#ANYWAYS. my only actual ‘prediction’ for any more getting added is fog | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

soobmint · 4 years ago

Text

voices | choi beomgyu [f] soulmates! au, 14.2k words

s u m m a r y : after seeing your soulmate for the first time (whether in passing or by actually meeting them), you are able to hear their voice in your head—but only when they are singing. you have never been very interested in finding love, and choi beomgyu has lost all interest in singing. what happens when the two of you begin to change one another’s minds about the things you wish to avoid more than anything else?

c o n t e n t s : soulmates au, strangers to sorta enemies to lovers, guitarist! gyu, freckle gyu, college au, yeonjun is your best friend, gyu is a brat but a cute brat, very fluffy, a tiny bit of light angst

t a g l i s t : @hyuckworld @chanluster @honeyju @magicalstellar @yeonjuniper (if you’d like to be added to the taglist for future oneshots, please let me know!)

n o t e : this was requested by my dear friend alice, and i hope i did the request justice! the lyrics used in the oneshot are from genius’ english translation of “runaway.” i hope you guys enjoy the oneshot, and do kindly leave a like, comment, or reblog if you enjoyed it! that would mean the world!

YOU MET CHOI BEOMGYU THE DAY YOU SWORE TO NEVER FALL IN LOVE.

As dramatic as it sounded, the day hadn’t been quite so terrible. You were sitting cross-legged in the floor of one of the many practice rooms in your university’s music department with a bag of popcorn in your lap, your head leaned back against the wall as you stifled back a yawn. Your best friend, Yeonjun, was going on and on about his most recent breakup, but the story was so similar to all the other breakups he had gone through in the past two years that you were having a difficult time staying focused. The afternoon sunlight trickled in through the windows, reflecting off the symbols of the drum set that rested in the far corner. You scooted to the side a bit so that the light wouldn’t shine in your eyes anymore as Yeonjun paced back and forth in front of you.

“And then she just stopped talking to me,” He said, running his hands through his hair. “Out of nowhere too! Things had been going so well, but then it was weird. Next thing I know, she’s breaking up with me—get this—over text.”

You tossed a piece of popcorn into your mouth. “Tragic.”

“I know you’re being sarcastic, but yes, it was tragic.” He finally stopped pacing and collapsed to the ground beside of you, leaning his head against your shoulder. “Love is so hard. You meet someone, you think it’s going to work and that you’ll spend a long, happy life together. Next thing you know, you’re single and stuck with your best friend in a stinky music room, waiting for some club meeting to start—or whatever it is we’re in here for.”

“We’re here because we are in charge of organizing the music and theater departments’ performance at the open house next month,” You corrected, flicking his forehead. “And didn’t you only date this girl for like, a week?”

He sighed, sitting up to glare at you. “Love knows not the boundaries of time, my dear friend. You’ll understand once you find it for yourself.”

“Calm down, Shakespeare. I am not falling in love.”

“Unfortunately for you, I don’t think you have any control over that,” He said with a teasing smile. “But why wouldn’t you want to?”

You scoffed, turning to stare at him. “Well, for starters, you haven’t exactly given me a good idea of what ‘love’ is supposed to be, seeing as you’re crying about another ‘true-love-gone-wrong’ every three weeks. Why on earth would I want that for myself?”

“Hey, love is different for everyone,” He said. “Just because my love life is vibrant and exciting and full of various names and faces doesn’t mean the same will happen for you.”

“How do you predict my love life will go, then?”

He hummed, tapping his finger against his chin in thought. “Well, you’re pretty boring, so you’ll probably be the kind of person that waits until they find their soulmate, then you’ll settle down and live a long, safe and uneventful life with them.”

“Shut up,” you said as you shoved him, but you couldn’t help the laughter that bubbled out of you. “I think my soulmate is out of the question, though.”

Yeonjun frowned. “You still haven’t heard him since back then?”

You sighed, shaking your head as you leaned back against the wall. “Not a thing.”

It was quiet then as the two of you thought about what this meant. It wasn’t the first time you had been faced with the reality of your situation, but it still felt like a punch to the stomach every time.

In a world where people waited years, decades even, to hear the voice of their soulmate singing in their head, you had been considered extremely lucky to have heard the gentle voice of a boy in your mind at the age of thirteen. You knew that you had to have met him somewhere—at least in passing—in order to hear him, but you had no clue who he was.

Yet, in a way, it felt like you did. He sang often—so often you wondered if singing was as necessary as breathing to him. It wasn’t a bother to you though; in fact, it was quite the opposite. The songs he sang always told a story; some spoke of love and joy, others off loss and heartache. You felt like each song he sang held a piece of him, and that piece was something that was shared just between the two of you.

Until his voice was gone.

It was rare for him to go a day without singing. Yet suddenly, in your sophomore year of college, days and weeks went by without a single note, and you had yet to hear his voice since.

Your soulmate had stopped singing, and it was difficult to not imagine that the worst had happened.

Yeonjun must have noticed the solemn look that came over your face, because he leaned over and gave your shoulder a squeeze. “Don’t be so gloomy,” he said. “He could still be out there.”

You smiled the best you could, although the pit in your stomach remained. “Yeah, I guess he could.” You tossed the popcorn to Yeonjun and stood to your feet, wiping the crumbs from your hands. “Wait here, okay? The other guy that’s supposed to be helping us is—” You paused to glance at the time on your phone, “—ten minutes late. I’m gonna make sure he knows where to come or see if he’s lost or something.”

Yeonjun nodded, helping himself to what was left of your snack. “Who is the other guy, anyway?”

You sighed, picking up the piece of paper that the department head gave to you when she asked you to organize the showcase, claiming that it would be a great deal of experience for you to acquire in your senior year of university.

You were mostly doing it for the extra credit points.

You began to read the names of the seniors that were in charge of organizing the project listed at the top of the paper. “From the drama department, Choi Yeonjun and Kang Taehyun.”

“Taehyun had an appointment,” Yeonjun said through a mouthful of popcorn. “He’ll be here tomorrow.”

You nodded, tracing your finger along the page, stopping beneath the next pair of names. “From the music department, Y/N and Choi Beomgyu.” You looked up from the paper, tapping your forefinger against your chin. “Choi Beomgyu? Do you know him?”

Yeonjun pondered for a moment before snapping his fingers. “Ah—that guy!” You weren’t surprised; Yeonjun seemed to know everyone in the performing arts programs at your school. “He’s one of the top guitar students, if I’m remembering correctly. Have you not heard of him?”

You shook your head, looking back down at his name. Choi Beomgyu. It did sound familiar, but no images or information came along with the words printed on the page. It was nothing more than a tugging feeling in your stomach that made you feel like you knew him from somewhere.

You began walking towards the door, still staring down at the paper. Just as the tips of your fingers brushed across the metal handle, the door swung open, and you barely had time to glance up and see a head of fluffy black hair and big brown eyes before the door crashed into your forehead so hard you fell backwards to the tile floor.

With a hiss, you brought your hand up to your forehead, relieved to find a lack of blood there. Your eyes were blurred with tears, but through the fog you were able to see the same round doe eyes you had caught a glimpse of before you hit the ground.

“Are you okay?” It was a guy’s voice, clear and ringing in your ears. You rubbed your eyes to clear some of the moisture and were then able to get a better look at the boy in front of you. Curly black bangs hung over his brows, brushing just over the tops of his wide chocolate eyes. His sun-kissed skin was sprinkled with a light spatter of freckles across his nose and lightly flushed cheeks.

You blinked several times before responding. “Y-yeah, I’m okay.” You accepted his hand when he offered to help you stand back up, and soon, you were on your feet once more.

“Sorry about that,” he said, brushing a hand through his already tousled hair. He leaned forward a bit, tapping his finger against your forehead. “Just got a tiny bump, though. You’ll be okay.”

You backed away from his touch, but he didn’t seem to notice as he had caught sight of Yeonjun. Your best friend was quite literally on the edge of his seat, perched on the ledge of the desk while shoveling the last crumbs of popcorn into his mouth as if this were some movie unfolding before his eyes. If you had been close enough, you would have hit him.

“Yeonjun?” Door Boy’s face lit up, and he strode over to give your pink-haired friend a high five. “I haven’t seen you in ages!”

“Hey, man,” Yeonjun said with a grin, ruffling Door Boy’s curly hair with his fingers. “I know, it’s been way too long.”

“I’m sorry, who’s this?” You asked, still a bit dazed from your unexpected collision with the door.

Yeonjun looked back at you, gesturing to the newcomer. “Oh, this is—”

“Choi Beomgyu,” he finished the introduction himself, giving you an overdramatic bow as he said his name. “And you must be Y/N?”

Things were beginning to click together in your head: Door Boy was Choi Beomgyu. In other words, Door Boy was your assigned partner—the one you would be spending the next four weeks trying to plan a performance with.

For some reason, the fact that you had met one another by him slamming a door into your face didn’t leave the best feeling in your chest.

“I look forward to working with you, Y/N.” He gave you a big, lopsided grin, one that any other person would likely find heartwarming.

You forced a smile in return, rubbing your hand across the bump on your forehead. “Same here, Choi Beomgyu.”

PERHAPS IT HAD A BIT TO DO WITH HOW POORLY YOUR FIRST MEETING WENT, BUT SOMETHING ABOUT BEOMGYU REALLY GOT UNDER YOUR SKIN.

The day after you had first met one another, Yeonjun had asked everyone to meet up in the coffee shop inside the campus library. This time, Taehyun from the drama department was also able to be there. You had gotten to know him pretty well over the past four years because of how close he and Yeonjun had become, so the three of you hung out often.

In fact, for the first fifteen minutes of the meeting, it was just the three of you sitting there. You pushed your tongue against the inside of your cheek in agitation before taking another sip of your coffee. “Does this Beomgyu guy have a thing for being late?”

“Relax, Y/N,” Yeonjun said absently from across the table, his attention focused primarily on his cell phone screen. “Not everyone’s a time freak like you.”

“Time freak—What does that even mean?” You crumpled up the wrapper from Taehyun’s straw and threw it at Yeonjun. “Unlike you, I actually care about getting these extra credit points and would like to organize this event properly.”

“Hey! I care!” Yeonjun placed a hand over his heart, as though he had been wounded.

You and Taehyun exchanged a side glance with one another, eyebrows raised.

“Stop looking at each other like that! I do care!”

Before the point could be argued any further, a messy-haired boy crashed into the seat beside of you, out of breath, his backpack falling from his shoulder and onto the ground from the impact. You stared at him for a moment before realizing that it was Beomgyu.

“Sorry—I’m late,” he said in between deep breaths. “On my way here—saw one of the campus cats—got distracted.”

You stared at him again, almost laughing at how ridiculous of an excuse that was. However, considering what little you knew of Beomgyu, the thought of him being fifteen minutes late to a meeting because he got distracted by a cat didn’t seem all that unlikely. With a sigh, you slid a blank piece of notebook paper towards him and set a pen on top of it. “It’s all good. Mind taking notes?”

He nodded—a bit too enthusiastically, if you were to say so yourself. “Sure. Can I grab a coffee real quick?”

You were about to suggest that he should wait until after the meeting, since the three of you had been there for such a long time already, but Taehyun chimed in before you could say anything with, “Of course. We’ve got nowhere else to be.”

It took everything within you to not roll your eyes. You were usually on the same page as Taehyun, but of course, this situation had to be an exception, because Choi Beomgyu was there.

The slacker was rummaging around his backpack, searching for something. He pouted, looking up from his bag. “I forgot my wallet.”

“No worries! Y/N doesn’t eat breakfast, so she always has an extra swipe on her meal card,” Yeonjun said from across the table. Your mouth fell open, eyes wide as saucers. “I’m sure she wouldn’t mind letting you use it. Right, Y/N?”

You weren’t quite sure that you did want Beomgyu to use your meal card, but what kind of jerk would you be if you said no? With gritted teeth and a glare at your best friend, you fished your meal card out of your wallet and placed it into Beomgyu’s open palm.

The pout left his lips instantly, a big grin taking its place. “Thanks. I’ll return the favor sometime soon.”

Doubt it, you thought, watching him rush towards the counter to order. You’ll probably forget you said that by the time you get your drink.

Soon he was back at the table, caramel latte in hand, your meal card back in your possession. You cleared your throat, shifting in your seat. “If everyone’s ready, we can go ahead and get started. I met with my professor yesterday—she’s also the head of the classical music department. She’s technically our ‘overseer,’ but all the responsibility of planning the performance is on us. We’ll only have about forty minutes total to showcase the drama and music departments, so we need to choose our sets wisely.”

“Yeonjun and I were talking a bit about this earlier,” Taehyun said. “We’ve been preparing for our winter show since the beginning of the summer, so we figured we could just perform a scene from the play.”

You nodded, liking the idea. “That sounds perfect. What’s the play?”

“A Midsummer Night’s Dream.”

“Right, I knew that. Could you guys work on finding a scene around ten or fifteen minutes long to perform for the open house, then?”

Yeonjun and Taehyun both nodded. You smiled, glad that you were finally starting to get some things together for the event.

When you glanced at Beomgyu to make sure he had written that down, the smile left as quickly as it had come when you saw that he was doodling tiny flowers and hearts all over the page rather than taking notes.

He must have felt your eyes on him, because he glanced up and caught your gaze. Seemingly unbothered, he simply smiled and said, “Don’t worry. I was just about to write it down.”

Your fingers itched to reach over and take the pen and paper from him so you could just do it yourself, but you kept your composure. “Beomgyu. Any ideas for what the music department could do?”

He finished writing down Drama Department—Scene from “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” before looking at you again. He shrugged, another nonchalant smile spreading across his face. “Not really. I’m down for whatever it is you decide to do.”

“Wow, helpful. Truly.” Your eyes went wide when you realized you had said those words out loud after Yeonjun and Taehyun began to snicker beside you. Your face flushed with embarrassment, but Beomgyu seemed unphased, that careless lopsided grin of his still on full display.

You sighed, brushing a piece of hair behind your ear. “Well, I was thinking about having the orchestra do a piece, and then having one of the student bands do a piece. That way we have something classical and something more contemporary. Thoughts?”

“I think that’s a good idea,” Taehyun said. “If we do our scene first, the orchestra could kind of act as a bridge between Shakespeare and more modern art.”

“I agree,” Yeonjun said. “And since Y/N is in the orchestra, she can get in touch with the director and have them prepare something. Oh, and Beomgyu!” The curly-haired boy looked up from his doodling when his name was called. “You know a few different bands, right? Think you could piece together a group of performers?”

“Definitely,” Beomgyu said. When he noticed your eyes on him, he quickly scribbled down Orchestra—Y/N. Band—Beomgyu Me.

“Well, since we all have our first tasks, I guess that’s all for today.” You were happy that the meeting was over; you were ready to get back to your dorm so you could get to work and actually get things done.

“Wait!” Beomgyu said as you stood up, slinging your bag over your shoulder.

Now you have something to say. You raised a brow at him expectantly.

“We should exchange phone numbers, right?” He smiled, standing up and holding his phone out towards you. “I have the others’ numbers, but I figure I should be able to contact my partner from the music department.”

You hesitated, but knew there was no logical reason why you shouldn’t give him your number. You were going to be working together for the next several weeks, after all.

After putting your number in, he took his phone back and grinned at you again, eyes scrunching up into crescent moons. “Perfect! I’ll try not to bother you too much, but I make no promises.” He reached forward and ruffled your hair, and you were too caught off guard by the sudden touch to back away, or to even react at all. He then waved at all three of you, throwing his backpack over his shoulder. “See you guys tomorrow then.” He turned towards you again, throwing you a casual wink that still managed to have you flustered. “I’ll be in touch, partner.”

You turned to watch him leave, face warm as you brushed through your hair with your fingers, trying to undo the damage your “partner” had done.

Something told you that he wouldn’t be keeping his promise about trying not to bother you anytime soon.

OVER THE NEXT FEW WEEKS, BEOMGYU PROVED HIMSELF TO BE ONE OF THE MOST BOTHERSOME PEOPLE YOU HAD COME ACROSS IN A LONG, LONG TIME.

The worst part was the fact that he didn’t do anything blatantly wrong. He did everything he was asked to do when it came to preparing for the showcase. The first week of work consisted of the two of you gathering all the students who would be participating in the performances, along with Yeonjun and Taehyun preparing those from the drama department. Beomgyu performed all of his tasks just as he was asked to do, so it wasn’t as if he was bothering you by being unhelpful.

It was just something about the way he held himself that seemed to get under your skin for no apparent reason.

For the past week, your “partner” had basically been a tagalong—he would stand beside of you and do what he was asked without contributing much to the creative process of planning. You found it hard to criticize him up front, as he just did as he was told.

However, that was all he did. When the four of you would all sit down together to discuss plans or ideas, Beomgyu’s role never changed: he would sit beside all of you, jot down anything you told him to in his nearly-full composition notebook, and crack an occasional joke that would always send Yeonjun and Taehyun into fits of laughter, but only earned a stiff, forced smile from you.

You were starting to wonder why your professor had assigned him to your team. After all, putting on this open house was your last shot at making a lasting impression on the higher ups in your department. Everything needed to be perfect; mediocracy was not an option.

In other words, Choi Beomgyu needed to step up his game, and he needed to do it quickly.

You thought about this on the day of your first rehearsal, where all of the students who would be participating in the performances had gathered in the main auditorium of the music building.

Drama students were scattered in all directions, occupying the space around them with dramatic line readings and critiques for their classmates as they practiced their roles. Yeonjun and Taehyun were busy taking charge of the drama students, making sure everything was running smoothly amongst them. You watched as Kai, one of the freshman students Yeonjun had taken under his wing, followed your friends around like a baby penguin waddling after its parents, and you couldn’t help but smile at the sight.

Music students were spread across the stage, the orchestra setting up instruments and covering stands with sheets filled by notes and lyrics while the band tuned their guitars and plugged up their mics. Soobin, a tall, blue-haired student from the same year as you, waved at you from stage with his mic in hand. You waved back, happy that you had been able to snag him as the main vocalist for the band’s performance—his voice was angelic, able to captivate any listener.

“Hey.” You turned at the sound of the voice you had begun to grow quite accustomed to, whether that was for better or for worse. Beomgyu was standing beside of you, brushing a hand through the curly black bangs that hung just above his eyes. The tip of his nose was flushed pink, a sign that he had likely just been out in the biting cold that had begun to creep up as fall quickly approached. He had his backpack slung over one shoulder and his guitar case held in one hand.

“Running a little late, aren’t we?” You asked, glancing at the time on your phone with no attempt at hiding your frown. “Is this going to be a trend with you, Choi Beomgyu?”

He laughed, nudging his shoulder against yours. You wanted to be more irritated with him than you were, but he had the kind of laugh that put everyone around him at ease; the kind of laugh that filled one’s chest with warmth, as if you had been directly touched by a ray of sunlight reaching down from the sky.

So you settled with being only slightly irritated, pursing your lips to keep your expression in check as he responded with, “What fun would it be if everyone was on time?”

“It’s not about fun, it’s about making sure this whole thing runs smoothly,” you said as you turned to face him. “Speaking of which, since you didn’t have any suggestions, I went ahead and helped the band choose a setlist. They’ll only have time for two songs, but the ones I picked are really diverse and should be—”

“Ah!” He cut you off, snapping his fingers in front of your face, causing you to flinch back in surprise. “I knew there was something I forgot to tell you.”

“What?”

He rubbed the back of his neck, grinning as he shifted a bit closer to you. You could smell his cologne—a misty citrus scent that was so light you could barely tell it was there. “Well, it’s kind of embarrassing, but the professor actually wanted the band to perform one of the songs I wrote. If that’s okay with you, of course—you’re the boss, after all.”

“You—you write songs?” You asked, trying not to get irritated at the sudden disruption of what you had planned. He had been complacent this entire time, so of course, the time he actually had something to contribute, he would be messing up what you had already set in place.

“Well, if it’s a suggestion from the professor, I can’t just deny you permission, can I?” You said with a forced laugh. “Do you have the—”

“Sheet music?” He finished your sentence, shaking a stack of papers in front of you. “Right here, partner. Want me to go tell the band?”

You sighed, crossing your arms over your chest. “Sure. Just tell them to switch the second song I had picked out with this one.”

He smiled at you again, ruffling your hair with the same hand he held the papers in. “You’re a saint. I’ll talk to you in a bit then?”

You had no time to respond before he was setting off towards the stage to talk to the band, papers and guitar in hand. You huffed through pursed lips, mumbling under your breath as you tried to put your hair back in place.

“What was that all about?” You dropped your hands to your sides when Yeonjun approached you, eyebrow quirked. Half of his cotton-candy colored hair was pulled into a ponytail, and he had on a pair of big round glasses with what you knew to be fake lenses—a fashion statement rather than a necessity.

“I don’t think Beomgyu knows much about personal boundaries or personal responsibility,” you mumbled, allowing Yeonjun to come up and finish fixing your hair with his fingers. “He decided to just now tell me that our professor wanted the band to use one of his songs in the performance.”

“What’s wrong with that?”

“Nothing’s wrong with it, I just—” You hesitated, unsure of how to respond without sounding like a jerk. “I just wish he would have told me about it sooner. That’s all.”

“Y/N, you need to cut the guy some slack,” Yeonjun said, stepping back once he was finished fixing up your hair. “You act as though you have a personal vendetta against him or something.”

“I do not,” You argued, feeling you defenses flare up at his words. “Why would you say that?”

“I don’t know, maybe because every time he walks in the room you start to grimace, and every time he talks to you I can literally feel the amount of energy it takes for you to not roll your eyes.”

“You’re exaggerating.”

“If you say so.” He put his hand on your shoulder, giving you a stern look that did, in fact, make you roll your eyes. “Give him a chance, Y/N. You may end up liking him more than you’d expect.”

You scoffed as your best friend walked away from you, returning to work on his previous tasks with Taehyun. A vendetta? Was it really that obvious to the people around you that Beomgyu got under your skin?

Perhaps Yeonjun was right—you did have a tendency to be extra sensitive when it came to your academic responsibilities. Maybe you were being too hard on Beomgyu; his goal was the same as yours, even if his methods differed drastically from yours.

You looked up to the stage to see Beomgyu laughing as he said something to Soobin, the rest of the band analyzing the sheets of music in their hands—Beomgyu’s song, if you had to guess. His skin glowed like honey beneath the stage lights, and you noticed that when he laughed, he laughed with his entire body; his eyes disappeared into crescents, his shoulders shook, he clapped his hands together and even stomped his feet a bit. You smiled slightly at the sight, before a pang of guilt hit you.

He did seem like a nice guy. It was time you gave him a chance to be seen as such in your eyes.

ANY PATIENCE YOU HAD DESPERATELY TRIED TO HOLD WITH BEOMGYU WAS WEARING THIN, AND IT HAD ONLY BEEN AN HOUR SINCE YOU DECIDED TO GIVE HIM A CHANCE.

You had both stayed behind with Yeonjun and Taehyun to clean up the auditorium after the practice. “I think that we’re done, don’t you?” You asked everyone after picking up a few discarded sheets of paper left behind by the drama students.

“Almost,” Beomgyu said from the stage. You looked up at him to see him pointing at two large music stands left behind by the orchestra. “Someone left these behind.”

“Can’t we just leave them there?” Yeonjun asked.

Taehyun shook his head. “No, we were given specific instructions to not leave anything behind.” He glanced at his phone. “They’re about to close the building for the night, so we should hurry and put them up.”

“I know which room they came from, so I can take them back,” Beomgyu offered.

“They’re pretty heavy, Beomgyu. Are you sure you can carry them on your own?” Taehyun asked.

“Yeah, it’s fine—”

“No, no, someone should definitely help you. You have to carry your guitar too,” Yeonjun interjected, a mischievous glint in your eyes that sent sirens blaring in your head. The feelings of disdain only grew when Yeonjun made eye contact with you directly, seeming to give you a sweet smile, but you knew the expression was laced with ulterior motives. “Y/N, why don’t you carry one while Beomgyu carries the other?”

You wanted to smack him, but that wouldn’t have been a good look for you, considering that everyone already thought you hated Beomgyu anyways. You glanced up at him on the stage to see that he had already picked one of the stands up, his guitar in the other hand. He gave you a big grin, eyes sparkling like freshly fallen snow. “What do you say, partner? Care to give me a hand?”

You pushed your tongue against the inside of your cheek, knowing that there was no way you were getting out of this one. “Sure,” You said through your teeth, glaring daggers at Yeonjun before making your way up the steps to the stage. The music stand wasn’t too heavy, so you almost dared to ask Beomgyu to try carrying them both in one hand, but decided against it.

“We’ll go ahead and leave then,” Yeonjun said, throwing a taunting wink your way. “You two have fun.”

You hate to bite your tongue to keep from cursing at him as Yeonjun and Taehyun left the auditorium, leaving you alone with Beomgyu for the first time. You glanced his way, noticing that he already had his eyes on you. Instead of averting his gaze when yours met his, he just smiled wider, gesturing towards the door with his head. “Shall we?”

You forced another smile. “Lead the way, partner.”

You followed him out the doors and up the stairs to the first floor, where the orchestra’s practice room was located. You were very familiar with the area, being a violinist yourself. When the two of you reached the room, you rushed forward to open the door, as Beomgyu’s hands were full. He thanked you and stepped inside first, and you followed suit, letting the heavy door swing shut behind you.

“Where should we set them?” He asked.

You nodded to the far corner of the room. “Over there.”

The two of you set the stands down, and you instantly turned back towards the door, ready to get back to your dorm for some alone time after such a taxing day.

“In a rush?” Beomgyu asked from behind you.

You turned to look over your shoulder at him as your hand grasped the doorknob. “Nah, just tired. Aren’t you?”

He shrugged, shifting his guitar case from one hand to the other. “Not really.”

“Lucky you,” You mumbled, turning back towards the door. “Well, I guess I’ll see you tomorrow—”

You stopped mid-sentence, heart dropping to your toes. When you tried to turn the knob, it wouldn’t move. After a moment of shock, you tried again, and then again, violently shaking the knob, trying to get the door to open.

“No, no, no,” You said, shaking the handle desperately. “Come on, this can’t be happening!”

“What is it?” Beomgyu asked, setting his guitar on the floor before rushing to your side.

“The door won’t open.” You shook the knob more frantically than ever, the entire door shaking from the force.

“Woah, easy there, partner,” Beomgyu said, gently placing his hand on your arm. “Why don’t you let me try to—”

“What exactly do you think you’re going to be able to do differently?” You snapped, snatching your arm away from him. His mouth hung open, eyes wide with what you assumed to be shock. “We’re stuck in here, Beomgyu. We’re stuck, and we’re not going to get out for god knows how long, and with you as my ‘partner,’ I’m one hundred percent certain we’re not going to be able to find a way out of here on our own.”

You could tell that your words struck a nerve with him by the way his shoulders tensed and how his eyes went narrow. Looking back, you wished you could reel the words back in, but they had already done their damage.

“Why do you hate me so much?” He asked, his voice low and thick with irritation.

It was your turn to be shocked. “What?”

“I said, why do you hate me so much?”

You blinked rapidly, feeling exposed and vulnerable now that he was confronting you. “I don’t—I don’t hate you, Beomgyu.”

He scoffed, pulling his bottom lip under his teeth. “Come on, I’m not that much of an idiot. This entire time, from the moment we first met, you’ve been cold and snippy with me. You can barely hide how much you dislike me with your facial expressions. I thought maybe we just got off on the wrong foot, so I’ve been brushing it off and treating you kindly. But you still treat me like I’m some annoying fly that you can’t quite get rid of, and I want to know why.”

“That’s not—I don’t hate you,” You repeated, jumbling your words together as you struggled to figure out what to say.

“Well, what’s the issue then?”

“You don’t take anything seriously!” Your voice wasn’t quite a shout, but it was almost there. Beomgyu took a step back, arms dropping to his sides.

“You’re treating this entire thing like it’s an elementary school play,” You continued, your voice getting louder and your words coming out more and more rushed the more you spoke. “You don’t contribute in the meetings, you show up late, and you barely do the things I ask you to do. I understand it may not be anything special to you, but this is my last chance to do something memorable here. I’m graduating in the spring, and up until this point, I’ve been nothing but another violinist tossed in the orchestra. I don’t stand out to my professors, or to scouts, to anyone.”

Hot tears began to well in the corners of your eyes as thoughts of your mother surfaced. Every word she had ever said about your pursuit of music being a waste of time, of how little a chance you had of making it, how your only hope was to stand out in the department, which, of course, she highly doubted you would be capable of doing.

“I have to do this, and I have to do it right.” Your voice wavered as you swiped at your cheeks, where a few tears had fallen. “If I don’t, then I’ll—I’ll—”

“Hey, hey, it’s okay.” Beomgyu’s voice was gentle, in stark contrast to the razor-sharp tone he had held just seconds before. You looked at him through your teary eyes to see that his own eyes were wide, this time with concern rather than anger. “You don’t have to explain, I understand, okay? I’m sorry, Y/N.”

You sniffed, more tears gliding down your cheeks as you did so. “What?”

“I’m sorry,” He repeated, looking as though he were about to start crying himself. “I had no idea that’s how I was coming across. I’m really, really sorry.”

You stared at him, dumbfounded. How were you supposed to respond to that? The last thing you expected to hear from him was an apology, especially since, now that you had yelled at him, you realized how unfair you were being towards him. You shook your head, wiping furiously at your eyes. “No, you don’t have to apologize Beomgyu. I should be apologizing—I’m the one being irrational, not to mention I’m also the one that locked us in here—”

“How about we just call it even then, hm?” He cut you off, looking around before he spotted a box of tissues on the front desk. He grabbed one and made his way back over to you, gently wiping the tears from your face, being careful to not touch you directly. “We’ve both apologized for something that the other person doesn’t think requires an apology. The grounds are neutral now.”

You laughed, gently taking the tissue from his hand so you could wipe your eyes on your own. He stepped back when you did so, smiling nervously at your sudden laughter.

“Thank you, Beomgyu,” You said quietly, wadding the tissue up in your hand.

He rubbed the back of his neck, rocking back and forth on his feet. “No need to thank me, Y/N.” He paused, seeming to be in deep thought. It was quiet for a moment before he stuck his hand out towards you, expression cautiously hopeful. “Now that we both understand each other a little better, do you think we could start over?”

You smiled, wrapping your hand around his to give it a firm shake. “Yeah. I’d like that.”

THE WORLD ALWAYS SEEMED COLDER WHEN YOU WERE ALONE.

Of course, it could have felt cold because you were alone in a hotel parking lot, sitting on the cool pavement in the late hours of the night. You hadn’t brought a jacket with you, and your dress was sleeveless and made of thin fabric that didn’t do much to protect you from the wind that sent strands of hair flying across your face.

However, you were certain that if your mother or father had been sitting beside of you that early winter’s night, you would barely even notice the bite of the wind or the goosebumps that prickled up all over your bare arms. Even the stars had denied you their company; the sky was pitch black, void of any trace of light.

Lower lip trembling, you sighed as you kept your gaze on the sky above, thinking that maybe, if you kept looking, you’d find a single star shining amidst the darkness. Tears filled your eyes, but you wiped them away before they could fall.

“You’re a strong girl, Y/N,” Your mother would say if she were to catch you crying. “Strong girls don’t cry, do they?”

“No,” You whispered, even though she wasn’t there to hear you. “Strong girls don’t cry.”

“What do you mean?”

You jumped at the sudden voice, placing your hand over your heart before you turned your head to see a boy sitting on the pavement beside you. He had curly black hair that stuck out from beneath a beanie, covering the top of his eyes, and a big jacket on over his clothes. He seemed to be the same age as you, but of course, you couldn’t be sure.

“W-what?” You spoke through shaking lips, pulling your arms around yourself in an attempt to stay warm.

“You said that strong girls don’t cry,” He said, eyeing you with curiosity. “What do you mean by that?”

“Oh,” you whispered, looking down at your shoes—a pair of black flats with scuff marks all over the toes. “It’s nothing— just something my mom says.”

He hummed, leaning back on the palms of his hands. “Well, I think she’s wrong. Everyone cries, even the strongest people alive. If someone tells you they don’t cry, then they’re lying.” He turned towards you, a big grin on his face. “You don’t seem like a liar to me.”

You sniffled, wiping your hand across your cheeks to catch the few tears that had managed to slip down. “Thanks, I think.”

“It was definitely meant as a compliment.” He sat up straight then, narrowing his eyes at you. You shrunk back a bit, shoulders shaking as the wind only seemed to get stronger by the second.

A moment later, he was sitting right beside of you, so close that his arm brushed against yours as he slipped his coat off, revealing an oversized hoodie beneath it. He wrapped the coat around your shoulders, and zipped it up, trapping your arms inside. He smiled again and sat back, but he was still close to you, so close that your shoulders were pressed together and his pinky was resting on top of yours.

Eyes wide, you slowly shook your head and slipped your arms through the sleeves so you could reach the zipper. “No, I’m okay—”

“Hey, keep it on, please,” He interrupted, placing his hand on top of yours to stop you from unzipping the coat. “It’s freezing out here, and you don’t even have any sleeves.”

You hesitated, not wanting to be a bother to this unexpectedly kind stranger, but you would have been lying if you had said that the cold wasn’t starting to bother you. Not wanting your lips to turn blue, you nodded, pulling your arms back into the coat to keep them extra warm.

“Thank you,” you said quietly. “What are you doing out here, by the way?”

“Me? Oh, I was just sneaking out to the indoor pool.” He pointed over his shoulder at the building with a large dome roof made of glass. “My parents are already asleep and didn’t notice me leave. You?”

“Ah, well, my family is staying here for the night. My parents and I are going out for dinner to celebrate my birthday.”

“It’s your birthday?” He asked, eyes growing wide. You nodded sheepishly and his smile grew bigger before he reached over to ruffle your hair with his hand. “Happy birthday!”

You giggled, smoothing your hair back down when he pulled his hand away. Your eyes met his, which seemed to sparkle with the light of billions of galaxies, paired perfectly with his beaming smile, and you realized that maybe you didn’t need the stars that night after all, because he alone shined brightly enough.

He looked around then, eyebrows furrowed. “But, where are your parents? Shouldn’t you guys get going before all the restaurants close?”

Your smile faded just as quickly as it had appeared. You swallowed, your eyes drifting towards a car that sat a few yards away from the two of you. The car was running and the lights inside were on, casting a yellow glow onto the two occupants seated in the front: your parents. Although you couldn’t hear what they were saying, you knew that they were yelling by the way they pointed their fingers at each other, and by the expressions on their faces, and the intensity with which their lips were moving.

The boy followed your gaze, his mouth parting slightly in surprise when he caught sight of your parents in the heat of their dispute. He glanced sideways at you before moving to sit in front of you, blocking your view of your parents.

“Why don’t you sneak to the pool with me?” He asked.

You shook your head immediately, a slight smile returning to your face. It was clear that he was trying to distract you, and you were grateful. That didn’t mean you were willing to sneak away from your parents, especially when the tension among your family was already sky high.

“Why not?” He whined, sticking his bottom lip out in a pout.

“Because I’m not supposed to move from this spot,” You said.

“And I wasn’t supposed to leave my hotel room, yet here I am.” He shrugged nonchalantly, brushing his bangs out of his eyes only for them to fall right back into place. “What’s the worst that could happen?”

There were a lot of really terrible things that could happen as a result of you sneaking away to go night swimming with a boy you didn’t know while your parents fought in the middle of a hotel parking lot. You could probably list ten off the top of your head. However, when you looked into the starry eyes of the boy in front of you, his lips spread in an encouraging grin that made you feel warm inside despite the cold, you hesitated.

What was the worst thing that could happen? The list seemed to be erased from your head as quickly as it appeared.

He tilted his head to the side, a playful glint sparkling in his eyes. He stood up and stretched his hand out to you, his fingers trembling from the cold.

“Should we run away?”

Your fingers twitched, urging to reach out touch his own. You bit the inside of your cheek, trying to find the balance between being rational and following where your heart was leading. These two things did not seem to be lining up.

Before you could do anything, however, you heard a car door slamming shut. You jumped to your feet just in time to see your mother stepping away from the vehicle before your father drove off, leaving her alone in the parking lot. Eyes wide with worry, you watched as your mother brushed her hand across her cheeks before taking a deep breath and making her way towards you.

“Y/N,” she said when she reached you, not even glancing at the boy beside of you as she took your face in her hands. “Your dad is going to come pick us up in the morning. How about we just have a girl’s night to celebrate your birthday instead?”

With your heart dropping to your toes, you felt the tears welling in your eyes once again, but you refused to let them fall. You smiled and nodded, wrapping your hand around your mother’s. “Yeah. That sounds fine.”

You turned towards the boy to see that his face was full of concern. Forcing the best smile you could, you unzipped his coat and slipped it off your shoulders before placing it back in his outstretched hands.

“Thank you,” you said quietly. Before he could say anything back, you had turned away and began walking back towards the entrance, arm-in-arm with your mother.

“I was thinking we could order a pizza and rent your favorite movies,” she said, straining to keep the emotion out of your voice. “I’ll order the food once we get back to the room, okay?”

You nodded slowly, halting your footsteps just before the automatic doors that led inside.

But when you turned your head to catch one last look at the boy who shined brighter than the stars, he was already gone.

IN THE HAZY PLACE BETWEEN SLEEPING AND WAKING, YOU COULD HAVE SWORN YOU HEARD HIM SINGING.

With your eyes still closed, the sound rang through your head, clear as day. It was comforting, as if you had heard it before. Yet it wasn’t a sound that only echoed around you. This voice, so gentle and sweet that it seemed to drip with sugar and honey, filled all of your senses to the brim. You weren’t just hearing it, you were feeling it.

“In moments like those, when tears fill your eyes, hold my hand tight. Should we run away?”

You sighed, swept away by the sound and the words that the voice sang. You felt as though you had heard it before, but you couldn’t quite think of where. Snuggling closer to whatever it was that you were leaning against, you allowed the faintest of smiles to trace its way across your lips.

The singing stopped. “Y/N?”

“Hmm?” You pressed your face closer against the warmth you were leaning into, frowning at the sudden absence of the soothing voice.

“Are you awake?”

“Yeah,” you mumbled, slowly forcing your eyes open.

You weren’t quite sure where exactly you expected to be when you opened your eyes, but it definitely was not on the floor of the orchestra practice room with your head in Choi Beomgyu’s lap. Beomgyu was smiling down at you, black curls hanging over his eyes, freckles illuminated by the faint moonlight that spilled through the windows.

You sat up quickly, trying to fix your messy hair as you felt your face grow warm. You didn’t remember falling asleep, but you were incredibly embarrassed that you had.

“How—how long was I asleep?” You asked, your voice hoarse.

“Just an hour or so. I think you got so stressed out after trying to call so many people that you just passed out,” Beomgyu said. He reached his hands toward you and helped you straighten up your hair, which only served to make your face even warmer than before.

“Sorry,” you said, gesturing to his lap. “For . . . that.”

He waved his hand at you before folding his hands behind his head. “Don’t apologize. Seems like you needed the sleep—you were dreaming pretty intensely.”

“I was? Did I say anything weird in my sleep? What did I say? Was it embarrassing?” You grabbed his sleeve, eyes wide as you bombarded him with questions.

He laughed, shaking his head in reassurance. “Don’t worry, it was nothing embarrassing. But you were talking.”

“What did I say?”

“Hmm, something about it being your birthday?” He placed a finger against his chin, eyes narrowed. “I’m not sure exactly what else. It was all kinda random.”

You squeezed your eyes shut, biting the inside of your cheek as you let go of his sleeve. You remembered every bit of the dream you had—well, it wasn’t really a dream as much as it was a memory. It was embarrassing to think that Beomgyu had heard any part of the memory, but you tried not to think about it too much.

“Beomgyu,” You said, opening your eyes once more to look at him. “Were you singing just now? Before I woke up?”

He didn’t say anything at first, his expression blank. Then, he smiled, nudging your shoulder with his. “Of course not—you know I don’t sing. Why?”

“Actually, for the record, I did not know that,” You corrected. “And I don’t know, I just . . . thought I heard someone.”

“Maybe it was your soulmate,” Beomgyu said, moving his eyebrows up and down.

You sighed, looking down at your feet. “I wish it was. I haven’t heard from him in two years.”

The smile fell from Beomgyu’s face right away. “Ah, sorry, I didn’t know.”

“It’s okay, you don’t have to apologize.”

“Do you . . . know what happened to him?”

You shook your head, staring at the moon through the window. “No. I don’t even know who he was.”

“Hey, why are you speaking in the past tense?” He turned towards you and grabbed your shoulders, forcing you to face him. “Think positively, Y/N. He could still be out there. When did you first hear him?”

“When I was thirteen,” You answered. “But he stopped singing two years ago.”

“And you haven’t heard anything since then?”

You hesitated, thinking back over the past two years and all the sleepless nights you had spent waiting and hoping to hear any trace of a note ringing in your ears, the faintest hint of a voice. Sometimes, when you were just about to close your eyes, you would’ve sworn that you could hear his voice for the briefest of moments before you drifted off, but you would always blame it on being sleep deprived.

“No,” you said quietly. “I haven’t heard anything. He used to sing all the time, too. I would wake up to the sound of his voice, and it would carry me throughout each and every day. I know it sounds weird to say this about someone I don’t remember meeting, but I felt . . . connected to him, if that makes sense?”

Beomgyu didn’t say anything, so you continued. “He’s actually the reason why I picked up the violin. I got so used to his voice, I would go around humming all day. I guess my mom got tired of hearing me, because soon after I started hearing him, my mom signed me up for violin lessons. And, well, now I’m here.”

You looked over to see Beomgyu smiling softly, but his eyes didn’t meet yours. “Do you have any idea of who it might be?”

You were quiet for a moment. The image of the boy from the hotel parking lot with his star-struck eyes and diamond smile came to your mind, as always.

“No. But I have someone I hope it is.”

You looked over at him again, and this time, his eyes met yours. The silvery light of the moon highlighted the right side of his face and the bridge of his nose, casting a stark shadow across the other side. He was neither smiling nor frowning as his eyes searched yours. What exactly he was looking for you couldn’t be sure of, however, you liked the eye contact well enough to let it go on for a moment longer before you cleared your throat, looking back towards the window.

“Did you try calling Yeonjun again?”

“Yep. No answer.”

“Taehyun?”

“Nothing.”

“The professor?”

“Didn’t pick up—I left a message though.”

You sighed, allowing the back of your head to hit the wall behind you. “We’ll be stuck here all night at this rate.”

“Well, now that you’ve had a little nap, we may as well use this time to be productive,” Beomgyu said, standing to his feet and stretching his arms above his head as he did so.

You crossed your arms, raising a brow as you watched him pull his guitar out of the case. “What’s this? Choi Beomgyu taking initiative?”

“Hey, we said we were starting over.”

You laughed as he sat on the edge of the desk in front of where you were sitting on the floor. He pulled the strap over his shoulder and began tuning his guitar by ear, something you always struggled to do with your violin.

“What are you doing?” You asked.

He strummed through all the strings, nodding when he was satisfied with the sounds. Glancing down at you, he smiled. “What does it look like I’m doing? I’m going to show you the song I wrote.”

Interest piqued, you sat up straighter and smiled back at him. “I was hoping that’s what you’d say.”

He laughed, adjusting his position on the desk before his fingers found their place on the neck of the guitar. You listened attentively as he began to pick the first notes, watching the way his fingers moved deliberately across the frets, yet, his movements never lost their grace. At first, he kept his eyes focused on his hands. But as the song went on, his eyes slowly closed, and he played without seeing, relying solely on the sound of the notes he was creating and the feeling of the strings that pressed into his calloused fingertips.

Awestruck would have been an understatement for the way you felt as you watched him play. The way he became one with the sounds he created, the way his wrist twisted to strum and how his fingertips slid across the length of the instrument as if it was the very thing they had been created to do. You were hypnotized, allowing the music to seep into your heart and make it thump against your chest like a caged bird begging to be set free.

If you had to put a word to how he looked in that moment, “beautiful” was the closest you would be able to get.

He opened his eyes as he strummed the last note, a gentle grin on his lips. You noticed how his eyes sparkled in the darkness, despite his back being towards the moonlight rather than his face.

“What do you think?” He asked, his voice sounding sharp as it pierced through the thick silence that had settled over the room.

“It was—”

“It was real pretty, kid.”

You yelped in surprise at the sudden voice, jumping up to your feet as Beomgyu practically fell off the desk, nearly dropping his guitar in the process. You helped steady him, and together, you looked towards the door to see that it was wide open, fluorescent light from the hallway spilling into the room as the janitor stood in the entry way, arms crossed over his chest as he blew a bubble with the gum in his mouth.

“If you’re done serenading your girlfriend, would you mind leaving so I can clean up and go home? This building closed an hour ago, but if you both leave now I’ll keep quiet.”

Your cheeks went hot, and you struggled to form words as Beomgyu scrambled to put his guitar back in its case. “Girl—girlfriend? No, we’re not—I mean, I’m not his—we just got stuck and—”

“Thank you, sir. We’re really sorry.” Beomgyu cut you off as he picked up his guitar case with one hand and wrapped his free arm around your shoulders, pulling you into his side. You gasped, but were too stunned to do anything but follow Beomgyu’s lead as he pulled you out of the room.

“What was that about?” You asked once the two of you had safely made it out of the building. “You were not serenading me.”

Beomgyu shrugged, letting his arm fall from your shoulders. Your mouth fell open at his lack of a denial. “Choi Beomgyu! Stop messing around.”

“Who said I was messing around?” He teased, winking at you as he began to walk towards his dorm building, which was on the other side of campus from yours.

You scoffed but said nothing as you watched his back while he walked away from you, trying to piece together what had just happened.

“See you tomorrow, Y/N!” He shouted, turning around as he walked so he could wave goodbye.

You gave him a weak-hearted wave in return, pressing your hands against your flushed cheeks as you slowly began to tread back to your own dorm room.

How strange it was that just that morning, you would have given almost anything to avoid seeing Beomgyu.

But now, you found yourself counting down the minutes left until the next day so you could see him again.

WHEN YOU GOT BACK TO YOUR DORM FROM REHEARSAL THE NEXT EVENING, YOU HAD A TEXT.

Beomgyu: I know we said we were starting over, but I can’t forget that I still owe you a coffee. Meet me at the library in 15?

You felt like an idiot, but you couldn’t stop the grin from taking over your face. Slipping your shoes back on, you typed out a quick reply before slipping out the door.

You: Make it 5. I’ll be waiting.

When you arrived at the library, you were surprised to see that Beomgyu was already there. The line for coffee was very short, as most students had settled into their dorms for the night. Only a few stray overachievers and those that were desperately trying to cram for exams were there, and Beomgyu had claimed a place in line amongst them. He held his guitar in one hand, as per usual, and you wondered if there would ever come a time in which you would see him without it.

“How is it that you demanded to meet me ten minutes earlier than I planned, and I still got here before you?” He asked once you had reached him.

“First of all, I did not demand anything from you,” You said, pushing your fist against his shoulder. “Secondly, that is so unfair, because you know that your dorm is way closer to the library than mine is.”

“Sounds like an excuse to me, but okay. Ah, it’s our turn.” He placed his hand on the small of your back and pulled you closer to the counter. Your stomach flipped, but for some reason, you didn’t mind.

After the two of had gotten your coffees, Beomgyu told you to follow him up the stairs. You expected to stop at the second floor, but to your surprise, he kept leading you. He took you through a door in the back that you didn’t even know existed, where there was another flight of stairs. At the end of these stairs was another door. You stepped outside and found yourself on the rooftop, with a great view of the campus below.

“Are you sure we’re allowed to be up here?” You asked.

“Well, no. But I’ve come up here a lot and never gotten in trouble, so what’s the harm?”

“That does not make me feel any better.”

“Come on, Y/N.” He took your hand in his and brought you over to the wide ledge, big enough for the two of you to sit on without the fear of falling off. “What’s the worst that could happen?”

You paused, eyes growing wide. He stared back at you as he hoisted himself up on the ledge. He took a sip of his coffee before asking, “Why are you staring at me like that?”

You shook your head, setting your coffee beside of him before bringing yourself up to sit on the ledge yourself.

“Nothing,” You said. “You just reminded me of someone.”

“Ah.” He stared at you for a moment longer before he slipped his jacket off and wrapped it around your shoulders. You opened your mouth to protest, but he placed his finger against your parted lips, which was more than enough to shut you up.

“Just accept an act of kindness, would you?” He said, zipping his jacket up over you. You watched him as he did so, noticing the way his chocolate eyes sparkled in the midst of the cloudy night.

You swallowed, averting your gaze. “Thank you.”

“You’re very welcome. That wasn’t so hard, was it?”

It was quiet then, but not in an uncomfortable way. You enjoyed sitting beside of him in the silence, watching the lights of campus below you, feeling the warmth from his jacket spread over your chilled skin.

“Actually, Y/N, there’s something that’s been bothering me,” Beomgyu said, breaking the silence.

You turned to face him, curious. “What is it?”

For the first time since you had met him, Beomgyu looked nervous. He picked at the skin around his nails, doing everything he could to keep his eyes from meeting yours.

“Remember how you asked me if I sang? When we were locked in the orchestra room?” His voice was a bit quieter than it had been before.

“Yeah, you said you didn’t.”

“Right. Well, that—that was a lie,” He blurted, seeming to regret his words the second they had left his mouth. “Well, not a blatant lie, because I don’t sing anymore. But I used to.”

You were a bit confused, but seeing how nervous he was, you decided not to ask him why he would lie about such a seemingly trivial topic.

“What made you stop?” You asked carefully, not wanting to upset him.

He hesitated, wringing his hands together. After taking a deep breath, he spoke again.

“My father and I used to sing together,” He began. “I taught myself how to play the guitar, but he was the one who taught me how to sing. He loved to sing, more than anything else, and he always told me that I had a brilliant voice. He said it would be a shame to keep such a voice to myself.”

He smiled fondly as he spoke of his father, and you couldn’t help but smile as well. The joy slowly faded from his expression, however, as he began to speak again.

“I lost him two years ago,” He said quietly, voice thick with emotions that caused your heart to clench. “He was in a bad car accident. I was doing really well here, in vocals and guitar. But when I lost him, I just . . . I couldn’t sing anymore. I tried, I really did. I just couldn’t do it.”

“Oh, Beomgyu,” You whispered, gently placing your hand over his trembling one.

“It’s pathetic, isn’t it?” He sniffed, wiping his eyes with the back of his hand. “Singing was the one thing he wanted me to do, and now that he’s gone, I’m failing at it.”

“No, Beomgyu,” You said, your voice firm as you squeezed his hand. “It’s not pathetic at all. You’re doing the best you can, and you’re still here. And most importantly, you tried. That’s what matters.”

He brought his eyes back to yours then, glistening with moisture in the moonless, starless night. He smiled at you then, and you smiled back.

“Y/N.”

“Hm?”

“Have I told you yet that you’re really, really beautiful?”

Your breath caught in your throat, and you froze, feeling the blood rush to your cheeks. You were frozen for a moment before you scoffed, pulling your hand away from his and tucking it into your lap.

“I thought you were going to start being more serious,” You mumbled, refusing to look at him. “Stop messing around.”

Then, he moved closer to you, placing one arm behind you while he brought the other to rest against your cheek, gently turning your face towards his. He leaned in, so close that his breath brushed against your skin. He smelled of citrus and vanilla, and you found yourself leaning closer to him.

He glanced at your lips, then met your eyes once again.

“What makes you think I’m not being serious?”

His lips were soft when they pressed against yours, and it felt as though your heart would burst right out of your chest. You allowed your eyes to fall shut as he gently moved his mouth against yours, slowly tucking a piece of hair behind your ear as he did so, before allowing his fingers to gently trace their way along your cheek, then your jaw, until he rested his hand against your neck, pulling you a tiny bit closer to him.

He broke the kiss for a fleeting moment, just to open his eyes so he could look into yours. You liked the flecks of light that beamed in his irises, as though his eyes were made of starlight. He smiled, allowing his nose to brush against yours as his eyes moved back down to your lips. Once again, he closed the distance between you, capturing your lips with his for the second time. He tasted like coffee and cheap cherry chap-stick—and odd combination, but you didn’t mind as you brought your arms around his neck and shifted closer to him, twisting your head to the side as you moved your lips in time with his.

The moment was unexpected, to say the least. But perhaps that was what made it feel that much more magical.

At least, it was magical until you felt scalding hot liquid splash all over the side of your leg, seeping through the fabric of your jeans to burn your skin.

You gasped against Beomgyu’s lips before pulling away, staring wide eyed at your jeans that were now stained with coffee. Your cup, which had been sitting between the two of you, was now knocked on its side, the contents drained.

“Oh my god, I’m so sorry, Y/N,” Beomgyu said frantically. His lips were shining from the aftermath of your kiss, his freckled cheeks and nose red as a cherry. He gently pressed his hands against your leg, pulling them back when you winced from the impact. “Oh god—I’m sorry, I forgot that it was there and I was leaning in and I knocked it over and—”

You laughed at how flustered he had become, amused by this side of him that you hadn’t seen before. You grabbed his face and pulled him towards you, pressing your lips against his in a swift kiss, effectively shutting him up.

“It’s okay, Beomgyu,” You said once you pulled away, letting your hands fall from his face. “I guess you just owe me another coffee.”

The goofy lopsided grin you had grown accustomed to took place of the frightened expression he had worn just moments before. He hopped off the ledge, extending his hand towards you to help you down.

“Come on, partner. Let’s get you cleaned up.”

IT WAS THE DAY OF THE OPEN HOUSE, AND YOU WERE SLIGHTLY UNNERVED BY HOW WELL THINGS WERE GOING.

You had hoped that everything would go smoothly. The past few weeks, you had spent all your time and energy making sure that the event would be as close to perfect as possible.

Well, you had also spent a bit of time with Beomgyu, but only when you had the time to spare, of course.

The performers were all setting up; the drama department was working on setting up the stage props, as they would be going first, and they were busy rehearsing with the orchestra for how they could effectively move the props to make room for the instruments in a timely fashion. Yeonjun was rushing about, directing them with the grace and efficiency only he could pull off.

Everything was going perfectly. You should have just been happy about that, but for some reason, it felt as though you were just waiting for something to go terribly wrong.

“Y/N.” You turned at the sound of Beomgyu’s voice, smiling as he walked towards you. He was dressed in a white button up shirt that he tucked into a pair of black jeans. His sleeves were pushed up a bit, exposing his forearms.

“Everything okay?” You asked once he had reached you. You glanced at the members of the band, who were talking in hushed voices right behind Beomgyu. Your eyes narrowed when you noticed that something was amiss. “Where’s Soobin? Is he on his way?”

Beomgyu sighed, running a hand through his already messy curls. “That’s what I was coming to talk to you about. He’s sick—he won’t be able to make it. I just got a text from him.”

You blinked slowly, trying to process what you had just been told. Soobin was the main vocalist for the band. Without him, or someone to fill his position, there would be no performance.

You quickly walked over to the band, desperately trying to think of something to fix the situation, and Beomgyu was following right behind you.

“Can any of you do lead vocals in Soobin’s place?” You asked.

“No,” the main guitarist said, looking just as stressed out as you were. “We’d have to change the entire key for it to fit my range, and even if we had time to do that—which we don’t—we wouldn’t have any backup vocals.”

You pinched the bridge of your nose, squeezing your eyes shut. “There’s got to be something we can do to replace him. We can’t just take the band performance out.”

“How about Beomgyu?”

Your eyes flew open at the sound of Yeonjun’s voice, and you whirled around to see him standing behind you.

“When did you get there?” You asked.

“A minute or so ago,” He said, striding forward so that he stood on the other side of you. “But seriously, everyone knows Beomgyu can sing. He used to do it all the time. Why not have him take Soobin’s place?”

“It would make sense,” the guitarist said, his face lighting up with a glint of hope. “He’s been here for all the practices—I mean, he even wrote the song!”

You turned your eyes towards Beomgyu, worry overtaking you in an instant when you saw his expression. All the color had drained from his face, his lips pulled between his teeth. His hands were trembling, and he refused to meet your gaze.

“Beomgyu,” You said quietly, taking his shaky hand in your steady one. “You don’t have to. We can figure something else out—”

“I’ll think about it,” He said, eyes finally finding yours. He did his best to force a smile, but it was so strained, your worry only grew at the sight. “Just . . . can you give me a little while?”

You nodded, squeezing his hand. “Of course.”

He slipped away from you then, disappearing behind the stage. Your eyes followed him until you couldn’t see him any longer, worry creasing your brows.

“What was that about?” Yeonjun asked, stepping a bit closer to you. “I understand not wanting to force anyone to do something last minute, but we don’t really have many options.”

“There’s more to it than that,” You said quietly. “Just trust me, okay? And if he says he can’t do it, he can’t. We are not going to force him to do this.”

Yeonjun still looked confused, but he simply shrugged. “Whatever you say, captain. But just so you know, if he can’t do it, you’re gonna be the one singing in Soobin’s place. And trust me, no one wants to hear that.”

You fought the urge to flip him off as he walked away, wondering why on earth you still kept him around as your best friend.

The rest of the preparations went on, and soon, the audience had begun to fill the auditorium. You hadn’t seen Beomgyu since that moment during rehearsals, and you were beginning to grow worried.

You stood in the right wing of the stage as the show began with the drama department. You tried to focus on the performance—it was amazing, of course, especially since Yeonjun played a lead role in the scene they had chosen. Everyone knew he was an amazing actor. However, rather than being able to enjoy the show, you could only think about where Beomgyu was and wonder if he was doing alright, your stomach twisting itself into knots as the seconds ticked by.

By the time the drama students were finished, the audience standing to clap for their flawless performance, you had bitten your nails down to nubs as you grew increasingly worried. Yeonjun rushed over to you when he left the stage, smiling widely as he stretched his arms out to his sides. “How’d we do?”

“Hm?” You snapped out of your daze, shaking your head as you gave him two thumbs up. “Oh—wonderful. You guys were great. Hey, will you make sure everything goes well with the orchestra? I have to go find Beomgyu.”

“Well why don’t you stay here and I’ll go find him—”

“Nope, I’ve got it! Thanks best friend, you’re the greatest!” You gave him a quick hug before he could say anything else, quickly rushing out of the auditorium. You made your way down a few hallways, taking a couple of turns until you had reached one of the dressing rooms. You knew this was where Beomgyu had been getting ready because his guitar case was propped against the wall outside of it, so you hoped he was still inside.

You knocked on the door. “Beomgyu? Are you in there?”

It was silent, but you heard someone sniffle from behind the door. You sighed, leaning against the wood. “You don’t have to say anything, okay? But just hear me out.”

There was no response, but you could have sworn you felt someone leaning against the door from the other side.

“I know you may feel like you have to pressure yourself to do this, but you don’t,” You said gently. “Nobody is going to be disappointed if you can’t get up there to sing. Not me, not Yeonjun, not the band.”

You paused, biting your lip before you continued. “Your father wouldn’t be upset either, Beomgyu. The fact that you’re willing to even think about doing something this hard just to help out shows just how great of a person you are. He would be so, so proud of you. I’m proud of you, too. Whether or not you get up there and sing tonight, I’m proud of you. Okay?”

You stayed there, waiting in silence for a moment longer before you pushed away from the door, walking back towards the auditorium.

The orchestra was almost finished with their set by the time you returned to the wing. Yeonjun and the band were waiting with anticipation when you returned, eyes wide and searching behind you, probably hoping that Beomgyu was close behind.

“Is he coming?” Yeonjun asked.

You sighed, shaking your head slowly. “I don’t think so. We’ll just have to call off the band’s performance, but it’ll be okay—”

“That won’t be necessary.”

You turned at the sound of Beomgyu’s voice, unable to help the big smile that overtook your face. You hurried towards him, grabbing both his hands in your own.

“Are you sure?” You asked. “You know you don’t have to—”

“I know I don’t,” he said with a smile. “But I want to.”

He leaned forward and pressed a quick kiss against your forehead. “Thank you. For everything.”

He went up to talk to the band after that, leaving you a blushing mess. The orchestra had just finished their set and were busy making way for the band. Yeonjun walked to your side as Beomgyu and the rest of the band took their places on the stage.

“Did he just kiss you?” Your best friend asked. For some reason, he didn’t sound surprised.

Dumbfounded, you brought your hand to your forehead and nodded, unable to speak. Yeonjun laughed at you, causing you to snap out of your daze so you could punch him lightly in the shoulder.

Once the band had finished getting ready, Beomgyu cleared his throat, tapping the mic before leaning forward to speak into it.

“Hello everyone, thanks for coming out tonight. My name is Choi Beomgyu, and these lovely people surrounding me are some of the many talented musicians in our music department.” He paused when the audience clapped, waiting until the applause died down before he spoke again. “To wrap up this showcase, we’ll be performing a song I wrote myself. I wrote this about someone I met a long, long time ago.”

He turned his head to the side then, making eye contact with you from the stage. He smiled, not taking his gaze away from yours. He looked heavenly in the light cast from the spotlight, strands of his black hair seeming to turn silver beneath the glow, his golden skin shining brighter than ever. You were sure that if you were close enough, you would see the star-like sparkles in his eyes that you had grown to adore.

“I hope she remembers me, even after all this time.”

“Is he talking about you?” Yeonjun whispered into your ear, noticing the direction of Beomgyu’s stare. “You guys just met like, a month ago.”

You were just as confused as your best friend, so in response, you simply shrugged, unsure of what was going on. He was definitely talking to you, but you had no idea what he was referring to.

“I hope she remembers me, even after all this time.”

You racked your brain, trying desperately to think of what he could mean. Had you met him before? Did he remember you from somewhere, from a memory that had somehow slipped your mind?

The music began to play, and you took a step closer to the stage, eyes narrowed, ready to focus on the lyrics, wanting more than anything to remember what Beomgyu was talking about.

“In moments like those, when tears fill your eyes, hold my hand tight. Should we run away?”

Your eyes went wide. You stumbled back, reaching up to hold your head in your hands.

“Y/N?” Yeonjun’s voice was distant, overpowered by the sound of the honey sweet voice that filled the air. “Y/N, what’s wrong?”

You gasped, hands tangling in your hair as the singing continued.

“Be my forever, call my name. Run away, run away, run away with me.”

Your head was ringing. Not only were these words the same ones you had heard in your head the night you were locked in the classroom with Beomgyu, but the voice—Beomgyu’s voice—was the same one you had heard day and night while growing up.

It was your soulmates voice.

You knew it was, not just because of the lyrics or the familiarity of the voice. You knew it was your soulmate because you didn’t just hear the words and the notes of the song, you felt them. Every inch of your being felt as though it had been struck by lightning. The voice filled up all of your senses, overpowering you in the most beautiful way imaginable.

But it was too much. His voice coming through the loudspeakers paired with it ringing inside your head built up so much pressure that it caused your vision to blur. You quickly stumbled out of the auditorium, fumbling your way through the front doors that led outside.

You sat down on the pavement, taking deep breaths as your mind began to calm down. No longer overwhelmed by all that was going on around you, you closed your eyes, listening to Beomgyu’s voice as it filled your mind.

“Don’t wanna stay, now we can go. Take me now to the magic named ‘us.’”

With those words, the voice died down, and you were surrounded by silence.

You simply sat there for several moments, your eyes remaining closed as you tried to understand everything that had just happened to you.

Beomgyu was your soulmate.

Beomgyu was your soulmate, and he was alive.

Bit by bit, you started to piece things together. The night of your thirteenth birthday, the day before you heard his voice for the first time. You had met the boy with sparkling eyes and a lopsided grin in the hotel parking lot. He had offered you his coat, and then his hand.

“I hope she remembers me,” Beomgyu had said.

You smiled to yourself, placing your hand over your heart as it beat fiercely against your chest.

“Yes, Beomgyu. I do remember you.”

“Y/N!”

Your eyes flew open at the sound of the door being thrown open behind you. You turned to see Beomgyu barreling towards you, practically collapsing to the ground in front of you. He took your face in his hands, eyes frantically searching yours.

“Are you okay?” He asked, his fingers gently running along the length of your cheeks.

You nodded, smiling even though tears began to pool in your eyes. “Beomgyu,” You said quietly, lifting your hands to hold his wrists. “You knew, didn’t you?”

“Knew what?”

“That you’re my soulmate.”

He paused, the worry in his face slowly being replaced by a wide, sparkling smile.

“So you finally figured it out, huh?” He said, brushing a strand of your hair back behind your ear. “If you didn’t figure it out after tonight, I wasn’t sure how else I was supposed to show you.”

You laughed, a tear slipping down your cheek as you tightened your grip on his wrists. His expression changed once again, brows knit with concern. “Are—are you crying? What’s wrong?”

“No, nothing, it’s fine,” You assured him, resting your forehead against his. “I’m just happy. I’m so, so happy, Beomgyu.”

He sighed with relief, wrapping his arms around you in a hug, pulling you snugly into his chest. His chin rested on top of your head as you slipped your arms around his middle, pulling him even closer than he already was.

“I was a little worried that you’d be disappointed when you found out it was me,” He said with a light laugh.

You shook your head against his chest, snuggling even closer to him. “Of course not. You’re exactly who I hoped it would be, Choi Beomgyu.”

The two of you stayed like that for a bit longer before Beomgyu pulled away and stood up in front of you.

The boy with stars for eyes and a smile that outshone the moon stretched his hand out towards you, fingers shaking from the cold, cheeks flushed from your embrace.

“Should we run away?” He asked.

This time, you placed your hand in his and let him pull you to your feet.

2K notes · View notes

remywrites5 · 5 years ago

Note

hiiii i really love your blog and i may or may not have spent the weekend binge reading your posts.... 😂 anyway i’ve had a kinda shitty day and i was wondering if you could maybe write something with james x regulus? if not that’s totally fine haha thank you!!!!!!

Hi nonny! I’m pretty sure this ask is like years old and I’m really sorry it took me so long! You probably don’t even follow me anymore but if you do I hope your days have gotten better! But either way here’s a little something for you:

***

“Oi, Jamie,” Sirius said, poking his head into James’ room. “Just a reminder that my brother is coming to visit for the weekend.”

James groaned. “Sirius, no!” he complained, shutting his chemistry book. “You’ll disappear with Remus for the entire weekend and I’ll be stuck babysitting your brother, who I’ve never even met!”

Sirius rolled his eyes. “First of all, Reg is only a year younger than us, you won’t be babysitting anyone. Second of all, we’re all going to a party at Mckinnon’s tonight so you won’t be stuck alone with him the whole time.”

“Just part of the time?”

Sirius shrugged. “I mean I’ll do my best…”

“God, you’re the worst fucking friend,” James grumbled, opening his chemistry book back up and attempting to cram for his test later that day.

“Oh and Jamie?”

“Yes?

“Don’t be a prick, alright?

Sirius ducked out of the way as a chemistry book went flying towards his head.

***

“Honey, we’re home,” Sirius sing-songed as he arrived back from picking Regulus up from the train station. James sighed and got out of bed, figuring he might as well try to be nice to the intruder. It wasn’t that James was opposed to people visiting for the weekend, it was just that Sirius and Remus were attached at the hip, and James hadn’t been making any progress with Evans. He knew it was selfish, but he hated other people being happy when he was fairly miserable. The last thing he wanted to do this weekend was hang around some snotty-nosed younger sibling.

He stepped out into the hallway and saw the Black brothers together for the first time. It wasn’t hard to tell they were related, same inky black hair, same impossibly high cheekbones, matching grey eyes. But where Sirius was all rough edges and rock and roll, Regulus was all smooth and posh. Unlike Sirius, who kept his hair long and shoulder length and a decent amount of stubble on his face, Regulus had his hair styled, cut short on the side and long on top to fall into his eyes in a very chic way. He was also clean-shaven and James could only imagine he had all kinds of fancy potions and after-creams to give him that effect.

“Hello,” Regulus said, holding his hand out to James, already being ever so polite. “You must be James. It’s nice to meet you.”

“Nice to meet you too,” James said, making the handshake a little rougher than was strictly necessary.

Sirius grinned broadly and threw his arms around each of their shoulders, drawing them close to him. “My two brothers, together at last!”

“Gerroff,” James growled, shoving Sirius away and into Regulus.

Sirius shrugged and hugged Regulus more thoroughly. “I’m so happy you’re here!”

Regulus blushed, his eyes meeting James and then darting away quickly. “Yes, you kept saying on the ride over here.”

James snorted. “I’ll put some tea on.”

***

The party was already in full swing by the time they’d gotten there. Marlene lived in a flat off campus with a few other girls and even though it was bigger than the dormitories, it still couldn’t really fit the amount of people currently occupying it. Just moving around the party was like swimming through jelly. James had spilled at least a cup and a half of beer on himself just from trying to navigate the party.

As predicted, Sirius ditched them the moment they got to the party and he found the familiar head of his favorite tawny-haired nerd. James hadn’t exactly been keeping the closest eye on Regulus since then but he was slightly alarmed when he realized Reg wasn’t close by. “Fucking great,” James mumbled to himself, trying to finish his drink just as someone knocked his elbow and the entire contents of his red solo cup splashed over his face. “Fuck this.”

James edged his way towards the door and somehow managed to get it open. Getting outside was a relief, being able to smell something other than booze and sweat. He shoved his glass up to the top of his head and lifted his shirt up to wipe his face clean. When he replaced his glasses, he noticed a figure in his periphery. He turned his head to find Regulus leaning against the building smoking a cigarette. He looked a bit like an ad from a magazine, the way his leg was bent so his foot could rest against the wall behind him, his face tilted back to reveal the pale expanse of his neck. James swallowed thickly. He was absolutely not going to fancy his best mate’s little brother. Regulus was Off Limits.

James walked down the front steps of the building and stood in front of Regulus. “Does Sirius know you smoke?” he asked, raising a judgmental eyebrow at the younger man.

“Is it his business?” Regulus countered, taking a long drag from his ciggy and blowing it intentionally in James’ face in a very obvious fuck off.

James waved his hand in front of his face to clear the smoke and exhaled loudly in disapproval. Christ, he sounded so much like his dad. “You’re nothing like what I imagined.”

“Yeah?” Reg said, flicking ash onto the ground below. “What were you imagining? A toddler?”

James shrugged. “You hear the words little brother and you’re not exactly what people picture, alright?”

“Sirius never showed you a picture of me?” Regulus asked, sounding a little hurt by the prospect.

“He has,” James said quickly, not wanting to give Reg the wrong idea. Sirius actually talked about him a lot, constantly worrying about Reg being stuck at home with their awful parents while Sirius was at University. At least next year Reg would be joining them and Sirius could stop being so concerned all the bloody time. “I just think most of the pictures he’s shown me were from when you were a lot younger. Still had your spots.”

Regulus smiled and took another drag. “He’s shown me pictures of you too,” he said, his smile becoming a little more sinister. “The one when you fell asleep drunk and he glued the deer horns to your head.”

James groaned in humiliation. “The next time I see Sirius he’s a dead man!”

Regulus laughed and dropped his cigarette, sliding his designer shoes over it to put it out. “What are friends for, right?”

“Yeah,” James said, trying not to sound sad as he said it. He was happy for Sirius and Remus, he really was. The first few months of Uni had been torture, watching Sirius and Remus dance around each other, both clearly interested but not saying it. It had been a relief to see them finally get over their shit and get together. But that didn’t mean James didn’t miss the old days of the three of them being friends, not that they weren’t still friends, but things had changed.

***

Sirius, of course, went over to Remus’ after the party, leaving James to get Regulus set up on their beat up old sofa. He pulled out the only spare blankets they had, just a thin sheet, and did his best to make it look comfortable. He showed Regulus how to work the telly, in case he wasn’t ready for bed, and then disappeared into his own room.

His curiosity got the best of him and he found Regulus’ instagram fairly easily. He thanked his lucky stars that it wasn’t a private account because having Reg know that he was looking was a bit too embarrassing. He began scrolling through the pictures and felt his mouth go dry. Reg knew how to take an amazing photo. James stared in disbelief that the same guy that was currently on his shitty sofa, watching what sounded to be That 70’s Show, could be the same person in these photos.

His eyes were glued to the screen as he swiped through picture after picture, his body heating up in response. Not good, he thought, trying and failing to remind himself that this was Sirius’ younger brother. Kill me now.

He was just about to slid his hand under the covers and do something about the ache between his legs when the door to his room opened. James dropped his phone in surprise and sat up, hoping he wasn’t tenting the blankets in an obvious way.

Regulus made his way over and slipped into James’ bed without asking. James stared at him, his throat working to try and swallow, and he watched in horror and Reg made himself comfortable.

“What are you doing?” James asked, his mind racing, trying to think of anything to make his erection go away.

Regulus shrugged. “It’s freezing and your sofa is a piece of shit.”

“Then go sleep in Sirius’ bed,” James said, dragging his hand over his face. This could not be happening to him.

“It would still be freezing,” Regulus rationalized, sinking further into the blankets. “This way we can share body heat.”

James stared at him incredulously.

Regulus sighed. “Don’t be such a baby, James. Just think of it as survival mode, right?”

James nodded and got back under the covers, taking care that no part of him was touching Regulus. “Good night,” he said awkwardly, his eyes wide open. He didn’t think he’d be getting much sleep.

“Good night.”

***

James woke up feeling good. He was warm and comfortable, and except for the arm he was sleeping on that had gone numb, he felt wholly relaxed. It took a moment for his brain to clear the fog and realize that he was spooning Reg. His nose was pressed against the nape of Reg’s neck and they were slotted together from that point of contact down to their feet. James’ crotch was pressed against Reg’ bum and Christ there was no way he couldn’t feel how hard James was.

Regulus began to stir, his body shifting and James’ hand flew up and grabbed him by the hips to still him. Reg turned his head and smiled wickedly. “Problem, Potter?” he teased, moving his hips just to be a little shit.

James ripped himself away and tore the covers off, heading into the bathroom. He turned the water to as cold as he could stand it and stood under the spray. Not good, he thought having a crisis right there in the shower. Sure, he’d been attracted to blokes before. This wasn’t a sexual identity crisis because James was bi and proud and would kick the shit out of anyone that had a problem with that.

The issue was that this was Sirius’ brother and James was fairly certain Sirius would never forgive him. And more importantly Regulus was only there for the weekend. There was no point to be getting all hot and bothered about it. Except that next year Reg would be at this school with them. Shit, James was so utterly and completely fucked.

Once he’d calmed down, he stepped out of the shower and slung a towel around his waist. He ventured out into the hallway and found Regulus waiting for him. “Have a good cold shower, did we?” he asked, his eyes shinning knowingly.

“Fuck off, Reg,” James growled, pushing past him towards his room.

“You liked one of my pictures,” Reg said to James’ retreating back.

“What?” James asked, spinning around, droplets falling from his skin onto the floor.

Regulus took a step towards him but didn’t close the distance between them any further. “Last night, you liked one of my pictures on Instagram. That’s why I came into your room. I thought maybe you had done it on purpose, but I guess it was just an accident, huh?” Regulus laughed awkwardly and scratched at his eyebrow idly.

James processed what Reg had just said, trying to get past his mortification at having done something so stupid, and went right to Reg coming into his room after knowing James was stalking him online. “So last night…” James started, trying to think of the night words. “Just what were you hoping for?”

“I don’t know,” Reg responded, staring at the floor. “Something like this morning except without the part of you running away like a frightened deer?”

James stepped closer, bridging the gap between them a bit. “Why?” he asked, reaching out and tugging Regulus closer by his sleep shirt. Reg stumbled a bit but went willingly. “You don’t even know me.”

Regulus blushed prettily and ducked his head down. “I feel like I do,” he murmured softly. “On his visits home Sirius would talk about you constantly. You were almost like – fuck – like a fairytale character to me. I kept pressuring Sirius for a visit because I wanted to meet you. God, you must think I’m a stupid little kid with a crush. Please, don’t say anything to Sirius about all this. He’ll never let me hear the end of it.”

“Then how will I tell him we’re dating?” James asked, smiling mischievously.

Regulus shook his head. “Please don’t take the piss right now,” he begged softly. “I don’t think my ego can handle it after this morning.”

James cupped Regulus’ chin and forced the younger man to meet his gaze. James smiled kindly and traced Reg’s full lips with his thumb. “I wasn’t taking the piss. Although I should probably warn you that I am a bit of a cock-up. I don’t think dating me will be the fairytale you imagined.”

Regulus bit James’ thumb playfully. “I don’t care,” he said, smiling at James. “Even the beast had some good qualities.”

“I notice you’ve cast yourself as beauty in the scenario.”

“You don’t think I’m pretty?” Regulus said, batting his eyelashes.

James chuckled. “I think you’re gorgeous,” he said honestly, “And also trouble.”

Regulus grinned. “You don’t mind a bit of trouble, do you, James?” he challenged, raising an eyebrow.

“Not at all.”

#jegulus #i write things #background wolfstar #university au #I've been writing a lot of those lately #long post #fluff #I actually wrote something where they don't kiss #it feels wrong

80 notes · View notes

burning-clutch · 5 years ago

Text

Crashing Like A Tidal Wave With Cardiac Arrest: Part 1

Read on Ao3: here (Chapter 1 of 2) Pairings: Jack/Maddie Trigger Warnings: Blood and gore, Major character death Author: @burning-clutch (Team Ghost) Total words: 4711 prompt by: Anthropwashere / Anthrop AO3 and FFN: Anthrop

-.-.-.- **Important** There is a bit of excessive gore in here I wanted to try my hand at writing but I marked it between xXxX lines. it's not a lot just an over detailed depiction of the scene, but if you need to skip it, it will not change how the story is perceived, and you can continue on with out worry. -.-.-.-.-

The day was routine, or at least it started out that way…

Danny had woken up late for school having spent the night prior fighting endless rounds of Ectopuss, giant rats, a pack of wolves, a bear ghost, the Box Ghost, Skulker, some weird rabbit gorilla cross…. All in all nothing too terrible… Just relentlessly endless and annoying, eating into his sleep and making him generally miserable the next day.

Danny had gotten to the school in record time, not that it mattered really, he was already late and the added five minutes it took didn’t make any difference in Lancer’s eyes. He was sorely tempted to skip his first period altogether but didn’t really want to risk the phone call home to his parents.

He was a big enough disappointment to them as it was right now, and the last thing he needed or wanted to be the hollow sight from his parents as they looked on to him hopelessly.

“I really wish you would take this more seriously hun,” his mother would say

“I know these are your best years son, but the school’s important! Fenton’s are smart and you got a legacy to uphold!” his father would continue.

It was the same thing almost every time he screwed up, followed by his sensitive ears picking up his parents' hushed conversations mainly consisting of. “I don’t know what we’re going to do for him… nothing helps…”

He sighed as he landed in the janitor’s closet and transformed back to human. He shouldn’t worry about this now. Jazz and him were making preparations to be able to tell his parents the truth, and hopefully, that will allow him to smooth over most of the issues with his parents. He was concerned that he may have some loss of freedom though.

Or at least Jazz had warned him that may be the case. At the very least he could expect enforced ghost fighting curfews with a ghost shield around the house that a halfa can’t get out of.

He shook his head to clear the thoughts and moved to exit the closet swiftly making his way to class. “Ah, how nice of you to join us, Mr. Fenton,” Lancer said, hardly even sparing the teen a glance as he continued to write on the board.

Danny offered the teacher a sheepish smile that seemed to go unnoticed by the middle aged man, and hurried to his seat, throwing himself into his chair as silently as he could. It only occurred to him once he was in his seat that Lancer hadn’t bothered to issue him a detention.

Strangely that thought twisted in his gut painfully. Was he so bad off that even Lancer deemed him a lost cause now? He sighed deeply and just tried to push those self depreciative thoughts out of his mind, and decided instead that he should count his blessings that he could head home directly after school for a change.

Regardless he still opted to tune out the rest of the lecture as the day dragged on, Mr. Lancer did not make The Grapes of Wrath sound interesting at all and his opinion.

His friends beside him took in his tired visage and offered him a pitying look. The bags under his eyes made it clear that he was in need of sleep.

“What kept you up last night dude?” Tucker asked him with a quiet whisper.

“Box ghost and a whole bunch of animal ghosts all teaming up to make my night an endless hell…” Danny responded equally as quiet with an exasperated sigh.

“You should have called us man we would have been able to help you” Tucker whispered back eyeing his friend with a critical glance.

“You know we're always ready and willing to share the burden, you don't have to do this all yourself, as much as you think it's your ‘duty’ to,” Sam added from his other side.

“I know but it's not right for me to drag you guys into this. What if you guys get hurt? I'd never forgive myself!” Danny whispered back, with a slight huff, though a slight glow overtook his eyes. betraying his truest feelings.

Sam and Tucker exchanged a glance around him knowingly, it was pointless to try and argue with him when he gets like this. Even Jazz with all of her endless patience for psychoanalyzing him eventually gave up trying to understand the motivations behind his weird compulsions and all the faults and quirks that came along with having a Ghostly obsession to boot.

Danny lets out a long yawn. Man, was he tired. Maybe he could just rest his head on the desk for a moment, Lancer probably wouldn't notice right? No sooner was his head down were his eyes sliding closed from his exhaustion, unconsciousness taking him quickly.

From Danny’s perspective, he blinked and then was suddenly being poked by Tucker. Danny raised his head and took in his friend’s deep frown. “Bell rang, dude.”

Right good… “Yeah,” he yawned widely. Earning a sympathetic look from his friends and a flat exasperated sigh from the teacher.

Danny did his best to ignore the look as he stood and gathered his things to leave. He was just passing the classroom’s threshold when his ghost scene went off, fogging up around his vision and dissipating off into the air. He groaned.

“If it’s Boxy, I’m just going to lock him in the thermos and keep him there until the Christmas truce,” Danny growled.

“You want one of us to take care of him then?” Sam asked as Danny handed off his backpack to her.

“No, I should do it... “ He sighed. “I’m the one that everyone expects to be late anyway.”

“Still dude, you don’t-” Tucker started only to snap his jaws shut when Danny waved a flippant hand at him.

“No, it’s fine just tell the teacher I had a bowel problem or something. I’ll be back.” Danny said, already turning to leave and head for a closet or the bathroom to transform in. This was so second nature for him now, he had to wonder what he would ever be able to actually accomplish in school if he had the time to dedicate to actually sitting still for more than an hour and actually having time to learn things.

One flash of light later and Phantom was in the air following his ghost sense to the roof of the school. No sooner did he fully emerge above the building did he get blasted from behind. Danny rounded on the enemy expecting Skulker again but was surprised when he saw one of Vlad’s vultures panting from the exertion of its attack.

Instantly on high alert now, and looking for the elder half ghost himself, Danny fired an icy blast at the annoying bird's wings taking advantage of it’s needed recovery time.

The attack struck true and the bird fell to the ground with a squawk. Vulnerable now, he unhooked his thermos and sucked up the ghost easily. Capping it, and reattaching it to his belt, Danny flew around the school, trying to find the other two vultures or Vlad.

Using his ghost sense to guide him, he makes his way off the school property and into the woods that were just behind, Danny soon found the second vulture. It was odd though the bird was flying quickly away from the school instead of trying to attack him it kept on its trajectory.

It didn’t take Danny long to put two and two together and realize that the vulture was luring him somewhere. So he threw up a shield in front of the bird, which it flew into with a wet sounding thump before that minion too was sucked away.

“Ha, even dead birds fly into stuff” Danny quipped.

He flew upwards to get his bearings and realized he was halfway to Elmerton almost now. He cursed under his breath before doubling back towards the school, ignoring his ghost sense that was trying to draw him further away.

If Vlad was involved in this… whatever it was, he at least wanted to try and make it hard for him to execute whatever plan that frootloop had set up. Heading back towards the school he caught sight of a flash of green of a pair of Ectopuss in the football field.

“How did I miss you?” He muttered as he flew down towards them.

He hardly entered the school grounds when a pink blast shot towards him whizzing right by his ear. Only the sound of the static as it fizzed through the air alerted him to the attack, giving him barely enough time to dodge.

“Ah Daniel, I must admit I was anticipating you being gone for a little longer.” Vlad mused seemingly unimpressed by the teenager’s appearance.

“Did you really expect me to go that far once I realized your cronies leading me off?” Danny spat hands aglow with green sparking energy.

“Well of course I did. Your infernal hero complex is all too predictable after all.” Vlad chuckled dryly. “By the way little badger, how did you sleep last night? I had an unfortunate ghostly animal jailbreak.”

“Of course that was you.” Danny snarled before launching an attack at the man.

Vlad simply floated out of the way casually, smirking in that overly pompous manner of his. “As I said, predictable.” he chuckled darkly before a clone came up from behind and kicked Danny down to the ground.

The teen yelled and tried to slow his fall, but he still managed to leave a decently sized crater in the ground when all was said and done. Danny pulled himself free in launch skyward invisibly hoping to catch Vlad off guard.

Again, the elder half ghost dodged, before rounding on the teen and trapping him with a bear hug

"Now, now, Daniel. I can't have you messing up my plans my dear boy. Today is the day I Triumph and finally end that fool Jack Fenton and take Maddie for my wife," he purred

Danny's eyes go wide at the man's words. “What did you do,” He growled out. “Where are my parents Vlad! I swear-”

“Oh don’t worry it’s nothing dear Maddoline can’t handle. Tell me did you happen to get all three of my minions or did you simply come back here to confront me?” The man smiled in an overly sickeningly way that made Danny want to vomit.

“Wait, you - UGH!” Danny sees red, or rather green, as his eyes shine bright the need to protect overwhelming him as he stretches his body out and escapes the man’s hold. Snapping himself back to proper shape he lets loose a powerful mix of ecto plasma and ice.

It launched out of his palms so large and wide that Vlad had no choice but to try to shield, unable to dodge. The pink shield strained and shook, cracking with spiderwebs lacing the ecto construct.

Danny’s fury helped fuel his power and the added power backing him enabled him to break through the shield, hitting Vlad square in the chest... and destroying the clone in a hiss of melting pink sludge.

The teen whirled about in the air looking for the next attack, any possible sign of his enemy. How dare he! This was his town, his lair and he would protect the people in it. In a way, they were his too. It only fueled his rage knowing it was his father who was at risk.

Danny snarled in rage before shaking himself into a more coherent state. He fumbled about on his person managing to find whatever weird interstate his phone had gone into, and pulled it free to check it over.

He pushed it open and brought up the ‘Fenton Finder’ app that showed where the GAV was at any given moment, something that the citizens of the city enjoyed so they could avoid the areas whenever possible, usually meaning that there was a ghost attack wherever the Fenton’s were heading.

For Danny, it helped him avoid, or find his parents quickly. Finding his parent’s location was easy and after sticking his phone from what area it had come from, he’d shot off like a rocket. Thankfully they weren’t far, practically down the street from the school near the mall actually, which made sense otherwise Vlad wouldn’t have been able to maintain his clone.

Danny arrived on the scene just in time to see Vlad telekinetically tossing things towards the GAV. He had managed to split up the elder Fentons and lifted a few cars getting ready to toss them at Jack with a howl.

Danny slammed into Vlad tackling him to the ground, hands burning as bright as his eyes as he blasted the ghost.

The damage was already done though. As soon as Danny had tackled Vlad, the cars had become encased in pink energy causing it to still follow the trajectory that Vlad had wanted.

Both halfas slammed into the ground but were still high enough, the crater created not too deep in the pavement, to see what was happening.

Vlad smirked and took Danny’s distraction as a chance to escape phasing into the ground leaving a bewildered teen halfa unable to move, only stare at the scene before him.

The car sailed towards Jack who tried to bound out of the way. The large man was not as fast as he liked to believe and of course, was a large target, to hit. The car slammed into his leg knocking the tall man over and causing him to roll back from the force of the strike.

“Fu-e- Ouch! That’s broken…” Jack hissed out changing his swear last minute. The orange clad man struggled to get to his feet, his right leg bending awkwardly below the knee, but putting all his weight on his left allowed him to clamber to his feet… er, foot.

Danny heaved a sigh of relief seeing his father still standing, a little worse for wear granted but overall alive…. Or at least he was until he saw the man he always knew to be cheerful and boisterous, went quiet and pale, letting out a barely audible “N-No...”

Danny realizing Vlad had taken off, stood and followed his father’s gaze, heart and core both pounding anxiously, before burning away into a mix of sorrow and furry. There, just a little bit away, he could just barely make it out to what it should look like… but it was indeed a leg... in a very familiar, painfully familiar, teal colour, sticking out from under a car.

Danny gulped wishing silently that the red that was splashed about the concrete was just paint… A grunt and a crunch pulled Danny’s attention back to his father, who was trying desperately to meet his wife.

Carefully he flew to the large man before landing silently beside him, only to look away a second later ashamed. “I…. I couldn’t stop him in time…” He managed out, voice as broken as he currently was and glow dimming to an almost nonexistent state. “H-Here…”

Jack wrenched his eyes away from the blood and gore before him to stare listlessly at Phantom. Normally his scientific mind would be undoubtedly fascinated by the things currently being exhibited by Phantom, but right now…

Jack hardly said anything, not even so much as a protest as Danny looped his arm around the large man’s back allowing him to use the ghost as a crutch. That normally would have worried Danny but his everything was just stricken. He just…

He forced himself to move forward, urged on more by Jack’s listless hobbling rather than his own will to do so. He heard sirens, and couldn’t care less whether they were police, ambulance, fire or even the GIW coming for him… he just…

He had to know that the stillness of that form ahead really was due to...

He shook his head chastising himself for thinking such a thing before he had any proof. Though the closer he got, the colder the air around him felt.

Even Jack was shivering but his mind was numb to the biting temperature that Phantom was giving off… Nothing mattered just… “Madds… Oh, Maddie…” Jack whimpered, as they rounded the car.

Phantom turned green and fell away from Jack’s eyes widened. His stomach turned at the bloody scene before him. His mother… she was… “She’s... She’s dead!” Phantom cried out large luminescent tears falling from his eyes as he quivered in sorrow and grief.

It was a grizzly sight

XxXxXxX

Maddie was not in one whole piece for starters, her lower half had been cleaved off by the car leaving her legs to lay underneath while her upper body had rolled on, landing sideways against the curb, Her eyes, still opened, were glassy like that of a dead fish, and were quickly clouding.

Her skin now looked a sickly grey as opposed to the healthy pink and peach Danny had come to associate with his mother. Her face had been scraped deeply from when she had slid across the pavement, reminding the teen sickeningly of ground beef with how bad the scrapes were.

Entrails hung out from below her ribcage spilling their foul greenish yellow bile across the pavement, while chunks of… something Danny didn’t even want to identify was strewn about in various shades of whiteish, grey, pink, bright red and reddish black…

Bones... That was bones… or rather bits of bone that had been crushed and scattered from the impact…. Danny had seen bones before of course, there were skeleton ghosts after all but never like this… not something like this...

And all the red! Red was everywhere. No matter where he looked there was red. Large globbing splatters all the way down to the tiniest of pinpricks, it was there, and it was her. His mother… her essence...The iron scent was so strong now he could taste it.

XxXxXxX

It quickly became too much for the teen, and he had to turn away from the scene onto the nearest boulevard to vomit. A thick green sludge that awfully enough reminded him of a slightly glowing lime Jell-o tumbled out from his stomach, burning his throat and nose.

After having emptied his stomach of whatever was in there and turning away from the mess he’d made, he carefully returned to his father who was weeping openly having fallen to his knees as he did so. The broken man was unable to turn away.

Danny swallowed thickly doing his best to keep his eyes on the ground, thankfully his own tears made everything blurry so he didn’t have to focus in on the mess that his mother had become…

“D- Jack? ...Come on… There are paramedics…” The teen managed out weakly. Jack looked up at him as if finally realizing just who was here beside him. Danny forced himself not to look away from the lost broken look on his father’s face. When he tried to say more it was as if his mouth was suddenly filled with cotton, and he opened it and closed it a few times unsure what to say.

“What do you want, Phantom?” The man asked after a moment of silence passed, both openly letting their tears fall, but neither mentioning it. The accusation was there but it was so much weaker than he had ever heard before… “If you’ve come to gloat I-”

“What!? No! Never! I… I actually wanted to say I’m sorry… I wasn’t fast enough I… This is my fault…” He sniffed out.

“What?! You’re sorry? You’re sorry!?” Jack boomed anger getting the better of him. Danny had heard enough of Jazz’s lectures to know what this was. He was so distraught and hurt, that he was going to take out his anger on anything he could…

Danny couldn’t blame him for turning on him though… everything is his fault.

“Sorry is not going to bring her back! Sorry isn’t going to fix this! Sorry isn’t going to- '' The man's voice cracked, breaking as he screamed becoming silent a second before he broke down again. “She’s gone… Sh-She’s gone!”

“I’m so sorry... This is my fault! If I was faster! I-I should have figured out Plasmius’s plan sooner I-I’m such an idiot I… oh Mom…” Danny hiccupped and tugged at his hair, nails digging into his scalp. “Mom! It’s all my fault! I should have saved you!”

“Wh- What did you?” Jack sniffed head snapping up in an instant watching as Phantom seemed to be having a mental breakdown. “Mom…” he managed out between sobs. Jack stole a glance at his broken wife, before staring back at Phantom.

The ghost looked young. Maybe somewhere in his mid teens at most, and with his glow now as weak as it was, he could clearly see the ghost that was usually hidden within the usual ethereal fog. He was a boy really, he looked so small, not at all like the muscled form they usually see. His glow was pretty much gone, leaving his usually brilliant white hair a dull steel grey. His white gloves and even the sharp crisp black… all of it just looked so dull…

Even the usual bright radioactive ectoplasmic green of his eyes had faded to a more human looking colour. If one were to take away the slight green tint in his skin he could easily pass for a kid who just dyed his hair, so long as someone wasn’t looking too hard at him... It was so surreal and uncanny in how the ghost moved, like an old movie that was missing an occasional frame.

And he was clearly having some sort of… episode… Perhaps he had died in a car crash with his mother? Was that why this was affecting him so strongly? The soft sobs of the usually strong and cocky ghost, and watching the boy cry about his mother… It felt so wrong.

“What kind of hero am I if I can’t even save my own mother? I can’t help anyone!” he sniffed, wiping his nose on his sleeve leaving an iridescent slime trail along his sleeve.

“Phantom…” Jack tried softly. Instantly the ghost’s head popped up to look at him, though it didn't last long as a moment later he squeezed his eyes shut tightly.

“Just… Just get it over with… hurry up and tear me apart… just… It’ll make us both feel better right?” the ghost pleaded brokenly to Jack's dull green eyes staring blankly ahead. “At least then I… I can be useful… not a disappointment… I’m just a screwup… I- “

“Phantom…” Jack said softly.

“I- I’m sorry” He sniffed.

Jack blinked slowly. “I need you to help me get to the paramedics.”

“I’m- You want me to help?” He sniffled again. He really was a broken child at this moment and not just a ghost… besides, Jack didn’t have the fight in him right now to even bother trying to attack the ghost. “Really?” Phantom asked again, hope filling his green eyes.

“Yeah… I mean since I can’t walk,” came the simple response. “I…I need your help Phantom.”

The ghostly teen nodded and moved forward to help the large man. Storm clouds barely being contained behind his eyes, while Jack on the other hand, just felt numb.

As Phantom helped Jack over to the emergency responders neither one noticed the other ghost that was on a nearby roof, staring down at the scene in silent horror.

Vlad masters or Plasmius in his current form had undoubtedly, unequivocally, and unquestionably screwed up… big time. Not only had his plan failed in the most spectacular way possible, but he had also killed the love of his life. By his own power, his own hand, she had stopped breathing, her heart stopped beating… her life drained.

In trying to end Jack, the man who ruined his life, he had unintentionally ended another's. The one most precious to him… Second only to the kinship that he had felt with Danny…

That feeling had been the most notable change here…

As it stood now, Vlad was unsure if he still felt the same about the younger half ghost. It was Daniel’s fault his plan had gone awry… If it wasn’t for him that would be Jack’s corpse smeared across the pavement from the car. The hunks of metal crushing the fat oaf of a man, not his dear sweet innocent Madeline.

But at the same time… they still shared a curse. A curse that bound them together whether they liked it or not. It was something that bound them to walk a tightrope of life and death and experience a sensation of isolation like no other.

Though as Vlad watched Jack interacting with Phantom, how the ghost tenderly had started embracing the man, and Jack in turn squeezed and held the boy so tight it looked like he would pop, the man couldn’t stop the bit of jealous rage that fermented in his core.

And yet, the more human side of his brain was breaking. Maddie was gone and he had destroyed Daniel’s family in all the wrong ways… It was his fault here as much as it was Daniel’s, and now... Now he just needed some time to himself to reflect…

Danny wasn’t sure how long he’d hugged his father for, and in ghost form no less, but they both needed this and it seemed like it didn’t matter who was there to offer the much needed comfort. “I-I…” He swallowed thickly again when he looked up into the deep blue eyes of his father globs of tears rimming his lashes and streaking freely down his face.

“It… It’s okay… I… You just… you look so much like my son like this” Jack admits. “I… I couldn’t... I…Oh, Danny....”

“Dad… I wanted to tell you sooner, and … and Mom too but…” He sniffed, trying to clear his nose and opened his mouth to continue only to hiccup, his voice betraying him. As the paramedics, cops and of course the GIW start to encircle them Danny whispered simply. “We-We’ll talk at home I…”

“Ecto-entity Phantom, by the order of CR-2003-02 you are under arrest!” The agent called out earning several glares from the emergency responders that had shown up.

“Like hell he is!” Jack boomed, surprising everyone there, but none more than the ghost himself. “You leave right now or I swear...” The large man said in a rather flattened tone. Jack loud was one thing, that was normal… Jack talking calmly or quiet well… that meant hell was about to break loose.

The agents looked about the area awkwardly, before one brave one with dark skin piped up. “But the law states-”

“And the law can get you a warrant to take him,” Jack said simply eyes hardened. He was not about to deal with them after… after… he shakes his head to clear his thoughts before putting an arm around Phantom… Danny… Danny Phantom, and pulling him to himself. “Ghost’s mine and I’m a licenced hunter so I have possession. Now leave.” he barked

Danny watched his father in awe. He’d seen his father upset before of course, and even protective of him and Jazz before too, but never like this…

The agents shared a glance before backing off with glares all the way back to their van.

The paramedics were next to approach while the Cops started roping off the area. Everything was a blur after that. And Danny hardly remembers anything once the paramedics took Jack.

He knows at some point he flew home, not bothering to head back to school, as he sort of ‘blinked back into reality’ to realize he was staring at his ceiling. He really didn’t care about school right now…

He wasn’t sure what time it was when Jazz came home. Her eyes were red and she sighed in relief upon seeing him, before practically collapsing on top of him crushing him in a hug their father would be proud of. It only took a second before they both began to sob again… -.-.-.-.-.-.-.- Incomplete Total words: 4711

#Danny Phantom #Phic Phight 2020 #prompt fill #Danny #Maddie #Vlad #Jazz #Jack

3 notes · View notes

therewithasmile · 5 years ago

Text

fermata

Of course she was working into the quiet hours of the night when, for the first time, it was Felix who brought Byleth tea.

(no one asked for this)

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

There was a knock on the door; it would’ve woken Byleth, surely, if she hadn’t already been awake.

Maybe the distraction was a good thing. The writing in front of her had begun to blur anyways. Byleth paused, contemplating; but the black scrawl wasn’t getting any clearer. She set down her quill back into the inkpot and allowed herself a leisurely stretch before finally reaching for the door.

The deep mahogany swung open to reveal Felix Hugo Fraldarius, raven hair held messily in a bun, a tray with a teapot and cups balanced in his hands. Byleth couldn’t help but to raise an eyebrow.

The swordsman caught her expression, smirk included. He coughed. “I figured it’s time for a break from training, and I was wondering if you wanted one too.” His eyes darted to the side, where the remnants of her letters remained askew across the surface of her desk. “I hope I’m not intruding.”

Surprise shot at the base of her spine, but Byleth swallowed the emotion down. “Not at all,” she responded. “Anything is better than the diplomacy after a skirmish.”

At this point, she had suspected Felix had grown accustomed to her occasional sarcasm. There was something wistful in her reminiscing the first time his expression slid to mild shock, when she had initially allowed her less professional thoughts to be voiced. If anything, five years later, the ‘always-ready-to-fight-and-nothing-else’ Felix smirked as he set down the tray. No sweets in sight, of course, but that was to be expected. A brief moment of surprisingly comfortable silence stretched between them. “It’s probably not as delicious as you would make it,” he suddenly insisted as Byleth reached for a chair, and then for the teapot. “I tried, but this will have to do.”

Byleth only hummed thoughtfully as she poured out the fragrant tea, only just able to catch the faint notes of a blush colouring his cheeks. She handed him the cup, a gesture that, by now, she’d grown used to. To her, nothing had really changed – aside from, of course, the one who was doing the inviting. But to him, she supposed, it’s been five years; though they’ve been reunited for the last few months. Five years – a moment to her, a lifetime to him.

She hadn’t noticed he had asked her a question. She took a swig of the tea, spicy notes dancing along the edges of her tongue. “Sorry, can you repeat that?”

Once, five years ago, Felix may have been annoyed at her lack of attention. But now, things were different; though the lines in his face had set deep, the roughness around his edges seemed to have worn away with time. A ghost of a smile seemed to live on the corner of his upper lip as he repeated his question, “Who are you writing to?”

Byleth paused; when it came to the war connections, some of it had been designated as confidential. It wasn’t as if Dimitri was going to share, well, anything, anytime soon. Byleth was careful to not let her exhale err too severely to a sigh. “A request to—“ She paused, when the realization of whom exactly she was writing to hit her. “Rodrigue, actually.”

Felix’s surprise was barely visible to her – admittedly, she was surprised in her own right at how easily she picked up his discomfort. His pinky stiffened and the lines intensified ever-so-slightly across his forehead; otherwise, he placed the cup to his lips, and his sip took merely milliseconds longer than usual, in a way that seemed to stretch many heartbeats.

“My father,” he said into the porcelain.

“Your father, yes,” Byleth said pleasantly. She allowed another mouthful of tea fill the temporary void. “To see if he’ll join our side in overthrowing the Imperial clutches into Faerghus.”

“Is that how you phrased it?” Felix said, and Byleth was slightly surprised to detect hints of teasing in his tone. He seemed to notice her reaction, too, as he lowered his cup, smirk no longer a mere idea but fully realized across his mouth. “What?”

Byleth paused, trying to find the words to describe the sudden flutters in the base of her stomach. “You joking is still something I’m still adjusting to,” she finally managed. His smile turned wry, but everything else in his body language invited her to elaborate on her initial explanation. “It’s nothing fancy, really; I’ve written to the other houses, but quite honestly, I don’t think I can really read words right now.”

Felix seemed deep in thought. “Ah. Then I’m glad I can provide distraction.”

Byleth hmmed into her cup. When she got the chance, she stole a glance at the man. His visage was nothing new, if anything still a bit jarring considering when she’d seen him last. His jaw was angular, clavicle more pronounced now. Beyond those, though, she noticed smaller details: eyebags, nowhere near the depths of Dimitri’s, but new – at least to her. His skin had lost its shine, in those reddish auburn eyes a hazy depth that she didn’t quite understand. “How are you holding up?” she asked, not really knowing where the words came from.

Something like a fond smile spread across his lips, and the fog in his eyes lifted slightly, but it wasn’t completely gone. “I’m…. okay,” he said after a brief pause. “Better now. Before coming back, things were tough.”

He sighed. “Things were much simpler back then.”

“They were,” Byleth recounted, a smile spreading across her lips too. How predictable he once was; when he’d come bounding to her after lecture demanding a sparring session, how she’d make her rounds with tea, only for him to share the dark feelings of resentment and loss. Back then, she’d counseled him like she would any student. Now, while the counseling was still a regular thing, she couldn’t help but to feel as if their relationship had shifted, even if just a little.

But it wasn’t in due to this newfound awkwardness that sometimes edged along the tips of every interaction he had with him. He’d grown in the five years – as one did, especially during war – but the anger he’d once held for Dimitri had transformed into something like protectiveness; the grief he held in his heart seemingly accepted and now simply a part of him. If anything, he reminded Byleth of her – an old soul, now, just trying to keep everyone together.

Maybe that’s why he’d brought her tea.

(It had nothing to do with said newfound awkwardness that she suspected he’d felt sometimes too, when his cheeks dusted red.)

“And how are you doing?” His voice, suddenly low, snapped her back to the present. His eyes were warm; molten copper in a backdrop of porcelain and the night sky, not unlike the outdoors that were filled with stars, despite the ongoing war. Comforting, Byleth thought, and she couldn’t help but acknowledge the urge and the part of her that wanted nothing more than to touch him.

“I’ve been better,” Byleth said instead, honest, trying to not let the way his face twisted into concern do feathery things to her heart. “I’ll honestly be much more comfortable when I’m done writing these letters and am back on the battlefield.”

Though the concern doesn’t quite filter out of his gaze, Felix grinned. “That I understand. If it weren’t so late already, I’d suggest we spar instead.”

Byleth couldn’t help but return the smile. “Guess you just have to come earlier next time.”

“Noted,” he said, almost huskily, and before Byleth registered it, he’d already drained his cup. Byleth mirrored his actions, though a small part of her wanted to stretch it out for longer – to enjoy the company of this Felix a little while longer, before the thoughts of finishing the letters threatened to overwrite the quiet pleasantries of his company.

Felix seemed to sense her thoughts, as when she replaced her now-empty teacup on the saucer, he cleared his throat. “I don’t mean to intrude on your duties, but as your friend, perhaps its best to leave these letters until the morning.”

The suggestion was so very tempting, even moreso in his honeyed tones, but Byleth sighed and stretched out an arm across the small table in her room, resting her cheek on her bicep. “Tempting, but I’m afraid our messenger would have to be sent today for Rodrigue to receive it in time.”

“Even at this hour?” Was his voice from somewhere above her.

“Even so.”

“I can stay with you,” he offered. Byleth glanced up through the green tresses of her hair, and managed to catch a faint glimpse of red dusting across his cheeks before it was gone.

“Even more tempting. But I’m afraid you’d be – ah- more of a distraction.”

For a second, confusion spreads across the swordsman’s face, but if he was thinking of voicing his thoughts (she was momentarily certain of it), he avoided it instead. “Well, I suppose I can’t hog all of your time.”

Byleth truly caught his eye then, and could only offer a sheepish grin as he gathered the saucers and cups back on his tray. “Next time, then.”

“Next time,” Byleth repeated, and she hoped that he could hear the weight she gave those two words. When Felix turned around, there was something charming about the messy updo that was his hair; she couldn’t help but to picture him throwing it up in a hurry, trying to get the tea together despite his outwardly calm demeanour. She walked him to the door, pausing as he stepped over the threshold. “Felix?” she said softly, and the blue haired noble paused.

“Don’t overwork yourself,” she said, before adding, “and it’s my turn next.”

“Of course, I can’t go disappointing my old man.” Felix said, that slight hint of teasing still foreign to her ears. “And Byleth,” his voice suddenly darker, more serious; he turned around and she couldn’t help but to feel speechless at his auburn gaze. “I look forward to it. “

#jak drabbles #jak wrote a thing #felix hugo fraldarius #byleth #felix/byleth #is there a ship name help a gal out #fire emblem: three houses #fe:3h

39 notes · View notes

tlbodine · 5 years ago

Text

A Decade of Horror Recommendations: Millennium Edition

After my 2010s horror recs post, @comicreliefmorlock asked me to do some for older films. So I figured I’d just work my way backward.

The lists might get a bit shorter and less diverse as I go back in time as I’m not as well-versed in older horror films, but I’ll toss out some recommendations for what I’ve seen and maybe some will be new to you anyway :)

Long post under the cut!

2000: A Surprisingly Good Year for Horror

Maybe we don’t think of the Y2K year as a big one for the horror genre, but it was still riding the tail end of the slasher/teen horror revival. Some must-sees:

Final Destination: I’ve written pretty extensively about this movie and it’s no surprise that I like it a lot, even if the sequels get downright ridiculous. The original still stands on its own feet.

Ginger Snaps: Maybe one of the best werewolf movies, period. Smart writing and a strong female cast as an added bonus.

American Psycho: Did you know this came out in 2000? I honestly always thought it was older, somehow, maybe because by the time I watched it in college it seemed like everyone had seen it. Fun fact: did you know it was directed by a woman?

What Lies Beneath: Part psychological horror, part drama-thriller, and sporting a surprisingly A-list cast. It has some well-worn tropes, but it’s a solid watch.

Battle Royale: Speaking of movies that seem like they’re way older than they are, did you know Battle Royale only came out in the year 2000?

There were a smattering of Asian imports in 2000 but none of them quite got their feet under them. I will make a shout-out/honorable mention here for Blood: The Last Vampire, an anime film that’s pretty well-known and gets referenced a lot.

2001: The Beginning of the End (for a little while)

Some solid stand-alone titles came out this year, but it also was the start of when the 90s revival started to dwindle down, I feel, with plenty of disappointments to go around. Scary Movie didn’t help much (and it also launched a whole trend of really awful spoof movies, which tried real hard to kill the comedy genre for a long time, imo). Anyway, some recs!

Jeepers Creepers: The director is an unfortunate sack of shit, but the movie is quite good. The first part, which draws heavily from a true story, is especially chilling.

Thirteen Ghosts: An underrated gem. The plot twists too much for my liking, but the ghost designs are super cool and the whole concept of the house is neat. A+ for originality.

The Devil’s Backbone: Maybe my favorite Guillermo Del Toro film, and a damn good ghost story to boot.

Suicide Club: A Japanese import that feels a bit ahead of its time in terms of pop culture (and internet culture especially). Features a couple of squick-heavy scenes I still struggle to watch (but, like, in a good way).

Ichi the Killer: Another Japanese import and my introduction to Takashi Miike, who makes me more viscerally uncomfortable than just about anyone.

It’s also probably worth mentioning From Hell, the Johnny Depp movie about Jack the Ripper, which many people enjoyed. I personally strongly dislike the film for reasons I can’t fully explain.

2002: Wait, That’s When That Movie Came Out?

I feel like 2002 was a big year for me in the “movies I enjoy but didn’t watch until years later” department, probably because I was a teenager with minimal access to decent cinema. It was also a rocking good year for Japanese horror.

28 Days Later: A movie that brought about the return of zombies in a big way, and also introduced (or at least popularized) fast zombies. Also it’s super scary.

May: I don’t even know if May counts as horror, but it’s a dark, quirky movie that I try to make everyone watch because I love it so much.

Ghost Ship: Honestly the bulk of the movie is pretty forgettable, but the opening scene is one of my favorite moments in gory cinematic history.

Signs: M. Night Shyamalan’s last decent movie or his first shitty one, depending on who you ask. I liked it a lot when I first watched it, and it started to fall apart more and more as I got older.

Ju-On: The Grudge: One of the better-known Japanese horrors and one whose tropes still get referenced and re-used. Skip the 2004 remake and watch the original trilogy.

The Ring: Probably the best-known Japanese horrors and maybe the import that put “Japanese horror” into public consciousness.

There was a lot of shlocky dreck in 2002, some of it decent (Cabin Fever) and some of it downright awful (Pinata: Survival Island/Demon Island). I should also mention Red Dragon, based on Thomas Harris’s novel of the same name, which quite a few people liked (I’ve only seen it once but I recall being underwhelmed). Also an honorable mention to Dog Soldiers, which I have not seen but which I hear frequently recommended as an A+ werewolf film.

2003: Wow that’s a lot of dreck

Look fam nobody said these film recs would be objective. There were a ton of horror movies that came out in 2003, I just didn’t really like hardly any of them. Some exceptions:

Willard: The movie that made me want to start keeping rats as pets, which says more about me than it does the film. It’s a great movie, though, the first thing I ever saw Crispin Glover in (and god, he’s amazing), and one of the few films that I think is better than the book.

Identity: A pretty decent psychological horror starring John Cusack. Watch this and 1408 together as a double-feature for maximum fun factor.

House of 1000 Corpses: Look, if you’re reading this blog, you probably already have an opinion one way or another of Rob Zombie. The movie’s on the list because it’s arguably historically important, not because it’s objectively good.

A few other notable moments from 2003 included a Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake (just watch the original, but if you insist on a remake, this is one of the better ones), the second Final Destination film (the last good one in the franchise), the Jeepers Creepers sequel, Freddy vs Jason, Darkness Falls, and Dreamcatcher. Like I said, there were lots of movies that came out this year, I just don’t think they were very good.

2004: Oops we created torture porn

I was in college at this point, which meant I was watching less horror than at any other moment in my life (I had a roommate who really hated scary movies) so maybe that’s why I haven’t heard of the majority of movies that came out that year. Or maybe they were all just really bad, hence why I still haven’t seen them. Hmmm. But! A few shining stars:

Saw: Obviously a classic. I’m lukewarm about the franchise, but the original is an excellent film and well worth watching, especially given the impact it would have on the next many years of horror cinema.

Shaun of the Dead: Hilarious, and honestly one of my favorite zombie films of all time.

Dumplings: A Korean important you likely missed in 2004 but may have seen in a Three Extremes compilation. Well worth the watch if you’re not squeamish.

Otherwise 2004 was pretty lackluster. Some forgettable franchise installments, some shlocky creature features, some unnecessary remakes. Lots of titles I’m unfamiliar with, though, too, so somebody tell me if I missed a big one that year!

2005: Ehhhh

Just a couple important titles this year too:

Hostel: Not a great movie. In fact, pretty damn campy. But an important one to watch to understand the torture porn genre.

The Devil’s Rejects: See above re: House of 1000 Corpses. Hit or miss but a well-liked film by Rob Zombie fans.

And you know what, I think that’s actually it. I mean there were other movies -- a remake of The Fog, the infinitely predictable Hide and Seek, the second Saw installment, and of course Doom. But it just wasn’t a great year for horror, imo. One shout-out here though for Wolf Creek, which is on my to-watch list; I haven’t seen it so I can’t vouch for it, but it does get recommended to me a lot.

2006: Mostly more of the same

Did we seriously have a Saw movie every year in the 2000s or what? No wonder everybody got sick of them and thought all horror was torture porn for a while. Talk about market saturation.

Anyway, some shout-outs:

Stay Alive: This movie is ridiculous, but I love it a lot. It’s about a video game that kills you in real life, and is a more successful video game movie than most actual adaptations.

ReCycle: An Asian import. I missed this one entirely when it came out, but it’s one of my favorites to have discovered in later years. It’s a seriously cool movie, both fanciful and deeply uncomfortable. Content warning for abortion, but it’s not what you think.

Otherwise, just some mostly soulless remakes (The Omen, The Hills Have Eyes, The Wicker Man), some franchise installments (Saw III, Final Destination 3, The Grudge 2). I will give an honorable mention to Black Sheep, which is so-bad-it’s-good ridiculous, and to that cult favorite Slither.

2007: Wait, is horror getting good again?

Well, not quite, but we’re back on the map with some promising additions in a year where the genre seemed to be struggling to rediscover its identity:

The Mist: One of the better Stephen King adaptations.

30 Days of Night: A divisive entry in the canon, but a pretty interesting piece to study for anyone interested in vampires.

28 Weeks Later: Not exactly a direct sequel to the earlier 28 Days Later, and probably not as good of a film, but pretty good in its own right.

1408: Watch this one with Identity (see above) and enjoy a night of John Cusack going crazy in hotel rooms.

The Orphanage: One of my favorite horror films of all time, both deeply unsettling and agonizingly sad.

Paranormal Activity: The highest-grossing film of all time thanks to its low budget. Also what we can blame for the burst of popularity in the “found footage” style.

Dead Silence: A movie that still frequently gets recommended and delivers some solid spooks. I’m not as fond of it as a lot of people, but it deserves a mention for how often it gets referenced (and for playing “killer ventriloquist dummies” straight as a trope).

Trick r Treat: A Halloween classic.

Of course the year brought us another Saw and another Hostel, a contentious Halloween reboot, another stab at I Am Legend (often adapted, rarely well), and a smattering of other sequels. I have not seen The Girl Next Door but based on how rarely I hear it recommended compared to the book, I imagine I’m not missing much. Borderlands was OK but, for my money, forgettable. Oh, there was also Grindhouse, a double feature which I quite enjoyed (I saw it in theaters, where it came with a warning for length, which I found amusing) but which history does not seem to have remembered positively.

2008: Did Somebody Order a Recession?

Back to slim pickings, although I admittedly have not seen most of the films released that year (I was pretty damn broke in 2008, so maybe that’s why). Still:

Let the Right One In: Skip the later English remake, you cowards, and watch this with subtitles. It’s so good. SO GOOD. An unexpected twist on the vampire story, and kind of a romance to boot. Sort of. In a really messed up way.

Cloverfield: A couple things are neat about Cloverfield. One, it was an early adopter and trope-setter for found-footage movies. Two, it successfully spawned a franchise where none of the movies feel related at all. Three, it launched with some really cool viral marketing that was utterly ahead of its time. On the downside, the shaky cam may in fact make you vomit if you get seasick easily.

Repo! The Genetic Opera: A classic. Also may in fact be the only film of its kind, or at least the only rock-opera scifi-horror that comes to mind.

I haven’t seen Pontypool, though it’s on my watch-list -- I’ve heard it’s quite good. Ditto Tokyo Gore Police which delivers, to my understanding, exactly what it says on the tin. Speaking of movies I didn’t see, can we take a moment to appreciate that a film called “Sauna” with the tagline “cleanse your sins” came out this year? Jfk 2008, are you OK?

2009: Why are all the best horrors comedies this year

It really does become obvious just how much the genre was floundering to figure out what it was doing the latter half of the decade, because the movies are so weirdly hit-or-miss. I do have some favorite hidden gems, though, alongside a couple well-known recs:

Zombieland: A genuinely funny feel-good zombie comedy-horror, feeding right into a growing cultural fascination with zombies.

Jennifer’s Body: Is this a comedy? Is this a horror? What is this? I’m not sure how to classify it but I sure do like it.

Antichrist: Ok I don’t know if this is a recommendation per se, but if I had to watch this with my own eyes, I’m making y’all watch it too. Have you ever wondered what it might look like to watch a filmmaker have a psychotic break while making a movie? That’s almost literally what this film is.

The Human Centipede: This is a cop-out because I have not watched these movies and I in fact refuse to watch these movies because the premise is fucking stupid, but I will acknowledge the historical, ah, importance? of this film in the greater scheme of 21st century horror.

Dread: One of my favorite movies, and the film I recommend to anyone who wants to watch a torture film done right. I love the shit out of this movie. Please go watch this movie.

Grace: Deeply disturbing and pulling approximately zero punches. It’s one of the best films to tread the “horrors of motherhood” territory, which is saying something because that’s very fertile (ha, ha) ground.

I actually have not seen Drag Me to Hell or The Last House on the Left, although people have recommended both to me. Anyone want to chime in with how good they might be? I also want to make a shout-out to Daybreakers, which I feel like nobody ever talks about but which actually has one of the most fascinating vampire concepts I’ve ever seen on film. The movie itself is kind of boring and forgettable, but the idea is really neat.

And that wraps up my journey through the 2000s in horror. Next decade: The 90s, coming right up!

#horror movies #film recs #movie recommendations #horror #horror by the decade

9 notes · View notes

chibalein · 7 years ago

Text

Kalafina Live Report - World Heritage Special Live @ Nikkô PART 2/2

Now it’s finally about the songs :D

Click HERE for Part 1.

The concert began when the lights were darkened and the musicians took their seats, shortly testing their instruments, namely Sakurada at the piano and the Konno Hitoshi Strings… at the strings. Sakurada started by playing a short solo and Kalafina entered the stage in their super pretty white dresses (especially Hikaru looked great!). At this point, I want to mention (which of course you already know) that all songs were in acoustic version. With no big surprise, Kalafina started the special live with “storia”, which sounds quite different without drums and so on. I have heard this song so often by now that it doesn’t really impress me anymore, but this version really got it right and the Cello – aaah, so cool. Those who read my Live Report of the 9+ONE concert in Kitakyushu know that I found the acoustics in the hall very strange sometimes and often the girls drowned out each other, with Wakana often being uncomfortably loud – this wasn’t the case AT ALL in Nikkô. Maybe because of the trees that carried the echo better than an enclosed room, but the acoustics/the sound were great! You could hear each girl and the instruments perfectly without them interfering with each other. This fact made this concert especially memorable, in my opinion.

Anyway, “storia” was a beautiful introduction, while “Mirai” made me feel… well, the feeling you feel when you hear “Mirai”. The stage was illuminated in purple light and gave it a mysterious touch, quite the contrast to the song which is rather bright but not any less disappointing. But I admit, in acoustic version this song gets cooler and the Strings were again killing it (I apologize, but I might use this phrase more often from now on – because these dudes REALLY killed it with their super string power). Kalafina moved around a bit, going from one side of the stage to another, with happy faces and creating a happy mood. Especially Keiko felt the groove and swung around during the instrumental parts. Since there were no upbeat songs played this time, the crowd sat still the whole time, so I felt quite cold at this point.

MC #1 included the traditional introduction of Kalafina. They talked about how this was their first special concert of this kind and their first time in Nikkô/Tochigi prefecture in general. They didn’t fail to emphasize again and again how special the atmosphere and how beautiful sceneries that they have seen were.

Kalafina continued with “fairytale”, with an absolute stunning beginning by the strings. It is very hard for me to describe the way they played, so I am sorry for that (but no words can convey the actual awesomeness). Well, you know the acoustic version from the Winter Acoustic Album – it was like this, but somehow better. Wakana was simply amazing! She sang perfectly (the whole time actually) and this song in this environment! They chose this one for this very reason, as they said earlier themselves. Keiko’s part on the other hand, was a perfect contrast to Wakana’s. Keiko was deep and emotional, with the Kajiurago bridge in the middle being simply amazing. Hikaru’s “sayonara” was short and cute, but I wish she would/could have done it like in the Red Moon Live back then… Again, the scenery. They illuminated the pagoda and the trees in the background again, adding to the mysterious atmosphere created by “fairytale”. In the final instrumental part, Kalafina moved slowly around, looking for invisible fairies.

The next song was “Manten” – I haven’t heard this song in such a long time that I had actually trouble to recognize it immediately. It was a whole different mood than before, much more dramatic, as the girls were illuminated from behind. Keiko killed her parts while the quartet did their best too. Best thing: the fog machine lol

Kalafina continued with “symphonia”, while being illuminated in red and orange. They really had some fun on stage, another great performance and interestingly different without the drums. Also at this point, it was getting colder and colder.

During MC #2, Wakana talked again about their first time here at Tôshôgû, with its beautiful nature and how people must have lived and felt here 400 years ago. I admit that I did not understand everything during their MCs, as they were talking rather quickly, almost rushing and using some bullshit keigo (Japanese polite form).

Now comes the highlight of the whole concert, at least for me: “Hyakka Ryouran”. OH MY FUCKING GOD. I can’t possibly explain this piece of acoustic gloriousness. During the instrumental beginning the whole stage was covered in deep red (well, no surprise), but when Keiko started it became so much sadder! Dear god, take away the e-guitar and drums from that song and you have a melancholic ballad. Keiko was just perfect. Then the lights changed to blue, with the chorus being suddenly much more dramatic than anime-like as in the original version. But now – the part that gave me literal goosebumps – Wakana’s kajiurago bridge. This goddamn bridge. It’s already beautiful in the original, it’s mysterious and adds well to the mood of the song. In this acoustic version, coming from a loud, rather fast and dramatic chorus, suddenly the singing pace became much slower and Wakana sang in such a sad, emotional way! Just this sudden transition from fast to slow was amazing, but Wakana made me feel actual pain. And then Hikaru – BOOM! She almost exploded with her part, singing louder and stronger compared to Wakana and the music gained speed and drama again, surrounded by red light again. It was a perfect harmony and seriously, this acoustic version of “Hyakka Ryouran” is much better than the original! Please God, make them sing it in the Acoustic Tour, too!

From this awesomeness, it went on with “Tombo”. Again, Keiko fooled me by saying “bla bla we want to sing another song from our most recent single................. Tombo”. Not “Kantankatan”. In fact, they got my hopes so high only to crush them AGAIN, I had to create a meme about my feelings at that very moment.

Seriously, what does a fan have to do hear this “Kantankatan” bitch live? JUST WHAT?!

ANYWAY. “Tombo” came with no suprise though, as it is a perfect song for an acoustic concert. Still, coming from “Hyakka Ryouran”, it felt quite strange, but during its performance the only things that were illuminated were the five-story pagoda in the background and the girls. Very very beautiful (you kind of get the picture from the photos of the news articles and the Kalafina blog posts). Well, and the performance was very nice.

Next song on the setlist was “far on the water”. As predicted, Kalafina would go with their “Rekishi Hiwa Historia” songs and the later “Into the World” wasn’t a surprise either. After rather sad songs, it was nice to have more fun and happiness on stage again. The girls were swinging and moving slowly, often looking past the audience into the future. Now, as I said, it was getting colder and colder and at this point, it was fucking freezing. I was shivering, but was too focused on the concert to use the damn kairo. Here I openly felt envious of all the rich bastards who bought the Kalablanket - it looked so comfy and warm T_T

During MC #3, Hikaru emphazised this cold weather more than clearly. She started rubbing her arms and legs and told us to do the same, making us laugh. I felt so sorry for them, because they didn’t really move during the concert and in those thin dresses, it must have been worse for them than for the audience. However, this provided us with the probably cutest WaKei moment in Kalafina history. Keiko ran to Wakana and hugged her strongly and long, like a child its mother that doesn’t want to be left in kindergarden, to warm herself. THEY WERE SO CUTE!!! And I could literally smell what almost everyone was thinking at this moment: “Let go of Wakana, Keiko. Let go and hug me”.

For the next block, Hikaru told us that they wanted to sing songs that convey a strong wills and desires. So the next one was “sandpiper”. SANDPIPER!!! FUCKING SAN--2§$%AIOSJKDNDFBP??DGJXGFFG!! I actually gasped (quite loudly xD), because I couldn’t believe it and I was like “fucking yes yes YES!”. I love “sandpiper” and wanted to hear it live for so long now, but certainly never expected it. I actually thought they forgot about this song lol This version was certainly dramatic, with a very dominant Cello, which only added to the drama, sadness and melancholy. Hikaru’s expressions were on point as ever. During the instrumental bridge, the surrounding trees were brightly illuminated while Kalafina were looking at them, simply beautiful. Wakana’s small part during the stanzas was not as strong as in the original (in the “After Eden” Live she is almost screaming, as you know), she was softer and quieter, giving Hikaru and Keiko the chance to really shine in their parts. The very last notes were played by the Piano and Cello only, boy this dudes killed it.

The following song was quite the surprise for me, as “Magia” wasn’t exactly a song I’d expect during an acoustic concert. I was like “What? Magia? Is that Magia?”. Which is why it was very strange to listen to, because it suddenly sounded… happier? Nicer? It’s very hard to describe xD When the chorus started, it gained its usual fierceness and strength again and the staff played a lot with the spotlights. I found it a bit sad though, that the girls did not move on stage at all. Hikaru made it up with her voice nevertheless, as she was singing very strongly and loudly, also more clipped, emphasizing every syllable. However, she appeared to have trouble with the “negai”s, as they sounded a bit forced and “out of breath”. However, during the second (or was it the last one?) chorus, I am 98% sure that either Keiko or Hikaru actually got the lyrics wrong! The last line of the second chorus is “kokoro ni furikazasu negai”, while for the last chorus it’s “inochi wo tsukuru no wa negai”. What (I think) happened is that either Keiko or Hikari mixed up “kokoro” and “inochi”, because in that short moment you could hear that it was not the same word being sung. Like I said, I am not completely sure (would love to hear from someone else who was there, whether it happened or not), but if so, then I guess even professionals like Kalafina aren’t safe from lyrics mix-up, right? It wasn’t a bad thing though. What I noticed too, was the missing of the “yeah hey hey” part at the beginning, middle and end.

From “Magia” it continued with “Gogatsu no Mahou”, certainly a song that makes a very nice acoustic version. At this point, I need to critizise Kalafina (yes, it wouldn’t be an original Chiba report if there wasn’t some needless nitpicking). I love “Gogatsu no Mahou”, loved it in “far on the water”, loved it during the 9+ONE concert, so that’s not the point – but dear Kalafina or whoever is responsible for choosing setlists: you chose “Gogatsu no Mahou” OVER “Kugatsu”? I mean, we had the end of September (it was vanishing!!) and the moon was barely visible due to the trees! Even the damn lyrics fit perfectly into the setting and you go with “Gogatsu no Mahou” instead?!

However. Wakana was beautiful as always in that song, while Keiko was dancing again slowly between the musicians during the instrumental parts (almost hippie-like, especially in that dress xD). Maybe I got it wrong, but I felt this song to be faster than usual? At least sometimes.

The Cello and Piano would introduce the next song, “Yume no Daichi” in a very deep way, which again led to not even recognize the song in the beginning. As usual, great performance, great harmony, great shivering.

MC #4 was mainly about Keiko saying again how special this day is for them, followed by the band introduction. Then the audience was asked “Is everyone alright?”, because it was so cold. Everyone laughed, but my feet were totally numb, so NO KEIKO I WASN’T ALRIGHT! Before the concert, the girls were guided around Tôshôgû (see Kalafina blog) and got some energy out of it, as they wanted to experience and cherish (their own) history? Something along this lines.

Well, we were already coming to an end and Kalafina wanted to sing a strong song as the “final” one: “Into the World”, of course. Wakana was very strong here and their harmony was again spotless. Keiko actually moved her arms and body a lot, while the very last line was a bit off-key for my sensitive ears. They traditionally fake-ended the event. While we waited for them to return, I honestly thought “Just get your drink and return, IT’S COLD AND YOU KNOW IT! COME ON, LADIES, GO GO GO!”. It was really cold <_<

For the Encore, Keiko said herself that they will hurry know, as everyone needs to return and catch the train, too. Well, Nikkô isn’t exactly a traffic junction, with the JR train for Utsunomiya (where the Shinkansen is) only going once an hour, so basically everyone needed to return via this very connection, unless they came here with car. Tôshôgû isn’t near JR station, so even an extra shuttle bus was prepared, as the normal busses were not operating anymore, either.

So they sang the last song, “Yasashii Uta”, having all the nice people and places they have met and seen during this occasion in mind. I admit, I never listen to that song, though I don’t particularly dislike it, so I was like “Eh, ok? Great”. For the final act, the pagoda and all the trees behind, left and right of the stage were brightly illuminated (this is the part where probably all the photos for the news coverage were taken, as you could hear the clicking of the cameras quite loudly XD). It was an amazing experience, with the starry sky and this particular song. The atmosphere was cheerful and Kalafina succeeded to convey happy emotions. Keiko hit those high notes like a pro, and it made a great final performance. At the end, they took a bow, waved and thanked everyone, hurrying from one side to another, shouting “Hurry, hurry!”. Keiko and Wakana left the stage, Hikaru slowly followed, waving (so cute xD). Then everyone proceeded to take photos of the stage, as the background was still illuminated and left the area, towards the shuttle busses and towards home.

And that’s it, that was the special commemoration concert in Nikkô. Here are some final thoughts:

1. Unlike during the 9+ONE concert, Kalafina had a perfect harmony with some song surprises, the musicians did a fantastic job in arranging rather upbeat songs into beautiful acoustic versions and conveying this awesomeness at such an impressive set. It was my first acoustic concert of Kalafina, but still I say it was one of their best concerts in general. However, it was very short (it only lasted about 1 hour and 15 minutes), I wish it had been longer (since it wasn’t cheap to get there, either).

2. I wish they would have interacted with the fans a bit more. They had a time limit, but they also made this quite obvious, as they seemed to rush through the whole thing.

3. I love how they sung without any technical help, it terms of pre-recorded parts mixed into the live singing, as it is the case during the normal concerts. So, all the kajiurago bridges were sung by them and arranged accordingly and it made the songs so much more beautiful.

4. NO KANTANKATAN!!! GAAARGH!!

5. NO HIKARI FURU!! They did all these illuminations and stuff! I mean, IMAGINE THE POSSIBILITIES! GAAARGH!

6. Here’s a list with all the songs I would have loved to hear as acoustic version instead of “Mirai”: “Kugatsu”, “Usumurasaki” (they could have done so much with the lighting too T_T), “Oblivious”, “Red Moon”, “Seventh Heaven”, “Kimi ga Hikari ni Kaeteyuku”, or any other song than “Mirai”. They really HAVE to do at least one shitty song at each concert. [/bitchy complaint mode off]

Thank you for reading my long report, I hope you liked it! If you find any mistakes regarding the content, have anything to add or questions, feel free to comment! (Any grammar mistakes you can keep as usual). My next Kalafina Live Report will be about the Acoustic Tour concert in Zama in November :)

#kalafina #nikko #special live #here it's actually about the songs

34 notes · View notes

cliquestitsandicks · 7 years ago

Link

I woke up this morning with Queen Sugar on my mind and needed to share my thoughts about last night’s episode, so here goes. Warning: all the spoilers.

Ok so first things first, there was literally never any legit reason to dislike Lorna in the present. Let me get that out of the way.

However, the narrative had been, at least in my social media circles, that in the past Earnest betrayed his family and left for some white woman. A more sinister take on it was that white woman stole him. Personally, I’m of the thought that you can’t steal someone from a relationship, but that’s beside the point… anyway, it’s a perspective we now know to be completely inaccurate and 100% Aunt Vi’s warped point of view.

The truth was Trudy, Nova’s mom, didn’t want a traditional relationship with Earnest. They didn’t want the same things so, feeling heartbroken with the relationship being over, he left town. He was not married when he met Lorna. He was not in a relationship. He was not cheating. He found out Trudy was pregnant (with Nova) and came back just to be rejected by her again. So he moved on, married Lorna, and had a baby with her. All of this is to establish that none of the people involved in the actual story of Nova and Charley’s creations are at fault in any way here. Earnest wasn’t a cheater and had every right to move on. Trudy had every right to reject him if it wasn’t the relationship she wanted. Lorna wasn’t wrong to fall for a single man in love with another woman; it was a bad choice, but one that could only hurt her and potential children in the long run really…and it did. And that’s unfortunate. Nevertheless, someone choosing to love someone knowing their heart belongs elsewhere isn’t a reason to think the worst of them. It’s definitely not a good reason to raise children to think poorly of them. Yet Aunt Vi’s general mistrust of whites, undoubtedly a result of the constant violent oppression her entire family has faced being Black in the United States and being 1–2 (?) generations from said family literally being lynched, led her to construct and reinforce a false narrative that’s created tears in the fabric of who the Bordelon children are individually and as a family unit.

Nova’s spent her entire life thinking her father abandoned her and her mother because of some horrible nemesis, her birth not being enough to keep him around. She believed he chose Charley for being half white and It isn’t a stretch to assume she pushed herself to excel academically in competition with the chosen daughter. But then RalphAngel came along after all that time and it seemed like the only thing she could have done to get him to stay was be a boy. This woman grew up her entire life thinking her mother and father were in love but as soon as something shinier came along he left her. Couple that with feeling like she was never adequate and we see why she has severe commitment issues, seemingly always looking for a reason to end it or ensure it can never really start in the first place (such as choosing to engage with a married man who is also a white cop when she’s a Black activist). And I’m not sure from this last episode of Aunt Vi was blind to what this was doing to them, especially to Nova, or if she just didn’t think there was anything wrong with it… but it’s clear she never intended to stop telling this lie. Her response to finding out Nova was with a married man was to mention everything her mother went through with Earnest and Lorna, a reference to the fabricated tale of cheating and betrayal based solely on Lorna being white and Vi’s personal, almost fanatic, belief that Earnest and Trudy belonged together.

Charley’s spent her entire life feeling like she didn’t really belong, but worse must have been the feeling of shame and being the source of so much pain for her sister. Imagine being the reminder of that evil woman your dad abandoned your sister for…that evil white woman…that evil rich white woman (of course we now know she wasn’t wealthy just worked really hard with the added privileges of being white and beautiful). Charley has said she felt more at home with the Bordelons than anywhere else because she didn’t have to try to make her Blackness palatable or make whites comfortable. But clearly the trade off was her mother (the one parent she was with most of the time, a woman who loves her very much and tries to give her the best) was literally hated by these people. She likely felt forced to choose. When she was with the Bordelons, she couldn’t be Lorna’s daughter. She couldn’t acknowledge her too much, couldn’t remind them of her too much, had to keep mom tucked away. In these last couple of episodes we see just how far that went. Charley felt she had to hide her mom, physically, from the rest of the family for fear of disturbing them and hurting everyone. A mom, once again, who’d done NOTHING wrong.

Everyone has stated Earnest babied Ralphangel, was overprotective of him, kept him close. While his daughters worked to feel like they were good enough, he was coddled and we can see the differences in how they conduct themselves both as individuals and in their sibling dynamic. That could not have been helped by this misinformation. RA is a reminder to both girls that they were insufficient for their father and much of it leads back to not just the ending of their mothers’ relationships with him, but how the situation was later conveyed by their beloved aunt. Nova has explicitly and resentfully stated that it wasn’t until RA was born that her father committed to her mother. All of that pain, all of that feeling unworthy… and it’s based on a lie.

I generally love Aunt Vi on this show and enjoyed that this episode complicated who has been the sort of moral compass for all of the characters. She doesn’t just hold grudges in situations where it seems understandable — Darla being a former addict who’d endangered baby Blue, Hollywood having a wife he never told her about — and we can say “yes, I would have responded the same way”. The morality of the show actually has a deeper character flaw than anticipated and i can appreciate that.

Although it was an interesting, albeit brief, conversation on how prejudices damage the efforts of even the most well-meaning and how our children absorb our hate in ways we can’t predict, there were two things I didn’t really like about this development. Personally, I would have preferred to get Trudy and Earnest’s perspectives some way, maybe a letter or other people who really knew them and their story without the fog of being the grieving sister with the racial prejudice. I find it hard to believe people watched Nova struggling with these feelings about her father and never stepped in to tell her the truth, that he wanted their family in tact but her mother didn’t want him. I also find it hard to believe that her mother taught her herbalism and the spiritual world aside from Christianity, raised her to be socially conscientious, was basically an Erykah Badu type… but never told her she wasn’t interested in traditional relationships. That’s odd. But then, we’re relying on the word of Lorna (who is still pretty much a stranger to us) and Vi (who we just learned isn’t the most reliable source on this) to give us the full story dead people cannot give.

The other thing that ultimately displeased me was that this revelation created an innocent white woman being harshly and unjustly vilified by an angry Black woman who is prejudiced against whites. On a show that has done a marvelous job of directly addressing the forms of racism Black people regularly face — in the justice system, business, academia, and media — it was a bit disconcerting for me to watch this unfold. I didn’t think it was a necessary or helpful addition to a story that’s supposed to be about us and our perspectives. But, I trust these writers, and definitely trust Ava DuVernay, not to create a Taylor Swift circa 2009 unless they’re going to expose her circa 2016. So I’m thinking she’s either a vehicle to a more interesting story line for someone else or they’re going to complicate her character and make her an ally to the family without making her a savior and we’ll get to watch how the rest of the family adjusts. Well, I’m hoping it’s something like that anyway.

#queen sugar #queen sugar spoilers

22 notes · View notes

asterinjapan · 7 years ago

Text

Nikko revisited

Ah, Nikko, you’re not making it easy for me to love you.

I’m talking about the city by the way, haha. I visited it for the first time back in 2015, but the day was overshadowed by hordes of Chinese tourists and really bad weather.

Today, my day was already off to a not-so-good start, since I had a very short night and not in any fun way. At 2 AM, was literally shaken awake – it took me a couple of minutes to wake up enough to realize this had to be an earthquake. Logically, I know I should expect these in Japan, but it still took me by surprise and I was a little scared to go back to sleep. Luckily, the Japanese are used to it and are very quick to update their news websites, so it was soon obvious that this was nothing to worry about. Still, the ground trembled a couple of times more in the morning, and it took me some hours to get rid of the shaky feeling (no pun intended).

Since I was so tired and still a bit shaken, I went to the train station too early out of nerves and accidentally took a wrong train. Well, it was a local train for Omiya station, but I wasn’t sure if that would take me there in time to catch my transfer to the bullet train. Luckily I passed a station that was also on the list for the rapid service, so no harm done, just an extra transfer.

The bullet train predictably went fast: from Utsunomiya, I took the JR Nikko line for uh, Nikko, and just sat back and relaxed, since that was the last stop too.

The JR station Nikko leads to an information center, and you can also buy a ticket for the buses at the station. The day pass is shaped like an amulet and pays off really quickly, so I got one of those and hopped on the bus.

I first wanted to visit the famous bridge here, but I was on the wrong bus for that, so I first went to Rinnoji temple. At this point, it had started to rain, just a drizzle but enough to warrant an umbrella. Spoilers: despite the weather forecasts, this did not change the entire day.

Rinnoji is the most important temple in Nikko, a mountain town that has been the center of worship in both Buddhism and shintoism, long before the Toshogu was built (we’ll get to that one later). Sadly however, it is also under covers for years, since they’re working on major renovations here. However, it is entirely possible to enter, and see the gold-lacquered statues of worship, and even go up to see how the renovations are coming along.

Before I did that, I found the treasure house with a Japanese garden across the road, so I first got a ticket for that. The exhibition in the treasure house was very interesting and mostly focused on the Tokugawa shoguns (who ruled during the Edo period, 1600-1868) and Buddhism as practiced here in Nikko. The garden was lovely, although I’m sure it would be even loverlier in any other season than summer, especially without rain, haha. I must say though, because we’re in the mountains, the slight rain meant that there was a light fog hanging around the trees everwhere, which gives most of my photos a nice mysterious look. That is however an effect I woudln’t have minded added later on….

Anyway, enough whining! I went into Rinnoji as mentioned, something I neglected to do last time I was here due to aforementioned renovations. I’m glad I went in after all, though, since there was a lot to see and it’s also interesting to see how detailed these renovations are. They’re really going back to the bare bones of the building to restore it, wow. It should be done in 2019.

Thankfully in this weather, most of the major spots in Nikko are a stone’s throw removed from each other. My next stop was the nearby Toshogu shrine. This is the final resting place of Tokugawa Ieyasu, the first one of those Tokugawa dudes and coincidentally the one who completed the unification of Japan and brought a long period of relative peace, after a period of warring states within what we now know as Japan. So yeah, he’s a big deal, and so is this shrine. The entrance fee is high (1300 yen!), but I must say the complex is pretty big, so you can easily wander around here for an hour or two.

A couple of things stand out here: first, this complex is also undergoing renovations, but since March this year, the incredibly intricately decorated gate Yomeimon has been unveiled again, so I was excited to see it now after having witnessed it all wrapped up last time.

There’s also a pagoda here, which is as high as the Tokyo Sky Tree! … Except they count from sea level up, and we’re on a mountain, so this pagoda isn’t exactly 634 metres high, pff. Still pretty as it looms behind the trees.

This complex became so huge thanks to Ieyasu’s grandson, Iemitsu, who really wanted to honor him and didn’t want his own mausoleum to outshadow that of Ieyasu. Hm. Anyway, this is one place where you see elements of both Buddhism and shintoism: both were intermingled throughout much of Japan’s history until the Meiji-revolution (1868), when they were forced to be separated. They couldn’t do that here, since they’re so woven together, so it’s an interesting mix here.

Finally, there’s a couple of interesting carvings in the various buildings here. First, we have the ‘see/hear/speak no evil’ monkeys, which seem to have had a fresh dye job, because I don’t remember the colours being so vivid last time. There’s also the ‘elephants by this dude who had never seen an elephant in his life before’, which worked out about as well as you think. And there’s the sleeping cat, guarding the stairway that lead you up to the actual mausoleum. This is actually my favourite part of this complex, and here is where I didn’t mind the weather all that much: the fog between the high trees and the relatively humble mausoleum gave this really serene atmosphere.

Last but not least, there’s also the hall of the Crying (or Roaring) dragon. There’s a ceiling painting here of, you guessed it, a dragon, but something interesting happens here: if you clap two pieces of wood together, there’s no echo anywhere – except when you do so right under the dragon’s head. So it almost seems as if the dragon is indeed roaring, although the echoing sound doesn’t quite fit my definition of ‘roaring’, but ssh.

My lunch for today was these delicious mochi (rice cake balls with sweet red bean paste filling) with a pinch of salt that were sold here outside of the Toshogu, and to my joy, they were still sold this year too! Not a very responsible lunch, but ssh.

Nearby, there was the Taiyuinbyo, another mausoleum. This one is for Tokugawa Iemitsu, Ieyasu’s grandson, who as I mentioned didn’t want to outdo his grandfather due to his deep respect for him. Nevertheless, this complex is very detailed too and probably shimmers very lovely in the sun with its golden details, but I guess I’ll never know, since it’s always rainy when I go here, haha.

Even closer is the Futarasan shrine, founded by the monk Shodo Shonin, who also founded Rinnoji temple when he brought Buddhism here to Nikko. This shrine is dedicated to the deities of the three most sacred mountains of Nikko, hence the -san in its name (which is one reading for the character for mountain). There’s a small paid area here, which has a couple of more buildings and interesting spots like a wooden heart, where you can put your own little heart with a wish (I mean a little wooden heart, not your actual heart). There’s also a cafe here, but it was sadly already closed for today.

Finally, part of the Futarasan is the bridge I wanted to visit at the start, but it’s quite a distance from the shrine, and I really didn’t want to walk through the rain anymore. I hopped on the bus and left it up to chance: if it would stop at the bridge, I would get off.

And well, it did, haha. I got off and made my way to the Shinkyo bridge, one of Japan’s three finest bridges (yep, they have a top three). To be fair, it is really lovely, the red standing out against the green forests and the blue water (which was rather stormy underneath today). I really should have started with it today since it’s the gateway to the World Heritage sites (the aforementioned shrines and temples I already visited), but whatever, it’s nice to end with too. According to legend, the monk Shodo needed to get over the river, so he prayed and a god appeared with two snakes, who wove together to form a bridge. There was actually an event going on related to that, so you could leave your wishes near the bridge. Naturally, you have to pay for that (Nikko is not a cheap day out), so I opted out. You can, however, also pay to cross the bridge! This is A Big Deal, since the current bridge has looked like this since 1636 (though has been rebuilt since), when only messengers of the imperial court were allowed to use it.

I only got a quick photo of the bridge last time, from the bus, so I took my time taking actually decent pictures this time before walking back over the bridge. I actually really liked this, even though you can easily see the entire bridge within 5 minutes. It’s definitely very pretty though.

I did some minor souvenir shopping and then took the bus back to the train station, where it was a half hour wait for the next Nikko line to bring me back to Utsunomiya.

Well, I’ve been back in my room for a while now, but gosh, I’m tired. I hope the ground will stay quiet tonight so I can catch up on sleep.

Not sure about my plans for tomorrow yet; it’s too much to do another long trip now, so I might just stay in Tokyo or go to Kamakura or something. Although to be honest, just sticking to Tokyo for now and maybe do some shopping or karaoke sounds pretty good right now, haha. It’s a bit of a waste of my JR pass, so I’ll see if I can visit a garden or something, but if the weather’s bad… yeah, shopping, probably, haha.

See you tomorrow!

#japan 2017 #report #report: japan 2017 #places: nikko

3 notes · View notes

warsofasoiaf · 8 years ago

Note

So, about medieval warfare and magic. You said you had a lot to say about integrating magic to a medieval worlds and militaries.

Yes, I do. It’s one of the more irritating things I see in traditional high fantasy. The people of the world don’t take into account the magic that exists in their world. If magic can be learned, it will become a part of the power structure of the world, finding uses in everything from war to statecraft to even the smallest aspects of life. When medieval armies act in the same fashion as their historical counterparts, without incorporating the differences, it’s a huge red flag that the worldbuilding was not done to my satisfaction, and, even if I elect to continue reading, I’m going to spend all my time picking out the logical errors and complaining rather than enjoying the novel.

So, with that being said, how can a writer include magic into their world in a wholly organic fashion? This requires thinking long and hard about what magic is in your universe, how it works (and how it doesn’t), what it can do, and how common it is. I’ll preface this by saying that these are simply my opinions and things I find appealing in a good setting. You may not like them, and you may even think the things I’m complaining about are things that you enjoy. That’s fine.

Anyway, let’s go examine what we need to do, and provide some examples, so your worlds can be as seamless as possible.

What Can Magic Do?

This is an important consideration, and should be one of the first things you consider when adding magic to your world. What can magic do in your world? If it can do a great deal, it will almost certainly be a part of the world. Can it heal soil? Farming communities would want that. Can it discern hidden knowledge? Rulers would absolutely employ scryers and interrogators to ferret out knowledge. Can you call down fire from the sky? That’s artillery right there, and that means that any military leader will invest in mages.

Additionally, there also needs to be consideration on the limitations of magic. Is there something magic can’t do in your world? You’d better believe that wizarding groups would try to keep that as secret as possible, while conversely, those who oppose wizards in any fashion (which will inevitably mean any who aren’t a wizarding group themselves) will attempt to find out what the limitations are of magic. What do wizards need to do to cast a spell? How long does it take? How precise can they be?

Then you have to think of the relative power level compared to non-magical people. If magic is clearly beyond the capability of normal men, then you’d better believe the wizards are in charge. Depending on the society you have, this could be an incredibly stratified arcanocracy, where non-magical people are literally considered lesser beings. If bloodlines carry magical talent, you’d have an aristocracy backed by magical force, and likely societal constructs and religion based around the righteousness of magic to rule. This, in turn, creates a large subservient class all its own, and presupposes a certain class struggle between the rulers and ruled, and the ones who believe in their mandate versus those who do not.

Keep in mind that side effects could be just as important as the actual magic itself. Magic might warp perception or cause mutations, and that’s going to bring no small amount of fear to a population.

If not everyone has magic, you need to be cognizant of how the non-wizards see wizards, and this falls into serious setting info. Fear and distrust are natural reactions to someone with potentially unknown powers, so if magic is largely unknown to the common folk, expect suspicion and hostility, even bigotry, and wildly exaggerated tales about what wizards can do. This will tie into how common magic is, explained below. Remember that people will strive to understand magic and how it fits into a rational universe, this includes science and religion. Expect magic to crop up in both and rationalizations for what is and not acceptable conduct will permeate (and vary between) all societies.

The possibilities and limitations mean that every facet of magic and its employment, as it exists in your world, needs to be considered with the larger movements of empires and nations with the smaller aspects of daily life. If it is a presence in your world, make it feel like it. Stress the presence that you are building in the actions both large and small of your society.

How Common Is Magic/How Does Someone Learn Magic?

This is big. This determines how many people are wizards, and thus determines the presence of magic in a more global sense. Does it require natural ability that cannot be predicted? Societies would devise tests and scour the realm for those showing prospective talent? Is it based through bloodlines? Magic would become bloodlines, breeding would be affairs of intense research, and you’d have a lot of the people on the outs resenting those with the power. Can anyone learn it? You’d have academies and social mobility at the cost of incredibly high taxation to fund them and probably a rather cutthroat system of advancement.

Then think of how many people are actually capable of becoming wizards? If it’s a relatively high percentage, you’d have specialization and integration into almost all facets of life, as wizards are a common resource that would be undoubtedly be used in technological development (unless magic is so much faster and so common that everywhere can use it, even then, engineering into redundancy is critical). If the percentage is very low, wizards are rare, used only in the most important aspects and probably reserved for high matters. Protection of rulers, state security, winning wars, that sort of thing. Such a nation would probably keep a hefty leash on their wizards. This may not be a heavy-handed authoritarian stance, it could very easily be a privileged caste given luxuries in exchange for service.

Note that potential wizardry pool is different from an actual wizardry pool. The actual amount might be much lower due to circumstances within your world itself. Did a magical catastrophe recently devastate the wizard population? Was their an anti-mage rebellion? These things can create an artificial wizard shortage, and that has it’s own considerations, for the use of magic in the short-term and the health of the wizard population in the long-term.

Examples of Medieval Military Magic

Now, I understand what people might be thinking. “You complain an awful lot,” and you’re absolutely right, I complain a lot about an awful lot of things. The natural corollary is: “Can you help provide a solution?” and that, I do believe, I can help with. So, let’s see how we can integrate magic into a medieval army.

Classic elemental wizardry, fireballs and lightning bolts, can be used as artillery toward formations of packed units. Using these sorts of spells against an army relies on determining how precise the wizard casting can pinpoint their spells, their radius, and how long the spell takes to cast. Spells which are imprecise can be used against large units, but can’t be used when actual combat is engaged, and this forms classical field artillery. A single person is much more mobile than a heavy cannon and crew,, so you would expect battlemages like this to bring about the artillery age early. Depending on the rate of fire and the amount of “ammunition,” so to speak, shapes the tactics of the battle. If there’s only a few shots before the wizard is spent, wizards would hit big formations for maximum effect and then retire. You would start to see the anti-artillery tactics of the field artillery era start to evolve to the fore, and mages would ID other mages as priority-one targets, and you might see scouts and ambushers specializing in killing mages before battles begin to establish magical supremacy. More precise spellcrafting can be used to support a charge, to help make a gap, or to hit charging cavalry as to break up a charge that could split friendly lines.

More generalized, less precise elemental magic could also be used to hamper the enemy. Early frosts hurt pillaging, magical rain can turn the ground into a muddy morass that slows down a column on the march, heat parches an enemy and exhausts their supply, fogs slow an enemy or can even march them the wrong way (or possibly invoke friendly fire).

The effects of elemental magic can’t be ignored. Fireballs will probably ignite dry grass or wooden buildings (or more, depending on how hot and how long the fire stays). Fire attacks are a component of war and have been for a long time, and magic makes them (probably) easier to employ.

Magic geared toward learning things would attempt to divine enemy plans, troop composition and location. Magical interrogators would form a key part of any state’s enforcement arm, and if there is anything that could be used to obscure any sort of magical scrying, such things would be made as abundant as possible to heads of state, key generals, and critical elements of a maneuver. If there is a particular metal that makes you immune to scrying, anticipate jewelry with it, some people might even grind it and eat it with food in an attempt to make themselves immune.

If you have any sort of compulsion or enchantment magic (which to be honest, scares me so much more than any other type of magic), such magic would form a cornerstone of a society for better and worse. Nothing is more powerful to a monarch than controlling the thoughts and behavior of a person (hence why Thought Police are so tempting), so defense against this is critical. In a military context, these types of magics could force someone to make deliberately poor placement and positioning (though unless you can control the vast number of the people, someone is going to notice before anyone gets into formation). If this sort of power is within your magician’s reach, expect rampant hostility from anyone who can be suborned.

Illusions are very powerful on a battlefield, as they can cause tactical and strategic mistakes that comes from pursuing false information. Military deception becomes much easier with believable illusion magic, and even unrealistic images have tactical implications for their ability to create panic and hurt the morale of the fighting men.

Even simple magic can be devastatingly effective. Sure, you can use tunneling magic or flight to circumvent an obstacle and attack from an unexpected direction (our people can breathe water so we’re crossing this lake and attacking you in the rear), but even something as simple as making a kit lighter makes an army faster, as could a work spell to help make fieldworks faster. Conjuring food from nothing obviously has huge implications for a military on the march (and a society in general, said wizards would make a medieval society non-agricultural), but even something as simple as a spell to ward off insects has tremendous effect (imagine if Valyrian slavers could cast magic to ward off the Naathi butterflies), and a simple snap of the fingers to clean and wash clothes has tremendous impact. Hence, if you’re making magic common, be prepared to do a lot of worldbuilding.

If magic requires special supplies, expect areas where that supply can be found or farmed to be areas of significant strategic interest for any world power. An entire campaign can be fought around access to a special geomantic ley line that allows wizards to cast more powerfully, with fortresses and static defenses guarding said areas. This determines national objectives and the size and shape of territorial gains and ambitions, which makes a macro-element of your setting feel more realistic.

Countering magic will have its own strategic and tactical uses on a battlefield. If mages need to see targets, you can bet ambushers and skirmishers will target mages first, and camouflage (magical or mundane) will be a big element of any anti-mage toolkit. You could have entire forces specializing in mage-hunting, with prepared tactical stratagems, specialized weapons, and an in-depth knowledge of any and all wizarding weaknesses to secure their objectively quickly and reliably. A general might use multiple false orders to fool enemy diviners, or loose arrow volleys into suspected illusions to see how they react. Military science is a neverending struggle of how to develop a new weapon, counter it, counter that, and so on, and magic would simply be a part of it.

In regards to side effects, I’ll use an example from my own fantasy setting. One of the primary characters is a wizard who suffers from altered perception. She specializes in creating sensory input to create fear, but she also has false sensory input of things that frighten her, and she knows that she cannot trust everything she sees and hears. Hence, her chapters have a tense, frightful feeling where the character (and vicariously, the reader) do not know what is real and fake, and what small background elements are hints of something larger. It gives me the chance to play with the ideas of the perception of danger, of tragic misunderstandings, and so on.

These are just some of things you can do to make magic feel like part of your world. I focused on the military side because I’m a huge military nerd and that’s where i notice a lot of people failing, but everything from societies to dealing with illness and injuries to a small flame conjured on the thumb to keep warm will be in the color of your society.

Thanks for the question, Overlord. If anyone has any more specific questions, ask and I’ll see about providing an answer.

SomethingLikeALawyer, Hand of the King

#worldbuilding #magic #strategy #tactics #writing #essays on writing and worldbuilding

1K notes · View notes

thefrostfalgar · 8 years ago

Text

Day 7: Seventh

It was not my intention to post everything I have in one go but seems like work will keep my hands full until next few hours so I’ll just give it all for Kid.

also this might a little bit OOC and contain a little fluff and everything but well...

AND HAPPY BIRTHDAY EUSTASS KID!!!

S for Seventh.

Seventh life time and still fall for each other.

It was one of a good day for Kid’s Pirate alliance.

They had just won over a battle against a rather huge pirate. Not in yonko caliber, but that still mattered. Not only they made it to the newspaper─again, even though they didn’t make it to the highlights as the first time they announced the alliance. But still, strategically, it was a good enough move to strike fear to other group. That added to the reputation that Kid had sank two Big Mom Pirate’s subordinate ships and get away with it.

So it was natural that they threw a party in the island they called safe house.

Three smaller boats had arrived from stocking booze and food from three nearby island. Kid didn’t know whether they buy or rob those. It didn’t matter. What matters now is to party hard, get over the forthcoming hangover, then get back up because in this part of the world, who knew will come up next.

They had partied for at least two days and one night now. Kid didn’t even remember. He only drank from his bottle of wine, chugging and listening to a joke so lame, he couldn’t help but laughing his ass off.

After the random dance, random fake fights among each other (some turned into actual fight), random drumming duet performance by drunk Killer and Apoo, and the poorly executed standup comedy by Apoo’s men, somehow the party had turned into some kind of foretelling by also drunk Hawkins. Kid didn’t know how Hawkins could manage to drunk─he always thought that the stoic man will be the only sober one, judging from his indifference almost in any situation. But well, maybe he couldn’t resist some fun too. And even though Kid sure that he’s just as drunk as he is now, Hawkins was still the only one that was somewhat composed enough not to randomly burst out a laugh on any poor joke thrown out by someone just to keep this party interesting.

Their men was too excited, asking Hawkins to foresee their future and their life in general. They laughed upon bad predictions, mocking and teasing each other on how they deserve such bad luck, and cheering over good predictions. Whichever result comes up, they drink anyway. Either to soothe the bad luck, or to celebrate the good luck that is still to come. Kid started to think that these whole fortune-telling thing is more to keep the party interesting and for them to find another reason to drink above anything else.

After a while, they seemed to run out of people who’s interested to have their predictions. But then Wire shouted.

“Hawkins, do Captain’s prediction!”

The other guys cheered to the idea, pushing Kid closer to Hawkins while echoing what Wire said in the beginning. Hawkins only grinned, while he shuffled his card once more and placed it on the strand of the straw from his devil fruit ability. “Eustass Captain Kid,” he started, while pulling cards after one another. “You’re gonna have a bad luck in the near future.”

The guys roared with laughter. Some cursing at Hawkins, telling that their Captain’s bad luck will result in Hawkins’ bad luck too, given that he’s the best chance for them to get away from any bad things that would come to their path. Hawkins rolled his eyes, gulping drink from his bottle before continuing.

“Hm? This is your seventh incarnation. Although, even in your previous six lives, you are always associated with metal or magnet in one way or another.”

Again, a roar of laughter, with Kid’s crew shouting “that’s my captain” or simply “Pirate King! Pirate King! Pirate King!”

“Can’t remember any of it,” Kid laughed.

Hawkins ignored the shouting and the laughter, while Kid only laughed and gulping the remaining of his bottle. That settled, Kid would drink to every prediction Hawkins read out of him. Not that he would stop if he’s running out of predictions anyway.

The stoic blond opened another card, sticking it into another strand of straw. “Although, you always know, and attracted to someone in the previous lives. It’s like you were on the same line of life,” he stopped for a little bit, eyes focusing on his cards and for a moment, Kid thought that Hawkins suddenly sobered up from all the alcohol running in his system. That’s very unlikely, by the way. Not with his power and abilities. “It is said that you even know and connected to this guy in this life also.”

Kid choked at that words. His face heated up, stomach scrunched while he gripped the neck of his bottle even tighter. This time, he’s also jolted up to full consciousness. His body all of a sudden have the ability to clear up all the fog caused by the hallucinogen he put to his system.

“That gotta be Killer!” someone from Apoo’s crew yelled, followed by the agreeing voices of all three crew. It’s very likely, Kid thought. Killer was his friend from day one. The guy who was always by his side, having his back and vice verca. But Kid got the feeling that Killer is not who the prediction mean.

In fact, Kid might have an idea of who it might be.

“Don’t think so. The connection is similar to friendship but not quite…”

“Okay, that’s enough!” Kid gulped the remaining of his liquor, trying to get the foggy mind back. He clearly knew who the prediction meant. He clearly knew what he would say next, because in fact, he had heard that kind of prediction before.

But Hawkins just wouldn’t stop. Just like Kid, he sensed a little bit dejavu in this prediction. He was rather obsessed with foretelling. He did that since he was young, and did it almost every day. Small chance he would remember every prediction, since for every result told, it could change based on the change of decision. But it occurred to him that he had read this prediction before─or something similar. Not to Kid, of course. Kid wouldn’t asked something like this voluntarily when he’s sober. His defiance made it harder for Hawkins to read him secretly. So no, this is not only belonged to Kid.

“Funny,” Hawkins said. With his drunken state, he could only touch the tip of his memory. He then flipped the card for Kid to see. “This is the next card that appeared.”

Kid didn’t have to see the damn card. He didn’t even bother to wait the card to fully flip in his direction before he snatched the card, whipping the rest down along with the straw strands that held them. “Party’s over,” he stood and announced, much in annoyance than anything else. “Get your ass back to work or I will throw you all to the sea!” he continued, throwing his bottle to the stone until it shattered to make his point, then storming out inside his safe house. Most of his men were automatically stilled, while the men from other crew booing him for being a party pooper. Kid didn’t care at all. He continued to storm out, trying to hold his liquor in his stomach while every cell of him just wanted to puke it all over. Fucking Hawkins. Fucking predictions. Why did he agreed to it the first time? Why didn’t he remember it the first time?

Oh, right. Because he was drunk.

Kid smashed things in his reach till they’re broken, and repelled every metal things he lay eyes on. Kid balled his human fist hard, burying his painted black nails to his palm until it hurts. On his mechanical appendage, he crushed the card that was the main reason of his fury.

He closed his eyes, trying to resist the memory crawling up to his consciousness, demanding to be remembered. But the pitch black darkness offered by his eyelids didn’t bring peace or a sense of security. Instead, the memory won. They painted themselves on the black surface perfectly. His drunken state didn’t help to block it. If anything, it helps the memory to come out as vivid as the day Kid captured them and stored them in his brain.

There’s a heavy monsoon that blew leaves off the trees and causing flood near the port. Then a pair of slate grey eyes with metallic gleam, half lidded by exhaustion and the remnants of lust from their previous activity.

“One more island, then we’ll arrived in Sabaody,” he said softly, almost as if he’s mumbling in his sleep. His lean fingers─the one that didn’t have tattoo over the knuckles, ghosting on Kid’s sweaty pale skin.

“One more chance, then,” Kid said. “Let me say it again─”

“The answer is still no, Eustass-ya,” the man said. “Heart Pirates will not be your subordinate, nor form an alliance with your crew when clearly, we have different vision on the outcome.”

“You’re crazy if you think you can get away with that plan of yours. You’re playing with damn underground, Trafalgar. You don’t know how big it is.”

“Like your plan is any better,” the man, Trafalgar Law of The Heart Pirates, said. “My plan is not even complete yet. There are variables I still reconsider depending on how the situation will turn up. With a little patience, I will get there. We will get there,” he stopped his fingers on Kid’s, rubbing the chipped black nail polish. “If you’re agreed to ally with me. We can beat them. Doflamingo, Kaido.”

Kid laughed half-heartedly. “The answer is still no, Trafalgar. I don’t want to be involved in your clever schemes. Monster with too many limbs is the monster easier to take down. So many things can go wrong.”

“But charging directly with so little preparation?” Law challenged.

“We managed to do it earlier,” Kid grinned. He leaned closer to Trafalgar, the top of his crooked nose ghosting over his sweat-covered skin. But neither bother to close the little gap between them. The mood had changed, ruined. Both dislike each other’s rejection, but neither made the effort to step down from their respective position.

“So we’ll go our separate ways, then,” Trafalgar said─more like an announcement. A challenge for war.

Kid paused for a moment too long. He felt the other’s voice had dissolved too deep into the silence, poisoning the room with something that tasted as bitter as betrayal. “Yeah,” Kid finally replied. He closed the gap between them and peck on Trafalgar’s lips. That declaration was so wrong, was so painful that he decided to savor every little things he can taste while they’re still present. “We’ll be enemies once more.”

“And will stay like that forever,” Trafalgar said. Another words with the bitter taste. Kid pulled himself away, refusing to breathe any of that shit anymore.

Then, silence ruled again. Only the sound of nature howling outside, wiping everything that gets in the way. Infiltrating the room with its destructive power and destroying whatever weak connection they had had.

Out of nowhere, Law broke the fragile silence with his soft chuckle. Kid glanced at him, raising the nonexistent eyebrow to ask.

“So I guess that’s it, then,” he muttered, more to himself. Before Kid could give any response, Law tilted his head to the other, grey metallic eyes met amber. “You know, before I got to the Grand Line, I met Hawkins-ya. We managed not to attack each other, and even had a little friendly chat.”

Kid couldn’t imagine how Trafalgar could make any conversation at all with Hawkins. The Doc was not the chatty type, and Hawkins is a stoic man─even that reputation was well known long before Kid met him. How did they communicate? Through eyes and sighs?

“He offered me interesting prediction,” Law continued, this time he managed to make Kid snickered.

“You believe in that kind of stuff, now?”

“Not really. While foretelling is an absurd concept unable to be explained by human logic, what he said about me was quite interesting. Do you not want to hear?”

Kid didn’t answer, knowing too damn well that the raven haired captain only asking to make his words more dramatic. Law didn’t exactly looking for his answer nor permission.

Law turned his head from him. “He said that this is my seventh incarnation of life,” he started. “The other might still going on somewhere in the parallel world, or have happened in the past, maybe the world before this…”

“I’m not stupid, Trafalgar. I know what incarnation is,” Kid cut through the other’s words. He had had enough of Law’s smartass attitude today.

Law chuckled again. “Who would’ve guessed?” he teased Kid, but he continued anyway. “Well, he said that in all six incarnations, I always got attached to the same person. A person that I share a deep connection with. Not quite like friendship. But more,” he shrugged, refusing to say the word that they both know and (much to Kid’s annoyance) they both feel. Law then leaned closer to Kid, pecking his skin in a soft, quick kisses before continuing. “You know what card appeared next?”

Kid didn’t want to know. He couldn’t cope with the idea of foretelling, or stuff like that. Not especially in his current state, where his chest was heaved by disappointment, and his mind scrambled from the fact that there are strong possibility that they will not be this close anymore in the future. The declaration had crushed Kid mentally, even though he wouldn’t admit that.

He felt so stupid for ever letting this man get into his skin.

But he turned anyway, offering a little interest to the smaller man.

“The beast card,” Law said. “Always a beast. He shuffled the cards multiple times, but it was always a beast─the kind with raw power and strategic thinking to match. And this beast always attract me like magnet. I’m quoting him down to every letter here.”

Kid paused for a moment, too stunned with the other’s words before bursting out a series of laughter. It’s ridiculous not to. Law stared at him indifferently, as if he didn’t expect any other reaction other than what Kid pulled now.

“I was just saying,” he said.

“Who’re ye kidding? You never were just saying,” Kid said, laughing again before muffled it down. “If you think that such cheesy shit will change my mind, Trafalgar, then tough shit. You make yourself a fool for nothing.”

“It was not my intention,” Law said, turning his face from Kid. “Only stating a fact. Foretelling is something we can’t comprehend, so does reincarnation. But since it was there and it matched the situation, perhaps it is more than just a prediction. Perhaps there are science behind it that we have yet to acknowledge. Fire was once considered magic too, you know.”

Kid muffled his laughter, shaking his head as he ruffled Law’s raven hair. “You know, you’re almost cute right now. I could kiss you.”

The raven haired pirate only rolled his eyes on Kid, then their conversation officially ended. Their mouths were too busy trying to dominate each other in a lazy makeout session. They were too tired to do anything more, so they had to be satisfied with it before they both fell back asleep.

When Kid woke up the next day, Law was already gone. There were almost no trace of him; no vivre card, no denden mushi, nothing. Only the smell of him, faint on the sheets and thick on Kid’s nostrils.

The next time they met each other, fought side by side in Sabaody, Law had become completely stranger. Still lack of manner, but way too distant. Untouchable. He did help save his life, of course, and stating facts that Kid too ignorant to notice about Batholomew Kuma─who turned out is a robot. But it felt different. Law felt different. It felt like the Doc had scrubbed the smallest remnants of their time together away. It felt like he, who confessed his attraction to Kid, now changed his nature and repel him.

And Kid was okay with it, or so he thought. He kept pushing the thought of that day on Sabaody to the corner of his mind, beating it down with the fights or the machines he built. He thought he won. He thought he managed to forget that doc and every inch of him that made Kid’s guard down. But no, of course not. The memories never fade. They never go anywhere or even decreased in number. They were never forgotten. Every second with him. Every touch. Every kiss. They were always there, hiding in the back of his mind for a while. Waiting to attack him in his vulnerable state. Like right now.

The red head opened his eyes in shock when he heard the small series of footsteps behind him. Not Killer, of course. He was too heavy to make those light steps. So Kid turned, and he didn’t surprised at all to see Hawkins there.

“I haven’t finished reading your predictions.”

Kid wanted to hear more. He wanted to hear the continuation of Trafalagar’s words that day. The fate written in the series of card. What will become of them? Second chances are rare, and yet right here, right now, Kid was presented with one. He has the chance to know about what will happen in their seventh incarnation. Will there another after this one? Will they still attached to each other? If all the pirate game over and one comes out as a king, will Kid and Law picked up where they left off? Will they found each other again before death claimed their life?

His mind was heavy with memory and the burning feeling of alcohol. But Kid knew what he wanted. “Don’t need to hear that. Don’t want to.”

“Whatever, Kid,” the stoic blond said. Like Kid, he had been shaken up from his drunken state, and both had turned into angry drunk right now. One step, and there might be a useless, unwanted fight. “But I need my Heart card back.”

#eustass kid week #eustass kid #eustass captain kid #trafalgar law #kidxlaw

19 notes · View notes