forgiveness as well? If Morgan got that chance, why not her? Simply because she was a ghost? And so young. Younger than Remmy. Younger than Nadia. Remmy wiped at their one exposed eye. “What’d they do to you?” they asked quietly, ignoring everything else for now. “The-- the Bachmans. What made you so...sad?” And they chose the word carefully, pausing for a long moment before saying it, because it was a very particular feeling they heard in her voice. It seemed like such an innocuous word, but Remmy could find no other to describe it. The sound was so familiar, so close to their heart. “It’s not safe because...when people want to hurt you, it doesn’t matter who you are or how you feel, they’ll do it. And it’s just-- it’s just another cycle of violence. Why does everyone wanna hurt each other so much? Why does anger have to be the emotion we respond to? Does anyone really think making someone else hurt fixes anything? Makes anything feel better?” They sniffled again. “It’s my concern because I don’t want to see you hurt. You or Morgan or anyone. I’ve had enough.”

Constance rolled her eyes and turned back to look at the building that had replaced her family’s house. She felt nothing as she drifted through the world, but she could feel the despair coming from this place. “Why do you care?” She huffed. “It was tragical, and foolish, and I lost everything. Even before I cast the spell, I had nothing left but myself. And handkerchiefs worth of objects I had on my person, but those were worthless, too.” A picture. A phony charm. Some cornbread. A flattened penny. The paper she’d used to make her plan with Agnes. A baby’s rattle would have been worth more in comparison. “My father said I was born melancholic. And cruel. He said a great many things, but perhaps he was right about the way I was born. It is difficult to come to an end such as this and feel as though you were not fated to pain from the start. And if you cannot understand a feeling such as mine, if you have never needed to see your pain paid back threefold, if you have never needed to feel a name and a line burnt out by time once and for all, I should think you wouldn’t want to taste it.” But the figure persisted, and Constance wondered if they knew Blanche Harlow as well. “Morgan is my only missing piece,” she said. “And my worst, for of course it should be this way,” she sighed, rolling her eyes. “It used to be that you couldn’t walk half a mile without running to a Bachman relative, or Bachman owned land, or a Bachman friend. And now I have one fiend of a woman so small, she’s practically the size of a child. I think I’ve accomplished a great deal. I’ve changed the world.  If that was your only wish, and you’d paid for it with your self, wouldn’t you risk paying again to see it done? To be finished, and have your wish come true?”

“I don’t know,” Remmy answered honestly, “I just do. I can’t help it.” And they couldn’t. And the more they thought about it, the more they realized they’d always felt this way. They’d always had a bleeding heart, hadn’t they? Even when they were a child, so angry and lost and scared, all they’d wanted was to help other people. Taking the fall for things that weren’t their fault; letting others use them if only to make themselves feel better; helping others even when they were struggling themself. Remmy had always felt the pain of the world around them and wanted to help-- it had just taken death for them to realize that. Swallowing, they looked square at Constance. “No, I wouldn’t,” they finally said, once Constance was done speaking, and was looking at them for some sort of validation. “But that’s just me.” They knew everyone, everything was different. “Doing that will just turn you cold, you know. I-- I understand how you feel. Maybe not entirely, but I do, on some level. I grew up with nothing. No mom, a deadbeat dad, poor as shit...and queer, to boot. People all told me I was never going to be good for anything. That all I did was bring others pain. I was trouble. I wasn’t worth it.” They swallowed, clearing their throat of the tears that threatened. “But they were wrong. Because...they don’t get to decide who I am and what I’m worth. I get to decide that. And-- it took me a long time to figure that out, but I did. And it’s true for you, too. What do you even gain by killing Morgan? By destroying a family line? Whatever pain they caused you-- it was so long ago. Morgan is so far away from whoever really hurt you, the pain you cause now just starts a new cycle of pain and violence and-- why would you want that? Don’t you want peace? Don’t you want...to be happy?”

The story the figure told was so familiar, Constance couldn’t bring herself to trust it. Perhaps someone had written about her, perhaps her death had meant more than one more miserable, nameless body in the woods. Which was more plausible? That some misguided record and put down the details of her cruel existence, or that this stranger, this person who had screamed and cried over what Constance had done would possibly understand her? “You don’t understand anything about me,” she said stubbornly. She drifted away from the building, away from this...person. “I don’t want to talk about this anymore. I’m trying to conserve my energy and be stable! A solid like you wouldn’t understand that either.” She wanted them to go and leave her be. A world that ignored Constance was painful but it was at least familiar. And perhaps if she stomped on her feelings enough she could find the words to explain how hopeless she truly was, and how little she had left beyond her wish. She bound herself to it that night, however many moons ago. Constance wasn’t sure if she would know how to let go until it was finished, even if she was mad enough to ever want to.

“Yeah, I do,” Remmy insisted, following after her. “Life treated you like shit-- you never got anything good and happy. And then when you finally did, it took it from you, right? It tore everything away, including yourself?” They went around her-- remembering how Nadia had said she didn’t like being ignored and walked through-- and stopped in front of her. She could easily phase through them, they supposed, but it was the act that mattered, right? “If you really think you’re the only one that’s ever suffered, you’ve got a big reality check coming, Constance. I died, too, you know,” they said, crossing their arms over their chest. “Alone and afraid and only after watching the rest of my world be destroyed. The only difference is that I woke up solid and you woke up transparent. That doesn’t make you any less of a person, or-or any less worth being given a chance. Maybe-- maybe you’re still here because this is your second chance to do better, to be better. To be...happy. And don’t-- don’t tell me what I do and don’t understand. I understand a lot more than you-- or anyone-- thinks.” And they were tired of everyone thinking they didn’t. They were tired of being pushed aside.

“If only I had truly been here this long,” Constance said bitterly. “If I had really been here this long, I might have finished my curse before your wretched friend was ever born. But when I bargained myself, I went…” Constance didn’t know the words for what had happened to her. There was nothing like it in any scripture she had ever read, Christian, Pagan, or otherwise. “It was like sleep, but it wasn’t. I didn’t know what was happening. I didn’t know that my house was trampled like it never mattered, or that there were huge petrol beasts coloring the air or that a girl can get made fun of for wearing a dress now, that was a stupendous treat to discover while I was visible. By the heavens, I wish I had really been here for so many years! I would know what to do with this nothing body better!” She was getting upset again. Lights behind her were flickering, screaming strange, buzzing, artificial screams. “I...woke up...in a circle. When she brought me here,” Constance said carefully, voice trembling. “To hurt me. I died and then I...was there, and I had lost even more than I knew how to reckon for. And I don’t think I’m the only one who’s ever suffered. I just think I’m willing to do something about it. I wasted my power when I was alive, mostly, but I won’t make that mistake again. I was a witch beyond measure, and even in death I can rebalance the scales. If there’s anything being in this wretched era has taught me, it’s that time bends long and slowly. Maybe you don’t see the point in what I’m doing or what I want, but maybe the stars and the trees will, maybe the lives that can grow without so much destruction or meddling. And I will know. I’ll know I didn’t just take it, or give up or ‘get over’ it.” She sighed, and realized what a fool’s gesture it was. “I don’t know if I am a person. I don't feel that way all the time, and however I try to be better, whatever I touch so far has turned to destruction and hut, and not even that which I intended. I think my soul is...strange, at best. But I do appreciate...whatever it is you are trying to do. There are not many kind people here. It is good to know they continue to exist, however few.”

“Morgan isn’t wretched,” Remmy said quietly, “and neither are you.” They were quiet for a long while, not flinching when Constance made the lights flicker and screech with electric hums. They looked over to the decaying apartments, then back to the spirit, and felt another tug at their heart. “She didn’t summon you to hurt you, you know,” they finally said. “She just wanted answers. To why her life was always falling apart, to why she wasn’t allowed happiness. You can...relate to that a little, can’t you?” They didn’t know what they were searching for in any answers from Constance, but they knew that she was trapped in a world that she wasn’t allowed to escape, suffering more pain. Remmy looked at her with eyes full of sorrow. “This world is-- scary, yeah. There’s a lot of not good things in it, but...there’s a lot of good, too, you know. You just haven’t...seen it yet. I could show you, if you want,” they wondered if she was even still listening, “if you’d give me the chance. Not everything here is destruction and meddling, like you said. And...certainly none of it is because of one person. Cursed or not.” They paused, biting their bottom lip, before continuing. “You are a person. Maybe different than the kind of person you remember being, but...you’re still a person. Just as much as me, or anyone else. And I think...I think maybe your soul is just a little lost. And I don’t think you deserve to be hurt just because of that.”

Constance couldn’t cry or rail at the stubbornness of this person, not without destroying yet even more of the world, and she did not want to rush to disappoint herself or Blanche even further. But it was all she could do to keep herself from it. She wanted to laugh, or fall over from the incredulity of it all, but feared the impact of that feeling as well. Could a shade such as she disrupt the world from delight? Had such a thing ever happened before? “What manner of creature are you?” She asked, shaking her head. “You know better than many what I am capable of. What I have done. ...What is it you really want from me?”

“I don’t...I don’t want anything from you, Constance,” Remmy said back, shaking their head again. “That’s not...I just want to help you. I know you’re probably alone and afraid...and I know how that feels. I don’t want anyone to have to feel that way.” They mumbled, hands digging into their pockets. Constance wasn’t safe, just drifting out among the general population. There were hunters and exorcists and mediums everywhere. She was already having such a hard time even keeping her spirit body together. It reminded Remmy of some of the ghosts they’d seen wandering the old haunted mansion. Slowly, an idea struck them. “Hey, you, um-- you said you’re having trouble staying stable, right? Figuring out this...spirit thing? What if I had a place for you to go? Where there’s other ghosts and it’s safe. No one can hurt you there. Would you come with me?”

The idea of such a place had never occurred to Constance. She couldn’t imagine it in her head, except as some euphemism for a ghost prison. They didn’t make human proof vessels, only salt and iron lines that tore her apart for trying to exist. But this...whoever they were, were so persistent. Surely if this was some jest or a trap, they would be worn out by now? Or would they? Constance had learned the hard way how persistent a lie could be. Perhaps this was how they proved their loyalty to Morgan, by luring her into a trap.

Constance hesitated for a long time. She should know better than to believe in...oh, so many things. But she said, “Tell me where it is and I will find it on my own. I can find out if it’s what you say it is or not. Who are these ghosts who trust you anyway?”

“Right, yeah,” Remmy said, nodding slowly once Constance finally spoke. “It’s um-- here,” they motioned for her to follow them around the building to where the horizon broke and on top of a small hill sat the mansion, off in the distance, beyond the cemetery. “It’s that house there. I, um-- used to live there, actually. When we moved in, there were already ghost residents so we just sorta...let ‘em stay. Didn’t seem fair to make them leave, you know? We had to establish ground rules and stuff, but we made it safe. For us and for them,” they explained. “We’re all just people. I think they...liked being seen. I would sit with them, even the ones that didn’t talk. It felt nice...to be needed by them.” They paused, went quiet, then looked over at Constance one last time. “Come whenever you want, no obligation. But...it’s safe there. I promise.” And even if it wasn’t yet, Remmy would make sure it was.

[wheremytwinwatches]

[Where My Twin Watches]: Full Metal Alchemist Brotherhood Episode 8

Happy birthday, Tephi! Sorry I was gone for a bit guys, work was kicking my butt for a while there. But we’re out of holiday season, and it looks like we may actually get another full-timer on my team! Anyways, where did we leave off again? Ah. Right. The whole “Stones are Soul Gems” thing. Guh. And Ed’s off exploring an “abandoned” lab, while some psycho with a knife is attacking Al.

Episode 08: “The Fifth Laboratory” Al looks up as the rooftop psycho (captioned as [66]) completely ruins the element of surprise with a battlecry. Well, given his heavy armor and the fanged skull-helmet, guessing that subtlety isn’t one of Mr. 66’s strong suits. Al jumps back and avoids the wild swings of 66’s machetes, to which the pfffahahaha ok hold up. I’m sorry, but he’s just so… pudgy! This 66 dude is a marshmallow, perfect example of acrofatic with the rooftop leap. Anyways, Pudgy compliments Al’s speed for someone of his size. Then follows the compliment by saying a lesser fighter wouldn’t be worth the effort to cut down. Right, masked psycho. Can’t let his adorable fluffiness distract me. 66 explains that he got the name from “them” when he came to work at the lab, and that he’s going to cut Al up nice and neat. So just sit back and scream, m’kay? Yeah, good luck with that, buddy. Inside Ed’s looking at a large Transmutation Circle in an open room, with a small pillar in the center. Said TC looks rather simple compared to the ones we’ve seen so far, is that really all that’s needed to make a Stone? Well, the TC and the noticeable red stains spaced around the five points. Ed makes the same assumption I did, and another voice confirms his suspicion. Said voice is a rather refined-sounding 48, another armored dude with glowing red eyes (like the Goths?) who says he’s in charge of guarding the lab from curious brats. Bit more back-and-forth between the two before Ed makes an arm blade, 48 (nickname Pompous) notes that he’s an Alchemist and WHOA he’s right in front of Ed already. Threat estimation just went way up. Yikes, and he’s already deduced that Ed has an automail arm. Pompous is proving to be pretty good. But Ed gets a stab in and- *clank*? Oh. OH. Wait a minute. He’s hollow? Like Al? But that implies… Ok, video’s paused for a moment. Getting some seriously bad implications here. We know souls can be bound to armor, our boy Al’s liv- well, existing proof of that. And if a non-certified child performing amateur Alchemy can do that, who’s to say a bunch of immoral scientists can’t? Take a lab designed to turn death into a power source, and siphon off a couple of the condemned to make immortal, nigh-impervious to harm guards for your sick manufacturing process. And why stop at just a few guards? Build up a friggin army of the things! Who’s gonna stop you? The genocidal government? You’re either working for them or you are them! Oh Leto, this is gonna end up with our boys having to face down armies of pseudo-Als, isn’t it? Cripes. Back to the fight, really really hoping that my theory is wrong. Buuuut nope, Ed confirms that’s the sound he hears when sparring with Al. Pompous reintroduces himself as the guy numbered 48 on death row, more commonly known as Slicer. Mass murderer, y’know. Pompous doesn’t confirm that the place was used to make Philosopher’s Stones, it not being “his area”, but he does reveal his Seal in his helmet, helpfully notes that if Ed destroys it, then the fight is Ed’s. Awfully considerate, although he says that he likes a challenge now and then. And he won’t just let Ed walk away, it’d totally ruin his mass-murderer rep. On to the fight! ...Hughes, you’d better have a good reason to interrupt the fight between our Protagonist and the Soul-Bound Mass Murderer. Yes, it’s adorable how happy you are that your daughter’s about to turn 3, but there are things going on! Roy agrees with me. Stop using a military line on military time to gush over your family! Hughes finally returns to more pressing matters, namely a certain scar-faced Ishvalan. They found bodies at the destroyed bridge, but they’re all so decomposed that they can’t be identified. Hold up, regardless of the fact that he’s clearly alive still, what do you mean by bodies? As in multiple? I count nine sheets there, where did they all come from? And why decomposed? The fight wasn’t that long ago. Although there’s no concrete evidence he’s dead, lack of sightings means Command thinks that he’s dead. So it should be ok to remove the Elric Brother’s guards soon. Said unfortunate guards have just found the empty room where their charges are supposed to be. [Brosh]: “Ah! Major Armstrong’s gonna take his shirt off again and yell at us some more, isn’t he?!” While Brosh sobs, Ross takes charge and orders him to follow to the only place they could have gone. To the Fifth Laboratory! Lots of yelling and grunting as Pompous and Ed swing at each other. But there’s a shift in gears? Ooooh crud. Ed’s arm is breaking, the increase in chrome and resulting weakness means it’s not holding up as well. Sure, it won’t rust as easily, but he’ll be too dead to enjoy that. Fight’s taken a shift in Pompous’ favor, where before they were equally matched now the Soul-Armor’s just standing, blocking while barely moving and then kicking Ed away. Pompous is all sad that Ed won’t last much longer, tired and wounded as he is. Not to mention that his partner’s likely finished with Ed’s companion outside. After all, 66 is quite strong. But not as strong as Pompous, of course. Ed finds this quite funny. See, he and Al have been sparring partners for quite some time. And to this day, he’s never beaten his little brother. Cut to outside, where Pudgy is getting his skullface handed to him. Or rather, knocked clean off. No sign of his Seal, though. Pudgy offers to share his story with Al, all starting with a man named Barry. Barry appears to be a butcher, given the artwork of a guy with a cleaver surrounded by meat. Barry the Butcher did so love cutting up meat into tiny little pieces. Until one day that wasn’t enough anymore, and he took his cleaver to the streets. 23 victims later, Barry was sent to the gallows. But then some dumbass decided that such a man would do just fine as an unpaid nightguard. Anyways, that was the story of the infamous serial killer Barry the Chopper! [Al]: “Sorry, I’ve never heard of you.” Barry/Pudgy does not take Al’s lack of local history well. Nor his lack of surprise to the whole “bodiless armor” thing. And then he’s surprised when Al calmly pops his own helmet off. Really, dude? The glowing red eyes didn’t clue you in? Heh. Oh man, poor Pudgy. You have no idea who you’re messing with. Wait. Why are you laughing? Oh. You DICK. [66]: “Are you sure that you’re not a puppet created and controlled by your so-called brother? Were you ever a real person to begin with?” Nope. Nope nope nope. Shut up. You do not get to ask those questions. You do not get to imply that Al wasn’t a real boy. That his memories were created to make him easier to control. That dear sweet Granny and Winry are just playing along to manipulate a “living” weapon. I was looking forward to seeing our boys take you down, murderer. Now I’m looking forward to them doing it slowly. Leto. First Soul Gems, now the whole issue of sapience and continuation of consciousness? This show’s not pulling any punches, is it? Um, cop? You may wanna well ok he’s dead. “I kill, therefore I am. As long as I know that, it’s all I need to prove to myself that I’ve always been me.” Back inside, Pompous is saying that he’ll finish off Ed quickly to go and fight the better fighter. Alright Ed, what’s your plan? Good plan! And shame on you, Pompous. You talked a big talk, but you really fell for the old “look behind you” trick. [48]: “That was dirty!” [Ed]: “There’s no such thing as ‘dirty’ in a fight. Before he destroys the seal, Ed stops to pick up Pompous’ helmet and demands what he knows about the Philosopher’s Stone. And just leaves the main body of Pompous behind him. Really, Ed? You’ve lived with Al for how many years? Seen his head get knocked off yet he still moves just fine how many times? Shame on you. Wait, what? “Impossible?” Why? You clearly saw the seal on the neck, right? Ooooh. “Slicer” was a pair of brothers? Independent head and body? So Ed was shown a seal inside the helmet, not the one lower down on the armor proper. And now he’s really injured, Armor-Slicer’s not giving him time to transmute (point for having the seal already on some gear, rather than using your hands each time). Ouch, jab to the cut and Ed’s down. Memory of Scar? OOOOOOOHHHHHH! Ed figured out Scar’s Hand o’ Doom! Armor-Slicer done got blown in half! And then freaks Ed out by wriggling. Ha! Pompous takes the defeat in fairly-good grace, calls for Ed to deal the finishing blow. But Ed’s not going to commit murder. [48]: “With bodies like these are we really even people?” [Ed]: “I consider you people whether you have physical bodies or not… If I didn’t, that would mean I didn’t believe my own brother is a person either.” Outside Pudgy continues to prey on Al’s doubts, goes so far as to dare him to break his own Blood Seal. Obviously Al won’t do such a stupid thing, but it’s because we know that he’s alive, not because he’s “programmed” to protect it. Guh, the sooner Pudgy bites it the better. Ed continues to insist that he won’t kill another person. Which amuses Pompous? Wow. Pompous remarks that it’s ironic, saying it wasn’t until they were Soul Bound that he and his brother were treated like humans. For that kindness, he’ll tell Ed everything. Awesome, we’re getting- aw crap. I know that dress. Ladies and gentlemen. Lust is on the scene. And she does not like helmets with loose lids. And Envy, as well. This is bad, isn’t it? Al, you may wanna get in and rescue your brother sooner rather than later. Jeez, hope Soul-Bound Armors don’t feel pain. Or at least it was quick for Pompous, getting split in two like that. WELL OK THEN. Guess that answers the question “Do Soul Armors feel pain?”. Envy’s taken up the sword and is repeatedly stabbing the Armor-Slicer’s seal, ranting about how their attacking the important sacrifice could have messed up the entire plan. Finally, the armor stops moving. Ed slowly slides up the wall to get to his feet, facing down Lust and Envy and demanding to know who they are. Uh, Ed? I know that you don’t know these people, that you aren’t aware that they seem to have hurt Scar enough - you know, that guy who utterly wrecked you and Al? - to send him into hiding. And that you’re pissed off enough to ignore your own physical state. But maybe you think you could tone it down a notch? Not try to kick Envy and prepare to fight? Whelp. Ed’s arm just went kaput. Winry, as much as I respect you as a mechanic, gonna have to question the choice to go so heavy with chrome. Rust isn’t as bad as these “technical difficutlies.” And yup Envy-knee to the stomach, Ed’s down for the count. [Lust]: “Listen to me well, boy. Don’t ever forget this. Always remember that we allowed you to live.” And of course, since Ed was poking around the place, it’ll have to go. Lust orders Envy to blow it up. Hey, uh, Al? How you holding up? Aw, no. Al, please. Please don’t let Pudgy’s mindgames get to you. Don’t start thinking that what Ed was going to tell you last episode was that... Hooray, Ross and Brosh are here! Woefully ignorant of how useless bullets are against Pudgy, but still. Uh oh, building’s cracking. And Pudgy recognizes what that means, makes a speedy exit. Al cries out that Ed’s still inside. Well, it’s not like the Goths are going to let their “important sacrifice” die as they dispose of the evidence, right? Called it! Envy walks out of the dust with Ed slung over his shoulder, drops him off with Al and Ross while cheerfully saying they should take him to a hospital and keep a better eye on him. “He’s a precious resource.” And like that, he’s gone. As the lab crumbles, the prison next door is home to a bunch of yelling prisoners. And further inside, someone named Kimblee remarks that it’s lovely to hear a building exploding. Hey, it’s Smiley, from the flashback to the Ishvalan War. You know, the guy who was grinning during the genocide? Seems he’s in prison now. This is the guy that Mr. Freeze was trying to recruit in the first episode too, wasn’t it? And even as the lab crumbles, even as our characters rush to get Ed to a hospital… Al thinks about what Pudgy said. ...wait, that’s it? That’s the episode? Come on! How rude is it to leave poor Al doubting his own personhood?! Post-credits: Hughes is talking on a phone, remarking that things at Central are pretty hectic. All the senior Alchemists killed by Scar? Rumor is a certain Roy Mustang may get promoted to fill in the spaces. But getting advanced so young Roy’s bound to make enemies. He needs as many people on his side as possible. Like a wife! ...yeah, I’m with you, [Receptionist]. Hughes, please stop with the personal phone calls. [Narrator]: “Edward Elric cannot find the right words to say what he must. Meanwhile, young Alphonse is frightened by his brother’s continued silence. Where does the truth lie? This truth is waiting, hidden in the memories of a young girl. Next time, on Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood-” Episode 09 - “Created Feelings” “The heart begins to waver because if fears what the truth may bring.” Hey, looks like we get to see Winry again! Almost makes up for Alphonse having to doubt his very existence! Man, I can’t wait to see Pudgy bite it!

[aethersea]

Must Have Caught A Good Look At You

Part two! @yw84fun your tags on part one have kept me going and are the reason I finished at all, thank you so much and I’m sorry for the wait

part one | on ao3

Tori knew who it was long before the knock sounded at the door, but he jumped anyway. He’d honestly been expecting her to float through the wall, or just appear behind him and give him a heart attack. But she knocked, and Tori jumped, and when he stood and answered the door it was as a man walks to the gallows, back straight and chest hollow.

She was the wrong age. He’d been too out of it to notice before, but it was the first thing he noticed now. He’d figured they’d still be twins, since she clearly wasn’t eight anymore, but she looked barely seventeen. She was thin, too, almost rangy, her cheekbones razor-sharp under her silver eyes. Tori wondered if this was what she’d looked like when she died – if she’d somehow survived when their father threw her out in the middle of that unholy storm, and then lived for years and years on the road, alone.

Tori had been fifteen when he fled in the dark of night and caught the first Greyhound out of the latest nameless town. He’d been so convinced she was dead already. He could have found her, helped her, but he hadn’t even thought to search.

“Hello, Tori,” she said softly. Her expression was shuttered in the way that meant, Tori remembered without meaning to, that she was hurt, and hiding it.

“Hello,” Tori said. He was pleased to note his voice didn’t shake. “Would you like to come inside?”

She blinked in surprise, but when Tori stepped aside to let her pass, she drifted into his apartment without a word.

Tori shut the door behind her and realized he didn’t know what to do next. He was suddenly conscious of the mess – papers strewn across the kitchen table, yesterday’s takeout cartons scattered in front of the television, blankets and cushions in a sprawl across the floor – and at the same time, of the sort of luxury they had only dreamed of as kids. The TV was a flatscreen, with two separate gaming consoles underneath it – they were his flatmates’, not his, but she wouldn’t know that. He had an actual kitchen, a soft couch flanked by huge armchairs, curtains on the windows and plants along the windowsills. No damp stains on the ceiling, no mold growing by the sink, no weird smells – well, apart from the faint aroma of peanut butter chicken drifting over from the takeout cartons. As children, this was what they’d thought paradise looked like. For the first time in years, Tori was embarrassed by how spoiled he’d let himself get.

She stopped by the sofa, black-gloved fingers reaching out but not quite touching the blanket thrown across the back of it, and turned, taking in the apartment. She’d lost that permanent jut to her jaw she’d had as a kid, like she was challenging the world to a fistfight at all times; now she was wary, distant, with all the coiled strength and thoughtless grace of a mountain cat. Tori couldn’t take his eyes off her. His heart was twisting in his chest at the painful familiarity of her face, for all she was nine years too old and nine years too young all at once. It was the same face he saw in the mirror – slimmer, whether from youth or hunger or death or just genetics, and of course bare of the stubble he’d neglected to shave in these past few weeks of denying his dreams, but still his echo, down to the hunted, haunted look that lurked in the back of both their eyes. There was some part of him that looked at that face and wanted to cry, or maybe throw his arms around her and never let go.

When she finally met his gaze, her silver eyes were filled with some emotion Tori couldn’t name. “It’s been a long time,” she said softly.

He stuffed his hands in his pockets, not knowing what else to do with them. “You died.” His voice broke on the words, and Tori didn’t know if they were an apology or an excuse.

She flinched, as if startled, and her face shuttered. She smiled, and it didn’t reach her eyes. “Guess it didn’t take.”

He smiled back at her, painfully. There was a knot of grief climbing up his throat, devouring any words he might have thought to say in return.

It mixed sourly with the fear that already thrummed with every breath. He’d hunted enough ghosts to know that they never came back unless they had a goal, one so all-consuming that they would claw their way out of the afterlife for it. It was pretty much always revenge.

Twice, he’d let her die – once when they were eight and she’d vanished into the storm, and again when they were fifteen and he’d walked away from Ganth without looking back, not even to look for her. She had ample cause to come for his head. Could he kill her again, with his own hands this time, and still live with himself?

Assuming, of course, that he even had a shot. Tori hadn’t hunted in years, and he’d left his rock-salt gun on the kitchen table, hidden under the mess of papers, like an absolute idiot. Maybe this time she’d be the one who killed him. It was almost, though not quite, a comforting thought.

She stepped forward, one hand reaching out as if to touch him. He still didn’t dare try to name the look on her face. “Tori, I—”

A single alien word cracked through the room, filled with such loathing that Tori was on the balls of his feet with his arms half raised to fight before he realized that it had only sounded in his head.

She dropped into a crouch, a knife appearing in one hand, whirling to face the empty apartment. One arm was flung out, almost as if to keep him back, out of danger. The voice muttered blackly in Tori’s ear, a wave of harsh, rolling syllables that tickled at his understanding. He knew without thinking to wonder how that the voice was talking about her.

Tori saw the moment when she realized that there was no threat, that there was nothing for Tori to flinch at but her. Her shoulders sagged, minutely, and her head dipped forward. He heard the soft huff of breath she let out, something between a sigh and a laugh. The muttering voice mimicked it, mocking.

She drew herself up slowly, the knife vanishing to wherever it had come from, and carefully squared her shoulders before turning to face him once more. This time her eyes were empty of emotion. She fixed her gaze on his left shoulder and said in a flat voice, “I came to tell you that our father’s dead. I figured you should hear it from me.”

Tori blinked, and struggled with the sentence. It didn’t seem to fit inside his head all at once. Ganth, dead – it was an impossibility, like gravity deciding to take a day off. Their father had always seemed an unquestionable fact of the universe, as immortal as the sun. He was just a man, Tori knew that intellectually, but at the same time it had never occurred to him that this meant he would someday die – sooner rather than later, probably, considering his chosen line of work.

“That’s…not all,” she continued, and now a tremor crept into her voice. “Winter’s dead, too. Her bar is—I had to—to burn them, I—”

Everything went strangely still. Brittle whispers rose in Tori’s ears. Winter’s dead. If Ganth’s death was an impossibility, Winter’s was an abomination. Winter, who had snuck them candy and taught them Latin, who had shown Tori how to garrote a man three times his size and patiently explained the concept of baseball. Winter, dead? It couldn’t happen, in no just world would it happen.

His sister stood in his apartment, the ghost of everything he had tried to leave behind, too old and too young because Tori had let her die so he could build this weak new life for himself. He had long since known that the world was not just.

The whispers were in no language Tori had ever heard, and he remained convinced he had no chance of understanding them even if he’d wanted to. But for a moment that conviction faltered, and he heard their meaning clear as day: She will burn down everything your life has touched, and you will watch it all screaming from the grave she puts you in.

Ice shivered down his spine. She didn’t seem to notice, looking down at her feet rather than at him. “There were twenty-three people in the bar,” she said after a steadying breath, with the air of someone delivering a report, “all of them dead. I made a list.” She pulled a small notebook out of her back pocket and laid it gently on the table, atop the mess of papers. “I didn’t know some of them, but I’ve been trying to draw their faces from memory in case you do.”

Tori stared at the notebook. It was thin, flimsy even, clearly a cheap thing that she’d picked up at a gas station somewhere. It was a drab lime green, the sort of color you don’t choose unless the other options are worse. And it was resting solidly on top of a precariously interleaved stack of half-graded exams. Tori was nearly sure he’d seen the papers sag slightly under its weight.

For all a ghost could kill you, no ghost could do that. Alien voices rustled in his ears, telling him that she was something more, something worse, but Tori fixed his eyes on the notebook and convinced himself once more that he couldn’t understand them.

She shoved her hands in her pockets, awkwardly, and Tori’s attention flicked back to her at the movement. She peeked up at his face, and whatever she saw there made her set her jaw. She turned in a slow circle, looking over his apartment. Tori watched her, silent, unwilling to put words to the dilemma swirling in his gut. Then with one last quick, sad glance at Tori, she strode briskly to the door.

Panic rose in Tori’s throat, sharper than the hissing whispers. He had let her die twice already. “Jame,” he said, a strangled cry, and it was like a dam breaking. Tori took a half-step toward her, one hand reaching out unbidden. The voices in his head screamed, furious and afraid.

Jame turned to look at him, a disbelieving frown creasing that painfully familiar face. One hand rested lightly on the doorknob – she was already so close to being gone, and this time, Tori knew, she would not come back.

Then, eyes wide and liquid with something unnameable, she stepped forward, closing the distance between them.

Tori skated his fingers across her cheek and she was real, solid and warm, alive and impossible and here. “Jame,” he said again, his soul breaking on the word. “I’ve missed you.”

[elusianknight]

hello! i only played dragon age inquisition once but i'd like to know what's the beef with cullen and why people dislike him, or if you could maybe point me to a post that explains it? i'd be grateful, thank you for your time :D

@dalishious​ has written much on this, and much better and more concisely than I (im SORRY THIS IS SO LONG), so definitely check out her literal CULLEN MASTERLIST here.

Long post incoming, my friend!  Here’s my personal explanation, but check out that link too for more examples / concrete evidence lol.

Okay, here’s my honest opinion on the subject.

So the first game, Dragon Age: Origins.  You can pick from six (seven) origins, and two of those are the Mage origin--the only difference between them is that you can play as either a human, or an elf.  All the other origins are dependent on race (dwarf commoner, human noble, city elf, dwarf noble, Dalish elf).

I chose an elven mage on my first playthrough, and you start out in this Circle of Magi--so like, the big tower place w the mages.  Specifically, Kinloch hold, aka the place Cullen was at.

As you play through the origin story of your character, if you’re a girl, it becomes clear that he has some weird crush on your character.  Some people thought this was cute, but that’s overlooking some real, uh, problems with it, to say the least.  He says that he would, literally, kill you if you failed the Harrowing (a test every mage has to take to evolve from being an apprentice to a full Circle mage).  BUT, he says he’d rather not.  So I guess people think it’s sweet that he’d regret killing you, despite doing it willingly...?

Later in the game, you come back to the Circle, and shit’s well and truly fucked.  Demons everywhere, lots of dead mages and templars all around.  But toward the top of the tower, you find Cullen in some weird magic circle thing.  He’s just sitting there, hunched over and mumbling to himself.  Apparently he’s been ~tortured~ as he says in DAI, but all it seems is that he was shown visions.  

And if you’re playing a female mage, those ~visions~ are of your character.

He says they’re “taunting [him] with the one thing he always wanted but could never have, using [his] shame against [him]... [his] ill-advised infatuation with her, a mage of all things.”  Now, I honestly don’t remember if this is just me imagining things or if this actually happened, but I’m rather sure he ALSO will make an additional comment about how she’s an elf, too, as in, just another thing to be ashamed of.  But I think the rest of the dialogue speaks for itself.

The woman who wrote the origin, Sheryl Chee (she wrote Leliana, too, in all games) was confused when people thought he was cute (back in the days of DAO, way before DAI).  She said the only sort of romance Cullen would have with the female mage Warden would be something “quick and violent” and just “to get her out of his system.”

One of the possible ending slides in Origins will mention that Cullen killed three apprentices back at the Circle before he left Kinloch Hold.  This is the ending slide that I got on my first playthrough of the game.

So that clearly colored my opinion of him, but also, when I played DAO i was struggling w my sexuality a bit.  Like, I think I knew I was gay, but I was dealing with homophobia from myself and my family, and I certainly didn’t feel good about it.  The romance with Leliana and my warden honestly brought me to tears at parts because it was so wonderful to see a relationship between two women portrayed as something so sweet and normal (well, as normal as it could be. considering they’re fighting to save the world and all that stuff).  So Cullen’s creepy comments were definitely NOT appreciated.  

And that's aaaaaaaaaall just in Origins.

In Dragon Age II, regardless of what ending you got in DAO, he moves to the city of Kirkwall (where Hawke goes to) and is somehow promoted to the Knight Captain... the second-in-command of Meredith Stannard, the Knight-Commander of Kirkwall.  And if you thought Kinloch Hold treated their mages bad, then hooooo boy, do you have another thing coming!  Because the Circle in Kirkwall is literally called “The Gallows.”  And rest assured, it lives up to its name.

Mages are hunted down and turned Tranquil (made into empty husks devoid of emotion)... illegally.  If a mage passes their Harrowing, Chantry law apparently states that they can’t be made Tranquil, at least without a very good reason--it’s considered a last resort, of sorts, because it leaves the mage alive but unable to use magic (or dream, or have emotions).  But in fact, it’s not a mercy at all.  It’s used as a form of control and widely abused in Kirkwall.  This leaves open room for any number of abuses, because Tranquil are all about ~logic~ and no emotion and what that boils down to is them doing anything, anything, that Templars tell them.  And of course that’s taken advantage of--demonstrated by the fact that a Tranquil mage in Inquisition will tell the Inquisitor that she wouldn’t want to be cured, because she didn’t think she could handle what happened to her while she was Tranquil.  

Anyway, back to Kirkwall.  Meredith keeps up a horrendous system of abuse of mages, such that if you walk near the gates of the gallows you hear people being tortured, like whip lashes and, iirc, screams of pain.  At the end of the game, Hawke can side with mages or templars, and if you side with the templars, Meredith will kill Hawke’s mage sister unless you explicitly stop her.  

And in the end, Cullen sides with Hawke against Meredith, because she’s lost her mind to Red Lyrium... but here’s the thing.

He’s her second in command. He could have prevented some of the abuses in Kirkwall--or if anyone could have questioned her authority, naturally, he could have.  But he didn’t.  Not until the last moment, when he sides with Hawke at the end... as in, sides with the unstoppable force (Hawke and co.) that’s torn through the city anyway.  If he stood with her, he’d have been cut down for sure.  

Finally, Cullen doesn’t even get over the mage warden EVEN in DAI.  If the Warden romanced Leliana, and if he didn’t romance the Inquisitor, he will ask Leliana about the Warden.  The first part makes sense, but the second part kinda confirms that he is literally still thinking about the Warden in such a way.  Which is at least kind of creepy.  It’s been ten whole years.

In the broader scheme of things, a lot of this boils down to the fact that he is a Templar infatuated with a mage.  He held direct power over the mage in question (literally tells the mage warden he’d kill her but feel sad about it???) so there’s not really any way for their relationship to have ever been equal, even if it wasn’t predatory to begin with (her being his charge directly).  

Because, as we know, Cullen can romance a mage in Inquisition.  And it is creepy as hell.  Like, “you’re okay because you’re not like other mages” kind of creepy--calling her an exception, rather than an example, of her people.  There’s other things in DAI--like how he never ACTUALLY apologizes or takes any sort of blame for what he did in Kirkwall--but check out the link because I avoided him as much as I could in DAI lol.

[qqueenofhades]

The Rose and Thorn: Chapter IX

summary:  Sequel to The Dark Horizon. The New World, 1740: Killian and Emma Jones have lived in peace with their family for many years, their pirate past long behind them. But with English wars, Spanish plots, rumors of a second Jacobite rising, and the secret of the lost treasure of Skeleton Island, they and their son and daughter are in for a dangerous new adventure. OUAT/Black Sails. rating: M status: WIP available: FF.net and AO3 previous: chapter VIII

Liam was stirred from a murky, circular, maddening dream by the sound of skittering. Peeling one eye open and promptly wanting to shut it again and die – he was in enough pain in the mornings when he slept in a featherbed, so spending the last week on hard, damp stone had just about done him in – he managed to catch a glimpse of the latest luxury of the Bristol city gaol: a brown rat as long as his forearm, perched near his foot and sniffing about in hope of food. Liam, with all the time he had spent on ships, was no stranger to rats, but it had been a long time since he’d had to deal with them on a regular basis, and he hated the diseased buggers anyway. With a cry of revulsion, he kicked out at it, causing it to speed through a hole in the stones to whatever nest of its brethren vermin awaited it, and sat up straight, sleepiness suddenly evaporated at the prospect of more of them lurking about. This correspondingly caused his back to hate him even more than it customarily did, and he caught short, grimacing and swearing under his breath.

The commotion had roused young Jim Hawkins, who was bedded down on some moldy old grain sacks across the way, and he squinted around with the expression of someone who was still hoping, despite the six days and counting in their current predicament, that he would wake up and discover it had just been a bad dream. “Eh? Whazit?”

“Sorry. Rat.” Liam supposed it was a mercy that it was August, though English summers were not by anyone’s standards terribly warm, otherwise the two of them would have frozen solid down here. No wonder nearly as many prisoners died awaiting sentence as they did on the gallows, which was another thought best done away with. Liam felt horrendously guilty for getting Jim into this with him, but the fact remained that it was not – for bloody once – his fault. He had no notion who had set the Benbow on fire or why Sarah had accused him of it, though he thought darkly that he could guess, and he kept waiting for Lady Murray, with or without Billy Bones, to appear and make them (or at least Liam) choose between assisting her or rotting in this miserable shithole forever.  Jesus. It had been weeks since he vanished from Paris, and Regina had to be tearing the place apart looking for him; she knew it was not in his nature to indiscriminately disappear. She might have marched into King Louis’ very privy closet at Versailles to demand answers, a mental image that summoned a grim smile to Liam’s lips. Much as her techniques might sometimes lack in refinement or concern for other people’s feelings, his wife did know how to get things done. It was one of the things he loved about her.

However, even if Regina did somehow follow the Ariadne’s-thread to find him in Bristol, it would not be nearly as soon as Liam needed her to do it. The constables had been by last evening to smugly inform him and Jim that they were to be tried on the morrow, and it was reasonably plain that any other verdict apart from “cleared of all charges” would see them taking the infamous walk up the wooden steps before the baying crowd, a hooded man waiting at the top. Nobody would shed any tears on Jim’s account, by the sound of things, and while his mother would doubtless plead for her son’s life, one widow whose house and livelihood had just burned to the ground did not possess outstanding political influence. Even if she could save Jim or arrive at a plea deal, however, this would involve convicting Liam. She had accused him of the crime in front of half of Bristol, and the crowd had to see someone punished for it, whether or not he was, strictly speaking, guilty of it. Civic order and public peace of mind demanded no less.

“Thought you were those bastards,” Jim said now, sitting up and tying his hair back in a tangled ponytail. “When they come for us, you think there’s any chance of fighting our way out?”

Liam’s heart clenched, as he could not help but hearing, and seeing, more than a passing resemblance to the young Killian. That was exactly what his brother at the same age would have suggested, and with the same disregard for the odds or the likelihood that it would just get them into more trouble as a result. “I’m not sure that would do us much good.”

“We could try.” Jim’s grey eyes blazed. “Better than sitting here like rats ourselves and waiting meekly to be paraded to a hot courtroom where they would jeer and throw rubbish at us and whisper behind their hands. I’m not going to be condemned to hang by some prick in a powdered wig, and I doubt you will either.”

“Look, lad, we have to think about this.” Liam coughed, which felt like a hot knife between his ribs. “I agree that getting to trial might already be too late for us, but we can’t just up and try to stage some improbable escape without a solid plan as to how – ”

It was clear from Jim’s face that he thought they very much could, but just then, they were interrupted by the sound of echoing footsteps in the corridor outside the cell. They tensed, turning to look, and it was then that, at last, the terrible twosome made their long-awaited reappearance. Lady Fiona was dressed for visiting, never mind that it was to a filthy dungeon, and Billy looked as stubborn and glowering as ever, though he had made some attempt to trim his beard. He stood almost a head and a half taller than his companion, towering like a silent colossus behind her, as she strode up to the bars and clapped her gloved hands. “Well. This really is quite ghastly, isn’t it?”

“Aye.” Liam did not feel in the least reprieved, or relieved that he had correctly predicted her intervention. “Though it was nicer before you arrived.”

“You know that’s no way to speak to someone who has been ceaselessly laboring on your behalf, don’t you? I would have come sooner, but I’ve spent the last several days trying to sort out this regrettable misunderstanding with the authorities. None of us want the spectacle and risk of a trial, do we? We know you haven’t done anything wrong, but it might be hard to convince the bloodthirsty masses, mightn’t it?” She giggled girlishly, which set Liam’s teeth further on edge – Good God, he loathed this woman. “They will have their pound of flesh. But if you could avoid it. . .  you’d want that, wouldn’t you?”

“You have the blue bleeding fucking hell of a lot of nerve,” Liam said, “to come down here and propose that I take your bargain if I want to avoid hanging for your crime. As if it isn’t damn well obvious who actually burned down the Benbow. I don’t know how you bamboozled Sarah into lying for you, but I intend to find out.”

Lady Fiona giggled again, but her teeth were bared, her eyes flat and black as river stones. “I think you will find that very difficult to prove, Captain. Especially after I promised the city such a useful amount of money to rebuild the poor old place and compensate everyone, Mrs. Hawkins especially, affected by the tragedy.”

“So pay her. Don’t just toy with her like a cat with a mouse.”

“Oh you see, Captain, I do so very much want to, but it is that precise matter in which I need your assistance. From where might I acquire that money?”

“Let me guess. Skeleton Island?”

“Indeed. So I can’t make amends for this sad accident, from the goodness of my heart, unless you help me to do it. Unless, that is, you wish to deprive your old friend’s widow and son. Such a pity, after Hawkins died in your service.”

Liam flinched. He did not know how much Lady Fiona knew about the circumstances of James Hawkins senior’s death, and could see absolutely no good to come of her finding out. Likewise, he had considered once or twice that he should really tell the truth to Jim, but he shrank at the prospect. From the days in which Liam had committed his first unforgivable sin in this city for his brother’s sake, he had hoped to bury the bodies deep, and no matter how spectacularly that had subsequently blown up in his face during the Jones brothers’ confrontation and downfall on Antigua with Gold, Plouton, James Nolan, and Jennings, he could not quite bring himself to it. Besides, for better or worse, Liam Jones’ first priority, his integral inclination, his heart and soul and purpose for living, had always been to protect Killian. Killian was not here and could not defend or explain the action of killing Hawkins, even when the man had been in arms and in mutiny against him, and so Liam was not about to divulge it behind his back. Even after so long living apart, in different countries and in different families – Killian with his large, loving pirate clan, Liam and Regina with only each other, as she had deliberately rendered herself barren long ago and there had been no more children since Henry and Geneva had returned with their parents – he could no more do differently than he could walk on his hands, or breathe water, or fly.

A vision of Jennings swam before Liam’s eyes, as it did every so often. You’re just like me, you know. Now you’re even getting to the place of admitting it. You may have killed me, Jones, but I will never die. How can I, when I live on every day in you?

“Well?” Lady Fiona smiled sweetly. “You could drag young Jim to trial with you, though that would be such a further cruelty to his poor mother. Or – ”

“Don’t listen to her,” Jim said. “We can outsmart a trial.”

No, lad. We can’t. Not when she had already informed them that she had bought off the entire jury, with the very money she expected Liam to help her fetch. Jim knew that they were in trouble, but it had not connected to an actual understanding of how loaded the dice were. He thought that presenting convincing evidence to the contrary would logically change men’s minds, rather than entrenching them still more firmly in their beliefs, evidence be damned. Liam had too long and bitter experience with the mood of a mob to put false and feeble hope in such a deliverance. And he had to get them out of here somehow. That was his job and always had been, no matter how much of his soul it cost. Can’t be much left by now anyway.

“Very well,” he said loathingly. “I agree to help you, and you conjure up a plea deal from your puppet jury. They release Jim with no charges.”

Jim looked at him in startlement; they had forged an unavoidable rough solidarity due to being stuck in a small cell together for a week, but that was a long way from agreeing to take the fall for both of them. “Captain Jones – ”

“Come now, don’t you want to be free?” Lady Fiona looked at him with those bright snake eyes. “It’s a very gallant offer he’s making, and between you and me, he does rather owe it to your family. All this time with just the two of you, and he hasn’t told you the truth about your father’s death?”

The air seemed to turn as cold as December. Jim looked blank, then suspicious, then angry. “My father died fighting pirates in the Caribbean. I already know – ”

“Did you ever learn which pirates? And why?” Lady Fiona turned back to Liam with an expression of mock concern. “Oh no. You haven’t told him. How dreadful.”

“Tell me what?” Jim’s voice abruptly caught in a boyish crack. “Tell me what?”

“Why, about the reason you grew up without a father.” Lady Fiona’s eyes sparkled more madly and mercilessly than ever. “Don’t you want to know?”

Jim looked between her and Liam, as if expecting and half-hoping that this was just another flat-out lie. It took him only one glance at Liam’s face, however, to see that this at least she was not making up. “What do you know about my father’s death? What happened?”

“Why,” Lady Fiona said. “That none other than – ”

“I killed him.” Liam did not even form the thought or the words consciously, just knew that they were rushing out of him with no ability to be checked or called back. “I. . . should have told you. I killed your father. It was a terrible situation, he rallied the men still loyal to the Navy after K – after we went over into piracy. I faced him in battle, and I. . . I did what was before me. I have never forgotten it.”

In truth, Liam had been far away from the battle of Nassau wherein all of this had happened, convalescing on the Maroons’ island after he had been stabbed by his younger half-brother. It struck him suddenly that Billy – who had been aboard the Walrus and fighting with the others, including Emma, Killian, and Flint, that whole time – knew bloody well that Liam had not killed Hawkins, that he had never set foot on New Providence Island or gone over to the pirates’ cause, even after Killian fell into the mad thrall of Captain Hook. Billy could open his mouth and disprove the entire story with a word.

Billy said nothing.

“You. . .” Jim, at that moment, looked exactly as Killian had that night on Antigua, when he found out what Liam had actually done to get them out of slavery. “You k. . .?”

“Aye.” Liam’s voice scraped like gravel in his throat. “I – ”

“You were his captain. His friend. My mother told you that the Jones brothers would always be welcome beneath her roof. She hugged you. Is that why you looked like that when she did? As if you could barely breathe with the guilt?”

Liam was considerably impressed with Jim’s perceptiveness, though he had absolutely no idea how to respond. This seemed, at least, a perversely fitting venue for such a false confession, already imprisoned for a crime he had not committed. “I’m a coward, lad. I know that about myself by now. I have. . . I have no excuses.”

Jim stared at him with the stunned, speechless mask of a boy who had grown up without a father, the very look Liam had seen in Killian’s eyes every day. Finally, very quietly, he said, “Get out.”

“Jim – ”

“I’d rather rot here forever than accept my freedom as a favor from you. Who knows. Maybe you did burn down the Benbow – old habits and all that?” Jim’s lip curled. “Though whatever happens to you, I think we can safely say you deserve it.”

Liam concurred. He had, he always had, knew it perhaps even more unshakably than Killian and his long-ingrained self hatred. But before he could remotely concoct what to say, Lady Fiona jerked her head, and a few of the prison orderlies appeared to unlock the cell and haul Liam and Jim out. Jim was marched off in one direction, while Liam’s wrists were put into irons and he was conducted down a low stone corridor smelling of damp and lined with unlit torches, through a blaze of pale sunlight, and into the narrow, stuffy office on the far side. A magistrate’s clerk squinted down at him, recorded his statement, and informed Lady Fiona that it would be duly passed along to the relevant individuals, and Liam himself was issued with a warning. Now that his bail and asylum from persecution were a matter of public record, and since Lady Fiona accordingly had actual documents to call in against him if he should flout her again, it would be extremely unwise to do so. She was tightening her grip on him, weaving him into multiple strands of the spiderweb, not counting on any one thread of guilt or deception or blackmail alone to bind him to her, but instead using as many as she could, making it harder and harder for him to think of escape. This woman is as dangerous as Jennings was, if not more. I’ll have to kill her too, if it’s even possible. He had ended one demon; asking to be so fortunate as to end two felt beyond a lifetime’s worth of luck. Then they can both bloody haunt me together.

Once Lady Fiona had gone, presumably to ensure that her cooked books were settled, and left them together to wait, Liam glanced over at Billy. Whatever the other man thought he was holding over him, Liam wanted it out now. “Why didn’t you tell Jim I was lying?”

Billy grunted. “You want to incriminate yourself, who was I to stop you?”

“Unless you’re waiting for the moment when you can? Reveal the truth, position yourself as the beacon of it, and prove whatever bloody point you’re trying to make with all this?”

“You know.” Billy looked grimy amused. “Time was, I thought just like you, Jones. Not in terms of honor – I think we both know that’s flexible, to say the least – but protection. I was so bloody dead-set to protect everybody. The crew, mostly, but also Flint. We fought like cats and dogs, aye, but I still protected him, for the longest fucking time, even after he tried to kill me. Out of some misguided sense of fairness that if I was protecting the crew from him, I must also protect him from the crew. Even John Silver, headfirst up Flint’s arse as he could otherwise be counted on to be, knew what he was. Then I realized, if I’m the only thing holding it together, if I’m the one standing there like Atlas stopping it from crashing down and crushing them, what sort of fucking existence is that? Flint’s madness drove us hither and yon, and I stood by too long. Even helped him in it. I knew what the Navy was, from Captain fucking Hume and the Scarborough – but eventually, if the Navy and Woodes Rogers were the instruments that had been given to me, why not use them? I knew Flint would most likely try to cache Vane and Jennings’ gold on Skeleton Island, if he intended to cache it at all. Silver was too busy profiting off being his confidante, he wasn’t going to help me do what needed to be done. So yes. I went to Rogers. I told him where to go. And from that day forth, I haven’t protected anyone anymore. Not once.”

“So I see.” Liam looked back at him, just as coolly. “So that is what this is? Revenge on Flint?”

“I intend to see him pay for his crimes finally and in full, yes.”

“He has lived for almost twenty-five years away from that world, in peace, with his family. You’re still bent on destroying him now?”

“If he learned about me, would he not be bent on doing the same?”

Liam was tempted to point out that this seemed a rather chicken-and-the-egg conundrum to him: nobody was about to portray James Flint as an innocent and passive victim in whatever skullduggery was afoot, but Billy had decidedly started the present difficulties, and thus far, any of Flint’s actions to protect himself and his family – the exact thing that Billy was so deriding – could appear as justified defensive measures. It was that, therefore, that made Liam feel far more of a kinship to Flint than to Billy, outward appearances aside. Billy had once protected and cared for others and felt as if he had to rue and repent the day he ever had, whereas Flint had slowly learned how to do so again, to do more than just destroy and avenge, to value his loved ones and their nearly miraculous restoration to him more than his rage. They had in fact proceeded in diametrically opposite directions, and Liam – for whom it was second nature, even now, to take the blame for Killian’s crime, forged in those floggings aboard ship where he gritted his teeth and counted strokes and told his little brother later that it wasn’t so bad, rather than see Killian go under the lash himself – understood Flint’s choices far more, and admired the strength it had taken to break the habit. Wounds made when we are young never entirely heal.

“So,” Liam said after a moment. “How exactly did you learn that Flint was alive, if that was what set you off on this hunt for vengeance?”

Billy glanced at him with a twisted smile. “Oh, you’d appreciate it.”

“And?”

“Do you think I’m a fucking idiot? We might be unavoidably working together, but we’re not allies. I know, because you’ve just shown it again, that when push comes to shove, you’ll protect Flint and the others. So I’m not about to tell you.”

“Bloody hell.” Liam knew that he himself was stubborn, knew that it was perhaps his paramount character trait, but he wanted to hope, however vainly, that he had never been quite this stubborn. “You’re not a stupid man. You can see that Lady Murray is completely bloody insane. So how do you justify working with her, selling her whatever she wants, if it gets you closer to revenge for a quarter-century-old grudge?”

“That’s the catch. I don’t have to.” Billy looked him dead in the eye. “As I said, you’re no stranger to that yourself, so if you’re asking how you justify it, that’s a problem for you.”

“She’s blackmailed me. Threatened me, forced me, used Sarah and Jim’s safety as pawns, destroyed their home, removed me from mine, cut me off from my wife, and set me up to choose between being sentenced to death or taking part in her mad little trip with you. Whereas you approached and collaborated with her willingly. I’d say our positions are not quite equal.”

“Maybe not.” Billy shrugged. “As I also said, though, you’re the one who still cares about that, is twisting yourself into knots over the apparent injustice of it. You could be the most dangerous of us all if you had any sense of self-preservation, Jones, but instead you’ll throw yourself away time and time again for your little brother. That’s not love. That’s pathetic. I spent too long throwing myself away for unworthy men before I realized that the damage could never be undone. It seems to be, however, a lesson you will never learn.”

Liam’s fists clenched, even as Billy tensed, shifting in preparation to block any potential swings taken at him. They stared each other down, air crackling, both of them clearly realizing that there would be a reckoning of some sort before this was over, and possibly of the sort that one of them would not walk away from. And that is far too bloody likely to be me. Physically, Liam and Billy were almost exactly the same age, but Billy had still been actively serving on ships and fighting and scrapping and adventuring God knew where the past decades, while Liam, with the legacy of two serious wounds and the anguished, grisly, scarring ordeal that had been his final confrontation with Jennings, had settled down in Paris and given up that life. He was not completely a decrepit old man, but he wasn’t who he used to be either, and he knew that. However he was getting out of this – if he was getting out of this – it would have to be another way.

The tension was broken by the door opening, as Lady Fiona stepped inside. “Captain,” she said sweetly. “You’ll be happy to hear that Jim has been cleared of all charges and permitted to go home – well, wherever his mother is staying. It is, therefore, time for you to hold up your end of the bargain. Our ship has been resupplied, and we’ll be leaving this evening. You’ll be serving as captain.”

“To Skeleton Island?”

“Eventually.” Her smile remained infuriatingly coy. “We have plenty of other business to do first, but yes, we will be making our way there. Oh, and the other thing. I do know where your family lives, including the little brother you are still so bafflingly devoted to protect. So. . .”

“Do you?”

“Of course.” Once again, that sickening, kittenish smile. “Savannah, isn’t it? Georgia?”

That, despite everything she had already done to him, rocked Liam on his heels. He had still been telling himself that this was some combination of spite, limited information, and lucky guesses, and that she didn’t actually know where to find them and hurt them. But hearing that comforting delusion so conclusively dispelled took all the air out of him. He had nothing left to say, no further protestations to make. He had to do whatever it took to keep her away from them, as he had with Jennings, and if this go-round killed him, well. It seemed long overdue.

“Well?” Lady Fiona said. “Ready to go, Captain?”

Liam lifted his head. “Oh,” he said. “Oh, yes.”

-----------------------

Killian continued to bang on the hatch long after he knew Geneva was gone, that she had not heard him, that he had missed whatever slim, wild, impossible chance he had ever so briefly had. Rufio’s troupe of junior jackasses had duly come down to pummel him and drag him back into the darkness of the orlop deck where they had tried, more or less successfully, to contain him for the duration of the voyage. But no matter how clever they were with knots and chains and ropes and restraints, they still had not yet found one that could hold him permanently. For a while, yes, but he always worked out a way to break it in the end. That was what had allowed him to climb up when he heard them approaching another ship, planning to make a break for it if he possibly could – and then in that heart-stopping, lightning-struck moment, realizing that the ship was none other than the Rose, and his daughter was the one speaking. He’d tried to shout for her, would have torn his way through wood and canvas with bare hand and stump to get to her, but the Lost Boys (as he had heard them calling themselves) were too quick on the uptake. Geneva hadn’t known it was him. It hadn’t been enough.

The one godforsaken useful bit of information that Killian had gleaned from the whole miserable affair, therefore, was the fact that they were bound for France. Rufio had, of course, taken great pleasure in keeping this from him, and even the boys had been careful not to mention this in his hearing. Killian did not know what was in France to the wee bastards’ interest, but there was one thing in France that was very much to his interest, and that was his brother. The Lost Boys might not be taking him conveniently to Paris, but it was not a total stretch of the imagination, and if so, Killian would do whatever it took to get to Liam. Liam would know what to do, he usually did. At least, he could put the wheels in motion to get word back to the rest of the family, and possibly also help kick Rufio and the world’s worst nursery school’s collective behinds, just for the principle of the thing. If Killian could get to Liam, it might not matter that he had missed Geneva. Indeed, he all but bloody had to. Let himself be squirrelled off to some disreputable French captivity, and his goose might be cooked for good.

Of course, this assumed that Rufio had not just been inventing some sundry destination to throw Geneva off the scent, but Killian had to hope this was not the case – for one thing, he didn’t think the strutting peacock was clever enough to think that fast on his feet. Yet as assumptions were all he presently had, there was nothing for it. The trip had been one such extended fit of misery – rattling in the hold like a ballast-stone during the storm, never fed enough, obsessively working to undo whatever knot they had him in, fighting flashbacks to Captain Freeman, Captain Campbell, and Captain Silver alike, and worrying endlessly about Emma – that Killian did not care in what fashion it ended, as long as it fucking did. He had tried to keep track of time by scratching marks in the hull, one for each day, but in constant darkness, it was very hard to be sure, and he felt like something pale and spongy, a mushroom or a fungus that only grew at night. It had been a while, that was all he knew. A fortnight at least, closer to three weeks. Who knew what sort of time they were making, but it seemed good.

Killian spent the next several days, therefore, conserving his strength and lying low after the failed escape attempt – he couldn’t take these brats thumping him indefinitely, especially after being fed a diet of shit and kept in the damp and dark. He was already feeling as bloody rickety as a scarecrow, and he tried to find small exercises, ways to keep himself from rotting entirely to sludge. They had, of course, confiscated his hook, but after quite a lot of searching, crawling on all threes through the hold, he found another one, with which some invention he managed to make fit into his brace. That ascertained, he took it out again and hid it, as he did not want them tipped off that he had one. No, that was a surprise best saved for the opportune moment.

He lost track of how many days it was after that, but it wasn’t more than about another week and a half. Killian wondered if it had been his birthday at some point, as it seemed to be getting on in August, and felt another pang of rage at how negligently these bastards had filched him from his life – not as if he expected some fuss of a birthday to-do anyway, but it was another reminder of how quickly everything had gone four feet up. God, he missed Emma. The rest of them too, even Flint, but especially Emma.

At last, on a sultry, sweaty, late-summer morning, Killian heard the distinctive sound of gulls, the creak of chains and the hum of commerce, and knew that they had reached port. Climbing painfully to his lookout post, he spotted half-timbered houses lining a handsome stone waterfront, the Bourbon coat of arms flapping against the sunny haze, and crowded docks teeming with small fishing boats and larger traders. As this was where he and Emma had arrived when they came to France the first time after the end of the pirates’ war, Killian recognized it: Le Havre, in Haute-Normandie, about a hundred miles upriver from Paris. Same place my bloody father ran off to, after abandoning us. Where he remarried and had a new son and never bloody once looked back. At all costs, Killian did not intend to let that same fate befall him, even inadvertently. No matter what, he was going home.

Hearing the sound of feet descending the ladder, he quickly checked that his new hook was hidden, and more or less permitted a half-dozen Lost Boys to untie him and march him above deck. The first blaze of full sunlight in over a month was withering; he felt like some fell creature about to crumble to ash, squinting and shielding his face against it, as a jeering chorus of chortles echoed around him. “Not feeling quite the thing, Captain?”

“I’m feeling just fine, actually.” Blinking frenzied sunspots from his dazzled eyes, Killian tried to judge when he would have the best chance of running for it. His legs were still as wobbly as buggeration, and if he made a move for it too fast, they could all dogpile him again and defeat the whole purpose. “Waiting for the big prick among all you little ones, are we?”

A few of the older ones, who grasped the double insult, glared at him, while Rufio swaggered forward. “You’re still not very courteous, are you, Hook?”

“A lot of grown men far more terrifying – and far more competent – than you have tried to thrash me into submission, you preening twit. They failed, and since you’re still almost adorably naïve enough to think that putting a man belowdecks and not feeding him every day is the worst thing you can do to him, it’s no damn surprise that so did you. I’d say it’s been fun, boys, but it hasn’t, and frankly, I hope the lot of you die of a bloody flux. And so. . . ta.”

As he was speaking, Killian had been edging inconspicuously toward the railing, and on the last word, he pushed up and over as hard as he could, bending his knees to absorb the impact on the quay beyond. There were startled yells from the Lost Boys – bloody amateurs – as they crowded to the side to stare wildly after him. As they could not open fire in the middle of a busy port, it was just possible to hear Rufio bawling at them to get down there now. Doubtless his employer would be very unhappy if he let their prize catch slip the net now. Pity.

Killian sprinted flat-out up the docks, crashing into merchants like ninepins and sending a volley of fish, baskets, sacks, ropes, barrels, and other such items flying. An equal volley of furious French obscenities followed him, but at least the pandemonium (ha, see what he did there) made it extremely difficult for the Lost Boys to get through, and he dodged and weaved, grabbed a cavalry saber strapped to the saddle of an unattended horse, and would have pinched the horse as well, but that would ensure he was hanged on the spot whenever they caught up to him – horse-thievery was a capital crime everywhere. He dove around a corner, fumbled out the hook and screwed it into the brace, and turned just in time to see Rufio himself speeding up arrears with an enraged expression. He went for the sword at his own belt, yanked it free to several screams as passersby scrambled for cover, and took a vicious swing at Hook.

Finally. Killian had been waiting for this moment for the entire voyage, and he did not intend to let it slip through his reduced number of fingers. He deflected Rufio’s attacks with ease, flicked them aside and aside again – the boy was strong but untrained, there was mostly blunt fury and not much refined technique. If he wanted to cross blades with the very pirate he had been so disdaining, he could learn a thing or two about why the world had feared them in the first place, not just as tall tales and monster stories that an arrogant pup like him didn’t believe anyway. Killian did not want to kill a man in the middle of Le Havre ten minutes after his arrival, as this would add the French authorities to his currently extensive roster of enemies, but Rufio bloody well deserved it, and leaving him alive to plot more chaos in his wake might be an act of mercy, but also one of considerable foolishness. He had not done it in a long time, but it was remarkable, and unsettling, how the knack never quite left you.

Killian caught Rufio’s slashing downcut on his hook, the metal tangling in screeching sparks, and slammed his sword straight between the boy’s ribs with a horrible, grating squelch. In that instant, as Rufio convulsed, Killian could see shock and incomprehension in his glazing eyes, almost fear, and it struck him that this was a boy, not a man. That for all his affected posture and bravado and ridiculous hair, this was no hardened criminal or ruthless killer, nothing different from any other lad at this age overinflated with a sense of his own importance. Rufio was, in fact, given or take a few months, probably the exact same age as his son Sam.

Regretting it instantly, horrified at himself, Killian jerked the sword out, as Rufio swayed and went to his knees in the dirt, clutching the ragged wound in his chest. Killian caught him as Rufio fell backwards into his arms, staring at him in mute, furious accusation. He seemed to be trying to say something, but couldn’t get his tongue around the blood. He shuddered once, then died without another sound, vacant eyes reflecting the blaze of the French sun.

Killian set him down slowly, arms feeling like stone, even as he could hear shouts rapidly coming closer – more than one concerned citizen was clearly leading the port authorities in the direction of the brawl. He was almost tempted to give himself up in penance, but that would render the whole thing pointless, and he had to get out of here now. Just as two large gentlemen in brown coats, unslinging blunderbusses, tore through a curtain – “ARRÊTEZ, AU NOM DE LA LOI” – and nearly tripped over Rufio, Killian scrambled wildly to his feet and ran.

He didn’t think they had gotten a good look at his face, but there could not be many men corresponding to the description of “murderous fiend with hook for a hand,” so as he kept up his demented obstacle course through the narrow, twisting streets, he hastily unscrewed the offending appendage and stashed it in his filthy coat again. Out here in the open air, Killian was pungently aware of the fact that he had not bathed or otherwise washed for a month, unless you counted being periodically drenched in seawater whenever the Pan hit rough seas, and possibly they could just follow his stench to track him down; they wouldn’t even require a bloodhound. If he could find somewhere to lie low – Rufio had been common gutter riffraff, such sorts died every day, they would put a cursory effort into finding his killer, but no more. Aye. Common gutter riffraff, and you killed him. So what does that make you?

Killian eyed up some of the counting and money-changing houses he passed, as such institutions were ubiquitous around a busy port that handled a good deal of international trade, but seeing as he had already started off with murder, bursting into one of those as if to burgle it would be a very bad follow-up move. Besides, they were almost surely all owned by Jews. Forced into the profession in medieval times by church restrictions forbidding Christians from it, Jews had been seized upon to do the essential economic dirty work since they (again, according to the boundless wisdom of the church) had no immortal souls to endanger with the worldly sins of mammon. Their situation was marginally improved now from how it had been then, but there were still not many jobs they could legally do, and Christian society, eager to throw stones (often literally) at the stereotype of the shifty, money-grubbing Jew while conveniently overlooking the fact that they had created it, needed no help in making trouble for them. If Killian was to barge into one of their houses, and the French constables were to find a Jew apparently sheltering a murderer, it could get messy (or rather, messier) in a hurry.

Killian, therefore, did not break stride, even though he was starting to feel a horrendous stitch in his side and other symptoms of complete physical disuse and imprisonment for a month. He couldn’t keep careering about like a runaway ox-cart much longer, and even if not the Jews, he should find someone else to burden himself upon. Spotting what looked like the backside of a seedy tavern, he vaulted clumsily over the low brick wall into the courtyard, crouched down as he heard angry shouts at the head of the alley, and held his breath until they passed. Then he went to the pump, drew some water and tried to make himself look at least somewhat less like a bloodstained, mangy tramp, and when he thought he had effected some improvement (or at least wouldn’t look any worse than the rest of the tavern’s dubious clientele) he went around the front, pushed the door open, ducked under the crooked beam, and sauntered casually in.

He had spent time at several establishments of similar caliber, but it had been a while, and he told himself that it was his imagination that everyone was glancing at him sidelong – though surely the authorities in valiant pursuit of some assorted villain could not be an unusual occurrence in this part of town. He had no money to buy a drink, so they would probably chuck him out on his backside soon anyway, but he didn’t need to stay long. Just until he could wrangle some way to hitch a ride on a cart or a riverboat heading down the Seine to Paris. Liam was going to be surprised to see him, to say the least, and this was hardly the way Killian had wanted to go about the family reunion, but he couldn’t help a spark of wistful, yearning happiness at the thought of seeing his brother again. Liam might not be thrilled at the fact of his little brother already fleeing the law in France, but he, alas, would likely not be terribly surprised.

Thinking this, therefore, Killian almost did not notice the fact that one of the hooded figures at the bar looked faintly familiar. He only caught it when they turned their head, and he caught a glimpse of sleek black braids, elegantly frosted with silver, coiled and pinned up. It wasn’t a they, or indeed a he – it was a she, and one engaged in what looked to be politely threatening palaver with the scabby sea dog next to her. Killian’s French was not nearly good enough to get the details, but she seemed to be trying to haggle out the use of his vessel – and then, it hit. It had been over twenty years since they’d seen each other, but he still recognized that voice.

Another lightning bolt, of a different nature, went down his back. Then he leaned forward, grabbed her sleeve, and hissed, “Regina?”

She spun around, saw him – and, forgivably, stared. She was too self-controlled to shriek, or otherwise give any overt evidence of shock, though her eyes went wide and her lips went thin. She surveyed his utterly disreputable estate up and down, then got to her feet, seized him by the shirt in turn, and hauled him, with impressive vigor for a small woman in her late fifties, around the dim corner and up against the hunchbacked wall. “Killian?”

“Aye, it’s bloody me.” Killian disentangled himself. He and his sister-in-law had never had a terribly warm relationship, though they tolerated each other for Liam’s sake – it was not easy to forget that they had met because Regina, then a high-class brothel madam on Antigua, had hired the Jones brothers to destroy Emma, who she blamed for the death of the man she loved. But Regina had grudgingly come around, taken Henry and Geneva to safety, and she and Liam had been married for many years, so Killian refrained from any other smart remarks. “What the devil are you doing here?”

“What the devil are you doing here? And yes, bloody seems to be the operative word for you.” Regina regarded him coolly. “There’s no way you could have heard, is there?”

“Heard what?”

“Liam’s missing.” Her mouth went even thinner. “He’s been missing for weeks, he went for breakfast one morning and never came back. I’ve turned Paris upside down, and the only lead I could come up with was that someone named Lady Fiona Murray was last seen with him. She’s English, apparently, so I was intending to get passage over the Channel and ask a few – what?”

“Oh, bloody hell.” Killian had to sit down on a hogshead. He had abruptly guessed why the Lost Boys might have been charged with bringing him to France, if Lady Fiona, the other head of the hydra, had been – at least until recently – in residence here. Give him over as a plaything for her and a blackmail inducement for the rest of the family back in Charlestown, and Gideon could keep the lot of them busy, chasing their tails, while he did absolutely whatever the fuck he pleased – Killian, with his old and deeply embittered enmity against the Gold family, would be too tempting for Lady Fiona to resist. Except in paramount irony, she had already, by the sounds of things, likewise kidnapped the other Jones brother from the bosom of wife and home, and thus was not available to receive her poisoned present. Jesus bloody Christ, I hate the lot of them.

With that, Killian was tersely obligated to explain to Regina the difficulties they had encountered in Charlestown with the pestilential Murray junior, the connection to malfeasance-in-chief Robert Gold, what he had been up to the last month, and his agonizingly close shave with Geneva and the Rose at sea, as his daughter had also had her arm twisted into setting sail to England in company with the one and only John Silver. Killian couldn’t see all the threads just yet, but he was increasingly certain that they were drawing together in an ever more intricate web with his family, and Skeleton Island, at the center. “I wish we had gotten rid of all the damn treasure, as Flint was planning, what with the trouble it looks to be causing us now!”

Regina looked as if she couldn’t say that she disagreed. “So Liam was kidnapped by the mother, you by the son? They aren’t – Gold isn’t alive, is he?”

“No,” Killian said, even as it struck him that he didn’t actually know – the crocodile would be in his mid-seventies by now, but would not consider that a major impediment to pursuing a colorful and varied career of evil, especially given the formidable grudge he held against the pirates for destroying his plans to re-establish the Star Chamber and take over the world. “I mean, I don’t think so. But Lady Fiona’s his sister, as I said, and she seems even more lunatic than he was, so we don’t need him to cause more than enough trouble. But Geneva’s in England, or will be soon enough, and if there’s any chance Lady Fiona took Liam there, that’s worth trying, isn’t it?”

Regina’s expression flickered at the mention of her niece. She had, Killian knew, become quite attached to her during the months she had cared for her as a baby in Paris, and part of her likely would not have minded at all if Killian and Emma had never returned to resume parenthood. There was also the fact that it was, as she had already noted, as good a lead as any on the whereabouts of her husband, and no matter how unconventionally their relationship had begun – though no more than his and Emma’s, Killian had to admit – he knew that Regina loved Liam deeply. It was one of the few points on which they could always find common ground.

“So,” Regina said brusquely. “We just do as I was already trying to accomplish, and find passage to England? Where, London?”

“I don’t know. I assume that’s as good a place as any to start. There is, though, one small thing. I may, ah, I may be wanted for murder.”

“Really?” Regina raised a cutting eyebrow. “Why doesn’t that surprise me?”

“I wouldn’t be chucking too many stones in that regard, love, seeing as you’ve murdered any number of men in your day. Just because you did it more indirectly doesn’t make you less guilty. In any event, it would be unwise for me to appear on the docks until it blows over. I’m not delighted about staying in this rat’s nest for any length of time, so perhaps if we could suss out more suitable accommodations – ”

“With you looking like that? Not likely. A haystack is about the best you could hope for.” Regina sniffed. “Haven’t bathed either, have you?”

“No, unfortunately, that went by the wayside while I was being abducted, chained up, half starved, and nearly drowned. Bloody hell, I know it’s in our nature to butt heads, but I also know that we both love Liam – and, I think, Geneva. So how about we both give up fighting the bit for once, and try to ride in the same direction?”

Regina studied him warily, then finally jerked her head in a nod. “Fine,” she said. “We’ll wait until your latest bout of felony doesn’t catch up with you. Who did you kill, anyway?”

“A boy named Rufio.” Killian clenched his fingers against his palm, once more feeling the sword rasp against bone. “Leader of the gang that kidnapped me.”

“He deserved it, then,” Regina said indifferently. “I wouldn’t tie yourself into knots over it. Come on. Let’s get out of here before you get me arrested too.”

Killian raised an eyebrow of his own at her back, reminded himself what was at stake, and without another word, for which he felt he should be congratulated, followed her.

----------------------

Jim had no idea where to go after his release from prison. His mother was almost certainly staying with his uncle at the Seven Stars, but if he went there, he would have to tell her what had happened, what he had learned, and he wasn’t sure he could stand that just yet. He was still reeling. It wasn’t as if he felt the grief on a personal level, since he had never known his father – and whose bloody fault is that, then? – but the betrayal was of a scale he could scarcely comprehend. He felt vindicated beyond words that he’d gotten himself thrown out of the Navy and never gone back, if these were the sorts of men they elevated to command – indeed, Jim had met enough Navy officers that he shouldn’t be surprised, seeing as a great deal of them seemed to have booked advance lodging in the deeper of the poet Dante’s circles of hell. But still. To spend all these years thinking that your father was a hero who died bravely fighting pirates, and then discover that he had been stabbed in the back by his own captain during a failed mutiny. . . Jim could feel the blood beating in his head, against his eyes, as if it was about to burst out of every orifice in a likewise hellishly appropriate spectacle. Jesus, he wanted to hit something.

He spent a completely aimless afternoon going absolutely nowhere (no different, he thought bitterly, from the rest of his stupid joke of a life) slept under a mossy piling on one of the back quays where nobody would bother him, and spent the next day trying to screw up the courage to just go face his mother and tell her the truth. But coming on the loss of the Benbow, and throwing her hospitality to Liam back in her face, it would completely break her heart, and he did not want to return without at least something tangible to atone for all the chaos and woe he had caused her, directly or otherwise. And as much as he did not want to admit it, his thoughts kept drifting to the tantalizing specter of Skeleton Island. It was a tall tale, a fantasy. . . but Billy said it was real, that he’d been there for three years, he could go back. He, Lady Fiona, and Liam bloody Jones had doubtless already departed on that very errand, seeing as that had been the condition of Liam’s emancipation from jail (maybe they’d shut him back in again when they were done), but perhaps there was a way to follow them. Not as if a single captain in Bristol would let Jim within a hundred yards of his ship, or listen to anything he had to say, so that was out. But perhaps if he just thought a bit harder. . .

Jim’s restless and unhappy peregrinations were interrupted on the evening of the sixth day after his release, as he had sent a note to his mother to let her know that he was alive and free, but was setting off to make reparations – how or where, he of course had no idea, but he hoped it would ease at least some of her worrying while explaining why he couldn’t come home, such as it was, just yet. He had taken to hanging around the docks in hopes of earning enough money for supper via odd jobs, and thus noticed the ship making her careful way up the river channel and into berth at the quay. She was a beauty, though obviously had been considerably battered on her voyage, and looked enough like a refitted Navy frigate that Jim squinted suspiciously. Sixth-rate, if he had to guess. The name painted on her stern was Rose.

Intrigued for absolutely no good reason other than that he had never seen her in Bristol before, and he knew almost all the vessels that traded out of here, Jim moved closer, watching the hands throw out ropes to tie up. Once the Rose was moored, four people descended the gangplank, two men and two women. Jim thought the older, blonde-haired man with a kind, gaunt face must be the captain, but the shorter, black-ponytailed one next to him, limping along on a crutch –

A brief, muted shock went through him. Billy had said to report it at once if he saw a one-legged man, a man named Silver, who he clearly considered a threat, and while of course this could easily be some other one-legged man, amputees being not uncommon in the world of seafaring, Jim could not help but feel that the possibility warranted at least some inspection. The third member of the party was a Negro woman, handsome and stately, long dreadlocks tied with a colorful head cloth, but Jim’s attention was immediately and then unshakably captured by the fourth, the other woman. She was about his age, with dark hair pinned up, striking green eyes, elegant cheekbones, and a cool, quiet air of command that suddenly made him reconsider if the blonde man was in fact the captain. But surely she –

Jim stared at them (all right, especially at her) as they made their way up to the street and appeared to be engaged in a low-level disagreement. When this was not sorted out in a few minutes, and his curiosity had by far got the best of him, he strolled up. “Evening. First time in Bristol, is it? Can I help?”

“Not the first time, no.” It was the one-legged man who answered, regarding him avidly. “But it has been a while, yes. What was that place you said you father and uncle used to stay, Captain? The Benbow?”

It was difficult to say which part of this surprised Jim the most – the fact that “Captain” was directed at the young woman, the mention of her familial connections here in time gone by, or that said familial connections were, yet again, entangled with his. Still, he managed not to show it. “If it’s the Benbow you’re looking for, you’re out of luck. It burned to the ground a fortnight ago.”

“It what?”

“Trust me,” Jim said grimly. “It’s a long bloody story. And one that, given which, I think I’d like to know who exactly you are.”

The group exchanged looks. Finally the one-legged man said, “I’m John Silver. This is my. . . this is Mistress Madi Scott. That is Thomas Hamilton, and his great-niece, Captain Geneva Jones.”

That confirmed his suspicions about Silver, but this last surname was one that Jim had been hoping not to hear, especially in relation to a young woman as distracting as Geneva. He reminded himself that it was very common, and yet was about to ask, before deciding that he did not want to know; he did not want to have to dislike Geneva just yet. “Jim Hawkins.”

They did not seem to take particular notice of this, which raised his hopes that this was somehow a different Jones (that father and uncle comment did not sound promising, but he ignored it). It was Geneva, however, who said, “I think that was the family that owned the Benbow, wasn’t it?”

“Aye,” Jim said, supposing it wasn’t much good to dissemble at this point. “My mother’s inn. It burned, as I said, and that’s why I’m out here on the bloody docks.”

Silver considered him for a long moment. Then he said abruptly, “Billy Bones have anything to do with it?”

Jim was not surprised by this question either, but he was canny enough to blink in confusion, as if he was. “Sounds vaguely familiar? But if you want to know more, I’d appreciate supper. And for that matter, a proper roof over my head.”

“Nobody’s taken you in from the goodness of their hearts?”

“Do you think I would be out here if they had?”

Silver smiled faintly, in acknowledgement of the point. There was something almost wry in his gaze, and quite sad, until Jim recalled that earlier comment about being back to Bristol after a very long time away. He did not think, somehow, that the circumstances of Silver’s last leaving had been pleasant, or what had impelled him to do so in the first place – as if he barely had to ask the question of whether anyone had taken Jim in, because he bloody well knew they hadn’t. But then, as if masking this momentary crack in his composure, he looked swiftly back at Geneva and Thomas Hamilton. “I’d say we could afford to provide the lad with bed and board in return for some information, couldn’t we?”

“Easier to offer when it’s not your money to spend, isn’t it?” Geneva looked at him coolly. “But I suppose you’re right. Mr. Hawkins, if you would care to come with us?”

“Oh – aye, sure, I could.” It wasn’t as if he had anything better to do, and uncertainty about the rest of them aside, he would not mind passing quite some time yet in Miss – well, Captain – Jones’ company. He really did hope, however vainly, that she was not related to Liam. As they started to walk, he suggested casually, “You know, you can call me Jim.”

“Where are we going, Mr. Hawkins?”

It had been worth a try. “There’s the King’s Arms on Broad Quay, they’ll give you a fair tariff. Food’s not bad, either.” If he was avoiding the Seven Stars, the King’s Arms was the least terrible backup option; its landlord was one of the followers of John Wesley, the itinerant evangelist and religious reformer, and felt that good deeds and social conscience, even and especially applied to such a hopeless case as Jim, was a service well-rendered to the Almighty. Even his charity, however, did not extend quite so far as putting Jim up for free indefinitely, so with no money, he had not been able to ask before. “It’ll be comfortable enough, if you – what?”

“Sorry,” Geneva said, exchanging a strange look with her uncle Thomas. “Only that putting the lot of us up in a lodging house called the King’s Arms is. . . more than a bit ironic.”

Jim sensed a story there, though he was unsure if it was wise to go digging for it, given the considerable misfortune he had already incurred by getting mixed up in the personal histories of mysterious newcomers. He led them up to Broad Quay and the King’s Arms, where the landlord was (not without considerable and not-unjustified wariness, given Jim’s recent track record) persuaded to accommodate them for the evening. The traveling party was weary from what had clearly been anything but an uneventful crossing, and as Geneva and Mrs. Scott went up to their room to freshen before supper, and Mr. Hamilton went to pay, Jim found himself alone with John Silver, the man that Bones had so suspected, or feared, as to warn him personally against. They sat there, trying to pretend that they were not surreptitiously stealing glances at each other, as Silver unbuckled the straps of his peg leg and eased it off with a grimace. Seeing that, and not sure what made him ask, Jim nonetheless said, “Does it hurt?”

“This?” Silver looked surprised that anyone would ever enquire into his physical comfort. “Not usually. I lost it years ago. Though sometimes, such as now, it barks up something terrible.”

“How’d you lose it?”

“Ask a lot of questions, don’t you?” Silver cocked his head. “Valiantly, if you like. In battle.”

Given that Jim had just discovered the last story of valiant heroism in battle to be a lie, he immediately suspected that this was some dimension of shading the truth as well, but then, it was a considerably personal question to ask anyone, let alone a man he’d not yet known an hour. “I suppose I do,” he said, in response to the first part of Silver’s remark. “In that vein, why are you looking for Billy Bones?”

Silver regarded him shrewdly. “So you have met him, haven’t you.”

“Aye. Him and a few others that I could stand to not meet again, frankly. But since one of them killed my father, I’d bloody like to – ”

“Who?” Silver interrupted. “Who killed your father?”

Jim was taken aback, but then, he himself had started this trend of rather nosy questions. “Captain Liam Jones.” He tried to keep his voice offhand, but it trembled. “My father’s old commander, of all the things.”

A most unusual expression crossed Silver’s face. He paused, as if weighing up his words, then shook his head. “No. Liam Jones has killed other men I know – other fathers, even – but he didn’t kill yours.”

“What?” Jim, feeling distinctly and unhappily whiplashed over this whole affair, stared at him in confusion and exasperation. “He confessed to me! We were in prison together, he bloody confessed to my face! How would you even – ”

“I know,” Silver said, “because your father died during the first battle of Nassau – the first one, between the pirates themselves and against Henry Jennings, rather than the second, against Woodes Rogers and Robert Gold – and Liam Jones never set foot on Nassau. He was recovering on an island of Maroons, traveled to Jamaica at one point, and then left for France from some no-account sandbar in the middle of the Caribbean. He never sniffed New Providence. So whatever he told you, he’s lying.”

“He’s – ” Jim was bloody tired of thinking first one thing, then another, and then another altogether. At that moment, however, he worked out how Silver and Billy must know each other, and from whence their rivalry originally stemmed. “You were on the Walrus too, weren’t you? Under Captain Flint?”

“Clever lad.” Silver sounded genuinely impressed. “Either that, or Billy has been talking.”

“Aye,” Jim said. “A bit. But I figured out plenty on my own.”

“Ah. Well. To make a long and tragic story short, yes, Billy and I both sailed with Flint.” Silver glanced around. “I don’t suppose he’s still here?”

“No. Left with the others a week ago.” Jim wanted to return to the previous subject, frustrating as it was. “Why the bloody hell would Liam tell me that he killed my father, if he didn’t?”

“Because,” Silver said enigmatically, “that is exactly what Liam Jones does. Trust me, I too have personal experience with the matter.”

Jim both wanted to push for more on that, and didn’t. He felt oddly relieved that Liam hadn’t – at least theoretically, he was fully prepared for the story to change ten more times before tomorrow – killed his father after all, guilty for the things he had said, even with every right to say them, and wondering in despair if he’d ever actually get to the bottom of this. But since the air had been cleared, he decided that he could at least stand to ask. “Geneva, she’s not Liam’s daughter, is she?”

“No. His niece. His younger brother’s daughter.” Something flickered in Silver’s eyes. “And her mother, by the way, is Flint’s daughter – adopted, but still. With or without  Liam, it’s a rather terrifying pedigree.”

“She’s Captain Flint’s granddaughter?” Bloody hell, that would be a terrifying introduction to the family, not that Jim was considering such a hypothetical scenario. “I’m taking it you don’t have the same feelings about him that Billy does? Otherwise you would have taken advantage of that fact somehow. Unless you already did?”

He thought for a moment that Silver was almost offended, though in what way he wasn’t sure. Then the older man said, “Her great-uncle has been vigilantly looking out for her welfare, and it was a long voyage, in more ways than one. So I’d advise – ah, Captain, Mad – Mistress Scott.”

Jim started as the two women strode up to the table, looking sufficiently refreshed. Geneva had put on a light blue lawn dress and fixed her hair, tall and elegant and calmly in command, and Jim’s throat went more than slightly dry as she took the chair next to him, her thigh just brushing his through her skirts. There was another chair closer to Mrs. Scott that he expected her to take, but as it was also next to Silver and this seemed to be a sticking point, she squeezed around the table to take the one on Geneva’s other side. This left the open chair for Mr. Hamilton, who returned in a few more minutes and did not seem terribly pleased with the arrangements, but was clearly too much of a gentleman to utter any disdain out loud. Instead, he seated himself next to Silver after only a brief hesitation, leaving Jim to wonder just what they all disliked about the man so much. “Well,” Thomas said. “Against all odds, we have made it to Bristol. Mr. Hawkins, I suppose you could be so kind as to tell us what you know?”

As their supper arrived, and Jim did his best not to tear into it like a mad wolf – he hadn’t really had a proper meal since the Benbow burned – he provided them with a concise and more or less comprehensive summary of the people he had met over the last fortnight, and what he could discern of their tangled skein of schemes and deceptions. At the mention of Liam, Geneva looked vastly startled. “My uncle’s here? He’s supposed to be in Paris.”

“Aye, well. He said Lady Murray snatched him.” Jim supposed he could be somewhat more charitable to Liam than he would have been yesterday. “And he’s not here anymore. He went with Bones and Lady Murray on their expedition. To Skeleton Island, as far as I know.”

His four companions exchanged darkly significant looks. There seemed to be a definite element of “I told you so” in Silver’s, which was odd – though he was wise enough not to rub it in overtly. “You’ve been very helpful, Jim,” he said instead. “But with what they did to you and your mother, I’m guessing you don’t want to sit back, wish us well, and wave us on our way?”

“No,” Jim said, especially conscious of Geneva’s gaze on him. “God knows there’s nothing for me here, and if I’ve been useful, I could be again. If you’re going after them, I want to come along. To this – this treasure island.”

“What man wouldn’t?” Silver once more looked wry. “We’ve only just got here, and we’ll need to do a few things before we leave again. But if Bones and the rest are ahead of us, we shouldn’t waste much time in following them. As young Mr. Hawkins says, there is none to spare, to set in search of a place such as that. Treasure Island.”

[jonogueira]

Áine.

Here’s the AO3 and the link to Moon Hair e Fire Eyes. I was listening to this while writing.

Chapter 6

New Beginnings - Old and New Scars.

Áine had to move. Kinloch Hold was her home once, not anymore. Too many bad memories, memories that kept her awake at night, memories that made her wake up screaming, memories that gave her panic attacks, memories that she could feel on her fingertips: old scars.

She begged First Enchanter Irving to be transferred for more than a year after the events in the tower. Every night that she couldn’t sleep or woke up screaming, every time she walked near that damned room, every time she couldn’t hold a panic attack, she went to his chambers and begged.

And here she was at The Gallows, and she was terrified. Things here were different from Kinloch. The mages were always afraid, there was always the threat of tranquility. She had never seen so many tranquils in one place. What was wrong with those people? Still, it was a fresh start, a new beginning.

After the tower was saved, the Warden decided not to use the Rite of Annulment, and the tower once again fell under the management of Irving and Greagoir. Many of the templars were not satisfied with the result, but they complied and Cullen was among them.

Cullen was a difficult subject, she rarely talked or was in the same room as him. After she moved she tried as hard as she could not to think about the man, but it was impossible, she still loved him, with her soul and body.

When the Warden defeated the Archdemon, and the Blight ended, she decided to write to the Warden and thank her, Alistair and Leliana for rescuing her, but she never really expected to receive an answer from them.

It was through her letter that she knew they got married and were Queen and King. They had been through a lot and deserved happiness. Their friendship grew, and they would often write to each other. The fact that she moved to The Gallows made things a bit more difficult, but there was a templar who would smuggle letters outside the circle, and they could continue exchanging letters, not so often anymore, but still, they were friends.

Having friends, meant having things to care about, things to lose. She didn’t want to talk to people, and the thought of having a friend again was heavy on her mind, after all, she had left her friend, or rather sister, back in Kinloch.

It was not easy to leave Amell behind, but she needed for her own sake. The way she viewed, she had 2 options: leave or become tranquil. Obviously, the latter was out of the question. As much as she wanted to get rid of those terrible memories, she cherished her life more. Opting to become tranquil was, to her, similar to giving up on life. There was a lot in life bigger than her fears: smiles, laughter, joy, love…

“Urgh!”– She shook her head reprimanding herself for thinking about him. – “Maker, please!” – She threw the book on her bed and turned to leave, but was stopped by Nina, her roommate.

“Difficult reading?” – The woman asked sitting by her side.

Nina was a talkative mage, always smiling, laughing and gossiping. Áine liked her, she was fun to be around.

“Not really, just can’t concentrate.”

“Ghosts from the past?”

“Definitely, but only one.” – She sighed and ran her finger through her hair.

“Only one? I see… Are you finally gonna tell me who he is?” – Nina tucked a curl behind Áine’s ear.

Áine liked her, but she didn’t want a friend, she couldn’t… She never told Nina or anyone about what happened to her, including Amell, just that she came from Kinloch and what happened there. There wasn’t a reason not to… people already knew it, so better tell the truth than creating stories.

“Sorry Nina, I…”

“Is he at least alive? Was he a mage or a templar? The way you act it makes me think he was a templar, of significant rank by all the secrecy… It doesn’t matter, you know I’ll understand if that’s the case!” – The mage pleaded with her eyes.

It was true. If anyone would understand it would be her. She was in love with a templar, she was actually in an intimate relationship with him. Áine was happy for her, at least Nina was an example that love could flourish between templars and mages.

Áine pondered if she should tell Nina about Cullen, but a knock on the door interrupted her thoughts.

“Who is it?” – Asked Nina.

“It’s me, Paul.”

Nina’s eyes sparkled, she stood up and ran to the door like a child in Satinalia. She stopped and rearranged herself before opening the door. The templar came in and grabbed her in his arms planting a rather lustful kiss on her lips, which made Áine blush furiously.

“Hey, Paul! Stop! We are not alone…” – She said between giggles.

“Oh, I’m sorry! How are you today Áine?” – He looked at her but didn’t let Nina go.

“I’m fine, thanks for asking. I have to… hum… return this book, it will take a while so... hum… make yourself comfortable?” – The redness of her cheeks and intonation made the couple laugh.

“Thanks! Oh! I hope we can finish our talk later, I’m very curious to know the name of your sweet templar.” – Nina said while holding Paul and planting kisses on his face.

Áine tripped on her way to the door and heard Paul about this templar story before she closed the door behind her. She would definitely not tell her about Cullen.

She was still leaning against the door when she heard a familiar voice in the distance.

“Knight-Commander some of the templars…”

“Cullen.”– She tensed and started breathing heavily.

Fuck! She was paralyzed, she didn’t know Cullen had been transferred there too. She thought the Maker was punishing her for not being able to endure staying back in Kinloch, he was punishing her with the one thing that terrified her the most. Yes, terrified. She loved him, she wanted him, she needed him. Him, Cullen, the young templar with kind eyes, easy laughter, with a smile that touched her soul. The young templar that loved reading, playing chess and chatting with the mages freely not warily, who saw mages as people, not demons.

How many nights had she dreamed about him? Dreamed that she was comforting him after the events in the tower. Running her fingers through his hair, letting the tips of her fingers wander his jawline and stop at his lips, just to hear him shouting “rite of annulment,” feel him grabbing her arm with one hand and unsheathing his sword with the other. For more nights than she could count, she woke up screaming his name. She felt luck was by her side, because every time she woke up screaming his name, no one was around, but apparently, she was running out of it.

Not knowing why, she felt the need to run and hide; her body was tense, she felt the muscles in her legs and arms getting ready to flee. They were almost in her field of vision, talking about something her brain was incapable of absorbing when she felt her legs’ muscle contract, and she started walking in the opposite direction.

Wanting to go unnoticed she kept her head down, and that was stupid, she was living in The Gallows for more than two years now, but she didn’t know anybody besides Nina, she bet no one knew or cared about her either, but the fear of being seen by Cullen was bigger.

She had been walking for a few minutes before she realized she was heading to the templar’s training yard. The presence of the Qunari in Kirkwall had a direct effect on the templar routine, they were training more and longer than before.

Áine stopped to watch them, they seemed tired and frustrated, some recruits had a hint of fear on them. Something was up, but Áine didn’t know what, she really didn’t want to know about what was happening outside the circle, not because she didn’t care, but because she was trying to shield herself from more things that could hurt her.

Amell used to say that she was like a sponge, absorbing all the emotions around her, more than once, well, a lot more than once, Amell would call her a crying baby, she would say Áine was a big receptor of emotions because she would be happy when people were happy, sad when people were sad and so on, but especially because she could feel more than others.

It was there lost in thought that she heard a scream. A recruit was injured, and there was a lot of blood. The senior templar was carrying him towards the healers when he spotted Áine and came running to her, the healers were far, and the recruit wouldn’t have time to spare.

She asked him to lay the recruit on the floor and immediately started pouring magic on his wound. It looked bad, really bad. The sword had entered near his navel and went all the way through, exiting his right side. Deep down she knew he wouldn’t survive, but she had to try anyway. The senior templar had gone to look for more help, leaving her there alone, bloodied and with what would become a corpse in a few seconds.

A couple of minutes later she heard fast and heavy footsteps coming her way, and she prayed it was the senior templar, she knew if it weren't him, that scene would be almost impossible to explain.

If she thought she was running out of luck, she knew now it had run dry a long time ago, Cullen turned the corner of the building and the expression on his face…

“You, mage!” – His face was contorted in anger.

Áine stood up very slowly, her fear was so great she could hear the blood pumping in her ears, she held her hands high in a non-threatening stance. Cullen’s grip on the sword was so tight, she could see his hand shaking.

“Step away from him blood mage. I have seen too much to know how this ends.” – He approached her with his finger curled on the sword hilt.

He was coming closer, and with every step he took, Áine studied him. He seemed so old, so tired. The curls that used to hang on his head were cut short, he had dark circles around his eyes, there was no more kindness there… just something else she wasn’t sure. Hatred? Fear? It didn’t matter, whatever it was it was not kindness.

“Cullen, please listen. This is not what it looks like.” – She tried reasoning when he raised his sword to her face.

Cullen stopped watching, studying, never lowering his sword. It was close to her face; she could feel the coldness of the steel on her chin.

“Do I know you? You seem familiar.” – With narrow eyes he searched her face.

She didn’t blame him, she had changed in the last 3 years, she was a 16-year-old child, now she was a 19-year-old woman. She had a full form, her body had grown in all the right places, she had cut her hair as well, now she had it short, her raven curls barely touched her shoulders.

“It’s me Áine, from Kinloch.” – Her voice a whisper.

“Áine? What are you doing?” – His hands were shaking – “A blood mage? Why Áine? I had hoped…” – There was disappointment in his eyes.

“No Cullen, I’m not…”

“She’s here!” – The words startled Cullen that made an arc with his sword when he turned to see who was approaching.

“She’s here. I hope she was able to save him.” – The senior templar told to the other healers.

“Save, him?” – There was doubt in Cullen’s words. He turned to look at her, and there was shock on his face.

Áine was standing with her hands high, her eyes shut; she felt pain above her jawline, there was blood on her face. When she opened her eyes she saw Cullen looking down at his sword, there was blood on it too.

The other templars kneeled beside the recruit’s body just to tell her what she already knew, he was dead.

“I tried…” – Áine said at the same time Cullen apologized. – “I’m sorry…”

“Knight-Captain I’m sorry. He suffered an accident during training, and I’ve seen her around with the healers, I hoped she could help, so I let her here with him while I went to get more help, I knew the lad was in bad shape, but I couldn’t… I had to…”

“It’s alright, you all did what you could. Now please take him from here and make sure his family is notified and well treated.” – He sheathed his sword.

Áine watched the way Cullen spoke to the others; the way he relaxed his shoulder, rubbed his neck and took a deep breath.

“Maker Áine! Put your hands down. I’ve cut you, can you heal it?”

“Yes, of course.” – She nodded.

She placed her left hand on the right side of her face and started pouring magic into it. She felt the pain subsiding until all she could feel was a tingling sensation, but she knew it would become a scar. She never had to heal herself, she wasn’t quite sure how to do it, all she could do was pray for the better, but as it seemed with her luck… In the meanwhile, Cullen watched her, he was standing there until she was finished.

“Done. But I should see a proper healer now.” – She cleaned her hands on her robes.

She was aware that there was blood on her clothes and hair, but when Cullen approached and touched her cheeks… She instantly remembered the first time he had touched her, right after Aiden left the room all those years back, and the memory of Aiden brought tears to her eyes, and she felt her face redden with rage.

“I am so sorry Áine, I didn’t mean to…”

“It’s alright Cullen. I should go.”

Áine turned and started walking at a fast pace, she didn’t want Cullen to see her crying, to see the rage in her eyes. Somehow, she knew he was standing there watching her leave.

 Thank you for reading!

[doctor-sweet-blog]

Rock Bottom () [Stronglioness]

In which Nala goes searching for the truth.

@nala-calame

Further Reading: The Investigation Begins – Copper and Taka Liars and Loopholes – Taka and Rodmilla A Helpful Interrogation – Copper and Nala Truth is in the Eye of the Beholder -- Simba and Taka

[Dated July 15th]

[tw for talk of death/murder/detailed description of injuries/thoughts of suicide]

NALA: Nala needed to get a private audience with one Dr. Joshua Sweet. This posed a real big problem for Nala because of the following reasons:

1. She had finished her PT a couple of weeks ago and so she was not in the hospital nearly as much-- really,, she wasn’t at the hospital at all. She didn’t have any outstanding bills or reasons to come back, besides a few nurses who had become her friends.

2. Despite literally living three floors down from her apartment, Sweet kept odd hours and was never at home from what she could tell. In fact, he was always at the hospital, the very same hospital Nala didn’t have much of a reason to go to anymore.

3. She did have his number, but she didn’t think he was going to take her calls because--

4. Sweet hated her.

Ah, that last one really was the biggest complication of them all. The last time she’d seen the doctor had been a … mess. Before that, an even bigger mess, as she and Sweet rowed in the halls like two kids arguing on a playground. She’d felt awful just minutes after she’d walked away from that fight, had wanted to go apologize, but her stupid pride wasn’t going to let her. So no doubt, since Mr. Crowley’s death and everything that followed it, Sweet did not like Nala Calame and probably wasn’t going to help her break the law.

Oh yeah. Breaking the law. Should that go under number five?

Nala had to figure out a way around all these stupid complications, including her own pride, because there was no other way that she was going to get access to Simba’s medical records and get to the bottom of all the… strange, suspicious clues emerging surrounding Taka Lyons. Even going to Simba himself wouldn’t work; she knew Simba too well, and he would defend Taka to the death until he saw hard evidence that said otherwise. Not to mention speaking a word of the accident would turn him cold and hard before she got that far. So Sweet was the key, the only key that Nala had short of hiring a secret agent or donning a ski mask herself. She wasn’t there--yet.

So instead, Nala opted to… stalk Sweet. Lesser of two evils?

She contacted one of her better nurse friends, arranging a coffee date to “catch up.” Then, she slipped into conversation how much she wanted to apologize to Sweet. Make it up to him-- if only she knew when he was off his next shift. Then, when she had the hours in hand, Nala did what any normal, totally sane, not-desperate person did: she waited outside his apartment.

And when he came plodding up the stairs and saw her down the hall, Nala pushed off the wall and smiled at him.

“Er-- hullo! Do you, uh, have a second?”

SWEET: Sweet had been at the hospital for thirteen hours. He was exhausted, which was so normal for him he barely felt the tired, even though it lay heavy in his feet and in the center of his shoulder blades. That was where exhaustion was carried, but he felt it there so consistently, it was practically natural at this point. The shift had been decent. He’d been in surgery for five of the hours, an appendectomy, easy but at least it let him cut. And, besides, these days he wasn’t feeling as eager anyway, what with what had happened to Mr. Crowley.

Yeah, he was trying not to think about that. Though, apparently fate had other ideas.

As he climbed the stairs to his apartment floor and opened the door from the stairway, he felt like he’d run straight into a wall. That’s what determination felt like—what stubbornness felt like. It physically ground him to a halt. It was that, more than the surprise at seeing Nala camped outside his doorway, that had him pausing with his handle on the door, as if he was considering turning around and just walking away.

He wasn’t considering that, he was trying to tear down that blockade mentally so he could step across the threshold. It took him a few moments, maybe a handful of them, before he was able to break through and cross the hall towards her. He was too tired, and more tired still from that mental exercise, to greet her with a smile.

“Nala,” he said as he got close enough to speak to her without raising his voice and disturbing the neighbors. He went about putting his key in the lock without pause, knowing that resistance was futile. She was going to say her piece whether he liked it or not. He didn’t mind, for the record, he’d never begrudge hearing someone out.

He was just tired. He needed a tea and he needed to take off his shoes, in which his feet pounded.

“Come in, I was going to put the kettle on, and you can tell me what you need to tell me.” He was too tired to bother with covering up the fact that he knew she wanted something, and that she’d stop at nothing to get it. Worse case scenario he just had to lie (it was not much of a lie) and tell her it was written all over her face.

Turning the handle, he opened the door, walking in first but holding it for her, toeing off his shoes right there in the hallway as she scurried in. He closed it and motioned for her to take a seat at the island as he went about preparing the kettle for tea.

NALA: Sweet didn’t smile at her. Nala hadn’t expected him to. Still, he approached her with his drawn expression, his eyes heavy from a long day, she was sure, in the operating room or flitting through the hallways checking on his patients. She second-guessed her own strategy for a second. Maybe the hospital would have been the better place after all, maybe he would feel more open to talking, more willing to listen….

But even before the whole...Crowley debacle, she’d remembered the looks that he’d give her, spotting her in a patient’s room. They were half-amused, half-disapproving; Nala hadn’t taken them all that seriously at first. She didn’t see how her little visits could be such a problem. Wouldn’t it lift a patient’s spirits, make them stronger, more optimistic for surgery, to know they had people cheering them on?

But that was before Mr. Crowley. Now she knew. She had felt her own heart split, even though she’d not known the man for that long. Even now, thinking about Crowley in passing brought back a little of the pain, and the guilt, and everything else Nala had learned in her brief stays in the hospital.

Which was why she’d thought, hey, go to his home, don’t disturb him at work, show that she was keeping her nosy nose where it belonged-- uh, to an extent (ince of course, Nala wanted very badly to nose around the files that only Sweet could get access to). But was that the right choice? Was this mission doomed from the start?

Nala often felt hopeless tasks like that though-- she always tried anyway. So Nala took a deep breath and scurried into his apartment, glimpsing at the flag when she passed it. She already felt like an intruder, though maybe that was still her own guilt following on heel.

“Er, thanks. Promise it won’t take too long,” she said as she wandered toward his counter. She didn’t know if she should sit down, so she lingered there instead. She also didn’t know if she should apologize first or just leave it unsaid (what if he thought the apology wasn’t genuine considering she was about to ask a favour of him?)

Sweet bustled into the kitchen, Nala still standing there awkwardly. She bit down on the inside of her cheek. “Did you, er, have a good-- shift?”

Was small talk worse? Probably.

SWEET: Contrary to what Nala thought, Sweet was not mad at her. Not in so many words. Annoyed? Yes. But, the whole issue of Crowley was a sensitive one for him. He hadn’t lost many patients in his time at Swynlake General, so of course, they always hit him hard. There was this—magic—surrounding Swynlake, where, for all the mayhem that was caused, hardly any life was lost, not really. People here died of old age, they died of disease, or their own stupidity, or random accidents, but the magic? Freak storms and lucid dreams and time travel? They didn’t. Not really.

Which meant, that when people died of disease—or surgeries they didn’t necessarily need…yeah, Sweet was going to take it hard. Of course, he knew that if he rewound time, he wouldn’t do anything differently. He hated sitting around and watching people die, withering away and letting their bodies eat at them until there was nothing left. Crowley had a fight in him, he was brave, up until the very end and Sweet—he believed that Crowley wouldn’t have regretted it either. Maybe he wouldn’t have done it, if he had a chance to do it again, but Sweet didn’t think his, hopefully at rest, spirit regretted the decision.

Maybe Sweet just thought that to comfort himself.

And, hey, Nala had enough loathing and sadness about the whole situation for the both of them. She looked at him like he was the Grim Reaper, and it wasn’t that far off from the truth. For handful of lives he saved, one slipped through the cracks.

That was just the way of it.

Now, he went about the motions of making tea, those blisters, now a month or so old, scabbing off little by little as Nala’s frazzled nerves picked away at them.

Glancing over his shoulder at her question, he sighed before turning back to pulling the stash of tea bags from the cabinet. “Sit down,” he told her, not harshly, “I’m not going to bite.”

When the water had been placed on the stove, Sweet brought the bowl of tea bags over to the island and slid it over to her. “Work was fine, tiring. Didn’t kill anyone, if that’s what you’re asking.” He raised his eyebrows at her a little, quirking his mouth in what could almost be a smile. Gallows humor. A specialty of doctors.

NALA: If it was a joke, it was not funny. It was the opposite of funny.

She didn’t flinch, but she wanted to. Her heart pulsed in her chest, like it was an animal under the headlights. Is that what Sweet thought Nala thought of him? That he was a murderer?

She knew that their last meeting had been-- confusing and high-stress and her emotions had been frayed and she’d not been entirely herself. She’d said things she didn’t mean to say, things that she regretted even as they flew out of her mouth. There had been no taking them back. Now felt like the wrong time to take them back as well, so here they were, Sweet thinking that Nala thought he was a monster, and Nala thinking (no, now she was convinced) that Sweet hated her.

It was so uncomfortable, Nala wanted to wiggle out of her own skin. She hated people hating her. She also hated that Sweet thought she-- that she was capable of thinking--

“Of course not,” she said after that tense second. She dropped into the seat, her eyes darting away from Sweet’s toward the tea bags. She plucked one from the small bowl but didn’t put it in the hot water right away. No, she fiddled, feeling too many things at once right now. It was unusual for Nala not to know where she stood, not to know the right way to say something. She listened to her gut, but her gut was twisted.

Nala bit at her own lip then dropped the tea bag in the water, another second having floated by. She took a deeper breath and looked up at Sweet. And then she pushed away the rest, all that sordid history, all the things she wish she could say but couldn’t, not right now. She pushed away her guilt and her shame and her apology. She didn’t want it to be soiled by the rest of what she had to do here, tonight.

Nala was able to do all this because it was for Simba. That’s what she told herself. It was for Simba, Sarabi, InterPride-- it was for Mufasa, perhaps most of all. And she felt that now he was with her, and it helped her stay focused.

“I have a very big favour to ask,” she started. “And it’s a long story too. But I trust you and I think you can help me and my-- my family.” That’s what they were to her. Simba, Sarabi, Mufasa. Family. She’d do anything for them. “InterPride is trying to keep it quiet but you might have heard rumours by now that there’s an investigation. It’s on Taka Lyons, our CEO. Apparently there are funds missing, and the police has a reason to suspect criminal activity and all this has made me realize that--” she stopped, bit down on her own lip. It sounded insane even to Nala’s ears, but her heart was beating soundly.

“Three years ago, Mufasa was in an accident with his son. With everything going on, I have reason to believe that it wasn’t an accident. And the only way I’m going to know, for sure, is if you help me look at his and Simba’s hospital files.”

SWEET: Oops.

Sweet’s joke had obviously missed its mark. He really had just been teasing. It was one of the only ways to deal with the kinds of things that he had to deal with on a day to day basis. His grandfather had raised him to believe that death was a natural part of life—which was hard to remember when it was you who ripped the pancreas out of a man and let him bleed to death on your table. It didn’t feel very natural then. Sweet counteracted the guilt the only way people like him knew how—to laugh about it.

But, he should’ve realized that it would upset Nala. He’d forgotten for a moment that she wasn’t as hardened as the nurses and doctors at work. He had only seen her, really, in the framework of the hospital. All of his memories of her were from there—except the one where she’d sat across from him on that very stool. His wires had gotten a little crossed, and he felt bad, but he just took deep breaths as Nala’s emotions scatted apart like dropped marbles across a hardwood floor. She gathered them up, one by one until it was solid again, just one emotion in her chest.

Determination. And—a warmth, brighter than Sweet had ever felt coming from her, but it was the unmistakable warmth of love.

He smiled at her and his head tilted. “Of course not,” he agreed softly. And, he didn’t think that, not really. Of course she’d been shocked and angry. She didn’t understand. To her, he’d seemed reckless, and in the moment, it had hurt, the mistake too raw still. But, well, Sweet was a man who learned from his mistakes, and Mr. Crowley would unfortunately be added to that list.

Pushing thoughts of Crowley aside, he watched Nala intently ready to listen intently to what she had to say.

And, boy, was it something.

He had heard the rumors. There was no better place in town to get rumors than the hospital. And InterPride was huge, the biggest business in town, employing near two hundred people, if not more. There were nurses and doctors with family and friends who worked there. Rumors had been plentiful. And many had surrounded Taka Lyons. He’d never met the CEO himself, but he had heard things. Things that were hard to reconcile with Simba, who he’d always been fond of, who always was so genuine.

And, he’d heard about Mufasa’s accident. When he’d come to Swynlake, it was just a month after, and he’d been greeted by a hospital of mourning. Everything had felt muted and quiet, as if Mufasa had been a personal friend to every worker. Sweet felt his spirit sometimes still, when people spoke of him. There were not many with a presence that could evoke something like that in people.

To hear that he had possibly been murdered, well, though it was not Sweet’s place to feel it, the grief yawned wide anyways.

“Alright,” he said as soon as she had finished. He didn’t need to be told twice. He trusted Nala. And Sweet was, obviously, not above twisting the rules for the greater good. He was a doctor and a Magick, wasn’t he? Illegal on all accounts. What was one more illegal thing? And, if it proved a murder, well, it would only do good. And, if it proved that the car accident was just that—an accident, at least it would put Nala’s mind at rest. To him, there was no other option.

“You’ll have to meet me on my next shift, which isn’t for another two days. Three PM is when I should get off. Have the nurse on duty at the desk page me. Is there anything else that I should know? That you need?”

NALA: Nala really didn’t have any arguments prepared past Please. That was it, just one word. She knew that it was the right thing to do but she didn’t expect Sweet to understand. In fact, she expected Sweet to find her paranoid and crazy and honestly, she could be those things.

And she’d tried so hard to convince herself out of this. Ever since Copper had questioned her, she wrestled with her own instincts, the same ones that always screamed at her about Taka. She went through the same song and dance that she’d been going through for years. Look at everything he’s done for you and Sarabi and Simba. Look at how he stepped up. Look at the memorial he helped create. Look at all the projects he’s given you. Look look look.

And then her heart would snap back: But where was he before Mufasa died?

In the end, that was the kicker. For all of Nala’s life, Taka had been the colloquial thorn in the Lyons’ side, only Mufasa taking pity on him. Nala believed in second chances and she did think people could change, but it all felt too convenient. If she was wrong? The worst that happened was-- well, nothing. She was embarrassed, she wasted Sweet’s time, she apologized, she went back to beating herself up for what would just be her own prejudices.

But if she was right?

It was worth the gamble. It could mean giving Simba his life back and saving InterPride and avenging Mufasa all in one swoop. So yes, if Nala had to, she’d say please, and she’d find a way to put all of that into words.

Good thing she didn’t have to. Because it took one beat, and then Sweet agreed. Nala lit up, the surprise dancing across her face, though it quickly melted into joy.

“Really? I-- I mean-- thank you, thank you so much,” she nearly gushed, barely holding herself back. “I don’t think so, I-- is there anything you need from me?”

SWEET: Sweet didn’t need to feel the joy to see it on her face and know he’d done the right thing--but he felt it anyway, like a firework in his chest, and it made him smile back at her and he knew he wouldn’t hesitate to do this for her. It was for the greater good anyways--this wasn’t selfishly motivated on her part. She was trying to help her friends--her family.

“Discretion,” he told her simply. “As I’m sure you know, I am breaking several rules in order to accomplish this for you. I will text you when I am ready for you, so keep your phone near.”

With that, they finished their tea and Sweet showed Nala out, promising her that as soon as he got the chance, he was going to text her. They parted ways and Sweet showered and fell rather quickly asleep, no anxiety plaguing his thoughts as he drifted off. He’d been caught doing worse things before, after all, hadn’t he?

It was another three weeks before Sweet got the opportunity he’d been looking for. It would’ve been sooner, but Swynlake had other plans in the form of a nasty snow storm that had the Hospital running on backup generators for 72 hours. Not to mention the influx of patients with frostbite, hypothermia, and pneumonia that trickled in throughout the rest of the week. There was also a slew of bone breakage from people slipping on the ice, not in the proper attire for the weather. They had been short-staffed and stretched thin.

But, eventually he texted her: Meet me outside of the morgue. Ask for instructions from the woman at the desk. Tell her you are coming to identify the body of Joseph Order.

Then, he leaned against the wall near the bathrooms at the opposite end of the hallway from the morgue, a pair of intern scrubs tucked under his arm, and waited.

NALA: When Nala got the text from Sweet, a shiver had run up her spine, like another snowfall had hit the air and blasted through her lungs. It was a good kind of shiver though, not one of fear. No, Nala was excited.

She probably shouldn’t be excited.

She realized that, as she quickly rescheduled a meeting and cleared her afternoon for this jaunt into the bowels of the hospital. She was 26 years old and should have long ago outgrown her sneaking-around days. But it felt like primary, secondary-- even uni again. Like no time had passed at all from Simba calling her up on the phone with some kinda plan or another. Sure, usually their escapades were sorta silly, weren’t they? Sneaking into a party or spying on Mufasa. They’d never really done anything as illegal as what Nala was supposed to do.

She wanted to tell Simba so badly.

But she resisted. She knew that if she did that, Simba would be furious at the thought of Nala poking that nose of hers where it didn’t belong, and against his beloved uncle too. No, Nala had to get undeniable proof first so he couldn’t deny it and so he’d see exactly why Nala had to go with her stubborn gut. And it was with that mission in mind that Nala left work early, made a pitstop at her apartment to change clothes (couldn’t go on a covert mission in heels) and showed up at the hospital with her marching orders from Sweet.

“Oh, hey Nala!” chirped one of the nurses who was just coming around the bend. Nala smiled back and waved, but was glad that the nurse scurried on to wherever it was she was doing. She didn’t want any distractions and she didn’t want to be asked why she was here (she’d come briefly a few days ago just for a check-up following the snowstorm, but was cleared within a few hours; besides that, she and the hospital had become strangers again).

She started scurrying too, beelining her way to the counter. When she got there, she found the woman that Sweet had mentioned. It was showtime. Nala’s heart beat fast, but steady and strong. She wasn’t nervous; it was just that--that thrill. Maybe she wasn’t meant to outgrow it after all.

When she approached, she kept her face drawn, serious. “Er-- scuse me? Do you know where I’m supposed to go? I’m.. er, supposed to identify the body of Joseph Order.”

The woman nodded. “I’ll send someone to take you down.”

Nala didn’t have to wait long. Soon she was on her way, winding through the hallways to a part of the hospital she had never seen. She had to keep her eyes from lighting up when she saw Sweet waiting for her.  

SWEET: Sweet felt his heart tick up slightly at the sight of Nala, feeling her excitement in his chest. Typical. He really wasn’t surprised, which was why it was easy for him to keep his expression neutral as he pushed off the wall, keeping his arms crossed (the pair of scrubs tucked under his arm, hidden beneath his lab coat.) He smiled just slightly, a contained kind of smile, a smile of condolences.

“Oh! Hey, Dr. Sweet, what are you doing down here?” chirped Patrick, the nurse who had been guiding Nala.

“The grief counselor is not here yet, so, I’m going to be stay with--” he checked the clipboard in his freehand-- “Mrs. Order.”

“Right, I’ll leave you in good hands, then,” the nurse said, smiling at Nala and touching her elbow gently. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

Sweet watched as the nurse walked away, before pulling the scrubs out from beneath his coat. “There’s a supply closet over there--you should change into these.” He tilted his head in the direction of the closet. “I’ll stand guard.”

And then, a little smile did twitch on his lips. When she disappeared, he leaned up casually against the wall again, though, no one came by. The morgue was dead--ha. People only came down here when they needed to. Otherwise, they avoided it.

The door opened and Sweet turned to Nala, smiling again and snorting a little at her in the scrubs. “Suits you,” he teased for a moment before sobering. “Alright, here’s the plan: the man in there is Manuel. Almost everyone calls him Manny. He’s a friendly bugger, so you shouldn’t have a problem getting him talking. These are the papers for Joseph Order. Say you’re just delivering them down from the OR for Dr. Tibbs. It’s a simple job--why we make the interns do it.” He raised his eyebrows. “Strike up a conversation and keep him talking.”

“I’ll come in a minute or so behind you and head for the paper files. They’re in a backroom. I looked up the records on the computer--but there wasn’t anything. Though, I remember back in December when Simba came in for his appendicitis, there had been a report from the accident. It said--there were drugs in his system, but the detailed toxicology report hadn’t been completed. I’m hoping the original paper files have the correct information because it shouldn’t be like that. No nurse leaves that blanket, and our toxicology printouts have exact measurements.”

He shook his head a little, brow furrowing, disturbed at the level of possible deceit and corruption within the hospital.

“You should leave before me, just wait outside. If anyone asks what you’re doing just tell them you’re waiting for me. They’ll believe you. Got it?”

NALA: Nala listened diligently to her instructions, nodding a few times-- almost bouncing on her toes. She knew not to do that, she didn’t want Sweet to think she wasn’t taking this seriously. She definitely was. To Nala, this might be the single most important thing she ever did, even if it was a glorified game of pretend. If it meant she was right, then a pair of these scrubs were going to go a very long way.

So she took those scrubs and ducked into the other room, wiggling out of her clothes and into her new disguise as quickly as she could. It was funny-- once a long, long time ago, when Nala was jsut a little girl, she’d thought about being a doctor. She’d had plenty of big dreams like that, every single one of them involving saving the world (at least, Nala liked to think so). She didn’t remember when those dreams had stopped, at what age, exactly, her daddy sat her down and told her of the great things InterPride could do, and how lucky she was to be a part of it.

Part of it. Nala had never been separate. Which was why this mission was her business, why she had a right to be down here, why she would not fail. So she rolled up her scrubs once (they were a smidge too long on her) and then slipped out of the room again, glancing toward the door. Her gaze snapped back to Sweet, more instructions tumbling out of his lips. She absorbed it all. Manuel-- Manny. Distract, schmooze, keep him talking, while Sweet found Simba and Mufasa’s files. It was a straightforward enough mission, as far as Nala was concerned. And she was good at her part, good at talking to people. Hopefully this Manny wouldn’t suspect a thing.

“Got it,” she said. “Good luck, Sweet-- not that you’ll need it, ‘m sure.” And then with a smile, she snatched the papers from his hand and sauntered her way to the door, shoulders back, chin lifted, confident confident confident.

She opened the door and Manuel looked up right away at her. Nala put on her sunny smile. “Hey Manny,” she said to him. “ ‘M just coming to deliver some papers.”

“Oh yeah-- is this Order?”

“Yeah. Tibbs sent them from the OR,” Nala recited her line perfectly. But she meandered a little, turning her head side to side like she was taking a tour of the place. “Y’know, this is my first time actually down in the morgue. It’s not as-- creepy as I thought it would be.”

Manny snorted at that. “Good to hear. You’ll be down here a lot more ‘fore you know it. A good place to come practice if you have the time-- you are one of the surgical interns, yeah? Tibbs, you said?”

Nala nodded. This reminded her of uni improv class-- she’d not been so shabby, though she was always at her best opposite Simba. “Yeah, he’s brilliant. Already learning a lot.”

Manny chuckled. “Bet you can’t wait to get cutting, eh?”

Nala had no idea what that meant. Cutting what? Into people? That’s probably what he meant if Nala was a surgical intern. “Oh yeah, you bet!” She said anyway, that grin of hers bigger than ever, though now her gears were spinning. She needed to turn the topic away from her. She could only bullshit for so long and she hadn’t even heard Sweet come in yet. Had he come in, and she’d just-- not noticed?  

SWEET: Sweet waited for Nala to bounce off and he did his best not to panic. He could potentially lose his job over this, but he trusted Nala to keep it together. It wouldn’t take him long, the files would be right next to each other--he just had to snatch them.

When the door shut behind her, he paced up and down the hall once before opening the door right as Manny asked Nala about cutting. Jesus. Maybe this was a terrible idea. But, he wasn’t too worried, Manny’s heart was beating a little fast as Nala turned her smile on him and Sweet knew it’d be fine.

“Hey Manny!” Sweet said with a bright smile and a wave. “Dr. Calame.” He nodded at Nala, knowing it’d be more suspicious not to acknowledge her. Manny might not be up on all the gossip, but everyone knew Sweet and Tibbs were connected at the hip.

“Oh! Hullo, Dr. Sweet. What can I do ya for?”

“Not much, just gotta grab a file. One of the nurses put it into the computer wrong when they imputed it a while back.” He shook his head with a playful roll of his eyes.

“Ah, you know where they are.”

“Thanks, Manny.” He nodded to the mortician before slipping away into the storage room.

He heard Manny lean in as he left, asking in a whisper: “What’s it like working with that guy?”

Sweet smirked. He was sure Nala would have an interesting answer to that.

The file cabinets were lined up in a row and Sweet found 2013 quickly and easily, pulling it open quietly. Lyons, Lyons, Lyons.

There they were. Sitting there innocently in their manila folders. Sweet plucked them out quick and easy. It was so easy. It made him incredibly sad. If what Nala said was true. If what Sweet found in these files were true, then the information had been just sitting here, all this time. Collecting dust. So easily accessible. But, he didn’t dwell. After a minute or two, he stood up and exited the back room, making sure the files under his arm had the names facing towards his body. Nala was no longer in front of Manny.

“See ya, Manny!”

“Til next time, doctor!” Manny replied with a wave.

He let out a breath as he went back out into the hall. Nala was waiting against a wall. As he walked passed her, he nodded his head slightly, so that she’d follow him into the supply closet. Soon as they entered and the door closed, Sweet flipped open Simba’s file. Quickly his eyes scanned over the file.

“Jesus,” Sweet whispered to himself with a shake of his head before closing the file and shoving it in Nala’s hands. He opened Mufasa’s next, his stomach sinking the entire time.

Cause of death: blunt force trauma, crushed windpipe.

Medical examiner’s notes: Patient deceased on arrival to the hospital. Windpipe injury in cohesive with other car accident-related injuries. Otherwise injuries were rather mild--concussion, broken leg, several gashes, internal bruising, but no bleeding.

Sweet looked up, his face drawn and serious. “Nala, I think you were right.” He didn’t hand her Mufasa’s file. She didn’t need to know those details. “Simba had a dangerously high dose of rohypnol in his system, along with alcohol. He could’ve died just from the combination if the car accident hadn’t had him rushed to the hospital. Does Simba have a history of drug use?”

NALA: Sweet swooped in just at that moment, turning Nala’s head with the sound of his voice. She flashed him a polite smile, one that she had often given her teachers, which made sense if Nala was playing Dr. Calame (she felt all wiggly and giddy at the sound of it-- man, how she wished she could tell Simba all about this) and Sweet was one of her many teachers. It only lasted a second anyway. He came, he exchanged a few words, and then off into the files he went. Her heart thudded faster and she nearly didn’t turn to look at Manny when he spoke to her again. There was a beat.

But she wrenched her eyes away and smiled again, leaning closer to the man like she was about to impart some grade-A gold gossip on their mutual friend, Dr. Sweet.

“Oh, Sweet’s great, real friendly. Can talk a mile a minute I’m sure you’ve noticed. I’ve had to develop a different shorthand when I go on rounds with him.”

Manny laughed at that and leaned in himself. “I hear him and Tibbs-- that’s your supervisor right? They’re pretty close.”

Ooooo, now that was interesting gossip, especially because Nala knew Tibbs from her PT. Her eyebrows raised. “Well, they are real chummy,” she said, going along with the gossip. “You don’t think they…?”

Manny smirked and gave her a look that read: You know what I mean. He tapped the side of his nose. “Keep a look out.”

Nala nodded. “I-- certainly will. Thanks Manny. I should probably get goin’ or Tibbs will miss me. See you around!” And with a cheerful wave, she scurried out the door, letting out a breath on the other side. She had no idea if she had given Sweet enough time or if she should have stayed any longer but what’s done was done. She crossed her arms over her chest and keep her eyes on the tile. As long as no one came by…

The door swung open behind her.

Nala turned at once and saw Sweet with the files. His eyes were already on one of them, and she could tell, just by looking at him, that whatever was in those files was not good. Her heart plummeted straight into her stomach and she was scared to ask. She’d come this far and now, here it was, the truth at her fingertips. But Nala opened her mouth and no sound came out.

Sweet didn’t make her ask though.

Sweet looked up at her, the answer in his dark, soft eyes, and Nala felt parts of her crumple that she hadn’t felt in-- years. Since that night, when she got the call about the accident and she’d arrived in this very hospital in tears.

She was right.

Nala ripped open the file. She scanned it just the way that Sweet did, though most of it she could not understand. Rohypnol though, she knew. She knew because in her uni days she’d been an ambassador for the feminist group on campus and she’d led many seminars on date rape and similar crimes. And so her blood turned to ice and she couldn’t believe it. Though she could. Though everything was finally perfectly aligned inside of her for the first time in three years-- her head, her heart, her gut.

Her eyes darted back up to Sweet. “Nothing, just-- alcohol and a bit of weed here and there. Rohypnol, that’s-- that’s roofies, yes? Someone put it in his drink? He couldn’t have… been driving, could he? With that in his system?”

SWEET: Sweet could feel Nala’s pain in her own chest. Shock was like a drain, like a plug had been pulled and all the sudden your emotions were swirling down through you. From your brain to your heart to your gut, all the way down to your toes sometimes. Sometimes the water was so hot it burned, but this time, it was cold as ice. It made Sweet shiver. Underneath that water, it took him a second to get his brain back in working order.

He should’ve prepared better. He should’ve delivered this news more gently. But, there was no way to do so. Sweet had told people that their loved ones were dead before. It was always that same feeling--that draining of all emotion until you were empty and cold.

His hand came up and he put it on Nala’s shoulder, squeezed it. Touched her face gently for a moment. He wasn’t supposed to do that. It was too intimate. But Nala had been a patient of his, he knew her better than some stranger in a waiting room. Not to mention, this was murder. Sweet had not dealt with those very often in his career. Such a thing shook even him. The idea of a human taking another human’s life so intentionally. Attempting to take someone else’s life? And no guilt at all, so it seemed.

“No, Nala, he wasn’t driving the car.” Sweet could say that with certainty, because there--right at the top of Mufasa’s file, it said:

Reason for admittance: Automobile accident -- driver.

NALA: Nala had known the answer to the question that she asked, but she needed someone else to say it. She needed to hear her own thoughts said out loud so it wasn’t… crazy anymore. Simba was not driving the car. Simba was not driving the car.

All these years, he’d thought, and she’d thought, and Sarabi had thought. All these years, they’d all been in so much pain-- no one moreso than Simba. She’d watched him nearly kill himself. She felt every drunk word he ever used to lash out at her again, all at once, each one as sharp as a knife. And the worst thing was they’d all been pointless. Her tears had been pointless, the times she had begged him-- the three years he had disappeared without a word-- his family’s anger at him. Her anger at him. Pointless. Misplaced. She and Simba’s relationship had been shattered and crookedly rebuilt for… nothing. Taka had been to blame.

She should have known. How many times did she suspect Taka? How many times had she buried that doubt and beat herself up for it? It had taken her four years and all those days of pain to listen to her instincts.

Her hand shook as it held the file. Nala wanted to be sick all over it. When Sweet touched her shoulder, she flinched like she’d been struck, looking up at him. Sweet was still calm, solid, like a lighthouse shining through the storm. She blinked again at his hand on her cheek. It lasted hardly more than a second, but it moved through her like a wave. She wanted to burst into tears.

Nala sucked in a breath instead, turning her cheek and her face away from Sweet so she would not crumble. She could not now. What did she need to do--  ?

“I-- I have to, to tell Simba,” she said, with her voice shaking. “I-- need these. Can I take these? I can bring them back, I’ll bring them back.”

SWEET: He knew that Nala was going to ask that and he frowned slightly. He didn’t think it was a good idea for her or Simba to read Mufasa’s autopsy report. That was the kind of thing you could never unsee. And when it was someone you loved, those facts, written so plainly, by someone who hadn’t even known the man. It was going to hurt.

But, he knew that she wanted them for evidence. Sweet didn’t know the specifics. If her taking them from the hospital would invalidate them as evidence, which was why he hesitated. At the end of the day, though, if it was what Simba needed--if it was what would make the poor boy see the truth. Sweet couldn’t begrudge that. He knew he couldn’t. All he could do was try to warn against the kind of trauma this could cause.

Reluctantly, he handed the file over to her.

“Don’t read it, if you can avoid it. Don’t let Simba read it, if you can avoid it,” he advised solemnly and took a deep breath. “And be careful, Nala. Make sure someone stays with Simba. Make sure someone stays with you. If you need anything, call me.”

[throwingideasatthewall]

Clone Wars    The Jedi Who Knew Too Much

            (Terrorize a                  woman)

               An adult

             Also wait       I thought they said no one was killed?.

             Like back near the ending they were like                 “he was the only one,”

                  [Working                         With?]

     ??

              So Force 

                That it was never ever brought up that they were dead or what happened to them or just whatever

                  ...    

               Oh joy a funeral 

              with a shade of                        Eugenics

                  Dear                        Frick

                 (This is why I hate    funerals; Bad enough that someone died in such a terrible way that they couldn’t be accountable in return to their        home (which they should     have) and had as close to a peaceful       death knowing that they hadn’t inflicted further pain and suffering on their fellow man,

          No let’s just parade that shit around and make everyone feel as miserable as possible while encouraging that misery

        (Not imagine reminding them about        soon their life will be over)

                     Dic                         k-                         .                         Re-                      mem-ber                            -                          Oh yeah I really care about all those   unnamed people-                           -                            Also yeah let’s try to remember how they were [in life] well the fact that they are dead is robbed in their faces

                        And guilt-tripped

                   Dick.

               [Ahsoka stop being an assumptious dick during a moment of                      silence,]

                   Well I may not respect the concept of funerals        But I do respect the concept of                    If there were rules for an established event                       That you decide to participate in                           You should probably follow                         them,

                       [Empathy circle,                            Asking if sad

                       No shit Sher                             Lock,]

                         It’s a                                Funeral]

[also why does      Ahsoka,        Single               out        Barisse?          She isn’t crying or seems noticeably more upset than any one else,

    “My            Light saber,”

     My mentor         was doing          nothing,

        I know, “younglings”              But for the age we see them          learning about light sabers              There’s little to no chance that someone she learned besides,                 Could teach her anything,

           “ Live for the living Jedi,”

           Then why did you drag the body out of here and make people stare        at it?

        [like live for the living      that’s all good and good,             But part of that includes              not being a dick,            Doing your role to make the world a habitable and decent place,                And being accountable,                 (If you’re inches away from death                  maybe stay home).                 And while this is going                  old fashion murder,                            You’d would assume they would’ve sectioned it off if they were anything resemb                      ling decent                      People,

                 Like not just one place (lane).     for this dude to operate,

                  And in case of       sociality,                   This place wasn’t closed off (permanent) for multiple reasons

                 (Like seriously you guys want to gather around a place where someone died?)

      Point being;           Living for the           living means being          acc-ountable                  And not subjecting people to           staring              at your           dead body,        -

  Live through     us     . . .   Er-

 [But-   they already did their fair share of     living-

[apologies for the “gallows”      humor,

   Just...following       the conclusion of the episodes         focus on,

        Death

   [Point being; you can’t make me feel bad for someone who literally decided   fuck the environment        fuck life     fuck humanity,      i’m going to be a self-destructive       asshole,            And it kicked them in the          ass,

       [Like yeah yeah           loss of life very           tragic,             World is a            wor           -ser,             But that’s a            quick moment-              -] 

           -            [Also yeah                 Jedi life,                   ]

              Like screw all the cleaning                staff,

            Do they even get burials?                   (Weird hierarchy)

               Also, those were all                Jedi?

             (Like seriously          what were they doing down there?)

             Also yeah no wonder             everyone was suspicious,

             Like five Jedi down there for no                 established                     reason

             Weird glowy

              Barisse

              [Where’s                Luminara?

              You know,                      Barisse’s            “Men-tor,”            Authority             assumer,

                  Known                        for                        . . .                 being on top of                    things.                       . . .                            And control                        -ling-                             -                             Micro manage                              -                                “Mov,

                          Seriously     can anyone        leave       this woman alone        for five seconds. .

      Excuses she was already            terrorized enough by              Sky               walker                    .                    Still sucks,

              Why?

               Re-                public

               Jedi-

                How is Ahsoka part of the space military and doesn’t know that they answer to the space government?

                 [Did she think       they were just going to keep them locked up in the same       cell forever?

    No space trial?

     Like this seems       like a very stupid           excuse-          To get Ahsoka involved,            (And overly sus)              And terror      -ize this poor woman further

      (Note I know what she did was            downright shitty,

      (Assuming she didn’t give a false confession          under duress)

       That doesn’t excuse the      tox,-

      Clones kil-

    Seriously when      and why does everyone care about the         clones?

     Like ‘oh no the      (ex) child soldiers died!

        Yeah?

    Like they were “actual” people             (By their standards)        and Jedi            (Who seem to rank up pretty high on the standards, even get a separate burial, and getting a statement ranking their lives only              (Assumed authority             is shit)           right there,

      Ad-miral

     Also yeah      they have different legal systems       for different groups of people,          (We’re just going to paint                that as fine,)

           Like I know this is              assumed authority,               But that’s adding another layer of tox that I think should be             acknowledged -

          She’s guilty-

             Fair-

          Dealt with                    Did-

    Did Ahsoka just advocate for the       death penalty-          !?

     Like her hand moved in that         “over the neck,”             expression,                  .                   Revenge

       Dude this is more than venting 

      this is murder

     (Focus on the don’t         murder          part, before the painting with          broad strokes-          ,         (You’d think one of the older Jedi would be advocating for this           shit)

    A-hsoka

    Could’ve        been a nice moment,

     But the tone was off

     And it didn’t make sense

       ‘ The evid-ence              seems clear’?

       How would the      evidence have changed anything?

          ‘ things will never change,’

        Weird statement,

         - -            Military

        That’s a damn good idea considering they’re          peacekeepers

     (Oh yeah that’s the thing that’s thrown around pretty sparsely;               These guys are supposed to keep the peace,

          (Yet from the itchy trigger finger you wouldn’t think that)

           Never mind Anakin’s suddenly developed                    terrorizing tendencies,

          What would be good...

          If they played              it up for evil,

           And didn’t ignore the        unfortunate implications,

        “Peace Keeper(s);

    Hey, they actually called       them out for that bullshit,

     That’s good

     And yeah she is 100% deserves to be ashamed,          For enabling Anakin          last round,              And possibly            brutalizing,

   Note, there’s a difference between venting       and brutalizing,

    (Mostly decided by     emotions,)

    But still they killed more people         than is acceptable either way                              (0)

       Oh never mind she’s just bitter and completely ignoring the consequences of her actions

         (Yeah!)

   (This is not accountability      this is            Vigilante justice,              Trying to solve everybody’s problems            for them,           Which is the just not how it works,             You can’t assume               accountability for               someone else

             You              aren’t                 them

 [Author-ity]

    Strate-gy-

     Um?

    [What?]  Is.

    Is she    a master now,

     If not then where is          Luminara?

      And just           tasks?

       [i’m sorry but Luminara doesn’t seem like the type to assign that kind of work,

     Being pretty controlling

     And high on everything rule -abiding even their elitist attitude -        towards the jedi-

     Pretty sure    she would’ve sent a bot       or a servant        or something              . . .                Not      an     apprentice?             . . .?             ?   Literally nothing about Luminara?

       “friend”

   Assuming a lot that made they’ve only interacted       once and nearly died that      time,

     Also, comfort?

    Ahsoka is the only one that seems particularly    disturbed-

    Yeah      Barisse is soft-spoken             -                But         not really sad that I can tell

   [all of her speech has been well actively non-consequential and      nonsensical,

  That vague]

  Also yeah     Ahsoka feels bad,           After just say          -ing            Screw              You              To a general that reasonably pointed out that they’re peace keepers, and shouldn’t be interfering so much and so aggressively, in other people’s     lives

   (And that’s fair with Lord terrorizer but painted as it’s no big     deal,”          Over there)

     So yeah you can’t really make me sympathize with someone who just a essentially said “Screw being an accountable person,  I want to hurt people         (Beyond reasonable venting         parameters),          And possibly kill them,

    Yeah, no sympathy

    Young

     More so psychopathic,

      [Like pretty sure      she insinuated murder there,]

       What’s with the cell phone music?

         Seriously, look;   

 She’s fine

  This,

  Also     geez she’s jumping right into the         baggage?

  Like poor Barrisse,        She just wanted to go for a walk      and get some tasks      done    and this person is bringing in the tox,

   [Like seriously you don’t just randomly launch into a rant about the abusers and the system they created,

    Everyone already          knows,

    Stick to the talking when there’s something actually good to    share,

   [excluding         rare     occasions,           - ]

Dear frick      what have       I got myself.       into?]

   Damn poor Barrisse      is trying to get out of this            conversation..

     Like dude that’s against code...

     Dude..

    Haha, you’re so cool

   * through gritted teeth,           *please help me*,

      Genoisse

     * Dear god you’re bringing up that             terrible             situation*?

         -         

        [Help ME]

             ?

            Oh yeah that’s not a completely weird thing to say to             someone after a               mur-der      

                  -    

                  ?     

            [Ahsoka’s           projecting fucking..  

              HARD

               Please                     Leave

        Ha, ha , ha

        [that is a why-do-I-hang-out-with-you       ex       -pression-     -         Like Ahsoka clearly got the talent of starting a long rambling rant about random nonsense and subjecting the nearest person to it” trait from      Anakin         [Pre-quel]              -    

[Here’s a reminder that Barisse just wanted a book or some   shit

   To do her    “tasks,”          And got       subjected        to that,       -    

 [Wait this was an        all-call meeting-

       [Apologies for the           abundance of pictures           but I have a lot of thoughts             ,]

          [Why did Luminara and Barisse              get snubbed?

           How is Ahsoka?                  [there are                 -multiple things wrong                   with this-]

        Anyway-

           L-eto

       Because you’re a gosh             darn terrorist,             And out of the two Jedi she             probably knows-           Ahsoka is the least likely to go            {immediate death mode}.                    Probably             she is kind of death mody now,                         -                        Com-mander                             Tano,                        Really?                            -                                  Besides all the normal,                    not Jedi guards,?                                -             Because that smells of plot                      convenience,                           -                          Like she and Ahsoka barely had one conversation,            Where she enabled Anakin’s crazy assumptions and tyran          -ical ruling,              -            ?             -             [It’s-       a nice         shot-]          -          Whelp,            -           The      guarding system are real         weird here;           Sometimes it’s the      Centurions,         This is the real first time          we’re        see-ing           arc             -          Overly          competent,

        Also like      five people dude, chill

      Also the feck    are you telling her            this?

          Oh                —               Guilt?                 (Good)                     .                     ?                       .      [None of them have a red button            except for one,

                               Hm,     Oh yes it just completely open.    the door with no shields   and let the unarmed person go first,

     -           Also yeah      dick move       Ahsoka,

      You were     the Jedi to contact          -          Seriously,   not your attorney

      Oh heck even one of the older Jedi?

     The ap-prentice-            ?

      This is getting to               Mary Sue               levels                  of          “fecking unlikely,”.                   And             “unrealistic,”                   To establish how much of an      unrealistic unbelievable bad ass       Ahsoka              Is,

        Which, congrats,  I don’t believe it

       That a person living in subsequent poverty would know the name of one of the young to-be Jedis, Who reach-       ed such        renown       after            a few short missions,                Where not much was actually done,

             And she never had an official staring                   role, on her own,

      That’s pure wish fulfillment      and it’s pure bullshit

              [You know what would’ve made more sense?                      And I’m not excusing the story in any way                      I fecking         hate                it at this point,

            But,                    What if she was someone screwed over by some people                 smugglers?

                Who saw some serious crime getting committed,

                  And knew the name                     “Ahsoka,”

                    From stories of the other people that got screwed over                        by people                          smug                             glers,

                          Building on the past mythos;                                    Her adventures with the others

                           Esta-blishing herself as a                                smaller crime fighter,

                          Typically.                              asso-ciated with people smugglers,

                          And allowing her to get up a bit of reputation

                           Form her                               own name.                                -                                     Just                                  -a thought                                      -                                     Time

                                Wow Ahsoka’s a bitch                                               [derogatory                                                     non-identification)

                                  The animation...                                       is not helping,

                                         Mine,                                            Yeah you mentioned it,

                                                    Before                                                    She did                                               you fuckin watermelon,

Also,     

[Apologies.         I meant     to make it    smaller, Didn’t;     Happen,]         But point      being she really         is trash; 

    Over - judgemental

     Willing to go farther than          humane

     Willing to assume           authority,

          And yeah lady did terrible            shit,  

      But it was         five        people,       in a            war;

      If that’s what set Ahsoka off, she’s really not up to hearing about the boomer war

        Because yeah        boomer is far from innocent,

        But these are         boomers this shit is expected,  

         And certainly didn’t         add or require that kind of tone                or behavior;

  That’s          A        “You        Suck,”        And         a trip           to      accoun       -tability

            Also yeah let’s talk about the              tone here for multiple reasons;

               The Boomer isn’t the victim either

                But by God, does it try to fame it as such,

              When we come in,  

                 [and I’m not            doing pictures for obvious                      reasons,]                         They are cur-led up in a corner-                           Tone just barely making it about childify                            -ication

                        And I got to say this                           tone is fucking backwards,

                       With the elder boomer criminal,                             Portrayed                               with a unsteady unsure                                  scared tone,

                          Meanwhile Ahsoka,

  For my complaints     of being portrayed         Too young       for her actions,           Too old         for the        -tone,

       Is now portrayed                 even older,                With cyn-                   icism and defen-                  siveness-                      -                           Which doesn’t make sense since the        present Gen doesn’t have anything to defend,                      And has the un-certain tone                          (Usually hope-ful)                              The tones are completely wrong

                                       Right after it being said that Ahsoka acts young in many ways

    Instead of        acting           Like an old person who’s already         done their thing                 And has something to be        defensive about

   [not even the most toxic person       in present Gen,         Loses the uncertain tone         until their time is up,]

        And continues a constant theme of the series not having any patience and not taking the time to develop anything

       They want to have   , Ahsoka be cool and bad ass and say certain lines but don’t have the patience to work-       To develop it         properly,

    Causing everything to fall        extremely           flat;

   Re;verse          (With      correct          Tone,          Ass-      uming this is a          trap,)

     O; What are you doing here?

    A:   What you?

          [Door             closes             behind]

      O; [crack      Guess you’re not the only one              les;]             to fall into their trap,

       A; [Lifts        Tell me or -or              up]

        O;         Or- or                        what?!

                     It’s not                   in your character                         ,child

        A;        Maybe         [Slump      not         Ing]                           -     -           That at least feels natural             and not like a              body switch,                - - -                [also now you’re playing the death theme after he brutalized several people?]

            Like,               [Wow that was quite possibly the most pointless set up I’ve ever seen,                With several                   easy resolvable instances -                        Play it straight                             with not a drop of self-awareness to drink,

                         And because Ahsoka acted like a complete jerk ass I have no interest,

          Especially when they can switch her tone to                old by gone enabler

             [Good job taking any tension                or suspension of               belief, out of                 your story]

             ...