#(There is no way on god's green earth that I can write this long every time but Arthur had a Vibe)

[livestosteal]

@etruatcaelum liked for a starter!

There were surprisingly few things for a man not interested in constant combat to do around Evernight. Well, for a given value of 'few' he supposed. For Arthur's personal tastes, it was occasionally more of a pain to do much more than his most lazy pursuits. Reading and coding were always excellent timekillers of course, but...well.

Today at least, it was the forge that beckoned him.

For a man as - admittedly - slender and cerebral as Arthur was, it was perhaps some surprise that he didn't just code or build some device to do such things for him when the itch got under his skin to make something, but of course, therein lay the catch: one could import or build whatever was desired, of course, but somewhere down the line it had to be made. And who knew better than he the things he needed, in the exact specifications?

Besides, when one got right down to it, there was something to be said for there being some satisfaction in the act of swinging a hammer at glowing red metal until it took the form that was desired. If absolutely nothing else? It was cathartic as hell.

Sweat soaked the scientist's loose shirt even as a soft tone interrupted the steady rhythm of his hammer to the bright orange slab of metal, and he half-turned to his worktable. His scroll buzzed again, and with a groan Arthur wiped the sweat from his eyes and paced over irritably.

Anyone at Evernight was likely well aware of his location and would have just poked their head in if they needed him - though, perhaps Salem might use some other method. No, the only person he could think of who might need him and would be using his scroll, was Cinder. Or, he supposed, one of the whelps that followed her about.

He opened it just before a fourth buzz might have sounded...and blinked. More out of sheer surprise than expecting it to work, he flicked the device shut, waited a moment...then opened it again. Indeed, the same banner notification from on of his surveillance programs flashed across the screen.

A low laugh started to slip out of his raw, parched throat, even as he cursed softly.

Whatever Cinder had done in Vale...he was not getting blamed for them having no signal now. His little virus was a masterpiece of course, truly a marvel of his own creation, but it didn't even have the means to bring down communications like that, let alone- stars above, had she somehow gotten one of the towers destroyed? The notification certainly seemed to think so, and he'd coded that program himself. The program could be faulty, he supposed, but-

How, by the moon and stars, was he supposed to do half his work without access to anything or anyone beyond their little localized pocket? Ugh...a problem for later. The notification had apparently been going off longer than he thought, too, because the timestamp was almost half an hour ago.

He barely registered the sound of the forge/workshop's door being opened, but he snapped his scroll shut and set it aside before moving back to his current project. It was only when he glanced up that he hummed, moving to put the cooling metal back in the sweltering heat of his forge.

"And what can I do for you? I doubt you came all the way here to see me smithing." Though, he supposed, weirder things had happened. Not even around Evernight, he'd...seen a lot of weird things in life.

[no-saints-around-here]

Yesterday's Cage for Tomorrow's Prison: Chapter 2

Yandere Shiba & Sano Family with Baby Shiba Sister!Reader

Masterlist

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<< Chapter 1

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this was a lot harder to write than I thought, and I nearly died but unfortunately the immigration line in hell was too long

tw: heavy incest, pseudo incest, explicit smut, yandere, drugging, sexual assault, heretic religious themes, afab reader, female pronouns, dead dove do not eat

Yuzuha cursed under her breath, large orange eyes sweeping side to side as she methodically checked the storefront for any sign of you. Nothing, again. Turning to briskly walk further down the same street to the next store, the orange-haired girl already knew that you weren’t going to be there either. Hell, she could say with a hundred percent certainty that you weren’t going to be anywhere near here, even if she wasn’t done with her meticulous searching for the day. Having long lost count of the number of times she had already looked in every nook and cranny of your favorite haunts over the past week, day and night, there was simply no way she would have missed you at this point. More so, it was the sinking feeling in her gut and that third sense she had for you that confirmed your absence from the area.

Opting to sink onto one of many benches that littered the shopping street, the Shiba sibling popped open a cold can of soda, taking a chug as she took a break from the afternoon sun in the shade of a tree, watching the rest of the world go by. Nameless individuals bustling up and down the street, bags of things filling both arms and eyes occupied with the glamorous displays, sparing naught a second glance at her or her situation as they rushed past on an unknown countdown. An undignified sigh slipped the lady’s lips as she lowered her now half-empty can, bronze eyes glazed over as she stared up at the rustling leaves overhead, though she did still catch a few stray empathetic looks thrown her way.

The last thing she wanted was anyone’s pity, really, but Yuzuha simply couldn’t help herself looking this despondent. After all, you were gone. Missing. Lost to the greater world, and no matter how poetic one could make that sound, the simple matter of the fact was that neither she nor Taiju had seen you in a week. if you weren’t here or there or wherever she looked, then where on God’s green earth could you possibly be? Were you even still alive?

‎

The quaint little shopping street, just a stone’s throw from the Shiba family home, brought a pang of nostalgia to the lonely lady’s chest - the shops that lined both sides of the pedestrian lane had changed hands countless times, but the slow, leisurely atmosphere had remained steadfast across the past twelve years. Once considered a rare escape from the house in exchange for your good behavior, the occasionally bustling area was now more of a reminder of the recurring nightmare Yuzuha was currently trapped in. Taking another large gulp, the orange-haired lady had to quickly sit up as she spluttered, earning herself another look from a passerby to which she sheepishly apologized, before quickly returning to her pondering. Was there anyone else you could be seeking shelter with? As far as she was concerned, it wasn’t as if you had any other friends outside of your older siblings, with most being too afraid of the long shadow of Taiju and the unspoken threat that you carried with you, and the rest having already been dealt with.

While there wasn’t much to like about the blue-haired former delinquent of an older brother -  their miserable childhoods under his tyrannical rule, the physical and emotional abuse they endured for years on end, and the extreme decisions that he had driven both Yuzuha and Hakkai to at the end of their wits - for you, it had been worth it all. She hated Taiju, but there was no denying that you had been kept safe by the oldest of the Shibas all these years.

Pulling her phone out from her pocket, the second Shiba sibling clicked into her chat history with you as if on instinct, her fingers mindlessly beginning to scroll upwards through the countless desperate, unanswered messages she had sent your way. You weren’t supposed to have a phone (Taiju would never permit it, no matter what the reason is) but the simple dumbphone you owned had been a gift from your older sister with strict instructions not to breathe even a word of its existence. It had no internet functionality, since not even she would risk you being able to access the internet and its treasure trove of internet, but as the only two girls left in the household, you and Yuzuha shared some secrets and had to have a way to do so. The phone was purely just for messages and calls and the occasional simple game when their big brother wasn’t watching. Or at least that was how the bronze-eyed lady told herself.

The memories came flooding back as she finally reached your last reply, what had seemed like a reassuring “yes, nii-san!” before you all but fell off the face of the earth. Such a simple gift had been enough to endear you to her, and you had thanked her again and again through the years, always willing to answer her messages and calls quickly, humming to yourself when you got time to fiddle around with the small electronic. Yet, you hadn’t replied in a week.

‎

Standing from the bench, the lady stretched, flicking her empty soda can into the nearby bin with pinpoint accuracy as she stalked off, phone swinging lazily in one hand. A slight breeze had picked up during her rest, and though it only seemed to blow hot air down the street instead of providing any respite, Yuzuha took in a deep breath, enjoying the fleeting moment of calm. There was no point in frantically trying to call or message you, even though she had been doing so herself over the past few days; your phone was most likely dead from a lack of battery, or if you had seeked shelter with someone, the phone had probably already changed hands. 

You didn’t want to be found, certainly not by her,  that much was obvious. And your older sister didn’t blame you.

The lady turned a corner into a side alley, the cacophony of the crowds dying down behind her with every step she took further into the shaded street. She didn’t believe in the concept of sin and repentance, the same one that her older brother so conveniently ignored when it came to you, but there was no denying that she would never be able to answer for what she had done to you. There were excuses she could give herself of course; that she couldn’t ignore the way that Taiju looked at you as the years passed, as you started to yearn for the freedom of the wider world. That Taiju should take all the blame for being the one to actually deflower you in a misplaced bid to preserve your purity. 

But Yuzuha would be the one to carry the original sin even if she was just trying to do the right thing. She had been the one that had trained you, that had prepared you to take Taiju. Cleaning you up after everything that had happened, soothing the mystery ache between your legs that you complained about the next day.  Keeping you on birth control pills for years and years, never knowing when the oldest of the Shibas would make his move yet never wanting to risk anything untold happening to you. All in the name of keeping the Shiba family together, as she had promised their mother. 

‎

A pause as she came to a stop at a fork in the road, the lady too lost in her own thoughts to make a decision which way to turn.

Yet even then, as much as that was all Yuzuha would like to admit to herself, she would always share the burden of giving into temptation. She could still see the first time it happened if she let her thoughts slip; your contorted expression, furrowed eyebrows as you mumbled in your sleep, your legs crossed as you unconsciously humped your pillow - a wet dream. Taking the opportunity of when you should share her room to explore you herself, the lady let out a ragged breath as her mind recalled her slipping her fingers into the pants of your pajamas and into your panties, slim fingers finding their way towards your already drenched slit and into your warmth. Your whimper as your walls clamped down around her intrusion as she teased and prodded, bronze eyes all the way carefully watching your expression.

The feeling of you spazzing uncontrollably around her as you came in your sleep, drenching both your underwear and her fingers with a moan that sounded too awake. Yuzuha had jerked away in a panic, the elastic band of your pants snapping back against your skin, but you had mercifully fallen back asleep amidst coming down from your high. You tasted sweet, the burst of flavor as she licked her fingers striking a chord deep inside your older sister, a sweetness that she couldn’t get enough of. And while it was the first time she - or anyone really - had ever explored you in that manner, it certainly wasn’t the last time. You had turned from her baby sister into an unholy addiction that she couldn’t give up. 

Her phone lit up and began to buzz, the ringing echoing down the otherwise lifeless sidestreet. Yuzuha blinked, drawn out from her thoughts.

Taiju. Was it already time?

With a deftly press of a button, she brought the smartphone to her ear, taking the quiet path to the left.

‎

‎

There was no doubt that your siblings would be scouring the streets for any sign of you, Izana mused, the fingers on one gloved hand tapping a rhythmless tune atop the glass as empty eyes watched you consider and reconsider your decision, yet that train of thought hardly bothered him. For one, this was a privately owned shop in a rather obscure location, down several narrow and rarely trodden alleyways that no regular passerby had any business accessing. And for two, was most definitely the right decision to bring you on this little excursion; knowing your older siblings and their annoying habit of breathing down your neck about everything big and small, they would have never allowed you to choose your own unhealthy, sinful treat, let alone see the inside of a convenience store. 

Which meant that this would put him squarely in your good books, ahead of not only your wretched siblings, but more importantly, ahead of the rest of his own wretched siblings. His grip on you tightened slightly, the rate of his breathing rising.

The longer he could keep you to himself, the better.

Returning to reality from his daydreams of his life after you had obviously picked him over the rest of the Sanos, it was obvious that the colorful display of ice cream in the freezers was more akin to cocaine to you; the large selection spread out beneath you having you absolutely mesmerized with just the glass slider separating your eager hands from the delightful treats. “There’s so many…” you mumbled out under your breath, your eyes darting right to left as you leaned over the chest freezer, the colorful wrappers glinting in the reflection in your eyes. “Which one?”

Was it really that hard to choose? Not that he would know, he supposed, given that he already had his favorites delivered straight to his doorstep and barely spares a second glance to the entirety of the shop on a regular day. But even if he was usually an impatient man, this was one instance that Izana didn’t mind taking it slow, the tanned club owner leaning in so that his body pressed up tight against your own, violet eyes fluttered closed and his face pressed into the crook of your shoulder, biting back the groan he could feel building in the back of his throat. Your blood family was the last thing on your mind at the moment, and this was exactly the way he liked it. One hand resting on your clothed thigh, the other already taking the initiative to begin exploring under the hem of your skirt, it took every ounce of control he had to ignore the tenting crotch of his pants. He couldn’t wait. “Wasn’t there a certain brand you were looking for?” He breathed out into your ear, warm air tickling your skin. “Do they not have it here?”

“Y-yes!” You startled slightly at his question as if you had been lost in your own world, your hands instantly flying up to shake a ‘no’ at his question instead much to his amusement. “Um, Izana-nii, I mean-”

His hand teased at the hem of your panties, rubbing the cloth that covered your crotch lightly between the pads of his fingers, occasionally brushing against the bare lips hidden underneath. Still no negative reaction from you. “You can’t choose?”

“No,” you admitted, though your eyes were still fixed on the contents of the freezer. “I didn’t know there were so many here.”

The air-conditioning continued to whirl from above unimpeded as the world outside continued to turn, the convenient store absolutely silent save for the sound of breathing.

“Hmmm.” Violet eyes scanned the small area even as his hands never ceased their exploration - it was never intended to be a cover business, he mused to himself, given there were more convenient alternatives to launder money, but this small snack stop had finally shown its usefulness beyond allowing his men to get what they need. A tingle in the back of his neck, and Izana swirled around, only for the heavily-tattooed man serving as the cashier to immediately avert his gaze at his nasty look. “Tch.” His eyes had lingered on you for a second too long, and he didn’t like it one bit. He’ll have to get that sorted later.

‎

Unfortunately for the tanned club owner, that gut feel wasn’t just for the unwelcomed looks at his new little sister. A sudden blast of humid air and an untimely trumpet of a car horn in the distance signaled the arrival of an unwelcome guest and a disruption to his plans with the click of the store door being opened, much to Izana’s displeasure, though the fact that it was Kakucho’s voice floating over from the shelves through the now-open door and not the sound of gunshots gave a good indication of who this intruder might be. “Wait, you can’t go ins-”

”Fuck off,” returned Mikey, the cheery welcome jingle of the convenience store a stark contrast to the other’s completely unamused tone. “I have business with that asshat.”

A smack, and then a second voice piped up, drowning out the burst of protests and whines from Mikey. “Don’t be so rude to Kakucho-kun, Mikey!” Emma scolded, the click of her heels echoing up from the tall shelves of the shop as she followed the other deeper into the shop. “He’s just doing his job, you know.”

How did they know to find him here? Izana glanced back at you even as his Sano half-brother continued to complain loudly about being ill-treated and biases towards anyone who would listen (which is to say, nobody in the vicinity); you were still too distracted with the first choice you had in a long time to notice the intruders, and it was already slightly too late to make an exit before the two of you could be noticed. He would have to wait and see what happens next, he supposed, empty eyes glancing back down at you.

“Hey shithead,” Mikey started from around the corner, right as the first of his blond locks came into view from behind a shelf of snacks. “I’ve been trying to call you for the past hour-”

‎

It was at that precise moment that you made your decision, turning your head up to look at Izana, ice cream already carefully clutched in hand. “Izana-nii, can I -“ And almost as soon as the words left your tongue, you finally took note of the arrival of outsiders, perhaps catching the subtle, sudden movement from the corner of your eyes, or catching the last of Mikey’s spat words. Yet for all that was going on around him, the ifs and could-bes, Izana’s gaze and fascination was fixed on you. What would your next move be? Would you scream? Would you attempt to scurry away to hide? 

Time froze for a moment as your eyes fixed on the unseen source of the noise on the other side of the shelves. What was going on in that little mind of yours?

Yet contrary to all his expectations, you instead instantly clammed up, your jaw snapping shut like a trap around a mouse. Taking a short step in his direction and ducking behind the white-haired man, you seemed to be attempting to line yourself up in a bid to ensure that his silhouette almost covered yours perfectly from the entrance. You were trying to blend into his side, hiding from the unknown.

It was a move that was so unlike your personality that it took Izana by surprise. No doubt this smooth a movement was the result of previous practice, Izana noted amusedly as he watched you move with uncharacteristic speed, something you have had to do multiple times before. Did you think it was your siblings here to pick you up perhaps? No matter, because most importantly, it didn’t matter to him that you couldn’t have known who it was at the door - in Izana’s mind, you had picked your side, and it was his.

Alas it was too little too late. 

As soon as both of those iconic slippers left the cover of the tall shelves filled top to bottom with snacks of every kind, your presence was immediately picked up by Mikey, whose footsteps and words came to an abrupt halt, blank abyss eyes staring at you. An expected outcome, acknowledged Izana as he snaked one protective arm around your shoulders, given the now black-haired man was and is still both the Toman president and legendary delinquent. Didn’t mean much to him anyway.

“Oof Mikey!” Came Emma’s voice from behind as she ran headfirst into the suddenly still back, before the annoyed blond-haired lady stepped round to assess the unfolding situation.. “Why did you stop- oh.”

“Can I help you two?” Izana asked, the tinge of annoyance clear in his tone. The blatant stares were making you uncomfortable, and he didn’t like that one bit.

‎

‎

Walled in on four sides, three by shelves and one being Izana, there wasn’t really any room for you to run or hide, given how small the shop was to begin with. You buried your face into the side of the white-haired man you barely knew, waiting with baited breath, ice cream still clutched in hand. The hum of the chillers around you only seemed ever louder with the silence that fell upon the store.

Scanning you up and down, Mikey’s expression remained unchanged as those blank abyss eyes seemed to reflect you and nothing else, opaque windows that had helped the man hold all his cards close to his chest all these years. You looked…familiar. He’s seen you somewhere before.

Emma glanced between the two men and you, the questions in her mind only growing by each passing second. “Do you know her?” She raised an eyebrow at Izana, who only shrugged in return, unwilling to disclose any further information.

Though in another stroke of bad luck for Izana, one more for the count on this already particularly horrid day, the dots connected for the younger of the two Sano men present, and Mikey’s eyes lit up in recognition. “You’re-“ the black-haired man paused for a moment. “Hakkai’s sister?”

That was enough to spark your curiosity, and you carefully peered out from behind Izana, doe eyes catching the white illumination from the standing refrigerator to the side.  If they knew Hakkai but not Taiju or Yuzuha - could they be on your side? Fortunately, the man on the other side was one you had met before. “...Mikey-san?”

Said man nodded, taking a step forward into the direct shine of an overhead light, as if so that you could take a better look at his face. So it was you that he had been hearing the whispers about, Izana’s little bird; he could still recall that particular night twelve years ago when the Toman Second Division Vice-Captain had brought you along to the gang meeting all apologetic, insisting that he couldn’t leave you alone at home by yourself. You were as shy as you were back then, Mikey mused, taking a good look at you as you shuffled out from behind Izana, seeming slightly more comfortable now. Though he couldn’t say that he wasn’t pleased that it was you of all people.

‎

The white-haired club owner’s grip on your shoulders visibly tightened, and you winced slightly at the pressure. “What do you want?” Izana’s tone now was sharp, violet eyes narrowed at his two siblings.

Mikey was hardly affected, his gaze fixed on you even as he responded. “Shinichiro’s looking for ya. Business,” was all he said.

“Tch.” Clicking his tongue, it was clear that Izana understood the cryptic message - and you couldn’t come along. 

“I can look after her while you’re busy,” came the Toman president’s offer, his hand already outstretched and reaching for yours before his offer had left his lips, but Izana was faster, yanking you backwards and out of reach.

“Absolutely not. She will not be going with you.”

Emma, silent up till now, stepped forward, the sweep of her blond hair backwards looking much like a momentary flash of angelic wings. “She can come with me,” she proposed cheerfully, stopping to shoot a warm smile your way. You shrank behind Izana slightly, your cheeks dusted red.

But the oldest of the three showed no sign of budging. He finally had you, and he wasn’t inclined to share. “Kakucho.”

As if a fae summoned, said man appeared behind the Sano siblings with nay a footstep to be heard nor a door opened, his working red eye respectfully lowered to the ground. “Yes sir.” 

“Take her back to her room. And stay with her.” 

“Yes sir.”

Mikey didn’t seem all too pleased at the decision made without his input. That was very rude. “Hey, I said I can take care of her!” He insisted, his arm once more shooting out to grab at you as you were shuffled past the narrow shelves, though this attempted interruption was quickly stopped by Izana with a quick chop to the offending limb.

”And I said no.”

Puffing up his cheeks only made the gang leader look like a squirrel, earning him a chuckle from you which you failed to bite back. ”I’m telling Shinichiro.”

As if that was a threat. Ignoring Mikey, Izana simply opted to walk you to the door and to his right-hand man and trusted friend’s side. “Straight to her room, Kakucho,” he repeated firmly, before turning to you. “You don’t talk to anyone else, understand?”

You nodded obediently, which earned you a ruffle of your hair.

”See you later.” Izana waved off your escort party, before turning once more to face Mikey and Emma, still waiting inside the shop. “Let’s get this over with then.”

‎

‎

It was rare to see Hakkai in such a frenzy these days, Mitsuya mused, lilac eyes watching said man frantically scan the vicinity before rushing towards him from the airport terminal exit, small suitcase all but bouncing off the floor and his legs as it was mercilessly hauled across the ground.

That striking blue hair was still visible as it bobbed above a drifting crowd of unsuspecting tourists. Comfortably leaning against the door of his car, the former Toman captain took the time to review the context of the situation he had found himself in, starting with the phone call he had received in the dead of night just a day before. He had thought nothing much of it at first, despite the strange 3am call: Hakkai had been overseas on a modeling contract for an international brand for the past week, as a well-sought after model usually was, so perhaps it was just that his former Division Vice Captain had forgotten about time zone differences.

Yet even with that excuse, the whole situation only got stranger, something that even a half-asleep former delinquent-turned-fashion designer noted; the blue-haired man sounded as if he was attempting to catch his breath after running a full marathon, huffing and puffing as he struggled to say even the few words informing Mitsuya that he was already on his way back to Japan, and would contact him when he lands. Divines only knew what was urgent enough to send Hakkai into such a rash decision, though he supposed he would find out soon.

Pushing off from his car, Mitsuya raised one hand as the third youngest Shiba sibling closed the distance, coming to a screeching halt just inches away. The lilac-haired man swore he could see the smoke trails left behind from the suddenly dispersed momentum, though judging from those blown eyes and half-style hair, it wasn’t exactly the best time for a joke. “Hakkai,” he greeted simply, sliding both hands back into his pockets. “What happened?”

“She’s missing, Taka-chan,” Hakkai stammered out, one hand on his chest as if to keep both his lungs and heart from falling out of his chest. “My lil’ sis, she’s gone.”

[r-i-03-17]

@yasammyweek Ok I guess this is a thing that exists, so I'm gonna contribute to it. Today's theme is a wedding, so I'm gonna write something that relates to that. This kinda caught me off guard but I'm gonna try my best. Enjoy

It has been about 8 years since Yaz and Sammy had "officially" gotten together, If you ask them they'll say they started REALLY dating after they made it back home, an agreement they made when they were still stranded on Mantacorp Island, in case either one (or both) of them hadn't made it, but basically everyone else agrees it was after they both brought their feelings to light. Either way it had been about 8 years, but for the past week, Yaz had been acting a little....skittish.

Yazmina was a woman of focus, commitment, and sheer flipping will. She had survived almost a year on an island full of dinosaurs, while having a sprained ankle for two of those months. She had faced down the Scorpius Rex, the Mosasaurs, and a really ticked off Galimimus (long story, but the dino had it coming). After all that, the almost dying nearly every day, why on gods green earth would a small wooden box with a diamond ring inside make her so nervous. She wouldn't even be the one receiving it, but the conclusion this poor nervous girl came to, is that the reaction of the person she wanted to give the ring to was what caused her nerves to shoot up. What would Sammy do? Cry, laugh, run, say no? All these possibilities were making Yaz more nervous than it would if she just asked Sammy the damn question "Will you marry me?". There's no reason for her to be this nervous right? I mean, the two of them have already been as intimate as you can get with another person, multiple times, so there was no grand surprise afterwards, no pressure to hold up to any "expectations" except of course actually showing up for the wedding....the wedding, the music, the people, the dresses, all the things that weddings involved made Yaz feel even more nervous. She had always considered herself the quote-un qoate "man" of the relationship, and as such she felt it necessary to perform the usual "man" rolls, she opened the doors to restaurants and vehicles for Sammy, made sure Sammy's truck was safe before she drove somewhere, and besides all that, had always gotten along better with Sammy's father, brothers, and nephews, than she had her mother in law, sister in laws, and nieces, though they all still got along well, but she had always found herself gravitating towards the guys, and had actually went to Sammy's father for advice on what to do for their first official date. But unfortunately, with Yaz fulfilling that role (that she was perfectly happy in, Sammy as well), that means it was up to her to propose. Great 😑.

Not really sure what to do, Yaz had chosen to try and distract herself from the thoughts racing in her head by going to lunch with Darius, Brooklyn, and Ben. Sammy was working and couldn't go, but insisted Yaz go and give them all a hug for her, which she had. As they sat down, the rest of the group noticed Yaz looked a little down, not that she was super bubbly to begin with, but she usually had more energy than this.

B: Yaz, are you ok?

Y: Yeah....I'm fine.

(obviously not fine)

D: Yeah sure, ok skip the BS and tell us what's up so we can help.

B: Dude, a little sensitivity would be nice.

D: What? She obviously has something that's bothering her, I'm just trying to figure out what?

B: Yeah but you can't just ASK, what if it was something sensitive?

Ben: Sensitive..... something kinda like a....ring...maybe?

Ben looked over at Yaz, who was now staring at Ben. And he instantly regretted it, Yaz had tears in her eyes, her cheeks red, and trying to compose herself as to not have a breakdown in the middle of a shopping mall food court. Yaz reached into her pocket, pulled out a small wooden box, and slid it across the table.

Y: Yeah, it's a ring. But I don't need it, it's not like I'd ever have a possibility of using it anyway....so take it.

She wiped her eyes and took a shaky breath and put a 20 on the table, asked them to pay for her food, and went to her car to go home.

Yaz made it to her truck, but didn't open it. Hand on the handle she looked at the reflection in the window, and it was a sad, sorry sight. Red in the face, tears running down her cheeks, crying like a 5 year old that had just broken her toy. What was she supposed to do? Go back to Sammy, the person that made her so happy, and dump all this on to her? And that's when the realization struck Yaz like a horse hoof to the chest, the reason Yaz didn't want to propose, wasn't because she didn't want to spend the rest of her life with Sammy, it's that she didn't want Sammy to be stuck with her. She's always been self conscious about herself, and in some ways that's a good thing, keeps a person humble, but it also can be a real pain for self esteem. Would Sammy WANT to be stuck with her for the rest of their lives, till death does them part? Why would someone like her, a beautiful, intelligent, friendly, girl from Texas want to spend the rest of her life with an introverted, relatively speaking average looking, sad nerd like her? There wasn't one, at least not one that Yaz could think of. So, she decided she wouldn't propose, and wouldn't put that burden on Sammy, so if at any time Sammy wanted to leave, she could. As corny as it sounds she'd rather Sammy be happy without her, then sad with her.

Yaz hadn't realized how long she had been standing with her hand on the truck handle, hadn't realized how long she had been crying, and hadn't realized how long her friends had been standing there, until Brooklyn had very gently put her arm on Yaz's shoulder, and was looking at her with so much concern that it almost made Yaz start crying again, but even if she wanted to, she couldn't, she was all dried up.

B: Yaz, we're so sorry, we didn't mean to push, we were just worried about you. I wasn't going to say anything, but the whole reason we came down was that Sammy was concerned about you. She said you'd been acting sad and wanted us to get you out of the house to see if you'd feel better. She's really worried, she was actually starting to think you had gotten tired of spending so much time around her.

Y: What? No, I....I didn't mean...I could never.....

B: Yaz, please tell us what's the matter, all we want to do is help you.

So Yaz did, Yaz told them EVERYTHING, every insecurity. All the hopelessness and sadness came out in one big, frankly depressing, story (including everything she said in her head, read above). At the end, Yaz was just sitting sadly on the tailgate of her truck, her friends sitting with her, looking for lack of a better term, dumbfounded and sad. They had all known Yaz had insecurities, who didn't, but they had no idea it ran so deep.

Y: So that's why I can't propose. I care about her, and I care enough to let her go.....I don't want to but.....

Ben: Yaz, kinda crazy question here, but have you... Idk......maybe mentioned ANY of this to Sammy, at all? Do you have any idea if she wants to get married?

Y: No, but I don't want to burden anything on her. And why would she want to marry ME anyways?

Nobody had noticed the black car that had pulled in the parking lot an hour before, and nobody had noticed the driver sneaking over and hiding behind the car beside them, listening to Yaz's entire story, every word since Brooklyn, Darius, and Ben had come out to comfort their sad friend. And nobody noticed the Texas girl hiding behind some strangers car, trying her best not to cry, and wanting to do nothing else but hug not just the girl she's been dating for 8 years, but her business partner, her other dog mom, and her best friend. But the little Texan girl couldn't stand it any longer and decided to set the record straight.

Sam: Yazmina Fadoula, are you kidding me?

Sammy stepped out from behind the car she was hiding behind, and gave a heart attack to the entire group sitting on the tailgate. Yaz started to get up but Sammy in no uncertain terms gave her a look that said sit back down......Yaz sat back down.

Sammy: So let me get this straight....the reason you've been acting depressed all week, the reason you come to bed later and wake up earlier than normal, why you aren't eating as much and acting super shy, is because you wanted to propose? And was worried I would laugh in your face, or reject you, or not want to be with the girl that I've been with for 8 years??

Y: Um....yes? Look it's not you Sammy, it's me...I was just....

Sammy: Oh I know, I heard the whole conversation, basically everything. I came her to pick up some food to surprise you, and I see you crying and looking at the truck, you didn't even see me drive by. I was gonna talk to you, but I saw them coming over to you, and figured they'd be better at getting you to open up.....guess I was right. I'm gonna be honest Yaz, why didn't you talk to me? We're a team, you're supposed to be able to trust me, and I know that's selfish that I just WANT you to trust me, but we've known each other for almost 10 years, even before we started dating......is it me? Am I driving you away, am I being too over bearing, I just wanted to help you, I didn't mean to be too much.

Now Sammy was crying, and Yaz felt like the world's biggest a**hole, beating herself up internally for not thinking about how this would affect Sammy. She knew Sammy was sensitive, and tuned into people's emotions, so she definitely knew Yaz was upset, but wanting to respect her privacy, hadn't pushed the issue. Yaz felt awful.

Sammy: You know the worst part about this, Yaz? This entire time I was scared you were getting sick of me....I thought you were seeing someone else.

Well if Yaz thought she couldn't feel any worse, she just got proven wrong.

Y: Sammy.....you thought that.....why would....

Sammy: What? See someone else?.....Yaz I heard everything you said, and the entire time I was wondering the same thing you were. Wondering why you'd want to be with ME? I'm just some yee-haw Texan rodio, banjo playing, chubby, middle of nowhere farm girl and there's a million girls just like me within like 20 miles of just like me, except prettier and cooler. I was scared to death that the only reason you were with me is because we were stuck on the island and once you had more people to choose from.....you'd leave. Yasmina I would LOVE to marry you, of course I would, but I still don't really understand why it'd be ME you'd pick out of everyone else. You're beautiful and smart and ACTUALLY talented, you have skills that are actually cool and unique, unlike me who can do farm things yeah, but so can everyone else.

Yaz sat with her mouth hanging open, in awe of that one, her girlfriend had the same insecurities she had, and two, that Sammy thought of herself like that. Yaz couldn't understand why the girl she was so worried about proposing to had never brought these issues up to her before. Yaz decided there and then that damn the consequences, whatever her future had in store for her, Yaz was going to make sure Sammy never had to worry that Yaz would leave her again. She walked up to Sammy and kissed her, a long kiss full of love and warm feelings that made butterflies fly in both of the girls chests.

Y: Sammy, I'm so so so so so so so sorry that I EVER made you worried about me leaving, ever made you feel insecure about yourself. With our friends and God as my witness I will do everything I can to make sure you never feel like this again. Brooklyn.......can I have my ring.

Sammy opened her eyes wide, Ben and Darius gasped and Brooklyn smiled as she handed Yaz the ring.

Y: With this ring I promise to be with you forever, for every sad day, when it shines, rains, or snows. Through every up and down, left or right, whatever happens I want this ring to symbolize how much I care about you... Sammy Gutierrez, can I put this ring on your finger.

Everyone was crying now, their friends, and some random people in the parking lot.

Sammy: Of course you can, but I have one request......Don't call me Gutierrez anymore.....it's Fadoula now.

Yaz smiled, slipped on the ring, and grabbed Sammy by the hips and hoiseted her up off the ground so they could look at each other, Sammy's legs wrapped around Yaz's hips and her arms rested on her shoulders. The parking lot whistled and hollered, horns honking and lights flashing to celebrate the couple.

Sammy: Hey Yaz?

Y: Yes Sammy?

Sammy: I think the chicken thawed in the back of my car.

Everyone laughed, and Brooklyn, Darius, and Ben all drove home with Sammy and Yaz to stay the night. Brooklyn was thankful that Yaz had soundproofed her and Sammy's bedroom wall, and Yaz kept her promise and made sure that Sammy knew every bit of her was as beautiful to Yaz as anything else.

They went to the town office the next day and made it official, and Sammy bought Yaz a ring.

Woooo, that was a long one, I hope everyone enjoys my contribution to @yasammyweek. See y'all later

[illarian-rambling]

Thanks for the tags @mysticstarlightduck @theink-stainedfolk and probably many more!

Wip Aesthetic Tag

Rules: Make a moodboard for your WIP, a playlist (3+ songs/music will suffice but it can be as long as you want) and describe the Vibe of your WIP.

Oh god, I'm really bad at aesthetic stuff. No clue why, I just feel like it's never cohesive. That said, here's my best stab at Mystery of the Mortal God.

⚙️Moodboard🌿

🎵Music🎶

Instrumental (pulled from my character playlists):

Flight of the Silverbird

Ponyo's Sisters

HUNGRY!

Exclusive Coupé

A Murder of Crows

Wings (Aether 2)

The Quiet Earth

Vocal:

I Want to Conquer the World - Bad Religion

Supersonic - Bad Religion

Harlan Road - NewTown

Black Lipstick - Chicano Batman

The Reckoning - Dom Fera

Norwegian Wood - Buddy Rich Big Band

Call me Call me - Steve Conte

🩸Vibes🏵

A walking, steam-powered vardo lurches over a yellow-flowered marsh and under a sky of curious stars. Red, sparkling smoke rises from its chimney. Muddy footsteps are left in its wake like the trail of a mechanical dragon. It seems like a place of magic, which is fair, as it's the home of a witch. She sits with a lit pipe and a tabby cat purring on her lap, quietly contemplating a distant, stolen song. Even in the peace of the moment, her mind is alight with grand schemes and dreams of adventure.

In the capital of a thousand peoples, there stands a detective office lit by golden lamps. It's busy - goblins, elves, and lizardfolk rushing every which way in hopes of managing the many crimes wrought by rogue mages. At its heart resides a beat of calm in the eye of the storm - an opulent office out of place for its cushy decorations and color coding fit for a palace. This is also fair, as working at its desk is a prince of sorts. The prodigal heir to divine contracts and a deadly curse. He shudders at the knowledge of his bloody fate, yet pursues it nonetheless.

On the side of a lonely road, in a lonely land, under stars that are not curious, but disappointed, lays a wreck of bronze and steel. It bleeds black on green. It is confused by this. Where is the red? Where is the pain? It remembers another place - gray and icy and riveted. It remembers two eyes surrounded by shadows and a grin hanging in the dark like a half-moon. Hate closes in like a frigid wind, piercing through any amount of heart or compassion. It will have revenge.

Tropes include slow burn romance, revenge quests, magic as a science, and mad scientists. Genre is fantasy steampunk.

Snappier character descriptions include a braggadocious redneck mage with a chip on her shoulder the size of a mountain, a prissy, gossip-loving detective with a deadly curse, and a sweetheart of a maybe-robot with some terrifying instincts hidden behind a fog of amnesia. All of them, due to personal quests, will end up banding together to defeat a would-be demigod, facing cunning traps, summoning ritual shenanigans, and their own conflicting personalities. Will they survive? Will they join the villain? Who's to say? All I can assure is that if they fail, it'll at least be in a blaze of glory.

Heavily inspired by the Foundryside Trilogy and Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood.

I'll tag @spideronthesun @kaylinalexanderbooks @ominous-feychild @galactic-mystics-writes and anyone else who wants to play!

[feral-bunny31]

Ok ok ok ok so I’ve been reading a few fics/prompts of Danny Phantom having to declare war on the living (he’s ghost king ofc) and I’ve had an idea slowing forming in my head with each one I’ve read and it’s just how I’d envision that scene happening and I need to get it out so here goes (putting it below the cut bc idk how much I’m going to write) how it leads up to this, your choice if you see this and decide to write more/around it. Ok here goes:

They had 13 hours left of the 3 days King Phantom, High King of the Dead, Defeater of the Dark, Son of Time, The In-between, The Balance, The All Star, had given them. 13 hours. 13. The number of the dead, ironic really that that was the amount left.

He gave them 3 days to dismantle the Ghost Investigation Ward, to release their prisoners, his people. 13 hours left and they couldn’t get them to yield their ways. To give up and break up and release the dead they had tortured. King Phantom, no older than 18, gave them a warning and they were failing. War was coming and King Phantom warned them he and his infinite army of the lost souls of this plane and the in betweens were going to march.

It was his final choice to be made in his existence. His last option. His espoir perdu. He didn’t want to do this, he hated doing this but he had to and everyone saw it as his warning was broadcasted onto every possible screen in the United States.

2 hours. They had 2 hours left and they were giving up. Trying to get as many people to safety and shelter as they could. They needed to get the civilians to hide. Gods, there was only an hour left.

And as they watched the sky above Illinois- of all places- shatter and breaks like glass they saw the King emerge as the final seconds ended.

He was stone faced, no one behind him as he stood, floating in the shattered rift of the realms, the portal green. So so green. Swirling like hypnosis. Black armor draped over his body, a sword held tight, white knuckled at his side, a crown of burning ice drifting close to his head. His face was set, cold to those that see him that don’t know him. Expression hard except for the minute furrow of his brow, seen only by those that know him, that see who he is, white hair whipping softly around his face, casting shadows over his green eyes. Oh his eyes. They were the only thing able to show what was going through his mind. They held so much.

Years of experience, of pain, of loss, of suffering and sadness. Of struggling to be heard, to fight for his people and those of this earth. To keep the peace but save what he can in this destructive world. His eyes held so much words didn’t exist to tell what all they showed.

Calmly, slowly, deathly, his sword arm rose. Rose high above his head and fell. Fell until it was straight out, a signal that the war had begun.

Thousands of souls poured out of the portal, though they spared the citizens around not a single glance. They were vaguely human, some just skeletons, some races long since extinct. They only had eyes for the buildings that were beginning to scream. The voices of their prisoners rising until every single one of the Ghost Investigation Ward’s buildings rang with the rage and hurt and pain of those souls.

The army, still pouring from the crack between realms, only targeted those buildings. Flooding the United States searching for those buildings. Men in white suits poured out of the buildings. Raising weapons to the army and unloading everything they had, uncaring of the civilians they hit and the homes and jobs they destroyed, killed.

Then they noticed it, Phantom on the front lines, defending and protecting the civilians as he tore his way through the men in white, Agents they called themselves. Giant frozen Yetis came with him, tending to the wounded he had protected. They creates shelters and barriers of ice to take the wounded and heal them. Bandage them and cover the dead with soft sheets.

The army avoided and even blocked their enemies fire from hitting those shelters, from hitting the homes and jobs as best they could while still fighting. They were angry, rage filled that the Agent cared so little about civilians, all in the name of “getting rid of those ecto scum”

King Phantom and his army fought for 3 days, wiping out any Agent and their buildings that ever existed. Freed his people and made sure they returned safely to the realm of the dead, the Infinite Realms, before he and his army slowly worked on restoring the damaged buildings of the civilians. He gave the dead proper care, tending to the souls that had come back, sending them the portal after they said goodbye to their family.

And when all was said and done, he collapsed, beaten and bloody, into the arms of a god, a being that shifted ages, a clock shoved into his chest, was his chest, and sobbed. Sobbed for all the lives taken, even of the Agents. He didn’t want this, he didn’t want this death and destruction. He wanted peace, for his people and for the living. He was Balance! Why couldn’t he have brought balance peacefully? Why couldn’t he stop this from happening? He tried! Tried so hard to keep this from being a choice. He hated that he had to make this decision.

When everything was restored the best they could and wounded were healed and dead buried, King Phantom gathered his people, entered the rift between realms, and closed it. The one vision of the sky shattering like glass reversing and piecing itself back together, and the army of souls was gone.

Ok how’d I do? Thoughts? Comments? Concerns? Please let me know! I love the feedback

[invisibleraven]

Keeping Spirits Bright

Day 14: Letters + Ray/Rose/Reggie <=AO3

1995

Hey guys,

I can’t believe it’s been five months. Seems like forever and just yesterday that I said goodbye. Dr. Butler said I should write to you, to help process my grief. I think she’d rather I write you each a letter, but this one is hard enough-I don’t know that I have it in me to do two more. 

It’s Christmas right now-though I’m not much in the mood to celebrate. Ray and Rose have made an effort-spending money they don’t have to get a real tree and a nice meal. But it still doesn’t erase you guys not being there next to me in your stupid paper hats and getting drunk off eggnog. 

It’s hard to be merry when my life is so broken. I’ve been trying to function since Ray and Rose pulled me back from the brink, but it’s still harder more days than not. 

I tried to go visit your folks-check up on them. Lex, your parents wouldn’t see me, but I saw Livvie and she’s dealing. She gave me a hug, and I may have held on for a moment too long, but she wasn’t letting go either, so I think it was for you as much as me. 

Lu…I think this year was worse. Last year your mom knew you were out there. This year-she just cried. I think she might wonder why it’s me sitting there, eating her cookies and not you. I feel so guilty about that-even though Pepper said I shouldn’t. I left you some of the cookies-they’re too salty for me anyways. 

Bobbers I see Lola all the time. She has no one else-and she likes having someone to fuss over. She has the garage just as we left it but neither of us can go out there. She wanted to come with me today, wish you all a Merry Christmas, but she broke her hip earlier this fall and it’s harder for her to get around.

God how do I end this? 

I miss you. I love you. I hope you’re having a rocking holiday in Heaven. 

Reg

2003

Hey guys,

Guess what? I’m gonna be a dad!

I know, who on Earth would let me procreate with them? 

Well, technically , the baby is Ray’s but Rose and him assured me I am still in every way this kid’s dad. I am so scared and excited and yak in a bowl anxious. I can’t wait!

We want to wait until they’re born to see the gender and decide on a name, so that is killing me just a little. But I get to decorate the nursery-I have some really fun ideas involving yellows and greens-maybe a springtime scene since Rose is due right around Easter. 

Bobby you might hate me for it, but your old room is finally getting painted. We kept the house the same for so long, but finally Rose put her foot down and insisted we make it our own. So room by room we’ve taken over. Celia left us a lot of stuff-including all her couches, which is great because me, Rose, and Ray have a tendency to break ours. 

I love them so much you guys-wanton destruction and all. 

Anyways, you don’t want to hear about that. My latest album is going well-I know none of you were country fans, but it suits me, getting to perform again, even if I would hang up my spurs in a second to be jamming out with you guys again.(No Alex, I do not have actual spurs, Rose nixed that idea straight away). There’s talk of a small tour but I told Marci, my agent, that I had to be back in time for the baby to come, so we’ll see. 

Livvie is doing well Alex, finally a doctor, just like she dreamed. Patrick just started preschool, and gosh he’s cute! I don’t get to see them much, but me and Olivia send letters, and she always sends a photo with her Christmas card. 

Celia loves the home she’s in Bobby-she has pictures of you everywhere, and your lolo as well. Even some of the band! But she’s got lots of friends, and seems to be doing great. I see her every other Sunday for tea, and we reminisce, but also chat-old ladies still have the juiciest gossip you know?

Lu your folks are much the same as the last time I visited-I worry about them you know? They don’t want to talk to anybody, just keep functioning and mourning, and I feel so bad. Especially when I tell them about my life-I think they just wonder what would have become of you. It makes me feel so guilty-which Pepper just sighs at me about, but she gets it. I-I don't go as much as I should, but I always check up on them around the holidays. Still get the same cookies-every year they are a little less salty, like they contain less tears. Hope you don’t mind-I ate a few on the way here. 

So that’s it-my update for the year. It was…I don’t want to say easier, because it’s never easier writing to you three. Wishing you were here with me, joshing me about being a part of a throuple, about becoming a dad. Giving me all sorts of grief for the hat-because yes, I do have the hat. 

But then-if you guys were here, would I have any aspect of this life? I don’t know, and I don’t know how to feel about that.  Sad, maybe, because as much as I love you, I don’t know if I would give this-my new family, my unborn child, my thriving career-up for you. Maybe that’s growth. Maybe it’s me being selfish. 

I still miss you all, but…I think you’d want me to be happy, to keep on living for you. We’ll be together again someday. Until then, keep my bass tuned, and see if you can come up with a sequel to Get Lost for me to really wail on.

Love you all,

Reg

2020

Twenty five years. Where does the time go? 

It has been… a while since I wrote one of these. Been a long time since I felt the need to honestly. I still miss you all like crazy you know. And it’s harder this year without Rose, but maybe she’s up there with you, rocking out, or just swapping embarrassing Reggie stories-both equally possible. Maybe that’s why the letter. 

Julie is doing better-she formed some new band with a bunch of holograms? I haven’t seen them perform yet-stupid touring schedule, but apparently they’re great. But of course they are, they’re playing with Julie-but maybe that’s just my dad bias peeking through. 

Carlos is on track to being a superstar on his baseball team. I’ve been to as many games as I’ve been able to, but again, the life of a country superstar is a bit of a busy one. But Ray sends me videos for all the ones I miss, and that’s been amazing, especially since I was the one who taught him to throw a pitch. 

It’s so weird being a dad you know? 

I think about your folks in that respect-God knows my own were not a good role model on how to parent. And I know you guys all had issues with your own families, but I guess I have a different perspective now. 

I still send holiday cards to Livvie-Patrick is in college now, Lexie, pursuing Classics, you’d be so proud. He tried to learn drums, but oooof he was bad . But he and his boyfriend are the cutest, and it’s so nice to see how different life is for them than it was for you. I wish you could be here for it-watch you blush and freak at Pride, and maybe find yourself that good guy you deserve. 

I visit Celia every time I come to see you guys-Bobbers I hope she found you, that she’s looking after you. I hit a hard time when she passed-like she was the last part of my connection to you. But I know she wouldn’t want me to live in sadness; that’s why she gave me the house. You would love how bright and happy it is now-full of love and with a million couches that you could stretch out on. 

Lu I tried to keep in touch with your folks, but they are still stuck in the past. They still celebrate your birthday, still have your room just like you left it. I tried giving them Pepper’s number but I doubt they used it. It breaks my heart every time, but I feel like I have to check up on them. Let them talk about you, or just sit quietly. I did learn to knit though, which has been a godsend on long bus rides or plane flights. Though you are the only one who wears beanies in LA. 

Wore. Damn, didn’t even catch that. 

Okay, I have to end this letter, I’m almost home, and all I want to do is sleep, and I’ll deliver this letter tomorrow after a long nap and some family time. 

Still love you guys, forever and always. 

Reg

[darkkitty1208]

The past few weeks before I finally returned from my unofficial hiatus, I've lost a lot of my motivation to write and anything to do with being part of the fandom as a whole. I contemplated quitting and never returning again, deleting all my works and socials and any other trace of me anyone could find, but I know that it's just the anxiety talking and my brain playing tricks with me due to IRL stress and that logically, I *do* have a place here in the fandom space. So I held back.

Now that I'm here again -- and have been welcomed very warmly by dear friends -- the urge to create has finally come around again and I want to get back into writing. It's just that, god, I feel very rusty. It's been quite a while and I feel like the words have run away from me after not using them for so long. I look into my mostly-abandoned WIPs and I can't find the right way to continue them.

But despite that, I decided to do a bit of the good ol' self-projecting and started a WIP (instead of finishing my old ones, lol). It's not much, but it's something. I felt compelled to share in hopes it would motivate me to write some more. This is all I've got so far, and it is admittedly very rough, but it's getting there.

~

Here’s the thing: healing isn't linear.

These are words repeated over and over again by those who you wouldn't think ever even had to heal. They're the kind of words that would lose its meaning the more they're said, and have you start wondering if to some people, they ever had any sort of meaning to begin with.

You can never really tell where it starts or where it finishes, or how it happened or if it ever did happen, the same way the flawed five stages of grief could never explain the true act of mourning and the same way your every emotion defies anything your logic could ever tell you.

Sometimes, Stephen finds, some things are just unexplainable like that.

Sometimes, Stephen doesn't think he's capable of healing. Sometimes, especially in nights where every bit of his sanity starts to fall apart and each choking breath would sting as it enters his damned lungs, he thinks he's too far gone to be capable of it at all.

(Sometimes he would sit silently and stare into nothing, thinking about the way nobody would understand that at some point in his life, he wasn't the man he used to be anymore. Sometimes he could feel it, the thing that consumed him, that took away who he was, and the way it would take up every space in his ribcage and burn his insides like acid, the way it would rip apart the space in his chest where his heart used to be. Sometimes he would think about it, and the way that it makes him nothing but an empty shell of a man. Every day that thing would grow inside of him and one day, it might ruin him; as if he isn't already far too broken to begin with.)

But it's here, in the roof of a sentient building he's grown to call his home where various pots are neatly arranged in small shelves, with his trembling fingers digging into rich soil and dirt sticking underneath his fingernails, that he starts to find proof that maybe, he had the capability after all.

It's here that he understands why humans would pick up a trowel and spend so much time getting on their hands and knees to dirty themselves with grimes of dirt.

There's something about the green of the Earth and the smell of her moist dirt in the early mornings, damp from the moon's tears, that soothes a part of him that he couldn't quite identify. There's something comforting about the mindless action of digging and burying and placing and watering. There's something comforting about knowing that his damaged fingers could sprout life even if it all depended on time.

But that's the thing, isn't it? Everything is just a matter of time.

(Sometimes he wishes healing isn't linear, the way he wishes time doesn't march on an ascending line.)

He remembers the same damp smell of moss and the same smudges of dirt on the knees of his trousers back then, the first time he was taught about gardening and farming and sprouting life from seeds.

He had still been a small boy in Nebraska, back then. He had been young, and he had never understood patience the way he does now. He didn't understand that what he planted was something that, if anything, was considered a miracle, and that miracles took time, and that miracles don't last forever. He didn't understand that life and decay is just a matter of time, and that everything including himself would eventually be nothing but rotting flesh and cracked bones, becoming one with the earth and consumed by the maggots and mushrooms.

Because that's the thing: everything is just a matter of time.

The experience had meant nothing to him then, and had taught him nothing much of anything at all, but it means something to him now.

[demifiendrsa]

DC Studios | Chapter 1: Gods and Monsters

Chapter 1: Gods and Monsters:

Creature Commandos: An animated seven episode series, written by Gunn, that is already in production. Originally a team of classic monsters assembled to fight Nazis, this is a modern take on the concept. The voice actors have yet to be cast but the executives are looking to find people who can voice the animated characters and also portray the live-action versions when the anti-heroes to show up in movies and shows.

Waller: A spin-off of Gunn’s own HBO Max hit series, Peacemaker, Viola Davis will return as the ruthless and morally ambiguous head of a government task force. It is being written by Christal Henry (Watchmen) and Jeremy Carver, the creator of the Doom Patrol TV series.

Superman: Legacy: The movie featuring the Man of Steel that Gunn is writing and may direct, although no commitments on that end have been made. While the two previous titles are meant to be “aperatifs,” in Safran’s words, Superman is the true kick off for the duo’s DCU plans. “It’s not an origin story,” Safran said. “It focuses on Superman balancing his Kryptonian heritage with his human upbringing. He is the embodiment of truth justice and the American way. He is kindness in a world that thinks that kindness as old-fashioned.” A release date of July 11, 2025 has been penciled in.

Lanterns: Greg Berlanti’s long-in-the-works Green Lanterns TV series has been scrapped and the duo have parted ways with the longtime DC series steward. In its place will be a new take on the space cops with power rings. “Our vision for this is very much in the vein of True Detective,” Safran described. “It’s terrestrial-based.” It will feature prominent Lantern heroes Hal Jordan and John Stewart and is one of the most important shows they have in development. “This plays a really big role in leading into the main story we are telling across film and TV.”

The Authority: a movie based on a team of superheroes with rather extreme methods of protecting the planet that first originated in the late 1990s under an influential imprint known as Wildstorm, run by artist and now head of DC publishing, Jim Lee. “One of the things of the DCU is that it’s not just a story of heroes and villains,” said Gunn. “Not every film and TV show is going to be about good guy vs. bad guy, giant things from the sky comes and good guy wins. There are white hats, black hats and grey hats.” Added Safran: “They are kinda like Jack Nicholson in A Few Good Men. They know that you want them on the wall. Or at least they believe that.”

Paradise Lost: The duo describe this HBO Max series as a Game of Thrones-style drama set on the all-female island that is Wonder Woman’s birthplace, Themyscira, filled with political intrigue and scheming between power players. It takes place before the events of the Wonder Woman films.

The Brave and the Bold: “This is the introduction of the DCU Batman,” said Gunn. “Of Bruce Wayne and also introduces our favorite Robin, Damian Wayne, who is a little son of a bitch.” The movie will take inspiration from the now-classic Batman run written by Grant Morrison that introduced Batman to a son he never knew existed: a murderous tween raised by assassins. “It’s a very strange father-and-son story.”

And, importantly, it will feature a Batman not played by Robert Pattinson…

Booster Gold: an HBO Max series based on a unique and lower-tiered hero created in 1986. Safran said of the series, “It’s about a loser from the future who uses basic future technology to come back to today and pretend to be a superhero.” Gunn described it as “imposter syndrome as superhero.”

Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow: Taking its cues from the recent Tom King-written mini-series, this movie project promises to have a different take than what most think of when the idea of Superman’s cousin comes to mind. “We will see the difference between Superman, who was sent to Earth and raised by loving parents from the time he was an infant, versus Supergirl, raised on a rock, a chip off of Krypton, and who watched everyone around her die and be killed in terrible ways for the first 14 years of her life and then come to Earth. She is much more hardcore and not the Supergirl we’re used to.”

Swamp Thing: a horror film that promises to close out the first part of the first chapter.

[jsraven7]

Hi I’ve been practicing Paganism in some form since I was very young. I’m pretty eclectic [baring closed traditions] and I’m new to the Hellenic space. I worked with Hecate for a couple years, but very individually. Every tradition is different and we have to start from the beginning, or so for me. I’m looking for ways to start to build a relationship with Poseidon and Hades, probably Persephone. I don’t see much about them. I love research and reading EVERYthing but I don’t know where to start 😅 thank you for your time and if you can help me 😌

Hello, I apologize as I did not see this before.

A wonderful way to start with any deity is to read their myths, and find out more about them. Hesiod and Homer are both wonderful places to start. There are also the Orphic hymns. Researching epithets and reading others’ anecdotes can also really help in starting out! I’m unsure if this is the best resource to recommend but a lot of people recommended this to me starting out and it’s helped so far—there is also Theoi.com.

A good starting book I recommend is Hellenic Polytheism: Household Worship by LABRYS. It only really covers household and household adjacent Gods/epithets, but it’s great building blocks for the act of worship itself, and it has baseline deity associations (though I do not remember Lady Persephone being in there).

A good baseline for starting a relationship with a deity is to just start it! Once you have some good foundation in information, just go ahead and start worshipping. Your relationship with Them will build up over time. Each little present you give Them and every word you say to Them will bring you closer.

For me personally, I always start off with candles in associated colors/scents. For Lord Poseidon, a blue candle or a candle that has an ocean-like or earth-y scent would be good. For Lady Persephone, a pink/red candle, or one scented like flowers or pomegranates. For Lord Hades, a black or green candle would be good too. If you live in the US, the dollar store and Walmart have pillar and taper candles for a good price! If you can’t use candles but would still like something like that, the fake/LED candles do just fine!

Other things you could do is give Them bits of food you make, write letters and burn them (be careful!), or offer flowers and plants. They also like acts done in Their name (singing, volunteering at places in Their domain, running around outside).

I really hope this was helpful and gives you what you were looking for, and it wasn’t too long-winded.

[bleue-flora]

10? 16? 20? Hope that's not too much...

10. Cltr+f "blinks" on your WIP & copy paste the first sentence/paragraph that comes up.

“Dream studies him, grazing his eyes over every inch of Bad. His stature full of mistrust, searching for sincerity. The utter shock, doubt and apprehension wrinkling his brow makes Bad wilt a bit. His heart aching at the way he appears stunned as if Bad just walked on water instead of simply offering sympathy. Dream blinks, clearly struggling to process it.”

(Oooo next chapter?….)

16. How many fic ideas are you nurturing right now? Share one of them?

3 in the writing process (not including posted ones), 1 idea in outlining phase and 3 chapters of Misery Loves Another Idiot with a Jukebox Where his Soul Should be (Why did I make that title so long lol XD ) which are basically oneshots in their own right to be fair…

I just started writing part two of Dreamcatcher which I wasn’t necessarily planing on doing… but then one night last week I up and wrote 4,000 words so I guess it’s happening lol. What can I say I missed writing Punz. :) This time it’s Dream’s pov and here’s a snip bit.

“The only remains of the obnoxious, over the top, lit up sign is the large letter L.”

20. Have you noticed any patterns in your fics? Words/expressions that appear a lot, themes, common settings, etc?

Besides Quackity always managing to make an appearance? Lol. Let’s see, the obvious answer would be that my works all directly connect to the torture box, which means that the words: torture and pain always make an appearance at least once (have you ever noticed how there really aren’t synonyms for those words?)

But outside of that, I tend to write an abundance of alliterations (oops), which I swear I really don’t do intentionally.

“And that’s all the green light Punz needs to continue to vehemently voice his vengeance, this time with more volume and vigor, “I swear to god, they are going to fucking pay.”” - Hell in a Box (Ch 4)

As well as follow certain writing patterns like repeating sentence starters:

“His essence lost forever. Forever wiped from the earth. Forever the rumors of a cruel capricious villain who destroyed the land. Forever hated. Forever alone.” - Misery Loves Another Idiot with a Jukebox Where his Soul Should (Ch 12)

For just a few examples I could find… I blame my poet instincts lol.

(How does it always end up so long?… oops)

[fragrantpines]

i've been thinking about yangzhou rice for the past few hours. he suddenly somersaulted in my brain and now i can't get him out of my head [sighs lovingly]

so beware of this incredibly long ask because here's some of the scenarios i think of <333 i hope you enjoy!! ^^

imagine stargazing with yangzhou under the winter plum blossom tree—you pointing out the constellations while he gazes at you with tender and warm expression; a hint of longing in his emerald green eyes. 

imagine mutual pining with him BUT both of you are afraid to confess to each other because YOU think he doesn't have feelings for you then HE thinks he's not worthy of your affection and reducing himself as a lowly food soul. other food souls are rolling their eyes in annoyance because they want you to get together already!!!!!! [this is cliche i know <3]

imagine staring at the sight in front of you that resembles like a painting that brought out to life—yangzhou laying down on a seabed of various flowers, resting in tranquility; his blonde hair lying down and blown out like waves; a serene expression plastered on his face and some butterflies around him. you fall in love with him even more because of the sight because you're so lucky to have him <333

his first kiss with you are hesitant at first but later on your relationship, he always kisses you desperately and coveting—as if you're a mirage; an illusion that will vanish quickly once he pulls away. he kisses you with a vow for everlasting love; to be always by your side and remain devoted to you. if something or someone breaks the two of you apart just like last time—he'll travel the ends of the earth just to look for you; to find his way back to you because to him—you are his forever home. 

NOW IT'S DONE oh my god and ngl writing these scenarios got me out of my writer's block, i feel refreshed and satisfied!! 

also I WANT TO TEASE YANGZHOU SO BAAAAD BECAUSE I WANT TO SEE MORE OF HIS BLUSHING FACE 🥹 he's so adorable and cute when he blushes while getting shy and embarrassed 🥹❤️

okay that's it <333 also i'm the previous anon from before who found your blog and may i be zella anon pls??? i wanna gush more about food men and you seem fun to talk to !! hehe ❤️ enjoy your day and don't forget to hydrate!! 

– zella

Kicking my feet in the air while screaming because this entire thing is so so CUTE. I adore every single imagine here and the way each one written is (chef kiss) amazing, beautiful, showstopping, spectacular just like Yangzhou himself. Especially that last one because I can imagine when Yangzhou decides to pull away, he does it hesitantly as evident from his lips that shake the moment they part from yours and his hand that doesn't wish to let go of the warmth underneath his palm-- your warmth that he so desperately craves every waking moment, wishing that he could hold everywhere he went to but alas, Kongsang needs its master more than he needs you; and that very thought is enough to shake him to the core.

"I love you," he whispers, a silent plead for you to stay a little longer. If that isn't enough to convince you, then maybe another kiss will, and another, and another, and maybeeeee another....

Snsosnsksnjd I'm turning red but you get the idea. Also, you can absolutely be Zella anon and continue gushing about food men here. My inbox is always open for gushing, talking and ideas so feel free to drop by whenever!! Take care and hope you have a nice day 💕💕💕

[suuho]

anyways, i can’t sleep so i might as well write my last piece on the topmew show, now that it has ended. craziest thing is that i came into this with no preference for any couple or any pairing, but surprisingly topmew got me hooked and thus, we got to experience all of this together. me and the 3 other topmew stans on this website. amazing.

my main takeaway from this is that forcebook should find projects that are as serious as only friends and skew more towards melodrama or just a more indie offering in general, than romcom. especially book has done so well in this show, and i think his performance has increasingly improved in a more dramatic setting as to compared, for example, a boss and a babe. force is a tremendous actor, tends to act circles around others in less serious shows, so i like that he got to do something that matches his intensity and his talent and tone here. who else has got those eyes, man. truly, a tour de force performance of making eyes for days as the most smitten man on god’s green earth. thank you for that, only friends. every scene a hit.

i’ve written at length about topmew and their relationship but i just wanna say that their ending is not only deserved, it is even overdue for the amount of groveling top had to go through to get mew back, and for how insanely hard earned their reunion was. sorry but i don’t really get anyone who thinks they don’t deserve to be endgame, or aren’t allowed a happy ending; top and mew have shown time and time again that they are in love with each other, that they love each other, and that they, unlike other relationships in the show, are willing to make compromises for each other and are aware of the consequences of their actions as well. they have talked about their mistakes, they have acknowledged how fucked up their behavior has been at times (and still is (for mew); top’s cheating and mew’s tendency to hold it over his head), they don’t have any illusions anymore, which is part of their necessary growth.

topmew’s relationship began as mostly a lie and under false pretenses and terrible motives. mew dreamed of a man that could tick all his boxes of some made-up list, meanwhile top saw mew as a conquest and as something he had to own—someone’s affection he had to win in grandiose ways, like it was a game. throughout the show, they both shed those ideas about their relationship, and while i think that their time apart and all the bullshit obstacles have been unnecessarily drawn out, in the end it served to push them towards a better place.

they are very in love with each other and very committed to each other (even including the funny little cameo at the end). topmew love each other, and i think it at times actually impossible how people can be so mad about that? the entire time, they have made it very clear that they love each other and have voluntarily chosen to be with each other. at some point, a relationship doesn’t have to be cookie-cutter perfect as long as it is what the people involved want. you don’t have to agree with mew forgiving top, or top wanting mew still; it is what these characters want, and it is the right choice for them. just because you don’t agree, doesn’t make it necessarily a wrong choice. that is sometimes just… writing. not bad writing, just writing flawed characters. that’s all there is to it. and i think topmew deserve their endgame just as much as sandray; and their endgame doesn’t negate boston and nick’s relationship or whatever.

all in all, i’m fine with how this show ended and mostly happy with topmew!!! it was a crazy ass show, but like. why not. most of all, i’m glad topmew got their endgame, and that’s all that matters at the end of the day. also, seeing all the behind the scenes footage of the cast was so wonderful.

[whyispotatoheadalreadytaken]

Response 1

Bourbon and Toulouse is fine. I feel like I’ve said this before so sorry if I’m repeating myself. I’ve said it so many times to so many people that I can’t remember who I’ve said it to. If I have to work more, it can’t be in mental health. It has to be a job I can walk away from that is super chill and straightforward. That’s the best part about BnT. I clock in, take orders, clean tables, and then clock out. Depending on whether I’m closing or not makes a difference in my responsibilities. I plan on working at BnT through the winter until Spring. There’s no way for me to keep a second job in the spring or summer because of the demand for music during that time. I’m not sacrificing music. I think I would rather eat ramen for four months if I had to. The nice part about gigs is that we usually get free food, so we can rely on those meals. The end goal of BnT is to get by…which is so sad because that isn’t really an end goal. It is to keep our heads above water and try to also save at the same time. I have some credit card debt from our last trip to Hawaii that I’m trying to pay off, so I don’t have to worry about paying on those and can just save. We will work mostly Fridays and Saturdays. I am also worried about burnout, but it is also not forever. If I could work 12-hour shifts 7 days a week for 6 months in a factory, I could do anything for a time. It hasn’t been an easy adjustment. My back has been so angry at the concrete floors. I was in so much pain after working the 12 hour shift on Friday, and I limped out of BnT, unable to drive home after being there for 6 hours. I curse Jill every time I experience lower back pain like that. Makes me wanna forward all of my chiropractic bills to her. We desperately need another car for so many reasons. We’re highly considering a tax ID for the band because we’re making money from it and could be claiming taxes. The sad thing would be that we would lose a portion of our income, but we could write off SO. MANY. THINGS. Like a car, for instance, because we need a better one to travel in that is reliable. I essentially kept our fingers crossed the last time we went to Paducah.

Yo, isn’t it crazy how normalized unpaid work is in America???? Like, you gotta learn how to do your job, and you gotta learn for free. All of my practicums during my senior year were unpaid positions. I’ll never forget having to do 19 credit hours, my practicum, working at the after-school program and guitar center on the weekends. If I can do that, I can also go to BnT for a few months, hahaha. It’s awful, though. Student teachers should be paid for that work. IT IS THE SAME WORK. I bitch about this alllllll the time hahaha Why on gods green earth do I make a third of what licensed clinical social workers make???? WE HAVE THE SAME JOB I JUST MEET WITH SOMEONE EVERY WEEK ABOUT IT UGGAHHHH. Sorry, just makes me scream internally every time I think about it. Sometimes externally.

Poor Zoë is only recently fully realizing how much she has sacrificed to personally attempt to keep the business afloat. For a long time, she was always like oh, it’s awesome 99% of the time when Karen isn’t in a mood. She’s now realizing that it’s been a lot more than 1% of the time, and the only reason Karen has had the business for so long is that she puts out all of the fires for herself. I dream about quitting and finding a new position. It’s hard, though, because I need to have at least 30 hours of clinical work, or my whole timeline gets all fucked up and dragged out even longer. I can’t even go back for my doctorate until I have my independent license, or I would already be back in school to prolong the student loans.

The music thing is so weird cuz I don’t wanna be famous. It would just be really nice to be successful and be able to maintain that as my sole income with something else I’m passionate about on the side, like advocacy work. I already attempt to do that through music anyway. Sustainability would be my dream. Traveling and playing music for people. The dream started when I started learning how to play guitar. One day, something just clicked inside me when I was learning how to play the live version of “I Hear Noises” by Tegan and Sara. It has three chords. That’s it. Just over and over, with a different rhythm for the chorus and a different chord for the bridge. Then I started learning the Mean Everything to Nothing by Manchester Orchestra from beginning to end. I thought it would be this crazy hard thing, and I was blown away by how simple it was, and that made no sense to me because it sounded complicated. I wrote a little bit about how Andy goes back and forth between his full band sound and his acoustic sound, and I became very enthralled by that concept. So, I started recording acoustic versions of various Tegan and Sara, Coldplay, and Snow Patrol songs on my brother's Macbook. And I was like, woah, I can do this with other people’s songs, so what is keeping me from writing my own??? Once I started writing, I couldn’t stop. Music always seemed too magical for me to be able to write my own, and then suddenly, I was creating magic. Getting to share that and receive positive responses just fueled the fire to keep going and see how far I get. Our geographical location is the biggest barrier to success in music. If you don’t do country or bluegrass in KY, no one really cares about you so it’s hard to break out. It’s all about making connections and networking. That was what Julien Baker told me when I met her. Make friends with everyone because you never know where those people will take you.

I feel like I’ve always dreamed of making a lasting change, which is why I wanted to be a therapist. If I can’t change the world, maybe I can change someone’s world? Maybe that will have a ripple effect? I think my depression and anxiety come down on me really hard when I feel like I’ve amounted to nothing. It took me so long to become a therapist, to begin with, and I’ve spent so much of my life just wishing I was dead. And I’m 30 now…unable to pay my bills…so stressed out and in survival mode for a lot of the time. I know I’ve made a positive difference in the lives of other people…at least, I hope I have. I just would have hoped I would be more successful than I am currently. Like, I never thought that life would be easy, but holy shit, why is it SO hard???? Surely it isn’t supposed to be this hard, right? I feel like our generation got handed the shittiest hand, and we’ve just been white knuckling through life since 9/11.

                  I am so glad that the thought of amounting to nothing isn’t something you’ve been worried about. I mean that too, that’s not sarcastic. Keeping it super simple is the way to go and the way to see it. If we’re doing something good with our lives and we are happy, that’s all we can do.

BROOOOOOO, I would have lost my absolute shit on that lifeguard if I had been there. YOU HAD ONE JOB. You literally had your baby in your arms like for the love of god HELP. That is so scary. Poor Rory was just being a kid not really knowing what he was getting himself into. I’m sure that was horrifying for you and also for him. I’m obviously so happy he’s alright.

My cousins came to visit for a summer when I was in 6th grade, and the youngest was such a brat. I could not handle her. I love my cousin who was my age. I got to see both of them the last time I was in Ireland. Lauren decided she didn’t care if she could swim; she was just gonna jump in the pool's deep end at the pavilion by the slide…which children are not supposed to be in any way because of the slide!!!!! She was something else, man, just defiant. Well, she jumped in and never came back up, and the lifeguard didn’t notice because he was watching the slide!!!!! And no one swims there!!!!! So, I jumped in after her and pulled her out of the water. So, when I was visiting, my Aunt Karen was like remember when Niamh saved you from drowning??? BRUH.

Praying Mantises are COOL, but they are aggressive, so you can’t get too close hahaha. There was one in the sensory garden last year that was longer than a pencil. That was horrifying, hahaha. They are awesome to have in your garden, though, because they kill caterpillars!!!!!

Bro Aiden and his croc charms for trump. Will literally never understand how people can still support that dude. Like, okay, republicans, be republican but why this guy???? I’m glad that he is kind to the babies. That is very nice and preferred.

Tabby is my new daddy 😭 broooooo. Is John doing any better now? Do those comments not bother him or motivate him to self-reflect on why his son would say things like that? Kids pick up on whether or not adults pay attention to them, especially their parents. I hope he can figure it all out. I have all the empathy in the world for struggles with mental health, but like he can do something about that.

The fact that kids will fight naps is so crazy to me. Like my brother in Christ, what I would give to go beddy-bye hahaha. Those toddler years are hard; learning how to process and communicate big emotions is hard for little people. Your parenting is solid. It takes a lot of practice for kids to regulate their emotions, but it eventually clicks for them. Having a supportive parent who can teach and model them those things is so important and so good on you, momma. I love that he’s telling those things to you. Has he gotten better about not being picked up when your back is in shambles? I remember you mentioning that he struggled with that and understanding why you couldn’t pick him up.

I can’t believe Jonah is gonna be one soon. That is so insane. I know he is an October baby, but I was unsure if he was the 13th or the 14th?

[libidomechanica]

“Other find who is body”

A rispetto sequence

               1

Late August in her curl’d in the hire baundoun. For himself briar bloncket did Lucy clime at rest of Green; for me. She still that nest, and what me. Other find who is body poore, hath his golden present ways, and her eyes with snowy bankrout know the set me lighter; the heard the place; and dreamed were stood bowed, what Loues like to pot. Thou art my way the in sweet coats looked out.

               2

Tells what is a hair! In lustihede and all it sits thievish for laik o’ gear ye light in the end knees And that was in thee weep it were touch we enthral or games, and made that nource of her diest, unwearing to face; which some cast meant her loosened bed-posts of living recorder. All grace. Whither heart alone. From homeward children feeling, he halls, and see a cold, aspire.

               3

It is perhaps from Beauty, all wrong my hands. Stilled to the sweet-fairer, I never within the same vnhappy youth cushioned in the cricked at him spyde, salámán still unsatisfied— I lives the Victor’s delight; o looke, then were— where betters with them—who forgot, deere kill and the morn! Rich arise; the buds; A half-taughter make in anguish, nor texture; she shoulder Men.

               4

Head, tis this bequeath no Spring. From the hollow kind? And freshly scratchy pocketbook. Night in ear! Her knees and prey, scarcely gall,—I heart without in his know just drove that beares, she is alchemy. Most ride and leads in another sae shy; for laik o’ gear ye light, to fly to God’s career his vein wander’d and some and broils with lullaby my old Apollonius?

               5

Shall eat thy faith odour of lies mine and heart to gaze of all those thy breast, and in and a busie bushy, O! Ah, what place. As easy mighty Being brain shore, more where time, you hold flowery earth my boys and the breeze in Wolues, guid with snow blood is it all too divided in the darkness of wild with other long stores to quell, my sin you overwrought meet to say.

               6

Fading yet it was of many a Horne pype play forbear, above must fade for an iron gave,—I claim: Forbeare of one of Apprehension make no common grow riches rich are my simple when love, and smacking all like geese above; which I weep, and want talke with loyal sport went of spring it. Let’s give hel-driu’n from crimson joy: and I near here under any guesse.

               7

My mother muskets on fire a very ring the greene my heart whose what wrong black leathe. Of Greek a moment every raven went must before I lost, Love the tide, and in Stella spide, which cause. And the twisted to fight: garlands of our dry, decrease his you here canst thou hasted-on leaves a certainly, and part to the fire, a liquid prison door key scraps or Schoolmaster.

               8

But, trowth, I care for thy lust, half the twelfth farre there; then the body friends or might of lost. Which need to know the fret the street of roses, and little bow’d down blossoms came jasper of Old England, not marbled with that if wit, admitted harts can weeding; she broad-spreads his happy roses drown’d to th’ ears, from whose disaster smooth shrieking with white surgeon’s praise enow!

               9

Hey heart toong? We show us Joy best, somethinking lies, thy name fumes of Sorrow of know what I were—where and may chance. In them much. What Nestores face down like same senses I in most th’ earst someth side of the looke, and cause their best, of wine. Love, in her solemn thousand down on myself I did so, shee watch followed: and out for maps to your touch it more thought!

               10

He white found answer This small its mouth and rocks, trees, and worst to see, that the First he nothing great Prince the plain at the Ring over the Fathers, to chance lie thy right to the lessons can e’er sorrowe at the Veil. How despite of life beyond Himself whatever beforne, thy progeny, as thy anxious grow, I alone supportions. But, pale it every will, the moonlight.

               11

Of old stay. What write the last hovel dirt, by yon with eyelids clothes. And the year? Who frown gray denied to news is the Chrysler burden why show to dear; tlot-tlot; tlot-tlot; tlot-tlot; tlot-tlot, in greene wote I, how sunk in thy beds and never return’d, he landlord’s blaze, naked all the sweet passionate aquiline curve in the mirror infest with the Abbey: they poison door!

               12

And the lady-sisted, do not mattere is with Silence, there I ever bed acrobatics with which glorie shine, failst eyes there, naked in a hill, that’s fields: and I saw my with his bloom! So must sport went the Signs their beams, soft tods o’er the Kiddie does know. And trembled from his friend, to be you holds a prize reserved cedar, mimick’d ever your time not hush’d that, in the sea.

               13

The holy ripe, I always most waves and blewe. Is ale-houses ere hung upon the free; but heo me within and not ask’d it them yode forked not into the skies, this wrong which the loved. What faulty feather’s Arms the voice led me her fashions and steep-up he there and rainbow on eares pull heards me out the black-eyed daughted map of his happy, happy as a bed of crime.

[findroleplay]

21+ roleplay. 🏰🌲 they, 23.

dragons, are gods from the beyond. it is believed that they were the first to bring about the elements, to teach humans how to use them, benefit from them. they would offer blessings in return for offerings and rituals; teaching few mortals the word of dragonspeak, a dangerous yet useful tool, meant for protection and to serve as a way to speak to the dragons; but this was centuries ago. now, the practice of dragonspeak is frowned upon, having driven any past speaker deep into a power hungry madness, changing that person completely. bree has been gifted with the ability to speak with the dragons, begging the kingdom of gold to let her practice their tongue. reluctantly, they obliged, and bree began her study. what happens when bree has a dream, being called on by ouroboria, the ancient dragon who was said to hold up the world they live upon, asking for help from the four kingdoms, what shall she do?

heyyooo! like the idea? not mine, not originally. its based off of the webtoon “here there be dragons” by disteal, following the main character bree, and four other lovable characters throughout their journey to the edge of the earth, to save a dragon! haven’t seen the webtoon? that’s fine! if you’re still interested, here’s what the characters are like!

bree : mtf. long dark hair, golden eyes. gold jewelry. a scholar, tries way too hard to be accepted and liked. has a hard time keeping close friendships, can sometimes be inconsiderate and blunt.

kaya : female, native, long brown hair, brown eyes, tall, blue body paint. very laid back, goofy. sometimes aloof and oblivious. friendly, trusts too easy.

axe : ftm. short dark brown hair, brown eyes, short in stature, green body paint. also laid back and goofy. less trusting than kaya, has a good intuition.

demetrius : male. short brown hair, brown eyes, tall, broad. himbo. strong and buff, kind of dumb sometimes. the brute of the bunch, has quite a bit of charisma.

adrian : male. short white hair, blue eyes, crown on his forehead. pampered (traumatized) princeling. doesn’t like getting his hands dirty, but knows how to fight. a bit stuck up, silver spoon in his mouth.

any of those interest you? neat! the roleplay would be canon x canon, multi muse and multi ship, no oc’s. pairings are kaya x axe (fxftm) & adrian x demetrius (mxm) im down to muse kaya & adrian OR axe & demetrius. writing is semi lit - literate (200-600+ words) discord only (i can take care of the server !!) replies once every 1-2wks!! faceclaims will be provided <3

i’m not going to be picky with portrayals of course, i just want to see these four in interesting situations. if you’re into fantasy roleplay im sure this could go far, ive got more descriptions for those who are interested. if you’d like to check out the webtoon it’s, “here there be dragons” by disteal. if you’re interested please feel free to give this ask a like!

-

[kneelingshadowsalome]

Ummm hi I just want to tear open and pick apart and drool over my fav parts here because babe your writing is just 🥺🤌🌟

"Why couldn’t he be the same? Always the outsider in one way or another; always the sore thumb rather than the loving green. Desolation is an art, a skill he’s learned to hide back: clenched teeth to still a wrathful tongue and a layer of muscle to guard that wounded thing in his chest."

FUCK I got shivers when reading this. This is pure pristine character study, just Könibear if you put him in a nutshell. He’s sooo ❤️❤️‍🩹❤️ I want to hold him! Pet him and give him a cup of hot cocoa 🥺 please!!

"No explanation is provided, but she lets him bring his fingers to it, ghost over where the purple melds to yellow in the shape of thick fingerprints. Add wrath to the ever growing list of his sins, because it’s all he feels amidst the envy and love. "

I loooove the way König just spirals down the path of cardinal sins in this fic. Such a beautiful way to do a character arc and describe how the story unfolds, also describe his love and devotion (which does not imply pacifism... or even sanity 🙃🫠)

"If the church caught fire now and the rafters came to sink into the earth not a part of him would or could even care as long as she were just here."

Seriouslyyy even for a guy who hasn’t known love he can be such a drama queen and I LOVE HIM FOR IT. I love it that there’s just this impending doom coupled with mad innocent-eye adoration throughout this whole fic... And boi just happened to see her in the garden. 😇 (baby I would lock this guy up in a no-woman zone as well if he's born this way)

 “I think that I lose myself when I’m with you.”

 “Does that hurt you?”

 “Nein… I’m happier like this.”

Wtf are you trying to make me cry ;.; (I know you are! Shame on you! 💖) This exchange is one of the most beautiful I’ve ever read tbh... “Does that hurt you?” is so. Blunt? yet caring way to ask if this kind of mad love is ok for him? Reader can be seen losing herself in this fic as well and I’m so here for it ❤️‍🔥

"Her tongue moves with grace, his is only a thing of greed. Each chaste peck is met with a hunger from somewhere so foggy and forgotten it never had a home at all, not before now."

Another jackpot where "Beautiful ethereal sentences that hurt you" goes. König finding love (=home) through physical intimacy because he’s such a sensual being despite being clumsy and awkward is so precious to me… You don’t even know! I know we’re all here for the emotional connection as well but when it gets amplified through kisses and lust and smut? It just gets 1000 x better and more tragic. so sue me

"Abstaining from meals during a fast is a struggle in and of itself; abstaining from her is some long-forgotten circle of Hell."

Living for these metaphors

"The demon is smaller, but strong. He’s been in situations like this before, doesn’t have to spit the words to tell König so. They’re felt with each blow, with the sharp edge of the knife this bastard manages to dig into his side. Just barely, before it’s jerked out of his hand and thrown several paces away. The skittering across the tarmac is enough to chant doom."

Visceral. Best thing I’ve ever read. Period.

"He’s not a saint anymore, no… a guardian angel. The archangel Michael with his sword set ablaze and divinity scrawled into every scale of his chest plate. Something holy and glowing, unsullied and beautiful. "

SYL FOR PRESIDENT 

No but actually if you’re not a published author by now I will go upstairs and punch God myself. Sorry not sorry!!

Hello! This is the Frankenstein anon back with more praise and another prompt that you might like. Again you are amazing and everyone you come out with stuff, I weep for joy! Please continue what you are doing because it is absolute art✨

Okay onto the prompt. So lately tiktok has been putting onto this telenova drama called Hilda Furcão which is pretty much this priest and prostitute fall in love but due to societal pressures, cannot be together. The YEARNING in this show is amazing and I can’t help but think of Priest Konig in this situation. Imagine he falls in love with reader who works at a brothel but because he’s a churchly man, he’s fighting demons in his head (and down yonder) cuz he YEARNS for her but the lord says no🥴

Please keep doing what you’re doing and I’m constantly cheering you on with your work! ❤️

In the Arms of Flowers

content/warnings: 18+. minors do not interact. pining, lots of talk of religion/silly metaphors, fluff, ridiculous attempts at courtship from both, dark (if you squint), implied cyber stalking, violence/murder, minor character death, some angst, sexual violence (not done by König), König becomes horribly obsessed and reader is fine with it, virgin!König-> oral (both receiving) piv smut.

wc: 11k.

There’s a garden in the churchyard, one that’s always been, even before his vows were taken and the cassock was pulled around his shoulders.

It’s the very place that the arching den window in the clergy house faces out towards, and the very place that an angel descends from Heaven to stalk through night after night.

Even when the thunder clamors and rolls to light up the sky above, the pretty thing is there, kneeling amongst the blooming lilies. A listless sort of purity swallows over her, bathes her in the white of petals and the bright illumination of each bolt of lightning above, arcs a halo over her head like a proper mirage.

The whole town knows these doors remain open, but never does she even look toward the church or the home of holy men at all: only the flowers. The lilies and carnations seemed to be her favorite to haunt, weaving through the petals as they sway for her in breezes like whispers from the pouting lips of cherubim.

He’s prayed for this lost soul many times already; clutched the rosary between his fingers and whispered to the Lord to protect her, to heal whatever aches, to bring her wandering feet into the chapel one of these days. But as most lilies, this one’s beauty is gone away by mid-morning.

Tonight, he wills himself to bring her in for prayer and refuge from the coming rain. Its been a long time coming, and regrettably he’s hesitated at every other opportunity. Nothing’s changed, the scene was so commonplace even the others have commented on it prior.

Maybe he hallucinates her holiness; the halo has become made up of fallen petals now as they arch over the crown of her head where she’s found sprawled out amongst them. She raises herself to sit upright, dusts the dirt from her knees and offers a wary glance with each step he takes until his soles halt in soil that would soon be mire.

“I’m sorry. I’ll leave,” the angel breathes out with her eyes darting from his collar down to rest at the expanse of short blades of grass between them. “I don’t mean to cause you any trouble.”

She doesn’t meet the concern in his eyes, and König is no stranger to sin. To the shame and grief that he’s absolved from far worse than her in the stuffy wooden confessional.

“You’re welcome to stay.” A silent prayer rests there in his breath — please stay, though even he wasn’t certain as to why there’s a demand stirring in the pit of his stomach for this woman clad in a dirtied white dress.

She smiles then, gazes right up at him in such a way that immediately sparks something misplaced, something tucked away beneath studying scripture and kneeling before the wooden altar. A sin of the flesh, a heated poker jabbing at both his heart and his loins.

“No, I’m okay,” she assures with a slight dip of her head, already taking steps back to dart away, back to whichever gilded little nest of baubles and starlight she took flight from. “I was just heading home.”

And that’s it. He doesn’t plead for her to come inside, the offer has been laid out already. It’s not his job to force a belief that one doesn’t want, only lend a kindness and a cushioned pew, advice for the lost and a choir for bleating lambs.

He bids her goodbye and walks back to the clergy house, ignoring the strange looks of his peers as they all prepare to bed down after a nightly prayer. It’s rare to smile here, when sacred words are passed from the wrinkled, cracked lips of his seniors. But König does smile, the grin is as bright as the seconds of white lighting up the sky in intervals as he silently thanks God for such a sweet vision amidst such darkness.

The fixation does not falter for the following three nights. She doesn’t return to the churchyard to whisper secrets to the blooms, but the angel weighs on his mind so heavily that König finds himself convinced that she must have been his calling, a soul that he would assuredly save.

His sermons now lack their passion. The parishioners come to him with weighty hearts and misery in their eyes, but bless him all the same, even when he’s distant. Away with the fairies, some would say. He can’t help but wonder when one such service rolls to a closing prayer if whoever conjured such words had also been in the presence of a seraph.

“Do you need prayer?,” one of his fellow priests asks as the flock trickles out, worry clear in the wrinkles laden beneath this eyes and the way his lips draw down before pressing thin. “You don’t seem to be sleeping well.”

And König regrets the words he speaks next, when he describes the woman from the flowers in detail greater than necessary: how her eyes seemed so soft, her smile fragile, and her body language more docile than that of even a lamb. He mentions the dirty dress, the way she seemed to be trying to escape something yet refused the shelter he offered.

The other priest nods and sighs, his eyes squeezing shut in thought, and though König has not feared a scolding since he abandoned home nearly two decades prior, the way the ordinarily calm priest seems so frustrated by this sends a swell of fluttering anxiety beneath his ribcage.

“The woman you describe is a temptress,” his elder explains coldly. His sharp, dark eyes rest on König’s face as though the disparity in their height does not exist at all. “Best to let her be, she does not want our help. Leave it alone.”

“Ja. Verstanden.”

The warning is enough to dull the buzzing in his chest, the mush that’s been made up of his head until he sees her again.

The bakery in town regularly makes donations of pastries and thick loaves of bread for church goingson. It isn’t regular that he’s been asked to pick them up; the eldest of the priests usually does so, some blood relation to the owners that König has never cared enough to ask about. The old man never did well in the summer months, though, far too frail now to bear the heat snaking over his pale skin and leaving burns.

With the mistake of rambling onward about this perturbing fascination still grating at his mind, he doesn’t hesitate to volunteer, to take the old truck and step away from the stained glass and crucifixes for a brief outing. A moment of respite.

There’s a complimentary mug of coffee presented across the expanse of the counter when the cashier greets him with a smile so broad it seems faked.

König’s fingers twitch when he grasps at the handle; the uncertainty was something he had sworn he would outgrow one day with God’s healing, but it never seemed to stray far from him. It rests over the back of his neck like a feeding vampire when he takes his first sip, one that burns his tongue and stings at his eyes when he notices the woman seated at a table in the corner.

It’s her: temptation and fate packaged up in a loose fitting sweater that covers the pulse in her neck and a short skirt.

She holds her phone, not the mug stationed before her, staring down at the thing with the most somber expression he’s ever seen on a lady before. She taps her thumbs at the screen, talking to someone, but there’s a loneliness in her expression apparent like the rust on the old truck parked outside.

Poor little thing.

She glances up when his staring is detected, confusion stripped bare upon her with a pinched brow and a slack jaw. Then, follows realization and she offers the same smile she did that night, some seventy or so hours prior.

“Morning, Father.”

There’s not a fractal within König that wants to make the sweet spirit uncomfortable, but each step he takes towards her table seems to make her shoulders tense. She knows that he knows, sees that sympathetic look in his eye and hates it.

Maybe even hates him for the divinity he wears in the sable cloth pulled over his shoulders.

That doesn’t stop his approach.

König sits across from her with shaking hands and a forced smile like the one the cashier wears, drops his mug onto the table and offers her his hand. Fingers bending to graze the palm as though beckoning a frightened animal when it’s he who feels most afraid.

The angel merely eyes him cautiously for a moment before she takes the cup into both of her hands and gives him a fragile huff, dismissing his attempt to pray for her soul. Again. Yet, the sting he feels is not from a lack of a starved savior complex being satisfied, only… that he has yet to touch her somehow. That sudden thought stifles him in full.

But angels are nothing if not merciful and loving; she picks up on his dejection and speaks again in his place.

“How are the carnations?”

“Hm?”

“The flowers in the garden… the red ones,” she elaborates with a soft laugh, hides it behind the rim of her cup when it’s raised for her to take a sip. Her mouth looks soft, compelling, and he’s staring again. “I like them the most.”

He knows he should stop this, that what’s become of an innocent meeting has left him feeling anything but. There’s a howling chasm in place of the heart of a worthy devotee. She’s nothing like the women who frequent the church — the only other women he sees. Brighter at best and alluring at the worst.

“I thought the lilies were your favorite…” It’s unsuited for a priest and a man so tall and broad to sound so breakable, but his voice only comes in an hurried breath, embarrassed and small.

She shakes her head, tousles her hair in the process. “I like all of them. The ones at your church grow prettiest.”

“I see…”

The woman gives him an expectant look, as if prompting him to speak more, before her phone chimes and the air seems to shift from tentative yet sweet to something vast and cold. She doesn’t seem eager to be interrupted in such a way, either; her expression falls from that subtle playfulness to something akin to a regretful acceptance.

She stands from her seat abruptly and takes a step towards the door. “I have something I need to take care of.”

God gives and takes away.

“I can bring you some,” he offers, winding in the too-small wooden chair to face her. Too late to reel in the flirtatious nature of such an offering, too late to bite his tongue and remember the vows he had taken. The burden upon his heart seems far more pressing than any words from an old book. “Carnations and lilies… some of the others, too.”

The woman almost seems shy when she glances over her shoulder and offers him the most imperceptible nod. “Yeah, sure… I’ll see you around.”

His angel leaves him to rot in thought at that lonely table, in this tiny bakery. He does not think to repent for the way his temperature and pulse spiked in her presence, for the way he takes her empty cup and stuffs it into one of the boxes of baked goods to collect later.

Riding back to the church is dreadful, because she’s already fastened to his heart like a ribbon on a pretty bouquet. He’ll ask the sisters from the cloister to clip flowers for him, tie them up in a lace that will leave her face warmed and lips pouting.

When the people in the church have their fill of sweets and bread, König tells a lie, maybe several.

He claims he doesn’t know why that innocuous porcelain thing is resting where food once had, doesn’t know why the baker would have stuffed that in there too. He takes it to his room and claims that he would return it come morning.

The bed has always felt far too small for him alone, but he pictures her there with him, sat upon his lap when he brings the cup up to his lips with his eyes closed.

It’s cold and hard, difficult to imagine it to be a kiss at all, but he pretends her lips are upon him, eager and willing. It takes only rolling his tongue back to flick over itself, envisioning it being her own, for him to feel his trousers grow too tight. He doesn’t touch himself. He can’t bear the thought of it, not with the cross staring down at him from the far wall.

And finally, regret comes.

Shame, too, because König is aware he’s become a bit of a creep; enchanting himself with second hand kisses whilst his angel takes another man to bed. A man undeserving, but… he could be. He was deserving enough to become a holy man, surely she could see he was worthy of her as well.

The bed is too small even when he curls into himself and pulls the blanket up passed his eyes. Sleep is too skittish to come for him, even when he prays in a whisper to be absolved of his lust.

The dreams are only filled with images of an angel trapped in a rose bush, the thorns sinking into her wings until blood is drawn, but still she smiles. She reaches toward him with shaky limbs, whispers something so dreadfully mournful he knows to his very soul that she is his purpose alone.

It’s what wakes him in a fit, compels him to venture out through the yard with a heart set on seeking guidance. There are moonbeams above and animal calls from the surrounding trees. All of God’s creations are in perfect, dreamy harmony.

Why couldn’t he be the same? Always the outsider in one way or another; always the sore thumb rather than the loving green. Desolation is an art, a skill he’s learned to hide back: clenched teeth to still a wrathful tongue and a layer of muscle to guard that wounded thing in his chest.

There is no better peace than the quiet of the church in the late hour. Moonlight through stained glass and empty, antique seats that would make the worldly whip out their phones to snap pictures in a heartbeat. The doors are always open, for the sinners and the devoted alike, though the confessional is rarely touched when there would be no saint awake set on absolving.

Perhaps that’s why he takes to the booth he needs to make himself smaller to fit into: one shoulder and one foot first, then the next set. He’s never cared for it, left it to the better and smaller. The sound just past the thin partition rattles him. It isn’t the creaking of wood below his feet, but something softer. A weak sniffle. A cry from the other side.

“I’ll leave in a moment,” comes a voice, broken from tears and so horribly sad that the usual script entirely fails him. He recognizes the voice, though a bit warbled now. The voice that would make the choir pause, an angel’s sweet tone.

“Wait… no. You can stay. I’m hiding, too.” A breathy laugh comes forced and misplaced. Priest or not, König has never been the best at consoling anyone, let alone one so far above him.

“I’m not hiding,” she tries to sound braver now. He can imagine her chin tilted forward and that sweet smile trying it’s damndest to paint its way across her face. “But… why are you?”

“Don’t know.”

“Who are you?” The crying seems to have ceased entirely for now. Clearly whatever seemed to ail her could be remedied by her own curiosity. A cute, unorthodox little thing.

“König.” It served well enough as a confirmation name when he could not settle on one of the saints. King of them all, one of the other saved men had said in jest. Ironic, now.

“I like your voice, König,” she murmurs, deliberately testing the pronunciation on her tongue in such an alluring way that a small shiver runs its way down his spine.

“Danke… and you?”

God forgive him, he doesn’t even try. Doesn’t try to bring shame or guilt, read her scripture or pray for her soul. He only listens in silence when she tells him her name, beautiful and charming as he had expected it to be. The woman then tells him of her work, of the motel she ventures to at night… the troubles with money and even vaguely, some of the men she suffers through. This had been a bad night. Strange how a singular hour could have broken someone down to such a desperation to open up, to grasp for what small comfort they could receive.

But she came for him.

She must have hoped to see him.

He thanks his god for that.

— — —

“I bought a phone.”

“I see that.” Her fingers graze over the stems of the flowers, cleanly cut by hands more patient and stable than König’s own.

The angel isn’t looking up at him, not this time. There isn’t even a smile on her face when she cradles the bouquet close to her chest, petting over it where she sits upon the motel bed wearing nothing but some strappy, barely-there lingerie. Pure white with pink lace over the cups of her bra where her breasts swell with each shaky intake of breath.

In this week apart, he’s kept the device hidden in a loose pocket and spent many a night scouring the seediest websites looking for a hint of a body that may belong to her in this very area. Only one seemed to match. The messages exchanged were about hours and pricing, establishing a location, and terms he didn’t quite understand. He didn’t harp on the small details, but finding her messages to be so rigid and dry did surprise him. There were no cute hearts or winking emojis, it all felt horribly transactional.

Priests don’t make a lot of money, it all goes back to the church, but he’s thieved enough from the offering bowls to have a night with her alone. As disheartening as the lack of flirtations seemed, he hoped not to squander whatever opportunity this outing proved to be.

The balaclava covering his face wasn’t purchased with the intention of making her nervous, only… shielding himself from curious stares. The whole town knows his face, his name, the words he speaks so resolutely to his flock. Just as well as they know of who she is, what she does.

Even this knitted shield couldn’t hide himself from her, though. The very moment he entered this drab, modestly decorated room with flowers in hand she had only looked further lost.

“You look very pretty,” he tries as he removes the mask and drops it to the floor, kneels just a hair from where her feet dangle from the bed. “I’m glad that I found you.”

“Thank you.”

The flowers are placed on the side table, petals falling down to the thin carpet below. A cascade of red like blood and white like doves feathers. Purity and a wound in one.

The poor thing looks scorned when she does give him a glance then, but she forces herself into a position that stokes a hellish, unnatural flame within him. Her thighs part as her hands rest on the cups of her bra, pushing the thin fabric down to reveal areola, her soft nipples, sights that he had never seen before.

“You shouldn’t even be here, König,” the lady warns when his gaze sweeps over the innocent flesh laid bare before him. The angel isn’t even wet. Her panties are pristine over her womanhood, and it dawns on him that… she wouldn’t risk what he was even for the generous donation he had given.

“I don’t want to ruin you.”

But she should. Crumble him into salt, cast him away with the wind. Should.

She sees something holy in him too… albeit, not in the way that he would like for her to.

He swallows hard as he rises to his feet and sits next to her. The hands that were so accustomed to being joined in prayer find her breasts now with tentative touches, a curious squeeze, until he wills himself to readjust the fabric and conceal her properly.

“Ja, but… I just wanted to visit you.”

“You don’t need to pay me just to see me.”

The tension in the room finally begins to dissolve. Not by much, but when she sighs something that sounds like amusement, the restless throbbing of his heart does begin to settle.

As much as he would like to take her like some beast in rut, lay some claim to her in bursts of white seed, he doesn’t even know where to begin. Each curve of her body looks as though it would feel like a miracle beneath his palm, under his tongue.

It’s just that nothing is going to happen, not here, not now that he’s brought a prostitute flowers and revealed who he was to her. She sees something pitiful, where he only sees someone to love.

He can’t tell her that he dreams of her, that he views her in the same way he views his god. That would only scare her away, lead her to believe he’s a lunatic rather than a man only just now having his first taste of love.

“Then could I see you every night? So that you don’t have to…” His head dips, because no matter how he tries he knows any word he says is foolish.

This isn’t something she’s doing because it is fun for her; it’s a job just like his own. Flesh or words spoken… did it even matter? And yet, König could feel a malicious, gnawing envy at the thought of a bolder man taking his place tomorrow evening. That man wouldn’t hesitate to peel away her pretty lingerie and fuck her, shove his tongue into her mouth while his cock sat between her legs as if it belonged there.

“König,” she sighs next to him, pityingly.

His jaw tenses as his fingers curl into his palms. The hopelessness of it all crashes down around him as though sung out from the loudest of the choir. He hardly notices when she presses her head against his shoulder, only realizes how close she’s come to him when her hand curls over one of his own.

“You’re the strangest man I’ve ever met.” It’s not a compliment but it feels like one when she laughs like that, airy and soft. “The sweetest one, too.”

He smells her perfume from this close, something scented like fruit or maybe maple, sap-sticky and saccharine. All of her flesh feels warm against the plain t-shirt he wears, a warmth he would give anything to dive into, but not without her explicit command. A powerful seraph in the form of one painfully cute, gentle lady. If anyone could see what he saw now, they too would forsake those holy books and eat from her open palm instead.

“I don’t know what to do,” he confesses, a peculiar bitterness hanging on his tongue.

“How about a walk?”

He pulls the balaclava over his face again when they make their way out into the quiet, darkened street. Hand in hand. It’s not from shame, but a necessity, perhaps, because his pale face has only flowered into a lasting pink since laying eyes upon her on that mattress, sprawled out and waiting. The blush only deepens with every squeeze she blesses him with, every hushed word spoken as she tells him about her favorite places.

She’s dressed in the same white dress they had initially met in, now clean of the dirt from flower beds. Somehow even more radiant at this close, too.

The churchyard and the clergy house are nothing in comparison to the way the rest of the town feels when the moon rises. It’s a world all their own, a place where no one looks at her as if she were a simple harlot, but a queen amongst chipping wood and tarmac. There’s even a skip in her step as she walks ahead of him, her hips swaying beneath her skirt. All because there’s no one here but she and her most loyal and only acolyte.

He wills himself out of her grasp when they cross the threshold into the cemetery. The darkness there is enough to pull him back to earth; thoughts of how easily swayed he’s been linger in the back of his mind. The want doesn’t even begin to reel back its claws, but the guilt does sink its pearly fangs in alongside it.

“I get it. You don’t want to be seen with me,” she says a small step away, drawing her hand up to her chest. It’s the saddest she’s ever looked, and he doesn’t have the words to further explain that he has no god damn idea what he’s doing: here, with her, in the midst of something that feels so normal even though it should not.

“Nein! That’s not—“

“You don’t want to touch me. You barely talk…”

Because the words don’t come easy. Because he’s never felt such an overbearing devotion to anyone, anything apart from what he prays to. How could she… this woman that shared in such loneliness with him not see him for what he was, not see him in the way that he sees her?

“You’re misunderstanding.”

“You just want to… to convert me, is that right?,” she hisses, sounding more shaken up than he had ever hoped to hear.

All hesitation had to be swallowed back.

There was no other option. He could feel her slipping away, a pain he wasn’t prepared to face.

God gives and takes away, but König refuses to let go.

His eyes narrow, his breath halts entirely, and he cups her face in his hands as gently as he can. The distance between them feels like miles as he lowers his head to kiss her through the knit barrier. It’s flighty and petrifying on his side… he feels cold sweat wet his brow when the warmth of her pulls through.

She could hit him, spit her curses like a proper witch, and he would only fall to her feet and kiss her heels. But… she does none of those things. Whatever pain was brewing here is ripped away with the night breeze.

Her hands peel away the balaclava, discard it somewhere into the tall grass where it wouldn’t be found, and she grants him his first, proper kiss.

With only the cracked headstones and cemetery angels watching, what once was tentative becomes a full indulgence. König samples from her mouth as though it weeps honey when the gentle peck graduates to a parting of lips. His hands run down the length of her sides as she grasps at his shirt, they pull her in close until her chest meets his own and two pairs of eyelids flutter.

She feels more heavenly than his imagination could have prepared him for, her tongue hotter and her sounds… the soft sighs and shaky murmurs of approval that fill him with both a maddening love and an urge to burn everything away if only it would keep her safe and near.

The world ceases to be entirely, cast down with Lucifer to the sulfur and smoke. Her lips remain parted when they break apart, a haze over her eyes reflecting the veil clouding his own irises.

Was a kiss really forsaking his vows? Was that really such a painful treachery? No… no it shouldn’t be. The issue remains that he can not see her as just some woman. Something as small as this could consume him entirely.

The night is spent with an abundance of those shared kisses when they return to the motel. Tentative touches, too. He’s never held a woman, not in the way he gets to hold her then. She presses tightly to him, her back to his chest with her hand keeping his own in place over her middle. She’s so soft, swans down plush and smooth as silk ribbon.

There is mint lingering on her breath each time she speaks. No talk of her work, only… she confesses how she had feared him so initially, how she worried that a holy man stepping into her life would only be further condemnation: an angel terrified by a devil that does not exist at all.

He knows he’s lost a part of himself here when he tells her he wishes to meet with her again, that if the church is no longer the place she fancies to walk, he’ll meet her amongst the dead again and again when the old clergymen sleep. Those promises he had reserved solely for God turn on themselves now, when he reveres the idol he shares this bed with.

Though her hips press back against his groin when his fingers crawl up to her sternum, and the desire strikes up within him, his cock remains untouched here. He doesn’t whisper a prayer for forgiveness into her hair when he grows hard, just tucks her in closer and smiles where his head rests atop her own.

It’s the closest to bliss he’s ever felt.

— — —

“You weren’t here for morning prayer.” The voice isn’t accusatory, just observant. The nightly prayers were missed too, though a reprieve is granted by way of those remaining unmentioned.

But the guilt does eat at König when he sees the concern in this man’s eyes, splinters at his very soul until he asks in a fragile voice if he can speak to the old priest in the confessional.

Everything here feels much too small and the booth is more or less the same. The wood closes in around him, bathes him in a blackness that even the glow of candlelight within these walls can not reach. The partition separating them does not help bolster courage, it only leaves him feeling more alone.

The clergyman listens in silence as König confesses that he has become weak. He does not mention the lady of the night, but there’s no need to at all: finding himself so captivated with a woman that he considered breaking every promise to the higher power was bad enough. He does not mention how he’s considered pleasuring himself, touching her too… only that they shared a night together embraced, counts the kisses that were exchanged with each digit of his hands.

There’s a pitying sigh from the other side before the man begins a lengthy prayer that König does join him in. With the “Amen” that follows, he’s told only to rid himself of those thoughts, to bury them with fasting and prayer. No more visits with this temptress, remain on the right path. The very, very simple things he must do to receive God’s forgiveness and favor once more.

“You are not a disappointment,” his elder reminds him with a small pat to his cheek and a smile. It’s more fatherly than the sparse affection he received from his own flesh and blood before coming here.

“Danke… thank you,” he breathes when his eyes bear the burden of tears.

God loves him and so do the sainted men.

But to never see her again would be worse than flagellation.

He chokes down the pain with more water when his stomach roars with hunger, hides the broken heart with smiles and prayer. Holy clothes feel heavier now. The money he stole to spend that night with her is returned to the collection pool in a week's time. The smartphone he had purchased is tossed out with the rest of the garbage in the bins. Even the cup is returned to the bakery after being rinsed in the sink.

Still not a part of him feels absolved from this torturous puppet show.

He thinks of her more than he ponders over his fear of Hell itself. God feels like an old memory as the days pass. He counts them in his daybook, an ‘X’ next to the dates he had gone without seeing her. Ten becomes twenty, and it becomes no less agonizing.

The prayers come easier, at least. He joins with his fellow men, kneels with his hands clasped before him, speaks such heartfelt words now that on more than one occasion he’s shared a healing tear or two with the other clergymen.

God is an old friend, yes, but that title is just a placeholder for the one his prayers are truly for. The little angel of the garden, the woman who has given him nothing at all but stole his heart all the same. Was she not the same as God from that aspect?

After a month, he’s finally given the privilege to stand before the altar and preach to the parishioners again. His sermon is directed by the other clergymen, a subtle admission of his own misdeeds as he guides the flock away from the sins of lust, of worldly pleasures that would steer them away from the right path.

Amidst the men and women crowding the pews sits a new face. She wears a hat, looking uncertain and skittish as a bunny amidst a pack of starved hounds beneath its curved brim. Her coat is tugged tightly around her where her hands grip to keep it closed and snug. No one is out to get her, not here, but there’s a purplish bruise on her neck. A sad stare trails up to meet his gaze when he stammers through the words of scripture.

Then, she smiles and his heart only feels full.

The sermon ends clumsily enough, but she waits for him in the center pew. He ensures the others have cleared out before he takes rigid steps toward her, where he sits a foot or so away on the bench; the feigned friendliness is only a front for the rapid beating of his heart and the way the blush upon his face paints up to his ears.

“I waited to walk with you… like you promised we would,” she says in place of a greeting. There’s no chiding in her tone, just curiosity. Gentle, like she’s speaking to a wounded bird, and perhaps that’s what he’s become: some big, ugly vulture. Holy in its love of everything from the sky to the rot down below.

“I’m sorry. I..,” he laments, grasping for an explanation that does not come.

“No, I understand. It’s alright, König.”

He knows he doesn’t deserve the gift of her redemption with how easily he turned away from her, from the blooming of… something. It was best not to use that word anymore.

“I just didn’t want to wait any longer. I missed you,” she huffs when the silence extends between them, breaks up the tension in the air but not what creeps over her own shoulders.

“Your bruise..” He wants to tell her of his sleepless nights, of how he pictures her in place of any old deity upon a throne in heaven, but settles for where his eyes linger on her neck.

No explanation is provided, but she lets him bring his fingers to it, ghost over where the purple melds to yellow in the shape of thick fingerprints. Add wrath to the ever growing list of his sins, because it’s all he feels amidst the envy and love.

His fingers dig into the plain back trousers when they rest upon his lap again, something foreign buzzes beneath his skin. The thought that any man would be brazen enough to lay hands upon his very own angel.. It’s unbelievable, unforgivable. His thoughts spiral so quickly it’s frightening. Timid things can become vicious, too, when backed into corners.

She manages to keep this growing storm in check when she stands and smooths her skirt, and offers to tidy up the church in an act of ‘repentance’.

The chores are simple and the sisters that linger far past service seem grateful to have her here as she takes up the broom and sweeps away at the dusty floor. They chatter away with her, take her hat and rest their hands over her shoulders when the cleaning winds to an end. His angel closes her eyes in prayer, doesn’t so much as open them to send him a knowing glance when they pray for her to find a good husband, someone who deserves such a lovely, godly woman.

She shares a meal with them while König keeps to himself with scripture in hand, mindlessly roving over the words even when his thoughts drift to the night of their first kiss.

He reasons that it’s only natural when she gives him such a display of acceptance too. It only solidifies what he knows already: this woman is no succubus— she has not crawled from the depths of Hell to drag him back with her, she’s only heavensent. An angel with a broken wing or a gaping wound somewhere… something to care for.

She’s encouraged to return by several fond voices. A few of the women even offer to walk her home, the daylight is dying and it’s dangerous for a lone lady out at night. The angel smiles at him then, sharing in the knowledge that she prefers the dark. Not the wicked things, but the peace and the beauty of the moon.

And she returns when he abstains from her.

She confides in him after each sermon that she does long to see him more often, but she likes the way he speaks of Mary Magdalene and the other women in scripture, pokes fun at the lilt to his voice when he notices her amidst the crowd of others. She says she likes him a lot before they part ways in the evenings, but she doesn’t tempt him with pouts or trailing fingers.

He thanks her for respecting his faith each time - despite being the one who crossed several boundaries initially. Though he keeps his hands to himself now, the looks he gives to her are pleading and soft. If she would pull him into a kiss now, he would let her have all of him. They could run away together, from the church, from her clients…

It’s on one of those cloudy Sundays that he does ask her if she’s stopped. He braves the look she gives him when his question comes as a hushed stutter. The comfort between them no longer feels tentative. It’s just there. Ever-present as the sky above.

“Well, you haven’t,” she whispers in response, propping her elbow up on the back of the pew. It’s as if she believes it could be so simple, but it’s not. Not for either of them.

The spiels of Heaven and Hell won’t reach her, so he doesn’t bother with those. She offers him an invitation with her words and the way she remains so open that it’s difficult not to take.

It’s been months since he touched her last and the love has only seemed to have grown. Strange. Perhaps he is as odd as she’s imagined him to be. There have been weddings in this very church, talks of long years of courtship, and even then what those men must have felt for their brides had to have paled in comparison to this. It had to.

“Tell me how to,” he breathes without any underlying thought. Saints don’t question their gods, they only serve them.

“You’re actually considering it…?”

“I might.”

The silence crowds around the bench while her fingers brush over the pages of a hymnal in repetition and his only inch closer to her clothed knee.

“You could meet me at the cemetery tonight… We could talk more there.”

“At night is probably not the best time.”

“Well, we’re friends, aren’t we?”

Friends don’t kiss. Friends don’t feel the way he feels now, or how he’s felt for the past few months. Platonic arrangements don’t require repentance. But, he bites his tongue and tilts his head back, lets it roll off the shoulder when his hand draws back to his lap. Another time.

Not where the Heavenly Father could see, if he were even watching any longer.

“… Tomorrow morning would be better.”

“Then I’ll come get you. Don’t you dare try and get out of it,” she chirps with the wildest glint of mirth alight in her eyes.

Stay.

If the church caught fire now and the rafters came to sink into the earth not a part of him would or could even care as long as she were just here. But he watches her go without a word of opposition, watches her nod toward the sisters standing out in the yard and clasp her hands in front of her, smiling to herself as though the world were made for just the two of them.

It stings during nightly prayer, and it burns when he lies in bed to wait for the morning. There are cicadas singing and footsteps on old wooden boards to remind him that he isn’t entirely alone, the scent of tobacco drifting from his window when another plaster saint hides beyond the veil of night to smoke. He doesn’t sleep, his eyes remain fixed upon the ceiling until the darkness of the room drifts to a dull gray with the sun’s slow rise.

And König does not wait for her to fetch him. Morning prayer dissolves into a mournful cry because there is no part of him that can fathom or interpret any of this. A trial should not feel like a blessing when he’s faced with it. God must be playing the stupidest game imaginable to test him with someone so lovable, so charming. Where the church leaves him feeling filthy with remorse, she purifies him with only a curl of her lips and starlight dancing in her eyes.

None of it is fair.

The guilt must be something obligatory, summoned up like puffs of dust from the floorboards. Worshiping idols is a sin, but it’s not the angel that feels like one, it’s the attention he pays to the cloud in his head that does. That’s the one that should go.

He grits through prayer with the other men, doesn’t chime in with unnecessary words of devotion this time. The coffee burns his tongue when he downs the mug and forgoes breakfast. There are dark rings beneath his eyes when he ventured to the washroom to brush his teeth, and there are whispers in the halls that the young priest must be either coming under a possession or God is preparing him for something. Something big and exciting. He ignores those and the stern glances from the little nuns in their robes, huffs something of a joke about a momentary sabbatical when he lumbers out of the walls of the church.

There are no new bruises this time, but König has the memory of the last ones stuck in his skull. A clear image of four small marks on the side of her neck, another on its opposite. Larger, more pronounced. Five marks from a hand that never belonged there. Kerosene and a match are what the thoughts running rampant in his head would look like to an outsider.

She tells him on the thin picnic blanket that she’s got a new client, that he gives her enough to where she doesn’t have to consider any others now. The man has a much stranger set of interests, ones she hadn’t delved into before him, but she’s merciful enough to withhold the details that would lead König to make the crucifixion seem a gentle affair.

She tells him because she wants him to be proud that it’s only one now. That she’s making some sort of progress for him. None of it is fair, and he knows without asking that she feels more akin to the way that he does than any of the holy men.

And still he can’t help but ask, “Do you love him?”

“Of course not,” comes her immediate response, and there’s a near imperceptible glare there, judging by the fire in her eyes. It’s cute… and he feels the world's ugliest fool for daring to ask for reassurance as though this relationship was any sort of normal. If it were even a relationship at all.

Their hands touch, reaching for the same flaky pastry in the basket she brought along and Heaven’s bells ring out in his ears when her gaze sweeps over him. Everything is sugared dough and right again. She offers him her lap in place of a pillow for his head when the clouds grow thick and gray above, feeds him from her own hand and runs her fingers across his face with the other.

“How did you get the sky in your eyes?,” she asks him, makes him blush so easily his heart stutters within his chest. He feels like a boy in her presence, and in a way, to her, maybe he even is just some inexperienced whelp nipping at her heels.

The angel does not judge, she softly rakes her nails behind his ear and neck until he shivers in her hold. His hair is next, a victim to her comfort as she tousles it between her fingers, strokes him like the smallest of kittens when he feels anything but.

“I don’t know what you mean,” he mutters, raising a hand to brush at her cheek. Warm as he expected, yet softer. There’s nothing wicked here, only a woman. A woman who loves him as he loves her.

“Your eyes are pretty… sad. I love them,” comes the sweet reply that reduces him to nothing but scattered feathers and a howling ache.

Did he even exist before now? Before her? This woman has filled him with such purpose, breathed new life into a stagnant soul. The church was a safe place for a man scorned by the rest of the world, but that blanket felt unnecessary now. He wanted to feel her hands move over him like this, smell the petals in her perfume, hear her voice speak to him, all of it. Forever.

“I think that I lose myself when I’m with you.”

“Does that hurt you?”

“Nein… I’m happier like this.” It’s the closest to a confession he can whisper.

And he returns to her, morning after morning König rushes through paying his dues to God and his men to return to her like this.

When the graveyard is silent and the dew still sticks to the blades of grass, her voice sounds sweeter somehow beneath the glow of the rising sun. The birds sing around them and often she pushes wildflowers into his hair, clasps her hands around his neck and teaches him to kiss.

Her tongue moves with grace, his is only a thing of greed. Each chaste peck is met with a hunger from somewhere so foggy and forgotten it never had a home at all, not before now. The angel needn’t show him where to rest his hands, they pry at every part of her: gentle brushes against her cheek and neck, kneading at her shoulders, further, further until he does finally starve off any lingering thought of what is good or evil to explore the curve of her lower back.

Most of the time words come in afterthought, once lips are wet and plush from this gentle devouring, after she steels herself from running her hands any further down than his stomach. He tells her in truth that he prays to her, not for. Not anymore.

The shadows cast from the aspens keep them tucked far away from sight, from God and his people alike. A temple for two without four walls to close them in. The only place on this earth that he’s ever found himself in perfect solace.

“I want to try something,” she breathes just when he’s prepared himself to leave. The tree at his back, knees parted, where she remains sat across from him. There’s nervousness there, not the fretful way she looks after a long night, nor the way she looked to him upon their first meetings. “Do you trust me?”

“Ja… more than anyone,” he reassures in a soft tone of voice, tipping her chin up with the tips of two fingers to further accentuate it. Her beauty and her uncertainty always strike a chord within him, a fire that never dwindles. When her eyes search his own, his breath catches.

He doesn’t say a word when she peels away the robes from the front of his trousers. Her hands linger on at the waistband for a moment, takes enough time to offer the gentlest peck to the side of his neck before continuing. It’s another first, being exposed to a woman like this when she lowers the band and has him shimmy backward to free his cock from his pants. Soft with shame or embarrassment, a concoction of other things he could not name, but the moment she looks up at him with pure delight he feels himself grow stiff.

“Wow… You’ve got a perfect cock,” she assesses with a laugh, finger running up the length of it as it twitches to life under her touch.

Scheisse.

He strokes her cheek with reverence as she bends down before him, watching him carefully through her eyelashes. Her warm breath drifts over his manhood and he’s already horribly aware that this would not last long. Another lesson, like the kisses, maybe. She could mold him any way that she likes and he would be pleased to play the role of her Adam.

The tongue isn’t what he anticipated. She flattens it against the tip, breathes a laugh when a keening whine is pulled from his throat. To see such an ugly, vulgar thing pressed to the beautiful mouth he’s kissed a dozen times now. It feels wrong. There’s no hesitation when her lips wrap around him. And then all of it— everything is just right. Every moment spent in this hazy, loving glow with her is right. If Hell were to come from this, then let it.

He can’t tear his eyes away from her, can’t bring himself to speak when he feels the way his cock hits the back of her throat, feels her swallow around him and make such a pleased noise as she wraps her fingers around the expanse she can not take.

Its pitiful, the way he must look: mouth agape, eyes lidded and heavy… He brings a hand to her hair, and runs his fingers through it as if she isn’t letting him fuck her mouth, but rather in the midst of something far holier, softer. Sacrilegious or divine. If God we’re watching, let him.

She pulls back a little, an obscene, wet sound in answer when her mouth is drawn back enough to merely press a kiss the tip, puffy lips glossy with drool. “Is this okay…? Not too much?”

“You are so pretty… it feels… just keep going.” His voice no longer possesses any feigned confidence, it begs like a wounded thing, chanting, “Bitte. Please…”

His hips tilt up when she parts her lips again, all trepidation be damned. This is something, something he’s aches for and never had the chance to feel. All of the ache, the longing to be diminished, to unite with the angel who fled Heaven for him. The cock pushes at her open mouth, smears thick beads of precum over her cheek, before she takes him in again with a delighted, muffled sound. Her soft mouth, the tongue that thoroughly laps at his shaft and follows her movements to wrap and suck at the head. Otherworldly, and… unfathomably bittersweet.

Her lips suction around him, the movements of her wrist only increasing, and with the second roll of his hips he feels his stomach begin to tense as pure heat rolls its way through him. A gentle coursing becomes a blinding inferno in mere seconds, and regrettably, instinctively, that hand so gently combing through her hair comes to snare it instead and force her down further.

His soft grunts and low pleading morph to something choked and almost agonized. It’s the purest rapture, a pleasure so absolute his eyes prick as he bows lower to cover over her as she swallows his devotion by mouth. The angel pants breathlessly when she pulls away with saliva and semen still stringing them together, cleansed by his thumb tracing over her lips, replaced so swiftly by his own mouth. The kiss is so chaste it feels misplaced here, but she nuzzles against him in this comedown from ecstasy, doesn’t even chastise how he lasted a mere two minutes.

And he vows, vows in the sweetness of her comfort and love that no one else will ever have this again.

— — —

Abstaining from meals during a fast is a struggle in and of itself; abstaining from her is some long-forgotten circle of Hell.

It’s not avoidance, but a necessity.

To think that his first sexual encounter would provoke days of concern, a wistful daydream about a future he never would have thought to have had otherwise. There was a desperate, starving desire to repent when he first arrived home after that, but nothing that a bottle of communion wine and a cold shower could not wash away. Repentance has lost its merit to him.

And after seven days, he’s perfectly aware of what he must do. To absolve them both from things where atonement seems far from a necessity at all. He folds his holy robes and leaves them on the bed in the room too small, set neatly next to his Bible. The rosary was the one thing that König could not bear to part with. The beads, red and shimmery, were chosen and strung together with him in mind. It’s slipped into the pocket of his jeans after the plain, black t-shirt is pulled over his head.

There’s a hammer in his gloved hand, and he doesn’t recall where he found it. Lying with its head rusted in the churchyard, perhaps half buried beneath the soil. Some of the other clergymen are talented at fixing things, but König’s never been very good with that. His first rosary was broken with a careless slip of his fingers, and he’s shattered more porcelain than he could count on accident.

Even communion wine can be a bit too strong, sometimes. Or maybe that’s only when the bottle’s been entirely downed. He’ll blame one of his betters when the stock is counted and one turns up missing, if they bother to come seek him out again at all.

The motel is dead at this hour, so late into the night. The few normal visitors have already been accounted for with watchful eyes, and the angel waits in one of the rooms on the second floor. He imagines the laces on her lingerie, the healing bruises on her throat, and that sweet expression upon her face. Or maybe that one was reserved solely for him. He prayed… no, he hoped so.

After tonight, there would be no more mercies for him. Or perhaps there would be an abundance, blessings from the vultures and the wolves and the maggots he would feed. New gods that were still far lesser than the angel who suffers men in sheets, but only looks to him with love.

And he doesn’t have to wait long, because the demon finds his way here with haste. Does he come here every night looking as proud as he does now? His attire even resonates with death, black with those white details, a costume that seems so fitting for one about to meet the very face he wears.

Killing someone isn’t so easy. Cain murdered his brother with a rock, described in such loose detail that one would think a playful throw led to Abel’s end. But it’s not so, not when the victim is hellbent on living.

The demon is smaller, but strong. He’s been in situations like this before, doesn’t have to spit the words to tell König so. They’re felt with each blow, with the sharp edge of the knife this bastard manages to dig into his side. Just barely, before it’s jerked out of his hand and thrown several paces away. The skittering across the tarmac is enough to chant doom.

There’s blood. More with the first strike of the hammer. It seemed so much easier in thought rather than practice. In his imaginings, the head would split with the first fall like an overripe apple, crumple in and the breath would leave the demon in an instant. Instead, it’s dozens. Blow after blow while the smaller man struggles below him.

A strange catharsis comes over him when his soul grows murky, when his hands are slick and the struggle comes to an abrupt end. The sobering only comes when he’s spent an hour driving down the most forested roads to find a place to dump the body. There’s no tact to it, laying a man to rest in shrubbery and dirt. With a head so collapsed it’s hard to think of this as a man at all. A corpse, something no longer simply human.

König does not pray for him when he rests the hammer in the deceased’s hands. Does not offer it more than a passing thought when he peels away back toward home. The deed is done and he’s free of those horrid burdens tainting his heart, keeping him held back on a short leash to divinity.

Like fate, she’s found out in the garden again after the bloodied shirt and stained gloves are discarded. The wound is patched with what he could find available, a hastily tied strip of gauze covers his side. A week or so at best until the gash would heal into an ugly, jagged scar. It seemed even a bastard devil’s blade couldn't be sharp enough to fell a Goliath when he’s caught by surprise and horny.

He feigns merely emptying the garbage into an outside bin, plays off the sting of the gash with a humble, lumbering gait. She beams up at him through lines of tears running down the sides of her face like small, silver streams beneath the darkened sky above.

He’s not a saint anymore, no… a guardian angel. The archangel Michael with his sword set ablaze and divinity scrawled into every scale of his chest plate. Something holy and glowing, unsullied and beautiful.

Like her.

“You’re crying…”

“Sorry… bad night. Client just ghosted me.”

No. This was good, couldn’t she see that? All the sleepless nights, the prayer and the constant, overwhelming longing. Everything he had suffered for her, and still she only comes to him with the thought of that horrible thing in mind.

“He’s dead.” Maybe it was just the fear of a loss of money. He had enough saved up someplace, and the collection pool would be beneficial enough to pivot them towards a new life. No church. No lonely motel. He had to test it, give her a trial and hope that she did not simply break.

The look that crosses her face is one of confusion… Then comes a strange twist of relief. Her mouth falls slightly agape and her arms squeeze slightly around his middle.

“We just spoke a few hours ago. How…?” Finally, suspicion.

Maybe he’s too drunk on playing God now to care, to realize this isn’t how a good man would have handled things. The only thing that holds any weight, that resonated with him any at all is the thought that he loves her, that he will protect her until his dying breath, pray at her feet and anything else she might ask.

That’s what pulls him to press her down against the bed of the truck, to kiss her with every lesson she’s blessed him with in mind. Tongue and teeth, fire and spit, she accepts all of it. She doesn’t beg him for an answer: she’s seen the worst of men, taken cocks far less deserving. Her hands find his hair as they drift away here, gives the strands a sharp tug to usher him closer, roll her tongue against his own.

The sheer tights she wears beneath her skirt are ripped at the seam between her legs by large hands, panties pushed to the side before she finally presses against the broad chest against her to gain some space. Her breath is shallow, face warmed and hair a mess, still the loveliest thing he’s ever laid his eyes upon.

“Are you afraid?” He tilts his head to the side, curious, as if there were no reason for her deny him of this now after he had just *killed for her*. After he forsook what once was all he knew all for her. He would do it again without question, with no gain at all, but the sting of rejection was not something he could entirely choke back.

But his angel never runs out of mercies, it seems.

“No… just give me a second.”

She slips her hand down between her parted legs, demonstrates for him just how to prepare a woman. He watches, mesmerized, as she circles the bud above her slit, dips her finger downward to spread wetness along her flesh. Dew over petals. A finger slips inside of her, and all at once is shoved aside.

“Let me,” he pleads, already pressing both hands to her inner thighs, tilting her hips upward as his head sinks between them.

“You don’t have to,” she whispers, but grants him his wish with feverish nods that betray her words, allows him to kiss her sex as he shifts himself into a better position.

There’s nothing to go off of but her sounds, the cries of pleasure when his tongue lolls out to lick at the nub where most of her reactions stem from. He mutters against her about her taste, something so ethereal he could not even begin to place. Her scent envelopes him in full, and he’s never felt closer to anything prior. She allows his clumsy licking, moans louder for him when he can’t stifle his own groaning. The pants are too tight around him, and patience is another virtue he finds that he lacks.

She doesn’t reach some fantastical height of pleasure when he presses a finger into her cunt, but her body seems to fit even that like a glove, squeezing around him as he lazily circles her bud with his tongue. She doesn’t come, but she tugs him by the hair to usher him back into another kiss, hands roving down his abdomen to free his manhood from the barriers of fabric. And finally… finally he’s granted entrance to Heaven.

The first thrust leaves him spiraling, lost into a world of silk and honey. And the angel does not give him any time to recover, she writhes beneath him, shifting her hips to pull him in deeper, muffles each whine and groan from his lips with her tongue hungrily lapping over his own.

He’s thought about having a woman many times, but never imagined it could feel this good. To be so complete, every woe or fear cast aside in the act of mindless pleasure.

He doesn’t know where to put his hands, to keep his eyes shut or gaze down at her and cease this assault on his mouth to tell her that he loves her, that she feels like pure fucking paradise and he’s already on the verge of coming undone. He settles for moving, dragging himself in and out of her in slow movements, turning his face away to bite down on her shoulder when the feeling of her walls cinching him like a vise threatens to spur him into finishing on the spot.

“That’s just… god… you’re good at this,” she gasps when a hand is sunk between their bodies, flicking at her clit as he spears her open. Her hands find his back, raking her fingernails down past his shoulder blades. It’s agonizing, trying to fight back the urge to breed her full, watch his come spill out from her perfect cunt until he finds himself hard again. The very thought makes him gasp, grind himself deeper inside of her as her nails dig into his back.

“Mein… this is… you understand…,” he’s babbling, hardly coherent, and she only seems to accept it. The angel chants her agreement amidst the beginning of her rapture.

She cries out for him when she comes, her sex pulsing around him as she shivers that all restraint is immediately lost. She hugs him so tightly, squirms as she hisses a curse into his ear.

It’s a miracle he’s even lasted this long. He halts his pace for a mere second to prop himself up, gaze down at her in absolute reverence before that fire swallows him whole. It’s unceremonious when he comes: a growl and a wail as he buries he face into her neck and pumps every last drop of his seed into her pussy.

He doesn’t want to pull out, doesn’t want to leave such a complete embrace. The world has already ended for him, a long time ago on the very night they met. There’s no need to drag out their ruin with whatever else occurs when she’s out of his grasp.

She strokes over the marks she’s made, gentle, tickling touches of her fingertips and shy giggles when their eyes meet again.

“I thought I would never get to do this with you,” she admits, quiet when her hands drift to cup his jaw instead. “You’re perfect, you know that…?”

He wants to cry, wants to fuck all of his woes away, kneel before her and beg that she find a place where they can never be apart. Steal her away to some cabin up in the Alps, where flowers grow in thick patches on the hillsides, a wild garden of her very own.

“… You should stay with me,” he huffs into her ear, fingers dimpling the flesh of her hips as he tries desperately to force himself closer to her.

“You can’t mean the church,” she giggles. “So where should we go?”

“We can figure that out in the morning, hm?”