#{ Extinction Is A Thing Of The Past }

[oysterie]

scifi book about how humans poaching animals to extinction is bad had a throwaway line about how humans were able to completely eradicate mosquitoes -_-

[spearxwind]

Hey you've probably been asked this before so I hope this isn't a bother, but is your comic Extinction officially cancelled? I really enjoyed it, it was probably my favorite webcomic I've ever read and I loved the dialogue and characters.

Hiya! And it's ok I can answer it again

I wouldnt say officially cancelled, but it is definitely on indefinite hiatus for now at least

It makes me really happy that you enjoyed the comic and that it was your favorite!! Gosh It simply became unsustainable for me to maintain, juggling my irl studies, and the comic itself, as well as my free time and social life. Comic pages took a long time to finish, and my studies demanded more and more time from me most of which I spent drawing or writing for class, so for my free time I wanted to do other things in the end

Currently my focus is on other stories, though I still love Extinction to bits. I would definitely love to return to it someday and finish it or reboot it if necessary if my life stabilizes enough, but at the moment I can't dedicate so much time to it as I used to be able to

[lesbianboyfriend]

“gothic fiction is an obscure 18th-century genre made up of mostly large books that no one actually reads” NOT TO ME AND MY MUTUALS

[laplaces-lovecraftian-dick]

but everyday I think about the way yukari loves and remembers

[thefage]

I'm sure that this has been said before, but the most annoying part about a lot of sci-fi is when they are in a time or place where English 100% just wouldn't exist and all the characters our protagonists encounter speak English with no explination. Are we just meant to assume it's translated for audience convenience? That doesn't work when there is no possible way the protagonists could understand or speak the language of wherever or whenever they are. It's just plain lazy.

[gotinterest]

"The ultra guard might have protected the earth from an alien invasion or committed genocide! It's the end of the episode and I'm the narrator signing off in a weirdly cheery voice for someone who just suggested that our heroes may have just cruelly wiped out an entire civilization for basically no reason. We still expect you to view them as the good guys after this. Anyway, bye kids!"

[xoxohomicidal-cougarxoxo]

Early restoration for summer classes are already coming up, ugh.

I can't catch a break. I got call career services and set up an appointment before then. Because I got not damn idea what classes I really need to do and what path I'm going.

I was hoping to do this after spring break, but I guess not.

[true-blue-sonic]

There's a YouTuber called Luke Humphris, who has been making shorts of a world slowly rebuilding after citizenship has collapsed, and I like to imagine that that's how Silver's bad future starts turned out after Blaze sealed away the flames of destruction.

I looked at a couple of shorts, and those are beautiful drawings and animations that he made!🍀

We know Silver's future has other survivors in it, so perhaps they'll be helping Silver out too. I think Silver would be quite adept at being the main link of a community, actually; he's very proactive and both Blaze and Espio seem to put him in the role of the leader between them, in my opinion. As long as he's got levelheaded people around him to help with the decision-making, I think Silver will lead the rebuilding of the world at an incredibly rapid speed! <3

Hmm, I'm also thinking... This can never have happened since the events from '06 got wiped from time, but I also like the idea that he gets support from his new friends in the past. Silver's world is their future, and I think they'd all be itching to lend a hand and help him make his era just as beautiful as the past is!

[dxrknessembr8ced]

Okinawa Japan, 2:07 A.M.

Japan was once a luxurious and cultural island country full of life and beautiful landmarks however as the erebus outbreak subsided and new outbreaks from viruses that evolved from the T-Erebus virus now emerging the entire country become now a land of monsters, the undead and ravenous bio organic weapons running amok where survivors continue to fight for their lives however there are things far worse than the undead and the monsters from the virus that have accelerate their evolutionary change.

Something far more ferocious that they are the top of the food chain in all across parts of tokyo. There now a thriving race of such nightmarish mutated hybrids, genetically modified monsters that adapted to the now harsh environment they've been unleashed too. These genetically modified monsters are no ordinary bio organic weapons for the beasts are dinosaurs that have been brought back to life and all of them either hybridized or genetically modified through the usage of the original t-Virus and chicken embryos along with the DNA of other modern day animals and the dinosaurs by none other than scientist Dr. Lykos who had acquired from the Third Energy Criticality Incident back in 2009 during the Kijuju Autonomous Zone Incident back in africa of the same year from his little project he calls the carnosaur project.

How are they have been released happen to be by accident as his most perfect creations killed him as an act of defiance thus letting the dinosaur mutants roam free through japan thus destroying everything all about the carnosaur project as the dinosaurs he created would die off, until the outbreak hit years later as the T-Erebus virus have made the dinosaurs adapt better and live longer and thrive. Becoming a menacing threat to the undead and other bio organic weapons however unlike the dinosaurs and hybridize dinosaur mutations there is another type of dinosaur mutation. One so horrifying and far more dangerous making the other dinosaurs and B.O.W.s. knew to stay away. One that is more disturbingly human and what appear to be Dr. Lykos's greatest creation, a new breed of post human.

A post human that is both dinosaur and man and one that will thrive and repopulate for years to come into the far future marking another dark chapter in human evolution and for mother nature to strike back against man playing god. Extinction is the thing of the past...

[kiunlo]

our humanity as Australian Aboriginal people has been questioned vigorously ever since whitefella came to our fucking lands and i'm going to be honest i don't give a fucking shit if your questions about Aboriginal people are purely from a scientific evolutionary standpoint: asking how or why Aboriginal people are considered to be Homo sapiens is the most racist dogshit way you could ever fucking ask your stupid question. As if us Aboriginal people don't have to deal with racist cunts saying that we're extinct or that we're not as evolved as everyone else because we never "progressed" past a certain point or some shit (as if "progression" was some how necessary for us to support our communities and live our lives the way we wanted to). it is the most tone-deaf racist fucking dumb shit i have ever heard. i am now demanding that non-Aboriginal people actually read the many many pdfs and articles that are out there, made by Aboriginal people and by different Australian government bodies about how to work with or communicate with Aboriginal people and what is/is not allowed to be asked and other BASIC FUCKING INFORMATION ABOUT ABORIGINAL PEOPLE because you whitefella are acting so out of fucking pocket that i truly believe that you need to read this shit so you actually start acting respectful when it comes to Aboriginal issues and you know HOW to actually talk about these issues without talking over us or being a shitcunt about it. and yeah one of the PDF's is 51 pages long. suck it up and read the whole thing and don't complain about it to me.

[bixels]

End-of-Splatoon thoughts.

Thinking about how since the very start, Splatoon has had a feature where players can draw and post artwork and spot them as graffiti on walls or billboards. Or how the weapons have always been paint brushes and rollers and ballpoint pens. Since its inception, Splatoon has been dedicated to engaging its players with the act of creation and creative expression, showing them how their art can build communities and (literally) change the world.

Thinking about finding golden human-made music discs buried underground for thousands of years, and a grand finale music festival. About the Voyager Golden Records. About those human handprints etched into concrete in Alterna. Did those human artists know it would end like this? First a fiery death and then, eventually, a worldwide celebration of music to represent our shared past, present, and future. Did they know that their songs, insignificant in the face of extinction, would one day become the solution that will save the next dominant life-form from the same fate?

Thinking about how eerily similar the Octarian domes are to Alterna. About how close Inklings and Octolings were to repeating the same mistakes as humans. But their doomed fates were undone not by some miracle technology or military power or a rocket, but by music.

Thinking about how humans wiped themselves out with war, and our parting gifts were liquid crystals that somehow paired with the DNA of primeval inklings and somehow infused them with our memories and culture and a Song. And 12,000 years in the future, that same Song will end a war.

Thinking about how art and music and punk culture and rock & roll and friendly competition and petty arguments and water guns aren’t uniquely human concepts, but the fundamental qualities of intelligent life. An inheritable spirit that can cross evolutionary bounds.

Thinking about the theme of Splatoon, that art and music and fun will not die with the human race. That every piece of art we create is a seed we sow for future generations to reap. That our legacy is ingrained into the crust of the earth. That long after we’re gone, the oceans will remember, and they’ll pick up where we left off.

Thinking about how Splatoon says that the essence of humanity –– the thing that will outlive us –– isn't war or prejudice or destruction or greed, it's a song.

[driftingballoons]

What's your favorite paradox pokemon, and what's a pokemon you'd like to see get the paradox treatment

My favorite paradox pokemon would have to be Slither Wing! Volcarona was already one of my faves, so when I saw a fluffier, more stylized version of it, I was enamored <3

As for who could get a paradox form…

Serious answer: Chandelure! I’ve seen all kinds of cool fanart with them as a paper lantern or something similar, which could work well for a past form, and a future form could have them with an LED bulb controlled by a touch screen interface that doubles as their face when idle. 

Less serious answer: Gardevoir/Gallade should get past paradox forms in which they’re part fighting type and just look like cave people. Ethereal and elegant kirlia evolutions are OUT, they deserve the chance to be feral >:)

[lizzybeeee]

DATV Spoilers - The Story We Lost

Posted earlier that I was compiling a list of lore/story threads that have been dropped with DATV's handling of Southern Thedas. The sheer number of things means that I've made this into two parts - this one focusing on all the story threads that have been effectively dropped.

Spoilers for the game ahead, of course.

If you've played the game then you'll know that Southern Thedas - everything from the past three games - was basically swept away by the blight.

A double blight should have catastrophic consequences for the entirety of Thedas, I don’t deny that, it’s nothing short of a mass extinction event – the absolute worst case scenario for all of Thedas.

However, waving away the fact that Southern Thedas - specifically every area you ever traveled to and interacted with in previous games – is gone, devastated by the blight, in a codex entry and line of dialogue makes it abundantly clear that BioWare is attempting to clean the slate so that they can move forwards with the game series with no ties to the previous ones.

The Warden, Hawke, and the Inquisitor effectively accomplished nothing.

As I put it in another post: I never expected them to consider every decision in game outside of the three options they gave us, but I certainly didn’t expect them to go scorched earth on the possibility of ever seeing the results of those decisions either.

How the lore has been handled in this game, summarized to “the elves did it” and “there’s been a shadowy organization in the shadows pulling the strings on everything” is absolutely devastating to the franchise.

The lack of care with which this was treated just bleeds, “There, we’ve answered all questions and finished with this era of Thedas. Moving on now.” At the same time, this destruction absolutely obliterated whatever story threads remained from the first three games.

Could BioWare bring these threads back? Yes, I suppose. But it doesn't change that it was so carelessly thrown aside in the first place.

If they didn't want people to care about their decisions and the impact they made on the world, perhaps they shouldn't have made that a feature of all the previous games.

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Story Threads/ Plot Points that were dropped:

Limited my points to what was in the Dragon Age Keep and what points were brought up frequently in codex entries, conversations, etc...

Edit: I never expected all of these points to be answered in DATV - this is just a list of what was effectively brushed to the side through very bad handling of lore and story.

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Dragon Age: Origins

What is the line of succession in Ferelden?

Things are looking very grim for Ferelden's succession and the Theirin/MacTir line if nothing is done. And nothing was done. The entire plot of DAO literally culminated in resolving this issue, yet no one seems to have learnt a thing from it?

- Anora ruling alone is unmarried with no heir - Alistair ruling alone is unmarried with no heir - Ruling together they have no heir - Alistair and a Cousland Queen have no heir - Anora and a Cousland King-Consort have no heir

The only potential candidate that can fit into several of those world states is Kieran.

Fergus Cousland, according to lore, is the second closest to the throne that is confirmed to be alive in DAI - potentially the brother in-law to the King/Queen of Ferelden.

Ferelden's succession with Alistair as King hinges on whether or not the Warden was able to cure the blight. Alternatively, it is hinted that he may be more resistant since he has dragon blood in him from Calenhad.

The potential implications of Kieran being the bastard son of the King of Ferelden.

Kieran being used as a political pawn to depose Anora using the Theirin bloodline.

DAI took away whatever destiny Kieran had with the Old God soul – that didn’t mean that BioWare had to take away everything else too. Regardless, it doesn't matter. Denerim and Redcliffe have fallen to the Blight - it's unlikely that any of this will ever be brought up again.

2. Did the Warden find a cure?

Unknown. Irrelevant.

Ferelden ended up blighted. Denerim fell. If Ferelden rises from the ashes, it will be without any sign of their influence. Any mention of them will likely be their title alone - no mention of their accomplishments.

3. General Questions about the Landsmeet

What happened to Anora if Alistair is named King? Who rules the teyrnir of Gwaren following the blight?

What happens to Alistair if he's exiled? We know Teagan finds him in DA2 but what happens after?

If Leliana becomes divine does that mean that Connor Guerrin is potentially an heir to Redcliffe?

4. Companion Plot Threads

Morrigan's sisters - the many daughters of Flemeth.

Shale's quest to reverse the process of becoming a golem.

Whatever the hell Nathaniel Howe was going on about when you run into him in DA2 in the blighted thaig.

What, if anything, Avernus leaned from spending a literal age or two studying blighted blood.

5. Zevran's Crusade against the Crows

RIP Zevran's one-man crusade against the Crows and their child slavery ring.

DATV messed up immensely by portraying the Crows as more of a ‘found family’ rather than the horrifically abusive organization it was set up to be.

The very same organization that preys on the weak and disenfranchised - honing them to be tools for the nobles/powerful of Thedas - are now the heroic freedom fighters of Antiva.

The literal decade he spent hunting down the Crows and their leaders is up in flames. No mention in DATV whatsoever.

Wasted a perfectly good opportunity to have a schism in the Crows, with Zevran at the helm of kicking out the antaam, taking in Crows who are are sick of what's happening.

6. The Dwarves of Orzammar

The impact of Bhelen/Harrowmont's reign - ruthless progression verses strict traditionalism

The rumours of an uprising of the casteless dwarves in DAI

Will we ever hear of noble House Brosca or Queen/Lady Rica? Nope.

Will we ever hear of the son that Aeducan can have with Mardy? Nope. (RIP Duncan Jnr - I still love you)

The Anvil of the Void and potential links it may have to the Titans.

If Branka lives what happened to her?

No more fine goods direct from Orzammar

The entire caste system has been simplified by Harding in DATV to effectively be: 'surface dwarves' and 'deep roads' dwarves.

7. The Magisters Sidereal / Awakened Darkspawn

According to a codex in the Descent: one went mad, consumed another, and the final magister fled into the Deep Roads.

Corypheous + Codex Magister + the Architect (most likely) = 4/5 magisters remaining? Possibly?

Reminder that it's hinted that there's an eighth Old God that was struck from the records of Tevinter.

The Architect and his Awakened Darkspawn.

No, it was all the elves. They're all dead now anyway. Thanks BioWare.

8. The Guardian and the Urn of Sacred Ashes

"Where did you come from, where did you go? Nobody in Thedas will ever knowwwww."

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Dragon Age 2

Dragon Age 2 was pretty self-contained, with most things being tied up in Trespasser or DAI. The worst of the plot points abandoned relate to the companions in the game and the lack of closure/answers about them.

General Questions:

Kirkwalls, apparently, endless line of 'provisional' viscounts and constant political instability since Varric ran off to go after Solas.

According to DA: Absolution the Red Templars are still in Kirkwall...yet the show is set after Trespasser - when Varric is viscount? When he mentions that they threw a parade when getting Meredith out of the Gallows?

Aveline, Varric, Merrill and whoever remains of the Kirkwall crew apparently just allowing red templars take over the Gallows?

What happened to Petrice if she lived?

What happened to Feynriel if he went to Tevinter?

If Hawke lives following DAI - where are they?

I have a whole list of lore that's also been brushed over: the Sundermount, Corypheous, the Band of Three etc... I decided to put them in Part 2 since I feel they fit in more with 'lore obliterated' rather than 'abandoned plot points'.

2. Companions

Merrill's Eluvian:

Merrill spent years fixing an eluvian with a piece of string, a potato, and some gum - managing to actually do it.

And it meant nothing.

Eluvians are now a fast travel hub - all mysticism and awe at this marvel of magic are completely gone. Whatever sacrifices Merrill went through to save her sliver of elven history is meaningless.

Imagine if Merrill's eluvian aided in the fight against Solas - if having it intact gave you an advantage against him. Imagine Merrill weeping as Bellara fixes every other single eluvian in ten seconds with her magical omnitool.

Fenris and Slavery in Tevinter:

DATV utterly trivializing slavery in Tevinter is abominable.

Disregarding everything Fenris went through, everything he ever fought for, and making it something barely touched upon in DATV is insanity.

You wouldn't know there was slavery in Tevinter if the Shadow Dragons didn't drop a line or two about it.

Fenris' entire story of going to help free the slaves is diminished because no one wanted to show the ugly, dark side of Tevinter in DATV.

DATV has retroactively made this choice for him to be so unfulfilling.

Where is Anders?

What happened with Sebastian's crusade against Anders? Was he ever captured? Was he executed? Are you telling me that no templars ever pursued this man fanatically after what happened in Kirkwall?

Does his fate vary if Hawke was friends/romanced him?

Varric appointing a new Viscount’s Keep healer called ‘Banders’ who just happens to sleep in the same room as Hawke and their children call him ‘daddy’ lmao

Does his fate vary according to who is Divine? Vivienne hunts him down, Cassandra puts him on trial, while Leliana pardons him?

How does he react to Leliana abolishing the Circles? How much does he weep when the rebellion fails and the mages are destroyed? This man instigated the starting event for DAI and drove most of DA2's major plot and he's just...gone.

The Hawke Siblings:

From DAI we know that Warden Bethany/Carver are safe, but what happened to them if they're in the Circle?

Give us Knight-Commander Carver and First Enchanter Bethany Hawke, you cowards! Have them dismantle the Gallows and be the shining examples of human decency we know they are.

What happens to them after DAI and the Mage/Templar War is concluded? In a world that can embrace or reject them - how do they find their place?

Varric

Trespasser gave him a satisfying conclusion - he's viscount, he's in his shit hole of a city, he's surrounded by the people that he loves and cares about. He has the chance to truly build up Kirkwall after all the shit its gone through.

It just feels so bitter, so meaningless, that they gave him the end that they did in DATV. Varric should never have been the one to go after Solas - the only reason it was him was because he's a popular character in the franchise and was used to draw interest.

Why not Cole?! Who was literally mentioned in Trespasser as being on hand to help his friends - who has the ability to get through to Solas in a way no one else could?

No proper send off - no acknowledgement from those who loved him as to his fate...Varric was reduced to a marketing gimmick to draw people in who wanted to see if he died or not.

Isabela

Isabela's story was brought to a close in DAI - she became an admiral, got a fancy hat, helped the Inquisition, and kept in contact with those she loved/Hawke if defended from the arishok.

Imagine bringing her back in a terrible outfit, having the most sex/gender positive character misgender another person, and making her part of the group that steals cultural artifacts from others.

The tomb of Koslun and Aveline would like a word with you?!

The entire Lords of Fortune group is also extremely bland? No commentary on the ethics/effects of colonialism/cultural appropriation - because confrontational topics/ideas are not allowed in this game. Just like topics of slavery/indoctrination.

Her entire character just seems to have regressed from DA2. Why bother having her cameo in the game if she's not going to meaningfully contribute/comment on whats happening?

Edit - Thanks to bunnyiscthulhu for reminding me that Isabela's mother sold her into marriage...yet she does nothing when Taash's mother is outright forcing them into a life they don't want. Isabela, who believed that everybody should be free - that no one should be forced into a life they don't want, just...lets it happen to another person?

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Dragon Age: Inquisition

What's going to happen to the Red Lyrium that's popped up across all of Thedas?

Ferelden, Orlais, Kirkwall - all areas are reported to have red lyrium on the surface.

What happens to the Red Lyrium in Suledin?

DAI speaks about how they can never stop the spread of red lyrium, only slow it – animals, insects, organisms - whatever life is in the ground is all susceptible to becoming blighted by red lyrium. Suledin Keep in particular was utterly devastated by the Red Templars - what happens to life there?

2. What happened to Corypheous' Inner Circle?

What happened to Samson? How long did he live *if* he’s given the chance to help Cullen? Can something good come from his cooperation?

What happened to Calpernia?

Looking at previous concept art for DATV she was a companion - freeing slaves, gossiping about Samson & Corypheous. Just...what a waste. Any potential insight we could have gotten into Corypheous is gone.

3. The Mage / Templar War:

How does the world vary if you conscripted vs allied with either?

How do the remnants of what faction was not chosen fit into this new world?

How does the world deal with abominations and weird magic shit now? Is an alternative to the Order made if it's wiped out in DAI?

How is Cullen's templar clinic doing? If the templars still exist, how is Divine Victoria changing/adapting the Order to better support mages/templars?

4. Wicked Eyes and Wicked Hearts:

How do Orlesian politics reflect who was made ruler?

Is Gaspard looking to expand into Ferelden once more? Are the elves being brutalized under his rule like they were by his chevaliers? Does he do away with the grand game like he threatened in DAI?

How does this differ if Briala has collared him? How do his supporters feel that Briala has his balls in a vice?

Do Celene and Briala stay together? Do things improve for the elves and for the culture of Orlais at large?

Do improvements for the elves mean that Solas' arguments to his elven agents are less persuasive?

If Florianne is alive what the hell is going to happen to her? How quickly does she fall on her blade after being forced to wear flat shoes for the rest of her life?

How quickly does shit fall apart if you get all three to cooperate lmao

Friendly reminder that DATV sets up that all of Orlais, except for the Winter Palace has been overrun by the Blight - and that a coup from the Venatori is inevitable, likely resulting in any ruler dying.

5. What is the line of succession in Orlais?!

Why does every noble family in Thedas have no contingency plans for if their head of government dies?!

Part of why we needed to resolve the leadership problem in DAI was because there was no clear, direct heir if Celene died!

Celene has no heir Gaspard has no heir

Florianne planned to frame Gaspard, murdering Celene herself, leaving no clear heir to the throne - Orlais was already in a civil war, the council of heralds/nobles would have all campaigned in their own interests...that was why this was so important!

Orlais shortsightedness and pride in their nation being the greatest in Thedas led to them almost falling in a single night!

6. Here Lies the Abyss:

What are the ramifications of having the Warden's exiled verses remaining in the south?

Trespasser literally states that there's a schism in the Order because some Warden's believe they should touch grass more often and not listen to some bloke up in Weisshaupt for what they do down in the south.

Perfect opportunity to have the wardens remaining in the south mean something! Greater numbers in the south means that there's a greater chance of holding against the blight - while greater numbers in the north can effect if Antiva/Tevinter end up blighted in the first attack!

How does public perception towards the Wardens/King of Ferelden change when they learn they were exiled for committing human sacrifice to demons?!

Give us a warden coup and First Warden Alistair / Blackwall, you cowards!

7. The Well of Sorrows:

What was the point of drinking Mythal's bathwater?!

It's been set up as something that changes you. Bound to Mythal forever?!

Retroactively, Solas feels like he's going mental about nothing! One of the few times he ever breaks - he begs you not to - and...for what? Nothing.

DATV does not acknowledge that in the slightest. Such a waste and disappointment of what was made out to be an impactful decision in DAI.

Imagine if the Inquisitor drinking from the well made us forced to fight against them during the fight with Solas - imagine if Solas, in a world state who hated the Inquisitor, used them as a puppet! Just like the envy demon in DAI - and no one notices until its too late. Imagine Mythal herself, wanting Solas to go through with his plan - (or one of the other evanuris) using an Inquisitor/Lavellan he loved as a puppet - imagine the horror he feels as another one of his friends is reduced to nothing more than a mindless slave of the evanuris once more. Imagine the devastation as he watches Lavellan lose all sense of self - perhaps swaying him to, maybe, not go through with his plan?! Imagine having Cole come back to help save the Inquisitor - or Solas begging Rook to save them.

8. DLC Implications:

What happens if Hakkon is not slain? What happens to Southern Ferelden and the Avaar?

How does the rest of Thedas react to the truth of what happened at Red Crossing and the Dales? How do they react to learning that Inquisitor Ameridan - First Inquisitor and leader of the Seekers - was a dalish, elven mage?

What happens if you do not save the mines in the Descent DLC? How badly is Orzammars economy crippled? There are already rumours of riots occurring within Orzammar - it this enough to push the caste system over the edge?

9. Elven Uprising and the War with the Qun:

The elven uprising that was implied to be occuring all over Thedas as a result of years of oppression, systematic abuse, and Solas’ influence? What happened to it?

Where are the agents of fen'harel?!

It was set up that Solas was planning to use this rebellion as a smokescreen for his plans - the elves, all rebelling for good reason, rallying to his cause while Solas planned to restore the world that once was. The rest of Thedas would only see an elven uprising, not knowing the true face behind it until it was too late!

The war between Tevinter and the Qun?!

Everyone conveniently forgetting that the Qun literally attempted to assassinate every noble family in Thedas? Why was there no exalted march because of this? This should have destroyed any accord between the chantry and the qun. There would absolutely be blood for this – Tevinter could have attacked the Qun and all of Southern Thedas would have applauded - no one would have differentiated between extremist qunari and the normal qun, especially not after Kirkwall.

The implication at the end of Trespasser that we could convince Solas to abandon his plans? Him saying that he welcomed giving us the chance?!

The difference that the Inquisitors friendship, love, or hatred could have in either convincing Solas to take another path or damning him to go ahaead with his plan, no matter the cost?

Have our decisions in previous games matter! How we treated the elves - if we worked to better their lives or 'put them in their place' - can be used to convince him that the world can change! Have the ripple effects of these decisions be seen when the elven gods return, blighted - does the world turn against the elves, hardening Solas, or does the world defend the elves from those who would blame them?

Why was Sandal in the Crossroads?! Where is Bodahn?!

10. Divine Victoria!

How does the world of Thedas change with Leliana, Cassandra, or Vivienne at the head of the chantry?

How does Tevinter react to having a mage divine?!

Do relations change between both nations because of this?

Leliana allowing elves, dwarves, and even qunari to join the Chantry! Leliana also allowing members of the chantry to get married if she's romanced by the warden.

What happened to the Seekers? Are they being rebuilt?

Does the chantry inform the masses, the rest of the mages, that they can CURE tranquility?!

If either Leliana or Cassandra was romanced - what are the implications that may have on the chantry?

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

No wonder the writers insisted that none of the past choices would have an impact on Veilguard - they literally went scorched earth on everything we ever did.

Ferelden is blighted - any legacy of the warden is gone.

Kirkwall is destroyed - any impact Hawke had is gone.

The hard won peace/order of the Inquisition was rendered meaningless since every single place that you went to and helped is now destroyed by the blight.

Orlais' ruler will likely be assassinated by the venatori who are plotting a coup with the nobles - making whomever you chose obsolete.

AND IT WAS ALL THE WORK OF THE MAGICAL ILLUMINATI FROM ACROSS THE SEA???

[moo-chemia]

So the cumplane runaway au has been in my mind rent free for the past two weeks and so I churn this out so pls excuse the word vomit as I explain what happens in this au.

SQH and SQQ realizes the other is a fellow transmigrator way earlier before the immortal alliance conference (in between the skinner demon arc and the demon invasion arc) probably due to SQH unknowingly outing himself and begins bonding with each other. SQQ brings up the sun moon dew mushroom and neither were planning on getting it until after the conference like canon. That is until they begin seeing how stressed the other is about their respective jobs/narrative roles after some drunk bonding sessions and convince the other to fetch the sun moon dew mushroom tgt and plant it so that they can fake their deaths to avoid doing paperwork and their narrative roles (SQH’s idea) and maybe go monster hunting/sight seeing around the world of PIDW instead (SQQ’s idea).

So during the IAC they fake their deaths just before SQQ has to push LBH into the abyss. SY and SQH wake up 5 years later in their plant bodies and immediately go monster hunting rpg style. They work as rogue cultivators and also trade in any rare monster parts to earn further income. They camp out during the night and huddle for warmth around the fire while reminiscing about their past lives (plural). They visit an abandoned temple for a forgotten goddess only to run into the cult that worships said goddess, causing them to almost be midsommar-ed. They visit a supposedly cursed sea only to run into the sea creature ‘haunting’ it and barely escaping with their lives. They visit lost cities to find supposedly extinct beasts and go bury treasure hunting, etc etc. Cumplane basically tour PIDW and have their best life (mostly) free of stress.

Meanwhile, if we rewind back to the IAC just after SY and SQH faked their deaths, SQH’s body is obvs now soulless and dead but the system forces SJ’s soul back into his og body and LBH still gets pushed into the abyss anyways opps. In the aftermath, SJ explains what happened with SY!SQQ and how basically SY and SQH are transmigrators and their whole situation from what SJ understands. SJ was a ghost all this time after the system forced his soul outta his body and he was lowkey haunting SY but SJ wasn’t always conscious, he probs only saw what was happening with SY!SQQ half of the time bc of the system. Cue Cang Qiong trying to track down one temporary SQQ and their logistics peak lord bc CQM is kinda burning down without him (and also to make sure both are ok)

Meanwhile, LBH speeds through the abyss and plans on taking over Huan Hua like canon and through some protagonist IQ bullshit that I’ve yet to come up with (probably through a grieving MBJ who's kinda been going crazy in the northern desert?) he realizes that SQQ is SJ but not his shizun, and he learns that CQM knows both SY and SQH are still alive and are trying to find them. LBH abandons his plot on taking over Huan Hua to team up with MBJ to find their two not so dead peak lords. 

Cue CQM vs the demon lords racing one another to find cumplane first for 6-7 years. 

Now back to cumplane. The two are enjoying their adventures together for a year or two after waking up in their plant bodies when they run into LBH and MBJ arguing with LQG in a village they’re travelling through. Cumplane realizes both the demon lords and CQM are trying to find them for some reason and panics when they overheard that SQQ is somehow still alive even though SY is right there and panics harder when they realize OG SQQ is back. Cumplane runs for their lives thinking they're fugitives now because their previous sect and the two demon lords are there to kill them/arrest them for impersonating a peak lord.

This is all I got for this au so far lol, this is still a wip so some things might change

[zstartrixxx]

𝐋𝐄𝐓 𝐌𝐄 𝐓𝐀𝐊𝐄 𝐂𝐀𝐑𝐄 '𝐁𝐎𝐔𝐓 𝐔, 𝐃𝐀𝐑𝐋𝐈𝐍'.

ʳᵉᵐᵐᶦᶜᵏ ˣ ᵛᵃᵐᵖꜝʷᶦᶠᵉ ʳᵉᵃᵈᵉʳ

𝐑𝐄𝐐𝐔𝐄𝐒𝐓: 𝐘𝐄𝐒 | 𝐍𝐎

𝐒𝐔𝐌𝐀𝐑𝐘: If being loved by a vampire means carrying eternity within you, what you have with Remmick is incarnate: his poison lives in your flesh, you are blood of his blood, a creature of his making. And because you are a part of him—a fragment that broke free and passed into you, sometimes even a sliver of his ancient soul trapped inside that dead body—everything you feel, he feels, and vice versa. Fleeing the imminent extinction of these lands, you and Remmick seek refuge in each other once more, bound together. Eternally, for he would never let you sever this tie—unless he were dead. Past and future memories knot inside you. Here, now—all blood and teeth—you fuse with your maker, your sacrament, your eternal groom. 𝐀𝐔𝐓𝐇𝐎𝐑'𝐒 𝐍𝐎𝐓𝐄𝐒: this particular piece was a deeply interesting and special writing experience for me: not only did i get to explore the hivemind concept, but i also played more freely with language and the essence of remmick as a character. so let me make one thing clear: it’s never my intention to distort the film’s canonical portrayal, but rather—through poetic license combined with the possibilities of fanfiction’s universe, PLUS the way i’ve absorbed and interpreted the character—my version of remmick (at least in my fics) might not be as literal as the original script. that said: here we have this scenario with a wife, which i initially imagine takes place before the film’s events, but the specifics of when, how, and where she was transformed are entirely up to your interpretation (before his arrival in the us in 1911? somewhere between the early or late middle ages? the modern era? europe, asia, or africa... let your imagination run wild ;) i’ve also paraphrased/incorporated certain very specific lines and moments from the film. 𝐖𝐀𝐑𝐍𝐈𝐍𝐆𝐒: +16 CONTENT. i think there's a lot of angst here and reader melancholy, so keep that in mind. use of some words in gaelic, i had to resort to good old google, if there is something wrong please tell me. remmik here it's (super) protective, almost toxic; hivemind concept explored, lots of internal dialogue, some gore (explicit description of blood and bruises), vampirism (blood consummation), and a slight sexual innuendo thrown in. 𝐖𝐂: 6k for whoever is going to read it, a great read! <3 likes, reblogs and comments are greatly appreciated :)

𝖱𝖤𝖬𝖬𝖨𝖢𝖪 𝖯𝖫𝖠𝖸𝖫𝖨𝖲𝖳 | 𝖬𝖠𝖲𝖳𝖤𝖱𝖫𝖨𝖲𝖳

"turn to me, and love me like you lacerate; just hold me down like i don’t need air." (air, shedfromthebody)

Your skin burned like Hell itself, which was kind of funny to think about: back when you were human, you loved spending your days under the hot sun, lying on the grass in the late afternoon and gazing up at the cloudless sky, where strange shapes would form just for you. You wasted away the days at the lake, naked, floating between water and sunlight, between cold and heat, simply existing.

Now, all you could feel was the searing pain ripping through your skin, sizzling in your ears like meat in a frying pan. Weak, you tried to run, but your legs wouldn’t obey, and your feet tangled with every step across the dry land, scattered with dead corn leaves. The rustle of the leaves irritated you, but what truly drove you mad were the screams echoing from behind, drowning out any coherent thought, merging with the heavy air that entered your lungs that no longer breathed. And that felt like a death sentence: not only the sun was paralyzing you, but also the distorted sounds that confused you, like a wounded animal, utterly disoriented.

You stopped in the middle of the cornfield, glancing around, trying to stay grounded, trying to reconnect the thread of thought between the two of you, searching through the suffocating haze for Remmick’s voice, calling him with panic and urgency, desperate for him to come save you. You looked at your shoulders: raw, scorched, smelling the acrid scent of burnt flesh rising from your own body. You shut your eyes, trying to find him, your voice lethargic: “Remmick… Remmick.”

Your vision began to darken, your body no longer felt like your own—it felt like it was floating, detaching, as if your soul—or what was left of it—was slipping out of you. Just like you’d felt a piece of yourself dying the last time you glimpsed sunlight through your human eyes, maybe ceasing to exist in that land would feel the same. All you had to do was slowly close your eyes, embrace the darkness once again, surrender to the searing fire that would extinguish you—and that would be it. You opened your eyes slowly, staring at the mighty sun before you: scorching, like your mother’s hugs, your grandmother’s kisses. Like Remmick’s grip when you were still human. Your entire body burned, tiny flames piercing through you, tears of blood trickling from your eyes. How long had it been since you felt even remotely human? All you had to do was give in, speak the one name that echoed in your mind, etched into your blood.

Remmick.

In poison and blood, within you. He was you and you were him. Remmick.

‘—Remmick, if you can hear me one last time, know that I—’

“Got you!” his voice came, rough and wounded, behind you. Firm hands grabbed you by the waist, your body partially covered by another, pressed against Remmick’s rigid frame. He whispered against your ear: “You’re safe, mo chroí (mu khree / my heart). Come with me.” He pulled you even tighter against his scorched body, shielding you like a protective shell, guiding you with quick steps into the heart of the cornfield. In the distance, the furious screams of some villagers echoed behind you. But despite the world turning into hell around you and everything seeming like the end, you felt safe in his arms.

Remmick looked back, staggering, using his sharp senses to search for any possible escape for the two of you. His left eye was swollen from the punch he took, combined with the sun’s deadly effect, and even with limited vision, he managed to find a way out from the horde chasing you.

You couldn’t stay upright. The sun’s weakness made it feel like your bones were nothing but dust beneath your scorched flesh. Tears of blood stung your eyes and soul, or whatever was trapped inside that immortal body, sharing a collective mind with Remmick and so many others before you. It longed desperately to escape this life and finally rest. But Remmick wouldn’t let that happen—oh no, let the pagan gods or the Christian God himself punish him with the harshest tortures if he did. You could feel that wrathful pain mixed with ancient rage flowing from him, harshly projected in flames and poisonous blood from him to you, as he nearly threw himself on top of you like a (scorched) leather jacket just to protect you. Madness. The voices grew longer, more indistinct, the hateful chorus fading, as Remmick, with his one good eye, searched for shelter.

Then, as if by magic, fate, or just the luck of some devil who still wanted to see you both wander through God's vast lands, there it was—a house beyond the edge of the cornfield. The perfect shelter. ‘Living food, darkness... —Remmick, don’t get your hopes up.—’ you thought back, replying to your creator’s voice with a sarcasm that didn’t quite match the moment. As always, he laughed—loudly, though the laugh came with dry, desperate gasps. He laughed. Even all fucked up, more than you, sizzling in pain and crying in despair to stay alive, he still found humor in his own misery.

“You’re getting real cheeky, huh, my little thing?”

“You’re the one who taught me to be like this, Remmy,” you managed to say, despite the bitter taste of blood rising in your throat—extremely unpleasant when it was your own blood boiling inside you. Remmick glanced over his shoulder, noticing for now that you were safe. He looked forward again, at what seemed like a mirage of a desolate wooden shack, dark, with the door and windows shut. It looked uninhabited to you. ‘—Love, don’t be so hopeless. Of course, there’ll be someone in there to be dinner. Or rather, lunch, given the time.—’ his voice cut through again, tugging you sideways, his hot and battered hand grabbing your forearm, where deep layers of your dermis were starting to show, making you let out a faint whimper. Remmick gave you an almost hurt look, immediately releasing his grip.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

“It’s fine. What’s a squeeze compared to almost melting under the sun, right?”

“You’re something else...” he muttered in disbelief, though his voice was laced with distress and anguish—a soft hint of the pain he was enduring. —If he died, you’d go with him by extension, in the worst possible way.— That was what was running through his disturbed mind, making you wonder whether you’d ever have a happy ending under those conditions. Remmick quickened his pace, and you followed beside him, feeling like the path to the house was more of a road to Hell than a material refuge. You were starting to believe it was a mirage and the Devil was waiting on the other side to welcome you both into his lap. ‘—Pathetic, darling. Pathetic.—’ ‘—Just like you, sweetheart.—’

Remmick ignored your retort, dragging himself up the steps, changing his expression as he began to shout for help. A wounded animal, fatally injured, a hoarse rasp clawing out of his throat, begging for help, pounding on the door with force. The sun’s haze was poisoning him—and therefore you—draining what little strength was left, forcing your bodies to absorb the foul smell of rotting flesh; even if your lungs didn’t breathe, they still had the cursed privilege of smelling. And even as supernatural beings, defying all human logic, you were still condemned to be inside those fragile bodies, exhaling the scent of flesh, blood, bone, thick saliva, venom, and a unique perfume your walking corpses carried. Not decay, but something more… floral? And that specific scent, like night-blooming jasmine in a graveyard or a dried rose in your garden, grew stronger as the mortal flesh imprisoning your immortal soul deteriorated.

Remmick kept pounding on the door and maybe—just maybe—with a little more effort, he’d become the first vampire to break the universal law by forcing his way in without being invited. He looked at you, distressed, his expression one of real pain. You pulled away from him, walking to a window layered in thick dust, wiping it with your palm. The cold, gritty surface scratched your sensitive skin even more. You peered inside and confirmed: ‘—There’s no one. It’s empty.—’ Remmick looked at you, almost dumbfounded, hearing your inner voice. He turned to the door, where simply twisting the doorknob opened it. The air inside was cold and stagnant, dust and mold, old wood and moth-eaten fabric, with an unwelcoming scent—but still, it carried that unmistakable smell of an uninhabited place. No human warmth or familiar energy.

Remmick was so relieved he dropped to his knees, like a devout soul who, tired of resisting sin, finally accepts divine punishment in good faith—arms open, body surrendering as he let himself fall into the house. You stood beside him, watching with a mixture of mercy for the poor wretch who was suffering, and with that sharp pain—hating, in a way, to share with him the memory and the collective sense of it all, because his pain was also yours.

Remmick crawled inside. You followed him, on your feet—weak, but standing. You looked one last time outside, toward the distance beyond the cornfield, where, by some divine mercy, those who had hunted you seemed to have gone. Just above, the burning afternoon sun pulsed like a condemning god, seated upon his sky-blue throne, mercilessly casting down his punishments upon you, poor wicked creatures.

You shut the door with a long groan, echoing the moan of the vampire now lying delicately at your feet—a strange sound between a whimper and the whine of a frightened dog. His hands were stretched above his head, face pressed to the floor, writhing from side to side, somewhere between fragile and furious at being forced into such a wretched state.

Through your mind, you could feel him tearing:

‘—These monsters will pay. As soon as the sun sets, I’ll hunt them one by one, haunt them in their homes, show them my wrath and my cruelty. Blood, blood… blood.—’

Your mind was now lapsing into a time far older than you, to a moment when Remmick’s humanity had been broken by the vampire’s curse—when the strangers came and took his land, his name, his faith. His prayers were converted, and all he saw before him were silver crosses and plaster Jesuses while he was taught the Lord’s Prayer. All of it disturbed you deeply. He clung so tightly to his roots that it made you feel everything: the fire of the scorched land, the spilled blood, the faithful ones he later killed one by one, the lands devastated by plague and by gold.

You closed your eyes, trying to impose your memories over his—to interrupt the bond that was bigger than either of you. You tried to think of blooming gardens bathed in sunlight, lazy afternoons of picnics and reading under trees, nights of endless dancing and joy.

Remmick stopped thrashing. His shoulders stilled, and his whimpers faded as he was slowly filled with his own memories, gradually regaining his strength and sobriety. He propped himself up on his arms—once feeble and lethargic, with bones eroded and flesh still scorched by burns—then raised himself and looked at you, a crooked smile forming on his lips:

“You’re always taking care of me, a aingeal.” (ah ang-yal | my angel).

“I was just trying to make you stop with those nightmares disguised as memories. I’m aching all over.” Your voice was somewhat harsh, despite your weakness, as you leaned your body against the wall, between the door and the window, where dust managed to dimly filter the sunlight. You were safe from the condemnation of the light.

Remmick rested his head. A look of sadness, lit by the darkness in his pupils, stirred something in your heart that no longer beat.

“I can’t let go of who I once was… even after all these years, there are pains that scar between our flesh and our soul, binding us to them forever…”

“I know. I know—” you smiled, somewhere between honesty and levity, trying to stay upright, feeling your body pulse and bleed, crying for healing. Remmick was in considerably better shape than you, even in his sorry state—his cotton shirt filthy with mud and dust, torn and bloodied from burned flesh; his pants tattered, shoes worn through, one bruised eye set into cadaverous skin with a polished hunger. He was enduring. The dark gifts made him far stronger than you. “—I’m just not in the best condition to relive those pains with you, not when mine are a little too real right now.”

Remmick nodded, drinking in your words, staring at you with glowing, coppery-red eyes—dim yet luminous—finally seeing your pain. His face twisted with worry and a flicker of anger as he staggered closer:

“Mo ghrá geal” (muh grah gyahl | my bright love), “they really hurt you, didn’t they…”

Then, Remmick recalled the grim scene when one of the townsfolk had found your hiding place—a house just as old and decrepit as the one you now sheltered in. The two of you were lying there together, side by side, entwined like tragic lovers, waiting for death—and maybe that had been part of the attraction, for just a few more seconds in that eternal rest, and you would have had a truly tragic end. Remmick remembered the moment the light from a blocked-out window was smashed through and the burn that followed. He opened his eyes instantly. You were still locked in your unshakable sleep when they grabbed you by the arms. He had fought men wielding torches and harvest tools. Then you saw it through his eyes: your body being pulled away—a blur. And you felt his fear and desolation as he fought off the frantic villagers to try and save you.

Then the man’s voice rang out again, clear and strong, a wounded hand touching your face with surprising gentleness:

“We almost didn’t make it out of there… If it had been closer to sunset, not a single one of those bastards would’ve made it—”

“Remmick.” His name traced your lips and tongue, thorny like the man himself. “They’re not to blame for acting the way they do—just like we, flawed murderous animals, once acted. They too have the right to want to destroy us. Wasn’t it you who taught me that human truth? That’s how we lived before we perished. That’s how we’ll go on existing, as long as we do.”

“Existing.” He clicked his tongue, and a sudden shadow passed through his eyes. For a second, his mind grew too clouded for you to read, to hear—but the visceral rage boiling in his venomous blood, oh, that you felt, bitter as it burned your dry throat. Dryness began to crack your lips. It weakened your warm body even more and made you feel the dark delusions start to crawl through the corners of your mind; that’s what happened when you weren’t fed—no matter how exceptional your self-control was, and even if you could resist without the human liquor for days, when you were in that state of true death, your body nearly collapsed.

Remmick dragged his pitiful, suffering gaze across your face. Around your minds, words in ancient Gaelic spun like ancestral chants—he was thinking about something beyond you.

His hand slid up to your face, grabbing your hair from behind, gripping it as he gently pulled it back, exposing the soft, burned, but still velvety skin of your neck. The cradle of your sacred blood—from where he had once drawn your human warmth into himself and given you, in return, the venom that turned you into him. And even though your heart no longer beat as before, when he first heard it, and your blood wasn’t warm enough to quench his thirst anymore, it was the vampire’s opium.

Remmick always thought of that comparison when he grazed his fangs lightly against your skin before penetrating it to anesthetize himself in your ecstasy:

‘—Your blood was sweet and warm when your heart throbbed between your ribs. But now, with my lymph and the poison of my being, it tastes better—bittersweet, undead. Our blood.—’

It made you moan and whimper.

Your hands pressed against his chest, palms open, trying to push him away from you:

“Remmy, are you sure about this?” you looked at him uncertainly, trying to find in him the assurance for the act.

Remmick didn’t answer you with words—not the kind spoken aloud:

“As weak as we are, there’s no one here, my love. Either we drink from each other, or we die like strays in this godforsaken place. Feed on my blood before you cease to exist…”

It wasn’t a request anymore by the time he was already pulling you closer to expose your neck, pressing his rough lips and sharp teeth against you, piercing the skin like needles.

Remmick held onto this belief that he didn’t need to ask much of you, because as you were one mind, everything he wanted was what you desired too.

Your eyes closed as you felt your flesh torn by his fangs—hard against your skin, like a stiff piece of leather being pierced by a sharp knife—until it reached where the blood, crawling weakly through your body, began to emerge in thick sobs, filling his mouth with your syrupy, bloody liquor. You were consumed by the burning and the sensation of ecstasy the act gave you, your body floating in the hands of the man who groaned with primal pleasure at being nourished by your life source.

Remmick also held the belief that since you carried his seed—that divine-profane gift of eternal life within your blood—through the consummation of acts and the laws of an ancient soul, you were part of a whole that pulsed with life. His life, yours, and those who would come after you both, all connected through that cursed and blood-stained lineage.

You squirmed restlessly in his hands. His claws were already out, tangled in your hair, scratching your waist as he held you as close as possible, bound to his pleading kiss.

Remmick whispered to you in thought:

“Mine, mine, mo mhianta (muh vee-an-tah / my desire), my life, my blood…”

—like a prayer, a rosary he recited bead by bead, his body burning as he inevitably felt his venom enter you. 

“Remmick—” your voice was pure wine of death, your nose the iron scent of flesh, your mind a stupor of souls that preceded you, strange voices you had learned empirically, faintly recalling the vampire Remmick who crushed you between teeth and acid; “—I think that’s enough, my love.”

Remmick let out an exasperated groan that vibrated against your mark, sucked a final portion of blood vigorously, licked the flesh slowly, then rose, revealing his face intact and free of wounds, his chin smeared with your crimson iron honey, eyes shimmering like copper pearls between iron and bloodlust. He smiled at you—there was heavy panting from paused lungs, a fresh breath, an almost spiritual renewal of his being.

“You are so delicious, blood of my blood, that it’s impossible not to want to drain your last blessed drop.”

He laughed—cursed and amused—raising his wrist to his own lips, biting it as if biting a pomegranate that exploded between his teeth, flesh and juice dripping at the corners of his mouth already stained with your blood; he extended his open wrist to you like bread to the dying, an offering to his god, waiting with generous eyes burning in the insane passion of his soul for yours.

His mouth salivated with the yearning to take it for himself, to drink from that wine that intoxicated you once and every time you drank it—in nights of lust where you feasted on the delights of the flesh, it intoxicated you.

There were sparks in your chest that burned from Remmick’s venom in your body, making you remember when he took you for himself, forever; Remmick appeared like a chorus behind you, chasing you through the darkness of forests and ancient buildings, ruins of nights wandering without meaning, inviting you to let him enter you repeatedly, giving him what he wanted, feeding the beast with your youthful joy, the beating heart—that which he had lost centuries ago, perhaps millennia. Life.

And once, proving that his love for blood and pain was greater than all lust or pleasure given to you, he offered you his ultimate love: he penetrated you with teeth and curses, buried memories imposed on you, suffocating you, watching you die before him, rot like a flower once beautiful and vibrant, now dry and hardened. Watching you rise with bright eyes and his bestial thirst, laughing and dancing with him, celebrating your new self. Or was it a piece of him, while you were trapped between so many layers of the one who created you?

And yet there you were, looking at him with veneration and anguish, taking his wrist with your misshapen fingers, claws that extended in excessive knots, placing your mouth against the torn hole that poured that offering of his flesh.

Oh, Remmick had your flavor too.

Sweet death he exhaled, primal sex and poisoned wine.

Feeding you slowly, bringing through that damned mortal sap your salvation.

You felt yourself revive, whining softly against his wrist, looking with complicity as Remmick watched you with the pleasure of pleasures on his face: parted lips, arched brows, eyes sparkling with desire and ardor. You smiled back, returning that passion, a hiss escaping from his mouth, pleasure bending between the memories shared through blood. His mouth detached from the bite’s embrace, a dull snap of flesh pulling away, the vampire’s blood dripping in sticky, thick drops like a whip on the wooden floor, a small pool of that iron blood separating you both.

He tilted his head back, satisfied, with a jubilation of pearl-ruby teeth, saying full of himself:

“Now we’re better!” He laughed between his teeth, while you felt his blood slide through you, healing the stigmata on your skin, slowly and pleasurably renewing you—him crawling between your bones and flesh, burrowing deeper into you as he pierced you with those eyes.

Remmick drew closer, your hands returned to normal, fingers caressing your now-soft skin, leaning down to kiss your lips with the sweetness of his honey staining them crimson, whispering through your mind:

‘—All we need now is rest, and once night falls, we can celebrate this moment together.—’

Eternal promises. As always, typical of him.

You welcomed him with open lips, tongue caressing his, you and he merging—blood and saliva, venom and the growls from the depths of your thirsty throats, your hands tangling into each other, desperate grips of bodies that loved each other through finite eternity.

…

In your dreams — or in that cathartic state of complete darkness of rest — all you had in your mind were the outlines of dreams of humans who had wandered through the eternities beside Remmick. You were a peasant in Irish lands, an English priest with golden teeth, a mathematician in Arabia, a physician from Prussian soil, a single mother prostituting herself in the streets of Whitechapel; everything and everyone. You were a pagan elder turned faithful parish priest. A hopeful young woman turned the vilest of executioners. Everything and everyone — and him.

Him.

Emerging in red, blue, purple, and black, from the shadows, blood dripping from his chin, stealing souls and stories like a devoted collector, a historian digging through pages and pages for what might fill his own gaps. Remmick pulled you by the hand like a savior — or a beast. That blurred in the shadows and forms, as he brought you into the light.

The light of consciousness, of being awake, of knowing night had finally fallen and you could once again wander among humans.

You opened your eyes with a sharp blink, seeing through a timid penumbra lit by a single candle — who knows where the hell Remmick had found it — exhaling, while he gently caressed your face, the tip of his finger tapping lightly against your nose, a serenity on his face that, under the warm golden light, almost seemed human. You smiled, rubbed your eyes, and let out a vocal exhale — a human habit you’d kept not to feel so detached from your nature — wetted your lips, surprised by the nudity of the man sitting at your side on that old bed, hard mattress, rickety frame that had served perfectly for your rest.

At the window, beyond the drawn curtain, a few wooden planks nailed to keep sunlight out were now opened, allowing the pale-silver glow of a Full Moon to shine on you. Between the bluish-gray mingling with the candle’s yellow-red, his slender and muscular body — shaped by the years when he was just a man of the land, using his bare strength — stood naturally before you.

His face, smiling at you tenderly, was damp, drops of water clinging to his nose, ears, and chin. A scent of dried flowers and soap wafted from his pale skin. His voice was soft:

“Come with me, a aingeal,” (ah ang-yal | my angel), “let’s take a bath to wash off this infernal day.”

Laughter spilled from both your mouths — irony mixed with ease — as his hand gently pulled you up, guiding you barefoot across the wooden floor, echoing down a narrow hallway toward what must have been the bathroom. Remmick nodded toward the wooden bathtub. Beside it, atop a chair, several candles were stuck upright with their own melted wax, casting a flickering light beside the moonlight that poured silver through the window.

“I cleaned it a bit before using, fetched some water from the well, and luckily found some flowers and a dried-up bar of soap lying around. Seems like the people who lived here left in a hurry — there’s still canned food and clothes in some closets. Let me help you!”

He placed the candle on the chair and undressed you, slipping off your dress and tossing it aside, smiling at your nudity, placing his hands at your waist as if admiring a statue sculpted by his own hands — a creation of his creation.

“Sit down. I’ll bathe you...” he said in a velvet tone, guiding your body into the cold water, which wrapped around your skin as he began to rub it with water, fragrant flower petals, and diluted soap.

And there you sat, still, watching him care for you — though you knew well what he was thinking.

‘—The hunt, the revenge against those who inflicted pain on us and—’

“Remmy…”

Your hand found his, pulling him from the depths of his thoughts, gripping the hand that tended to you, “...stop, at least for now. Just think of something else.”

“What else could I possibly think about?”

“In other things, I don’t know, think about music, about dance, about me...”

“I don’t need to think about those things because they’re already in me, darling. It’s almost a pleonasm, as that old professor we ate once said, remember?”

“The one we ate? What an absurd thing to say!”

“Sweetheart, seriously?” Remmick tilted his head to the side, a mischievous little smile playing on his lips. He stopped rubbing the dried blood off his neck to look at you with cynicism. “You, of all people, who loves sinking your teeth into those juicy necks that show up for us!? You, blood of my blood, my own creation, poison of my poison who...” he paused, narrowing his eyes, his voice coming out in a thin whisper, “loves sinking those pretty little teeth of yours into the most unusual places!?”

A daring finger touched your lips, slipping between them, lightly scraping your canine with its nail. You stared at him calmly, studying him in that unashamed nakedness, amused by you. Rolling your eyes, you pushed his hand away from your mouth.

“Pathetic. That’s what you are sometimes.”

“I love you too, my darlin’.” He chuckled through his teeth, returning to wiping the bloodstain from his skin, focusing on the act. Even in that silence made of voices loudly spoken, your minds were speaking through images, memories flowing back and forth in a stream of consciousness, undulating like the water that surrounded your body, tracing that eternal conversation you both had. Deep down you knew he wanted to go out hunting, to get drunk on fresh human blood, and then return to this shelter, take you in his arms and possess you in the most animalistic way possible. But on your end, you still felt his venom lingering through your body, the blood that had served as both nourishment and healing still casting a haze over your senses. Ancient blood from someone who had lived so long it carried stigmas. Strong, dense, defiled, concentrated.

Remmick finished scrubbing you, stood up from your side, and left the room, staying outside for a few minutes, leaving you immersed in the water and the moonlight. Thinking. For a moment, your mind seemed to detach from his, floating through the corridors of your own being—you saw yourself among humans, walking barefoot, feeling that burning thirst in your throat, the bile of anger tormenting you even as your melancholy made you ethereal; sucking foreign blood, capturing life stories for yourself. Remmick reached out a hand to you—a claw—with the ghastly smile of all the dead, always whispering to you: “Mo mhianta” (muh vee-an-tah / my desire), in your mother tongue. Remmick… Remmick. The one who created you and now was you too, part of your desires, part of your life, part of your soul. Would you ever be able to break away from that guiding thread? From the one who offered you both death and life? Would you be able to disconnect and be just… you?

Remmick emerged from the darkness of the house, carrying a bundle of clothes in his hands, wearing a pair of soft-fabric pants, his torso still bare. He smiled with those secrets he could hide from you between his lips:

“No, I believe that if one day you no longer belong to me, I’ll probably be dead.”

“Reading my thoughts again?”

The question was practically rhetorical, laced with a certain bitterness you couldn’t hold back. Standing before you, the vampire handed you the clothes.

“I am them. Even when you try to escape through the corners of your thoughts, I’m there.” Remmick smiled, sharp teeth glinting, a suggestion shining in his eyes like a beast ready to kill.

“Come on, love, the night is a child crying to be fed.”

“Smartass,” you hissed through your teeth, rolling your eyes. When you rose from the bathtub, your eyes suddenly caught sight of two figures approaching in the distance. Remmick didn’t even need to be warned—he was already spying from the corner of the window, his thoughts starting to hiss like a rabid wolf growling, thirsty for blood and slaughter. He turned his face toward you, a sharp smile while his eyes tiled the blood of the defeated. His tongue was a blade between needle-sharp teeth:

“We shall have a special feast, my love!”

…

The house was dark.

Its scent was of dust and stagnant wood, dry and moldy. In the background, you could catch the smell of melted wax. No noise. When that couple stepped into the house, shotguns in hand, eyes wide with fear, all they wanted was to play heroes for the little town—hunt the monsters that had been parasitizing the area and receive applause for their brave deeds. Fueled by fear and pride, they wanted to hold in their hands the heads of those two who had earlier been hunted and, for some reason, had disappeared; and there they were, in that shack abandoned for weeks—maybe months—eyeing each other with unease.

The woman said, glancing around the first room, a lantern serving as a flashlight:

“I don’t think it was a good idea to come here at night…”

“Nonsense, woman—we’ll catch those monsters before they go messing around with anyone else,” the man shrugged, walking toward the hallway, the woman right behind him—until she heard a little noise beside her, at the open door.

The man kept walking, oblivious to his wife, heading toward the back of the house, finding a side room with its door ajar—he pushed it open the rest of the way with the barrel of the shotgun, the wooden door creaking slowly, revealing a bed.

And a woman lying on it, back turned. Naked.

A shiver ran down his spine, his breath grew heavy, heart pounding against his ribs, and beyond all that, a wicked voice called him to approach her—that nest of lust and desire. Ignoring his partner, he let curiosity and depravity take over. He lowered his weapon, step by step, now close to the woman’s body, his hand trembling as it reached toward her, while the other held the lantern swaying noisily at his side, its yellow light flickering across the sleeping body.

“Have mercy on me!”

A high-pitched scream came from deeper in the house. The man startled and turned, dropping the lantern to the floor, where it shattered and sparked into flames. He raised his weapon again, spinning around—only to find a man behind him.

Eyes glowing with an inhuman red glint.

A macabre grin stained with blood painted his chin, his neck, his bare chest.

A rustle behind him made his knees weaken with fear; a cold gust of air fed the fire now licking at the wooden floor. He looked over his shoulder and saw you awake—eyes just as luminous as the monster in front of him, thick saliva dripping from your chin.

As he tried to scream, a hand clamped over his mouth—metallic blood flooded his tongue.

A tear welled up in his eye.

The vampire’s voice in front of him rasped out, bestial and raw:

“Shhhh… Shhhh… Don’t cry now. Didn’t your mother teach you it’s wrong to mess with someone else’s woman?”

And he laughed—demonic—gripping the man’s throat, nearly choking him, as you remained behind, salivating for the living blood pulsing through his arteries. Remmick looked at you from the side, tilting his head, his voice undulating between the three of you like a serpent shaking its venom:

“Darling, your wife was delicious! I hope you taste just as good for my wife!”

The man screamed with all the air in his lungs, while Remmick offered him up like an animal for ritual slaughter—offering him to you. And you took him from behind, draining him with the ease of mortality—no pity, no hesitation.

Remmick watched you with affection and admiration, something growing inside him with the euphoric pleasure of a successful hunt. When you finished draining the man, his corpse now at your feet, he held out his hand to you.

You took it, letting him lead you out of that room to the front of the house, where the open door allowed the silvery light to touch your naked body, your face covered in scarlet—just like his. Remmick cupped your face in his hands, looking at you with his soul reflected in your eyes:

“My girl, how do you feel?”

“Perfect. Just a little… overwhelmed. I think it’s the thrill of the hunt.”

“Good—” he murmured, leaning in to capture your lips in a wet, filthy kiss—saliva and blood, soft tongue brushing pearly teeth. When he pulled away, a string of bloody spit still connected your mouths.

“—'Cause now, you’ll let me take care of you, darlin’. The way you deserve.”

You felt him penetrate you through the soul, his hands pulling you close into the kiss of the dead upon your lips, speaking to you through your minds:

‘—Let me take care of you, darling, let me take care of you, let me show you how good I can be for you…—’

𝐅𝐎𝐎𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝐂𝐎𝐌𝐄𝐍𝐓𝐒: maybe it deviated a little from the initial concept of the request (idk), but this one was by far one of the fanfics with Remmy that i enjoyed writing the most, it's side-by-side with my fanfic involving priests, religion, Christian guilt, vampirism, remmick and other little things…