#( ― ✧ TELL ME NIGHTMARES BEFORE SLEEP / FT. UNKNOWN

[xxblossomx]

☠︎Ｔｈｅ Ｓｈａｄｏｗ☠︎

“Zero, Zero Uzumoto.. Don’t forget it.”  

💀BASIC INFO💀

Full Name: Zero Aries Uzumoto  the Known as: Demon Prince of the underworld, darkness, Dreams, Night, and Shadows.

Nicknames: Shadow and Prince of darkness

Age:  

Human: 24-27

Demon: 793

Gender: Male  

Sexuality: Straight  

Birthday: March 23, 1293

Zodiac: Aries

Religion: Pagan

Species: Full Blooded Demon

Powers: Demon Abilities

Nationality: Greek, German, and British

Ethnicity: White

Languages Spoken: Greek, English, German, and Latin

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💀PHYSICAL APPEARANCE💀

Height: 6’0  

Weight: 140  

Hair Color: Black  

Eye Color: Black but changes to red  

Skin Color: Pale or Tan  

Battle Marks(Scars, missing body parts, etc.): Battle scars all over his body.

Tattoos: The only tattoo like is his curse mark.

Clothing Style: Dark themes, shirts, pants to boots.  

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💀PERSONALITY💀

Overall: His personality is a bit bumpy, considering he mostly is to himself all the time. That’s because it changed after the age of eight and he hid everything away. He had a dark aura around him, his tone is cold or straight forward; rudely to be more specific. He lacks the personality of caring or any other good ones that others tend to show off. He does show cruelty, just only when he is in battles or fights. He lacks the trust for others and tends to tell others, “You can trust me, but I will not to you”. He has rudeness and can be blunt and truthy honest. g

Positive traits

Brave

Responsibility

Self-disciplined

Honest

Neutral Traits

Sarcastic

Low-Profile

Serious

Stiff

Negative Traits

Aggressive

Rebellious

Cocky

Judgmental

Greatest Fears: Unknown

First Impression: It’s Eh, He can be really bad for a first impression  

Once you get to know them: Chilled but still shows his rude side  

Default Expression: Angry look  

Extrovert, Introvert, or Ambivert?: Ambivert

Habits: When Angry, He’ll fight anyone or hurt anyone in his way. Doesn’t think before fighting nor speaking.  

Pet Peeves: Unknown  

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💀SPEECH💀

Prefer Voice Actors: 

English: Mix with Daniel Southworth, Clifford Chapin, and Ivan Jesso.

Voice Description: Dark, somewhat deep but not too much. Scruffy but clear.

Most used phrases/words: Swear words mostly  

Slang the use: None  

Swearing?: Yes  

Do they think before they speak?: No  

Do they worry about accidentally offending someone with their words?: Nope  

Humor: No  

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💀INTERESTS💀

Likes: Swords, wolfs, darkness, fighting.  

Dislikes: Rude humans, demons, his grandfather

Favorite Food: None

Favorite Animal: Wolf and Hawks

Favorite Color: Black, Red, and dark blue

Hobbies: Fighting and killing demons

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💀MISCELLANEOUS💀  

Song that fits character’s personality: Unstable – Chaotica

Song that fits character’s story: Bury the Light – Casey Edwards ft Victor Borbo: Virgil’s battle theme from Dmc 5

Social Media Account they would have and what type it would be: Instagram – Photography of himself and dark aesthetics

Typical Hours of Sleep: Barely sleeps.  

Worst nightmare they’ve had: Tends to get nightmares but doesn’t always remembers them

Best Dream they’ve had: None

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💀LIFE💀

Occupation: Moving assassin/avenger  

Thoughts on occupation: None  

Dream Job: None  

Education: Fully educated from his father and mother

Past Relationships: Only relationship was with his parents.  

Current Relationships: None, but soon has a strong love relationship with Sakura.  

Family:  

Father: Damien Cerberus Uzumoto  

Mother: Ava Helena Uzumoto.  

Grandfather: Kratos Lucian Uzumoto

Hometown: Greece  

Current Residence: His remodeled family home

Room/Housemates: Akara, Jace, Zash, and Riza. (Two ocs I haven’t finished yet)  

Financial Status: None  

Source of Money: Jobs for hire  

Health: Good, but tends to get badly hurt.  

History: 

Birth/Childhood: 

Zero was born in the year of 1293, On March 23rd; three years after the holy war that covered the world in darkness and death. His parents were Damien and Ava Uzumoto. Ava gave birth to him at their family home somewhere hidden in Greece, the only known other that knew about him was Lilith Melania. But too much of their shock, Zero’s grandfather; Kratos knew Zero. After the birth of his grandchild, Kratos took the book of the curses and placed a curse on Zero. His parents saw the curse as a good used to hide the sword of sealing, blending into the curse itself. Since the curse was known to be “uncontrollable”, it was sealed. Zero would be Ava’s only child due to the risk of herself. After he had fully grown up at the age of three, he started to be trained by his father. He also would soon meet Akara whenever her or her mother would come over. Zero saw himself in her but as a female counterpart. Ava was very upset since he was too young to know his true self. 

Damien, however, made it his choice to make sure that Zero was fully ready in case Kratos came. When Zero was little, he was very outgoing and bright, he was a child after all. At the age of six, Zero was very curious of his hand that he removed the seals. When he did so, the curse immediately became active. Young Zero lost himself in the darkness from the curse and lead himself out of control. However, since he was at home; his parents immediately came to stop it. Zero never ever take the seals off after that. Two years later, life soon went downhill. His grandfather Kratos came to end his parents and himself. Kratos soon faced off with Damien while Ava ran with Zero to hide him away. While she hid him, Kratos was on his way to her. He had banished Damien to the underworld for life.  

Ava then left Zero and headed out to find Damien, to which she meets Kratos in the hallway. Zero, however, didn’t want to hide. But instead, soon chased after his mother. He soon appears behind her as he then witnesses her death. While Ava dead, she placed her spirit into the balance orb and sent to Zero’s heart. Afterwards, it became a blur. After he had awoken, Kratos was gone, and his home was burning. He was able to stop that. He then was able to get together his mother's ashes, placing them in something; soon burying her. Afterwards he went into a deep depression and quietly hid away for five years. 

Pre-teen/Teenage/Young Adult: 

Zero, who is now thirteen; came out of hiding and started to train himself. His father had left behind his weapons, Demon weapons that were made by demons. Even at a young age, he was able to control the weapons easily. The weapons were known to be demons themselves, Chaos and Oblivion; twins. Zero let them choose any animal that they wished to be. Chaos took up a black wolf with red eyes and Oblivion, a white wolf with blue eyes. Chaos could speak and Oblivion was muted. All three would be close as he continued to train with them. During this time, he started to show signs of PTSD and insomnia.  

Zero trained to use his telepathic skills to teleportation. By the time he was at the age of sixteen, he knew every ability he had. Zero not only worked on his powers, but he also worked on his body. He worked out with exercise to build up his strength, so that within six months his body was fit. After his training, he started to find leads on his grandfather, but he didn’t leave his family home until he was eighteen. When he got that old, he stopped growing and aging. By that time, Zero had built up his rage and anger inside, cutting every other emotion out. 

After leaving and following up on leads to leads, he would soon meet Zash and Riza. The two were close, making them married. Zash was good at finding information for leads and would have his contacts if they didn’t them for him. Which was good for Zero, since he pretty much was bad at finding leads due to his introverted self-style. Riza was much of a problematic demon, considering she was a succubus. But she was faithful to Zash, but she did tend to flirt with others as a joking matter. It annoyed Zero. All three were then together for a few or more years, soon leaning towards meeting Akara and Jace.  

When they met, Akara was a traveling witch and providing medications for humans or anyone that needed it. Jace just so happened to be with her, since they both came across each other on their paths. Akara was a skilled witch who knew how to use a sword, she was basically like him but female. Jace was a fighter, he would mostly do club fights where others would be between with money. Zero wasn’t much for a bigger team or having more than two, but he would grow to them afterwards.  

Adult/Current life: 

Since Zero was older than everyone, he still hid away from them. He would move through the shadows to keep himself hidden from anyone. He was now twenty years old in human years, but in demon; much higher in numbers. That's only because he stopped aging at the age of 18. He was fully struggling with PTSD and insomnia; he completely stopped sleeping due to nightmares. Zero thought he would stay hidden for a long time but soon was found by four others. He was shocked since they could find him but then again, they were demons themselves. He became shocked when he saw Akara, whom he had forgotten about. Zero wasn’t a save from before though, so he was different than he was as a child. He wasn’t much for the team up, but they wouldn’t take a nod for answer. 

Zero was in fact stuck with them. At this point, He didn’t care if they all joined him for job-for-hires. The more demons are together, the more power they are together. Zero was with them for about a few years or more, it’s unknown since he doesn’t count how long, nor they don’t. All five then soon found leads on Kratos and follows it to where their new-soon-to-be friends are. As it turns out, Kratos was looking to start a war or anything to get rid of the humans. Zero, long with his group, Sakura, and her group teamed up to end Kratos raging. During that, Zero would start showing her feelings for Sakura and she does too. 

During the battle against Kratos, Zero would learn that he could control his curse by placing his mother’s half Chao orb into it. He must consume the darkness, even if it overtakes him in the process. To which, he would soon also learn that the sword of seal was in that same curse. This information was given by his father, Damian, as he would show up for the battle to support. Damian would soon also tell his son that the other half of the orb was in the princess; Sakura. Knowing that Ava has been with Zero and Sakura the whole time, bright him at ease from the pain he went through.  

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💀Other💀

Weapons: Twin despairs: Chaos and Oblivion

Chaos: Demon of Chaos, form of a wolf or sword. Blade is black and handle red with black leather wrap. Moon emblem under wrapping.  

Oblivion: Demon of Oblivion, Form of a wolf. Blade is dark blue and handle is same blue with white wrapping. Sun emblem under the wrapping.

Other weapons: Few Daggers, bow and arrows, and hell chains.

Stats (10 of 10)  

Confidence: 4/10

Strength: 10/10

kindness: 4/10

Self-Esteem: 1/10

Neatness: 1/10

Agilify: 10/10

Persuasiveness: 4/10

Gullibility: 6/10

Luck: 6/10

Dexterity: 9/10

Constitution: 7/10

Intelligence: 5/10

Temper: 10/10

Wisdom: 5/10

Charisma: 4/10

Abilities:

Telepathy: Zero can telepathically talk to his demon swords aka Chaos and Oblivion. But there is a disadvantage when oblivion is in animal form. 

Oblivion takes up a wolf form, thus as the same length of telepathically reach. Oblivion also is muted, so thus telepathy is he way of talking. 

Chaos can telepathically talk to Zero at a good length close to a mile, about three miles. Chaos can however telepathically talk to oblivion since their connected to each other.  

Teleportation: Zero can teleport through darkness, meaning he can simply walk through the shadows. As well as make portals of darkness and go through them to get to a place. But he barely uses this since he prefers the shadow moving.  

Dream Walking: Zero can appear into dreams, but he can not do it by teaming with other to dream hop. When he sleeps, he just gets sent to dreams of someone that is connected with his or similar of his dreams.  

Healing: Zero’s body can heal on it own, but the healing can do so much. After a wound is healed, it’ll become a scar. Also, if a weapon is still in him like knifes or etc. The wound will not be healed and will bleed out. In same cases, if a wound looks deep that humans tend to dead from. Those wounds will take a long healing process for Zero, so he is unable to fight or etc.

Magic: Zero barely uses magic but when he does, he uses the dark arts or mainly the flames of underworld. Since his blood is of his father’s, he is able to use the fires that burns sinners in the underworld. Zero can only use about 40% of those flames, so he mainly used it to cover his swords or throw the flames at his opponent to distract for a chance to hit them with his swords.  

Strengths:

Zero’s body can self heal after being wounded but will leave scars. He has good reflexes and can sense danger is coming. His battle skills are good, but can have some flaws.  

Weaknesses:

His body may heal, but only after the weapon is removed from him. If it’s still in him, he’ll bleed out. His curse that rests on his right hand is useful but it can kill him. Since it was given to him after birth, its core purpose is to hurt him. 

The curse is mainly a demon curse that is strong for anyone to have, including Zero himself. There is a way to control it but it has not been found. Another way Zero can be killed is if the sword of sealing is found and used in battles against him. But due to it being the full sealer for his grandfather, it is hidden away until it’s ready to be found.

[illcgal-archivos]

( ― ✧ 𝓲𝓷𝓽𝓻𝓸𝓭𝓾𝓬𝓲𝓷𝓰

Bok Dae Hyun | 25 años | Cantante | Homosexual

TW: Menciones de abuso físico-psicológico y uso de drogas.

PERSONALIDAD: Una persona de corazón puro, incapaz de ver a primera instancia la maldad del mundo. Cariñoso y sociable, un chico que siempre mantiene una sonrisa en sus labios así esté pasando por un mal momento. Posee una empatía genuina para con la gente, siempre poniéndose en el lugar de otros incluso cuando nadie se pone en el suyo y ve las cosas desde su perspectiva. Un poco caprichoso y berrinchudo, le gusta tener la atención de las personas y no es una mentira el hecho de que no se esfuerza mucho en conseguirlo, pues su atractivo fácilmente atrae la mirada de más de uno. Le gusta que lo mimen y le den cariño, que lo hagan sentir querido y le den regalos, totalmente ignorante del precio que estos podrían tener más tarde. Es una persona que no duda en mostrar sus talentos y habilidades, regocijándose cuando es reconocido a un nivel de llegar a alardear un poco al respecto. Sin embargo, a pesar de todo esto, también es una persona sensible y muy fácil de lastimar, alguien a quien se le podría hacer llorar fácilmente si no se le reconoce su trabajo y si no lo hacen sentir en el lugar que él cree que merece. Es el tipo de chico que, a su vez, sufre en silencio y cuando algo lo atormenta jamás lo exterioriza, pues no quiere romper la imagen que muestra a otros.

HISTORIA:

Nunca tuvo todo en sus manos… y cuando lo hizo, deseó no haberlo hecho nunca. Hijo de un matrimonio de clase baja, sin mucho que ofrecer más que un amor incondicional hacia su primer y único retoño. Las cosas para DaeHyun nunca fueron fáciles cuando era un niño, pues cada día era una lucha para sobrevivir en un mundo donde sus padres no eran personas importantes pero que, al menos, hacían todo lo posible por mantener su estómago lleno cada mañana. Siempre tuvo que aprender a medir las cosas, a recibir lo que podía recibir y a no pedir más, incluso cuando siempre deseó más de lo que tenía. No era avaricia ni mucho menos una necesidad por vivir una vida de lujos que evidentemente no le había tocado llevar, sino más bien sueños e ilusiones por salir del agujero en el que estaba para tener mejores oportunidades, para evitar a sus padres el constante esfuerzo que hacían todos los días al irse a trabajar, por no verlos cansados y con la espalda partida por darle un futuro a él.  DaeHyun siempre fue un niño centrado en lo que quería, aunque las oportunidades para lograrlo realmente fueron nulas por mucho que lo intentaba.

Pronto creció y se convirtió en una persona vivaracha, que demostró tener más de un talento oculto en su persona, pues no solo fue su perfecta y maravillosa voz lo que sorprendió a su padre en más de una ocasión, sino la habilidad para el manejo de instrumentos que parecía tener. Sin embargo, aunque fuese un artista nato, el apoyo era mínimo y no contaba con las herramientas para seguir desarrollando y explotando sus capacidades, especialmente cuando a los diecisiete años fue obligado y orillado a tomar la decisión de dejar la escuela. Sus padres no podían seguir pagando las colegiaturas, los transportes y mucho menos los uniformes y los útiles escolares. Ese fue el principio y el fin de un sueño, que terminó por convertirse en un deseo frustrado carcomiéndole las entrañas.

Así fue como comenzó a trabajar en una bodega de carga, su primer y oficial empleo tras haber dejado la escuela. La paga no era mala y la verdad era que ayudaba bastante a sus padres con el dinero que ganaba, sin embargo, no era del todo feliz estando ahí. O al menos no, hasta que seis meses después de laborar conoció a un chico que recién ingresaba para unirse al equipo. DaeHyun no lo llamaría amor a primera vista, pero es perfectamente consciente de que algo en él se removió desde el primer momento en que se vieron y compartieron palabra. Fue instantáneo, prematuro y hasta extraño, pero él se había enamorado de este desconocido de quién, más tarde, se enteraría que sentía lo mismo hacia su persona. Es ahí donde tras meses de salir y conocerse deciden hacerse novios y un año después, luego de haber cumplido sus diecinueve años, se mudan juntos. Las cosas no fueron fáciles en un inicio, pero finalmente consiguieron cambiarse a un pequeño departamento viejo solo para los dos. Su nido de amor, su casa.

La vida perfecta, era lo que DaeHyun solía pensar cada mañana al despertar y tener al amor de su vida junto a él, feliz y tranquilo. Toda marchaba de maravilla, ambos lograban sustentarse con sus respectivos salarios y darse una vida plácida. No obstante, tal vez destinado a la miseria y al sufrimiento, la bodega decide cerrar y por ende, dejarlo sin trabajo. Los tiempos difíciles volvieron a agitar la vida del cantante como un huracán, por que todo comenzó a ir en picada de nueva cuenta. Sus bolsillos volvieron a estar tan vacíos como su estómago y aunque nunca tuvieron pelear ni riñas al respecto, aunque nunca dejaron de quererse como desde el primer momento, las cosas comenzaron a complicarse. Aplicaron a trabajos y en todos y en cada uno fueron rechazados, hasta que con un golpe de suerte su amado fue contratado en un trabajo casi similar al que solían compartir juntos. DaeHyun se sintió inútil, un completo bueno para nada aun cuando su novio le había dejado en claro que trabajaría por él y para él, para brindarle la vida que merecía más que nadie.

Y así fue. Hasta que un día pese a que estaba seguro de que su amor no le fallaría, decidió hacer algo por su cuenta. Así que cargando una guitarra vieja en el hombro y sus ropas mullidas, como las esperanzas de cazar algo de suerte, salió a las calles a cantar. Lo hizo un par de veces, recibiendo en pocas ocasiones uno que otro aplauso a cambio y después, poco a poco, un par de wones como apoyo a sus talentos sin explotar. DaeHyun jamás se negó a esto y comenzó a hacerlo con más frecuencia, alegrándose de poder aportar un poco en sus gastos de alquiler y alimento, hasta que un día dentro del estuche mullido de su guitarra un cheque fue depositado, con una cantidad gigantesca de dinero. Resultó ser que el generoso hombre era un supuesto caza talentos, que tenía tiempo escuchándolo y que hasta ese día se había animado a acercarse, para ofrecerle una oferta que terminaría por cambiar su vida en muchos aspectos. Es ahí donde la pesadilla comienza, disfrazada de un sueño volviéndose realidad.

No tardó mucho tiempo en aliarse con él, al ser contratado para cantar en uno de los tantos bares bajo la posesión del hombre que ante sus ojos lucía amable e importante, como su salvación. Se presentó por muchas noches, llamando la atención del publico ante su melodiosa voz y habilidades en la guitarra, comenzándose a sentir especial cada vez que las luces de los reflectores se enfocaban en nadie más que él y los aplausos llenaban el lugar, elogiando su trabajo y su talento. La paga fue buena, quizás mucho más de lo que esperaba más nunca lo notó como algo extraño, él solo pensaba que estaban dándole lo que merecía por las cosas que hacía y por lo bueno que era cantando, animando al público. Sin embargo, todo comenzó a cambiar tan pronto como inició. Empezó con cenas, salidas al cine, caminatas por la ciudad y después algunos regalos, cosas pequeñas pero muy bonitas que rápidamente escalaron a joyas elegantes y trajes caros, zapatos de marca y relojes gruesos de oro. Regalo tras regalo, cada vez que terminaba de presentarse en el escenario, todos y cada uno justificados bajo el “Es lo que mereces, por ser la estrella de este lugar. Mi estrella.” Daehyun quería creer que se trataba de nada más que agradecimiento, de una muestra de aprecio hacia su persona, más no que aquello no era precisamente una conducta que un jefe tendría hacia un empleado.

La situación acabó por crear las primeras peleas con su novio, quien evidentemente no veía la situación como algo “normal y correcto”. Molesto el cantante continuó dejándose halagar, hasta que una noche todo se salió de su control y ya no tuvo más como volver atrás. Había peleado con su pareja antes de irse al trabajo, por lo que después del espectáculo no dudó dos veces en aceptar el salir a beber unas copas con su jefe. La noche y el enfado lo llevaron de una mala decisión a otra, pues para cuando quiso detenerlo todo ya era demasiado tarde. Esa fue la primera vez que lo tocaron sin su consentimiento, en el asiento copiloto de un auto en el que, en contra su voluntad y con sus gritos resonando en la cabina, fue violentado y mancillado en inocencia. DaeHyun no entendía lo que pasaba, él solo había salido por un trago para olvidarse del mal rato y ahora estaba ahí, con la camisa rasgada y los pantalones abajo, con las lágrimas brotando de sus ojos ante el maltrato y el infierno que estaba sufriendo.

Desde entonces no fue el mismo. Su jefe, ese asqueroso hombre que creía alguien bondadoso, terminó de proclamarlo suyo y jamás volvió a regresar junto al hombre que verdaderamente amaba. Ahora, sin más, era propiedad ajena y no tuvo oportunidad de decir adiós, al haberse metido él mismo en la boca del lobo sin saber que no había oportunidad de retorno. Desde esa noche y para el futuro, DaeHyun se convirtió en un muñequito más, la estrella del lugar y la joya del hombre que no lo dejó ver la luz del sol con libertad nunca más a base de maltrato, de golpes e insultos, de violaciones y amenazas contra aquellos que amaba y que, en definitiva, no dejaría que nadie lastimara jamás. 

Datos extra:

Mide 1.80

Tiene un gato llamado Spark, que adoptó una noche lluviosa al volver a casa después de haber sido abusado.

Vive con una compañera de piso que le fue asignada por su jefe. Terminó tomándole cariño y ahora la ve como una hermana, su única familia.

Perdió el contacto con su familia desde la primera noche que no volvió a casa, cuando pasó a ser posesión de otro hombre.

No ha vuelto a saber de su pareja. Solo espera sea feliz y que haya dejado de buscarlo por su bien, pues ha sido amenazado con poner su vida en peligro si no obedece.

Su actitud cambió un poco. Se volvió un poco diva e  irritante.

Tiene un tatuaje en su pantorrilla derecha, una ancla azul que se hizo en conjunto con su primer novio y amor de su vida. De esa manera siente que siguen conectados de alguna manera. 

Abusa del consumo no-recreativo de marihuana y cocaína, para olvidar lo que siente.

status: MULTISHIP/SINGLESHIP @springdciy

[thelargefrye]

YEARNING FOR YOU. kang yeosang (18+)

── summary. you’re just within reach and yet every time he tries to get to you, you vanish right before his eyes... again and again and again.

── roles. mage!yeosang + mage!f!reader (ft. poly!mage!ateez & other idols)

── genre. smut + one-shot + mages + magic shop + supernatural + mythology + historical to modern day + romance + eventual poly relationship + angst + drama + reincarnation (most of these are for the overall story not necessarily this one-shot)

── word count. 3.3k

── warnings. nightmares + language + sub!yeosang & dom!reader + kissing + little hair pulling + one moment of spanking + anal fingering + handjob + degrading + amazon position + y/n is mentioned to have tattoos 

── developer’s note. happy birthday @atiny-piratequeen​ !! this is just a small something that i’m working on that’s inspired by against the tide !! i figured that since i probably might not get the whole story done by your birthday bc i’ve already been working on it for two weeks and i’m only still doing world and backstory building rip then i would just share a small piece that included yeosang. i’m still working on characters and personalities so anything you read here is subject to change by the time i get the first official chapter out. 

when the door to the shop chimed, yeosang didn’t bother looking up from his book he was reading. he knew that usually customers – humans at least – would just look around before leaving or come up to mindlessly flirt with him. it was the same thing every time the bell dinged. 

he could hear the customer’s shoes, heels to be exact, softly thudding across the old wooden floors as they strolled around the small shop. his hearing could pick up where exactly in the shop they were, so when they finally started nearing the back to where he and register were, he assumed this customer just wanted to flirt with him like always. 

“um, excuse me,” yeosang’s head shot up immediately at the sound of the familiar voice. you stood in front of him also with a look of shock from how quickly yeosang moved and his eyes flickered down to the canvas in your arms. 

“o-oh, um, hi. how can i... how can i help you,” yeosang says as he tries his best to relax, but honestly he doesn’t think he can, not when you’re here in front of him and talking to him. 

you smile softly at him before handing over the canvas you had in your hands, “this is the painting hongjoong asked me to paint. he told me i could find him and the rest of you here. is he, um, is he here by any chance?”

“huh? oh, yeah is he, let me go get him!” yeosang had never moved so fast before as he practically jumped off his stool and ran to the back to get the group’s leader and tell him you’re here. 

“y/n’s here!” yeosang says probably a bit too loudly and maybe just a little too excitedly but he hasn’t seen you in centuries. he has a right to be happy to see his missing lover. 

hongjoong isn’t by himself in the back, all the others are basically here too, except for jongho and san who had gone out to get information on how to help you remember your first life.

“she is? why?” mingi asks, a look of shock drawn on his face knowing you’re here just in the other room. 

“she brought the painting hongjoong asked her to paint,” yeosang says and hongjoong is quick to go to the front and yeosang picks up on how hongjoong greets you with a cheery tone. 

at first yeosang thinks about staying in the back and letting you and hongjoong talk for a moment, but his need to see you again overcomes that he heads back to the front of the shop. he hears the others coming up behind him as he does and he figures the others couldn’t wait either. 

a wave of memories washes over him as he sees you and hongjoong interacting so closely. all the times he would see you and hongjoong interacting on the utopia, all the lingering stares and touches you thought no one else saw, but in reality everyone saw.

he misses you. they all miss you. 

“wow, y/n, this is beautiful,” hongjoong can’t take his eyes off the painting you gave him and you have a proud look on your face as your eyes flicker between the male and the painting before you slowly look up and over at where him and the others are. 

“oh, i didn’t know you all worked here as well!” you say and greeted them all with a smile. 

“i actually own this shop,” hongjoong says and you turn to look at him in shock. “my grandmother ran this shop before passing it down to me before she retired.” yeosang couldn’t help but slightly snicker at how hongjoong called hyuna a grandmother. 

“really? that’s so cool! i had actually never been in this shop before until today,” you offhandedly as you glance around the shop some more. “oh!” you say catching the six males off guard as they watched you dig through your bag before pulling out eight envelopes. “siyeon is throwing a party and wants me to invite you all!” you say handing each other an invitation before giving jongho and san’s to wooyoung. “i hope you all can make it!”

“of course! we’ll do our best to be there,” hongjoong says, but yeosang knows that all eight of them are definitely going especially since you’re going to be there. “also, thank you again for the painting, it really is beautiful.”

“oh, of course! i’m glad you like it, i always enjoy painting sea related stuff, so this was a blast to paint,” you explain with a small laugh. “well, i should be going! i promised siyeon i would help her with party decisions, so... i’ll see you all around,” you say bidding the males goodbye before turning on your heels and leaving the shop. 

yeah, yeosang and the other are gonna have to work fast.

𐂴𐂴𐂴

sometimes when yeosang misses you, he’ll find himself remembering the time when you all were together on the utopia. he’ll remember how you use to help him in the kitchen, acting as both a hand and taste-tester to him. 

all the heated gazes the two of you shared being the reason for his flushed face that he would blame on the heat in the kitchen when the others would question him. although he was sure the others didn’t believe because his magic dealt with fire, so some kitchen heat was nothing for him. 

but no matter what the same thought still comes to him. he just misses you. he thinks that over and over again until he falls asleep and you appear in his dreams. 

it’s silly he knows it, mainly using his magic in order to ensure that you appear to him. he has sweet dreams when you are with him and others all enjoying your time together; however, the moment he remembers that none of it is real and that you are living a completely different life without remembering them, without remembering him. it all turns into a nightmare. 

and its always the same. the same day he and the others are forced to remember and sometimes relive again and again for centuries. 

“yeosang, wake up!” 

his eyes snap open and he feels hot, his bangs matted to his forehead with sweat and his eyes are immediately trying to get used to the darkness of his bedroom.

that voice... he thinks as he brings his hands up to cover his face. huh? was he crying? 

“yeosang,” he hears it again and sounds so close to him. right next to him and he feels like he’s still dreaming. but he turns his head and his brown orbs meet your own worried eyes as you sit next to him in his bed. 

“y/n...?” he reaches out to touch your cheek, his hands caressing your face and he gasps when he realizes you’re real and next to him. 

“why are you crying, love?” you ask him watching as he sits up. you reach over to brush his tears away before he suddenly takes you in his arms. “did you have a bad dream, yeo?”

yeosang doesn’t trust his words so he just nods his head as he nuzzles his head into your neck. “it’s okay,” you say softly, rubbing his back in comfort, “i’m here and nothings going to happen while i’m here. i promise.”

yeosang has heard you say those words before and it only makes him cry harder. you said that to him the first time you woke him up from a nightmare. you would always take him into your arms and hold him and wipe away his tears and tell him it’s okay and it’s all in the past. 

when yeosang does finally calm down, tears no longer running down his face, he slowly pulls away from you to lay back down. you lay down right next to him, pulling the blanket up to your chins as you brush hair away from his face. 

“i love you,” he says as he feels himself slowly falling back to sleep. you smile sadly at him, a hand still running through his hair as his eyes finally close. 

𐂴𐂴𐂴 

seonghwa was jealous, yeosang was 100% sure of that. the ice mage’s glare could probably set someone ablaze if he had fire magic instead. and honestly, yeosang doesn’t blame his boyfriend for being jealous because he was as well. 

“and who the hell is that?” wooyoung was the one who spoke up, shocked like seonghwa and himself at the sight of you talking to this unknown male. 

well, unknown to them at least. you seemed to be pretty close to the male, too close if yeosang or any of the others could say anything. 

“do you think they’re...” mingi didn’t want to say it out loud, probably knowing how much chaos he would cause among them if he did. 

yeosang wanted to be upset. upset at you for potentially going and falling in love with someone that isn’t them, but he couldn’t. he couldn’t be upset at you because this you, the one standing not too far from him and his seven lovers, this you isn’t the same you he met all those centuries ago. 

you don’t remember the love you shared and it broke yeosang’s heart. 

his eyes flickered over to seonghwa noticing the furrow in his eyebrows before he looks over to hongjoong who is just staring at you with sadness. then his eyes go back to you and this male who are sitting closely next to each other. the guy looks at you with such a softness that it reminds the fire mage of how seonghwa looks at all of them, with love. 

the male plays with the ends of your hair, running it over your face in a teasing manner that makes you laugh and yeosang would be lying if he said your laugh didn’t make his heart flutter. 

yeosang misses you.

𐂴𐂴𐂴

yeosang can’t help but sigh as soon as his body hit his bedsheets. he felt clean and relaxed after a long day of working in the shop below them and dealing with both humans and supernatural creatures alike. 

while he was staring up at the ceiling, he closed his eyes and started to doze off. he’s not sure for how long his eyes were closed, but he only opens them when he feels his bed dip. 

looking over he was greeted by the sight of you in little to no clothing and a warm smile on your face. 

“y/n, what are you doing?” yeosang was more than surprised to see you in his room. he was quick to sit up with a shocked expression as he moved so he was sitting right across from you. 

“what do you mean, yeo? i’m visiting you of course!” you say cheerfully. 

yeosang looked over you and he noticed the familiar tattoos that decorated your right arm. “you’re not real, are you?” he asked as he bowed his head so you couldn’t see his face. 

one of your fingers reached under to tilt his chin up and you looked at him with a gaze, “i’m as real as you want me to be,” you say with a smile as you leaned over and kissed him. 

yeosang immediately allowed you to take the lead. your lips guiding his as you ran a hand threw his hair and gently tugged on it causing yeosang to moan into your mouth as your tongue explored his mouth and while also teasingly play with his own wet muscle. 

yeosang was melting into the kiss, his hands coming up to your waist to pull you closer to him with your chest flushed tightly against his. when you pulled away from the kiss, yeosang tried to follow after your lips making you let out a small laugh at how cute he was acting. 

yeosang only looked at you with slightly dazed eyes, still not fully believing you are here in front of him which allowed you to push at his shoulders, making him fall on his back and into the softness of the bed. 

“y/n... please,” he whines as you hover over him slightly, both your hands caging his head to the bed as you look down at him. 

“what yeo? what do you want me to do?” you ask with a teasing smile, god, he hasn’t seen this smile in centuries. 

“p-please, please fuck me,” he chokes out and your smile turns into a grin as you trail your finger down the center of his body before it stops at the towel he still had wrapped around his waist. 

“want me to take it off?” he nods without hesitation, “words.”

“yes!” and the towel was unwrapped from his hips and now he was completely bare to you. his cock was only semi-hard when you removed the towel and yeosang watched as your fingers ghosted over the tip, just barely grazing it. “please touch me, don’t tease me,” he begs and you hum before wrapping your hand around his cock and slowly began stroking it until it was fully hard and an angry red, his pre-cum only just slowly starting to appear at his tip. 

he let out a string of whines and curses as you began moving your hand suddenly at a fast pace without warning. yeosang’s back arched off the bed, but your free hand came down to hold him still to the bed before you suddenly stop stroking him. 

yeosang watches you as you move in between his legs before grabbing the underside of his thighs, giving them a good squeeze before hoisting them up to his chest. when you let go of his legs, yeosang immediately went to hold them in place as his face was flushed a bright red. 

you cooed at him as you leaned over his bent body and kissed him before pulling away to look at his ass that was now on full display for you. his hole tight and pink as you played with it, wiggling just the tip of your index into him before pulling out. 

“you’re so tight yeo, does none our boys fuck you open enough?” yeosang moaned at the degrading tone you had laced in your voice. “that’s okay though,” you begin adding a firm smack to both his asscheeks, “i can just fuck you open myself.”

yeosang wanted to come with there and then at your words, but he only settled for letting out a few moans instead. he knew the minute he came then it would all be over. he watched you quickly stand up and go over to his bedside table and dug through the draw before pulling out a bottle of lube. 

yeosang watched as you squeezed the clear liquid substance into your palm before he felt you apply it to his hole. he moaned at the cold feeling it gave him as you rubbed it around his puckered hole before applying more to your fingers. fuck, he couldn’t hold his excitement as he felt your index probe at him before slowly slipping inside him. 

“f-fuck– oh god, please!” he moaned out, throwing his head back as you eased him open. your movements were slow, almost too slow as if you were messing with him and he looked over to meet your eyes. 

when you finally entered a second finger he felt his eye roll back as you started to pick up the pace a bit in your thrusting. yeosang let out a broken fuck as you slowly started hitting his prostate before grabbing his dick with your free hand and stroked him in time to your fingers thrusting in and out of him. 

“does that feel good?” you ask and yeosang can only nod as his head fell back onto the bed. you frown at his nonverbal response and quickly stop both your hands making his whine as you remove your finger from him. “i asked a question yeosang, so answer it,” your voice sent a chill down his back as if it was seonghwa speaking to him. 

“it does, it feels good,” he says, face burning red, “b-but...”

“but what? what do you want?” 

“please, let m-me... let me be inside you,” he says and you coo once more at him before you lean over him once more. your nose brushing his from how close you are. 

“do you deserve to be inside me? you may have a nice dick, but do you think you can use it to pleasure me?” you ask, raising an eyebrow and yeosang felt his dick twitch from between the two of you at you questioning tone. 

“p-please, y/n, please u-use me to pleasure you,” he says out of breath and you let out a small laugh as you sat up and slowly grind down on his dick. the fabric of your underwear slightly damp from your growing wetness and causes yeosang to moan at knowing how close he was actual to you. 

“do the others know how much of slut you are?” you ask with a small laugh, “i’m sure they know how much you like to be used. hm, don’t they?”

“t-they do,” yeosang stutters out as he watches you move off of him to take your underwear off and he feels a chill run down his spine as you hover back on top of him to take his dick in your hand a position it at your entrance. 

“is this what you want?”

“y-yes!” you smile as you sink down on his length with a moan. yeosang lets his mouth drop open as you start to bounce on his length, the sound of your skin meeting his joining the sound of his and your moans. 

“f-fuck, yeosang!” you moan as yeosang takes you all in. his eyes fall on your chest which was still covered and he lets his legs go for a moment in order to unclasp your bra. you take your bra off and throw to the side now allowing yeosang the ability to see you completely bare now. 

god, how he missed this sight and he was glad you were using his legs as support for yourself because this allowed him to roam his hands over your body.  

getting lost in his pleasure he accidentally thrusted up making you glare at him before stopping, “toys don’t move, so still or i won’t let you cum,” you say and yeosang nods letting out a quiet y-yes before you continued between bouncing and moving your hips in figure-eights. 

yeosang felt himself grow closer to his orgasm and you clenching around him doing nothing but bringing him closer. “i-i’m c-close! please y-y/n! let me–

he own choked moan cut him off as he felt you clench around him as you came with a loud moan and a whimper of his name. you coming was enough to finally send yeosang over the edge as he took in the sight of you climaxing, knowing you used him to reach your own pleasure. 

it took you a moment before you slid off of him and next to him. you were quick to get him to put his legs down which felt a little sore from the position he held for so long. 

while he caught his breath he felt you reach over and press different kisses all over his face making him smile. you pressed a final kiss to his lips before cleaning him up and helping him under the covers. 

“i love you, y/n, please don’t disappear,” he says as you hold him close to you under the covers of his bed. you remained silent, only slowly running a hand through his hair and lulling him to sleep.

eventually, yeosang closed his eyes welcoming sleep as he fell asleep in your arms. 

when he woke up the next morning he was greeted by an empty bed and yeosang can’t tell if what he experienced last night with you was even real or just a dream. with a sigh, he gets up and starts to get dressed before heading out of his room and to the kitchen to prepare breakfast for himself and the others.

“i love you, too.”

[unsuccesscr]

Hello and welcome to HD Wrote 3k words of Pain.

ft @invisiquirk hc that Tooru dies at 21.

Also @needlxd and @amplifyingtrace and @rrenao make an appearance bc...OC rights babey

Heroism is a profession that is, by its very nature, fraught with danger. As such, there isn’t a single hero in existence without some scars. Physical or otherwise.

Prism was one of the few that carried hers over from childhood. By the time she experienced her first battle she was already scarred. Already bent and bruised. Already prepared to look into the face of oblivion.

Tooru is the type of person to try to hide their pain. To pretend everything is fine, to focus on everyone but herself. It’s hard to tell if her wounds have begun to heal at all, or if she’s just better at shutting people out.

Izuku likes to believe he knows her well enough to tell the difference. Knows her scars, has traced over them with gentle, careful, fingers, as she has done with his own. The ones not on her skin but within her mind and soul...those are a little more difficult to detect.

He knows some. About as much as she knows about his own. They’re not quite secret, but also not the type of thing one wants to talk about in any sort of detail. The kind that bring everything rushing back in an instant. So he doesn’t know everything, every bruise her mother had left; every nasty, vile word, spoken.

But he supposes he doesn’t need to. Tooru doesn’t need someone to hate Yue Hagakure, she needs someone that loves her. Despite all of the years that she’s been told she’s unlovable, despite all the lies Yue told her about her lack of worth. That she’s loved.

Of course, Izuku Midoriya is not the only one, not by a long shot. Tooru is as well loved as she is kind. He is, however, the only one who knows how much she needs to hear it. How easily she forgets that the world would shatter without her presence.

He’s the only one who bares witness to moments like this. Woken from some unknown nightmare, with shoulders curled forward, away from him; so she won’t wake him. As if rest is more important than this, more important than the quiet sound of her sobs.

“Tooru,” Spoken in a hushed tone. Always careful because loud noises, sudden movements, they can all reopen those unseen scars. 

In response there’s a hiccup, a hitch of breath followed by forced even heaves. A rustle of the sheets around them, as Tooru turns towards the source of the voice. 

“I didn’t mean to wake you up,” her own voice shakes, sounding oh so tired. And it hurts to wonder how long she had been like that before he had noticed.

“You should. You should wake me, I want to help.” The usual reply to the usual response. It has somehow become a part of their routine. These nightmares. Slowly, hands find hers; weaving their fingers together. He would like, in this moment, to hold her tightly. But that may be too much. “Is this ok?”

“Yes,” The affirmation is just as worn as her initial response. For a few moments they lay like that. Just listening to the sound of each other’s breathing, taking in the warmth of their shared space.

“Why do you stay with someone so broken?” Tooru asks. And she may not be broken but her voice is, clearly still in the mindset of her dream.

“You’re not broken. You’ve never been broken. Just...scarred,” Silence follows Izuku’s words. The kind of silence when she doesn’t want to argue, but doesn’t believe what he said. “I don’t know...what you were dreaming about just now…”

Tooru’s breath hitches and she tenses once more.

“I won’t ask, if you don’t want to talk about it,” The tension bleeds back out, slowly. He traces circles over her palm with the pad of his thumb. “But it wasn’t real. Even if it was a memory. It’s a lie to say you’re broken.”

There is more of that silence, so he simply continues.

“You know me better than that. You know I don’t settle. I’m with you because I want to be. Because, whether or not you believe it, you deserve love. And I'm incredibly, insanely, lucky, that I get to be someone who gives it to you.”

Finally there’s a response, a snort of laughter. Not derisive, not even laced with bitterness; genuine, if somewhat sad at the same time.

“You’re so corny,” Tooru teases, when she’s done laughing.

In place of a retort, he brings her knuckles up to his lips and gives them a small kiss. She can feel his smile against her skin. Feel the nightmare melting away.

“Hey,” Izuku speaks again after a moment “You should call in, we could stay in and watch movies and eat junk. It’s been a while since we’ve had a chill night.”

“I can’t do that, I have work. Lady Hydra depends on me, we don’t have a lot of sidekicks,” What’s unspoken is that she doesn’t want to acknowledge just how much this is affecting her. Doesn’t admit that she’s tired and the idea of doing patrol work after less than an hour of sleep isn’t appealing at all. Nowhere as appealing as sleeping in and spending time with her fiance.

“It will be fine for one day. You have sick days for a reason, someone can cover for you; just this once. Sasaki will understand, she cares about you too, you know,” One of the benefits of working for an underground hero. Or perhaps Lady Hydra was a special case. “Please?”

This is selfish, he knows. Because any day Tooru is not working as a sidekick is experience missed. She prides herself on being reliable; is reliable. But she’s also exhausted and in no state to fight. Likely, it would be fine. It always is. She’s strong and smart and always comes out relatively unscathed.

That doesn’t mean he doesn’t worry. And if there’s one thing Izuku has learned over the years, it’s that sometimes being selfish is the right choice.

“This could be our last chance to hang out for a while, you know,” He adds. And it’s true, what with them both working as heroes and the wedding just around the corner.

“Okay,” Tooru relents, because it does sound like exactly what she needs. Just, a quiet day at home.

…

When Izuku stirs the next morning, it’s not with a start. It’s slowly, deliberately grasping at the dream even after it fades away. 

They’ve been tormenting him for months, these ‘could have been’ dreams. He can’t tell if they’re better or worse than the nightmares. Would she really have stayed, had he simply pressed harder? If he had insisted would she still be here? Questions like these were useless, but plagued him anyway.

In the end, things had happened the way they happened. Tooru had gone to work with a smile, Izuku hadn’t stopped her. And the hero Prism was no more.

No more than a dream that gave him a few hours of respite a night. 

The buzzing of bedside alarm was no more relentless than the forward motion of time itself, and with a worn sigh he reached over and shut it off; blinking away the lingering wetness in his eyes. 

After a dream like that, it would be a good idea to book an appointment with a grief counselor. They could tell him that it wasn’t his fault. That you can’t erase someone’s trauma with affection alone. (He knows that, of course he knows that. But he could have made her stay, made her rest). While he pretends to believe those words. Pretends that guilt isn’t festering inside along with a different, more ugly, feeling.

Izuku had been doing that for months, though, with no results. Therapy didn’t help overnight, he knew that. Was still going for things that had happened to him a decade ago. But this was different. There was something impeding any sort of progress. He couldn’t move past the moment of her death.

Holding her cold, lifeless, hand, in his own.

There were more healthy ways of grieving. His friends insisted on them. Cards with professional’s numbers on them and pamphlets for support groups. They meant well. And they were going through the same loss. Izuku wasn’t so naive as to believe that he was the only one hurting, was the only one she had left behind.

It just seemed like he was the only one unable to move on.

Somewhat reluctantly, he heaves himself out of bed and away from the comfort of the ‘what could have been’ dream and prepares for the day ahead.

…

It’s a coincidence, really, a twist of fate; that the name Hagakure passes his desk. Not Tooru Hagakure, no, there would be no reason for that name to be attached to a recent report of organized crime in Osaka.

No, this was Yue Hagakure. Cold eyes staring back through a photograph.

Funny, he’d tried to imagine this woman many times. Tried to picture the kind of person who would hold such wrath towards her own child. Somehow, she seemed even more evil than he’d assumed.

He wonders if she knows that Tooru is dead. Wonders if she knows that it's her fault. That Tooru was always a little willing to die because of what she had done.

Sick of looking at her, her name and her face, he files the folder away quickly, and moves on to the rest of the paperwork assigned to him. Not exactly glamorous work, but necessary. And informative. As Izuku files away past reports he always skims for details, learning about villains he may one day have to face.

He tries to forget what he had read about shadow manipulation, about the Yakuza branch in Osaka headed by the woman named Hagakure.

Tries to forget how long it would take him to get there from his home in Kyoto by train.

…

Iida is the first one to notice. Perhaps because he knows the feeling of wanting revenge. He sees the storm brewing before Izuku himself does. Because he’s still pretending he didn’t see that file. Ignoring all the ways he could negate shadow manipulation.

Osaka isn’t in the area covered by the Wild Wild Pussycats, anyway. It’s neighboring. The report was just about the spread of Yakuza related activity. It wasn’t a mission. He was just a sidekick.

Revenge was a dangerous path.

Iida takes him out to lunch, just the two of them. They’re friends, certainly. Izuku can even safely say that the engine hero is one of his closest friends. But they usually go out as a group. And Iida never wants to meet up on a day he has patrol, never shirks responsibility.

Izuku pretends not to see the red flags. He does an awful lot of pretending, these days.

“Midoriya,” Iida breaches the topic with an air of formality, despite their familiarity. A nervous tick Izuku knows well, but ignores. Maybe if he continues to pretend everything is fine, it will be. At the very least, he refuses to look up from his menu.

“Why haven’t you gone to the counselor?”

This gets Izuku��s attention, causing him to flinch. Appointments were made through the agency. They wouldn’t know what was discussed, but they would know if he canceled repeatedly. Which he had. Mandalay had probably relayed that detail to Iida. He wouldn’t hold it against her.

“It doesn’t help,” He opts to answer honestly. “I went a couple times, it didn’t help.

Iida frowns at the pitiful excuse for a reason, gently taking the menu from his friend’s hands and setting it down. “This kind of thing takes time. Itou still going.”

That made sense. The ex-villain was closer to Tooru than anyone. No one ever really talked about it, but Kitiara had been saved by Tooru. They were sisters, if not by blood. And if anyone knew the hole her loss had left, it would be her.

Izuku hadn’t seen her since the funeral. Not that that was her fault, he was avoiding her. Avoiding seeing that emptiness reflected back.

“I’m dealing, in my own way.” Izuku says, uncomfortable with the concerned stare of his long time friend.

“I hear there’s been a rise in Yakuza activity near Kyoto. In Osaka.” Iida says, his expression clearly stating that he sees right through the core of Izuku’s darkest thoughts.

“Yeah, I suppose so. I don’t see a lot of action, as a sidekick.” Izuku tries, in vain, to keep the conversation casual.

“Revenge won’t help.” Iida moves straight to the point.

“I know,” Izuku replies. Because he does know. But it’s getting difficult to ignore how badly he wants to make Yue Hagakure pay. At least the criminals behind Tooru’s death had already been put away. Lady Hydra had made sure of that.

Iida looks unconvinced. “I learned that lesson back at UA, you saw what happened.”

“I know. I did.” Izuku winces, trying not to look at the scar on the back of Iida’s hand. “You’re right. And I….I’m not going to do anything stupid.”

…

The next, almost as if on cue, is Todoroki. Whereas Iida has been in Izuku’s place, he has been in Tooru’s place. Has scars from the hands that were supposed to raise him gently. Had been molded into a weapon for his father’s use.

Unlike Iida, he doesn’t take no for an answer. Tells Izuku where to meet him.

Somehow, he ends up staring at the name Hagakure once more. Tooru Hagakure, engraved in stone. Early spring frost causes the grass to crunch under their feet, and Todoroki says nothing; allows Izuku to grieve in silence.

He’s not sure how long they spend there. Long enough that he can no longer feel his fingers or the tips of his ears. He’s not even sure he’s had a single thought, the entire time. Brain filled with static as he stares at the marker. Surrounded, as always, by fresh flowers.

The ice and fire user waits until they’re ready to leave to speak.

“I’ve thought about it,” Todoroki says, voice impassive “Taking down my old man for the shit he pulled.”

Izuku’s not sure how to react to this confession, looking at the unreadable expression that follows it with concern and confusion. Todoroki, in turn, looks at Tooru’s grave.

“Sometimes our demons get the best of us. When that happens...we don’t hurt only ourselves, but everyone around us. That’s why I didn’t do it. Not because he deserves forgiveness, but because I wouldn’t really be hurting him.”

Izuku swallows hard, mouth suddenly dry at the double meaning to his words.

Todoroki looks, much like Iida, directly through him when he continues. “Don’t do anything stupid, Midoriya.”

…

Predictably, the one who is able to crack through his walls, in the end, is Leia. As it so often has been since they were children.

It takes little more than her plaintive voice over the phone, telling him to get some rest.

“You haven’t taken any time off since it happened,” Leia says, in the somewhat firm (but still, oh so gentle) tone that she reserves for when either he, or Katsuki, are being particularly stubborn. “You’re going to get burnt out.”

Revenge won’t help.

Don’t do anything stupid.

“Take some time, process things. Get some rest. Please, Izuchan, i’m...worried about you. I haven’t seen you this tired since highschool.”

And she’s right. He still had nightmares, to be sure, but hadn’t outright neglected self care for years. He slept, plenty, though. It was the only time he was able to be with Tooru again.

But he’d also been working more hours than necessary. If he worked all day and slept all night he didn’t have to be alone with his thoughts. That had always been a problem for him. He’d just forgotten for a while, because for a while he wasn’t alone even when he was alone.

“I miss her.” Izuku admits for the first time out loud in a long while. “I miss her so much I...Tooru deserved better. She deserved a long, happy life. She shouldn’t have died it’s not fair.”

And he’s aware that he sounds like a child, whining about how it's not fair. But it truly wasn’t. Tooru had already been robbed of her childhood, and now she had been robbed of her future as well. She deserved so much more. A light like that shouldn’t be gone. Not when the awful woman who had hurt her still walked free.

It’s in that moment, with Leia’s words of comfort floating through the speaker of the phone, that Izuku realizes what he’s missing. Why he’s been stuck.

Closure.

…

Even if he’d tried, he didn’t forget. Didn’t forget that file on Osaka. It hadn’t contained her exact location, of course. If the police knew that, they would have brought her in already. But Izuku was smart, and he’d plenty of time on his hands; since he’d finally decided to use his time off.

Mandalay was thrilled enough that he seemed to finally be mourning in a somewhat healthy way, that she had granted the leave request without question.

From there, it was just a matter of following the trail. Yue Hagakure wasn’t as much of a ghost as she’d like to think.

…

Deku isn’t sure that Yue is surprised to see him. He doesn’t even know for sure if she knows who he is. Or, at the least, who he was to Tooru. 

And he doesn’t really care. The less he has to listen to Yue Hagakure, the better. Doesn’t care what words she uses to defend herself, if any.

Instead, he focuses on what needs to be done.

Closure.

…

The battle is hard fought, and hard won. Yue, even without the use of her quirk (he’d made sure, before cornering her, that there would be no shadows to manipulate) is a skilled fighter; and not one to give up easily.

But she underestimates him. The hero without a quirk. And that, ultimately, is her downfall. 

With her face in the dirt she continues to antagonize. The words she speaks foul and acidic. Towards him. Towards Tooru.

So she did know, after all, the reason why he, specifically, was here. He thinks about all the satisfying ways to shut her up.

…

When the police are called in Yue Hagakure is restrained and injured, but very much alive. Albeit with a somewhat spiteful gag, preventing any more vile insults.

Later, when Izuku is commended on his restraint; he doesn’t mention the fact that he’s still shaking with the urge to end her life when she’s taken away.

…

Yue Hagakure doesn’t exactly look the picture of regret, even in her holding cell. Pissed, certainly, but seemingly confident that she won’t be in there for long.

She has no idea, the enemy she made. Enemies, plural, because Izuku isn’t even close to the only person who wants her to suffer for what she did to Tooru.

Just because revenge was off the table doesn’t mean that she would get away with everything.

“You can escape. But I’ll find you again.” He says, voice startlingly calm even to himself. “And again. And again. And again.”

“I will do whatever it takes to make sure you rot in here like you deserve.”

Tooru wouldn’t get what she deserved, the happy life, the peace. There was nothing he could do about that now. But Yue Hagakure would get all she deserved, that much was certain.

[ayeletinthemountains]

Mount Temple via East Ridge

8/2/18

Mount Temple had been on my radar since around ~2015, when I first visited Banff. In the summer of 2017, during our van trip, Leo and I had set our sights on the East Ridge, but the Banff area ended up being a disaster most of the time we were there because of a heat wave and constant smoke from fires. Nervous about the snow traverse during a heat wave, and lacking all motivation since we’d have no views, Leo and I decided to leave it for another time.

That other time for me ended up being the next summer when I visited Marco in Banff while he is on his own van trip. Marco is a strong climber who doesn’t have much of an interest in long slogs, but I managed to trick, I mean convince, him this would be a fun day. We did all our research the morning before, and in the evening after some cragging near Canmore, we headed up to Moraine Lake to scout our route for the next day. We found the slide path ~2km before Moraine Lake where we’d need to park the next morning and begin our ascent.

We drove to the Lake Louise overflow lot (this spot is so clutch — free overnight parking with everyone sleeping in their vehicles) about ~25 mins from our starting point, where we planned to sleep for the night. We made dinner, ate plenty of ice cream, and packed our gear. We each planned to wear approach shoes, but bring climbing shoes, harnesses, an *extremely* light rack (3 cams: 0.5, 0.75, #1), crampons, ice axe, helmet, and a 60m half rope. We made sure to pack shells as well, since there was a chance of rain in some forecasts (though mountain forecast called just for clouds, making us feel comfortable going for it).

We set the alarm for 4am, were at the trailhead at 5am, and were hiking by 5:10am. Originally we’d hoped there might be a use trail heading up the avalanche slope, but we never found one while looking the night before, so we just started up the talus field. The talus field narrows to a distinct steep gully at its top. It got pretty loose/miserable towards the top of the gully, but once we were there we were treated to some of the first “good” rock of the day. I say “good” because it seems all rock in the Canadian Rockies is crap (us Californians are spoiled, I know), but this section wasn’t *totally* chossy. :) The gully separates to a left fork and a right. I got the impression from trip reports that either would work, so we picked the left fork, heading straight up for a while before starting to veer right. We scrambled up and right for a while until we found some cairns.

We followed the cairns going up and up. We felt that we were finally on the ridge at this point, but I never felt 100% certain because the ridge is so broad at this point. The scrambling is fun and feels solid enough, maybe up to fourth class here and there. As we kept going, I was nervous that we hadn’t come across any landmarks that I recognized yet until we finally reached the little step, protected by a bolt as promised in other trip reports I’d read. The little step really only had maybe 2 low fifth class moves. Marco pulled my pack up for me, and then I felt comfortable doing them sans rope or climbing shoes. We continued up the ridge a couple hundred feet more and found ourselves at the big step right around 8am.

By this point I was starting to feel pretty hungry — after all, we’d been moving for nearly 3 hours and gained probably close to 3k feet of elevation. As Marco flaked the rope and assembled the rack, I wolfed down a cliff bar. We followed the SummitPost beta for the climbing pitches and didn’t have too much trouble, with Marco leading all the pitches. The climbing felt a bit harder than I was expecting, and I was happy to have my rock shoes. Marco on the other hand stayed in his approach shoes and felt very secure with the three cams he’d brought for our rack. Later that night I heard him on the phone telling his girlfriend, “I’d start a pitch, put a piece in so Yelly wouldn’t worry, and then climb to the next anchor.” Thanks Marco. :-P

We finished this section of roped climbing around 10am, put away the rope, and took another snack break. We scoped out the rest of the route as we munched, easily identifying the leaning flake we needed to reach just below the black towers. We continued up the ridge, cutting left on a ledge and heading towards a chimney as described again in the SummitPost description. Once we passed the chimney, we basically took a direct upward/left traversing line towards the flake. The terrain was definitely loose, but I managed to feel solid enough to make good progress. When we finally reached the flake, we had to climb over the band of snow that is typically there. I was happy to see that right next to the flake, the snow was maybe only 5 ft wide, so not too bad to cross.

Marco carefully kicked steps in the very soft snow, plunging in his axe entirely for extra safety on each step. I followed suit, and then climbed up behind the flake, again seeing the bolts we’d expected from the SummitPost description. The description says going behind the flake is the hardest part of the black towers, but I found it to be quite easy. While some people pitch out the terrain up to and even past the flake, I never felt even close to the need to pull the rope out. I kept on my approach shoes, since the terrain felt very reasonable to me. Yes, it was heads up, but never really felt like fifth class to me. Marco disagrees here and definitely says it felt like fifth class. Who knows?

We continued up the gully through the black towers. As promised in some beta we’d read, every single hold did indeed have pea-sized gravel on it. I felt that my approach shoes were better on the gravel than climbing shoes would be. Just before 12:30pm, we topped out and had our views of the glacier. Over the course of the whole day, I’d been most nervous about the glacier. It seemed most trip reports didn’t really mention it, but those that did usually didn’t have good things to say. I also haven’t climbed much steep snow this year, I’d borrowed Leo’s very dull aluminum crampons and only had approach shoes, and we had no beta on the snow conditions on the glacier. If we’d found that the conditions were bad and we had to down climb the whole east ridge, I might have chosen to give up climbing entirely. Okay, that’s a bit dramatic, but down climbing all that horrible loose terrain really seems like a nightmare (which, after the fact, Marco did find a trip report in which some people thought they wouldn’t need crampons on the glacier, so they did indeed down climb the whole thing).

We took another snack break and geared up for the glacier. This was Marco’s first time doing roped glacier travel, and my first time this year, so I had to somewhat dust off the cobwebs. Between the two of us, we had enough knowledge to make it work though! For example, I couldn’t for the life of me remember how to tie an alpine butterfly, but Marco was there to save the day. After debating about who should lead the rope team, we settled on Marco, since he’d likely be faster at kicking steps.

And we were off. I was feeling pretty nervous about the terrain, since it was still unknown, and it definitely looked steeper than I had anticipated. The snow varied from everything to soft post-holing to full on alpine ice. I got pretty spooked in the alpine ice section, feeling my crampons couldn’t get nearly as much purchase as I’d like. I, with no ice climbing experience, was desperately throwing the pick of my axe into the ice, trying to get a good hold, with Marco watching and thinking…. well, that’s not going to work. He tried to coach me through the best way to throw my axe, and after several minutes without making much improvement, I yelled to him that this was not the time for me to learn to ice climb, and I’d just have to make my existing skills work.

As we got closer to the summit, we got more on the ridge proper. The snow was better closest to the edge, making me want to go towards it badly, but we also knew that the edge was heavily corniced, so quite dangerous. Excellent. After passing one particularly spooky spot, I spied some hikers on the summit, and was incredibly jealous of their position of safety, which was so close yet so far away. I saw them taking photos of us and thought to myself, “Well, it would be really embarrassing if I fell right now”. With Marco’s words of encouragement (and a “belay” at one point — though, let’s be real, we had no ice screws or pickets — this was a “make you feel good” belay), I got through the cruxes, and we moxied on up to the summit!

All the hikers had left by the time we arrived, so we shockingly had the summit to ourselves. It was just before 3pm, and I was pretty pleased with our very reasonable time — less than 10 hours to the summit. We took off our now very wet approach shoes and changed into dry socks, ate our sandwiches and some celebratory Reeses peanut butter cups, and took the required summit selfie. The clouds had luckily held off all day, but were looming nearby, so I didn’t want to press our luck. After maybe 20 minutes of snacking and repacking the gear, I headed off down the tourist route. I’d read very little about it, so I hoped the trail would be easy to follow, and it certainly was.

Heading down the trail was pretty uneventful. It did rain on us for a few minutes after we’d descended maybe halfway. The views from the trail itself were spectacular. The switchbacks above Moraine Lake seemed to go on forever, losing so little elevation at a time. But, we were back at the lake by 6:15pm, so just over 13 hours after we’d started that morning. After asking 6 different cars, Marco finally found a ride back to the van and then shuttled back to the lake to pick me up. I was shocked how good I felt and was stoked to have bagged such a beautiful peak via such a classic route. I was just craving more. :) Marco, more reasonably, was tired and ready for some rest. Shockingly, Marco the rock climber said it was a fun day and not a *total* slog. We headed to the Lake Louise overflow parking lot to make dinner and sleep away all our sore muscles.

Big thanks to my rope gun Marco for this one — for leading the rock pitches and helping me keep it together on the exposed snow. #teamworkmakesthedreamwork

[howsit-going-toend]

What Do YOU Want? Pt. 1

A Kwon Jiyong series ft. Kim Jiwon

Genre: Angst/Fluff

Word count: 2,500+

Summary: The most important person in the world to you can appear most often when you least expect it. But through everything, you can’t forget about you and your own happiness. Who are you happy with? Who is the best for you?

Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 

Your patience was wearing thin.

It had been nearly 3 weeks since you and Jiyong had spent any time together and it was time to address it. Since you worked during the morning/day at YG and then spent the early evenings in your studio, you made sure that you had all night free and you assumed Jiyong would do the same. But you were mistaken. Again.

It was really starting to break your heart how much less and less he seemed to have you in mind when he made decisions recently. You both would often discuss dinner plans early in the day, or meet up at the YG food court for a quick lunch, or just run your plans for the rest of the day by the other person at least once. Lately he would often decide to spend all day and night in the YG studio or go out to dinner with friends without an invitation or acknowledgment of you and then come home too tired to even enjoy your company. You saw him every night but you knew that things just weren’t the same anymore.

Maybe he was just too comfortable with living together and wasn’t putting in the same effort to your relationship because of it. That would be a simple fix, right? Or maybe it was something more.

What if he met someone?

You wiped the thought out of your head as quickly as it came. Your heart was already breaking, you didn’t have the time to put yourself through more misery over stumbling through the unknown. But what else do you think when the person you love more than anything in the world, hardly treats you like a friend anymore? He used to make you feel like the luckiest person in the world with just one smile after he came home from a long day at work. He used to hold you close and rub your back reassuringly after he woke up to you having a nightmare beside him. He never had to buy you expensive things to make you feel loved, though there was plenty of that. (No matter how much you would insist you definitely didn’t need that diamond choker…) You would lie awake all night just talking about anything and everything. You had been there for each other through every high and low and everyone around would complement the strength of your relationship. He used to tell you all the time how he had never felt this way about anyone before and that he couldn’t imagine life without you.

But above all, the most important part of your relationship, was he never actually had to say any of that for you to know. You felt his love for you and at some of the lowest points in your life, it served as the only thing that you were 100% sure about.

But lately you found yourself lying awake in the middle of the night and gazing at him in his sleeping state. You had always done this since you first started spending nights together and when you eventually moved in; you would observe how he snored ever so lightly and your heart would warm every time he shifted in his sleep to get closer and wrap his arms around you. Now however was different. You now stared at the love of your life and couldn’t fight the tears in your eyes that came when you started to wonder when the space that divided your side from his started feeling like it was 300 miles long. He would wake up at 7am for work, kiss the top of your head and say “I love you so much. Have a good day today, jagi” just like he has done every day since you moved in. But now it just felt like a mere routine and utterly heartless. The smile that used to touch his eyes and warm your heart now made you more uncertain than ever before.

What are you supposed to do when the person you miss so much is actually still sitting right in front of you?

You weren’t a confrontational person in the slightest, so your best tactic for letting him know something was wrong was to shut down. In the past, the second he noticed you doing this he would ask you what was wrong and wouldn’t stop until you told him. “Jagi, something is wrong and I want to do whatever I can to fix it. Please, just tell me.” But as of lately, that didn’t happen. He would ask you what was wrong and once you lied and said “Nothing, jagiya, I’m fine,” he would believe you and that was that. He wouldn’t ask again the rest of the night.

Something needed to be done. You needed to pull yourself together and talk to him about it. No more quietly crying yourself to sleep. No more pausing dance rehearsal to run to the bathroom and break down because you couldn’t handle putting on a show to everyone at YG anymore. You were not ok and the one person that needed to know that, didn’t.

Y/N: Hey. Come home for dinner tonight? I’ll order take out and we can just hang out?

You texted him on your lunch break before you went back to teaching the trainees some new choreography and hoped to God that he didn’t already have plans. Your attempts to spend time together in the past couple of weeks have all failed. Why should this be any different? But you needed to be hopeful. This talk needed to happen. Even if your heart was telling you the outcome wouldn’t be pretty.

**They say love is blind, Oh baby you’re so blind** You silently cursed the ringtone you chose for his text alerts for the improper timing of such a lyric. You snatched your phone out of your pocket with lightning speed, nearly spilling the coffee you had just poured yourself in the YG food court.

J: Of course, jagi. See you at 8?

Y/N: Sounds good to me <3

It was set. You thought you would feel some relief when he actually agreed to spending time with you, but you only felt your anxiety increase. You realized that you had no idea what to even say to him.

For the rest of the day you were a wreck. You tried your best to put on a fake smile and teach all the trainees the new choreography you’d come up with, but there was noticeably less passion and heart in your moves. You hit every angle with laziness, making it clear that your mind was preoccupied. This went on for the next few hours.

What am I supposed to say to him?

You were wrecking your brain all day trying to come up with a fluid script that you could run through in front of him. Just tell him you aren’t happy. Tell him you don’t feel like he’s invested in you or your relationship anymore. You know what, tell him to fuck off!

You were definitely flustered, and the constant physical movements during rehearsals weren’t helping. You dismissed the second group of trainees and checked the time on your phone.

“3:00”

You groaned loudly, thinking no one was left in the studio until you heard a distinctive chuckle towards the door. You jumped, which only made Bobby laugh louder once he realized he startled you. “That’s right, it’s your favorite time of day!” he teased.

He wasn’t wrong though. Lately, iKon’s dance rehearsals had been the only thing that had brought you any kind of stress relief. You had been hired by YG as a top choreographer, given your fame in the US, and your latest project aside from teaching YG’s style to the newest trainees was preparing iKon for their debut. They were already great dancers so working with them was a breeze. You’d grown to love these boys and since they were all close to you in age, you were able to joke around with them effortlessly. You looked forward to 3pm as a fun 2 hour break from the rest of your stress filled day. The only reason you had been less than thrilled to see the time today was because it meant you had 5 more hours to endure before you’d meet with Jiyong for dinner.

“Haha, I’m sorry Bobby, my mind is a bit elsewhere today. I wasn’t…”

“Hey, you don’t have to explain anything to me, Y/N, I’m just messing with you!” You smiled in relief as he ran to his place in the middle of the studio and jumped in the air, while twirling, and landed superhero style. It was the first genuine smile that came across your face all day.

The next two hours with Bobby and the boys flew by. The rehearsal was spent perfecting choreography on a single from their new album and it was coming along amazingly. At 5:00, the boys were all saying goodbye and that meant it was time for you to do your solo work, coming up with new routines and planning out your teaching schedules. You were supposed to do this until 8pm…just 3 more hours Y/N, you can do this…

“Hey, B.I. and I are going to grab some dinner here in a minute, if you’re hungry?”

It would seem Bobby had a knack for startling you when you were deep in thought. You jumped slightly at the sound of his voice interrupting your thought process and he drew a couple steps back from his place by the open door with a bashful grin that touched his eyes.

You wanted to accept Bobby’s invitation, but you had work to do and your plans for later had already included dinner, so you had to politely decline. “Oh thank you so much for offering, but Jiyong and I had already planned to grab take-out once he was done working.”

You thought for a moment that you noticed Bobby’s eyes grow sad at the mention of Jiyong, but if they had he quickly switched back to his cheerful grin.

“Sweet, no worries Y/N, Y’all have a good night!”

You returned the sentiment with a bow and once the door to the studio shut, you came back to your deep thoughts. You decided there would be no bullshitting tonight. Once you were both home, you would bring up that you needed to talk and just go from there based on what felt right.

If Jiyong doesn’t even have anything to say for himself at the mention of your unhappiness, then why bother preparing a speech…

**They say love is blind, oh baby you’re so blind** Hearing your phone go off with Jiyong’s lyrics at that hour caught you off guard as you fumbled through your bag to reach it.

J: Hey baby, I’m done! Shall we start our dinner plans early? I’m starving.

Shit

Well, it was now or never. You returned a confirmation text to Jiyong and proceeded to pack up your bag and exit the studio. You were still unsure how you felt about everything but were more overwhelmed with the fact that you were seeing him before 11pm for the first time in nearly a month.

“I just don’t know what you want from me. I’m busy a lot. You’ve been used to my schedule since we first started dating. It’s been years. Where is this dissatisfaction coming from?”

Dinner had ended and the amount of uncomfortable silences couldn’t go unaddressed any further. You had just gotten as far as telling Jiyong that you were unhappy with how far away he has felt recently, and he was already on the defense. He was defensive and had his famous pokerface on. 

“That’s just it, Jiyong. This is nothing new. I have been unhappy for a while now and you just don’t show that you care. We hardly ever talk anymore and when we do, it feels so forced as if you don’t even want to talk to me. You go to bed with me and that’s it. We used to show each other so much love every single day and were convinced that we’d never get out of the ‘honeymoon phase.’ Well here we are. But it’s far worse than that. It feels like we’ve completely gotten out of ‘us’…” Your last words caused Jiyong’s pokerface to fall into obvious confusion and a little bit of something else; hurt. Your words were starting to ring true to him and the truth was cutting deep.

“You may be content with this but I am not at all, and have been trying to show you that all month. You feel a million miles away and I can’t explain to you how much that hurts. It feels like I’ve already lost you and there is absolutely nothing I can do to change it.” Tears had started to drop from your eyes as you let out a groan of frustration and violently ran your fingers through your hair.

Jiyong remained staring at you, speechless, with the same hurt and confused expression.

“And if you have nothing to say to keep me here or keep our relationship together, then there is no reason for me to be here any longer. I cannot do this anymore Jiyong.” He started shaking his head vigorously and reached his hands out to you, desperately, as he removed himself from his position on the couch. There were evident tears in his eyes and yet, he still couldn’t find the words.

“Please…please stay.” He uttered with a shaking voice.

“Why should I? I need you to give me more than that Jiyong. I need to know you still love me and that you still want the same things with me that we have talked about for years. I need to know I’m still your one and only…”

All he did was cry. Jiyong’s face fell into his hands as he burst into tears. “You can’t go, Y/N…I need you here,” he managed in between sobs.

You looked on, tears flowing as you observed the man you love, a bawling mess. Despite the feeling pulling at you to drop to your knees and hold him and tell him everything will be ok, you shook your head and said what needed to be said.

“No. No you don’t. You have made that very clear and I am sick of feeling worthless. Goodbye, Jiyong.”

You turned and grabbed your bag as you walked towards the door, ignoring his desperate pleading for you to stay and sort things out with him. But how could you sort things out anymore after how he reacted to the news of you being unhappy?

Why had it been news to him? Did he truly not pay that much attention to you…?”  

Your heart was breaking into smaller and smaller pieces, with every step you took away from his apartment. The place you would no longer call home. You fought off each and every urge to turn around and run back through those doors. But your mother raised you better than that; to put the needs of others before yourself, but to never ever forget about your own happiness at the end of the day. “If someone makes you question your worth to them, then you need to follow your own path and remind yourself just how much better this world is with you in it.” After your first love proved to be a manipulative and abusive asshole, your mother said these words to you as often as she could.

But Jiyong was completely different from him. You loved him with every fiber of your being and couldn’t bear the thought of living a day away from him. But that all was about to change. You didn’t know how, but you were going to be ok without him. You needed it. You needed to find your happiness and worth again.

[uncharacteristicallyhonest]

Something Epic

I’m remembering more and more of my trip this weekend at Mount Shasta, but uncertain on how best to start the tale.

As I stumbled into a hotel late Sunday night to catch some much needed shut-eye, and upon seeing me painfully limp across the foyer in my sweat-stained trekking gear, wildly matted hair, and crusty sunburnt face, the young female clerk says to me, “You look like you’ve done something epic today”. Words often utterly fail me, but she nailed it. And its going to take me some time to fully appreciate exactly what happened and what it will mean.

There was a brief moment of clarity on an otherwise agonizing, sleepless night on Friday. Let’s just assume it was around 3:00 am, in the middle of the most horrific wind storm I’ve ever experienced in a camping tent. We had geared-up that morning, and backpacked some number of miles over difficult snowpack from the trailhead, across various ridges and gullies with the heaviest pack I’ve ever carried. This was only my second ever backpacking trip, so that’s not necessarily impressive, but it was back-breaking work for me, and in snowshoes. I had only two companions, including the guide, and a shadow guide-in-training.

By the time we had dug out enough snow to build a decent size windbreak for the tent, set up camp, melted enough snow to refill our water bottles, and consumed some warm and welcome calories, I thought sleep was going to come quick, deep and restorative. My guide had dissuaded me from packing my new ultralight (and super-comfy) sleeping pad in favor of an older, less compact (4X), and significantly heavier (3X) pad. I told him I’m a side-sleeper, and need the extra comfort afforded from the 3.75” of air goodness vs the 1.5” of the older one. He simply stated, in a flat monotone, that I wasn’t going to be comfortable no matter what, but the insulating capability of the older pad would mean I wouldn’t freeze to death while sleeping on snow and ice under my sleeping bag. I took note that even with the improved insulation, he carefully did not claim I would be warm. Of course I took his advice immediately (but secretly resented not being able to use my newer expensive one!)

The wind had picked up considerably by the time we turned in on that first night, well before sunset. As I watched the light fade ever so slowly, in expectation of that glorious sleep after a labor-intensive day, the wind changed to outright fury. Demonic fury. I had helped dig and build the windbreak we were in, and could not imagine how things might have been without it. Even so, the sides of the tent constantly whipped and slapped at my side and head. There was a continuous barrage of ice particulates on the exterior. Believe it or not, the guides (now sleeping very peacefully, curse them!) had left the door to the tent stashed open (to reduce condensation), with only the vestibule offering meager protection from this unending assault of wind and freezing temperatures. I was giving deep consideration to what the average wind speeds and maximum gusts were *inside* the tent.

So it was at this indeterminable hour that this one simple point of clarity had arrived (sorry for taking so long to get to it). Apparently I had cracked a fingernail during the day, and a painful hangnail had developed on that finger. I knew it was bleeding, and the searing pain caused all of my universe to narrow down into this tiny focal point of extreme discomfort. And then it hit me. I can’t deal with everything going on right then, but I could use all of my few remaining faculties to isolate and extract this god-damned hangnail. It took some effort and time, but ultimately succeeded.

Next, I could force myself to sit up and secure the tent door. By then, the vestibule zipper had blown open, flapping loudly (with all the other noise), and the tent had been completely exposed to the maelstrom swirling outside for some hours. It took several minutes in the blackness to will my fingers to unfasten the unknown and hidden straps and secure the door. I just couldn’t believe my two companions were sleeping through all of this. My body was freezing, shivering, tense and locked in a tight and rigid state of misery. Maximum pain peaked in my toes from the cold. And I couldn’t even touch them with my hands in the mummy bag. So I went to work on things I could control, like relaxing my body to improve circulation, and finding new features of my bag (like the pull strings) to reduce heat loss. Et cetera.

My toes never did fully warm up that night, and ultimately a heavy despair had set in. The wind had not let up once, and I was wracked with wave after wave of abdominal pains. After first light, I could lay there no longer, got dressed, and braved the cold and wind for my first-ever adult leave-no-trace, backcountry poop experience. We were above the tree line, camped on a ridge, and the only reasonable location I could find in the frozen snow was on a small out-cropping of rock. Space just enough to hold the “target” while going about my business. My view was of the whole valley below, majestic and pristine in the frigid arctic air, with my bits in full exposure. It was very difficult, and took a long time. But I did it, and despite just about everything totally sucking for me in the world, I fist-pumped the sky, packaged up my prize, and re-entered the tent a champion.

The pains, cold, discomforts, and despair did not leave however, and neither did the wind. I gave considerable thought to how badly (if at all) I wanted to even attempt to climb this mountain. I figured my guide would simply announce the weather was bad enough that the climb was too risky, we would wait for a break, pack up and out of this miserable (but beautiful) place. Despite all the training I had done over the past 3 months, I was over it. The experience so far, would suffice. I rationalized that enough had already occurred for my goal of increasing tolerance for discomfort.

My guide is a genuinely awesome person. Ruggedly handsome, amazingly experienced in the backcountry, and an enjoyable adventure companion. He is also a man of few words. And as we lay tent-bound during those morning hours, I attempted to coax his assessment of the weather with regards to our objectives and options for getting out of there alive (and as soon as possible!). The most he was willing to offer was this: “We’ll do what we can do today.” It was frustrating and vague. But he would say no more about it. And of my climbing pessimism, he was having none of it. Honestly, I was scared to even contemplate continuing on with the climb. So I took a different tack, and discussed some of the problems (like my freezing toes), and he indicated these were solvable. After our discussion, and with the storm slightly easing, he got up, dressed and went to work in the “kitchen” (an alcove in our snow-brick windbreak) to melt more snow, boil water, and prepare some oatmeal and coffee. The only thing I could do was follow suit, gear up, and shake off that sleepless nightmare of the past 12 hours or so inside the tent.

During breakfast, the wind died down, and we shortly commenced what my guide called “Snow School”. This involved a fair amount of mountaineering history, and he demonstrated the various techniques for using crampons. Frankly, I was rather surprised at how expansive the “science of cramponing” can be! And I spent the rest of the morning marching up and down a large and dangerously steep incline in crampons doing the “duck”, then “French” technique, followed by the “German” technique and later Canadian, “Plunging” and various combinations thereof. It was fun and educational.

There was a break for lunch and then we moved onto all things “Ice Axe”, which as I’m sure you’ve guessed by now, is rather more nuanced than might be guessed at first glance. This culminated in a lengthy series of exercises where I would have to repeatedly launch myself down this same dangerously steep incline in various poses (sitting, on my belly, and headfirst on my back!) with the axe (AKA: deadly object with many sharp points), and after enough speed develops, use the ax and a complicated series of fatal-looking maneuvers to stop myself in various conditions of ice and snow. Frankly, I’m a bit surprised I survived the afternoon. But it was more fun in the snow than I’ve had since snowball battles with 6th grade classmates. Wow. During dinner, I began to re-evaluate my earlier despair over climbing the mountain. I was in the tent and heard my guide outside mentioning to the shadow how excited he was to climb the West Face later that night. “Me too!” replied the shadow. The words “Me three!” escaped my lips. And I never looked back.

Mount Shasta, at 14,178 ft and an impressive prominence of almost 10,000 ft above its surroundings, is the 11th most prominent peak in the US (96th in the world). It is considered a potentially active volcano, and the USGS rates it as “Very High Threat” for eruption. It absolutely dominates the landscape in that region of California, and is a popular destination for extreme backcountry activities of all kinds. When you tell someone you are going to climb a mountain like this, the first thing they will ask is if you “summited”. My guide says less than half of his clients actually make it (and these are vetted folks, who’ve paid a fair sum for guides). Either fatigue, extreme conditions, or sometimes altitude sickness can lead to unsuccessful attempts, and this is quite common. So asking “Did you summit?” is totally a “thing”. And a positive response is in no way a sure thing.

We woke up at 12:00 am, midnight. I say “woke up” with a high degree of generosity of what was actually a very meager few hours of total sleep time. But my toes were not cold thanks to the expert advice from my guide, and the weather was looking like ideal conditions. (Note that ideal for climbing means extremely cold!)

Imagine, if you will, the sky that I saw in that remote backcountry location. It was one day from a new moon, and an hour’s drive from any reasonably-sized city. I want to say it was pitch-black, but I’ve never seen so many stars in brilliant display, at such elevation, with crystal-clear skies, and thin, brisk night air. I ask you to imagine that, because words often fail me.

We had re-packed our packs with only essentials, downed a cup of instant Folger’s, and bid goodbye to the relative comforts of camp. Without belaboring the point, I do say “relative comforts” honestly, keeping in mind how miserable my body was the night before. I knew perfectly well (in perfect ignorance) that this was not going to be an easy day.

During gear-check, my guide asked how I felt, which I replied “almost comfortable”. He then told me to remove one of my insulating layers. I knew better than to question his instructions, and later he explained that we need to be “cold” starting out, because the effort of climbing will generate a lot of heat. Slightly after 1:00 am, the three of us were trekking out into the blackness, single file, with red headlamps, and crunching snow with crampons. Out, and up. 

I called my mom the next day to wish her Happy Mother’s Day, and let her know that I was ok from my Shasta adventure. After telling her a few details about what it was like climbing the mountain, she demanded of me (as only a mother can), “Brian, my son, why did you choose to do this??” I didn’t (and don’t) have a great answer for that. Adventure is its own reason, as little sense as that might make. On my whiteboard at home, I have a list of my activities for the past 4 months that terminates at the bottom with the label “Shasta”. Every line above was planned with the purpose to prepare me for this trip. 10 weeks of climbing Mission Peak, Double hike of Mission Peak. Running. Mount Diablo. Mount Umunhum. The freaking Grand Canyon in one day! 100km bike rides. Mount Sizer. Backpacking classes and my first backpacking trip to Pt Reyes with the Sierra Club. I’ve been obsessing over backpacking books and on friendly terms with the staff at REI. “It just sort of happened”, is the best I could offer my mom for an explanation.

And despite all my efforts and preparation, nothing could have prepared me for this trip (and nothing short of my preparation would have enabled its conclusion). I simply had no idea of the magnitude of the challenge.

It starts out rather simply, just one crunchy step after the next in the snow. Follow the leader. His headlamp is the only thing I can see in the blackness, (besides all those stars!). You don’t even need to think about it. That next step just happens all by itself. We’ve been camping at the foot of this mountain for 2 days, and my mind is able to envision the slope we are on, heading into the center of the local snow “bowl”. As promised, my body warms (for a certain definition of “warm”) and all seems magical in the universe. It will be a good four hours or so before first light. The headlamps play tricks on my eyes with the snow slopes, rock outcrops, and effort needed to sustain this climb. As the incline steepens, the effort increases. We switch from “duck” crampon technique to a mix of French and Canadian, and swap trekking poles for the ice axes. Approximately every hour we find a relatively safe location (“relatively” because it is all perilous in the extreme) and rest for 5 minutes. We have to immediately don our puffy down coats. The body temperature plummets dramatically, and the effect is startling and most disconcerting. After a few mins, and a quick snack, I am already shivering visibly, and my hands begin to ache with freeze. Re-stashing the puffs, we get on our way.

I never asked what the temperature was, although it was always on my mind. It really didn’t matter. It was what it was, and it varied greatly from moment to moment. The coldest time of the day is at first light, and I’m guessing it was probably low-20s or high teens, with an impressive wind chill factor. My two guides have a ton of experience between them in far worse conditions, and they were fairly ecstatic about how great conditions were for the climb. To me, it was fucking cold. It doesn’t get that cold, anywhere, ever. And if it does (and it did where I went to college) I’ve either never gone out in it, or have completely blanked those memories. But here I was at first light, about half way up the West Face, in this freezing cold. Each time after a break, my hands would turn to excruciating shards of searing pain. This would last for a long time. And when the fingers would slowly thaw out of it with climbing exertion, like a panel of LEDs that would eventually all turn green, it was a good feeling that all systems were functional at nominal levels! But other body systems would turn amber or red for other reasons, and need a break. So there was this cycle of pain and discomfort that defines existence while climbing.

As the sun rose behind Shasta, there were many amazing views that I struggled mightily to NOT see. Every time I took my eyes from the snow directly in front of me, there was a certain degree of disorientation. To be honest, the disorientation happened often, even without losing focus, but either looking up, over or down definitely made it much worse. Like I could lose my balance and fall off the edge of the world. It seemed vitally important (and its interesting to look back and agree that “vitally” is used here without exaggeration) to not look both up and down during the same moment of appreciating a view. But my guides were determined that I should see some unforgettable and utterly unique views. Like the razor sharp shadow of Mount Shasta projected as a triangle unto the landscape below, perfectly encompassing the Black Butte pyramid-shaped “mountain” far, *far* below. Or looking down into the fully intact summit crater of the nearby peak of Shastina (looking DOWN into a 12,000 ft mountain! — Shastina on her own is the fourth largest peak of the Cascade Range)

By the way, the West Face ascent is somewhat longer and more difficult than the much more popular Avalanche Gulch approach. We saw no other living creature (outside of a few ravens) until reaching the aptly-named Misery Hill about six hours into it, where the WF route meets up with that from AG. (And for the record, I had no idea we were doing the WF, or that it was longer than AG. Looking back, I might have made better choices with a bit more research and attention to detail.)

Anyway, well before reaching the aptly-named Misery Hill (and yes, if you have climbed it, you’ll also never drop the “aptly-named” prefix for that particular “hill”), the steepness and generally horrific conditions at the top of the West Face become another one of these all-consuming universe-vortex-of-focus moments. We skirted a few glaciers up there (there are seven named ones on Shasta). Glaciers! My guides are pretty stoked about the whole experience. This is what they do, and exactly how they make their living. And although neither has actually completed this particular route (in previous attempts their clients had all bailed before this point), they are in very good spirits. But my experience was a little different. My body (considerably older than theirs; I’m entitled to point out!) is nearing exhaustion, and at the limits of what it can physically do. Every step I take means that I will have another one, equally dangerous, to get back to camp. (Oh, and I should add that my guide would often make note that upon return to camp, we will be immediately packing up and undertaking the also-treacherous -- if rather less so by my new standards for such things -- hike back to the car!)

So try to imagine yourself nearing the top of this incredibly tall mountainside, with a crazy steep slope of snow (hello!? Right over there its called *Avalanche* gulch for a reason!). You are now tethered to your guide via a short rope, but that doesn’t change the fact that every move you make is purely on your own power and judgement, and any misstep might very well lead to your death or life-changing injury. Your body is nearing its limits of production. You’ve had 2 hours of sleep over the past two nights. The air you are breathing has significantly less oxygen that you are used to. The wind can literally blow you off your feet, (and you’ve already experienced that on safer terrain). After about six hours of this, I got to the point where I was faced with a fateful decision. Do I try to take another step? Just one more step? There is a surprisingly large number of risk factors that went into it. Can you even take another step, and still return to camp? There is no other route out of this; no escape plan. I *think*, with enough focus, I can lift and place my right foot just so, using correct technique, pulling my body (and pack) just a little bit higher and maintain my delicate balance. And do I want to? This time, yes, ok. And then, go through that whole process again with the left foot. Et cetera. That wasn’t my favorite part of the climb (at least at the time). But I think there is some important meaning for me. Or something. Still trying to sort this out.

At one point, after a break, and my hands were in that excruciating state, I lost feeling in one or two fingers. It felt different. I’m told that is not good, although a lot of the pain subsided. It felt like the glove itself was frozen, so I couldn’t move it. I knew from my guide that I couldn’t lose the ice axe. It was absolutely critical. If you lose grip (and it needs to change hands often - we practiced this in Snow School), it will obviously fall down the mountain and be lost forever. Your climb is done, and everyone will have a most unpleasant decent from there, trying to get you down alive. Somehow. There are pros and cons to using a tether for your axe, and we were of the school that concludes with no tether. And I couldn’t feel at least one of my fingers, and I still had to use that axe during every single step. So yeah, I was scared. And focused.

With renewed effort of exertion over several minutes, the feeling in my fingers gradually returned (much to my relief), and became among my most intensely painful moments (that haven’t been already blocked out of memory). But I survived.

I can’t say things got better from there. The aptly-named Misery Hill earned its name. The actual summit was a long, steep and perilously narrow path through craggy rock outcroppings and fiercely high, and bitterly cold winds. We took a few pics. My guide shared some “summit” bitter dark chocolate, he had graciously carried for the occasion. I think I broke off too large of a piece because I couldn’t finish it. Adhering to the “leave no trace” policy, I stashed it in a pocket, and enjoyed it much more nibbling on it while writing these notes :) The return trip was also difficult, and due my knee issue (diagnosis: Chondromalacia of both patellae) took a much longer time than anticipated and caused no end of pain. Because our summit was a relatively quick one (at 8 hours from West Face), the conditions were not appropriate for Glisading until the very last leg (which was seriously fun!). We packed up camp, and marched out the way we came, with these very heavy packs, and exhausted from 18 hours of straight hiking. Note that with “leave no trace”, the packs literally weigh the same going out as when you came in (gross, I know!)

I will never look at items of my backpacking gear as simple checklist boxes that they were when purchased at REI. These precious items enabled me to survive in extreme conditions. My life relied on their construction and proper functioning.

I’ve written way too much here, and didn’t cover many interesting aspects of the experience. They say that girls bond easily during everyday life, but for guys it takes either a war or extreme adventure. There were times of both love and a little bit of comical hate for my two companions, and they both deserve far more words here than I’ve given them, and I will always remember these two magnificent men who led me up my mountain and got me back down alive. Thank you Richard and Will. (Fyi, I tipped them as much as I could afford)

When I got into my hotel room (after that “epic” greeting by the clerk), I was finally able to peel off the socks and inspect the damage first hand. It wasn’t pretty. It’s going to take a few days to recover, from all over. I made a list of everything that is currently hurting, which I won’t share, haha.

Although I “left no trace” of my adventure on top of Shasta, I wonder what effect the experience had on me. Certainly significant, I can feel. But it will take more time to digest and observe. It’s time to erase my whiteboard, and find out what comes after “Shasta”.