#Do you think they grew less distinct every time as he remembered the outside world less and less

[nomsfaultau]

do you think scp Tommy painted his friends and family on the wall in Red when the isolation got to him? So he could pretend they were still there. Staring at their pictures for hours as the only company he’d get.

did the Foundation wash it off? Did they say it was unhygenic or a biohazard? When really it was any depiction of anomalies and humans as anything other than adversaries, Tommy’s own lived experience testament to the ideological flaw in the systematic cycle of oppression. Or was it that idea that his family knew he wasn’t human and loved him regardless was incongruous with the depiction of Tommy as a brood parasite?

how many times did Tommy repaint his loved ones on the walls when the Foundation erased them over and over?

and how many times before he gave up?

[beyondspaceandstars]

While You Sleep

Chapter 2

Relationship: Bucky Barnes x Reader Warnings: angst, mention of violence, slow burn Summary: Soulmate!AU - Throughout life, you’re given glimpses of your soulmate through dreams. As you sleep, memories flash in your mind showing you the life your soulmate has lived. Everyone around you raves about how their soulmate reads great books or volunteers in their spare time. But you can’t relate as your dreams end up being more like nightmares. Through initial images of death and violence, you come to learn your soulmate is the Winter Soldier.

Masterlist

You were sobbing. That’s all you knew as you started to come out of your daze. The realization that had hit you suddenly had made everything cloudy, unsure, scary. 

There was someone next to you watching you crumble. Part of you expected it to be him as you turned your head, but no. He was still living on the television. Living in your head. Unreal and very real all at the same time.

The person in flesh beside you was just your coworker. The expression she wore was more terrified than worry. But you didn’t know what to do, so you just turned back to television.

The news was doing a special on him, on his history. Some of the things you had seen nearly much first-hard through those haunted memories. You felt like you were watching a highlight reel of your life. It felt so real and so far away. It was stunning. Utterly and completely stunning. 

But as fast as everything hit you, the news moved on, unaware and unaffected. The report had come and gone. The pictures of him went, too. 

Him.

Finally, you could take a deep breath as you were forced to come to terms with reality. People were still watching you. Not staring per se, but definitely observing and mumbling to their friends. You peeled your gaze away from them to face your overly worried coworker. You finally noticed the hands she had on your shoulders, trying to wrap you in comfort from your outburst. 

When she saw you realizing she was there, she softly asked, “Are you okay?”

You hesitantly shook your head and as if some miracle, your boss came in to start their afternoon shift. Your coworker called out saying you weren’t feeling well and would be in the back for a bit. Your boss barely responded, too stunned at the situation he walked into but nevertheless waved you two away in silent permission. 

She guided you to the back, holding your shoulders firmly as you sniffled and shuffled along. Your heart was heavy. Your mind was not doing any better.

Your coworker sat you down at the backroom table. You ran your hands through your hair, trying to soothe yourself. Your brain was an absolute mess. Seeing that picture, feeling him... It was him. It truly was. You thought it’d be harder having practically nothing to go off of but everything fell together like little puzzle pieces. The arm was the biggest clue. But then the eyes gave the saddest confirmation. 

Was this how everyone felt? No one ever talked about it being this intense, this sudden. But, then again, no one had what you had. You had never witnessed someone actually seeing their soulmate for the first time but knew how others talked about the moment with such wonder. They were joyous, so grateful. Were you feeling that, too? You couldn’t tell beyond your pounding heart and shaky hands.

“What’s wrong?” Your coworker finally asked, leaning at the table across from you. “I mean… You don’t have to talk about it but...”

“It’s my soulmate,” you forced yourself to speak. 

She placed her hand on her heart, concerned. “Did… Did something happen to them?”

You shook your head. “That was him.”

“Who?” She asked everything so cautiously. It almost scared you to say anymore. 

“On the television,” you whispered. “The Winter Soldier. J-James I think it said.”

You thought your coworker was going to fall over. Her eyes grew wide, jaw slacking in pure shock. You couldn’t get yourself to meet her eyes. 

“Are- Are you sure?” It had taken her a moment to collect her words, making your heart sink. 

“Yes,” you nodded. “I- You can’t mistake those nightmares-,”

“Nightmares?” She chuckled, hesitantly. “You mean dreams. Soulmates have dreams. They’re not supposed to be…”

You finally looked up at her, wearing the most burning expression. If looks could kill, you’d have sliced her up countless times by now. The tone of the room shifted as she found you were very serious. She got quiet again, taking in your position. 

“They’re nightmares,” you assured her. “They’re a mirage of flashbacks from his...doings.”

“You just now realized this?”

You let out a weak chuckle. It sounded silly for sure. “I never saw much of him in the memories outside some distinctive features. If I had seen more I- I don’t remember it. I mean maybe I had guesses but seeing that photo and the name and the reports… It’s him.”

“My gosh, girl,” your coworker sighed, absolutely in disbelief. You weren’t doing much better yourself. “What are you going to do?”

You wanted to sob at the question. What were you going to do? 

You leaned back in the chair, eyes focused on the ceiling as you tried to hold back the tears. “Maybe I need to move on.”

***

It wasn’t the craziest idea. Soulmates moved on from one another more frequently than people would like to mention. Just because you were paired didn’t mean it all worked out all the time. Stuff got fried and people changed. There could never be a perfect system but you never really personally knew of it to fail. The last time you had heard about soulmates moving past one another was decades ago. It still happened, you told yourself. And maybe your soulmate had even moved on. Maybe Bucky had too much to care about already.

But this wasn’t looking to be some easy getaway for you. It was proving impossible as you let your mind wander.

You pondered it all heavily as you sat at your computer doing some (slightly intense) internet search on your soulmate. You didn’t expect to find yourself deep in such work but you got curious, got restless at the thought of him. The news report kept flashing in your mind accompanied by bits and pieces of the nightmares.

You learned he went by Bucky and originally had his life set in the 40s. You couldn’t figure how he didn’t have a soulmate there. How his soulmate -- you -- ended up years and years away. 

But that may have been too painful if he had had someone considering he was kidnapped during World War II and weaponized for decades, way before you were ever even a thought in your parents’ brain. 

You continued to scroll through his military photos, finding yourself blushing at him in his uniform. He was quite the knockout, especially in the present day. Part of you wondered why you hadn’t recognized him before but you realized he was just… different. The eyes, the emotions, he actually looked full of life, real shining eyes and hope. Modern-day him was rigid, unsure, stoic. Not to mention the metal arm feature. That was who you were learning through the dreams but you certainly didn’t want it to be like that. If granted some chance by fate, you wanted all of him.

The more you searched, the more you learned, the less you felt like you could just get up and walk away. There was something in his face as you looked at the photos that made your soul ache. A connection was there, sure, and maybe you had to explore it. At the very least, he didn’t care. Then you could move on because that was possible, you reminded yourself. Rare, but possible. 

As you went, you found he was the best friend of Steve Rogers. Captain America. after some thought, you decided that could hopefully be your start to this journey to him. 

You just happened to see the particular super soldier nearly every other morning. The black coffee the shop served was a “real treat” he always said. 

While having some place to begin, you couldn’t help but feel so weird it took you so long. Never had there ever been that connection, that feeling, when even around Steve. Never any inclination that his best friend was… supposedly the one for you. 

This wondering was gonna eat you alive if you allowed it. You had to act. Something was lit inside you upon seeing him. It was as if the world told you to get it into gear. Enough wondering, enough fearing. You had to hit the ground running.

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.

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[hawksky]

You wake up on your ex's fire escape; wc 2.5k

A/N: I don't really know how to categorize this ? starts as funny, gets into angst with a happy/hopeful ending. I might write this again for another character and make it 0 angst but using Megumi just let this get away from me. Thank you @sixeyesgojo for reading through my first draft, it helped me edit a lot since 😘. Although I have not looked over the ending since I wrote it, I'm done working on this fic so sorry if it falls flat.

CW: Mentions of excessive alcohol consumption.

Suggested listening: song 1 and song 2 you can pick just one to cater your experience (they are VERY different vibes) or switch over around the shampoo situation.

Objectively, there were good ways to wake up. In the arms of a beautiful person, with cold sheets and a warm body, or with the scent of your favourite breakfast wafting through the air. No disrespect to mornings at all, there were good ways to wake up, you were mature enough to recognize this.

A perplexingly rough, wet, and warm sensation gliding across your cheek, while last night’s jeans dug into your waist, and there was a pounding in your head? It was fairly safe to say this was not a good way to wake up.

It spoke volumes for how out of it you were that it was only just beginning to register in your brain that you weren’t at home, you were not even on a bed, and that the continued licks across your face were the work of animal far too large to be one of your friends cats.

“Fucking hell you’re supposed to be intimidating” you hear a voice grumble without much heat behind it.

As you forced your eyes open you are met with an excited dog tapping its paws in excitement of your presence, and the man behind the half hearted grumble. His gaze was unmistakably familiar, but his expression could not be more foreign to you.

“uhm, Hi” you croaked out while plastering a wide grin in hopes he wouldn’t murder you.

His eyebrow raised on instinct in response. You knew he was waiting for you to explain what you were doing, but the reality was you didn’t have an answer.

“I wish I could explain, but honestly I’m not sure what happened – last thing I remember was being bought another shot… Wait, where am I exactly?” You were desperately hoping you came off as charming instead of pathetic given the circumstances.

“How out of it are you?” he scrunched his face in confusion as he muttered to himself. “You’re on my fire escape, it’s in Ikebukuro? Tokyo… Japan, in case you needed the reminder”

It felt infantilizing to have him scold you like this, which only made this next part all the more difficult. You were not supposed to be Ikebukuro. You were not supposed to be in Tokyo. You were supposed to be in Yokohama. What was even more concerning is that you were definitely not supposed to be on your old fire escape, the one connected to the apartment your ex still lived in.

As you painstakingly pushed yourself upright, a warm weight laid on your upper thigh, a furry face nuzzling into your stomach – you wondered if she was aware of tension between you and her owner. You scratched behind her ears, letting Jade know she was in fact a good girl despite the earlier reprimand from her owner.

As much as you’d love to spend the day sitting on a fire escape petting your ex’s dog, you had to go home, you just need to call –

Your phone. Where was your phone? You felt around frantically for your phone, only to come up with nothing. A light sense of panic bubbles in the pit of your stomach, only to be swiftly interrupted.

“it’s already charging, I plugged it in last night, you dropped in inches away from falling down”

So, he was still watching you despite having returned inside long ago. It was difficult for you to parse this sort of gesture, how caring could it be to plug someone’s phone in when you still left them to sleep outside? Maybe he was just doing everything he could to get rid of you. It was too much to try and analyze for someone who blacked out and woke up in a different city.

“Why did you come here?” you hear him bite out from inside. It sounds harsh, but it feels like his stange way of inviting you inside.

“I don’t know what you’ve picked up from these circumstances, but not knowing is kind of a part of the problem. Believe me, there’s no amount of conscious desperation that would leaf me to sleeping on a fire escape, even yours”

You glanced around the apartment to avoid his void expression; it was spotless. But it was even harder noticing, the turned over picture frames, your favourite quilt still on the back of the couch – remnants of the past living in the present.

This tension only increased as a mug of freshly brewed green tea was placed in front of you. How thoughtful to remember you hated coffee, to realize your throat was probably killing you – you would have tasted a creeping bitterness from all these emotions, if it wasn’t overpowered by what was the distinct taste of your favourite brand that had to be special ordered.

He had always complained, there were plenty of good options for tea at the grocery store, why wasn’t that enough for you? It was so much extra effort to special order from a tea shop across town, the only place that you were able to charm the owner into ordering for you.

“How are you still so fucking awful at taking care of yourself?” he spat the words out like an insult, it was jarring honestly. Despite the time away from each other, it was no less strange to feel his detachment.

He moved towards the door beckoning Jade to follow. “There’s a towel and change of clothes in the bathroom, you should probably take a shower. If I’m not back by the time you leave, just lock up before you go, I haven’t moved the spare key.” Without looking back or waiting for a response he left.

You were starting to recognize your growing frustration – you had known him how long? Dated and lived together for a not-insignificant amount of time? Yet here you were, no idea how to interpret this strange morning, much less his last comment. Did he want you to be here when he returned? Were you supposed to leave and act like you had never been there? Could he genuinely be as indifferent as he wanted you to believe? It pissed you that your feelings were probably plain on your face.

You searched for your phone, finding it on what used to be your side of the couch. It felt ridiculous to think you ever had a side of the couch, but you were both creatures of habit and slowly without even thinking you both made your own little sanctuary mere metres away from each other.

You awoke your phone, expecting a flood of texts and phone calls from your friends, only to find nothing. Not a single check in from anyone. You open the group chat and furiously tap out a message.

<Hey assholes who let me go home on my own last night? Anyways good job I blacked out and I’m on Fushiguro’s fire escape! You are all absolutely useless to me I swear to god.>

Your phone vibrates rapidly as you place it down but you’re not in the mood to field their questions.

You’re tempted to leave now, just to get it over with, go home and crawl into bed and forget any of this ever happened. But, you felt gross, it was late enough in the morning that you could run into someone you knew, and you missed the water pressure here.

As you got ready for your shower you surveyed your options. You refused to smell like him, but the only other bottle in the shower was doggy shampoo. Surely dog’s fur and human hair weren’t so different right? Jade did have a beautiful coat, very soft and shiny… You reprimanded yourself for the ridiculous idea, but the point remained, there had to be something else for you to use.

Your brain, far more alert than it was 30 minutes ago, thought of all the things he hadn’t changed, all the fixtures still in place. You had always kept an extra set of all your supplies under the sink. By the grace of all that is good on this cruel cruel earth, they were there, in all their dusty glory, your prized hygiene products sat unmoved under the sink. It would have been sick and twisted to have to leave your ex-boyfriend’s apartment smelling exactly like him, left to spend the rest of the day agonizing over whether you should take another shower.

As you entered the shower you wondered more. He had to have noticed the softness in your eyes, the faint smile you wore just having an ounce of his attention again, the way ti widened at every caring gesture, and falling with every biting remark.

Yes, it hurt every day missing him. Yes, it would hurt if he hated you. But none of that compared to the feeling of not knowing. What were you supposed to do with all these residual feelings that have yet to go away? Were they worth the suffocation or should you strip them away?

You were proud of yourself, all these reminders of what you once had, in a place you once loved, and you had yet to break down, not even shedding a tear. If you weren’t wrapping yourself in a towel, you would’ve given yourself a pat on the back. This victory was short lived, everyone’s strength has its limits and you had taken yours too far past it already. But then you saw it, something you were completely unprepared for.

Laid neatly on top the closed laundry basket was THE outfit. It was nothing special to anyone else, just a grey sweater and loose joggers, but how many days had you spent alone breathing in his scent for comfort while he was gone? How many hard days at work had you reaching for these exact pieces as if they were the cure to all your problems?

Unable to support your own weight anymore, you fell to the tiled floor, tears spilling out, as your already sore throat grew even more hoarse – you felt like everything was collapsing around you. You weren’t expecting to see him, and you certainly weren’t expecting to need him in so many little ways. It was easy to forget how easily he weaves himself into your life, encroaching on everything you do.

The world disappeared behind each shallow breath, and an endless stream of tears you couldn’t control. Your fingers scratch against your forearms repeatedly, trying to ground yourself in some reality you could no longer grasp. It is so exhausting trying to be over him, going through these cycles of strong emotions, over and over and over again.

Suddenly, for the second time in as few hours, you felt an overwhelming weight encompass your body.

Of course, his stupid fucking perfect dog would still know how to bring you out of a panic attack like he had spent so much time training when you started dating. You clutched to Jade as your breathing slowed, but it did nothing to stop your sobs, if anything it was just another painful reminder of everything you let go.

“Uhhh….” Megumi was frozen at the door, for the first time today he didn’t know what to do. His indifferent façade dropped as he observed the scene on his bathroom floor.

There’s nothing left to lose, not for a moment that he has seen this morning have you possessed more than an ounce of dignity, “So that’s it? You don’t know what to do either? You know it’s been a whole fucking year and I still haven’t figured out how to live without you. A whole year and I’m still a mess. I can’t survive being reminded of us, look at me. And yet every attempt to get over you was a knife twisting because they’ll never be you. Now I’m here and I get to witness the wonderful Megumi Fushiguro, unaffected, and you… you have it all together.” You trail off, giving to him everything left in you.

You weren’t expecting the confused and indignant expression on his face, “You think this is having it together?” His voice lightly raising with each word “This place might as well be a sealed shrine to you and our relationship. I haven’t thrown a single thing out, moved any furniture, bought anything new – the only thing that’s ‘new’ is your stupid tea I keep buying even though I hate it, and for fucks sake y/n I should’ve moved out. Every part of me that looks like I have it together is just my version of a mess.” He brushes a stray strand out of your face, his own face moving far too close for this to be purely platonic anymore “y/n I’m no better off than you are, I’ve just kept everyone from looking”.

“So what are we supposed to do with all this?” Your eyes shining, naïve hope seeping through your defenses at the confirmation that he couldn’t live without you either.

“We could try again” Somehow, it wasn’t quite what you needed to hear. “I, am going to get dressed, and then we’ll talk, I’ll meet you in the kitchen.” He nodded lightly, pulling himself up and exiting with Jade on his heels.

Dressed in the clothes you thought would burn your skin to even touch let alone wear, you let out a long sigh as you sit on at the breakfast nook. “Look, Megumi, I need to know if you’ve worked through it, any of it? I can’t, I can’t wait another three years for you to tell me you can’t say the words I love you, that you can’t commit to more than a yearly rental, I can’t just have you here I need more security than that”

He pursed his lips, unsure of what he could say to that, how he could make sure you didn’t leave again.

“Megumi, I don’t need you to say it to me today, I don’t need you to commit to anything today, but I have to know you’ve tried that I can’t keep waiting for you”

“I… Just give me a minute, please” his voice weak pleading with you. You waited, knowing better than to rush him, laying a hand on top of his assuring him you weren’t going to run out the door.

“y/n, I’m supposed to be honest and vulnerable, I’m supposed to tell myself that people won’t abandon me just because I give them access to who I really am. I want to tell you I love you, because there’s no other explanation for feeling this way. For feeling like your eyes outshine the stars, that your mind is more brilliant than the sun. I’ve tortured myself for a year with the idea of you meeting someone who could give you everything I couldn’t, and selfishly I prayed they were awful, I wished you were miserable so I pretend the truth wasn’t real that I was not enough for you, that I couldn’t give you what you needed. I’ve never seen a loving relationship, certainly not for long enough to form memories, but I look at you and I can’t imagine anything else”

Your thumb reaches to brush away the stray tear sliding down his face as he spoke to you. Manoeuvring yourself around to be on the same side of the nook as him, you pull him into you, letting him bury his head into the crook of your neck. You placed a gentle kiss into his hair before whispered into his ear “You were always enough, I just needed you to know it too.”

not not a tag list: @satosuguslut @sandyscastle

[kylosgenesis]

Teardrops on Fire

Synopsis:

Steve Rogers is the last Alpha of the an almost extinct Lycan pack. With only less than 100 members left. Steve must produce an heir to ensure the species survival and reduce the chance of attacks from others. Omegas are rare, and betas have a hard time producing children. Steves reality is finally setting in as his obligation of producing an heir faces a major set back.

Reader is the last suitable omega to mate with Steve, due to the fear of her daughters fate in the pack, her mother kept her hidden from the pack after her own exile. Only her mother, and Bucky's family know of her existence. Bucky is Steve's right hand man, and the packs best warrior! He and the reader developed a friendship and bond over the years, but age forced them to become distant.

What happens when she presents and her first heat cycle comes? Her body is in excruciating pain and a strong fever quickly overcomes her body. Facing the fear of her daughters possible death, her mom calls on the only person who can save her at this point, Alpha Steve! Bucky and the alphas friendship will be tested. The reader will be faced with her love for Bucky or her duty to the pack.

Warnings: Mentions of death , A/B/O dynamics

Playlist: https://open.spotify.com/user/gennyzoe/playlist/7xFIhRFa8o2Ae4QJpD1Hp9?si=gWsZ__YOQdKCS81X21jZqw

Chapter 4: I found

Hours had gone by! Bucky was caught of guard with the smell of fire. Faint...but distinct enough he knew it wasn’t his imagination. The chilled air dragged a whiff of the combined scents of fog, smoke, and very faintly in the background... HER!

She was close! He could feel it! This wasn’t new territory to him, but he wondered how she’d ended up hours from her home. He followed the wind, blowing ashes by his face. Leaving a trail, that called to him as if nature was guiding him to her. All the odds were against her tonight, but the forest smelled safe! It was like it protect her from the evil of the elements.

After a couple of minutes on the trail, it hit him! The smell blew the air out of his lungs, he approached the small faded fire with caution. Not wanting to scare her off. As he got closer he noticed her small frame. She was attempting to stand up, but doing so knocked her directly into the fading red embers of where a fire used to be.

The world disappeared for him at that moment! It was her! Just him and her!

And she smelled delicious! Everything is his being screaming to make her his in this very spot, and vanish with her. Nobody to find them! As long as she was there, there was nothing he’d want in this life or another! She was the trophy and the torture, that cursed through him. To love, but never poses. How could he even be thinking of love right now? He hadn’t even looked into her eyes yet.

What if she hated him?

What if she didn’t recognize him?

How was he gonna explain what’s going on to her? She has to know what her body wants right now, what it’s craving for her to do! And how much he wishes to not crave her in the same way.

He bolted to her with all his might, and caught her calling frame. As her eyes slowly faded into unconsciousness, peace resonated in her eyes. He’d dreamed of those eyes for years! And as her body went limp on his arms all he could do was hold her close and pray for the strength to keep her alive and safe... from himself!

She opened her eyes as they adjusted to the moonlight above her. Her body was covered in a warm flannel, she didn’t recognize the source of it.She remembered the eyes she saw before losing consciousness.

Had it all been a dream?

She felt like her limbs were on fire! They responded to every bit of stimulation the flannel was rubbing upon her body. She realized it wasn’t the flannel that was causing her body to jolt up at the feeling of touch; It was that it smelled like an alpha. Her body was trying to absorb as much of him as it could! She was unconsciously reacting to him and granting him access to her.

Hearing a branch break from behind the forest bush, she sprung up as quickly as her body allowed her to react and grabbed a beach from her side.

“Who’s there?” She was in full alarm, she also noticed the fire she had started had been reignited, and was fully blazing and strong!

“What do you want from me? And for the love of... “

She noticed that the reason she had the flannel on was for her own modesty, because underneath the flannel she was as naked as she was brought into the world.

“ Why am I naked? ”

Bucky noticed her panic as he approached the camp again. He’d gone out to get some more firewood and clay to dress her wounds. He wasn't expecting for her to be so recovered.

“I’m sorry ... I didn’t mean to startle you! I'm here to help.”

He put his arms up, to show her he wasn’t a threat, dropping the contest of his arms to the ground! “I was just getting us some more fire, and you need something for your wound... it doesn’t look good!” he fixed his hair back with one of his free hands, a nervous habit he had kept since childhood.

She furrowed her brow, and took a swing of the branch startling him and forcing him to step back. ” I bet you would you know what wound need tending to?” She replied with a cocky attitude! She imagined he would’ve had to look at her body while he took her clothes off, but the realization that her body was not in display contrition made her blush for a moment.

Ignoring the heat rising to her cheeks, and the small pit of embarrassment in the pit of her stomach. She put on a brave face! As he got closer her body reacted to his presence.

He was tall! Always had been, but despite the fact she’s grown since he last saw her, he still sported a good foot above her. She lowered her stance and let go of her makeshift weapon.

Taking a step back, she tripped, and stumbled back. Bucky tried catching her, but before he could he lost his own footing and tackled her body to the ground.

There she was!

Looking like a goddess underneath him, in a flannel, with her little confused doe eyes! She didn’t even try to fight him off. They just stared at each other's eyes, for a small eternity that what theirs to have.

They could both see their changing features, the fire’s light shone on Bucky to reveal his dark black hair. There were messy strays surrounding his face, but the rest was neatly tucked behind his ears. Stubble framed his face, and his jaw was the jaw of a man. It was also an awkward time to notice how much muscle he’d gained in the last 10 years. His body was solid on top of her, even through his shirt, his body told his story! He was a man of work! His body was that of a man who did hard labor, a man who was outside for long periods of time. Which was something she could tell as she noticed the tan in his upper neck had begun fading as the weather grew colder.

His muscles responded to her stare in ways she couldn’t pinpoint!

He on the other hand noticed her delicate face, the way she had grown into her childhood innocence and beauty. Her frame was so small and breakable compared to him. He for a moment thought he could easily crush her, and tried to ease his weight to make it lighter on her.

Her hair was gorgeously long! It surrounded her like a halo, fit for her like an angel. And her eyes where large and expressive. He could’ve read those eyes a million ways years ago, but now! He couldn’t help but wonder what they were trying to say.

He couldn’t stop himself as the word slipped from his lips.

“Doll!”

He placed his knee between her legs and pushed on the palm of his hands in an effort to lift his body weight off of her.

“Don’t call me that! Haven’t heard that in a long time”... she wiggled under his body and pushed him off her “ that name used to be special to me”

She tried to stand up, but a dizzy spell forced her to remain seated on the ground. Looking at his hurt expression a few more seconds that she wanted to.

“ I really missed you!” Her eyes filled with tears that threatened to roll down her cheek as she tried to stare forward, but he would still read her pained face. “ When you caught me. I thought I was dying! ..and you weren't real”

“ Im sorry! Im so sorry! I shouldn’t have left you just like that!”

He sat down next to her frame, he noticed how her body was shivering, even close to the fire. Her smell was spiking up. He knew that once morning came he’d have to rush her to Steve as soon as possible! But for now, he just wanted to enjoy her! Just enjoy her own smell one last time.

“I never stopped thinking about you!” He lowered his face to the palms of his hands. It was there when she noticed. One of his hands wasn't quite his. It was a lusterly metal, but it still radiated his energy, and warmth.

“I'm sorry too! I shouldn't have interrupted whatever it is you guys do in the village...” she was guarded! Her body tensed up as she talked, a knife in her words ” a lowlife like me getting lost... that’s what it took for you to care again” the tears began to fall, a combination of her hormones, and now shock!

Her body was changing and she couldn’t do anything about it, and now the ghost of her former best friend was back. She didn’t know how to process. She was stronger than this! Why was her body dissolving her to her nature?

Bucky wanted to embrace her! To say so many things, but nothing felt like enough to him.

“Listen now it’s not the time for... ” as he stood up he heard her let out a pain filled grunt. Her hand reached out to grab his thigh, as she doubled over to the ground in pain.

He quickly reacted to her pain, and kneeled down next to where she now laid doubled over on the cold moist ground.

“No, no ,no , no listen to me doll... you have to pull through!” He positioned his body as comfortably as he could for her “ I can’t help you... I’m not supposed to...”

He’d made a mistake! He’d coated her in his smell from the moment he held her in his arms. Her body was screaming for an alpha and it was only going to get worse till an alpha helps her body respond to it’s needs.

From the little life she had a few minutes ago, this little omega at his feet was shaking, and frail!

“I’m sorry, doll…” he looked around in distress “please just stay with me! We have to make it till morning! Please just look at me...tell me you’re alright! “ he cradled her small body and held her close to him.

As a strong wave of her scent hit his nostrils, and a small seizure overcame her body.

Bucky knew what he had to do!

But he wanted to make sure he had well enough exhausted all of his options. It would be selfish of him not to admit he wanted to help her.

“ Bucky... am I gonna die? ” she looked up at him with pained eyes, she was suffering! He used his shirt to wipe down the trails of blood exiting her nose. He wanted to help her so badly! She was nuzzled up against his body, shivering and looking more lifeless by the moment.

Her body was rejecting her omega change!

Bucky knew the fever wasn’t a good sign! But with the seizures that were now overtaking her body every few minutes, it was confirmed to him that she was moments away from collapsing upon herself. An alpha made an omega stronger! It was in their nature!

She needed an alpha !

As he held her in the heart of the forest, illuminated by the light of the moonlight, he could see the teardrops of red leave her eyes. Tears the color of fire!

And when the moon was above then at its brightest, Bucky looked up at the sky, and then down at her “Im sorry doll! I'm about to let you down one more time... I hope you can forgive me one day” as he exposed her neck to him, her untouched mating gland on full display to him.He carefully extracted his canines, and like a soft kiss, he bit her!

He knew Steve wasn’t going to be happy, and quite frankly he was even more scared of her finding out he’d taken away her choice!

Tag list: @austynparksandpizza @nerdgirljen @exposition-belongs-somewhere @connie326 @patzammit @blessedwedgie

[autumnslance]

I've got a writing question that's been on my mind for a while: how do you keep your OCs from becoming self inserts? Every time I think of developing an OC I realize that it's attributes that I

Oops, you got cut off! But in general: all your OCs are going to have traits of yours; it’s inevitable. Sometimes big things, sometimes small things. It’s how we relate to them, and also just natural, I promise. We write what we know, and we know how we interact with ourselves and the world.

But there is a difference between sharing some traits with a character and making them a self-insert. It’s letting their life, their community and culture, their experiences, also influence their traits and thinking, in ways that might be different from how you would respond in a similar situation. Even if you share those attributes.

This is me so let’s go behind a cut shall we?

Dark Autumn is as introverted and solitary by nature as I am; she can and does interact in professional and friendly ways with people (as I try to do), but needs alone time to recharge. However, Dark also has a very different outlook and relationship with her family than I, since her family is large and supportive, very close knit. If family is a lottery, I got the $50 scratch off prize while she hit the Mega-Millions. So I take that into account when thinking of her relationships not just with family, but with friends and potential romantic interests; Dark sees things through a lens of positive, low-drama familial relationships that I can barely fathom. This also means she has a support network and resources myself and other characters don’t, so gets some wish fulfillment of working through issues with care and grace instead of remaining in unhealthy places. She is my “comfort OC” so gets a lot of good things I wish I had—which shapes how she responds to others, like taking care of a FCmate and becoming something of a big sister figure for him, or the responsible older sister figure of my group of OCs. Which is me, really, idealizing my own older sister tendencies into this giant woman who’s better at it.

Aeryn was written to be on the ace scale; not my first character to be so, but the first written that way as I began to realize where my own orientations lie and wanting to examine that through fiction. That she fell for a certain rogue in the process of playing through MSQ again was not at all intentional. I like Thancred as a character—he hits a lot of tropes I enjoy—but in my own mindset, he’s a frustrating younger brother. I didn’t think I’d do NPC x WoL shipping. But there it is, because in determining Aeryn’s own experiences and how those shaped her, it ended up working out that way (and I spent the better part of 2 years writing the characters separately to figure that out and if it could work before writing them together because it’s not something that comes naturally to me).

Aeryn’s internal anger is something I have a difficult time with; it’s outside my own nature to carry things like that. I have my angers, certainly, but they are different from hers. I tend to need a lot to set me off and then it burns out hot and quick. Aeryn’s more of a long boil she keeps bottled up. I’ve gotten a few things through various fics, I think, but it’s why I do things like reference arguments but rarely depict them. Being non-confrontational myself (I’m meek and have hangups thanks to my own life) it’s a challenge. Aeryn responded to childhood traumas (that I never dealt with), bullying (that I did), losses (that I haven’t yet), and the responsibility she’s been given (thank goodness I don’t) far differently than I. Maybe I’d be more volatile, too, if I had her life. But I understand where her anger comes from sharing some of the reasons, I just shape it differently than my own.

There’s a lot of things about Dark and Aeryn that are accidentally similar, just due to the timing of their character generation and other RP OCs made for other games along the way; “Oh I haven’t done X or Y in a character in awhile” sort of thing, but how each approaches those similarities and why—their quietness, their issues with using magic, their tendency to “adopt” others as family—all come from different places and resolve differently, too.

C’oretta comes from a part of me that doesn’t quite want to grow up. That wishes I had been more of the peppy, active, cheerful, risk-taking, live it up stereotypical party kid, that “popular girl” archetype I felt so often on the outside looking in about. As my second character, I wanted her to be different from Dark Autumn—visually, emotionally, mentally. Where Dark is steady, C’oretta is flighty. While Dark is people oriented, C’oretta’s a bit selfish (like I often feel). Dark’s introverted, C’oretta’s extroverted. Much of C’oretta’s attitude is a deflection against the hurts in her life, a way to fight back against some terrible things. It’s a way I could never react. But I also can’t get away from a character who loves to learn and wants to try new things—but where other characters gain the ability to stick with and see them through, C’oretta gets my easy frustration and boredom, and then the “ooh shiny” of a new interest. There’s a history of ADHD (or whatever the acronyms are now) and even autism and learning issues in my family; it’s possible I have some undiagnosed ND stuff going on, and people have noted these things in C’oretta that I’ve based on my own experiences and those of people very close to me.

Many of my characters have traits I wish I had, or were better at; patience, kindness, consideration, convictions, courage, thoughtfulness, and so on and etc. They’re good at skills I haven’t the knowledge in, or the ability to do. They’re certainly more active than I am, or could be! Because I can take the time to think and plan and research and write those things out better, and just maybe along the way not only learn something myself, but try to practice it better myself. I can even sometimes let them teach me what I can possibly do or be, not just imagine it as an ideal that’s out of reach.

I try to let my characters make mistakes I wouldn’t—or in some cases, have in my past, and that’s OK. Especially if I learned from them, but maybe the character does not. Maybe they do but it takes awhile, or repeated instances until it sinks in. Maybe I let them make errors I still make, as a way to puzzle out better solutions I should probably entertain for myself.

Character voice is something I’ve felt I struggled with in keeping my OCs distinct. Do characters ‘sound’ alike, in dialogue and prose? Having distinct ways of speaking helps; C’oretta’s breathless chatty run-ons are certainly different from Dark and Aeryn’s quieter tendencies. I have to remember to trim down Aeryn’s dialogue more often, say less aloud, add more gestures and facial expressions. I tend to be a talker, an over-explainer (if you can’t tell), while the only times she gets like that are specific. Dark’s somewhere in the middle of those two, like I am. A lot of the reason I like writing NPCs and try to keep them close to my interpretation of canon is to practice distinct character voice to get better at it in my OCs, so they don’t sound like me!

And something I’ve never admitted to before is that I think for me, it helps that from the time I was a kid watching various series of Star Trek, I always have had an in-my-own-head-only self-insert. She’s always a support character (that’s what I’m best at). She has cool and unusual abilities to help the actual heroes, cuz heck it’s my internal fantasy and that’s fun. She has traits I want to be better at or wish I had, developed over time with more energy and focus than I can actually muster in reality. As time’s gone on, she’s become more of a mentor and Mom Friend as I’m now older and see a lot of protagonist characters as “my kids” now. She appears in nearly every story I’ve loved over time, in one iteration or another. And because I have a headspace character where I can say “this is what I, ideally, would say and do and be capable of in this situation…” My other characters that I actually write about can vary between doing something similar (if it suits them) to doing something completely different (cuz darn kids never listen) as I can compare them to the self-insert and decide where to diverge.

So it’s a mix of myself and my traits and knowledge, but taking into account how each character would respond and use those same attributes differently than I do or would. Write what you know, write who you are—and then add in some wish fulfillment, some what ifs, some bad choices, some good choices, and shake things up. Give the characters tics and tricks different from yourself and let that shape them, too, by remembering to take those things into account (even if you have to tape a note to your monitor).

And finally, don’t be ashamed of your self-inserts; I’ve known some great characters that started as self-inserts and grew, through their experiences, into wholly different people than their writers over time. Heck, the epic romance my original WoW priest was part of was with a character that started as a self-insert; his player began the game knowing nothing of the lore or roleplaying, but as he learned the story and how to RP, and determined how his character fit into the world and how that shaped him, the character diverged over time, while still sharing some key traits (some endearing, some frustrating, as people are and all part of that friend). It’s not a bad starting point at all. The rest can come over time and practice, especially if you make a lot of OCs and try to make them different from each other while also being aspects of yourself.

[sonderrow-moved]

ROY’S BIO IS FINALLY UP ! It is available on his about page, mobile about or under the cut !

♚ “AND LATER MY MACABRE JOY SOURS AND I’M WEEPING FOR MYSELF, UNABLE TO FIND SOLACE IN ANY OF THIS, CRYING OUT, SOBBING, “I JUST WANT TO BE LOVED,” CURSING THE EARTH AND EVERYTHING I HAVE BEEN TAUGHT: PRINCIPLES, DISTINCTIONS, CHOICES, MORALS, COMPROMISES, KNOWLEDGE, UNITY, PRAYER - ALL OF IT WAS WRONG, WITHOUT ANY FINAL PURPOSE.”

This man has lived too long. A classic concept written, imagined by artists. To comfort them about their mortality, explore the ins and outs of an alien narrative full of ifs. How would this even work ? Even the people with the best memories, to a genius level even, eventually forgets, for the brain can only retain so much. This feeling people gets as they grow older, the biased nostalgia of glorified items they saw through their pure, untainted, still developing eyes and the resentment towards new trends as they cannot see anything without any scum anymore. The yearning not for those movements, but for this soft sensation, of looking, admiring something and think, for a moment, that it’s idealistic form was real.

This sweet, unadulterated notion became only a distant, forgotten memory as time hardened the one known today as Roy. For years. Decades. Centuries. Millenniums.

A man who was born during another civilization, another time, long forgotten with only myths remaining of it. Not even a relic to be talked about, as everything had disintegrated, returned to earth for another life cycle.

♚ “THE PAST ISN’T REAL. IT’S JUST A DREAM,” I SAY. “DON’T MENTION THE PAST.”

Roy was born under another name, one he still remembers, but has long buried away, as it is not his name anymore. No one remembers it. It is not him anymore, as much as he might like to. It is only an appellation to let go of. As humankind developed its technology to a peak, so did their power, as they yielded control over nature people nowadays couldn’t imagine. It wasn’t as clear as one making a motion to have the waves, wind and earth respond to it. It was a much more fundamental, rawer sense to it. Where the energy of the world could be used to build even new life.

Always the diligent person who only lived to serve, executing tasks exactly as he was asked to, Roy had been appointed to be the Right Hand of the High Priestess. A young female who had only recently bloomed into womanhood. So perfect in existence, like a bright, pale, white being given to their kind in exchange of their discovery over worldly power. She had embraced her role as a symbol since birth, and he was to accompany her every step of the way as she rose to an official position. To inspire and love. Untouched by anything, for her importance was too great as people shook the world order in their insatiable human curiosity. Nowadays, Roy could have been defined as a bodyguard, yet, in this time, there was no fear of another person’s mishap. Only was he to protect her from accidental injuries, get more menial tasks off her shoulder and, most of all, as they understood this aspect deeply, have her emotional and social needs satisfied.

The way she was so beautiful, the way she would only crack a laugh at his shenanigans, the way he knew how to soothe her and she, in her infinite kindness, learned to soothe him back when a crack of worry grew between his impeccable … how could he not fall in love ?

He loved the way she would recite poetry while he slowly got used to her wanting him to caress her head, and she loved the way he would sing her verses in his smooth, sultry voice. The way she would eye him while someone else was talking on stage with a soft smile while he was guarding the entrance and he’d let a smile crack.

It wasn’t a consummated love like you would see in the current, modern days. There were, of course, pairings who held deep affection towards one another and brought in the next generation, but she had a role where she would never have the chance to do so, for her symbolism was not to replicate, only to be a happenstance, a gift which mustn’t be tainted by an attempt to be artificially redone. She accepted her role with no issue, and so did Roy. And the two of them were perfectly happy with this.

This was a time before the continents even started to noticeably separate on Earth, or even before the initial ground became more and more flooded by the waters. A time where Roy’s kind felt so unified, at peace… until this built up, free of conflict power shattered in on itself.

Raw abominations started roaming, not in the form of creatures, not exactly. So ephemeral, yet spreading chaos and distortion at every corner, fueled by the abuse and infighting of those who had gathered too much and only yearned for more. Years and generations of peace had made civilization take harmony for granted, and the couple was powerless as they saw it unfold. As the world balance collapsed, Roy was approached by a group of pacifists, trusted people for outside the conflicts, everyone knew anyone, respect one another, grew with one another. And as sickly dear ones, growing tainted by the plague pleaded with him, for his position had him perfect for what needed to be done for the greater good: kill the priestess, so the good in her would spread across the land, calm the spirits through their weeps, and save them.

Someone like Roy, of unfathomable loyalty, had a decision to make. And despite the tugs at his heart, it was an easy one. For he believed that, if the Priestess was present, the choice would be simple. That she would understand, because, in her infinite goodness, she could forgive them, forgive him, in the end. And as his trust towards her was strong, it is during a bright morning, away from the war, in the beautiful temple they inhabited, up in the mountains, away from civilization, that he entrusted her with what the people wished of them… and like the great woman she always had been, she kept a serene, albeit slightly sorrowful expression as she accepted. If there was a chance the power built inside her since birth could save more than one person, she would die.

But when his blade pierced her heart, tainting her white, ceremonial clothing in the middle of the garden, she only clanged onto him, eyes wide with desperate sorrow, an expression she, and he, never ever witnessed in anyone before. Fear and betrayal spread across her dark eyes as they grew more and more obscure.

I don’t want to die. My love, I don’t want to die…

―were her last words before, as she wept and choked, the High Priestess expired in her guardian’s blood soaked arms, him wearing too stunned an expression for her to ever hear an answer for him.

Just like beliefs and idolization are made-up by man for comfort and, ultimately, are fake, so was the glorification that one death, from someone incredibly beautiful from the inside out, would be a solution to mankind creating their own demise.

And so, it was at his feet that Roy saw the last of humans slowly die out, first from their endless conflict, so harsh they forgot where it even started, and then to the unforgiving nature, taking back the life they had abused off her.

Only, as he himself felt like he was expiring, with all lifeforce living him in the deserted, now ruined temple he had taken cared of with his beloved.

♚ “THIS IS TRUE: THE WORLD IS BETTER OFF WITH SOME PEOPLE GONE. OUR LIVES ARE NOT ALL INTERCONNECTED. THAT THEORY IS CROCK. SOME PEOPLE TRULY DO NOT NEED TO BE HERE.”

And with the end of this first Humankind was the land so dry of its lifeforce that the cycle of resurrection immortality and resurrection ended. It was quite simple at the time, and helped with the utopia free of grief and unnecessary sadness for their knowledge-seeking kind. If happenstance had you gone, your aether would go back to the earth, only to rise again in the next year, century, no one knew, but they would rise again, the same people, to meet the ones they knew in another life again, with hazy memories, but just enough to recognize your loved ones, and find them again. The more time passed, the less did people come back from this dormant phase, millions and millions now sleeping under the crust of the Earth, never to awaken again. Only the one who had gathered more power could come back more quickly, not the servants, no matter how strong they were, like Roy, who was only, despite all his strengths, a support to a higher one.

Only, as their kind ended, in her last breath, was he given the last link to the cycle, to be connected to his brethren, when he wasn’t supposed to be the one to live again to better the world.

She gave it to him, as her last gift. As the forgiveness she could never give him while she clung to dear life so desperately.

For the greatest gift to give to someone where inevitable death surround them is to still live……… isn’t it ?

I have seen too little, did too little to be of any solace in chaos. You, my love, have seen, experienced. I cannot think of a finer person to carry out our legacy, for I trust that only the best will come out of you.

♚ “PEOPLE CAN GET ACCUSTOMED TO ANYTHING, RIGHT? HABIT DOES THINGS TO PEOPLE.”

Life went back to its natural course. Ancient structure became ruins as vegetation took over, and, strong as it ever was, mankind rose again from the ashes. At the dawn of a new civilization, an orphan would be found at a nearby river, taken in by farmers and eventually would be a child raised by the whole humble village… a child who hadn’t forgotten a thing, and worked towards the dawn of a new age where he could protect what was dear to him.

And so, the one these days called Roy, grew up like he did before, to train and refine his ways. Only, this time, he didn’t only focus on his personal growth, but on others’ too. Estranged from other children like he had always been, with adulthood reaching his mind too quickly, only devoted to his craft. Despite snarl from the youth, his reputation grew amongst the adults and elders, and the communities beyond. As soon as his body was barely out of its formative years, did the boy set home in the mountains. Out of the leftover ruins his past life would let him have. A strong foundation to not lose sight of his objective.

Discipline. Commitment. Responsibility. Peace of mind. Realism. Alongside harsh but fair mental and physical training, all from what he had been taught and remembered, Roy kept exploring martial disciplines he even hadn’t touched in the past, wanting to reestablish what had been lost, and, before he knew it, he was known nearly as a Sage Deity across the land. A man coming from another world, who set up his temple atop the mountains made of smooth boulders eroded with time, near a clear water source, in the middle of a blossoming garden full of colors and hybrid one never knew how such an abundance of different species naturally grew alongside one another in this location, like it was enchanted.

Often, the village elders sought Roy’s advice, which he hoped have given sparingly, in neutrality, since he couldn’t guide mankind every step of the way, only show them a flourishing path. Travelers would come from afar to seek both his teaching and words, with glorified stories growing slightly intimidating to the young man. Despite this, he did his best to carry on his duty, taking care of the new temple grounds he assembled himself, wearing flowing clothes he sew himself; all loyal to the form and aesthetic of the woman he cherished, adorning the same attire she did and flowing, long hair. He wasn’t hoping for them to meet again, only honor her memory. He had grieved and grieved, wept and wept before she gave him the gift of eternity. His salvation was throwing himself into his training, contemplating his sorrow, and so on and on again until he only felt peace.

Roy’s stories of a lady in white with the darkest of eyes became legends, tales of kindness, bravery and adventure. And, amongst his own legacy growing, did Roy decide, after much deliberation, to take in disciples. One, then two. People under his tutelage, who would, in return, vow to spread and defend what the temple fought for, alongside taking equal parts in temple duties. And as the young people he accepted under his wing grew, Roy would soon be surrounded by four bright students he deeply loved. Unable to truly have a father’s touch, he, at least, believed he was a good guardian, hoping that, with time, his students would become masters, and that humanity could flourish.

It was then that, surrounded by his disciples, minus one, actually, that Roy had just finished drinking light tea and eating some sweets. He sighed as a cloud formed in front of his thin lips, the cold air announcing the winter to come. Even as his eldest disciple spoke, Roy didn’t reply. He stayed still, unmoving, silent, for there was nothing to say about what he felt was to come.

He didn’t even groan when he felt the ornate blades of his disciples pass through him, all three at the same time, for they were bound to be guilty together. While the screeching pain enveloped his senses, he wondered if this was what she felt, when he betrayed her.

That night, the Sage’s remains were cut to pieces, scattered far and wide, while his head was burned in the courtyard bonfire, all in an attempt to stop the link he had with his brethren, to cease the “gift” he had been given and for the cycle carried by the billions sleeping to come to an end.

But, unlike what men thought, Roy’s cycle was only part of nature, and he was to rise once more.

♚ “MY NIGHTLY BLOOD LUST OVERFLOWED INTO MY DAYS AND I HAD TO LEAVE THE CITY. MY MASK OF SANITY WAS A VICTIM OF IMPENDING SLIPPAGE.”

It was always the same. Again and again. He would be reborn, train, work, bond, and die at the hands of the very ones he had linked himself. The only reliable companion Roy ever had was nature outside of mankind, harsh but fair, just like him. With a behavior he could coexist with peacefully. It started eating him from the inside out. This time around, Roy had come back from the dead a few decades after his murder, found stark naked in a rice field even farther East, still in a young adult form, regenerated. Mankind hadn’t been doomed yet, and so, he vowed to save it by himself.

Roy would travel far and wide as mankind spread its territory and the continents started separating, being the only one of his kind which could still read the flow of life, its remaining corruption, and how to neutralize them. He would never stay in one spot for too long, only focusing on what he had to do. Because if he didn’t do it, who would ? If he didn’t do anything, he would only be left seeing the same amount of suffering and death, all by himself.

He couldn’t sit down. He couldn’t lose hope.

But Roy’s respect for life took the better of him. As he helped others with his abilities, presenting himself as somewhat of a medium as others also showed special traits, he hadn’t seen how darker human’s hearts had become. So much more quickly than the society he had known in the past. People turned envious of his abilities, and, soon enough, he needed to fight and run for his own life, at the risk of being torn apart yet again.

This fight and flight narrative happened again. And again. Until Roy’s duty had no time to be done; if he wasn’t around, there was no way anything could be done. He had to survive. And as the world grew around him, his mind and memories became muddied, and the depravity surrounding his person slowly creeped into his mind, as any remainder of his initial purpose was muddled with a constant years of bloodshed. An age of decades where he was to be burned and tortured, captured again and again before he’d lay waste to entire villages for his own safety. So no witness was to remain, and less people were to go after him. His training was used in a way he had never done before. For a cause he couldn’t decide to stop. He learned how to kill as efficiently as possible, how to decimate communities, destroy morale through underhanded means. Jumping from one allegiance to another as he either killed or fled before they’d go after him. For the first time, Roy could see how much his raw abilities could be of use in carnage, with no ceremony, no cause behind them. Only death. The very somber death he swore to stop.

He didn’t even stop to wonder at the technology men came up with, using the growing devices as meant for an end, anger and rage creeping into his very soul, indulging in vices he was being offered by humans which morals he always despised. There was no relief in this life, no moment of quiet, only screams and chaos, and only sins could provide a moment of respite. Roy, actually, never remembered how he died, but he did, at some point, in some time, after all sane people had left the territory, and only savagery had roamed the land he had loved so dearly.

During this time, he had forgotten her name, even her face.

♚ “THE CONVERSATION FOLLOWS ITS OWN ROLLING ACCORD - NO REAL STRUCTURE OR TOPIC OR INTERNAL LOGIC OR FEELING; EXCEPT, OF COURSE, FOR ITS OWN HIDDEN, CONSPIRATORIAL ONE. JUST WORDS, AND LIKE IN A MOVIE, BUT ONE THAT HAS BEEN TRANSCRIBED IMPROPERLY, MOST OF IT OVERLAPS.”

At some point, Roy had no recognition if he had been in the same world, the same plane of existence amongst the cycles when he awoke once again. This time in a white, desperately empty desert. With no one at his side. He was still, somehow, a fully grown person, with the fresh memories of violence he had laid, and the scent of blood into all his pores, and the grotesque weapons he had used with no ceremony.

Yet, in this newly regenerated body, in this empty space by himself, his mind centered itself. His discipline kicked in between the silence and hunt for sustenance. He had spent so long a time by himself, alone, in the most chaotic of scenarios. With no one who remembered him, no one who remembered his loved ones, no one who remembered who everyone he even knew were.

After spending time and time, he couldn’t count how long, to rebalance his person, reshape his senses and skills yet again, Roy readied himself to reach civilization once more… yet when he started his journey again, he stopped, the sudden weight of his contact with humankind anchoring him to the ground, unable now to stand. His body was trembling, and everything he had packed fell to the ground. He knew what would happen if he gave up. What he would need to go through and experience. Again and again. He tried. He tried so hard. But no matter how good he could be, it seemed so… hopeless. However, even if it was an impossible endeavor, he couldn’t stop, or else he would have nothing.

He wouldn’t be able to, maybe, one day, see everyone again. How many times had it been ? His memory couldn’t bear so much, what important things could he not recall ? He could start counting, but there was no way to say if entire lifetimes were not thrown into the abyss, and if forgotten crucial knowledge would end up with yet another failure…

This is when, hunched onto himself in this deserted, white horizon, Roy held his head in his hand. He groaned of pain as his mind was strained to its limits, drooling as he agonized, and images faded far, far away as he life flow was being torn apart from him by his own hands. He could hear the screams of his brethren, their legacy being desecrated. Useless. Useless. He didn’t need to remember their names. He didn’t need to remember their faces. Everything deemed useless to the core of his mission was shred out of his very soul, making the pain, the worries fade away, for he only needed to focus on what needed to be done.

Discipline. Commitment. Responsibility. Peace of mind. Realism. For those virtues to lead mankind to a greater part. And maybe, just maybe, recover part of everything he had lost.

For it was the one thing she had not accounted for, for she saw this man as someone so perfect through her affection for him.

That, ultimately, he did all of this so he could see them, see her again if he ever succeeded, and mankind could doom itself if it wasn’t the only way he knew to move onwards. That he did what was needed of him, without taking it so much to heart, that, in the deep of his heart, laid a hidden, selfish reason for all of this. Yet, it may not be this one anymore, he couldn’t tell.

And as Roy literally lost his mind, all by himself, with not a soul around to witness his sorrow, he laid there, vegetable from the trauma, feeling but unable to move, in a haze of horror and pain, before, finally, dehydration took him, and he was back in the cycle again.

Only, this time, there would be no memories. Only physical ones. No loneliness, only fake memories pieced by the world to balance his existence. Only a man, his training, his virtues, and an impossible task that is his only defense against despair and insanity.

♚ “THERE IS NO TIME FOR THE INNOCENT.”

[littlemisswonton]

How Shanghai is losing its mother tongue

In the past 20 years, Shanghai has surged to become an international commercial, cultural and transport hub with eye-opening speed. While gaining worldwide attention with its fast-growing economy and skyscrapers, the megacity is quickly - and silently - losing a precious part of its own: its mother tongue.

The Shanghai dialect is a part of an ancient language family, Wu Chinese, which originated in eastern China some 2,500 years ago and is spoken by roughly 80million people today.

Known for its soft and elegant sound, Wu Chinese is not mutually intelligible with Mandarin, which is based on the Beijing dialect. And because Wu Chinese has preserved some ancient pronunciations non-existent in Mandarin, classic Chinese literature from hundreds of years ago - such as popular poems from Tang and Ming dynasties - would sound more authentic and rhythmical when being read in it.

The Shanghai dialect, also known as Shanghainese, is a young but prominent member of Wu Chinese due to Shanghai’s prosperity as a colonial trading port between the mid 19th and 20th century. It was a fashionable tongue in the pre-Communist China and introduced many then-trendy Western items to Chinese people’s life through phonetic translation, for example “vez lin” for Vaseline, “fa le niong” for flannel and “kes mi” for cashmere.

It was associated with intellectual, entertainment and political icons, such as novelist Eileen Chang, singer Zhou Xuan and “the mother of modern China” Soong Ching-ling. It also spawned opera, comedy and entertainment productions enjoyed by generations of Shanghai dwellers.

But the distinct lingo, which could be heard in the city’s every nook and cranny up until three decades ago, is struggling to survive the rapid modernisation that has propelled Shanghai to its global status today.

(Soong Ching-ling, the wife of Sun Yat-Sen, was born in Shanghai and spoke the Shanghai dialect all her life. The above picture of her, via Wikimedia, was taken by British photographer Sir Cecil Beaton during the Second World War in China’s wartime capital, Chungking.)

A 2016 survey showed that only 30 per cent of Shanghai residents would use the Shanghai dialect in their daily conversation, while more than half of the locals preferred to speak Mandarin, China’s official language. Another study from 2017 found that nearly 80 per cent of local youngsters between the ages of six and 20 could not speak their mother tongue fluently, highlighting a sombre cultural crisis.

The dialect’s popularity was dealt with a sudden blow in 1992 when the central government launched a hard-hitting campaign to “promote Mandarin”. Aimed to establish a lingua franca for the country, the language movement, however, imposed heavy restrictions on the use of Shanghainese in Shanghai.

Among a list of mandatory rules, school children must receive lessons in Mandarin and were banned from speaking dialect in class and during breaks. Besides, public servants and service industry staff must stick to Mandarin at work. A few years later in 2001, Shanghainese programmes, beloved by the locals at the time, were pulled from TV and radio stations by a language law.  Only a few opera and comedy shows were permitted to be run in dialect.

Propaganda slogans, such as “Learn Mandarin, be a civilised person” and “Speak Mandarin is the symbol of civilisation”, appeared ubiquitously in Shanghai during the 1990s and early 2000s, leaving many youngsters feeling ashamed of using dialect.

Some of those compulsory policies were in place for more than a decade, others still remain effective.

(The above photo, via Vmenkov/Wikimedia, shows a ‘Mandarin-promoting’ slogan outside a kindergarten in Shanghai. It reads: ‘Everybody, please speak Mandarin, and standardise the language and writing.)

Qian Nairong, a Chinese language professor at Shanghai University, views the school ban a major cause of the dialect’s decline. He notes that the city’s primary school pupils were prohibited from speaking the Shanghai dialect on campus from the 1990s for over 10 years. As a result, several generations of Shanghai children grew up unable to express themselves well in their mother tongue.

“The inheritance of Shanghainese has met a rift when it comes to people born after 1985,” lamented Prof Qian during an interview with China News.

The ardent Shanghainese promoter authored a comprehensive dictionary in 2007 in a bid to romanise the dialect and standardise its written form. Five years later, he penned a petition with 81 other scholars, calling authorities to set up systematic regulations to protect Shanghainese.

Unfortunately, these grass-rooted efforts are yet to yield substantial changes in the government’s directives. Moreover, they might have come a little too late to alter millennials’ communication style.

Wang Kanyu, a 30-year-old Shanghai author, admits that it is difficult for her to hold a conversation purely in the Shanghai dialect because she talks to her friends and colleagues mostly in Mandarin.

Born in 1990 to a local family, Ms Wang began her primary school education in 1997 and was strictly forbidden from speaking the dialect by her teachers.

“I remember we promoted the using of Mandarin in my primary school. We had rankings with stars for pupils in our class. If anyone spoke Shanghainese, they would have a star taken away from them,” Ms Wang explains slowly using the Shanghai dialect.

“In middle and high school, all of my classmates were from Shanghai, but few of them would talk to each other in Shanghainese because most had got used to using Mandarin.”

She says as she grew up, she rarely conversed in Shanghainese with anyone outside her family. “Therefore, I am not accustomed to speaking it now. Besides, I feel that I cannot speak it well,” adds Ms Wang.

(I was among the very last generation of Shanghai children to be taught predominantly in my mother tongue throughout my school years. Above is my kindergarten graduation photo taken in the summer of 1989. I am in the front row, the fifth to the left.)

Apart from the tough Mandarin mandate, Shanghai’s swiftly shifting demographics pose as a challenge.

The city’s population ballooned by a third between 1998 and 2018, largely due to an influx of migrants from around the nation in search for work and better life. In other words, more than eight million out of Shanghai’s current 24million citizens did not grow up speaking the Shanghai dialect and rely on Mandarin to communicate in their daily life.

Huang Peide, a 37-year-old native, considers this a primary factor that prevents many Shanghai locals from using dialect.

“It is not that Shanghai people don’t speak Shanghainese any more. The fact is they have fewer and fewer people to speak it with,” Mr Huang points out using a mixture of the Shanghai dialect and Mandarin.

He says: “Environment can change people. For example, for people born after the 1980s, many of their friends, colleagues and clients are not from Shanghai. If they talk in Shanghainese, the listeners can’t understand. So what can you do?”

Mr Huang and his wife, both born in Shanghai, are encouraging their eight-year-old son to communicate with them in Shanghainese at home, “but he sometimes uses it, sometimes doesn’t”.

The father notes that around a third of his son’s classmates are from non-Shanghai-native families, and some 30 per cent of the teachers are non-Shanghainese speakers. Therefore it would not be practical for his son to speak the tongue while in school.

“In daily life, I insist teaching him the dialect, but he doesn’t have the environment to use it outside our home,” Mr Huang admits.

(The Shanghai dialect, or Shanghainese, could be heard in every nook and cranny of the city up until three decades ago. This picture, circulating on social media and believed to be taken in the early 1990s, shows pedestrians and cyclists on Nanjing Xi Road near the Jing’an Temple.)

Prof Qian believes it has become “urgent” to protect Shanghainese and the “key” is to encourage Shanghai youngsters to converse in it.

“The inheritance of a language relies on people, especially children,” the 75-year-old urged in a recent column. “We must let Shanghai pupils bring Shanghainese, which they have spoken with their parents since infancy, to their schools freely and allow it (the dialect) to be used after class. This is the key to passing forward Shanghainese.”

The academic, who has also developed a Shanghainese input method for computer users, stresses that promotion of Shanghainese is not aimed at marginalising Mandarin, but to build a society where the two can co-exist in a “harmonious” way.

“‘Bilingual people’ who can switch between Shanghainese and Mandarin can, for sure, have a more smooth, natural and free life in Shanghai. Furthermore, there are more and more occasions for [people to use] English. Therefore, Shanghai will certainly become a ‘multi-lingual’ society,” Prof Qian writes. “… In a diverse society, we need to build a harmonious, ‘multi-lingual’ life. Mandarin and Shanghainese can achieve a ‘win-win’ situation in Shanghai.”

Prof Qian’s comments echo the social stigma Shanghai locals face while talking to strangers in dialect. Out of fear that the addressees would not understand Shanghainese, and thus they would be regarded as “discriminating against migrants” - a sensitive topic in today’s Chinese society – many have now abandoned Shanghainese entirely in public and at work.

Mandy Chen, an analyst for a Fortune 500 firm in Shanghai, considers the discrimination topic “an interesting social discussion”.

“Normally, if we go to a less-fortunate place and hear the locals talk in their dialect, you won’t think they are discriminating against you. But if we go to a more developed area and hear the local use their dialect, you might feel that they are excluding you,” says the 36-year-old “new Shanghai citizen”, who can understand Shanghainese but has not actively learnt it.

(The Shanghai dialect spawned opera, comedy and entertainment productions enjoyed by generations of Shanghai dwellers. This picture shows Shanghainese stand-up comedy legends Yao Mushuang, right, and Zhou Baichun, left.)

Ms Chen grew up in northern China’s Inner Mongolia and has lived in Shanghai for 10 years on and off after moving to the city for university. She says she doesn’t mind - sometimes even prefers – her friends and colleagues speaking Shanghainese to her. But she acknowledges that some non-natives would, indeed, feel being looked down upon if spoken to in Shanghainese.

“This is more a psychological issue of the listener than a language issue. Often, the speaker doesn’t have any intention to show prejudice against the listener. It could be that they sound cold naturally,” she explains.

While the lingo-in-crisis is yet to be officially allowed in school or added into the curriculum, many of the city’s community schools have set up Shanghainese courses intended for “new Shanghai citizens” who moved to the city from other places.

���To pay more attention to teaching Shanghainese to new Shanghai citizens would be very beneficial to their children’s adoption of Shanghainese,” Prof Qian pens.

Ms Chen confesses that if she has a child in Shanghai, she would be happy to learn Shanghainese and the Shanghainese culture together with her son or daughter, so “my child can somehow relate to Shanghai as their hometown”.

She says that due to her family background, she grew up speaking only Mandarin. Still, she supports the idea of protecting Shanghainese because dialect is “a symbol of a region” and “a bridge between a person and their native culture”.

“I don’t wish to see Shanghai children unable to understand Shanghainese one day. It would be very unfortunate. For one thing, many cultural nuances and household gossips can only be expressed thoroughly through dialect,” Ms Chen points out in Mandarin. “In this regard, I am a sad example. If you ask me to talk, I can only use Mandarin.”

[writing-radionoises]

to be loved

ship: odazai, fyodazai, kunikidazai if you squint

genre: alternative universe

prompt: in an alternate universe where when someone who cares about you touches you, it leaves a colored mark on your skin, dazai is covered in so many unwanted marks from his abuser.

notes: tw for mori typical bullshit, referenced self harm, and implied sexual content. this is also just. my au but yall are free to do whatever you want with it as long as you credit me ^^

Most people value and adore marks.

The colored hand prints and kiss marks that litter each and every person’s body, each one unique from the other.

It means that someone cares about you, loves you in any way possible.

Whether it be platonically, romantically, or familial.

However, Dazai is not one of these people who values the marks.

Being passed around from person to person has left him with left marks, most of which fade after he is passed off again.

When a mark fades, it means the person has forgotten about you, or that they’ve died.

Many of Dazai’s past caretakers have died.

However, that would be why Dazai loathes his marks or the romanticization behind them.

His body is covered in marks. Bruise-like hand prints litter his body, predominately on the wrists and waist.

He has a distinct hand print over his mouth, a hand once used to silence his screaming and protesting against the perpetrator.

Dr. Mori Ogai is the cause behind these marks. He has a tendency to manhandle Dazai, toss him around however he pleases, and use him like a toy.

Dazai hates Mori more than anything, and had always wished the marks would just disappear. He wished Mori would stop caring about him, forget about him.

He wished Mori would die.

There was nothing that Dazai hated more than feeling like Mori’s toy on display, everyone who saw him could see all the pain Mori put him through.

Dazai covered himself in every way possible. Bandages, oversized clothes, jackets in spring.

But the marks pop out against his pale skin like neon colors.

Over time, he got used to them. He got used to having no other marks than from Mori, to looking like a beaten up toy, like a broken porcelain doll.

It was, until Dazai met Odasaku.

Odasaku was a kind man, his hand was littered in little hand prints from children, like rainbow face paint. He had a warm and comforting smile, and pushed Dazai to become his friend.

The first mark Dazai had gained outside of Mori’s was one of Odasaku’s. Oda had grabbed his hand, and when he removed his hand to bid a goodbye to Dazai, a green mark remained over Dazai’s left hand.

It looked fluorescent against Dazai’s pale skin, and mellowed out over time into a pretty pastel green. Dazai would trace each where Oda’s fingers laid before sleeping in awe.

To think another person would care about him.

Many marks would follow. Odasaku was an affectionate person, he left Dazai with forehead kisses, cheek kisses, hugs, and anything of the sort.

The green of his marks popped out against the once disgusting and gross color Mori had left Dazai with.

Soon enough, the green color would be painted on his lips, as well.

Dazai grew fond of the marks Oda would leave on him, and would ignore the ones Mori had left.

More colors followed suit with Oda’s.

Ango’s was a light brown, only the slightest bit darker than Dazai’s skin tone. He left behind the ghost of hand shakes, ghosts of the memory of wiping off Dazai’s face.

A light brown lingered against Dazai’s scarred arms from Ango’s stitching, overlapping with the bruises Mori left.

It had shocked Dazai the first time he saw such marks, having believed that Ango could care less about him. But nonetheless, Ango’s marks appeared on his skin, and never left.

When Osamu had picked up the homeless and sickly Akutagawa siblings, he had noticed the younger one, Gin, was covered in blotchy and inky black hand prints. Against her cheek, along her hands, on her shoulders. Dazai found the same marks on himself later that night after carrying the older Akutagawa to his car. Sure enough, a blotchy black handprint laid against his collarbone, where Ryuunosuke had clung to him like a kitten.

Dazai had remembered reading somewhere that black markings were rare. A certain part of him was rather happy that Ryuunosuke had left one on him.

Over time, Dazai started looking more and more like an abstract painting than a person.

He loved it. He loved feeling loved.

But all good things come to an end.

Ango betrayed him and Odasaku, leading to Odasaku’s death, and eventually to Ango abandoning Dazai.

The last mark Odasaku left on him before his death was a light touch on the cheek as he pulled off the bandages covering the scar Akutagawa had left Dazai.

He asked Dazai to do one thing for him, one last thing to make Dazai happy.

To be on the side that saves people.

An unconventional request it was, hard to process among every other thought racing through Dazai’s mind.

He didn’t want Oda to disappear, he didn’t want the last person to truly love him to die yet.

The thought of the marks Oda left on him shattered Dazai’s heart. The last thing he would have left of Oda, gone.

… And yet, the green marks never disappeared.

Weeks went by after Oda’s death, Dazai would awaken every morning and stare into the mirror, waiting for them to fade.

But they didn’t.

Oda may have been gone, but his love wasn’t. His love for Dazai would outlive him, and carry Dazai to trying to do the right thing.

He left the Port Mafia.

He waited for Akutagawa’s marks on him to disappear. For Mori’s marks to disappear.

They never did. If anything, Akutagawa’s marks grew more vibrant against his skin.

He couldn’t tell if he was getting paler, or if the marks really were changing color.

Mori’s marks remained, much to Dazai’s dismay.

He’ll just have to wait for the old bastard to die.

The surprising part, more so, was that Ango’s marks stayed. The cinnamon color remained over his hands, in streaks against his face, and underneath his knees from being carried.

Dazai never understood why they didn’t. He couldn’t comprehend Ango still caring about him after all this time.

He wondered if Ango’s marks stayed on Odasaku, too.

He never found out the answer.

Dazai had his identity erased, now at 19 years old, and bought a cheap apartment with his savings.

No longer a mafia member, but now just a kid.

… A kid just barely under the drinking age. Which was annoying.

Dazai converted his former alcoholism into a caffeine addiction.

There was a coffee shop down the street from his apartment that he liked to go to, despite the sad memories with it.

His first get together with Oda and Ango.

“I’ve… Only had black coffee before, I don’t know what to get,” Dazai mumbled, rubbing his bandaged arm awkwardly as Ango turned to him.

Oda was already at the counter, ordering something.

“Do you need suggestions?” Ango asked, to which Dazai nodded.

Ango pulled Dazai close against his chest, readjusting his glasses as he began to narrow things down for Dazai, figuring out something he’d like.

Dazai was incredibly confused by how much Ango knew about coffee, he was certain the other had been too busy to visit coffee shops like this all that much.

“Can I have a large iced white mocha with… Four extra shots of espresso?”

“You want six in that?”

“Yeah, please,” Dazai said with a smile.

“Alright…” The cashier said, wary as she looked over the total, “That’ll be 600 yen.”

Dazai handed the woman his money, and left the line to go sit down by the window.

It’s frosty outside, winter is making its way into Yokohama.

Dazai will have to buy a new jacket soon…

A man slides into the seat across from Dazai. He adorns a clean white button up, and a fluffy white coat over his shoulders. His hair is a deep purple, shoulder length and silky smooth, a white fluffy hat atop his head. His face is soft, and his piercing violet eyes bright with curiosity, wonder with the world around him. There’s a bandage over his right cheek, and bandaids all across his fingers. It appears he has a habit of biting them.

Dazai can’t find this man anything short of gorgeous. The smile on the man’s face tells him more people think the same.

“My, my, you are an interesting looking one,” says the man with a smile, a foreign accent slips into his Japanese with easy, “Like a patchwork doll, I have not seen anyone quite like you.”

Dazai returns the smile, “So I’ve been told. You’re a strange looking one yourself, you aren’t from around here, are you?”

The man nods a no, “Ah, no. I am from Russia, though I am fluent in Japanese and English.”

“Far way from home, I see. Your Japanese is very good for a tertiary language.”

“Thank you,” replies the man, “My former teachers regarded me as a language prodigy. Ah, I’ve forgotten to ask… What might be your name?”

“Osamu Dazai,” the brunette replied, propping his head up in his hands, “Yours?”

“Fyodor Dostoevsky,” he replied.

“Dosto… Dos-”

“Fyodor is fine. I understand in Japanese you call people by their last names, however, Russian last names are hard on the Japanese tongue.”

“Fyodor-san,” Dazai corrected, “You are quite the stunning one, you know? Your beauty is incomparable to anything I’ve ever seen.”

A smile appeared on Fyodor’s face, Dazai half expected him to get flustered, though he remained calm.

“Many people say the same, I don’t quite understand. I believe I’m rather average looking, to say the least…”

The server provides Dazai with his drink, and passing what appears to be a caramel macchiato to Fyodor as she leaves, Dazai hums a thank you to her.

Fyodor pops the lid off his drink, fishing out a small bottle of clear liquid and dumping it into the drink as he stirs with his straw.

“Vodka? Isn’t it like nine in the morning?”

“I said I am Russian, did I not?”

Dazai laughs a bit.

Fyodor writes his phone number on Dazai’s napkin later.

His handwriting is crooked and messy, though to Dazai, it looks amazing.

He doesn’t quite understand his interest in this Fyodor person.

Dazai awakens in a hotel room.

He’s been in ones like these time and time again, never remembering where he was.

After Odasaku died, Dazai developed a habit of letting people take him home for temporary pleasure.

However, this one is different.

The hotel room smells heavily of alcohol, yet the place is rather neat. Coats hung up on the closet doors, lean counters, suitcases emptied and set to the side.

Dazai pulls the white sheets closer to his naked body as he glances next to him, to see the sleeping body of Fyodor Dostovesky.

His hat had been discarded, placed haphazardly on the bedside table, yet he looked incredibly peaceful when he slept.

Dazai remembered more bit by bit. Fyodor invited him to a bar, asking if Dazai would teach him a little more about Japanese drinking culture. They, of course, got drunk. He supposed Fyodor and him hooked up shortly afterwards.

Dazai wasn’t surprised, he did this with just about every man he met nowadays.

Dazai glanced down and over his own body.

No new marks. To be expected.

Yet, when he looked over Fyodor, he was a blank canvas.

He adorned no marks from what Dazai saw.

His brows furrowed in confusion, Fyodor must be a well-loved man with his beauty and interesting personality.

At the very least, he would have marks from his mother and father, right?

The plot thickens, and Dazai slides out of bed to get his clothes.

Fyodor awakens shortly afterwards, greeting Dazai with what Dazai assumes in a ‘good morning,’ though he has spoken in Russian.

He watched Fyodor brush out his hair, button up his shirt and place his hat back on, and then proceed to order breakfast in for the two of them.

Dazai comes to the conclusion that Fyodor is an amazing actor, and that he definitely has a hangover he’s not talking about.

As they eat, Dazai decides to spring a question.

“You don’t have any marks at all, do you?” He asked the other man.

Fyodor glances up from his food, shifting his head to the side as he nods.

“Yes, I have no such markings. It is a mystery to me as well.”

“Not even ones from your parents, eh?” Dazai asked, shoving a piece of omurice into his mouth.

“My parents died when I was young,” Fyodor explained, “It was my fault, it was an ability accident. I was fostered shortly afterwards by a priest, though he never left any markings on me, either. I do not know much of anyone outside of them.”

“So you’r-”

“Unloved,” Fyodor interrupted, followed by a smile, “But I do not mind. I have never left markings on another person, either.”

Dazai’s brows furrowed, “Never, huh?”

Fyodor nods, “Never. I have started to believe I’m incapable of doing such.”

“Incapable of caring for others?”

The Russian man looks up, thinking about his answer for a few minutes before looking down at his food. There’s a slight somber look in his eyes, one of loneliness and doubt.

“I suppose so.”

It’s been years since Dazai and Fyodor met. Their relationship broke off, Dazai joined the Detective Agency, and Fyodor went off to become a terrorist.

Dazai is now 22, and Fyodor is 23.

It is not the first time they have seen each other again after all their years as teens, but the first time they’ve been alone together since then.

They both escape from the prison, Fyodor now his enemy instead of a past lover or friend.

But Fyodor still smiles at him like he’s a friend.

No marks appear on Fyodor’s skin, though Dazai has gained some new ones.

Soft yellow ones from Kunikida, his partner.

A brash violet from Atsushi, his newest apprentice.

A dull green from Fukuzawa, his mentor and father figure.

Among many others from so many of the agency members. Dazai is back on his feet, he feels loved once more, and will not let anyone take that from him.

And yet, when Fyodor looks at him, he can feel the slightest bit of jealousy from the Russian man, too.

He wants to be loved, too. Dazai knows it.

Dazai wonders if he’s the only person who has ever cared about Fyodor, wonders if Fyodor even knows it.

Fyodor readjusts his hat as he walks closer to Dazai.

“Might I show you something, Osamu?” He asks.

“If it isn’t death, sure,” Dazai replied, half joking.

The smile on the other’s face softens, “It is not death, I promise.”

Fyodor fumbles with his hands before taking the left one, fingertips covering his bandaids, and gently caressing Dazai’s cheek. It feels cold, the other’s anemia leaves Fyodor with icy cold hands and feet. He used to tease Dazai with it, but this was not him teasing.

Fyodor’s face is soft and genuine and as he removes his hand, followed by a weak smile.

“I thought I should probably contribute to the masterpiece.”

Fyodor leaves before Dazai can say anything as he presses his hand against his now cold cheek, looking into his reflection in the glass windows.

A baby blue handprint had made itself home on Dazai’s cheek, where Fyodor had touched him.

A smile came to his face.

“So you weren’t incapable after all,” Osamu says, softly.

How peculiar...

[thehltwoghosts]

Adore You - The Story of Two Lovers

‟In all the seas, in all the world, there has never been a land quite like the isle of Eroda. Shape unmistakably like a frown, it is home to an all but forgotten fishing village that has had perpetual cloud cover for as long as anyone can remember.”

Eroda is an unique island. But still it’s like any others, can be seen by everyone, can be visited by people who want to discover and maybe someday the one who embraced the beauty can find themselves in it.

However people chose to not acknowledge it, they closed their eyes, extinguished the candles, shut the doors… Just to run away from a thing that is buried deep into their hearts. Even If lights are out or they can’t see anything or hear anything, it is still going to enlighten their darkness, fill the blanks with whispers, assemble the hearts that are too weak to be encountered.  

That’s why the island is covered in clouds. Forgotten by anyone but still there, exist.

Eroda isn’t an island, it’s a feeling. Feeling that at first tried to be covered but no matter what, it was released to space for exploration. To find a place to settle or a person...

‟An isle where some still that it’s bad luck to mention a pig in fisherman’s pub.”

In a fisherman’s pub, you should find seafood not a pig. It is irrelevant, weird, inappropriate. 

It’s like a snowflake on a sunny day. Different... and for them difference is something bad, something brings bad luck.

‟Where seeing a minister in the morning meant you should go home immediately.”

Religion is so venerable that it makes the person employee about unapproachable. Which causes people to behave from hearing but not from learning and when they don’t try to learn, there’s nothing that can be done.

‟Some fishermen still wore a single gold earring for luck, some say it’s to pay to have your body buried If you die in a strange port.”

"Most commonly in the 80′s, wearing an earring in your left ear was a statement showing that one was oriented towards the opposite sex. Less known, perhaps, was the symbolism of having an earring in your right ear, which meant you may have been attracted to the same sex. The motto was, ‘left is right, right is wrong.’ "

The man is wearing an earring from the left sight. Specify himself as ‘normal’ to bring him good luck, to be worth burying. For people to not misunderstand him or indeed misunderstand him.

‟It was also frowned upon to be caught whistling in the wind, in fear you might turn a gust into a gale.” 

A single word, whisper, whimper can turn a gust to a gale. Can enlighten your own truth to yourself like a wave, just a blow of wind can cause tornadoes.    

One person can make you who you are.

‟And If you ever leave Eroda, avoid doing so on odd numbered days...”

This is coming from fear. They can’t be left in too odd numbers, they can’t act too manly or girly, they can’t style their hair too unusually… Too isn’t something you shouldn’t do and that brings gratuitous fear.

‟Everyone was always frowning which they referred to as Resting Fish Face. But then… well something peculiar happened… or I mean… someone peculiar happened. The Boy was… peculiar… from the moment he entered the world. No one ever meant to be mean towards him but in town grown used to how the things were, no one knew what to do with something… different.”

Instead of others who don’t admit themselves as a whole and covered the parts they don’t want to feel with dreary frowning, the boy embraced himself. With every part that belongs to him as any other, with every feeling he has, he smiled to an island. 

In an island that doesn’t know the light but dark, doesn’t know happiness but sorrow, doesn't know equality but disparity… They wouldn’t know how a smile could make a difference, so they wouldn’t.

‟They did their very best to ignore it… hoping it would go away… and eventually so did The Boy. He had lost his smile and without it the world grew darker, the wind colder and the ocean more violent.” 

They ignored him, his feelings and his smile as always. They hoped that it’d go away or he’ll go away ‘cause in here, these are the things you have to be covered. They were scared of him, of the lightness he brought with himself, bright as sun maybe brighter than the sun because he can bore into clouds and eliminate them.

However the boy was lonely. He needed somebody to share his weight with. He couldn’t do it on his own, his luminance was so bright, either he had to keep it as a secret or explode the world that didn't have the ability to keep him alive.   

So he chose...

‟The Boy tried to ignore the fish but he was not alone in his melancholy. Loneliness is an ocean full of travelers trying to find their place in the world. But without friendship we are all lost & left with no hope, no home, no harbor.”

He collected jars of disappointment, masks of suppression, rocks of desperation and decided that the world doesn’t deserve his smile or him completely. He didn’t want to be seen by others. If he existed for the last time in this paltry earth, he had to be remembered by his smile, his difference from the frowny faces.

What he didn’t expect was to see someone like him. Someone traveled through the oceans to find himself but eventually gave up with understanding that loneliness is an ocean and the only way to get out will be landing hard rocks and watching himself disappear slowly into the shallow.

The fish was lost while trying to find himself, he was left on a hard surface with no hope to accompany him, no home to settle in, no harbor to keep him alive...

‟He wondered what cruel twist of fate brought them together and If fate was involved, what did she have in store.”

He threw up fish to a place he thinks the fish belongs; however fish was tired of trying to find a piece of him in an ocean that represents loneliness. The fish came back with hope that he’s soon going to survive from his melancholy but the way he’ll survive was not expected.    

The boy wanted a partner to share his weight, his difference, his loneliness with. The fish wanted to be a part of something, accepted by others that didn't need him, got rid of his lonely state of multitude.

So they found themselves like they’re two missing pieces of an incomplete puzzle. They were meant to be but fate was holding a twist, they were going to learn that soon...

‟Walk in your rainbow paradise. Strawberry lipstick state of mind. I get so lost inside your eyes, would you believe it?”

The fish found himself survived by a person who tried the same way as him to handle voidness. By dying down to oblivion. He would never conjecture what’s waiting for him but it just kinda happened suddenly, fortuitously... 

He has been lifted and carried away in a closed space. But darkness after meeting with the source of light was so appalling, he wanted to escape from it and he over flowed. He came face to face with the surface again, the same emotions were going through inside of him. That was the place he belongs, a hard surface, an abandoned island. Nevertheless he felt foreign to cold after warmth touched his skin.

The familiar warmth welcomed him again, with a face full of apprehension. Maybe the boy’s scared of people to see him because the fish was gleaming in the form of golden skin. Maybe the fish’s scared of being seen by people, encounter with frowns that not just formulated but effectuated a demeanor towards difference. 

In any case, the boy was so lost inside of an ocean that he was captured with fish. Would he ever guess that someday in a place where everything finally becomes an end, someone was going to be his new beginning? No, he wouldn’t. Would you believe it? He ran away with fish from the censorious eyes in a hope that they would never meet them again.

‟You don’t have to say you love me. You don’t have to say nothing. You don’t have to say you’re mine, honey.”

At the beginning the fish was tiny, the boy could find a place for him to live, where he would keep fish next to him. He was infatuated with him from the moment they’ve met, he wanted to keep him alive and close. He's paid attention to little things that make a big difference; the water was hot, it could burn fish’s skin, make him uncomfortable, however he would never let him suffer at least with pain that comes from his hands.

There were people who have been watching them. The quantity was low, the ones who perceived a sparkle and found the source affected differently. Some of them haven’t changed; same frowning, same coldness, same obstruction that restrain the truth from coming out, same eyes that were looking but couldn’t bother to see. 

Some of them have changed, they brightened from the sparkle which was going to be a flame. Empty eyes comprehended a sign of vividness, sun rose above the hazy minds and made them clear, souls embraced themselves as whole. Without distinction, contempt, shame. 

The boy made them realize who they really are by dint of light that was actually buried deep into their hearts. He helped them through their journey. And at the end they found themselves, their lightness, their eroda. That was the beginning of the regeneration, a reborn.

‟I'd walk through fire for you, just let me adore you. Oh, honey. I'd walk through fire for you just let me adore you. Like it's the only thing I'll ever do.”

When he’s scared people away and left alone just by himself, when there’s no reason to go outside because there is no one out there for him to talk to, he would go to his secluded place. He would spend his time here, get away or suppress his feelings that want to come out then come back to his hiding place, his bedroom. 

The bedroom was inside the doors, surrounded with walls that are like a fine line between him and the others, closed and open… Bedroom’s aura has been capturing the feeling of cloudy weather before the storm arrives. Dark blue walls mixed up with baby blue and white, sheets are turquoise, ceiling is sky blue. Before the dreams had appeared in the air, he would look at his handmade sky and wonder about days which he will see the natural sky in daylight, hot and full of life. 

There are jars of his sorrow on the shelves, traces of his pain in the corners. This room is a concrete form of his emotions, a shelter for his wishes, a part of his heart and now he brought the fish to his hiding place. The very first step of him to a heart that has never been loved.

First feeding each other (or the boy’s feeding the fish and himself), first love stares throwing one and another, first taste of sweet feeling in the air which collapses shirts when the boy adores the fish like it's the only thing he'll ever do, first glimpse of colors appearing on the faces. A form of red, orange, yellow, green, blue and purple...

With each of these; the connection between them is becoming stronger, the reality is dreamier and their existence that encountered with a new hope is bigger. So does the fish. He’s bigger now, more noticeable but not bright enough for people who didn’t want to see, to notice. 

He wanted help from another boy. An opportunity for the boy to see his journey and his new beginning through the light he came into. Another realization...

‟You wonder under summer skies. Brown skin and lemon over ice, would you believe it? You don't have to say you love me. I just wanna tell you something, lately you've been on my mind honey. I'd walk through fire for you, just let me adore you.”

His hiding place became a gate for his own heart that opened up a short time ago to someone who is going to change its ownership. His secluded place became a location for the biggest crime, robbery. When you stole something, the one left behind was never going to be the same ‘cause his one part was captured by someone and the only way for him to be whole again is finding his missing part. 

The fish stole his heart at this spot, now his heart doesn’t belong to just one soul but two. This is a place where two souls complete in one body, two hearts in one beat.

Once he was filling the jars with desperate screams; now his disappointment, suppression and desperation is creating melodies into the sky that welcome each other with echoes. Once he was keeping his head low, now the sky can’t contain his smile which widens with each breath and heightens to the sky he’s been dreaming about. Once the air was misty, full of clouds; now the sun shows its face slightly, opens the thick air with light.  

The source of his happiness is next to him. Listening his thoughts, hearing his screaming without him formulating it, looking at what he’s showing to him, seeing his effects on other people, dancing with him under the daylight without fear. They’re alone but it feels more crowded than when people are around. There’s something that wants to be vocalized, out and loud. It creates shivers down the boy's spine, "Lately you’ve been on my mind, honey." "I adore you."

He helped another soul who chooses love instead of hate. He gave him a hint, the rest was in the hands of fate and the boy…

‟Oh, honey. I’d walk through the fire for you, just let me adore you. Like it’s the only thing I’ll ever do. Like it’s the only thing I’ll ever do.”

The boy's knitting second skin for fish. Like fish’s skin this is multicolored too, a reflection of his rainbow paradise that he found with fish. But this skin is showing the fish more apparent, more certain to anyone and boy’s making this for him. He wants to be obvious to people who saw them together, thought that maybe they’re ‘normal’ but no, boy wants to say "I’m who I am, open and proud. Colorful and cheerful. I am me with all of the things that make me who I’m today, with my skin. I’m wearing myself on my skin." This is a way of expressing without the needs of words.

When darkness comes with the arrival of the night, their eyes are still continuing to shine through each other. Each look is another indication of fondness, each blink has maden is a waste of time when all the world is lying in front of you. The fish is mesmerized by him, those two eyes he had found are captivating. Capture the seconds he's had, capture the feeling that brings him somewhere he hasn't been in before, capture the moment that deserved to be frozen, capture his eyes that settled with continuity, capture a part of him.

A heart had been shining from inside but was lost in the darkness. Another heart had been trying to find his home without any compass to guidance. Somehow the light of the heart shined through the dark to a road that another’s been trying to find. It’s guided to home where you don’t find familiar faces but familiar souls. Home became not just a place but a person, heart found out that everywhere you’re loved, you are home. A decision has been made, two hearts were each other’s home and they wanted to be each other’s forever too. The infinity was impossible and death was inevitable but their bond was unbreakable. They exchanged their most precious part, most fragile... Once lost heart split its loneliness in two, once excluded heart split its needs of belonging in two and they made them one in the end. Forever and ever...

The news was telling that others like him need a new home but the fish has already found his, hasn’t he? He doesn’t want any home while his home was here with him, sleeping with peace, unaware of everything. He kept thinking throughout the night, maybe their forever has to break at some point ‘cause he needs to go.

Once his happiness was a reason for him to grow, now the sadness filled him and became a part of his growth. With every passing minute, he’s getting bigger and bigger and the boy’s hope to keep him away from censorious eyes is getting tinier and tinier.  

Another person who looked at them and really saw them. Who figured out their bond with each other and how they’re too close and important to one another. She’s one of the people who have changed and found their eroda. 

All fishes who immigrated to Eroda, are travelers trying to find their place in the world. They all wanted to discover themselves, wanted to finally find a hope, a home, a harbor so they ended up at Eroda. The ones who embraced the beauty found themselves in it but the consequences were bad. People killed them from outside and inside and that became a reason for others to hide in dark oceans that far away from those censorious eyes. And that was the reason for the fish’s departure…

Also another person who witnessed their hard times and learnt from it. To smile.

The boy doesn’t want to be left behind by him when finally this place’s beginning to feel like home. But sometimes you need to sacrifice your wishes for the person you love the most in this entire universe. His person saw others who are just like them but with one difference, they were open. And he saw them get punished for their honesty and for their courage by people who are ready to judge and destroy them just with words, simple words of a complicated story. He saw them getting disgusted glances, loud whispers and endless judgement by others. He saw that they were discriminated against for something that should be normal...    

And he got scared to be treated like them, like you’re something that should not exist. He’s scared something is going to happen not just to him but to his lovely boy too. That’s why he wanted to leave even If that causes him to worlds.

The boy was desperate about how he’s going to handle the heavy weights he has to carry around. First he needs to let go of him, that’s the heaviest of all and he was alone. But through the moments he’s spent with him, they’ve affected lives more than once. His light that brightened with his arrival, changed people. Give them a chance to find themselves, be aware of who they really are. At the end they’ve found themselves, their own light and their own eroda. The boy helped them through their journey and now they’re helping him with sharing his weights. So the boy isn’t actually alone anymore, there are people who will always support him for who he really is. 

With all friendship, dedication, importance, love he’s received from the boy, he grew with happiness; with all aversion, disgust, judgement he’s received from people, he grew with sadness. His emotions are him, the more complicated they got the more he wanted to hide them. He comes to a state where he can’t hide his feelings anymore because they’re too big and heavy to hold. But then he wanted to protect his lover too so he did what he had to do, leave to a place where he could be away from judgmental eyes. 

At first his skin was golden, he’s shining like the boy he’s encountered with. Then he shared his skin with other colors because every color, every person, every love deserves equality. At the end he wore his colors with fear ‘cause even the colors could change people’s opinions about you. His colors faded but never disappeared. He’s proud of who he is, he found his eroda here, his love… But first he needs to learn what’s really important to him, people’s opinions about them or his lover’s presence next to him. He needs to learn what he has now but maybe at first he needs to lose it to find it.

‟At that moment, with the entire town united in putting a fish back into the ocean, the clouds broke, the sun shined down on the isle of Eroda, melting every frown into the unmistakable shape… of a whale’s tale.”

The boy lost him because of people who are too afraid to smile, too afraid to embrace themselves or others as a whole, too afraid to look in the eye of bravery. He was heartbroken but then something peculiar happened. The ones who have changed are still standing next to him and smiling. Big and bright. Open and free. Brave...   

The sun shined down on the island. A feeling once forgotten by anyone released to space for exploration.

And now the island knows how a smile could make a difference.

‟Maybe one day you’ll see one of Kieran’s paintings in your motel room...” 

At first in her painting the sky was misty, the colors were dark and pale, the road which led home was deserted. Then with the boy, her light came alive and dwell in her paintings. Now her painting is reserved, the sky looks so blue, colors are bright and vibrant. The road is full of plants, lush greenery spreading around her with every step she’s taken to go home.

She’s learnt to be bright.

"Kieran means; little dark one or little dark-haired one, produced by appending a diminutive suffix to ciar (black, dark). It is the masculine version of the name Ciara." 

Kieran’s representing a person who is dark-haired and good at paintings.

‟...or read an obscure yelp review about diner with the most curious menu...”

She saw two lovers that have gone through a lot of troubles, heartbreaks, break-ups. Also she saw how two people can love each other under pressure, how two souls can line up and complete in one, how one person can make a big difference in your life. And she learnt from these, she learnt and chose to smile to the world. Now she’s happy with what she’s doing, the job she’s loved. And she smiles whatever happens ‘cause at the end the most important thing is her happiness nothing else.   

She’s learnt to smile.

She’s representing a person who is always smiling and loves food.

‟...or pass someone in the street in the haircut and think, where on the earth did they get that?”

People were designing their hair styles according to others. Everybody in the town was the same. But sometimes a person’s differences can make a change in others' lives. The girls have listened to whispers that came from the deepest place in their souls. "I don't need all the answers. Feeling good in my skin. I just keep on dancing."

They don’t need all the answers to the questions that are thrown at them, they’re just feeling good with themselves in their skin, body, hair. Because all of these belong to them and the one who has control on it will be them too. 

They’ve learnt to embrace difference.

They’re representing a person who changed his style through the years but still proud of who he is.

All of them are the representations of one direction members; Zayn, Niall and Liam. Also his fans, his supporters. The people who have changed with the light of the boy and found who they are, helped the boy to feel safe in return. They created a safe place where the boy just spread his smile wider. And now the boy has a family, a family will always be supportive towards him. He’s feeling loved and safe.

‟Maybe you’ll be invited to a wedding between two neighbors whom it took an ocean to bring together.”

One lover had been searching gold treasures on the ground. One day he came across an invitation, he took it and decided to learn what life will bring to him by this. He went to a place that has written on the paper then met with the person who he’s been searching for from the beginning. He’s found his treasure he had been searching for a long time, a golden. It was like a twist of fate had been made and brought them together. 

His lover was too bright, so golden… That made the boy brighter, with his lover’s light, he shined too. His lover was a sun that radiated everywhere and he was a crescent moon that had an insufficient brightness. Day by day he’s been approaching his full form with the power of something bigger than the existence of them, the moon and his sun. When he took its full form, his lover was distant from him like never before. The moon was shining with his full energy meanwhile the sun was fading away from the lack of resistance. It took some time for them to come back to each other again but they’ve never given up on that something bigger. Love. Love won like always...   

They’ve learnt to love.

They’re representing the boy and the fish.

"We don’t need no piece of paper from the city hall."

A approve that coming from a person who represents the fans, their supporters is enough for them. They don’t need anyone else’s opinion because the ones who have seen their love, will always be there for them. That’s enough, their love is enough. 

‟And who knows maybe one day you’ll find yourself in the isle of Eroda, for each night the local bartender still pours a glass of ale to appease the celtic water spirit shenandoah.” 

Someday when you’re ready to shine, when you have the courage to smile, when you embrace your difference and when you understand the definition of love, you can find your own eroda. 

It is already in you; on an unexpected day, in an unprecedented location, with peerless semblance it’ll appear to you. And when the appearance’s been made, your ambiguous thoughts will be sweet melodies to an ear that only hear for you. 

"Every heart sings a song, incomplete, until another heart whispers back. Those who wish to sing always find a song. At the touch of a lover, everyone becomes a poet."

‟The Boy decided to find out what other wonders awaited him in the world however, he sailed on an odd numbered day, which caused everyone in town to lose their hairs but that’s another story.”

The boy’s purpose had finally been concluded. A regeneration has happened, a reborn of the isle. 

No longer, difference isn’t something bad, something brings bad luck. People don’t try to specify themselves as ‘normal’ to bring them good luck ‘cause there isn’t such a thing as normal. Everybody is normal in their own special ways. They aren't afraid to be left in too odd numbered days or act too manly or girly or style their hair too unusually. Now too isn’t something they will be afraid of.  

From now on; the island doesn’t know the dark but light, doesn’t know sorrow but happiness, doesn't know disparity but equality. Also they know how a smile could make a difference.

Nevertheless the ones who don’t want to change and showing the same frowning which is referred to as Resting Fish Face, are still here too. However these old-fashioned people lost their hairs like any other things they’ve lost; empathy, courtesy, respect, kindness, heart…. There will be difficulties that they’re going to encounter with and like the people they’ve judged, there will never be a choice for them to choose.

But that’s another story...

And now the boy’s mission is completed. He’ll sail on an odd numbered day or with new understanding on a normal day.

The boy found his eroda and the heart that he completed with. He tasted a sip of love and got drunk by the pleasant flavour. This time two souls got lost but in each other. They’re swinging at the edges of the rainbow; a day with desire red, with enthusiasm orange, with lightness yellow, with acceptance green, with peace blue and with imagination purple. Then stormy weather finally arrived, the sun disappeared from the sky and left his brightness to the moon to enlighten people’s life in the absence of itself. Sentences have been made with bitterness before their separation, "We don't know where we're going but we know where we belong. Wherever I go, you bring me home. You'll bring me home..." With that sun left.

So did the boy, he has got a long journey in front of him. Thousands of lives he’ll be affected, hundreds of cities he'll shine over, tens of friends he’ll have fun with but just one heart he'll belong, forever and ever...

THE END

Thanks for reading, take care yourself xxx

[prophecy-is-inevitable]

Indulgence of Divinity: Chapter 1

Michael Langdon x OFC

Four months after the events at Outpost 3, Michael begins to grow restless in the Sanctuary. His powers continue to grow seemingly without a purpose, and the Cooperative is clamoring to know his next move. Help arrives from an unlikely source that changes everything Michael thought he knew about being the Antichrist.

Rebuilding the world requires a delicate balance-destruction and creation, death and life, dark and light. Thankfully, he doesn’t have to do it alone.

Chapter Warnings: Mild Language (we’re just warming up)

Word Count: 3846

So excited to finally have the first chapter posted! Hope you enjoy! (Also posted on AO3 under the same title.)

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

Chapter One: Court of the Divinity

Water droplets traced the lean outlines along his torso and thighs while others collected in the hollow at the small of his back. The aqueous kisses briefly reminded him of caresses that yearned to memorize each dip and swell of a lover’s form. His eyes drifted closed as he tipped his head back, lips drawing apart to pass contented sighs, in an attempt to savor the sensation. How long it had been since it was more than an illusion… His head lulled with a deliberate slowness to feel the tension ebb and flow from the corded muscles across his shoulders, up the base of his skull, and down the center of his spine. A delicate floral note occasionally touched his senses that he couldn’t quite place as past or present, simply familiar; nonetheless, it momentarily quelled the chaotic swarm of thoughts plaguing his mind. Even kings deserved a reverie now and again.

Michael’s gaze flitted about the room as he stood from the bathing pool and retrieved his towel hanging from the decorative iron gate.

Flickering candles lined the stone alcoves and shelves carved centuries ago out of the grotto rock and filled the room with a serene luminance. Their reflections danced and swayed on the surface of the water only to writhe in the wake of his languid movements. The sheer array of burning wicks had produced a surprising warmth in the chamber–a warmth that drew memories from the rugged stone and imparted the scent of incense from pilgrimages long-forgotten into the air. A shrine to the Lord and his archangel Michael that once stood proudly at the front of the holy cavern had been reduced to nothing more than an opulent light fixture. It brought him a sense of satisfaction in no small measure, and a smug curl of his lips accompanied the thoughts of sacrilege.

‘How fitting that the Sanctuary of Saint Michael Archangel, his oldest shrine in Western Europe and a holy destination for centuries, would become the seat of power for the Antichrist of the same name. The Sanctuary of the Apocalypse,’ Michael mused while patting himself dry. The infernal heat thrumming through his veins made short work of any dampness left to his skin. The grotto he stood in had once been the location of a church. Since coming into the possession of the Cooperative, the pews had been removed to make room for a stepped recess to be carved into the floor and filled with water in the style of an ancient bath–an extension of his personal chambers. ‘Someone clearly thrives on irony.’ Of course, it was not to be lost on him and his smirk of satisfaction only grew as he pulled on the sleek black fabric of his pants.

The journey back to his rooms saw the return of Michael’s incessant thoughts of uncertainty. The existence of the Sanctuary had been somewhat of a surprise even to him. Then again, the best lies were always built from a foundation of truth. What had begun as a ruse to incite panic and chaos amongst survivors was apparently very much an actuality. An actuality that he had been living in for the last four months.

Outpost 3 had been the last for…liquidation. Once the task was completed, the Cooperative had sent him a communication informing him of an automated jet waiting to take him to a “safe place”. They didn’t want to risk the use of Transmutation, despite his ever-growing powers. The flight was long and turbulent from the dramatic air currents and storms swirling in the wake of the cataclysm. A coastal mountain topped with a medieval structure loomed outside the window as the plane started to descend. The Sanctuary.

Noticeable architecture and the few remaining geographical features alluded to a location somewhere most likely Mediterranean. Michael’s lips stretched into an open-mouthed grin, and his eyes burned from how widely they were opened as he looked at the landscape of his making. Previously turquoise oceans undulated in new scarlet waves onto a gray shore. Bare branches strained against the raging wind–their leaves decimated long ago. Armageddon had truly come, and it was by his hand. Sure, he had seen first hand the result of his handiwork in America, but the satisfaction of seeing the effects clear across the world… Michael remembered the way his chest swelled and his shoulders straightened with pride.

That had been four months ago . Fucking hell… What great accomplishments had he achieved since those glorious days of revelation? Once again, he had been left to do his father’s will with no direction, no help of any kind. The remaining Cooperative members were breathing down his neck like hellhounds, either trying to curry favor with absurd and depraved behavior (which he may or may not have accepted on occasion) or hovering for a command. How could he lead his people when he had no means of navigating the future himself? Even the stars were silent behind the eternal midnight cinders cloaking the sky.

He dropped onto the lush mattress and draped his forearm over his eyes. In times of stress, Michael’s mind conjured up images of a world that no longer existed and perhaps never had. The sense of familiarity surrounded him once again as he stood amongst the tall pines and colorful oaks. He remembered these woods. Birds trilled happily above as if pleased by his return. His blood no longer marred the earth in a ruby pentagram; sprigs of white bell-shaped flowers sprung up from the circle and perfumed the air with their sweetness. They were larger than last time. Michael crouched to slowly reach out a hand, palm up, to cradle one of the drooping blossoms.

“Do you like them? I’ve been practicing.” A soft voice reached his ears just as the scalloped tepals dusted the tip of his middle finger. The uncertainty in the voice made his brow crease. He turned his head with a frown to face the shimmering specter, their radiance shrouding any distinguishable features aside from their feminine figure. She was always there, stood in the same space his frantic young mind had hallucinated an angel while begging for his father’s aid.

“You thought I wouldn’t?” It was much more a statement than a question. Had his own imagination turned against him, too? Was this a subconscious manifestation of his own doubt?

“White and delicate isn’t exactly your style,” the figure said. Her tone had relaxed a bit at the sound of his disappointment.

“Perhaps that’s all the more reason for me to like it. A palate cleanser to the world before my eyes every other minute of the day.” The flowers captured his attention again when they began to bob in the breeze. “Beautiful,” he breathed. He couldn’t see a smile, but he got the distinct feeling of happiness from his companion. Curiously, his own heart beat a bit easier as the aura permeated his space. Michael straightened again to take in the full effect of the flowers and surround woods.

“Something’s bothering you, Michael. You’re never here otherwise,” she mused. The light shifted as she moved to sit on a mossy rock. He titled his head to look at her without turning his body. Long strands of golden hair fell over his shoulder and framed his face in the sunlight. A shrug tugged at his shoulder as he spoke.

“What comes next? Have I done all I was meant to do?”

“Is fire, blood, and chaos all you were born for?” A tight nod answered her question. “Doubtful.” She rose and stepped into the ring of flowers with him. The hair hanging in his face was pushed behind his ear by misty tendrils he perceived to be fingers. A slight chill tickled his cheek from the contact and caused the hair at the base of his neck to rise. “With each breath, you grow in strength and purpose.” One of the flower stems was placed in his hand. “Why do you think these have flourished? As you grow stronger, so do I. It would be pointless to give you more power with no purpose behind it, especially since you already hold more power than any being left in the world.” A dark chuckle bubble in his throat at that. Her words satisfied him when similar grovels from those in the Sanctuary would find his ire.

“Then why -” The presence of a frosted hand directing his gaze back towards the glowing woods stopped him short.

“Patience, Michael. Having power does not mean you have to be omniscient. It simply means you will be more than capable of whatever is required in time. You’ve given them what they wanted–there’s no reason to believe you would fail at that in the future.” Phantom fingers slid up his cheek and into his hair in a gesture of comfort and Michael closed his eyes with a sigh. “Patience, my king.”

The stone ceiling of his bedroom greeted him when he next opened his eyes. Goosebumps still prickled his skin as a reminder of his dream. For a few moments he did nothing but stare blankly, wondering if he could close his eyes again and return to the simplistic visions of his mind.

“Patience…” he grumbled, dragging a hand down his high cheeks and chiseled jaw. Could the Antichrist possess such a heavenly virtue? Michael couldn’t remember any recent time he was met with less than near-instant gratification. Several soft yet pronounced raps on the door put an end to his wishful thoughts of mental escape. That would be Ms. Mead, and he certainly didn’t want to keep her waiting. It wouldn’t do to treat the one person here that was truly on his side so poorly, and certainly not after she’d undergone such extensive repairs from the events at Outpost 3.

A rare, genuine smile graced his full lips when he pulled the door open to reveal the woman. The deep furrow of her brow and the shift of her eyes promptly removed the carefree expression from his face.

“You’re needed in the great hall.” The muscles around Michael’s eyes twitched in scrutiny. Only incredibly important or special occasions called for the use of the great hall, and he certainly hadn’t issued any grandiose decrees. She wasn’t pleased to be ignorant about whatever situation had arisen, either.

“I will be with you shortly once I’ve made myself presentable.” Michael acknowledged her request with an elegant incline of his head. Ms. Mead nodded quickly and turned on her heel to await him outside his chambers.

Michael quite enjoyed catering his looks to maximize the effect of his presence. Without knowing the purpose of this engagement, he would have to work with what previously resulted in the most success. Within three minutes, he was walking through the halls with Ms. Mead and rather pleased with his appearance. He had donned his usual black dress pants and tucked button-up, the buttons of the cuffs trailing well up his forearms. A luxurious black side button dress coat accentuated his broad shoulders and lean stature; Michael enjoyed the feeling of the fabric conforming so perfectly to his body.

Many survivors admired the thought that went into the Sanctuary’s design each time they walked the halls. Displays had been embedded into the mountain walls where the builders encountered the fossilized remains of prehistoric flora and fauna–lingering reminders that all origins were followed by the same undisputable end in time. Rivers of fire ran down trenches parallel to the walkways for sufficient lighting. Without access to the outside world, they set the fire to cycle intensity and mimic the path of the sun. At night, minerals were added to the oil to make the fire burn blue in homage to moonlight. Large fireplaces dotted the hallways for added warmth and light in the deeper parts of the mountain.

Today, residents of the Sanctuary that had found themselves a partner were happily clinging to each other in alcoves or corners. Some exchanged gifts they’d either made or traded for tied with red ribbon. Someone had poorly scribbled hearts decorating their package, and Michael’s eyebrows jumped momentarily in realization. Of course. It was February. Many of the survivors had chosen to observe the old holidays in a vain attempt at normalcy. If it gave them reason to remain happy and kept morale high, then he would allow them to cling to their absurd traditions. They smiled and waved, some bowing their heads in respect, as he passed them. An occasional brave soul wandered his way with the intention of handing him chocolates or paper flowers. Michael held up his hand to stop them with a small, appreciative quirk of his lips but shook his head.

“There’s no need for that. Your loyalty and support are enough.” They held eye contact for a moment until the person scampered away to a cluster of others standing by a fire pit. Almost immediately, Michael’s jaw squared and returned his expression to simmering annoyance.

“Ms. Mead,” he drawled, “why am I on my way to the great hall for an obligation that I can’t seem to recall arranging?” Her head shaking slightly was barely visible off to his side.

“This wasn’t arranged at all. These…people–Court of the Divinity they called themselves–just showed up and wanted to see you. Wouldn’t say what for, but I recognized the man in charge as a member of the Cooperative. Some high ranking clergyman or some bullshit.” Ms. Mead continued to shake her head and gave him a sidelong glance. “I don’t know where they get off thinking they can make such demands of their king. It’s impertinent if you ask me.” Her voice dropped to a conspiratory level. “We shouldn’t trust them.” Michael’s head tipped back with a pleased laugh.

“Oh, not to worry, Ms. Mead. We must attend to the needs of our people.” Michael stopped outside of the oversized mahogany doors and turned to the older woman. His hands came to rest on her shoulders as he fixed her with a pointed gaze. “And if they waste my time, it will be the last time that they do so.” Ms. Mead returned his look with a smile and watery eyes, one of her hands reaching out to delicately stroke the long curls resting over his collarbone before she replied. The pride rolled off of her in waves nearly as strong as the electronic pulses of her fabrication.

“That’s my beautiful boy.” Michael would always hold her affection in highest regard. With a deep breath, Ms. Mead returned to the moment and smoothed down his hair. “You go in ahead. I’ll retrieve your guests from the auxiliary hall. My king.” She left with a bow and beaming smile so Michael could take his rightful place in the extravagant throne chair at the front of the hall. He certainly cut an imposing figure. One leg rested crossed over the knee of the other, his elbows firmly on the arm rests to allow his steepled fingers to remain steady in front of his chest, and his jaw clenched with a minute grinding the longer he waited.

Several minutes passed before the heavy doors were opened and Ms. Mead, now wielding a stern expression, led in a bizarre group of men. Michael couldn’t help leaning forward a fraction in interest. Each man was dressed in different holy garb. A Buddhist lama, a Hindu sadhu, a Jewish rabbi. Those were only the ones in clear view. Still more troubling, not one of them did he recognize beyond the cardinal standing at their front. He had worked as the Cooperative’s source inside the Vatican for decades under the guise of a faithful God-worshipper. Michael lifted his chin out of habit at the man’s approach, heightened even more as the small congregation bowed before his dais.

“Cardinal Vicente Santori.” The name dripped off Michael’s tongue like saccharine wine. “To what do I owe the unexpected pleasure of your audience? For your sake, I would hope it’s something of the absolute utmost importance.” The cardinal bowed again. The tone in their king’s voice left no conflict regarding his displeasure.

“My king, as you know, we are more than 20 months through your prophesied reign,” Santori began. Michael’s intrigued gaze turned to that of ice, and he brought his chin to rest on his bejewelled fist.

“I am aware. So…what is this?” He opened his palm up towards them inviting silent answers. “As you said yourself, we are beyond the halfway point of the Apocalypse. It’s a bit late for any religious intervention.” Michael’s patronizing chuckle reverberated in the vaulted room, “Especially from you, Cardinal.” The man quickly shook his hands to brush away those notions.

“No. No, we are here for quite the opposite.” The slight tilt of the king’s head drew the cardinal’s attention before he continued. “You have done well in cleansing the stain of humanity from the world. You’ve also grown stronger since coming to the Sanctuary, haven’t you, my king?” When he did not receive a denial, Santori delved into further explanation. “We are the Court of the Divinity, tasked with a special purpose. We have the answers to that phenomenon: there is still more work to be done. Work that you cannot be expected to complete on your own. What we have experienced is only the beginning of your father’s great plan. Preparation of a canvas about to become your greatest masterpiece.”

“What would you know of this ‘work to be done’?” His father had refused to answer his own questions, yet these heretics claimed to have knowledge of his purpose? All Michael had ever wanted was answers. Would it be washed-up clerics that gave them to him? Michael ran his tongue over his teeth. The most irritating aspect of it all was that not a single one of them held a lie within their heart or mind.

“Satan was cast into the fire and chained amidst the burning lake against his will. Would you wish to remain in a prison for all eternity? Is that what you would base your greatest wish from? It is one thing to condemn others to share your fate, but it’s something else to rise above it. There has always been a deeper longing for Paradise, and what better way to secure his claim on Earth than by his son creating something that surpasses that of God. However, you will not succumb to such hubris as God, my king, for you won’t be alone.” There was a pause in the cardinal’s ramblings to let the information settle. Silence hung heavy in the air for so long that some of the men began to shift uncomfortably. Even Ms. Mead seemed to be holding her breath off to Michael’s side.

Their king stood, each vertebra aligning themselves one by one, until he reached his full height. His descent from the dais was marked by the crisp, measured knocking of his heeled shoes on the stone floor. Arms clasped elegantly behind his back, Michael approached the cardinal and looked him up and down. The older man was in his choir dress for what he must have deemed a special occasion; vibrant scarlet cassock with matching scarlet trim, red elbow-length cape over the lace-trimmed white rochet, and a red cleric’s skullcap. One item was notably missing; Cardinal Santori no longer burdened himself with the symbol of the cross. Michael stopped directly in front of the man to give him a sardonic smile.

“Will it be you, Cardinal, and your men that seek to help me with this task of surpassing God? The one you once promised to worship and honor with every breath and whom you have now forsaken?” They were so easily swayed by a little show of power. Michael had won their faith by hardly lifting a finger. The cardinal stepped aside and issued a beckoning wave back to the others. The group parted, three men on either side, to form a passage for the remaining associate at the back of their cluster.

“Unfortunately, the act of creation has always been a divine gift. We have never been blessed in such a way, though we have been given the honor of upbringing for the one who has. Our glorious purpose.” Soft heels clicked across the thin carpet runner approaching the dais. “God failed because there was no balance, which he now knows. There cannot be creation without destruction, no life without death, no light without the dark. To force one into extinction is to condemn the other. Someone once called you ‘the Alpha and the Omega,’ correct? Well, they were halfway right.” A slim hand settled into the one the cardinal left outstretched.

“My king.” Michael’s eyes quickly darted to the speaker when they stepped into his view, dipping into a low curtsey.

She was his opposite in every way. Delicate feminine features and form contrasted his strong, masculine bone structure and build. Her lustrous amber eyes met his aquamarine, and both pairs widened at the sudden jolt they received. Fire and ice. Twisting. Turning. Climbing from earth to sky. Something about her called to him. Something quietly familiar. Michael stepped forward with a creased brow while she allowed him to continue his observation. He swept a wave of her silken obsidian hair over her shoulder. Her breath shuddered momentarily, but her smile widened when their gaze met again. She waited patiently, allowing him as much time as he needed. After all, she had been patient long enough in waiting to meet him, and this gave her an equal opportunity to drink him in as well. His skin held the warmth of the fire he was born from in both color and temperature. She, on the other hand, seemed to be risen from the first winter snow. Could it be true that he wouldn’t be left to rebuild the world alone? Their proximity caused a breeze to weave through the room that centered around them. Years of waiting and begging and training…would this be the beginning of their purpose?

Clothed in flowing white, the crystalline vine embellishments captured the firelight to give her a glowing illusion. Chiffon draped from her shoulder straps and down her back in a delicate cape veil that did nothing to obscure the expense of her open back. More of the gentle fabric was braided across her chest to protect her dignity. A large portion of the bodice remained sheer except for more sparkling embellishments designed in the same intricate vine pattern. In place of a slit, the sheer fabric continued from the bodice, over her left hip, and down the entire left side of the otherwise modest, floor length skirt. It was a look meant to make an impression while still conveying the purity within her body and blood. Sensual yet sinless. She wanted him to be pleased, to be intrigued. And he certainly was in both respects. Cardinal Santori’s voice broke through Michael’s considerations.

“This… is the Divinity.”

[alistonjdrake]

June’s World Building Cheat Sheet: Part One - Where You’re Going & Where You’re From

*It was really more like 4 years but that doesn’t sound as catchy in a title.  Heyo. It’s me. June. Some of you expressed interest in me talking about how I world build. I just want to preface that this will be less a “how-to” and more “this is just what works for me.” Don’t take my word for gospel. I’m not an expert and I don’t think I have any secret skills but I’ll be going through the steps I take to not only build the world I set my stories in but to make them feel lived in. 

My biggest pet peeve with some world building tips is it goes into things that either don’t affect daily life or tells writers to ignore them. Like, of course, don’t insert what building materials are popular in a particular kingdom for three paragraphs and distract from the story. And you probably don’t need to research medieval building techniques either. But even if certain things never make it into the story, it influences the world your characters live in. It influences the experiences they’ve had and leaks down into other parts of life. Knowing these things, even if it’s never explicitly said helps make the world feel full and more realized. But we’ll get into the finer details of that in a later part. I want to start backwards and work my way up so this round we’ll start with things that almost certainly probably won’t have a large impact in your plot. Because I love to suffer! This will likely be obvious to a lot of you but let’s get into it. 

Your Characters Live in the Present

Maybe not literally. I write low fantasy settings that are reimaginings of the past. Of Rust and Gold/ The Saints’ Song series takes place in late 18th century inspired world. A lot of what I read and research when I’m looking for inspiration I draw directly from history and it seems silly to mention but it’s important to note that history does not exist for my characters. Nor does the future. At the beginning of ORG, Argus lives in the year 1782. I know what’s gonna happen months from the first day. He doesn’t. He doesn’t know what 1783 looks like any more than I know what 2021 will be like. I like for characters to believe that they’re living in the modern age. Because they are. Unless they’re time travelers or can see the future, for them this is as modern as it’s currently gonna get. It’s important to talk and ground a setting as if it’s modern to them and not something written through the lens of a 21st-century writer looking back on vaguely historical details. But more than that. The point here is that modern worlds have history and history matters. 

Give Your World a Past

It’s not always plot-important but for a world not to feel sparkling and new or frozen in time when readers grace the first page a world should be touched. And even if it’s not super crucial to the plot, it’ll influence the characters and lives. (Like I mentioned above.)

In my own series, one of the recent historical events is the downfall of the Republic of Abenland. An instance where lower-class citizens of Abenland pushed out ruling dukes, built a new government, and were later invaded and turned to anarchy until it’s taken over by an imperial power. That’s a whole long, lengthy story on its own. I think it’s mentioned briefly twice because it’s not crucial, but one of the main characters was born when the republic was still in power and raised partially during the anarchy and the take-over. This has a strong impact on the way he sees the world, what he thinks about certain people and laws, and his beliefs. Even if not explicitly said or a crucial plot element. 

Historical factors and knowing even big past events that might not have any *strong* hold on what your characters are doing every day will at least still add bits that make things seem more realized than they might me. Like how in ORG, Escan, Nava, and Tadrus all used to be one country, broke apart, and then recently united under one flag again. People from Nava and Tadrus still call themselves Navanese of Tadrune before they ever claim to be from Escan first though, even if they’re all under the same flag and monarch. It’s the history of being a separate state that they still respect in conversation and it’s a small element that adds something to each character who this would be relevant to. And it’s also just an easy way to make it seem like these places and attitudes have been around for longer than the seconds it took me to come up with them.

I’ll also be saying this in literally every part of this, but also your world’s history should not just be black and white. Which is to say, just go up to one of those dudes who’s way too into World War Two and talk to him for more than five minutes and understand we all have very different understandings of the past. Who a character is, where they’re from, how they grew up, will influence how they see their nation’s or a world’s history and how it makes them relate to other people. The Republic of Abenland is remembered very differently by the dukes (who survived) than anyone who would have been part of the rebellions or grew up under it. The Republic of Abenland isn’t thought of at all in Escan because they had nothing to do with it. Just like people outside of Escan do not care that there’s a slight distinction between being Navanese, Tadrune, or Escana. Just like I can’t tell word for word the history of a nation I’ve never heard of (I couldn’t think of anything to name because honestly? I read a lot of history books purposefully from countries I’m not from) most of your characters shouldn’t walk around with textbook knowledge about obscure history that might not be important to their own society and culture. Or interests. 

To Cut the Fat

Give the world your story takes place in a history/past. If it’s never brought up in the story it might still influence the factors within it and how certain characters might see each other or what version of historical fact they believe or understand. Having a history exist even if it never graces the page at least makes a setting feel like it’s existed longer than the first page of chapter one. 

Keep watch for part two where I’ll be diving into creating cultures and languages that aren’t monoliths. 

Tagging some people who seemed interested in my rambles: @asablehart @space-cadead @mirror-of-too-many-books​ @shattered-starrs​  

[inspirationdivine]

Faeby Driver || Lydia and Rio

Timing: Tonight and Tomorrow Parties: @3starsquinn​ @inspirationdivine​ Summary: Several hours after being attacked by Kaden, Lydia completes her promise Warnings: medical blood, body horror, mentions of gun use

Lydia had pulled herself into the car’s backseat by the time she heard someone approaching. Sometimes, when she moved wrong, white hot pain filled her vision with stars, and the only way the world stopped spinning was if she pressed her forehead against the cold window. Inch by inch, she had eased her coat off her body. It was torn and useless now, good only for protecting the cream leather of her carseats from the blood and mud that covered her from where Kaden and her had grappled on the forest floor. Wooden splinters dug into the palms of her hands and on one side of her face, but she couldn’t reach to pull them out. Instead, millimeter by millimeter, she tried to straighten the shattered boneos of her right forearm. This was no easy feat, considering the heavy iron burn and still-bleeding cut from Kaden’s iron-tipped crossbow bolts. She didn’t even know how to begin looking after the shredded wing that hung lightly to her side. Without help, Lydia wasn’t sure she would even get out of here. Her promise to Kaden was slowly beginning to eat at her insides. When she heard Rio approach, Lydia wrapped her glamour around herself like a blanket and growned with the effort. He couldn’t hurt her. He was afraid of hunters himself. If nothing else, he would be ever such a good bargaining chip. Still, her heart beat as fast as a rabbit’s as she watched him approach. 

 In the hurry that Orion was, he hadn’t had much time to get ready before rushing out of the door. He still had on the same sweatpants that he had been sleeping in and had only been able to throw on a hoodie and a pair of shoes before he was rushing out the door and jumping into his car. Rio had no idea what Lydia’s car looked like, but he figured he would just get to Derry Lane and go from there. “Lydia?” Rio called out once he jumped out of his car. His hair stood on end. As far as he knew, that hunter could still be out here and looking for Lydia. Was Rio ready and willing to get in their way? To try to fight the hunter if he had to? The thought alone made Rio want to throw up, but he wasn’t about to let Lydia get killed. He didn’t exactly keep himself well armed on normal occasions, but did have a small hunting knife in his car that Athena had insisted that he keep with him. Just in case. His hearing picked up on a nearby noise and he took off towards it, coming to a stop when he noticed a car along the woodline and jogging to a stop in front of it. “Holy crap.” He whispered, noticing the figure in the backseat. She looked brutalized. Dirt and wood covered her face and she cradled her arm as if it was damaged. There was a nasty burn across it. Up to this point, Rio had never given much thought to what supernatural species Lydia might be. In the grand scheme of things it didn’t really seem that important. But now, Rio was starting to get a ballpark idea. “Thank god you’re alive. Do you have your keys? I need to get you somewhere that’s not here.”

 “Thank the lord indeed,” Lydia groaned. She grit her teeth together and hissed as she reached into her pocket,  pulling out her keys  and tossed them into her hands. “Out of town. I have to- I have to get out of the town,” she insisted. They could stop just outside the border, but she had to leave. The promise was starting to make her sick. There wasn’t even any time to go back for her humans, but she could get Deirdre to get those, if need be. Lydia shifted slightly and cried out as her vision whited out from the searing pain. Her glamour fell to the wayside, her skin glowing only faintly as her wings unfurled and ears extended. 

 “Out of town?” Orion questioned almost immediately. Sure, a hunter was dangerous but did they really have to leave town? If they could get somewhere safe Rio could figure out how to keep the hunter away from her. “How far out of town?” Rio asked. He was apprehensive about the idea, but hadn’t completely counted it out yet. He was desperate to help Lydia. Desperate to prove that he was worth more than the murder of his two parents. If driving for a few hours to drop her off somewhere safe was what she needed, Rio had to at least consider the idea. Before Rio could answer, something happened. Rio knew about glamours. He had never seen one drop so quickly. But in an instant, Lydia had gone from a completely normal woman to a woman with glowing skin, elongated ears and undeniably Fae wings. Though the most shocking visual about this wasn’t any of those things, but instead how maimed and shredded the wing looked. The hunter that had attacked her had been ruthless. The way it looked, Rio didn’t have much choice but to give in. “Yeah. Fine okay. I uh- I’ll drive. Where do we go?”

 She could hear him hesitating already, and almost screamed that he didn’t have a choice. He owed her a debt, he would do as she damn well pleased. But honey caught more flies, and she wanted to keep him sweet as long as she could… Lydia was in no mood to be clever or cruel right now, even to a human, as she pulsed blood out of injuries she couldn’t even wrap herself. He didn’t panic when he saw her, even though for many hunters her distinctive appearance only meant one thing. Not that he could, but it was a small relief that he wouldn’t even try. “Just- just out of town. I promised. I’ll- I’ll explain, I just need to get out first.” Lydia could barely even sit up for the ride, each tiny movement jolting her like hornet stings. She could barely think, barely stay awake, barely plan the next step, like where the hell they should go. How many people she loved that she was leaving behind. “I- I don’t know where to go,” she said, her voice cracking. She could barely believe she was alive.

 Lydia didn’t seem like she was in any state to make a rational decision where to go. But she seemed adamant about leaving town. The more time they spent here, the more they risked that hunter catching up with them too. The way Orion saw it, he wasn’t left with much choice. With a deep sigh, less because of Lydia’s own situation and more because Rio’s own anguish about making a decision might legitimately force him to break into hives.But finally, he relinquished, “Tuck in. I’m closing the door.” He shut the backdoor and circled around to the driver’s seat. One last chance to call 911 instead. But he knew with her state she wouldn’t be able to keep up the glamour. That may put her in even more danger than driving her out of town in her current medical condition. Rio was no doctor. The only training he had was dealing with his own wounds following a particularly brutal training session. Either way, Lydia’s life was in danger. Rio had just decided how much he was willing to participate in keeping her alive. “Try to stay conscious, okay? You might be concussed.” He started the car and gripped the wheel tightly, twisting until his knuckles grew pale. He had no idea where he was going to go, he only knew that he needed to drive. 

 Lydia pulled in to the car, shifting her weight until she found a way to lie that hurt the least, as her blood trickled down her clothes, into the cream leather of her seats and into the creases that only professionals could keep. Staying conscious was manageable, but each bend and bump and everything had her cringing. The weight of the promise lifted off her with every mile, until at least that was one pain untangled in her chest. “I kept making promises,” her voice cracked, and she wasn’t sure if this quick confessional was for her or for him. “God, he just kept hurting me. I was begging him, I couldn’t do anything and he wouldn’t stop. I promised to leave town and he wouldn’t stop. I- I wasn’t doing anything wrong.” And Lydia didn’t know if that counted as a truth because she hadn’t been doing anything except walking in that moment, or because she believed that she hadn’t made a single mistep when it came to Regan while she was here. Her ears rang and her arms hurt too much to wipe away the sudden tear. “Y-you can stop for a little now.”

 Hearing Lydia recounting what happened to her made Orion’s chest tighten. A hunter just as evil and monstrous as his parents had been. So willing to torture someone just for having been born as anything other than human. He wished he had the strength to keep them all safe from hunters, but he knew that in a physical battle Rio didn’t stand much of a chance against most hunters. He never regretted refusing to take part in his parent’s training. But sometimes he wondered if he would have been better off playing along so that he could learn what he could from them before flipping sides. Not that it mattered now, obviously. It was too late to go back and change anything. “Yeah. Sounds good. Let’s just get some rest.” Rio had no idea how long the two had been driving. A glance at the clock showed that it was getting closer to morning, but Rio could barely remember when he had started driving in the first place. He pulled off at the next exit and parked as soon as he could, rubbing at his tired eyes and failing to stifle a yawn. “So what do we do next?”

 “Can you- Can you stitch me up? I have- I have tape for my wing, I just- I can’t reach.” It was the wing she’d just regrown, the wing she’d poured hours and hours of care and ancient fae wisdom into growing. It would heal in time, but slowly with the iron burns, and it would never be complete again. It might have been better if he had torn it right off. Lydia shook that thought away immediately. Her own vanity would be the death of her. First, she would get to Peru, then she would worry about more superficial things. And then the thought struck her again. Peru was the place she needed to go. She could sink into the cultures of the local Aos Si, wait a couple decades for all the hunters in town to die out, maybe even start the family she so desperately desired. When her face would no longer be associated with Lydia Griffin and everyone who wanted her dead was dead themselves or had long forgotten her, she would work out how to break her promise about Regan, and return. It would take time, but time healed most wounds. That was what she needed to do. Lydia reached for her phone, only to yelp, recoiling abruptly and collapsing into the backseat again. “Oh god, oh god,” she cried, squeezing her eyes shut. “To hell with fucking Kaden Langley.”

 “Uh” Was all that Orion managed to draw out for a long moment. He was barely confident in his abilities to patch up his own wounds. A practice that he had spent most of his life doing on a fairly consistent basis. He definitely didn’t have much faith that he could carefully and painlessly wrap up a Fae’s wing. The practice seemed dangerous. But he wanted to help. “Sure. Uh. Just let me know where the tape is.” Rio finally gave in, moving quickly to find the tape so that he could get started. “So uh, I’ve never done this before. Just tell me what to do.” He was ready to get started when the name threw him completely off base. “Wait… what?” Rio recoiled, a sliver of doubt running through his mind. Kaden and Rio had too many arguments to count about the morality of hunting, but even this seemed too violent. “Kaden did this to you?”

 “Glove compartment,” Lydia murmured. “I have a first aid kit there.” His nerves were palpable. She couldn’t in good conscience lead hunters to her healer, she couldn’t call Deirdre, she couldn’t do much of anything other than trust this human child to do a tolerable job. “Start at the back of the wing closes to my spin and closest to my joint. You can slowly work out where it needs taping.” Lydia shuddered at the thought of any human touching her wings, but the situation demanded it. “Just make sure everything's aligned. I’ll try to keep still.” Lydia braced herself as well as possible against the backseat. “He did. I was just walking through the woods, the first thing I heard were gunshots. I don’t know how he kept missing me. Then he wasn’t-” Lydia hissed sharply through her teeth, gripping the seat in front of her sharply. “I guess he stopped missing. It was almost like he was enjoying making me hurt. He was… I’m terrified, Rio, I’m so scared.”

 Orion got to work quietly, focusing on the wrapping to make sure he wasn’t too rough. One of the many cons of super strength meant that it was far too easy to put too much in what should be a regular push or pull. When Rio’s strength first came in he had made unfortunate victims of many door hinges and freezer doors at grocery stores. At this point in his life, he had mostly gotten a grip on that strength, but stressful situations always made Rio lose focus. But he tried to focus on her instructions as he slowly wrapped the damaged wing. His mind kept straying to Kaden though. How could he have done something like this? Maybe that was just who Kaden was. Rio hadn’t wanted to see that. Maybe he had been fooling himself into thinking that Kaden was changing. Kaden had been very clear on many situations that he didn’t see them as people. Rio shivered at the thought. What was he supposed to do about this? “He’s not going to hurt you.” Rio reassured her. “We’re going to get you out of here and then I’m going to talk to him when I get back to town and… you’re going to be fine.”

 Once he began to tape her, Lydia’s mind shrank to white static, digging her nails into the bloodied leather as she screamed between her teeth. Her body burned like lightning had hit her. Not that any hunter deserved to think they were that powerful, but if the last seven decades hadn’t done it, Kaden had cemented her belief that hunters all deserved to die, Even the ones she could weaponise, Lydia screamed on last time, and then Rio let go.  Lydia slumped, pressing her face into the seat.  “Please don’t. I don’t think you can reason with him. He might even hurt you.” He would be dead by the time Rio tried, but that was neither here nor there. She reached for her phone, trying to think, trying to win. Kaden Langley would send more. They couldn’t stay here. “I think I- I can get in touch with a friend, I can get out of the country. Can you- god, I hate asking, but can you stay until they’re with us, wherever they want to meet?”

 Orion was quick to move away from Lydia and her wings once he had finished wrapping it. Something about it all felt so… wrong. He couldn’t touch them without flashing back to the moment Lydia deduced that Rio was a hunter. The disgust and fear in her voice had been so visceral. So absolute. What right did Rio have to help her, knowing what his family had done to fae just like her? He wanted to keep a healthy distance if he could. For her own comfort as well as his own. “I don’t think-” Rio wanted to defend Kaden. Rio knew the image of Kaden that he had built up for himself. Someone who truly believed that they were doing what was right. Someone that had seemed so black and white when the two had first met. But now seemed conflicted in all the opposite reasons Rio was. In a way, Rio and Kaden seemed to be two different sides to the same coin. How could someone Rio considered a friend do something like this? But Lydia’s condition was hard to ignore. So for now, Rio would listen to her pleas. He wouldn’t reach out to Kaden. Not yet at least. At least now Lydia seemed to have a plan. It meant leaving the country, which seemed a bit dramatic, but Rio wasn’t about to argue. All he needed to do now was hang out with her until this friend of hers could step in. “Yeah. Of course. You got it.”

 “He did. He did, please, you have to-” Lydia coughed from the bruising ache of Regan’s last scream. Or perhaps it was from when she’d plummeted to the ground where Kaden had shot her out of the sky. Every inch of her ached, all the way to her heart and the weight of newfound family, and everyone who had been left behind. She made a call to her friend, black stars flashing in front of her eyes. She’d need ID, enough to get on the plane, and the plane itself, but nothing else until she landed. “Okay. Can you… drive me to Castle Rock and my friend’ll- my friend’ll-” The dark swallowed Lydia as she collapsed in the backseat. Her body was healing itself, and it would not wake her for another several hours. 

 Just drive her to safety and wait for her friend and then you can go home. Just drive her to safety. Wait for her friend. Then go home. If Orion kept repeating the same mantra over and over again, he could convince himself that nothing about this could go horribly wrong. She would make it there without dying from her potentially very serious wounds. Her friend would show up with everything that Lydia needs to make sure Kaden can’t hurt her again. Then Rio could go home knowing he had helped someone. He refused to consider any other scenario. Acknowledging all the things that could go wrong seemed counterproductive. “Castle Rock- Got it. I-” Rio was already in the driver’s seat and starting the car when he realized that Lydia hadn’t just trailed off. She had passed out completely. “No- Hey… Lydia.” Rio began quietly, trying to ease her into consciousness. When that didn’t work, his voice became increadingly louder and frantic. “Lydia! You need to wake up okay? You could have a concussion. Lydia!” He started driving, still mumbling her name as he got back onto the main road and headed towards the highway. He would start heading in the direction of Castle Rock. If she didn’t wake up soon, he would have to detour to a hospital. He didn’t have any plans on how to explain her anatomy or her appearance if the glamour failed, but he couldn’t just let her die. 

 When Lydia woke up, the light had changed, dark into daylight. Her bones had begun to stitch together incorrectly, the bleeding stopped and caked onto her skin and the leather behind her. Her phone was vibrating by her cheek, like a call was coming through. After reassuring Rio, she sat up, blinking blearily at the screen. Hermana. Deirdre. Lydia blinked in confusion, before declining the call. She could answer later once she was on the flight. They could discuss Regan and Kaden and whatever dead rabbit Deirdre had found then. Lydia checked her messages about the flight. Three more hours. She set her phone down, only for the buzz to come through again. Deirdre. Lydia declined on the first ring this time. “Where are-”

 It was her phone. Again.

[forasecondtherewedwon]

Don’t Ever Let Me Start

Fandom: Bodyguard Pairing: David Budd/Julia Montague Rating: M Word Count: 1170

Summary: Julia's in some hospital room and David's alone, wishing he were a doctor.

David had the most peculiar thought. As he sat there—tuning in and out to what they were saying on the news, declining Vicky’s persistent calls, and swiping his hand across his forehead to keep the cold sweat away from his fresh abrasion—he thought, Let me help her. Let me.

He’d only seen the St. Matthew’s College footage leading up to the explosion play once, bracketed by warnings of violent content so the more sensitive viewers knew to avert their eyes, but a still image of Julia was fixed in the corner of the television screen throughout the breaking news broadcast. David had forgotten that he wasn’t a doctor. Looking at her face there, in that picture, he felt taunted to find its dirtied, bloodied twin in his recent memories. Also near the surface of his thoughts were the conversations he and the Home Secretary had shared when she wasn’t completely being the Home Secretary. When David had revealed to her his adolescent dream of practicing medicine.

Clenching his fingers, he forced a slow, shaky breath through his lips. Those exercises counselors or therapists or shrinks wanted you to do, David considered them mostly bullshit. But breathing was good. Breathing wasn’t a technique or a fucking coping scheme. Breathing was oxygen to the brain for thinking, not blocking shit out with cheerful lies they wanted you to swap for your real experiences of the world at its ugliest. David breathed. David thought. David wished, now with full focus, that he was a doctor and not the armed monkey Penhaligon had once assumed him to be.

It just felt wrong to be sitting here clenching his hands together so he didn’t snap and chuck a chair through a window; what he wanted to do was be where she was. Julia. He had been assigned to be with her all day—then longer, after Thornton Circus and being moved into adjoining suites. Every room he was meant to shadow her into. Now, she was in a hospital room and he was here, trembling with the intensity of his fury for the world.

David hated her, that was part of it. What she did, who she was, and how those things were bound together. He could not ever separate Julia from her work because she believed what she did which such fervency. The fervent belief of a terrorist, really. Did she ever see that? And him being loyal to her, lying for her. Lying for the person who had made a distinct decision not to tell him that his children’s school was on a list of targets. It was fucked up.

He was.

Vicky knew it.

Vicky didn’t like answering the phone when he called though. David continued to love his wife with a desperate fire, but he’d missed having the voice of a woman who let herself need him in his ear. That was what Julia had offered following the sniper attack. At his job, he was expected to react. It got him praise, promotions, commendations, this talent for moving quickly and with a clear head when the world went to hell around him. He felt his ability to anticipate was less appreciated. When Julia had rung him that night, David had understood what it meant. She hadn’t wanted to stare at his stoic, professional face while she went to pieces to the sound of a rattling a drink tray, the shock of the day concentrated in her hands. She wanted a firm, present body to fuck her hard into a soft surface. He understood. He provided.

When they were housed in neighbouring rooms, he had anticipated again, his communicating door already open when Julia got up the nerve (or succumbed to the urge) to unlatch her own. She was arrogant because of her work and, god help him, he loved that. He got off on knowing she believed herself to be in control. Yes, of course she was wielding all the power, but who kept inviting who into their room? Who wanted whose strength when they couldn’t shake the sound of persistent gunfire striking armoured metal? Who convinced themselves they were a dominating, scorched-earth force only to gasp and writhe when they were pushed up against a table. Perched on its edge. Taken in merciless, snapping thrusts while the other person pledged protection?

Who was the powerful one: the one who had been blasted off their feet and coated in grime or the one hunkered over them, reflexively sheltering their prone body in case of a second detonation?

Before things had gotten anywhere near this far, but after the day David had given Julia his shirt to wear in an interview, he had gone back to his dismal apartment and watched her on the telly. He’d watched her shout from her seat in Parliament. She had the intensity and conviction of a preacher and he had almost crushed the remote in his fist over the words leaving her fucking mouth. Instead, he’d whipped the remote aside and widened his thighs, slumping in his seat. His apartment had been dark and the night outside even darker—the blinds not drawn down—as he’d roughly jerked himself off with a scowl on his face, picturing fucking the Home Secretary right there in the House of Commons. David had begun with a feeling of enraged helplessness, but that had changed as his pleasure grew. By the time he’d been unintentionally holding his breath, panting hungrily when he’d remembered to inhale, he’d wanted something far more dangerous from Julia, which was permission to hold her.

A handful of muddled seconds had shifted David’s strongest feelings for her from loathing to longing. Ever since, he’s wanted to caress her, to press his nose to her throat and determine if that was why they called her “Lavender.” When she’d returned the white button-down he’d surrendered for her use, he’d carried it back to his apartment, then buried his face in it in privacy. It’d been dry-cleaned; regardless, David had bunched the fabric in his hands—it had required ironing afterward—and hunted for any trace of her scent.

Julia was his responsibility. To clothe, to tail, to advise. To spy on, to snitch on. To fuck, with passion and confusion and all sense of doing the wrong thing. How could he treat her? Not with prescriptions and emergency surgeries. David wasn’t even sure he treated her with respect, exactly. Not when he was listening at doors or choking her because he’d forgotten where he was and who she was, unless he hadn’t. Unless he’d known her instantly when he’d woken to find her above him. Maybe she deserved what so many people had attempted to do to her, what David had thought the most recent attacker had accomplished before Julia’s pulse jumped beneath his fingertips.

He didn’t know, he didn’t know.

He squeezed the bridge of his nose hard while his face crumpled inward, springing back in the next second as he forced himself to breathe.

[blackswaneuroparedux]

Anonymous asked: I love your book reviews under the banner ‘Treat Your S(h)elf’ - nice play on words. You have such a wide and cultured range of interests that I really learn something new. Do you read poetry? What are your favourite poets? What are you currently reading?

I love reading poetry because as the poet Robert Frost put it succinctly, “Poetry is when emotion has found its thought, and thought has found words”.

Poets are before anything else in the words of W.H. Auden, “a person who is madly in love with language” and language is the bedrock of any culture and society and ultimately civilisation. When you truly think about it, poetry is meaningless when it has been left to gather dust on a piece of paper. It is simply a memory of an idea conjured up by a writer with something to say. Poetry must be read, it needs to be experienced because it keeps these ideas burning. These meaningful concepts about the nature of life, death and everything. Every time a person reads a poem, a new bright spark emerges in that person’s head. A new way of thinking, a new way of understanding. That is exactly why poetry must be read because it is the essence of our language.

The reasons I personally read poetry, you ask? Here are some reasons I can think of from the top of my head others are too personal to reveal:

I read poetry because poetry is thoughts that breathe and words that burn. And I read poetry because it is what happens when my mind stops working , and for a moment, all I do is feel. This is good therapy for me as I’m not the most openly emotional or prone to displays of emotion in public. It’s just not how I was built. Poetry helps one to feel. So some poems remain so close to my heart.

I remember when I was about to go on my first tour to Afghanistan I was quite calm and cold blooded because that was and is my nature. My father - who served with distinction in uniform like his father and grand father, and great-grandfather before him - was always proud and supportive of me being the black sheep of the family as the only girl in our family going through Sandhurst and now I was off to the last embers of a war in Afghanistan that everyone had forgotten about. He was concerned - like the rest of my family - like any loving parent about what might happen. But he didn’t question my professionalism or my abilities so he didn’t give me that lecture instead he thrust in my hand both classical literature (Thucydides and Homer in particular) and the works of selected poets. He told me poetry will save your life. He wasn’t anxious about my physical safety he was thinking about my soul. For what happens during war and what comes after if and when I come home. Long story short: poetry saved my life.

By nature I am restless to an incredible annoying degree. I fear being bored. I find it hard to sit and be idle. Poetry is my balm for boredom.

I am incredibly busy and I work punishing long hours. Time is premium. People make demands on me and my time. Poems are like super-condensed stories, and are therefore usually short enough to be read over your morning tea/coffee. In this fast-paced world we live in, sometimes poems are a better alternative to reading fully-fledged novels, or even short stories and poetry gives you the chance to continue to expand your literary horizons even during the busiest times in your life. And becoming more widely read is an incredible way to ensure you are continuously growing, and learning, while becoming a more cultured individual at the same time. There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you and when I read some of those beautiful pieces of poetry by my favourite poets it's like the paper is filled with the breathings of my heart.

The most frightening thing is people I know stop growing culturally after they leave university and get on with the business of life i.e. careers, marriage and family. Once on that treadmill they don’t or can’t stop. They are unable to step off and take a breath. Poetry gives you a breather and helps you to re-centre your priorities.  The more you read poetry, the greater your quest for knowledge awakens. Doorways will open inside your mind and unlock your hidden potential for a greater understanding of life. Anyone who reads poetry often can connect with this conclusive sentence formation that defines your very questionable outlook on life.

I also believe poetry allows us to be less rigid in our thinking with an authentic, personal touch. When I read poems, nothing is often straightforward. Every poem has a meaning hiding under it, but it is blocked by a myriad of literary devices such as metaphors and symbolism. It is important to be able to think more figuratively because it allows you to understand ideas and perspectives in a more abstract and possibly more meaningful way. Sometimes I find that having a single page of beautifully crafted words can be enough of a distraction to spark a sudden creative leap in my brain. There have been many times where I've miraculously thought of ways to solve a problem (big or small) purely because reading poetry forced me to think differently from the usual day-to-day thoughts required for general life.

Poetry is best read when you’re hidden from the outside world, in a quiet little spot, somewhere away from all the hustle and bustle. It is increasingly hard to do just that. I have so many demands on my time and limited space but I force myself to carve out the time and space to do this - one must try. As a rule I switch off all social media (not that I have many to begin with but most definitely my phone). The best time for me to carve out time is when I’m traveling as I’m able to shut out everything around me. Usually when I’m waiting for a flight in the business class departure lounge it’s quiet and not too many people to distract me and there is usually a delay to the flight. When I check into a hotel I feel a disconnect to the world around me. I feel like an alien. Poetry helps me to connect again. Poetry calms and focuses the mind. With poetry I can almost reset my day because it’s not just a time zone I have to get used to but also a state of mind - and especially if I find myself being unproductive too!

I often escape Paris and go into the countryside. I love going on walks, hikes, mountaineering, and other outdoor pursuits. It allows me the space and time to read poetry and reflect in peace. And of course I snatch time before I go to sleep to read a poem if I am not too tired.

The point is that I need the head space to absorb the poem and take some time to work out the meaning of the full entity. I try not swallow a whole book in one sitting, instead I read a few poems and leave the book until the next day or a few days depending on my schedule. Sometimes, you can read a poem again and you will find other meanings or pick up on information that you couldn’t see before. That’s poetry, you create the film, journey or picture inside your mind from reading the words on the page.

As for my favourite poets this is of course is a very personal choice. I didn’t read English at university but rather my academic interests were Classics and History, so I profess a very paltry poetic palate. Still, I’m grateful to those friends more versed than I to point me to other poets. So I do my best to keep an open mind and try and read poetry recommended by others or some thing that captures my eye when I browse through book stores or read it as a passing reference in a book I am reading. 

Different poets and poems are discovered at one stage of life and where I happened to live in the world and only take on another meaning when re-read them at another stage. So I tend to re-visit poets I used to read as a teen and then see how it resonates now.

The majority of my poetic readings are in my native English and Norwegian languages but because I have varying degrees of fluency in other languages (because I grew up there for instance) I love widening my poetic palate. One of my regrets is not knowing Japanese and Chinese to a sufficient degree to really read poetry in those languages even if I have basic fluency in literature and everyday conversation. So reading Ezra Pound is one way in English to appreciate these Eastern poetic influences. I’m also ashamed to admit that I only know a woeful smattering of words in Scotiish Gaelic - my Anglo-Scots father knows it fairly well but even he struggles - and really I must find time in the future to learn more of it because it’s such a fascinating language (not least because it’s also dying out and that is tragic).

So below is an eclectic and random list from the top of my head and in no real order of preference:

• Homer (Greek) • Sappho (Greek) • Rumi (Farsi) • Mirza Ghalib (Urdu and Farsi) • John Milton • John Donne • William Shakespeare • Dante (Italian) • Robert Burns • William Wordsworth • Samuel Taylor Coleridge • William Blake • John Keats • Emily Dickinson • Christina Rosetti • Gerald Manley Hopkins • Walt Whitman • Oscar Wilde • W.B. Yeats • Rudyard Kipling • Wilfred Owen • Alfred Tennyson • Rainer Maria Rilke (German) • Cavafy (Greek) • T.S. Eliot • Hilda Doolittle • Marianne Moore • Sylvia Plath • W. H. Auden • Olaf H. Hauge (Norwegian) • Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson (Norwegian) • Aslaug Vaa (Norwegian) • Rolf Jacobsen (Norwegian) • Sarojini Naidu (Hindi) • Gulzar (Hindi)

Living in Paris I tend to read more French poetry these days. By osmosis it helps me appreciate the French language and French culture even more.

• Charles Baudelaire. • Paul Verlaine • Jacques Prévert • Arthur Rimbaud • Alphonse de Lamartine • Alfred de Musset • Paul Valéry • Paul Eluard • Jean Genet • Françoise Villon

Poetry is an art that combines the essence of life through the fabrication of reality. Poets challenge and nourish me with their wisdom, philosophy, love and journeys beyond what used to be the limits of my own creative imagination. They push my boundaries ever so more. In doing so they grow my mind for understanding, my heart for empathy, and my soul for wisdom. It would hard to disagree with Robert Frost who sums up what poetry means to me, “a poem begins in delight, and ends in Wisdom”.

Thanks for your question

[blukoffee]

Out of Place, Out of Time (AU Oneshot)

Okay, so. I rarely (read: never) post original stuff on here, so this is a learning curve for me, pleasebenice, but I swore/promised/crossed my heart that I would contribute to @intricatecaprice 30 Days Dead Men’s Tales. And here we are! This’ll probably be messy and not nearly as pretty as the rest of those gorgeous posts, but hey, it’s the thought that counts, right?

So, I of course had the idea of Isabeau being plonked into the lap of one Cursed Capitán. I mean, who wouldn’t? But as it is currently being wonderfully done by so many talented authors, I decided to stick with my human Salazar. But this is just a small scratch of satisfaction to that itch. I hope you enjoy!  (Also, just wanna note that this isn’t the Monarch and these are different prisoners than those in the beginning of the film. I tried to make that distinct, but just want to clarify. Also, this is purely self-indulging, so please excuse any errors.)

Prisoners Should Know Their Place

It was the screams that told Isabeau her luck was about to change for the worst. And that was a feat, since she was pretty sure her luck had already hit rock bottom.

The guy in the cell next to her, barely a few years older than her, if even that, began to whimper in terror, his fingers tugging at dirty red hair. The wrinkled old man with him started muttering prayers under his breath, the gaps of missing teeth flashing every now and then.

Pretty sure that's not gonna help anyone, dude. Isabeau sighed, then grimaced when her ribs protested the movement. The nasty bruise from the officer's boot would take a while to heal, especially since he hadn't bothered holding back when he'd literally kicked her into the cell.

Asshole. I hope he was one of the ones that screamed like a little girl.

Despite the tone of her thoughts, Isabeau was worried. Whoever had boarded the Victorious were going through the crew with lightning speed, and nothing outside gave away any hints of who the attackers were. For all she knew, they'd be worse than the British she found herself prisoner of.

Great. This day really can get worse. I honestly didn't think it could.

There was a couple of loud crashes up above, and a distinct sound of crackling that sent tendrils of alarm snaking down her limbs. 

Fire. I smell fire. 

Cinders began to float down through the cracks in the boards and she struggled to keep the primal part of her brain from sending her into a panic. 

The younger guy apparently had less control and suddenly threw himself at the bars with a loud crash, screaming at the top of his lungs. The old man tried to calm him, to keep him quiet, but he was thrown off.

Mere seconds later, slow footsteps began to thump heavily down the stairs to the brig. 

The screaming man instantly quieted, staring up at the deck above in horror.

Isabeau looked up from where she sat curled in the corner, surprised by the prickle of unease that skittered with spider legs across her nape.

Whatever was coming their way wasn't anything good.

All three of them froze as boots suddenly appeared at the top of the stairs, slowly descending to show a large man leaning heavily on a cane as he made his way down the steps.

It wasn't his sheer, intimidating size that made Isabeau's breath freeze in her lungs. 

It was the way his hair wafted around his head in a halo of black strands, like he was underwater. 

It was how flakes of ash floated in his wake whenever he moved.

It was his burnt and decrepit uniform, shifting and following his movements in a way that wasn't natural.

It was the grey skin, covered in ashen cracks and the splintered skull with sharp, jagged edges of bone.

It was the burning amber eyes, almost glowing with their brilliance in the dark.

They all stood staring at each other for a brief second, then the man was joined by more men, men that had similar appearances of unnaturalness.

Isabeau was grateful she was already sitting down, else she would have collapsed on the floor.

They had walked through the walls. They had simply walked the walls, as if it'd been empty space.

What...the fuck…

The old man next to her began to moan his prayers, a note of bleakness in his tone that said he knew he was about to die. 

Isabeau wasn’t feeling much more optimistic, but she had bigger things to worry about. Such as why the apparent leader of the ghostly horde was now staring directly at her, and he hadn’t blinked since he’d spotted her.

In her short experience in an 18th century world, she’d come to the quick realization that women were simple commodities to be acquired, to be seen and not heard. To actually have intelligence as a woman was considered unnatural, a short step from being pronounced a witch or insane.

So the fact that any man, not merely a ghostly one, was staring at her with such unnerving focus was not a good thing.

She bit her lip, blood seeping on her tongue in an effort not to snap at the man to ask what he was looking at.

The older man’s moaning grew louder, the other man trying to figure out if he was going to fight while there was a distinct stain on the front of his pants, his blue eyes wide with terror.

Apparently, the imposing figure staring at her had had enough. A slight jerk of his head towards the other two prisoners and one of the ghostly apparitions behind him stepped forward, through the cell bars, and thrust a corroded sword straight through the moaning inmate.

Silence instantly echoed through the brig following the thud of his body.

And still the man continued to stare at her, making her skin itch under his perusal, making her want to curl into herself to hide from his burning gaze.

Finally, he stepped forwards, and no, she hadn’t been imagining things.

His entire body passed through the iron bars, sliding through them only a faint resistance and leaving them sizzling and smoking in his wake.

Definitely not human, definitely not human!

Isabeau pressed backwards into the corner, curling tighter as the man or whatever he was continued to move towards her with slow, steady steps. She kept her eyes lowered, so as not to seem as a challenge, and was surprised to find him crouching in front of her.

She squeezed further into the corner, bracing herself for another boot, or possibly a hand, when she heard a deep voice rumble, “Look at me.”

It should have sounded like rocks grinding together, as deep as his baritone was, but instead it sounded like liquid honey, like the purr of a lover, his accent making it roll through the air like music. She could hear a gravelly rasp to it that only added a smoky flavor, making her skin shiver and tingle in the wake of the sound.

Carefully, she slid her eyes up, taking in the once elegant uniform that still flattered his powerful body with its faded stripes, the tattered cravat that floated and swayed in a nonexistent breeze, until her gaze landed on a face that would haunt her dreams.

She sucked in a quick breath, surprised by how utterly handsome the ghostly man was, even in death. Her eyes skimmed over strong, mature features of a male in his prime, who would have been beyond devastating had he been alive.

Nor had he missed her interest, something flaring visibly in those burning amber eyes that made her swallow convulsively.

The man straightened, towering over her, and turned to gesture at another of the men that accompanied him, one with an eyepatch over one side of his face.

Unfortunately, the other inmate still alive had apparently found his courage, if not his brains.

He slammed his hands into the bars, one of his fingers crooked as if he’d broken it, and sneered at the man standing in front of her, “What use do you have of some whore, Spanish dog? You can’t-”

He never got to finish before the man whirled and his hand flashed out, instantly wrapping around the inmate’s throat. He was lifted off his feet in a frightening display of strength, while the man in the striped coat hissed, “She’s mine, and you would do well to remember that.”

Isabeau honestly thought he was going to kill him, but instead he only held him for a few seconds more, just long enough to make sure his point got across, then dropped him, leaving the man in a crumpled heap on the filthy floor.

Wait. What does he mean, “she’s mine”? 

“Moss, bring him.” The man before her whirled around with blazing speed, reaching down to grab her arm and hauled her to her feet.

Isabeau gasped at the feel of his icy fingers on her arm, as unbreakable as any manacle, before she was dragged after him.

One of his men broke the cell lock and he continued to yank her along, making her ribs scream in protest.

“...wait,” she gasped as he headed towards the stairs. “Wait!”

She threw herself backwards, no mean feat when her weight was being continuously dragged forwards, and the man holding her whipped around to glare at her, his eyes a burning crimson.

“I will not wait, chica. You are my prisoner now, and I do not wait for prisoners!”

Prisoner. That hated word burned in her gut. She’d heard it more over the past few days than she ever cared to again, along with a good many more slurs against her simply for her gender.

Fury made her hiss up at his face, “I’m not your fucking prisoner, now let - go of me!”

With a burst of frantic strength, she managed to wrench free of his grip, which had slackened a hair in his surprise at her outburst.

She turned and bared her teeth in a snarl at the one-eyed ghost that stepped in front of her. His eye flickered over her shoulder and he moved out of her way, staring at her with such hostility that her anger faltered.

Two others paused in the act of dragging the unconscious man out of his cell, his dirty red hair hanging lank about his face.

Isabeau shuddered, glad she hadn’t been put in the cell with him, and limped towards the room where her bags had been carelessly tossed. Sighing at the sight of her clothes thrown haphazardly on the bench, she closed her eyes wearily, just wishing this day had never begun.

She heard wheezing breaths behind her and knew that the man had followed her. The one who had claimed her as his prisoner. The one who stared at her with uncomfortable intensity.

Squeezing her eyes harder before opening them, she stepped forwards and began picking up her things, the smell of smoke gradually growing stronger.

“You are not English. What are you doing in an English cell?” the man asked suspiciously, stepping around to peer curiously at her belongings before swinging his gaze back to her.

“You wouldn’t believe me even if I told you,” she muttered, then finally couldn’t take it anymore and pulled her shirt over her head, not caring if she was being watched or not.

She heard a wheezed curse and felt her face burn in embarrassment, then quickly  grabbed another of her shirts and slipped it on.

Grabbing the rest of her things and tossing the strap on her big bag over her shoulder, she turned to see the man had given her his back out of some form of courtesy.

Claiming her as his prisoner or not, she appreciated the gesture.

“I don’t even know your name.”

He turned to face her, his stance proud even with his slightly hunched back. “Capitán Armando Antón Salazar de Estrada. And yours, chica?”

A spark drifted down from the ceiling and she sidestepped it warily, suddenly realizing just where they were. And what was happening to the Victorious. “Isabeau Revanne. Okay, fine, I’m your prisoner, take me to your brig.”

She’d been trying to expedite matters to get off the burning hulk, but apparently the only thing she’d managed to expedite was Capitán Salazar’s temper.

He stepped forwards, towering over her even without a straightened spine, and glared down at her. “Sí, you are my prisoner, and prisoners should know their place.”

Isabeau swallowed as she struggled not to stare at his face. “My place is in your brig, isn’t it?”

Salazar stared at her for a good long minute, making her grow more and more nervous as heat began to filter down to the room, before he suddenly smiled.

It was a smile that made her extremely uneasy.

“Perhaps I have another purpose for you. Your companion in the brig had a good idea, no?”

Her companion? Wait, the one who had called her a-

“I’m not a whore!” Isabeau spat indignantly, gritting her teeth in outrage at the suggestion. She’d been called worse since she’d been tossed into that cell, but honestly, she’d somehow been under the impression that Capitán Salazar was different.

His burning gaze flickered over her, taking in her clothes that must seem incredibly strange to him. “That remains to be seen.”

Both their attentions jerked upwards at a loud crash, but Salazar was quicker to recover.

Isabeau yelped as she was suddenly lifted into the air, wheezing as a broad shoulder was wedged into her stomach.

Salazar turned and snapped an order, one of his men slinking forwards to pick up her belongings.

Clinging to the back of his coat, Isabeau struggled to breathe as she was carried along. 

Salazar paused at the top of the stairs before moving over to the railing.

What is he-

Her thought vanished as he leapt over the railing, the sudden shock of it sucking the scream right out of her throat as she saw pitch-black water rushing towards her.

She squeezed her eyes shut, only to feel herself suddenly jolt to a stop.

Confused, she cracked open one eye, then both went wide in shock as she still saw water beneath her, yet it wasn’t getting any closer.

Salazar was walking on water. He was walking on water.

An explosion of fire and noise drew her attention away from this new knowledge and she hissed in pain when one chunk of burning debris grazed her arm.

Salazar instantly jerked to the side, swinging her out of the way of another piece of debris before breaking into a run.

Another explosion and she looked up to see a cannon sailing straight towards them. “Look out!”

The massive metal construct whistled by them as Salazar swerved at her warning, his pace increasing to a lithe run as he put distance between them and the exploding wreck of the Victorious.

Finally, he began to slow down to a rolling jog, then coiled his big body into a crouch before springing upwards.

They landed lightly on the deck of a rotting hulk of a ship, a vessel twice the size of the one she’d been on, if not bigger, but all she caught was a quick glimpse, catching sight of the red-haired man sprawled on the deck where he’d been dropped before Salazar turned and carried her down a corridor, 

Indignation began to fuel a burning strength. She’d spent the last several days locked in a cell, she’d woken up in this hell hole of a time period with no warning, she had no idea how to get back, and for the icing on the fucking cake, she had been kidnapped by a stupidly handsome ghost whose intentions she didn’t have the slightest clue about.

And she was tired of feeling his shoulder digging into her stomach!

“Put. Me. Down!” Isabeau thrashed and threw herself back against his restraining arm, ignoring the screaming in her ribs at the sudden movement.

Salazar grunted at her unexpected struggling, then shoved his way through a door, slamming it closed behind him.

Isabeau found herself flung into the air with a squeal and she flailed wildly before landing on something plush and slightly lumpy. She laid there for a second, sucking air into her lungs as her bruised stomach ached, then carefully sat upright, staring at the ghostly captain warily.

But to her confusion, he wasn’t looking at her face. Instead, his gaze was somewhere lower, and she glanced down in alarm, only to see that her shirt had ridden up when she’d been tossed onto the settee. And the bootprint bruised into her ribs was clearly visible.

“Which one?”

Isabeau’s attention flashed back to Salazar, his deep voice ominously quiet, rage turning his irises a bloody crimson. Black blood ran down his chin as he bared his teeth in a snarl. “Which one?!”

Slowly, she inched her shirt down to cover the bruises. “One of the officers. I’m pretty sure he’s dead now.”

Sanguine eyes flicked to her face. “Did he touch you - anywhere else?”

She quickly shook her head, even as she wondered why the mere thought of it enraged him. Surely such a thing was commonplace in this time period.

Salazar made a noise in his throat, almost a growl, his face still stern and unyielding in his anger. His fist tightened around the hilt of his rapier, which she just now noticed was still gripped in his hand. 

Isabeau edged backwards along the settee warily, then yelped in alarm when he lifted it up and plunged the tip into the floor with a loud thud, the blade quivering from the force of the blow.

They were both frozen for a second, then Salazar straightened and sent her a harsh glare. “Do not move.”

And with the ominous implications of what would happen if she didn’t obey his orders hanging in the air, he whirled and walked through the door without opening it, leaving wisps of ash trailing behind him.

Isabeau didn’t feel like moving from her spot on the settee. She had seen how deep the blade had plunged into the floorboards and felt it was wise not to incite the captain’s temper. Though that didn’t stop her curiosity from lifting its head and creating questions about the man.

She didn’t realize that she’d dozed off until she felt weight depress the cushions next to her.

Something cool was spreading soothing bliss over the aching bruise on her side, making the pain fade to a background hum.

She cracked open bleary eyes to see a man sitting next to her, huge and imposing, yet his touch was gentle as he feathered calloused fingers over her skin.

“Thank you.”

Salazar paused at her words, then resumed rubbing whatever it was into her bruise. “You are welcome.”

Isabeau was quiet for a second, watching him groggily before blurting, “Why are you helping me?”

This time he didn’t pause, merely pulled away for a second to wipe his fingers off on a rag. “You are my prisoner, therefore my responsibility.”

She couldn’t help but be fascinated by his smooth, efficient movements, the complete unnaturalness to him. He shouldn’t exist, but here he was. Still, questions continued to bounce around in her mind.

“Why did you bring that other man too?”

He chuckled ominously as he suddenly leaned over her, those eerie eyes fixed on her face. “Because I always leave one man alive to tell of me. And since I’m not letting you go, I needed someone else.”

She swallowed nervously as she felt his fingers stroke her hair back behind her ear, felt his weight depress the cushions around her. “What do you mean, you’re not letting me go?”

His hand slid under the back of her skull, huge and powerful against the bone, and he held her still as he leaned closer. His hair flowed downwards to tickle her cheeks when he stopped, his nose almost touching hers. A black grin spread across his lips. “You’re mine, now. And I don’t let go of what is mine.”

[sonderrow-moved]

IC          CANON          VOICE          BODY          TRIALS           PLOTTING

◭ I.D

FULL NAME: Roy Kaworu Spiegel BIRTH: March 14th, 27 y.o. SEX & GENDER: Male SPECIE: Human ETHNICITY: Asian American LANGUAGE: English, German, Japanese OCCUPATION: Intern in environmental research, masseur RELIGION: Shinto SEXUALITY: ??? ◭ ANATOMY

HAIR: Bright auburn red EYES: Light grey FACE: TBA COMPLEXION: Milky honeyed skintone HEIGHT: 184 cm BUILD: TBA VOICE: Melodious and serious

◭ PERSONA

LIKES: Reading, anthropology, people older than him DISLIKES: Injustice, vices, ignorance MBTI: TBA ALIGNMENT: Lawful Good POLITICAL STANCE: Middle ground EDUCATION LEVEL: PhD DRUGS: Do vitamin supplements count..? PHOBIAS: Acrophobia DISORDER: None diagnosed

♚ “AND LATER MY MACABRE JOY SOURS AND I’M WEEPING FOR MYSELF, UNABLE TO FIND SOLACE IN ANY OF THIS, CRYING OUT, SOBBING, “I JUST WANT TO BE LOVED,” CURSING THE EARTH AND EVERYTHING I HAVE BEEN TAUGHT: PRINCIPLES, DISTINCTIONS, CHOICES, MORALS, COMPROMISES, KNOWLEDGE, UNITY, PRAYER - ALL OF IT WAS WRONG, WITHOUT ANY FINAL PURPOSE.”

This man has lived too long. A classic concept written, imagined by artists. To comfort them about their mortality, explore the ins and outs of an alien narrative full of ifs. How would this even work ? Even the people with the best memories, to a genius level even, eventually forgets, for the brain can only retain so much. This feeling people gets as they grow older, the biased nostalgia of glorified items they saw through their pure, untainted, still developing eyes and the resentment towards new trends as they cannot see anything without any scum anymore. The yearning not for those movements, but for this soft sensation, of looking, admiring something and think, for a moment, that it’s idealistic form was real.

This sweet, unadulterated notion became only a distant, forgotten memory as time hardened the one known today as Roy. For years. Decades. Centuries. Millenniums.

A man who was born during another civilization, another time, long forgotten with only myths remaining of it. Not even a relic to be talked about, as everything had disintegrated, returned to earth for another life cycle.

♚ “THE PAST ISN’T REAL. IT’S JUST A DREAM,” I SAY. “DON’T MENTION THE PAST.”

Roy was born under another name, one he still remembers, but has long buried away, as it is not his name anymore. No one remembers it. It is not him anymore, as much as he might like to. It is only an appellation to let go of. As humankind developed its technology to a peak, so did their power, as they yielded control over nature people nowadays couldn’t imagine. It wasn’t as clear as one making a motion to have the waves, wind and earth respond to it. It was a much more fundamental, rawer sense to it. Where the energy of the world could be used to build even new life.

Always the diligent person who only lived to serve, executing tasks exactly as he was asked to, Roy had been appointed to be the Right Hand of the High Priestess. A young female who had only recently bloomed into womanhood. So perfect in existence, like a bright, pale, white being given to their kind in exchange of their discovery over worldly power. She had embraced her role as a symbol since birth, and he was to accompany her every step of the way as she rose to an official position. To inspire and love. Untouched by anything, for her importance was too great as people shook the world order in their insatiable human curiosity. Nowadays, Roy could have been defined as a bodyguard, yet, in this time, there was no fear of another person’s mishap. Only was he to protect her from accidental injuries, get more menial tasks off her shoulder and, most of all, as they understood this aspect deeply, have her emotional and social needs satisfied.

The way she was so beautiful, the way she would only crack a laugh at his shenanigans, the way he knew how to soothe her and she, in her infinite kindness, learned to soothe him back when a crack of worry grew between his impeccable … how could he not fall in love ?

He loved the way she would recite poetry while he slowly got used to her wanting him to caress her head, and she loved the way he would sing her verses in his smooth, sultry voice. The way she would eye him while someone else was talking on stage with a soft smile while he was guarding the entrance and he’d let a smile crack.

It wasn’t a consummated love like you would see in the current, modern days. There were, of course, pairings who held deep affection towards one another and brought in the next generation, but she had a role where she would never have the chance to do so, for her symbolism was not to replicate, only to be a happenstance, a gift which mustn’t be tainted by an attempt to be artificially redone. She accepted her role with no issue, and so did Roy. And the two of them were perfectly happy with this.

This was a time before the continents even started to noticeably separate on Earth, or even before the initial ground became more and more flooded by the waters. A time where Roy’s kind felt so unified, at peace… until this built up, free of conflict power shattered in on itself.

Raw abominations started roaming, not in the form of creatures, not exactly. So ephemeral, yet spreading chaos and distortion at every corner, fueled by the abuse and infighting of those who had gathered too much and only yearned for more. Years and generations of peace had made civilization take harmony for granted, and the couple was powerless as they saw it unfold. As the world balance collapsed, Roy was approached by a group of pacifists, trusted people for outside the conflicts, everyone knew anyone, respect one another, grew with one another. And as sickly dear ones, growing tainted by the plague pleaded with him, for his position had him perfect for what needed to be done for the greater good: kill the priestess, so the good in her would spread across the land, calm the spirits through their weeps, and save them.

Someone like Roy, of unfathomable loyalty, had a decision to make. And despite the tugs at his heart, it was an easy one. For he believed that, if the Priestess was present, the choice would be simple. That she would understand, because, in her infinite goodness, she could forgive them, forgive him, in the end. And as his trust towards her was strong, it is during a bright morning, away from the war, in the beautiful temple they inhabited, up in the mountains, away from civilization, that he entrusted her with what the people wished of them… and like the great woman she always had been, she kept a serene, albeit slightly sorrowful expression as she accepted. If there was a chance the power built inside her since birth could save more than one person, she would die.

But when his blade pierced her heart, tainting her white, ceremonial clothing in the middle of the garden, she only clanged onto him, eyes wide with desperate sorrow, an expression she, and he, never ever witnessed in anyone before. Fear and betrayal spread across her dark eyes as they grew more and more obscure.

I don’t want to die. My love, I don’t want to die…

―were her last words before, as she wept and choked, the High Priestess expired in her guardian’s blood soaked arms, him wearing too stunned an expression for her to ever hear an answer for him.

Just like beliefs and idolization are made-up by man for comfort and, ultimately, are fake, so was the glorification that one death, from someone incredibly beautiful from the inside out, would be a solution to mankind creating their own demise.

And so, it was at his feet that Roy saw the last of humans slowly die out, first from their endless conflict, so harsh they forgot where it even started, and then to the unforgiving nature, taking back the life they had abused off her.

Only, as he himself felt like he was expiring, with all lifeforce living him in the deserted, now ruined temple he had taken cared of with his beloved.

♚ “THIS IS TRUE: THE WORLD IS BETTER OFF WITH SOME PEOPLE GONE. OUR LIVES ARE NOT ALL INTERCONNECTED. THAT THEORY IS CROCK. SOME PEOPLE TRULY DO NOT NEED TO BE HERE.”

And with the end of this first Humankind was the land so dry of its lifeforce that the cycle of resurrection immortality and resurrection ended. It was quite simple at the time, and helped with the utopia free of grief and unnecessary sadness for their knowledge-seeking kind. If happenstance had you gone, your aether would go back to the earth, only to rise again in the next year, century, no one knew, but they would rise again, the same people, to meet the ones they knew in another life again, with hazy memories, but just enough to recognize your loved ones, and find them again. The more time passed, the less did people come back from this dormant phase, millions and millions now sleeping under the crust of the Earth, never to awaken again. Only the one who had gathered more power could come back more quickly, not the servants, no matter how strong they were, like Roy, who was only, despite all his strengths, a support to a higher one.

Only, as their kind ended, in her last breath, was he given the last link to the cycle, to be connected to his brethren, when he wasn’t supposed to be the one to live again to better the world.

She gave it to him, as her last gift. As the forgiveness she could never give him while she clung to dear life so desperately.

For the greatest gift to give to someone where inevitable death surround them is to still live……… isn’t it ?

I have seen too little, did too little to be of any solace in chaos. You, my love, have seen, experienced. I cannot think of a finer person to carry out our legacy, for I trust that only the best will come out of you.

♚ “PEOPLE CAN GET ACCUSTOMED TO ANYTHING, RIGHT? HABIT DOES THINGS TO PEOPLE.”

Life went back to its natural course. Ancient structure became ruins as vegetation took over, and, strong as it ever was, mankind rose again from the ashes. At the dawn of a new civilization, an orphan would be found at a nearby river, taken in by farmers and eventually would be a child raised by the whole humble village… a child who hadn’t forgotten a thing, and worked towards the dawn of a new age where he could protect what was dear to him.

And so, the one these days called Roy, grew up like he did before, to train and refine his ways. Only, this time, he didn’t only focus on his personal growth, but on others’ too. Estranged from other children like he had always been, with adulthood reaching his mind too quickly, only devoted to his craft. Despite snarl from the youth, his reputation grew amongst the adults and elders, and the communities beyond. As soon as his body was barely out of its formative years, did the boy set home in the mountains. Out of the leftover ruins his past life would let him have. A strong foundation to not lose sight of his objective.

Discipline. Commitment. Responsibility. Peace of mind. Realism. Alongside harsh but fair mental and physical training, all from what he had been taught and remembered, Roy kept exploring martial disciplines he even hadn’t touched in the past, wanting to reestablish what had been lost, and, before he knew it, he was known nearly as a Sage Deity across the land. A man coming from another world, who set up his temple atop the mountains made of smooth boulders eroded with time, near a clear water source, in the middle of a blossoming garden full of colors and hybrid one never knew how such an abundance of different species naturally grew alongside one another in this location, like it was enchanted.

Often, the village elders sought Roy’s advice, which he hoped have given sparingly, in neutrality, since he couldn’t guide mankind every step of the way, only show them a flourishing path. Travelers would come from afar to seek both his teaching and words, with glorified stories growing slightly intimidating to the young man. Despite this, he did his best to carry on his duty, taking care of the new temple grounds he assembled himself, wearing flowing clothes he sew himself; all loyal to the form and aesthetic of the woman he cherished, adorning the same attire she did and flowing, long hair. He wasn’t hoping for them to meet again, only honor her memory. He had grieved and grieved, wept and wept before she gave him the gift of eternity. His salvation was throwing himself into his training, contemplating his sorrow, and so on and on again until he only felt peace.

Roy’s stories of a lady in white with the darkest of eyes became legends, tales of kindness, bravery and adventure. And, amongst his own legacy growing, did Roy decide, after much deliberation, to take in disciples. One, then two. People under his tutelage, who would, in return, vow to spread and defend what the temple fought for, alongside taking equal parts in temple duties. And as the young people he accepted under his wing grew, Roy would soon be surrounded by four bright students he deeply loved. Unable to truly have a father’s touch, he, at least, believed he was a good guardian, hoping that, with time, his students would become masters, and that humanity could flourish.

It was then that, surrounded by his disciples, minus one, actually, that Roy had just finished drinking light tea and eating some sweets. He sighed as a cloud formed in front of his thin lips, the cold air announcing the winter to come. Even as his eldest disciple spoke, Roy didn’t reply. He stayed still, unmoving, silent, for there was nothing to say about what he felt was to come.

He didn’t even groan when he felt the ornate blades of his disciples pass through him, all three at the same time, for they were bound to be guilty together. While the screeching pain enveloped his senses, he wondered if this was what she felt, when he betrayed her.

That night, the Sage’s remains were cut to pieces, scattered far and wide, while his head was burned in the courtyard bonfire, all in an attempt to stop the link he had with his brethren, to cease the “gift” he had been given and for the cycle carried by the billions sleeping to come to an end.

But, unlike what men thought, Roy’s cycle was only part of nature, and he was to rise once more.

♚ “MY NIGHTLY BLOOD LUST OVERFLOWED INTO MY DAYS AND I HAD TO LEAVE THE CITY. MY MASK OF SANITY WAS A VICTIM OF IMPENDING SLIPPAGE.”

It was always the same. Again and again. He would be reborn, train, work, bond, and die at the hands of the very ones he had linked himself. The only reliable companion Roy ever had was nature outside of mankind, harsh but fair, just like him. With a behavior he could coexist with peacefully. It started eating him from the inside out. This time around, Roy had come back from the dead a few decades after his murder, found stark naked in a rice field even farther East, still in a young adult form, regenerated. Mankind hadn’t been doomed yet, and so, he vowed to save it by himself.

Roy would travel far and wide as mankind spread its territory and the continents started separating, being the only one of his kind which could still read the flow of life, its remaining corruption, and how to neutralize them. He would never stay in one spot for too long, only focusing on what he had to do. Because if he didn’t do it, who would ? If he didn’t do anything, he would only be left seeing the same amount of suffering and death, all by himself.

He couldn’t sit down. He couldn’t lose hope.

But Roy’s respect for life took the better of him. As he helped others with his abilities, presenting himself as somewhat of a medium as others also showed special traits, he hadn’t seen how darker human’s hearts had become. So much more quickly than the society he had known in the past. People turned envious of his abilities, and, soon enough, he needed to fight and run for his own life, at the risk of being torn apart yet again.

This fight and flight narrative happened again. And again. Until Roy’s duty had no time to be done; if he wasn’t around, there was no way anything could be done. He had to survive. And as the world grew around him, his mind and memories became muddied, and the depravity surrounding his person slowly creeped into his mind, as any remainder of his initial purpose was muddled with a constant years of bloodshed. An age of decades where he was to be burned and tortured, captured again and again before he’d lay waste to entire villages for his own safety. So no witness was to remain, and less people were to go after him. His training was used in a way he had never done before. For a cause he couldn’t decide to stop. He learned how to kill as efficiently as possible, how to decimate communities, destroy morale through underhanded means. Jumping from one allegiance to another as he either killed or fled before they’d go after him. For the first time, Roy could see how much his raw abilities could be of use in carnage, with no ceremony, no cause behind them. Only death. The very somber death he swore to stop.

He didn’t even stop to wonder at the technology men came up with, using the growing devices as meant for an end, anger and rage creeping into his very soul, indulging in vices he was being offered by humans which morals he always despised. There was no relief in this life, no moment of quiet, only screams and chaos, and only sins could provide a moment of respite. Roy, actually, never remembered how he died, but he did, at some point, in some time, after all sane people had left the territory, and only savagery had roamed the land he had loved so dearly.

During this time, he had forgotten her name, even her face.

♚ “THE CONVERSATION FOLLOWS ITS OWN ROLLING ACCORD - NO REAL STRUCTURE OR TOPIC OR INTERNAL LOGIC OR FEELING; EXCEPT, OF COURSE, FOR ITS OWN HIDDEN, CONSPIRATORIAL ONE. JUST WORDS, AND LIKE IN A MOVIE, BUT ONE THAT HAS BEEN TRANSCRIBED IMPROPERLY, MOST OF IT OVERLAPS.”

At some point, Roy had no recognition if he had been in the same world, the same plane of existence amongst the cycles when he awoke once again. This time in a white, desperately empty desert. With no one at his side. He was still, somehow, a fully grown person, with the fresh memories of violence he had laid, and the scent of blood into all his pores, and the grotesque weapons he had used with no ceremony.

Yet, in this newly regenerated body, in this empty space by himself, his mind centered itself. His discipline kicked in between the silence and hunt for sustenance. He had spent so long a time by himself, alone, in the most chaotic of scenarios. With no one who remembered him, no one who remembered his loved ones, no one who remembered who everyone he even knew were.

After spending time and time, he couldn’t count how long, to rebalance his person, reshape his senses and skills yet again, Roy readied himself to reach civilization once more… yet when he started his journey again, he stopped, the sudden weight of his contact with humankind anchoring him to the ground, unable now to stand. His body was trembling, and everything he had packed fell to the ground. He knew what would happen if he gave up. What he would need to go through and experience. Again and again. He tried. He tried so hard. But no matter how good he could be, it seemed so… hopeless. However, even if it was an impossible endeavor, he couldn’t stop, or else he would have nothing.

He wouldn’t be able to, maybe, one day, see everyone again. How many times had it been ? His memory couldn’t bear so much, what important things could he not recall ? He could start counting, but there was no way to say if entire lifetimes were not thrown into the abyss, and if forgotten crucial knowledge would end up with yet another failure…

This is when, hunched onto himself in this deserted, white horizon, Roy held his head in his hand. He groaned of pain as his mind was strained to its limits, drooling as he agonized, and images faded far, far away as he life flow was being torn apart from him by his own hands. He could hear the screams of his brethren, their legacy being desecrated. Useless. Useless. He didn’t need to remember their names. He didn’t need to remember their faces. Everything deemed useless to the core of his mission was shred out of his very soul, making the pain, the worries fade away, for he only needed to focus on what needed to be done.

Discipline. Commitment. Responsibility. Peace of mind. Realism. For those virtues to lead mankind to a greater part. And maybe, just maybe, recover part of everything he had lost.

For it was the one thing she had not accounted for, for she saw this man as someone so perfect through her affection for him.

That, ultimately, he did all of this so he could see them, see her again if he ever succeeded, and mankind could doom itself if it wasn’t the only way he knew to move onwards. That he did what was needed of him, without taking it so much to heart, that, in the deep of his heart, laid a hidden, selfish reason for all of this. Yet, it may not be this one anymore, he couldn’t tell.

And as Roy literally lost his mind, all by himself, with not a soul around to witness his sorrow, he laid there, vegetable from the trauma, feeling but unable to move, in a haze of horror and pain, before, finally, dehydration took him, and he was back in the cycle again.

Only, this time, there would be no memories. Only physical ones. No loneliness, only fake memories pieced by the world to balance his existence. Only a man, his training, his virtues, and an impossible task that is his only defense against despair and insanity.

♚ “THERE IS NO TIME FOR THE INNOCENT.”