#AND that you've done worse

[its-okay-youre-adorable]

A mantra of mine is "not the stupidest thing I've done" and it covers basically every stupid thing I'll ever do. At this point I'm not even sure what the stupidest thing I've done is, I just know that whatever I'm about to do does not compare.

Well put. (Source: Writing About Writing Facebook page)

[crystallizsch]

HMMMMM more crumbs of this

nobody asked for a follow-up of this love triangle drama except for ME and like. at least 3 other people --

[furiousgoldfish]

Abusive parents will go 'Oh yeah? Well I had it worse! My parents were bad!' and it's like, Oh? We can acknowledge that your parents were bad? You can say that? You can say they treated you very badly? You know this and are aware of this?

And yet, when raising your own child, you used their methods and decided that you are the victim here? That it's okay because they've done it 'worse'? You're comfortable telling your children that they're paying for however you've been treated, and that you specifically had your children to expose them to all of the bad things that happened to you? The world feels fair to you if your own children are suffering? That's where you take your power?

Your parents were bad and you know this, so you went ahead and became a bad parent on purpose, and you're thinking you're the victim in all this?

[iamfuckingsorry]

"Do you know where we are going next?" I asked ART.

Y'know what, I think maybe I don't need any more Murderbot books. I think maybe ending things here is fucking perfect and as much as I love Wells's writing I'm genuinely not sure it can get better for me.

Like, so much of the books are about MB learning how to be a person, about becoming okay with being a complete individual with everything it entails. The first thing it does once it's actually allowed to decide on its own is it runs away from it all (admittedly to go on a mission to confirm some things about its past, because it genuinely just wants to be *good*). It shoves all its emotions away as much as it's able to. Then shit happens, and it makes its first friends, makes decisions based on these friendships, goes through a lot of emotionally intense situations...

And we get to this point here. MB having zero doubts about going with ART says a lot about its relationship with ART, but it also says a lot about its relationship with its humans - it knows that wherever it goes, when it comes back, the humans will still be there. Its humans actively acknowledge its struggles with being a now-free SecUnit and MB is willing to entertain the discussions to an extent and share information about its deeply personal experiences. Hell, System Collapse ends with MB admitting it might be somewhat broken, but that's okay as long as it can keep doing its job, and agreeing to basically do counselling - this is the guy what would rewatch its favourite TV show again and again in order to avoid acknowledging it even had Emotions a couple books back.

Reading this, I know that MB will be okay. It has hopes and goals and genuinely believes in itself and it has an amazing support system that its willing to lean on for the first time in its life. I'm convinced it'll go on to do great things with ART. And that's really the only thing I need to know.

[my-mom-named-me-duck]

hehehe I'm a horrible person

[hexcrystals]

our flag means death + reductress headlines 19/?

[beauregardlionett]

there's something so loud about the widofjord and dorym parallels and i think i'm simply going to perish about it

[sweetpea-sprite]

wait the wizard king is evil in dotdd??

hi anon. i've been putting off answering this ask for over a week. you know this. the thing about this ask is that i know. i KNOW. that if i answer this it will restart the cycle (lol) of me thinking about dotdd's wizard king and NOT STOPPING THINKING ABOUT IT for weeks if not months. i also think i've answered this before so technically i don't have to do this to myself but we all know i'm gonnaANGEL JUST DMED ME WITH A FIC SNIPPET ABOUT THIS VERY FUCKING THING. YOU'RE ALL TRYING TO DRASG ME BAVK IN I CAN'T FUCKING DO THIS AGAINNNNNN YOU CAN'T DO THIS TO ME I THOUGHT I WAS FREE!!!!!!!!!!!!! I THOUGHT I WAS FREE

just kidding i am never free ^-^ dotdd true ending spoilers under the cut

i don't even know where to start. like. i don't know. al-khemi's half human and his mother fucked a 10 story tall genie who can make buildings using alchemy?

that's the core concept of dotdd's postgame. is alchemising a building - moya tower - so that you can go to the top floor and defeat the evil wizard king. the wizard king who is evil. the wizard king who wants to be a god. the tower is 100 floors high; you get the key for the top floor from horace's final quest, where he reveals that he climbed the tower himself and tried to fight the wizard king, but was ultimately killed in battle. "ok ruby this all sounds cool but relatively normal in reference to wotww" WRONG! POPULAR FAN THEORY SAYS HORACE HAD A HUSBAND

("popular fan theory" means i came up with it because for a long long time i was the only english-speaking dotdd fan i knew and also separately i later discovered japanese fans came up with it so i'm basically correct and beautiful all the time always. anyway)

before we get into the miragapo trenches i do want to mention the evil shit the wizard king got up to here, most notably the fact that the three stone guardians are evil for real now, except cerboreas who turns out is just A DOG THAT THE WIZARD KING STOLE FROM A LITTLE KID. LIKE HE WAS A REALLY GOOD GUARD DOG SO HE JUST TOOK HIM. AND THE KID WENT INTO THE GLITTERING GROTTO TO FIND HIM AND GOT LOST AND DIED IN THERE. cerboreas's original name was grey. by the way. if you even care. also crossbones is a capitalist.? anyway

in dotdd there is a coliseum that is completely and entirely different to the solosseum in wotww. it's situated in del mokahl, a casino town (also unique to dotdd) and is sponsored by a man named giovanni gappolino, also known as the casino king. during the coliseum, you fight - alongside other opponents - nicky, your rival who is just deeply obsessed with oliver in a really. he's gay. so the prize for the coliseum ends up being a ticket to the next division of the coliseum, one where you fight all the great sages + solomon and umbopa + nicky as a fun surprise round where he tells you that mr gappolino is his dad and implies he's neglectful AFTER you beat him to a pulp just so you feel bad + finally giovanni gappolino himself.

after THIS division khulan comes out and reveals that giovanni is actually a sage who has been around since the wizard king was sealed by a deity. he has been masquerading as a rich man playing with his toys when in reality he has been desperately searching for someone strong enough to take down the wizard king for real this time, by running the coliseum and waiting for someone to get through it all.

we are not given a reason for why he is doing this. this is an appropriate time to mention horace's "friend".

when you meet horace in hamelin (notably, the town directly after meeting him in del mokahl; also notably, in del mokahl he gets especially frustrated about not having all his memories back and he and oliver get into a small fight about it) he's very excited because he remembers that he had a friend! and they went up a tower together! and they were besties! "an amazing, dependable, wonderful friend!" that's what he says! sounding a bit gay there horologium.

anyway. you can see the pieces slot into place. horace and giovanni climbed the tower together. they got to the top. they confronted the wizard king. he was sealed. giovanni made it back. horace did not. at some point during this whole process they probably explored each other's bodies. hopefully not after the death ! and then giovanni spent a thousand years trying to find someone who could avenge him.

they drive me fucking nuts and they're based on a theory that isn't even canon. do you understand what miragapo does to me. are you kidding? guy who has been trying to avenge his dead husband for a thousand years? AND he's a neglectful father? COME ON

...so that's the miragapo side of things. um. you asked about the wizard king. sorry you now know about the miragapo agenda

SO. you climb to the top of moya tower. you use the key that horace gave you. you get to the top.

it looks cool as hell. you walk forward to confront the wizard king, and mornstar, in oliver's hand, reacts to the presence of astra, in the wizard king's hand. you fight. his attacks follow a very specific pattern. when you whittle his health down, he gets a second phase where his attacks turn more unpredictable. also, he looks cool as hell

you defeat him. you go through the victory screen and discover that it's just oliver, no drippy esther or swaine, with the wizard king. and it gets horrifying and fun.

the wizard king gives oliver astra and teaches him how to use the spell, remarking that he won't be needing it anymore. oliver furrows his brow. and asks why he wanted to become a god. and he responds:

"hmm. i forgot. why did i want to rail against the heavens? i wish i knew. i've forgotten all of those things... it must be the fault of that... throne. or else... heh heh... perhaps it was you who caused me to forget...?"

he turns to oliver and starts to fade away, as all the other ghosts in the game have done. and he says to oliver - who still holds astra: "here... is where our shadows went. in order to figure out the mysteries of magic, for all curious wizards... i'm sure that will come in handy as you try to surmount the final hurdle."

"and so... you have become a fountain overflowing with power, you foolish young man."

and then he fades. and oliver's friends come back. and they celebrate the defeat of the wizard king, and oliver's new wand. and as they turn to head back down the tower, the scene lingers on oliver's laugh for a moment - and then pans up to the empty throne, with the giant eye above it looking directly at oliver. and then the credits roll.

this is what drives me fucking insane. in both wotww and dotdd, oliver has both wands; by all means, he should be the new wizard king. in wotww you don't really think about it too hard because the wizard king is a good guy, so oliver will end up like him; in dotdd it MAKES you think about it too hard because OLIVER WILL END UP LIKE HIM.

oliver's fate at the end of dotdd is unknown, but it's constantly said that he has a choice, and it's constantly implied that he will choose badly. there's more evidence for this throughout the game as well, a bunch of small things that seem innocent enough but kill you if you know what they're referring to. there's a fortune teller in hamelin who tries to read oliver's fortune and comes up confused because she can't, and remarks she's "never gazed into the future of one of his ilk". there's a skeleton in coconanda who wishes for oliver to live for a thousand years or more. by far the most prominent of these comes from nicky in the coliseum, who at one point asks oliver, "we have both hope and hopelessness waiting for us, don't we? which one do you want to hold onto, oliver?". hell, the ENTIRE COLISEUM you are competing for PANDORA'S BOX. THAT'S WHAT THE PRIZE IS. AND OLIVER OPENS IT AT THE END and gets a mandragorer out of it BUT THE POINT IS THAT IT'S PANDORA'S BOX!!!!!! THE BOX THAT CONTAINS ALL THE HOPE AND HOPELESSNESS OF THE WORLD. YOU KNOW PANDORA'S BOX. and if you've played wotww's own postgame you will know that the conductor very specifically calls out oliver's curiosity as a large trait of his. if you know anything about the myth of pandora's box you will know that she opened it because she was MADE TO BE CURIOUS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

however. you won't believe this but there's more. the most damning piece of evidence we have for this outside of the wizard king himself is actually the only thing we have officially translated, because it's in the wizard's companion - both of them! it made it to wotww's companion, so they translated it! on page 282-283 of wotww's companion, there is an illustration depicting the wizard king.

this is actually depicting dotdd's wizard king; at the end (read the story starting top left, then circle back around) you can see the wizard king attempting to get into heaven using a ladder, but being pushed out, followed by the moya eye and him sitting on the throne. you can also see that the magic he's putting out in the middle... isn't exactly friendly. in any case - there is nazcaan around the edges! it reads:

On the first day a wand will be held aloft; On the second day lightning will arc; On the third day a storm will rage; On the fourth day the earth will be rent asunder; On the fifth day a great wave will crash; On the sixth day flames will dance; On the seventh day a blizzard will howl; And on the eighth day a new king will bring the light; And the world shall kneel before him.

first of all: earlier i mentioned the wizard king's first phase in dotdd follows a specific pattern. this is the pattern! he follows this prophecy! he repeats this pattern over and over! it's really neat.

second of all holy fucking shit it's a cycle and he repeats it over and over.

the prophecy loops perfectly. the wizard king gives astra to oliver and effectively crowns him the new king. it's a LOOP!!!!!!!!!! the ouroboros (or oroboros. lol) consumes its own tail. oliver is prophecised to be the next wizard king and absolutely 100% it is not guaranteed that he will be evil. it is not guaranteed that he will fall to hopelessness. but HOLY SHIT it looks like that's what's going to happen.

and to loop back around to miragapo and nicky. because they're everything to me. i didn't even go off on a long tangent about nicky this post! i just mentioned him briefly! are you all proud of me. too bad i'm about to break it. the miragapo nickiver parallels... augh. what would you do if you found a kid to avenge your dead husband after a thousand years and he manages it only to then go on to become what you were trying to beat. AND your kid is in love with him and is the only one able to stand up to him. like what do you do in that situation. because truly i believe nicky wouldn't let oliver do that without a fight. they have a whole entire coliseum-based arc about which of them is going to be the one to defeat the wizard king. you think oliver's gonna BECOME the next wizard king and nicky's gonna take that LYING DOWN? NO. this is why nickiver does cocomelon shit to me

anyway. toooooo answer your question. yeah he is. ...and so is oliver, probably.

...i do really think we look over the "al-khemi is half human and his mother fucked a frankly too big genie" thing too often it's just that the rest of it is so Like That that you truly just forget

[pkmoth]

having swap au thoughts. *slaps roof of claus* there's so much mental illness in this guy. im gonna blow up everyone in the room and then myself

[front-facing-pokemon]

[kakusu-shipping]

Teruteru's tag gets significantly shorter once you block all the RP Blogs and the Incorrect quotes and the submission blog who's only Teruteru posts are how much anons hate him and people who draw Teruteru "redesigns" where the only change is he's thin

[ourladyoftheflytrap]

My mom always complaining about how I never spend time with her.... ma'am the last time we had a serious conversation you told me you thought i was making traumatic memories of my childhood up just to demonize you

[yoldels]

Finished the Sdr 2 playthrough a few days ago, btw

[lurkiestvoid]

On January first twenty-twenty five I got so distracted (writing)(worth it) sitting in my car I accidentally left my headlights on for two hours and killed my battery.

This is normal life fuckery for me anyway so I chill. A parking lot rando offers to run home and come back and jump me, I have cables. Cool.

Rando does not return. Cool. Still chillin.

I have two three cousins in reasonable distance, the closer one responds first and isn't busy so he throws his kiddos in the truck and comes and hooks us up and I get to chill in his warm cabin with him and his kids while we wait for my battery to revive.

My other cousin. The cousin I grew up with. And her husband my "big bro". Have verbed my name (lovingly, tolerably) into meaning 'a ridiculous situation and/or Broken thing, often after being touched by [my name]' because my luck is so hilariously, expensively bad the only thing I can do is fucking laugh about it.

My name irl is rather long, like lurkiestvoid, but my nickname is much shorter, let's say Lurk (shit I might have just figured out my nb name)

Anyways i had texted Beloved Cousins #1, 2, & 3 "breaking news i lurked something up"

Eventually #3 (Big Bro) replied while we were charging, they were making dinner, what's up? I told him no worries, I wanted a jump but Cousin #1 was on it, thanks anyways!

3: oh shit you could have called

Me: oh it was no emergency or anything it's cool

Me: I was just chillin but I left my headlights on and killed the battery so im still just ... chillin

Me: I lurked it up. y'know (at the same time as 3: you lurked yourself already jfc)

3/Me: 💀

Later, #2 got back to me much later with her apologies.

2: I'm so sorry I was making dinner but 3 told me what happened and girl it is the FIRST DAY 💀

this is just who I am as a person and I accept this. I fought it so long but I can't anymore I just am that clumsy unlucky comedy relief mucking about in the scenery and breaking props. not main character energy but some weird sideways kind of pathetic energy, like a wet squishfaced cat slowly sliding-falling helplessly down some really twisty Escher stairs in the background of some dadaist tapestry about something else entirely. It took decades but im finally okay with my role in the universe. Radical acceptance 2k25 lets go

[keliguess-is-here]

That one mf going "[person here] is problematic!!!!!" when they've done way worse is actually wild

[immoralimmortals]

A Song With Ten Names

Chapter 15: Misanthrapologist (2)

Chapter 1 ☆ Next chapter ☆ AO3 ☆ Featured song playlist

Summary of chapter: Hidan doesn't know how to say "I love you." What he knows instead is how to savor something that hurts.

Author's Note: *WEE-WOO-WEE-WOO, SIREN SOUNDS*

CONTENT WARNING: This is a chapter very much about the intersection of mental illness, self harm, and having triggers for self harming. There is also knife play. From this point on, any chapter with the title Misanthrapologist may involve said knife play. Whats more, the knife play while consensual is not safe. I am perfectly okay if you skip anything that is uncomfortable for you.

The performer also has absolutely no idea he is immortal, the exact depths to which he can carry out what he preaches. It may be intense compared to prior interactions between her and Hidan.

The song for this chapter is Misanthrapologist by Will Wood.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

So call me Amadeus

God made me famous 'cause I am his favorite

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

Kisame did, indeed, touch Hidan’s fucking room. After such heartfelt welcoming, the performer is already trying to take the reaper backwards by the arm, beseeching him to calm down. “Hey, hey, it’s okay!” she pleads, watching the way he grits his teeth and raises his fist. “You can make a new one!”

“I shouldn’t NEED TO!”

Kisame pinches the bridge of his nose. “Hidan, it was literal, rotting blood stains on the floor. It was starting to reek.”

“Fuck you???" is all he has to say to that. Damn heathen. "Fuck you!”

The woman exhales, long and exasperated. Surely there is something else they can focus on? They only just started, this adventure all together. It’s like a dollhouse, all of her friends (“friends”? they're kind of forced to be nice to her) together, but they still are all fairly willing and capable of killing one another. Joy.

“Hidan, why don’t we go for a walk—?”

“Takara—” Wait. She is pretty sure he’s never said her name before. Huh. That’s...huh. This is a weird time for that sentimental tidbit of information. “—I have spent so many. Damn. Hours. And hours. And hours. Walking.” Oh thank Jashin, the lady thinks, he’s starting to think of something besides the missing ritual circle on his decrepit bedroom floor. Maybe she can use that to her advantage, to make peace.

“Then what would you like to do, now that you’re back?” she offers helpfully.

“Pray.”

“Okay, we can—”

“On my intricately drawn holy sigil for Lord Jashin that SOMEONE thought was freaking dirty!”

The blue man has his arms folded, frowning with squinted, exhausted eyes. She couldn’t have been discovered in this world by someone else? Anyone else? Maybe became friends with a wild dog or a swarm of angry bees? That’d be easier to handle than Hidan, of all people in their universe.

“Think of it this way,” the prophet’s one and only ally optimistically suggests, “You can teach me how to do it this time!”

Oh dear gods above. Kisame raises a lone index finger. “Takara, I have to say that I don’t think that’s very wise of you—”

“Wise my ass, that’s actually a decent idea!” Oh, there’s that horrible smile of his. It’s a real talent for something besides bloodshed to get him to grin, so Kisame is caught off guard by the easily shifting enthusiasm.

...Does his own bloodshed count, though?

Almost like they’ve known each other for years, the best and the worst disciple of Jashin swing their palms toward one another’s in excitement, clenching to make a deal. It doesn’t take very long for the pious man's free hand to begin to wave the shark away like he’s no more than a fly. “Now if you excuse us…do ya mind?”

Yeah, Kisame does a little, certainly when the only civilian in the house will be left alone with arguably the single most unhinged mass murderer on the planet. ...Okay, the swordsman of the Mist isn’t much better, but at least he hasn’t entirely lost his mind. Not like Hidan has. And so a wary guard looks to his ward for her consent. She looks back, bright yet soft, and flickers an innocent smile. She nods her consent to be left be.

“...Yell if you need me,” Kisame makes her promise, but she just closes her eyes, just like a cat does when it trusts you.

“We’ll be okay.”

On Hidan’s head remaining on his shoulders, she damn well better be, Kisame thinks as he reluctantly steps out and closes the sacrificial altar's front door.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

But I can hate myself

So you don't have to

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

The silver demon knows better than anyone that this woman is not as innocent as she pretends to be. No such thing as people on the moon, there's never been people in space. It's all as ridiculous as the way she dresses, all the pastel and floral and pink. For whatever reason, one he's not ascertained yet, the stranger wraps all things macabre and dark in a big frilly bow, like she sewed her heart inside a teddy bear. It's so distracting...so is it to protect herself? Eh...that doesn't really make sense to him, but that's his best guess, and honestly, it's not that far off. A scholar at heart, it isn’t like she’s shoved cotton in her ears whenever he speaks of his religion, not like her questions mean nothing at all. A sociologist: that’s the word she told him before. Everyone has their reasons, and she lives to know. That is how she can watch on with interest as the two sit across each other, finally, again after so much time. The familiarity is like a warm blanket on Hidan’s soul, the way they both sit cross-legged as she listens.

No one else listens like she can.

“So, might remember, might not, here’s a refresher for ya,” he begins, shifting one leg up so he can lean on his knee. “Circle’s important part of the prayer. Remember why?”

The performer bites the inside of her lip. She doesn’t know how to read the cheat sheet he gave in a handwritten bible, so she needs to go off of memory. “It...unifies and amplifies,” she recalls with his same choice of words from a month-so before. “It is not strictly necessary for prayer, but to always go without is like walking outside without shoes.”

“Bingo!” ...Wait, do they have fucking bingo—? “But,” he drawls out the syllable to give her time to think, “There’s somethin’ important you forgot.” She chirps up with a small “oh!”

“The...the blood represents dedication. The...precision of the circle being made of...your...ah...own...flesh?” She pauses to gauge his approval or lack there of, to which he glances diagonally at the ceiling and waivers his hand with a hum. It’s close enough. “Flesh is demonstrative of your focus and sacrifice.” Hidan hums again, this time longer and more satisfied with an upward tilt of his chin.

“You got it, you got it.” This is a side of him that no one else gets to see. No one else gives him the time of day, listens to his sermons, even attempts to understand what he’s trying to say. And so, no one else but her will be able to see him like this: unagitated and engaged. “And once the circle is drawn?”

He reaches into the inside of his black cloak while she tries to pluck an answer from her brain.

“You…” There’s no recollection of something more specific, and so she answers in a way that feels too plain, too simple. “...Pray?”

“Mm.” The man nods, and a kunai is gripped in his hand.

And abruptly, she is not doing so great.

“Eh?”

His eyes widen ever so slightly at hers going into saucers. The woman is pale, in an instant she is sick to her stomach. He raises a brow. Their first meeting was a doozy for her, yeah, but their conversations about his religion never turned up this way since, no matter how much he talked about the worst of things. What’s up now?

“Are ya...okay?”

She is not. She most definitely is not. But she should be. She should be. And so she must answer in the affirmative. “Yeah, I’m— I’m fine.” It’s not a lie if she should be fine. It’s just a knife. But Hidan has no idea that the problem is that there is a knife.

“Well, if you say so…” he mumbles, casually bringing the blade towards his palm, ready to get started as she had so requested to see. Audibly, though, she flinches; a whimper comes as her shoulders tense inward like she might be able to fold herself tighter in place, less able to move.

Hidan’s eyes narrow, and it is only coincidental that the kunai in his hand lowers away from his skin. “Hold on...you aren’t squeamish, are ya?”

“No, no—” That is actually true, at least usually.

“Then the hell is the matter?”

“Nothing—”

“Fuckin’ liar,” he rolls his eyes. “Listen, you asked to learn and now we’re learning! If you’re a wuss about blood, might as well tell me now.” He tilts his head. “Might make it a bit easier, yeah?”

“I’m not! I’m…” Her eyes are glued on the glinting metal; it eats her words up. “...Sorry.” She's escalating a lot faster than he anticipated, Hidan can see the panic on her face.

“Takara, can you just—”

“Sorry!"

Shamefully, she must take her leave. The woman stands up, and her hands grip each other for her dear life. She’s a bad friend. “Sorry. Sorry.”

“Takara—”

The door closes again, and he is alone. Hidan exhales. His hand raises the blood-drawer again. Might as well get it done since he’s already started.

“...Goddammit.”

Slash.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

'Cause I like you, don't you see?

I just like you a little more than me

I, I like you, don't you see?

Oh, hеy, I just like you a little more than me

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

Busy work keeps from idle hands, idle hands can be kept from dumb mistakes. The running water breathes its voice into her ears, and she tries to meditate on it alongside the motions involved in doing dishes. Shaky fingers grab one plate, scrub in a circle, set it down. Another plate, scrub in a circle, set it down. Spoon, accidentally do that thing where you put aim the faucet right onto the curved end so it splashes everywhere, set it down. Kitchen knife—

“Heh—!”

A cling of metal and a gasp occur at once, briefly interrupting the stream of sound from the small waterfall. It continues as ever, running the clear liquid over the innocuous little tool, making the silver seem even brighter and therefore sharper under its ever-changing shapes. Something so ordinary can intimidate her so much and it’s pathetic. Here she thought she was doing better. The performer frowns. Wasn't she improving? She hadn’t thought of it once since the water took her away from the old world.

A shadow drops over her shoulder, a pursed lip and a bored expression a great contrast to her own face as the traveler whips her head back to look. Purple irises slide over the way she’s raised her hands, the way they’re making sure they’re far away from so much as thinking about getting cut. Apologies begin to stammer again, to which Hidan only rubs his temple and interrupts like she's saying nothing at all.

“...You have a damn phobia,” he surmises. “That’s the word for this, right?” He makes the mistake of assuming that this is why she was afraid to kill with his scythe instead of normal civilian common sense. Either way, she shakes her head, bashful.

“I...well...only...kinda.” In full, aware control, she lowers her arms to her sides, slowly shuts off the sink, and gradually turns around. “I used to be more afraid, all the time. Now it’s only...sometimes.”

One eye squints with a questioning grumble. “Sometimes?”

“Only sometimes,” she repeats. Even when she walks past him and leaves the kitchen, Hidan trails behind. He’s a hard man to satisfy, in terms of curiosity.

“So like. Somethin’ triggers it?" he asks the back of her head, "Not just if you see a weapon?”

“Oh yeah.” The further she gets away from the sharp edge, the easier it is to talk, the more she expresses herself freely. “Usually it's when I’m not doing so great.”

The tea room will do, she decides, making a turn into the little nook where Kisame and Itachi once sat frozen for a whole day. She takes the south-facing loveseat, sitting horizontally across it so her feet are on the cushion. Hidan does the same, taking the northern chair and resting one leg on top while the other dangles off.

“...Are ya not doin’ so great now?” he presses. She’s quick to assuage him of his secret fears, that he is not enough after all, by shaking her head.

“Things are...pretty good, honestly?” Her gaze moves off of him to glance sideways at the window behind her seat and Hidan's only friend makes a list of things that are better with him around. “I got people who care about me...I don’t have to worry about being safe...or if I get enough sleep before work...or when the rent is due…” The more the woman goes on, the more clear it is to Hidan that this isn’t comparison to times when they had lived together before; it’s even further beyond.

“Do ya have a point?” he presses, getting she means something to bring all this up.

Her chest visibly rises and falls with full and heavy lungs. He can hear her breath even from over the coffee table between them.

“...Keep a secret for me?”

“Eh?” He blinks several times, but the answer is obvious, regardless of what he’s getting into by saying it. “Yeah, sure, okay… What’s your big secret, girly?”

Her expression is...shockingly calm in the long pause that comes to pass. It’s an aspect of her, a piece of her that will never quite go away. You can only speak of such a thing with casualness, with humor, lest it get more power than deserved.

“You ever feel sometimes you just wanna bash your own head in?”

If she sees his jaw drop, she ignores it, still watching out the window.

“That since you can’t kill God for doing all this to you, you just wanna kill yourself so you can go up and meet him, tell him what an asshole he’s been? Maybe get your hands around his neck for doing all this?”

She has achieved the impossible: Hidan is now concerned for someone else. “...Takara, what the fuck?”

That catches her attention, and she glances back at him, measuring his reaction. He is genuinely confused; she’s only seen this face on his before the one time he caught her singing a Lemon Demon song to herself. It scares her a little; out of everyone, she thought maybe he’d be the easiest to explain it to...

“Sorry. I don’t mean to scare you.”

“You’re not—” She kind of is, but he can’t be scared of anything. “—I just don’t get it.”

...Maybe she could keep trying.

“Do you remember when you asked me if my period was chronic?” With another sputter, Hidan’s cheeks prickle till pink and he rubs the back of his head.

“Uh. Yeah? What about it? So what?” He makes a wrong guess: “Is it happening again? Yer having a fuckin’ mood swing or whatever?” She shakes her head...though he is halfway right.

“I do have something chronic,” she finally admits, something that is perhaps worth his pity after all. A fingertip knocks the middle of her forehead. “Sometimes, brains get sick just like the rest of you can. Just like any other organ. Back where I’m from, it’s pretty common—” Putting aside her belief that it’s probably common here too, just handled differently. “—So they make medicines for it.”

The woman allows silence. Hidan may not always realize something immediately, but if you give him enough time, he catches on with deadly accuracy:

“...Ya don’t have that medicine.”

“Mm-mm,” she hums in the negative, so nonchalantly about something so life-altering. “So sometimes...I think...even though things are good...the chemicals my brain produces in response to stimuli isn’t always in the right balance. It’s like my brain— I mean, my logical part— and my heart— the part that runs off of the chemicals— don’t always agree on what is really happening.”

“Ah…” he murmurs, slinking his face into a palm, elbow pointed against the arm of the couch. “That fuckin’ sucks,” he understates, though she’s not the least bit offended. Honestly, the more easygoing this conversation is, the better.

“I can’t blame it for everything, but it’s a lot of work to retrain my mind, my reflexes. So whenever I’m weird...or I apologize too much...—” I’m sorry. “—You know why.”

It’s a fascinating contradiction, he begins to see, between his philosophy and her mental illness. The death of someone doesn’t mean much to Jashin if they don’t put up a fight. Killing yourself for no reason does nothing to spread his gospel. He ponders...is this why? Is this why she listens so keenly to him? Is this why she seems to accept such harsh truths even when she’s as weak and thin-willed as a butterfly wing?

Is any thirst for blood simply reserved for her own?

On her end of the room, as the disciples mirror one another as the fishes do in the constellation Pisces, the traveler enjoys the quiet. Someone knows. It’s not something she meant as a secret, but as soon as he moved to strike himself, she realized it had been one all along. Someone knows now, someone can finally come as close to understanding it as maybe someone can.

That’s about to be her problem, turns out.

“...I got an idea.” Hidan rolls his leg off the cushion and then moves from sitting to standing. The motion in his wrist indicates she’s to follow.

“Uh...okay.”

She slinks along behind, hands behind her back rubbing one another in residual anxiety, though the emotion she feels at his mysterious proposal is closer to intrigue than fear. They walk up the creaking staircase, turn the corner, and he opens the door to his room. The smell of rot from before is gone, but the metallic aspect has returned. Her eyes widen. The ritual circle has been drawn in her absence.

“I...oh.” Is this it? Is this what he wanted her to see? After stepping inside, Hidan moves to close the door behind her. He’s so uncharacteristically wordless that it takes her a second to look to him, to see what he’s doing.

His cloak is unbuttoned and drops to the floor. Hidan has been technically shirtless all along, but it looks so different when he’s taken his coat entirely off.

“Wait.”

Wait.

Wait.

Wait.

“Hidan. Hidan, wait, what-?!”

He stops halfway in beginning to slide down his pants, looking up at her from the awkward position. “Eh? Well, guess for this first time I don’t need ‘em off…” The fabric shimmies further back up on his waist as before, not revealing anything further than the hips after all.

First time?!

“WHAT!” Her face is as red as the blood on the floor.

“Can you calm the hell down?!” Oblivious to one another’s intent, it’s only till his next words that seductive things are taken off of the table. “Don’t listen to the chemicals or...whatever.”

Her lips part to speak silence as he shoves the black and crimson cloth out of the way. A hand holds her wrist. As long before, when he first felt a pang of pity for the girl, it is so very gentle as he walks them onto the circle. It’s so fresh that it's still a little tacky as it sticks to his lowering knees.

“I have an idea,” he repeats, now that he’s lured her here. He has sunk to the floor in the middle of Jashin’s triangle, and he brings forth an object from his pocket to a standing woman much like how someone would propose. The only problem is that he is once again holding the kunai. The issue is that he wants her to take it. She’s so frozen she can’t even flinch.

“Hidan…” she murmurs, brow furrowing so hard it hurts. There are no words for this besides his name and to question. “W...what?” The circle is complete. In fact, she can now see the raw cut on the plushest muscles upon his hand. What is he asking her for...?

It’s more what she could be asking of him, really.

“Any way ya wanna hurt yourself…” Hidan explains, serious as can be, “Do it to me, instead.  I can take it. I'll be fine.”

“Hidan…” she quivers, horrified. The length of kindness does not matter when it creates such an atrocity. “That’s…” The bottom up her lids pinch upward in moral disgust. “...No…!” He responds to her terror so levelly, it makes this even worse.

“I want it.”

“No you don’t—”

“I fucking do.”

A reply so fast from her cut so short. His eyes are hooded. Now that he’s half naked, it becomes clear to her: the many, many scars upon his skin. She does not know that they are lighter, more minor than they should be on any human being, considering what he’s gone through...by his own hand or any other. Somehow, he is both so very damaged and absolutely immaculate. The beauty of him is overshadowed by the circumstance.

“Hidan…” The disciple pleads, tears in the corners of her eyes, unable to cross the line he reaches across. “Hidan…!” But damn if he isn’t curious. He asks something of her, as calmly as she’s ever seen him:

“Why not?”

Why not?

It should be obvious, but clearly the reaper has such a different view of the situation than she. In this grave matter, how can she unwrap it? How can she explain how this is so very wrong? She decides, unconsciously, that it necessitates the most painful of honesty.

“Because...I...don’t want to hurt,” she confesses. His hand remains out, blade resting upon it, waiting for her to take, but she does not. It scares her so much. “I don’t...want...to do what I’m not willing to have someone else...do to me. And—” Her reasoning: “—It’s selfish. But. But. But.”

But he is still listening. She has no escape, no interruption. She must continue to explain herself.

“I can’t...handle that kind of hurt if it’s from someone else.”

...What a strange distinction. It’s foreign to him, the idea that she’s more okay with hurting herself than she is anyone else. Masochism and sadism are shades of black and white blended till gray in the prophet’s existence; there is no such thing as sympathy, not when we all bleed the same.

...Then why, pray tell, has he been offering such a lowly thing to her?

He makes his own contradictions shut up by moving his empty, ringed hand so delicately up to his docile master, so carefully as to not scare, so smoothly so as to assure that no pain will be entering her own body tonight. Her skin is so soft in his scarred fingers.

“So...the fear of being hurt is the only thing that holds you back?” he tries to discern correctly. “It isn’t even that you’re not willing to hurt yourself?”

So sinfully, the truth is clear. “...Yes.”

She watches his face. A pensive expression grows a small smirk. He has been assured that maybe she could be a killer, after all.

“...Don’t worry about me, angel.” Another word...another thing he has never called her. Not out loud. She isn’t sure if this is a nightmare or a dream. She isn't sure anymore if she wants it to end. “Whatever can be done to a human body, I’ve done it. It’s been done to me. Whatever you feel...it’s nothing to me. I'll soak your suffering like a sponge. I can take that shake in your damn hands and carve it into a prayer.” Into his flesh. Into his soul. Jashin will surely hear them this way. “Just trust me.”

The stranger is unable to move her own body; it is so very easy to guide her fingers to clasp around the kunai’s handle...but something still isn't right. What is it?

…Ah, the most important part.

“Do you believe me?” he asks. “Do you believe me when I promise I won’t hurt you back?”

…

…

“I. Don’t.” Her mind is not in her body. “Know.” His fingers trail across her knuckles like butterfly kisses.

“Will you let me prove it?"

This is a nightmare of misunderstandings. She merely meant to say...that sometimes things are hard. Sometimes things scare her. And sometimes she needs to leave. This is far too drastic. There's no way she should ever ask this of him, that it'll do nothing but craft a desire to hurt other people. And yet.

And yet.

Religious purpose is used as an excuse to explore something truly deplorable.

"...Yes," she concedes, breathless.

That's all that is needed for the man to give her his everything. Hidan guides her grip on the kunai  with his own, and the disciple allows him, starting by pulling her down to his level, to her own knees so the symbol of his faith bleeds onto her dress. He brings the tip of the blade to the same palm he’s already struck to make his sigil, the hand laid face up between them with the wound's thin edges pinkened by healing cells. He grits his teeth at the first pinprick from the weapon she holds with his fostering attention, but he soon exhales in release as the line starts to draw. The new cut meets in the middle of his own and keeps going to forge an "x", the same orbit as star-crossed lovers.

Drip.

Drip.

His blood is now on their hands.

The tables have turned, the man now at her mercy instead of the woman at his. It's worshipful, his sacrifice. This first time, she can only cut a small part of him and only with his help, but that's just fine. She cries. She cries, but she won’t stop it. This means so much to him. Doesn’t that make it worthwhile? And somewhere, so evilly, doesn't he want it to make her feel good?

From the darkest depths of blazing hell, it is euphoric to be wanted so badly like this, behind the flames and blaring alarms. Someone sees her pain. Someone wants to rescue her. Through the smoke and screams, a savior is here. He will carry her away.

Like never before, the man soft, and praising, and encouraging. It makes this all the more sinful. “Just like that. That ain’t so hard, huh?” The soothing look upon his face is more like one you may wear when you’re proud of someone, not that you are being mutilated by them. His tongue is honeyed, airy as a feather. “I told you I could take it.”

She is simultaneously so disgusted, so sick to her stomach, but undeniably part of her illness is from how her heart twists. So sweet, so terribly, she begins to appreciate the reaper's own appreciation for her. How could someone care this much? He offers his body to her. And what has she done to deserve it?

Merely exist in the way only she can.

“Whenever you want to hurt yourself like that...just find me," he repeats, etching a promise into her soul as he helps her etch his skin. He helps her hand fold on top of his once the act is done. The seal is made, and her lungs choke on his dedication. "We’ll make something out of it. Make it worth somethin’ besides just keeping you afraid of nothing worth your time.”

The words "I love you" don't matter in Hidan’s reality, only actions. Only the actions that hurt.

Even if it means that if she can never hurt, he’ll have to carry it all on his own shoulders. He can do that just for her. Just for Jashin and his angel sent from the stars. This is what Hidan has done today to deserve his eyes.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

Oh, oh, oh yeah

Oh yeah

Oh yeah

Oh no

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───