#Fergus' Funeral

[cakemoney]

anyway i might have to put the neverafter but everything is set in our normal world with no magic fic on the shelf to write a mismag but everything is set in our normal world with no magic fic about the pilot program as friends who were really close during a summer camp but then fell out of touch and now circumstances have transpired to put them on a cross-country road trip where they must work out their feelings for each other. woo

[clonerightsagenda]

Never did come up with a good title but here is my latest take on #crude monsters, or all the toxic things we've decided we can't live without in the Anthropocene

We would have taken Jane more seriously at happy hour if we’d known about the ghost.

We knew her boyfriend died. At work, we made the right noises; we passed around a sympathy card and bought her meal delivery vouchers. Over drinks, we debated what sort of outrageous gesture she would make. Call in for a month’s worth of sick days. Invite the whole department to a Viking-style funeral. Fling herself out the window of their shared apartment building. Everything was on the table. If you knew Jane, you’d understand.

We didn’t have to wait long. She contacted one of those companies that reduces biomass into fossil fuels and came back with what was left of him in a shimmery vial. We took bets on that too. Stir it into her morning coffee. Sleep with it on a cord around her neck. Mix it into the latest product line so a million customers would spread it over their skin.

The evening after she came to work with a rainbow slick shimmering on her lower lip, Leah slammed her hand on the table. “Ate it,” she said. “Pay up.”

Jane didn’t come to happy hours with us. She rushed home from work to spend all her free time with Fergus—playing at tradwife but afraid to commit, Leah said, while Mary said there was nothing wrong with being a homebody. We offered after the vial, though, so she would know we were thinking about her.

“No thank you,” Jane said, the way we knew she would. Then she added, unexpectedly, “Fergus and I are staying in.”

Mary was the one who’d asked. She stood there, mouth open, and then laughed nervously in response while Jane sailed out the door. As soon as her footsteps faded, we convened.

Had she really said—? Yes. And hadn’t she—no, now that we thought about it, none of us had seen her crying this week. She’d responded to cautious ‘good morning’s with her own and attacked her work the way she used to. She still looked dazed, like the time the delivery boy with that week’s samples walked into the lobby’s glass doors, but she’d been smiling.

“It could be grief. Denial’s one of the stages.”

“A scammer? They knew right away after my car accident. They might check death records too, and AI these days can fake voices so well you’d think your dead grandma was calling you.”

“Someone should be checking on her. Does she have anyone?”

“I drove her home a few times last year when her car was in the shop; I remember the way.”

*

The four of us spilled out of Mary’s car to gawk at Jane’s apartment building. “Unit 302,” said Leah, who had access to the personnel system, and we trailed after her.

The hallway was warm: an insistent, foreign heat. “Here?” Mary asked, frowning, and the rest of us shrugged.

“They’re finding them in new places now, with all the fracking. Or is that just stirring up the ones that were already there? I don’t remember.”

None of us did.

Ghosts stay near their bodies, but they take their time being born. Hundreds of thousands, even millions of years. You can spot oil fields from the ghostly shimmer of prehistoric ferns, track the lumbering forms of dinosaurs as they step over their bones. Arya swears she saw a megalodon swimming stories up in the air once, but she refuses to tell us where. She says she wants it to still be there for her nieces and nephews someday. There are no human ghosts, not yet. They say if you sit with the bones of our earliest ancestors, sometimes you’ll hear whispers, or the click of stone on stone.

Hauntings aren’t always visible, but the heat is a sign everyone knows. The old oxygen-rich atmosphere of a million years BC, maybe, or the pressure of so much time alchemizing them body and soul into something new.

The point being, the heat from a haunting shouldn’t be radiating out of the walls three floors up in an apartment building. Someone would’ve noticed before.

Leah rapped on the door, and we milled around until Mary ended up in front. She’s not old enough to be grandmotherly—you don’t see much of that in our office—but she was the closest we had.

Jane opened the door a minute later. She paused at the sight of us and then, unusual for someone finding four colleagues on their doorstep, smiled. She’d been smiling like that on her lunch break, we remembered. Smiling like it hurt.

“We’re here to see how you’re holding up,” Mary said.

Jane looked flushed, like she’d been bent over an oven. “Oh, you didn’t need to do that. I’m fine.”

“And how’s Fergus?” Arya asked. Leah shot her a look.

“He’s doing great.” Did we sell lip gloss with that rainbow shimmer? “I just don’t know what I’d do without him. Did you want to say hi?”

Later Arya told us, “I signed the card. If my $5 Grubhub donation was under false pretenses, I wanted to know about it.” So she walked in. A moment later, we heard her scream.

If it had only been one of us, we wouldn’t have come in after her. But numbers give you confidence. That’s why we stuck together, even though Leah was bossy and Mary was old-fashioned and Arya had the social grace of the pigeon that got stuck in our revolving door last month. So we jostled through the doorway, and this is what we saw.

Besides the Grubhub gift card and a scented candle, the office had pulled together to buy a bouquet. The vase stood next to the candle on the coffee table, the flowers inside still bright even though they’d come discounted from the grocery store florist. 

Behind the coffee table was a sofa. On the sofa sat a man.

We’d seen Fergus before: in the parking lot picking Jane up after work, at a few holiday dinners, in the pictures she showed us of date nights and anniversaries. His ghost looked like him, barely. A washed-out tracery layered over itself again and again, edges hazy, rippling the air around him like a mirage. His hair clung wet and glistening to the contours of his face. Eyes sunken into black wells bored straight ahead into the wall.

Arya didn’t like being embarrassed. She had a reputation to maintain; she was the one who’d dealt with the pigeon and always checked the mouse trap behind the microwave. She spun toward Jane. “What the fuck? What did you do?”

Jane settled down next to the ghost. He didn’t twitch. “He came back for me. I was going to bring it up, but you were all so sympathetic, I didn’t know how to explain. I’m glad you came by.”

Arya spluttered. Mary reached out, like she wanted to put a soothing hand on Jane’s shoulder, but she couldn’t bring herself to get too close. “Jane,” she said. “He’s dead.”

“I know,” Jane said. “I don’t mind.”

“Right,” Leah said, with the same gleeful horror that filled her voice when she showed us the latest awful Teams message she’d gotten from the creep in IT. “We should go. Tell Fergus we’re glad he’s feeling better.”

If Leah was done, the rest of us were too. None of us wanted to get caught alone in that boiling apartment. On our way out, Arya gestured at the vase, finding her voice for a parting shot. “Change the water,” she said. “I can smell something rotting in there.”

*

When we got back to the car, we sat motionless for a while. Mary didn’t even nag us to put on our seat belts. 

“He looks good for someone who got hit by a semi.”

“Ghosts should be more… together, shouldn’t they? I’ve never heard of one looking like that.”

“He’s a rush job. He shouldn’t exist.”

“The grease on her mouth…”

“Do you think they, well,” one of us started. Then we dissolved into giggles until Arya, who thinks she’s better than the rest of us because that kind of thing is beneath her, said, “It’s not any more disgusting than the regular kind” but Leah pointed out, “Think about the stains” and Arya, who isn’t above having to do laundry, agreed.

“Didn’t look like anyone was home, anyway. Ghosts can’t think. They just repeat themselves.”

“Maybe human ghosts can.”

“Not that one. You saw him.”

“As long as it keeps Jane happy, who cares? They don’t hurt people either.”

“It can’t be healthy.”

“That relationship’s never been healthy. I should’ve gotten a picture; no one’s going to believe me.”

“That’s what you’re thinking about right now?”

“Sorry, are you not planning on telling everybody you know about this?”

Maybe we did go home and tell our family, our friends, our social media networks. But none of us reported Jane. Who would we call? The police? An exorcist? A hazardous materials remediation company?

It was out of our hands. We wanted to see what would happen next.

*

Leah came by our desks as we were settling in the next morning. “She brought him to work.”

She didn’t have to say who. We checked over our shoulders, but she shook her head. “Down in the parking lot. Come on.”

The four of us circled Jane’s car. Fergus sat in the passenger seat, staring straight ahead with those oil well eyes. Grease beaded off his skin and dripped into the front cupholder. Jane, usually so neat, had left a pile of fast food wrappers in the backseat. Empty wrappers, one half-eaten burger, another still wrapped tightly in paper. Was she trying to feed him? Did he eat?

“Should we call someone?” Mary asked.

“And say what? It’s not like she left a dog in there. He’s made of petroleum; this is his natural habitat.”

“His natural habitat is six feet under.” Arya hadn’t forgiven him for making her scream.

“I don’t envy the poor asshole who comes out to vape and sees this looking at them. She could have at least put up a sun visor.”

The three of us exchanged glances, but Leah marched back into the building, and we followed. If anyone discovered Fergus on their smoke break, we didn’t see it happen, even though we found reasons to drift by the windows on the way to the printer or the bathroom. We were watching when Jane clocked out for the day. She opened the car door, climbed inside, and leaned over to kiss him on the cheek.

We were too high up to see, but we knew he didn’t do anything back.

Fergus sat in the parking lot all through the next day, too. The car’s back seat swam with wrappers now. Someone in another office must have called security to complain, though, because Jane got a long phone call and the next day her car was empty. No ghost, no garbage, and a long, dark streak on the passenger seat.  

Jane seemed to take it alright. She kept speeding through work to rush home, typing so fast she started wearing compression gloves that sheathed her hands in gray up to the fingertip. She must have sweated under the stretchy fabric and the long sleeves she wore even though the AC was broken near her cubicle and the whole area sweltered. Another reason she raced home, maybe, along with the way her cubicle wouldn’t stay clean. She’d always tacked the walls with photos, but papers covered her desk, her trash can overflowing. We thought the janitor might be skipping her until we overheard him grumbling as he hauled another load away, the plastic bag bulging with irregular shapes. Leah peeked into the bin once on her way over to our desks. “Who needs ten men’s travel size deodorants?” she asked. “Is she turning into a hoarder now too?”

“Maybe she’s getting rid of Fergus’s things, and her apartment has a trash bag limit,” Mary suggested.  

“I doubt he uses deodorant anymore,” Arya muttered.

Two of us were trying to get a better look at the papers burying her desk—they looked like the same document replicated over and over, but no workflows required that many copies—when Mary gasped. Jane had bent down to refill a printer tray, and her shirt hiked up to expose the bare skin of her side. A dark red handprint marked her waist.

“Are you alright?” Mary asked.

Jane blinked at her, confused. “Of course I am. Paper’s not that heavy.”

“Your side,” Mary said, and Jane laughed.

“It’s nothing. Don’t worry about me.”

We huddled together the next time Jane went to the restroom. “So much for saying ghosts don’t hurt people.”

“He didn’t grab her,” Arya said quietly.

“What do you mean? What else could have done that?”

“No, it was his hand. But the way the fingers splayed… I don’t think he grabbed her. It looked more like if you took someone’s hand and…” She demonstrated, taking her own wrist in her other hand and bringing her palm to her chest. “Pressed it.”

We thought then of the gloves covering everything but the tips of Jane’s fingers.

Even Leah didn’t have anything to say to that for a moment. Then she shook her head. “I always knew she was a freak about him.”

Mary twisted her own hands together. “Shouldn’t we—?”

“What? Some people are beyond help.” She turned away from our whispered conference. “I’m sick of talking about this. I heard there’s leftover birthday cake in the break room.”

Mary frowned. Arya chewed her lip. But Jane wasn’t our friend. None of this was hurting us. So we followed Leah. Like always.

*

I drove back to Jane’s apartment on my own. The spot I parked in was marked for fifteen-minute drop offs. I spent ten of them sitting behind the wheel, trying to work up the courage to go up alone.

When I did, I didn’t need to remember Jane’s room number. Heat curled out from underneath her door. Sweat broke out on my forehead.

I hoped Jane wouldn’t answer when I knocked, but of course she did. Where else would she be?

“Hello,” I said, and stepped inside before she could change her mind. The apartment had gone downhill since my last visit. The carpet squelched under my feet, oil oozing up from its fibers. In the vase, bright flowers jostled for space with faded blossoms and mold-fuzzed stems. Men’s slacks and button-downs poured out of the bedroom door in drifts. The room was buried in the material of their life together, echoed on top of itself into incoherence. Hauntings shouldn’t do that, but then, Fergus wasn’t a normal haunting. Jane dug him up too soon.

“It’s just you?” Jane asked.

“Just me.” I wondered if she even remembered my name. I wouldn’t blame her if she didn’t. “I’m worried. I don’t think this is healthy.”

She stepped to one side, shielding the ghost who sat in the same place on the sofa, staring at nothing. “I need him.”

I understood. At work they were Jane-and-Fergus, the way we were Leah-and-Mary-and-Arya-and-me. You get used to the patterns that make up your life, even when they leave you waist-deep in garbage.

“He shouldn’t be like this.” Surely Jane had to realize that, when she picked up his burning hands and pressed them to her skin because he wouldn’t lift a finger for her on his own. “He shouldn’t be here. I don’t think he’d want to be hurting you.” I didn’t know that for sure. Maybe he’d always been like this, a blank-eyed doll who left nothing good in his wake, but she’d cried so hard when he died.

Jane sat down behind the trash-strewn coffee table, hunching protectively toward him. I imagined I could hear her flesh sizzling, but she didn’t flinch. I couldn’t smell anything over rotten flowers and the sickly sweet of the candle we’d bought her, half-melted in the heat without even needing the matches scattered next to it. “I love him. Shouldn’t I have that?”

Why not? Why shouldn’t she drown in oil and memories with burn scars crawling up her arms, if that’s what she wanted? She was doing it to herself.

We all did it to ourselves.

I rested one hand on the doorknob. The metal felt cool against my skin. “Do you want to get drinks? Just the two of us. We could talk about it.”

Jane shook her head. She’d clenched reddened fingers around Fergus’ unresponsive wrist. With her free hand, she dug through the garbage on the table. “I can’t leave him.”

“Not even for a little while?” I didn’t know why I was still trying. I felt sorry for her. I felt sorry for me. I wanted to believe that someone, somewhere, could let go of what was bad for them. “Can’t you try?”

Jane looked at me. Her eyes weren’t glassy or tear-filled or any of the other descriptors Leah would have used to write her off. She looked like she felt a little sorry for me, too. “I don’t want to.”

She released her grip on Fergus’ wrist and brought her scalded hand up to fumble with something small and square she’d pulled from the mess. I tried to make it out as she leaned forward and took a long breath from the vase. The air in the room hung heavy with rot and sweetness and fuel. “Thank you for the flowers,” she said, and lit a match.

[nicstylus]

Carol + Crystal Edgley

Completed: June 24th and 25th 2025

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‼��� Minor Spoilers for KOTW ahead ‼️

Notes:

8 n 9 of 24 SOTA Cards!

I've always pictured Carol in Green and Crystal in Blues n Purples- but in the Faceless trilogy the twins really only show up in three notable instances: The funeral (formal) the family reunion (dressy?) and lunchtime in their home.

In this trilogy they're very 'trying-to-be-popular' and 'mean girl' and whatever. But they're also in Beryl's house, and I can't see her 'allowing' them to wear popular, trashy teenage stuff, as much as they'd like to. So here they're pictured in semi formal clothing (re: funeral and reunion) but also not necessarily in clothing that they would like to wear.

This is also before they're in the throws of their respective eating disorders and look much more similar than they do later on. Crystal hasn't dyed her hair yet, (I've only drawn her twice before, and yet drawing her blonde here was still difficult) and ofc Carol is... well, alive.

Carol has Beryl's eyebrows, lips and ears, but Fergus' face shape and nose and a mix of the two eye shapes.

Crystal more closely resembles Beryl, with Fergus' lips

As I'm writing this I'm realizing that the purple and the green make them look like the evil stepsisters. Not intentional but hilarious nonetheless

You can find my spreadsheet for this project here

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[siskinboo]

Просто хочу напомнить вам, что Кемпбелл стоял на похоронах Фергюса в том же костюме, в котором Фергюс проходил собеседование

(I just want to remind you that Campbell stood at Fergus' funeral in the same suit that Fergus was interviewed for the job)

[sassenach77yle]

7x11 “A Hundredweight of Stones”

Holy Michael ...high King of Angels...coming to meet the soul...

...and leading it home...to the Heaven of the Son of God.

June 16, 1778

The forest between Philadelphia and Valley Forge

IAN MURRAY STOOD with a stone in his hand, eyeing the ground he’d chosen. A small clearing, out of the way, up among a scatter of great lichened boulders, under the shadow of firs and at the foot of a big red cedar; a place where no casual passerby would go, but not inaccessible. He meant to bring them up here—the family.

Fergus, to begin with. Maybe just Fergus, by himself. Mam had raised Fergus from the time he was ten, and he’d had no mother before that. Fergus had known Mam longer than Ian had, and loved her as much. Maybe more, he thought, his grief aggravated by guilt. Fergus had stayed with her at Lally-broch, helped to take care of her and the place; he hadn’t. He swallowed hard and, walking into the small clear space, set his stone in the middle, then stood back to look.

Even as he did so, he found himself shaking his head. No, it had to be two cairns. His mam and Uncle Jamie were brother and sister, and the family could mourn them here together—but there were others he might bring, maybe, to remember and pay their respects. And those were the folk who would have known Jamie Fraser and loved him well but wouldn’t ken Jenny Murray from a hole in the— The image of his mother in a hole in the ground stabbed him like a fork, retreated with the recollection that she wasn’t after all in a grave, and stabbed again all the harder for that. He really couldn’t bear the vision of them drowning, maybe clinging to each other, struggling to keep— “A Dhia!” he said violently, and dropped the stone, turning back at once to find more. He’d seen people drown. Tears ran down his face with the sweat of the summer day; he didn’t mind it, only stopping now and then to wipe his nose on his sleeve. He’d tied a rolled kerchief round his head to keep the hair and the stinging sweat out of his eyes; it was sopping before he’d added more than twenty stones to each of the cairns. He and his brothers had built a fine cairn for their father before he died, at the head of the carved stone that bore his name—all his names, in spite of the expense—in the burying ground at Lallybroch. And then later, at the funeral, members of the family, followed by the tenants and then the servants, had come one by one to add a stone each to the weight of remembrance.

Fergus, then. Or . . . no, what was he thinking? Auntie Claire must be the first he brought here. She wasn’t Scots herself, but she kent fine what a cairn was and would maybe be comforted a bit to see Uncle Jamie’s. Aye, right. Auntie Claire, then Fergus. Uncle Jamie was Fergus’s foster father; he had a right. And then maybe Marsali and the children. But maybe Germain was old enough to come with Fergus? He was ten, near enough to being a man to understand, to be treated like a man. And Uncle Jamie was his grandsire; it was proper. He stepped back again and wiped his face, breathing heavily. Bugs whined and buzzed past his ears and hovered over him, wanting his blood, but he’d stripped to a loincloth and rubbed himself with bear grease and mint in the Mohawk way; they didn’t touch him. “Look over them, O spirit of red cedar,” he said softly in Mohawk, gazing up into the fragrant branches of the tree. “Guard their souls and keep their presence here, fresh as thy branches.” He crossed himself and bent to dig about in the soft leaf mold. A few more rocks, he thought. In case they might be scattered by some passing animal. Scattered like his thoughts, which roamed restless to and fro among the faces of his family, the folk of the Ridge—God, might he ever go back there? Brianna. Oh, Jesus, Brianna . . . He bit his lip and tasted salt, licked it away and moved on, foraging. She was safe with Roger Mac and the weans. But, Jesus, he could have used her advice—even more, Roger Mac’s. Who was left for him to ask, if he needed help in taking care of them all? Thought of Rachel came to him, and the tightness in his chest eased a little. Aye, if he had Rachel . . . She was younger than him, nay more than nineteen, and, being a Quaker, had very strange notions of how things should be, but if he had her, he’d have solid rock under his feet. He hoped he would have her, but there were still things he must say to her, and the thought of that conversation made the tightness in his chest come back. The picture of his cousin Brianna came back, too, and lingered in his mind: tall, long-nosed and strong-boned as her father . . . and with it rose the image of his other cousin, Bree’s half brother. Holy God, William. And what ought he to do about William? He doubted the man kent the truth, kent that he was Jamie Fraser’s son—was it Ian’s responsibility to tell him so? To bring him here and explain what he’d lost? He must have groaned at the thought, for his dog, Rollo, lifted his massive head and looked at him in concern. “No, I dinna ken that, either,” Ian told him. “Let it bide, aye?” Rollo laid his head back on his paws, shivered his shaggy hide against the flies, and relaxed in boneless peace. Ian worked awhile longer and let the thoughts drain away with his sweat and his tears. He finally stopped when the sinking sun touched the tops of his cairns, feeling tired but more at peace. The cairns rose knee-high, side by side, small but solid.

He stood still for a bit, not thinking anymore, just listening to the fussing of wee birds in the grass and the breathing of the wind among the trees. Then he sighed deeply, squatted, and touched one of the cairns. “Tha gaol agam oirbh, a Mhàthair,” he said softly. My love is upon you, Mother. Closed his eyes and laid a scuffed hand on the other heap of stones. The dirt ground into his skin made his fingers feel strange, as though he could maybe reach straight through the earth and touch what he needed. He stayed still, breathing, then opened his eyes.

“Help me wi’ this, Uncle Jamie,” he said. “I dinna think I can manage, alone.”

1 A Hundredweight of Stones ~ Written in My Own Heart's Blood

[n14-4cko]

Okay I’m going to ramble hold on right

* Skul loves reading at the local library and one day meets author Gordon edgley, starts reading his books, and later wins a contest because he predicted the ending with the clues given throughout the series or something. Gordon finds him a bit cheeky but daring and clever nonetheless and after skul keeps following him at book meets for more answers and predictions, Gordon invited him over to talk more about detective work and they grew close (uncle/nephew type thing)

* Skul is given the same advice in the funeral and Val gets the house and what not. Not sure how to add beryl, fergus, carol and crystal :(

* Val doesn’t use a wig and sunglasses often, instead uses a bike helmet and is wearing that when the house gets broken into. (later gets the facade)

* Val has the powers she has currently and throws lightning not fire on the guy who broke the door down. (the guy also can use lightning since in the book he was impervious to fire. So now it’s lightning i suppose)

* Skul is at Gordon’s home. He picked the locks after the funeral to try and get closure to feel better, he’s sat reading when the break in happens.

* Doesn’t faint at seeing skeleton Val, but asks lots of questions. THEN faints.

* Val doesn’t have a hat to steal, but she has tire marks to follow. One of skuls brothers is obsessed with bikes so he has minor knowledge and, he somehow figures out where she lives and demands to be brought along with the cool lightning throwing biker skeleton

* wife and child - girlfriend and sister (melitsa and Alice

* Val drives a 1949 Vincent 998cc Black Lightning Series-C. One of only 34 ever made (bike)

* Darquesse and lord vile also swapped places. Though darquesse was/is her anger and alter ego for 5 years and lord vile is the true name, seen by seers and by skulduggery in the book of names.

* Most things and people stay the same (for now lol)

* The first time Val brings Skulduggery on a mission/investigation he puts on his best suit w bow tie and converse. When asked he insists he wants to be practical and taken seriously and to look the part. He’s just a huge doctor who fan. Later meets ghastly and gets a proper suit and shoes. Likes it more.

* Skulduggery is the one who insists at first about finding out about Gordon’s death (he’s vals great great great nephew or something and still writes books)

* Val is openly known to have lots of powers, less than book Val but is stronger and had much more practice focusing on less powers.

* Instead of Solomon giving Val permission to use his cane, skulduggery doesn’t ask and throws spears of darkness. Doesn’t enjoy it but is willing to learn more. Not necessarily from Solomon but will listen to Val and others.

* Val isn’t a detective specifically but is still very good at getting the job done like in the books. Skulduggery quickly becomes the brains and likes to deduce what’s going on and slowly becomes very talented at it.

*im not certain on whether the facade has the random face like skul or if she’ll have her own permenantly. I like the idea of both tbh so she can be herself and blend in inconspicuously if need be.

I’ll either change this or add more (or both) but these are my initial thoughts.

[monochromemoomin]

thinking about all of the times campbell is shown to be somewhat a reflection of fergus. like his future is going the same way as fergus, or at least he thinks it could be.

examples because i have Things To Say:

• when campbell is in the reflection of fergus’ wardrobe mirror. dunno what this quite means yet but it’s there.

• the obvious one is campbell’s reflection in fergus’ casket plate. i’m thinking it could be to show that campbell saw himself in fergus and so is afraid of ending up dead himself.

- also note how campbell is drunk at the funeral. he doesn’t want to confront his actual feelings towards it so he combats that with alcohol and complaining about the service

• not reflection this time but when campbell says “they’re not gonna find me in a heap on the pavement”. our boy is much more afraid of ending up like fergus than he lets on i think. he doesn’t really talk about it much other than that.

i could write an essay about campbell and one day i just might.

[thenightlymirror]

I can’t help but think of my parents watching this, back in the day. Because when I see it, the transphobia, the homophobia, is not intuitive to me anymore. It sort of surges up like a vestigial force. My parents’ homophobia was always so dramatic. They would make these big displays. And I assume the scenes where Fergus kisses Dil after he knows really must have freaked them out. Where for me, it’s more like, why are you sabotaging your happiness when it’s standing right in front of you? Is it not clear?

I haven’t written about going up for my Uncle Tony’s funeral, and seeing my brother. Or staying up late with E. and H. talking about growing up as victims of sexual abuse and coming out of the closet in various ways. I feel like my mother must have overheard that conversation, because she couldn’t hide it in the first look she gave me the next morning. Guilt and horror. Fear. My rage. And then we moved on.

[chocolatepot]

The Crow Road and Good Omens

When I watched season two of Good Omens for the first time, I noticed that Crowley throws Muriel a book at random near the end of the finale, but I didn't pay a ton of attention to it, because there was a lot going on. Then I started a second watch where I took notes on things that struck me, references or lines that couldn't just be random but had to merit a closer look. One of these things was the fact that Metatron asks Muriel about their book and they hold it up extremely conspicuously (twice) so that the title, The Crow Road, is very obvious. It seemed impossible to me that it was just a random book, so I ordered a copy from the library and settled in with it.

(The only copy in the system is held in the library my mother runs in another town. Coincidence? OR FATE?)

The Crow Road

The Crow Road is a hard book to sum up. There is a relatively straightforward "present day" plotline from a single character's perspective, but much of the book (particularly in the first half) consists of flashbacks.

I'm going to sum up the family relationships first, for simplicity's sake. Margot and Matthew McHoan are the parents of Hamish (married to Antonia), Kenneth (m. Mary), Fiona (m. Fergus Urvill), Ilsa, and Rory (who has been missing for years). Kenneth and Mary are the parents of Lewis, Prentice, and James. Fiona and Fergus are the parents of Diana and Helen), and Fiona is dead by the start of the book. Fergus's sister, Charlotte, married Steve and had a daughter, Verity. Rory dated Janice, who had a daughter, Marion. There is also an unrelated family, the Watts: Lachlan is in Kenneth's generation; his brother's kids, Ashley, Darren, and Dean, are in Prentice's.

Prentice is the main character, though the other bolded names are important. He's a middle child, jealous of his older brother (a successful comedian) and dismissive of his younger one (who barely turns up on the page anyway); he's in love with the gorgeous and unattainable Verity; he has simultaneous superiority and inferiority complexes that make him moody and self-righteous, sure that he's smarter than everyone else but at the same time terribly insecure. Relatedly, he's estranged from his father because he believes there's an afterlife and his father is a committed atheist.

The main plotline begins at Margot's funeral and cremation in 1989. Prentice leaves the post-funeral gathering (after Margot's body has exploded in the oven as they forgot to remove her pacemaker) for the pub, where he catches up with the Watts - he's at university and not around town. Ashley gives him a piece of the Berlin Wall and tells him that when she was there, she came across some man saying that the McHoan family was being tricked.

He starts to investigate the disappearance of his Uncle Rory, finding Janice and getting some of his papers from her. Weeks(?) later, he catches Verity and Lewis canoodling at the Hogmanay party at Urvill Castle; the next day at another party, he gets blackout drunk and embarrasses everyone by screaming at them. The next morning, told off by his mother and having a terrible, horrible, no-good day, he leaves his bag on the train - including all of those papers, only half of which he'd looked through.

After a dinner with Ashley in the city where she also tells him off for his poor choices (he's also failing at his classes and has gotten caught shoplifting), he gets a call to come home because his father has died: he was struck by lightning while climbing a church. Prentice starts to wonder more seriously about Rory's fate, now, and looks harder for clues. After they bury Kenneth and Lewis and Verity get married, he finds some old floppy disks in his parents' home marked as Rory's. Ashley realizes that the man from Berlin is actually a news correspondent who reports for the BBC around the world, and takes the discs to get investigated by her techie friends.

While he waits, Prentice finds some old diaries of Rory's as well, borderline incomprehensible because they're full of abbreviations. He goes with Ashley to a bar to find that news correspondent, who turns tail as soon as he sees him and mysteriously flees. Finally he gets the info from the discs: it's a narrative about Fergus catching Fiona in bed with Lachlan Watts, telling Rory about it, and then deliberately driving aggressively to cause the car accident where she died. This helps Prentice put together a strong theory that Rory went to Fergus to say he knew what had happened and Fergus killed him, then got the journalist to send then matchbooks from all over the world to make it seem like Rory is still alive. He goes to see Fergus about this, not being completely direct but still ... and that night the house is broken into and he's attacked, the intruder getting away with nothing.

Later, Fergus crashes his Cessna into the Atlantic after presumably having a heart attack in it. Not very far from the crash site, the police soon after come across a motorcycle with a body tied to it that is determined to be Rory, killed with blows to the head. The Bentley Eight Fergus left to Prentice in his will (originally it was to go to Kenneth) has a paperweight in the glove box that exactly matches the description of the murder weapon. Around this time, he completely loses any faith he had in religion.

Now that loose ends are tied up and Prentice is making better life choices, he and Ashley get together, fuck, and admit that they love each other - but she is still leaving for a job in Canada, and she says she'll come back once he's done with university (he's repeating a year) if he still loves her. He also goes back to Urvill Castle, where his cousin reminds him of a time they were all drunk/high up in the observatory and he was going on and on about the wonders of the stars and how they were better than religion, which spurred her to become an astronomer. The younger members of the family go back up there in order to do a determinedly unreligious "christening" ceremony for Lewis and Verity's baby, Kenneth.

Along the way in all this, there are flashbacks to Kenneth's childhood, youth, and young parenthood; to Rory's POV; to Prentice as a teenager - all of these help to build their characterization, and also that of other characters, as well as to drop clues about what Fergus did and what Rory was doing.

What is the Crow Road?

The "crow road" refers to three separate things in the book.

"Away the crow road" is a euphemism of Grandma Margot's to mean "died".

It's a literal road in their town, where Janice lives.

It's the title of the work Rory was building around the whole Fergus-Lachlan-Fiona story before, I assume, he realized that Fergus killed Fiona.

Death and Religion

Death is ... pretty central to the book. It starts with Margot's death, we're made aware of Fiona's at the funeral, we find out that Prentice and Kenneth's estrangement stems from Ashley's brother Darren's death in a motorcycle accident, Kenneth dies, Fergus dies. Prentice also gets to live in the home of an old rich woman who died while her will's being sorted out (a la Jarndyce v. Jarndyce) after his father's death, when he's turning his life around.

That estrangement is generally over religion, but more specifically Prentice's belief in a soul and afterlife. He has to believe that there is something of Darren that will go on, and Kenneth thinks this is utter stupidity. Kenneth has a lot of lines regarding religion/Christianity that, if tweaked to accept the existence of God but rejection of the religion and philosophy around said god, sound quite Crowleyish - religion is used to justify evil, the concept of original sin is inherently unfair, etc. And by the end of the book, when he tosses the paperweight that killed his uncle into the sea, Prentice has come to agree completely with his father.

Hamish, Kenneth and Rory's older brother, has his own spin on Christianity that's charmingly batshit and heretical. He thinks bad people have exactly the things done to them in the afterlife that they did to hurt others, and that there are versions of everyone alive there for the dead to interact with. After Kenneth's death he's completely shaken and briefly goes back to ordinary Christian beliefs before spinning off again. He comes across as deluded the whole time. He also has a line about God being a "strict father" which prompts Prentice to consider God as a child-abuser.

Toward the end, there's a flashback with Rory, who says he briefly had the belief that by humming a particular low note he could affect tv screens, but then he realized that it was vibrating his own head and only affecting his perception of them. The point of the flashback was for him to suggest that Fergus may not have even seen Fiona cheating (he was drunk), just imagined it, but it's not hard to see a critique of religion in this as well.

Love and Sex

Ohhh, is there a lot of these in the book. It's quite horny! Prentice hooks up with Marion as a teenager in an old car in the garage, which they basically destroy by accident; he also fucks her mother, Janice (who then takes up with his roommate so he has to be aware of them fucking all the time); he's constantly burning with lust for Verity - but Ashley is the only one he seems to actually love. Lewis and Verity have sex at the Hogmanay party. Kenneth and Mary have sex in a boat before they get engaged. Rory sees Fergus trying to get Fiona into bed at a wedding before they get together, and of course there's Fiona and Lachlan. Not to speak of the talking/thinking about masturbation present in many of the adolescent flashbacks.

There's also a lot of familial love. Kenneth loves the children (all the children, really, not just his own; he writes stories and creates games for them), Mary loves them, Margot loves the family, Rory and Prentice love each other. The Watt siblings love each other, coming together to destroy the concrete litter bin that killed Darren. Lewis and Verity love each other, and by the end, Lewis and Prentice are loving siblings again as well (nobody cares about James), and they both love baby Kenneth.

War

It doesn't really come up in my summary, but war is a strong part of the setting. The "present" of the book runs through the Gulf War, which is of great importance to the characters - they worry about a draft, they criticize both Saddam Hussein and the US's capitalist motives, at one point they consider it possibly the beginning of World War III. Kenneth's childhood is also during World War II: in one flashback, Lachlan explains to Kenneth and Fergus that his father uses their bread to strain green dye out of petrol to sell on the black market (technically postwar, but still during rationing).

So, How Does This Relate To Good Omens?

Well, all of these things are very much present in the show!

The main characters and the backdrop of Armageddon are of course drawn from the Bible, and it's hardly an uncritical use of a religious source - Heaven is no better than Hell, God is absent, and Crowley and Aziraphale are right for standing together to create their own side; as noted previously, it feels very in line with Kenneth's thoughts on religion as an institution. Death and war certainly come into it, though mostly as something to be averted in season one and presumably in season three again, and love is ... well, love is the point. They love each other, they love Earth - they love the universe, Crowley created all those marvelous stars. The ending of the book specifically lines up with the ending of season two, in that the main characters who love each other are temporarily separated. And of course, the story structure that's chock-a-block with flashbacks is highly reminiscent of season two, with its historical minisodes cut in with the present-day scenes to highlight important character background and parallels.

I don't think anything from the plot of this book is meant to be a clue as to plot developments in season three, although I don't think it's entirely impossible for the way the mystery of Rory and Fiona's deaths is solved through finding an answer in Rory's writing to be a reference to Aziraphale's diaries. But there is so much going on in the book that it's hard to pick out what it could be - working through Rory's papers/files is actually quite a minor part.

If it is supposed to presage something (rather than to be an easter egg so people who know the book can go, "oh, that book really works with this show!"), I think it's more likely to hint that Muriel is going to learn to think for themself and reject Heaven's orthodoxy, or else to more generally refer to Aziraphale realizing that he can't fix it.

[a-star-that-fell]

not campbell wearing the suit he’d offered fergus to his funeral :(

[identity-library]

Disability (Films)

A:

A Christmas Prince (2017)

Emily Charlton (Spina Bifida - Wheelchair User)

A Costume for Nicholas (2020)

Nicolás (Down Syndrome)

All Together Now (2020)

Chad (Unspecified Mobility Disability - Wheelchair User)

Ricky (Autistic)

Amélie (2001)

Lucien (Amputee)

...and Your Name is Jonah (1979)

Jonah (Deaf)

A Quiet Place (2018)

Regan Abbott (Deaf)

A Silent Voice (2016)

Shoko Nishimiya (Deaf)

Atlantis: The Lost Empire (2001)

Kashekim Nedakh (Blind)

Avengers: Civil War (2016)

James "Rhodey" Rhodes (Paralyzed - Wheelchair User)

B:

Baby Driver (2017)

Joseph (Deaf)

Ballerina (2016)

Odette (Unspecified Mobility Disability - Cane User)

Big Hero 6 (2014)

The Ringleader (Partially Blind)

Brave (2012)

King Fergus (Amputee)

Bring Her Back (2025)

Piper (Blind)

C:

Cha Cha Real Smooth (2022)

Lola (Autistic)

Children of a Lesser God (1986)

Sarah Norman (Deaf)

Christmas Ever After (2020)

Izzi Simmons (Unspecified Mobility Disability - Wheelchair User)

CODA (2021)

Frank Rossi (Deaf)

Jackie Rossi (Deaf)

Leo Rossi (Deaf)

Compensation (1999)

Malaika Brown (Deaf)

Malindy Brown (Deaf)

Curse of Chucky (2013)

Nica Pierce (Heart Condition, Paralyzed - Wheelchair User)

Cyrano (2021)

Cyrano de Bergerac (Dwarfism)

D:

David's Mother (1994)

David (Autistic)

Dumbo (2019)

Holt Farrier (Amputee)

Dustbin Baby (2008)

Poppy (Autistic)

E:

Eastrail 177 (Trilogy)

Elijah Price/Dr. Glass (Osteogenesis Imperfecta - Cane/Wheelchair User)

Eight Crazy Nights (2002)

Eleanore Duvall (Diabetes, Limb Difference)

Tom Baltezor (Amputee)

Whitey Duvall (Limb Difference, Seizure Disorder)

Elio (2025)

Elio Solis (Partially Blind)

Eternals (2021)

Makkari (Deaf)

Ezra (2023)

Ezra (Autistic)

F:

Feel the Beat (2020)

Zuzu (Deaf)

Finding Dory (2016)

Destiny (Low Vision)

Dory (Short-Term Memory Loss)

Sheldon (Allergies)

Finding Nemo (2003)

Dory (Short-Term Memory Loss)

Nemo (Underdeveloped Fin)

Sheldon (Allergies)

Forgive Us Our Trespasses (2022)

Paul (Limb Difference)

Forrest Gump (1994)

Daniel Taylor (Bilateral Lower Limb Amputee)

Forrest Gump (Unspecified Intellectual Disability)

Four Weddings and a Funeral (1994)

David (Deaf-Mute)

Fullmetal Alchemist (2017)

Edward Elric (Amputee)

G:

Godzilla vs Kong (2021)

Jia Andrews (Deaf)

H:

Hellfighters (1968)

Jack Lomax (Paralyzed - Wheelchair User)

Home on the Range (2004)

Lucky Jack (Amputee)

How to Train Your Dragon (Franchise)

Gobber the Belch (Amputee)

Hiccup Horrendous Haddock ||| (Amputee)

Toothless (Amputee)

I:

Inside I'm Dancing (2004)

Michael Connolly (Cerebral Palsy, Wheelchair User)

Rory O'Shea (Muscular Dystrophy, Wheelchair User)

Inspector Gadget (Franchise)

Sanford "Dr. Claw" Scolex (Amputee)

I Saw The TV Glow (2024)

Owen (Asthma)

J:

James and the Giant Peach (1996)

Earthworm (Blind)

Glowworm (Partially Deaf)

K:

Keep the Change (2017)

David Cohen (Autistic)

Sarah Silverstein (Autistic)

Kingsman (Franchise)

Charlie Hesketh (Amputee)

Gazelle (Double Leg Amputee)

Harry Hart (Partially Blind)

Richmond Valentine (Lisp)

L:

Lemonade Mouth (2011)

Alex (Unspecified Disability, Wheelchair User)

Live Flesh (1997)

David de Paz (Paralyzed, Wheelchair User)

Love & Other Drugs (2010)

Maggie Murdock (Parkinson's Disease)

Luca (2021)

Massimo Marcovaldo (One Arm)

M:

Mac and Me (1988)

Eric Cruise (Unspecified Disability, Wheelchair User)

Mad Max: Fury Road (2015)

Corpus Colossus (Unspecified Mobility Disability)

Margarita with a Straw (2014)

Laila Kapoor (Cerebral Palsy, Wheelchair User)

Marvel (Franchise)

James "Bucky" Barnes (Amputee)

Nebula (Amputee)

Nick Fury (Partially Blind)

Odin Borson (Partially Blind)

Phil Coulson (Amputee)

Stephen Strange (Nerve Damage)

Thor (Amputee, Partially Blind)

Maya and the Three (2021)

Zatz (Partially Blind)

Midwinter Night's Dream (2004)

Jovana (Autistic)

Muppet Treasure Island (1996)

Blind Pew (Blind)

Long John Silver (Amputee)

N:

Nathan's Kingdom (2020)

Nathan (Autistic)

Newsies (1992)

Crutchy (Limited Mobility, Crutch User)

Nimona (2023)

Ballister Boldheart (Amputee, Prosthetic User)

O:

Orphan (2009)

Maxine "Max" Coleman (Deaf)

P:

Peter Pan (1953)

Captain Hook (Amputee)

Pinocchio (1940)

Gideon (Mute)

Pinocchio (2022)

Fabiana (Limp)

Pirates of the Caribbean (Franchise)

Mistress Ching (Blind)

Posse (1975)

Harold Hellman (Double Amputee)

Q:

Quest for Camelot (1998)

Garrett (Blind)

R:

Resident Evil (Franchise)

Becky (Deaf)

Charles Ashford (Unspecified Disability, Wheelchair User)

Road House (1989)

Cody (Blind)

Rogue One (2016)

Chirrut Îmwe (Blind)

Run (2020)

Chloe Sherman (Asthma, Diabetes, Heart Condition, Paralyzed, Wheelchair User)

S:

Shallow Hal (2001)

Walt (Spina Bifida)

Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (2021)

Razor Fist (Amputee)

Sharp Stick (2022)

Zach (Down Syndrome)

Shazam! (2019)

Frederick "Freddy" Freeman (Limited Mobility)

Ship of Fools (1965)

Carl Glocken (Dwarfism)

Skyward (1980)

Julie Ward (Paralyzed, Wheelchair User)

Sound of Metal (2019)

Joe (Deafened)

Ruben Stone (Hard of Hearing)

Soundproof (2006)

Dean Whittingham (Deaf)

Spies in Disguise (2019)

Killian (Amputee)

Stand Clear of the Closing Doors (2013)

Ricky (Autistic)

Star Wars (Franchise)

Darth Maul (Multi-Limb Amputee)

Luke Skywalker (Amputee)

Strange World (2022)

Legend (Amputee)

T:

The Adam Project (2022)

Adam Reed (Asthma)

The Best Years of Our Lives (1946)

Homer Parish (Double Hand Amputee)

The Book of Life (2014)

Jorge Sánchez (Double Amputee, Partially Blind)

The Crippled Masters (1979)

Lee Ho (Double Arm Amputee)

Tang (Double Leg Amputee)

The Eighth Day (1996)

Georges (Down Syndrome)

The Evil Dead (1981)

Ashley "Ash" Williams (Amputee)

The Fundamentals of Caring (2016)

Trevor (Muscular Dystrophy)

The Great Mouse Detective (1986)

Fidget the Bat (Amputee)

The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996)

Quasimodo (Hunchback)

The Hunger Games (Franchise)

Bobbin (Amputee)

Woof (Hard of Hearing)

The Lone Ranger (2013)

Red Harrington (Amputee)

The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993)

Dr. Finkelstein (Unspecified Mobility Disability - Wheelchair User)

The Peanut Butter Falcon (2019)

Zak (Down Syndrome)

The Princess and the Frog (2009)

Mama Odie (Blind)

There Will Be Blood (2007)

H.W. Plainview (Deaf-Mute)

The River (1951)

Captain John (Amputee)

The Secret of the Jade Medallion (2013)

Cornelia (Amputee)

The Three Musketeers (1993)

Captain Rochefort (Partially Blind)

The Tribe (2014)

Anya (Deaf)

Gera (Deaf)

King (Deaf)

Makar (Deaf)

Nora (Deaf)

Sergey (Deaf)

Shnyr (Deaf)

Svetka (Deaf)

The Village (2004)

Ivy Walker (Blind)

Noah Percy (Unspecified Developmental Disability)

Tinkerbell (Franchise)

Lord Milori (Amputee, Limited Mobility)

Rani (Amputee, Limited Mobility)

Tiptoe (2002)

Maurice (Dwarfism)

Rolfe (Dwarfism)

Treasure Island (1950)

Long John Silver (Amputee, Crutch User)

Treasure Planet (2002)

John Silver (Multi-Limb Amputee)

True Grit (2010)

Mattie Ross (Amputee)

U:

Unfriended: Dark Web (2018)

Amaya (Deaf)

V:

W:

Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962)

Blanche Hudson (Paralyzed, Wheelchair User)

Wish (2023)

Dahlia (Unspecified Disability, Crutch User)

Wonder (2017)

Auggie Pullman (Facial Difference)

X:

Y:

Z:

#:

101 Dalmatians (1996)

Mr. Skinner (Mute)

[renee-writer]

The Fire Chapter 33

AO3

Benjamin becomes a doctor, to mama and Da’s great pride. Fergus and Marsali have a passel full of children. We all grieve the loss of their youngest, Henri-Christian. His death isn’t the only thing that mars our happy family.

 

We bury Uncle Ian. Wee Ian and his wife, Rebecca, take Auntie Jenny into their home.

 

Mama retires after Benjamin finishes his training. Her and da spend their last few years loving on and spoiling on their grandchildren.

 

They pass within a few hours of each other. Though it is expected, it cast a pall over the inhabitants of Lallybroch.

 

William takes over the running of the estate.  Fergus has moved to Edinburgh and works as a printer. He, Marsali, and their children and grandchildren return for the funerals.

 

It had been discussed long before, the Lairdship.

 

“It needs to go to William,” Fergus had said, “He is your birth son.”

 

“You are our first son.” Da had argued.

 

“Aye, but we are settled at Edinburgh. William has remained here to see to things.”

 

So, there was no difficulties in the turning over of the Lairdship at his passing.

 

It is as smooth as it could be. Benjamin had long taken over as the healer. William had been doing more and more of the running of Lallybroch.

 

As for me and Rabbie, well he has long been helping  William with the estate. I was happy to be a wife and mama, them grandma.

 

To see mama holding Amanda and Jemmy’s children was a huge blessing.

 

Now to be holding my own first great-granddaughter, oh my darling Claire Brianna Janet, how blessed your great granny is.

 

The End.

[princeloww]

Invading your asks once again to ask you a very important question

What are your thoughts on Campbell and fergus' relationship?? I keep going between kinda romantic or at least there being a little tension and them just being really close and platonic and I was just curious as to your view on it.

Either way I still think that what they have is special no matter what the nature of their relationship is.

Hellooo! I very much enjoy the asks, feel free to keep them coming.

Personally I just see them as very good friends. I think they have a fun dynamic, and I love seeing them together, especially with Fergus being on the quieter side compared to Campbell's extreme energy.

I don't really like shipping them, cos I don't like their age difference (during Fergus' funeral, Campbell corrects the minsister and says Fergus was 27. Campbell is 19, and hasn't finished his education yet). But I think other people can ship them if they want !! Just personally, I think it makes it kinda iffy. Yes, Campbell is technically an adult and above the age of consent, but I just think people of those ages have very different experiences and mindsets, regardless of what they have in common.

Don't get me wrong, I absolutely LOVE them together in a completely platonic way !! I wish we saw more of their friendship before.... yk. :(

I also quite like an older-brother type dynamic, as I find found family so, so sweet and Takin Over The Asylum already has quite a sweet, found family thing going on.

Just my thoughts though!

[butchtwelfthdoctor]

for some reason the start of lover you should have come over, the 'looking through the door / i see the rain fall upon the funeral mourners / parading in the wake of sad relations as their shoes fill up with water' make me think of fergus's funeral every time.

his family wasn't there (or maybe they were but campbell says, if they cared why didn't they come visit him?). but eddie and campbell and francine and rosalie were there. in the rain. and when the song starts playing the end of that scene i always think it's the slow version of 'forever young' but it's not

fergus was a great character and deserved so much better than he was given, in the end. anskhasnahsk it's just really sad

[queenofyumcha]

CW// omegaverse, alpha/beta/omega, internal homophobia, self destructive behaviour

✨emhyr/Impera✨ accidental drabble bc Emhyr isn’t like other omegas 💅

Emhyr refuses to acknowledge his own weak, omega nature.

He refuses to take lovers outside of beta women, he takes only cold baths and only keeps thin, decorative, heavily embroidered bedsheets in his chambers. They’re scratchy and uncomfortable, utterly unsuited to nesting and smoothed out by the maids each morning.

That does not matter, because Emhyr is not an omega that needs comfort and coddling. He is disciplined, he can control himself and that of his baser urges.

Emhyr dismisses lovers from his bed the second they’re done, doing everything he can to limit physical contact. He’s perceived as unnaturally cold and aloof for an omega, and that’s exactly what he wants. There is no trait he despises more than weakness. he will root out and destroy all traces of it within himself. Emhyr judges no one as harshly as he does himself.

Heats simply do not happen. Spending a week out of every three months bedridden, out of his mind with lust, debasing himself with the company of men - unthinkable. He takes enough suppressants to leave him with routine bodily aches and pains, flashing lights at the corner of his vision, daily migraines, his healers hesitate with each new dose of medication they hand him, they try to dissuade him with warnings of how this will impact his health-

It does not matter. This is for the good of Nilfgaard. The empire can handle an emperor that needs to take a few minutes a day of silence to fend off the pain of a migraine, to steady himself on his Impera’s arm when a dizzy spell takes hold, to discretely spit blood into an ever present hanker-chief- The empire cannot abide by a weak emperor, too consumed by his lusts for flesh that he would routinely leave his empire leaderless for a week at a time.

Fergus had been a poor leader. Absent more often than not, his days spent wine sodden, lolling in the brothels of the city of golden towers.

His father was weak. Emhyr will be nothing like him.

And yet here he is.

Body shaking so fiercely Emhyr fears he will come apart at the seams, unravel into a cascade of lies, masks, insecurities, half perfected legislation written in a cramped hand, ever shifting border lines, every little thing that makes him whole.

It has been two years since he has slept in his bedchambers in Nilfgaard. Nowadays, where his armies go, he follows. Always a safe distance behind, but close enough to smell the smoke on the air from the funeral pyres.

He had not considered the psychological toll of leaving his nest behind. He had never knowingly associated his chambers with safety, it had only ever been a place to sleep, to dampen his urges with cold, distanced sex whenever his distractions grew too… great. Whenever his eyes lingered too long, too considering, on the silhouettes of his Impera, his most trusted guards.

An ever present temptation. Strong, trusted alphas, proven fighters, sworn and loyal to Emhyr and Emhyr alone. Just one of these traits would have immediately turned any other omega’s head.

Emhyr is stronger than that. He has to be.

His teeth chatter in his head though he is not cold. His body continues to shake, to tremble, to ignore every command his mind issues.

These days he sleeps in a canvas tent in the middle of a Nilfgaardian army base. He is safe, he knows, in the heart of nilfgaardian territory, surrounded by loyal soldiers.

Yet his feeble hindbrain cannot settle, constantly anxious at the presence of thousands of unmated alphas around them, at the continuous movement and sound of the bustling camp. The soldiers sleep in shifts to keep the camp guarded and they patrol all the more enthusiastically when they know they guard their omega emperor as well as their comrades.

He cannot settle, cannot rest properly when he consistently sleeps in a new environment, the near city of tents moving endlessly northwards. His surroundings are always new, unknown. His only constant is the presence of his Impera, standing guard in a circle outside his tent, with two men always on duty just within the tent entrance. Close enough to reach Emhyr in a few steps should they need to, far enough to allow the omega emperor a fantasy of privacy.

The Impera’s comforting presence and feeling of safety they bring is the only thing that allows Emhyr a few hours of sleep a night.

Mererid fusses, as he is wont to do, attempting to usher him to bed earlier, pressing hot cups of heavily doctored milky tea into his hands as though Emhyr cannot detect the scent of healing herbs beneath the sweetness of the honey.

It has no effect. He goes to sleep tired and aching. He wakes up tired and aching.

So, when he wakes up tired and aching once more, body alight with what he believes is a mere fever, why would he think much of it?

It is simply another trace of weakness he must uproot from his body.

He falls asleep at his desk, having worked through the day, knocking back cup after cup of herbal tea, drinking whatever disgusting concoction Mererid brings him.

It is not exactly rare for Emhyr to fall asleep at his desk.

It is unheard of for him to wake up elsewhere.

He stirs, aching body protesting as he forces himself to sit upright. The blankets he is swathed in smell strongly, though not unpleasantly, of alpha. Familiar, strong, safe, alpha.

His eyes struggle to focus, but soft coverings slowly come into view, the off duty clothes of his Impera, the heavy woollens of their winter cloaks, the very pillows from their bunks.

His men have taken everything from their bunks and shed their winter cloaks in the depths of a Nordling winter to ensure Emhyr is comfortable.

Something in his chest lurches at the thought, caught between wild delight at such visible demonstration of their loyalty and crippling fear that this is evidence of their desire for him. To possess him. To use him, not to serve him.

The surface beneath him creaks at his movement, the leather and wood protesting. Standard issue military cots, many of them pressed together to make the equivalent of Emhy’s sprawling four poster bed.

His movement brings fresh pain spreading his body, his muscles convulsing and his body shaking. Emhyr curls in on himself in agony. A gauntleted hand suddenly comes into view and Emhyr flinches back violently.

What was the use of being an omega if his so called heightened senses couldn’t warn him of an unsafe alpha close by?

Alphas, plural, he corrects himself, glancing around the large canvas tent warily as other armoured and off duty impera alike shift uneasily under his gaze. A few sketch out shallow bows, most salute and there are those who do not dare meet Emhyr’s gaze. They do not know what the correct conduct is in this scenario, no more than Emhyr does.

The scents in the air are decidedly tense, neither alphas or omega comfortable. Emhyr does not know if he is relieved or offended that none of them smell of arousal.

He winces a little as fresh pain courses through him. Relieved and grateful, perhaps, that none of his Impera find a pathetic omega’s scent of pain and distress to be arousing.

The Impera kneels with a soft clank of armour, his head bowed in deference and Emhyr swallows bitter bile that wells up in self-disgust.

In his addled mind, he has come crawling into the Impera’s barracks like a half starved mutt begging for scraps. He has disgraced himself, lost control of his own body, wandered through the camp, delirious and wanting to the wellspring of his temptations.

Emhyr whimpers, wracked with pain as what feels like a steel gauntlet wraps around his internal organs and closes its grip, his lower abdomen alight with pain so strong his vision becomes blurry with tears.

The Impera makes another aborted movement to help him, gauntleted hands forming frustrated fists. To touch an omega uninvited is taboo. To touch an emperor uninvited is to risk your neck.

“I shall fetch your healer, your majesty. The others will watch over you, I swear to not leave you undefended in your time of need.”

Emhyr’s hand reaches out desperately from the swathes of blankets, clinging to the Impera’s arm with a strength he did not know he had.

It is logical, for the Impera to leave and return with a healer. Medicine, to stifle this heat.

Every ignored instinct in Emhyr screams at him to not allow this strong, loyal, safe alpha to leave.

He bites back a plea. Weak an omega though he is, he refuses to beg.

“No. No healer. I need… I need you.”

“Whatever you require, we give freely, sire.”

Emhyr smiles shakily. “You can start by shedding that armour, soldier.”

This was written directly into this post so please ignore any typos and grammatical errors ahaha, i’ll tidy it up and pop it onto Ao3 later

[detective-inspector-her]

explain the Tanith Route AU, i dont think ive heard of it yet

So a while back I mentioned how funny it is that Valkyrie can end up completely different based on who gets her involved in magic. This was triggered by this ask @bizzarefixations got.

The idea of Tanith being at Gordon's funeral and having contact with Stephanie/Valkyrie from the beginning was funny to me and it evolved to, 'what if they just kept missing Skulduggery by like, a minute?'

Here's a bit: The woman laughs and Stephanie blushes in embarrassment. The lady reassures her that she wasn't laughing at her to be mean, just that it seemed like the sort of thing she wished she'd been able to do in her childhood carefree. Stephanie smiles and says that's sorry she didn't get to, the woman smiles back and says that she's sorry she's left without an awesome uncle and has to deal with Fergus instead. Stephanie laughs and her eye catches a man in a tan overcoat with a scarf wrapped around the lower half of his face and wild and frizzy hair escaping from the wide-brimmed hat low over his gigantic sunglasses leaving the house.

Of course, this is just an outline so I know what to write in detail and the general conversation, but yeah. Missing Skulduggery is just a joke in the background lol.

I haven't thought about it as much as others but it pops into my head every few days and reminds me that it exists.