#HORRID RESURRECTION

[really-burnt-toast]

Redesigning my COTL cast pt.1

HAHA I'm finally done! I only made busts tho bc Im lazy and Im not putting myself through drawing a size chart... YET.

It WILL come, just so I can show pretty outfits and show how ridiculous Leshy's hight is LOL

If you see any spelling mistakes, please ignore them <3

(more info and rambling under cut)

Here I'll write some more things relating to each character;

Lamb

Born in Darkwood to a single mother, their mom had named them Mellia after the flowers that grow there, since they had aided in striving off an illness she had during the pregnancy.

The Lamb grew up pretty happily despite being on the run. Their mother was eventually caught whilst they made an escape. During their years of hiding, they broke their leg during one particularly risky escape and were caught not long after.

Their number is 1.600.666 because I keep making a connection between Darkwood and Germany's Schwartzwald - there are 1.6 million sheep in Germany - so I decided to have that be the approximate number. 666 was just added for fun.

Their ear was tagged to keep track of how many sheep were caught in which realm. They just so happened to be the last to be executed. By mere coincidence.

They were born without horns and kinda made the crown shape into a set. It has the benefit that they can rip em off and use them as impromptu weapons.

Due to centuries of being treated as a tool for a prophecy and merely a vessel, their self esteem is downright horrid. Whilst they don't condone followers speaking ill of them, they pretty much let Narinder trample on their feelings up until they had snapped one day. In the end it did help them both, but it wasn't great it had to be taken to that point.

Extra: I added the vitiligo because when I imagine a human version, I couldn't help but see them as having Vitiligo. Their leg limp was made after I thought it would make them look more imposing seeing someone "weak" suddenly pull out a giant hammer.

Narinder

Found within a burning village under rubble, clutching a crown as war raged around them. He was found by Shamura and taken in.

He was the first to create resurrection and back then it was an EXTREMELY taxing ritual. It would require his own godly flesh to beckon people back to life - thus it would literally cause his skin and flesh to melt off his bones. Now that's not needed anymore but his body is still weak to it, meaning during certain stress factors, he can still become skeletal. He doesn't have scarring from it, but gained some cool markings.

He was bound by his arms, torso and neck - all of which are scarred. In the afterlife he was perpetually sitting, causing him to be paralyzed from the waist down. Once he was usurped he had to regain his ability to walk and was taken care of by the Lamb.

He was in a catatonic state for many years and it only got better gradually with many setbacks. For years he never left the bed and by the time his Siblings had been rescued, he had barely started going outside. He was also suffering from chronic pains which wasn't really helpful.

He's also very... Temperamental. It took him just as long to say anything nice to the Lamb and it took him extra long to see them as more than his vessel.

Extra: I changed his markings to be more like I had imagined them. The catatonic trait and chronic pain was added after the update and I remember how horrible it was having tendonitis and I wanted to channel my distaste into Narinder.

Shamura

Found and raised by the last gods, they weren't the greatest sibling. They may have taken in the others but it took them a long time to be anything other than cold. With Kallamar, Shamura was distant and strict - then with Narinder they attempted to be less harsh after the kid started crying himself to sleep. With Heket and Leshy they got less and less cold. They tried their best, they'd argue.

They got carried away by their feelings as they had feared at the start and that's when the first prophecy came to them. They had kept it hidden for way too long until the balance of the crown's powers were ripping at the seams due to Narinder's pursuit in power - and they made a decision. They had told Kallamar first. Then Heket and Leshy were brought in.

Stuff happened. Now they are barely coherent and at most have an hour or two at a time where they seem to make sense. Leshy stays with them the most. Kallamar takes care of them. Heket takes care of the rest. Their skull is caved in, they lost an eye and limbs - some of the damages can't be hidden by bandages.

There's also this thing that their crown keeps getting out of control whilst trying to keep their mind stable - sometimes they'll get startled - attempt to form a weapon and instead end up with their arm speared through. They have scarring all over their body from it.

Upon recruitment they are pretty overwhelmed. Their crown can't stop them from breaking anymore and they have gotten so used to godhood that mortality now feels like they are literally rotting alive. They can feel their body wasting away.

Only after getting their relic back do they start becoming more independent and stable. They nowadays go through some sort of rehab to try and regain their sense of self.

Extra: Not much was added. I wanted to give them Glasses but I can't for the life of me draw them with a pair... So Ill just say they have them but not show them LOL

Kallamar

His past is basically forgotten. It sorta slipped away since he hadn't deemed it fit to be remembered. At first he had MANY fights with Shamura, then it ceased after a confrontation turned violent which left him with a bad scar.

He had to take care of his younger siblings whilst coming to terms with godhood - filling in whenever Shamura wasn't physically or mostly emotionally unavailable. For a long time he was the only one that could comfort his ailing siblings. Dealing with that sort of made him pretty easily agitated.

When Shamura proposed the plan, he had been hesitant - but ultimately didn't say anything.

Now he takes care of his siblings medically. He hates himself more than he hates anyone else and as much as he is quick to condemn and betray Shamura - he is also quick to condemn himself. Though maybe not as enthusiastically or openly.

He likes to compensate. Giving gifts to request forgiveness - grand displays of favoritism or mainly decking himself and his multiple spouses out with Jewels. He still keeps his wedding rings around his neck and his earring references his siblings.

Funnily enough, he caused the least troubles to the Lamb. They could argue he even seemed relieved after a short while of staying in the cult.

Extra: Added Jewelry and two tentacles because he looked naked without them.

Heket

Loudmouth frog that when found with her crown, she started trying to fight Shamura - insulting whatever parent they had. She kept threatening to poison them too.

In the lineup of her siblings, she was often the one who took the sidelines. If she was happy, she was left alone. If she was displeased, she'd let herself known. The most uncomplicated of the siblings.

You'd almost miss how every other bishop would seek her out when help was needed. While Shamura helped with godhood and Kallamar with emotional needs - Heket was a good person to pester with anything else. She'd handle it - just let big sis do it. Even if she was the second youngest - it's funny how even Kallamar and Narinder would occasionally use the nickname.

Then when everyone else was dealing with their wounds, she picked up the pace and kept their respective cults from falling apart. She handled Silk cradle until Shamura could - helped with Darkwood and took over Anchordeep when Kallamar was tending to the others. No problem.

She was still loud when entering the cult. Not as much as her brother - but she loved to cause scenes. Her muteness didn't seem to hinder her at all with that. She's not allowed near knives but somehow can handle axes?

Her temper problems don't get better. She just stops being an asshole about it.

She prefers having scarfs covering her neck bandages whilst they're all bloody and disgusting.

Extra: Nothing because Heket is already perfect.

Leshy

Literally a weird insect that kept clinging to the crown until it grew big enough to hold in one hand. It bit anything that got close and by the time Shamura found it - he had started eating small critters.

And god, he kept growing and growing until he wasn't a small worm in Shamura's hand but literally too big to fit through most doors. They suspected he'd grow until the end of time. Or well, now since his crown is gone.

He never listens. He screams for fun and overshares the worst details to the point he manages to break his siblings into just accepting anything he talks about. They can't even scold him or punish him since Leshy always finds a way to make things worse for anyone else but himself.

He also copies everyone. First it was Heket's tone. Then it was Narinder's behavior - now he started growing flowers and vine braids to make fun of Kallamar and his antlers were at first a crude mimic of Shamura's pedipalps and now they grow vines to be similar to the jewels hanging from them. He refuses to acknowledge doing so.

He's very clingy. After locking away Narinder, he stayed with Shamura every day until they were out of bed rest. He follows his siblings around and when he does give them a second to breathe - hes probably laying around in Darkwood instead of doing anything productive. He does tends to plants occasionally, but he prefers "to let chaos do its thing" - as if that means anything.

He makes for a great gardener after he stopped trying to break everything upon recruitment. And once he got over growling at every living thing - he actually became one of the most well liked people living there.

Leshy knows exactly what someone needs and somehow finds a way to achieve that with the littlest of efforts. It's the thought that counts.

Extra: Braid and vines because I thought Leshy would look cute with it.

Special: The 4 bishops all wear old faith themed robes, but Shamura got the elder clothes for comfort and Leshy kept tearing his clothes apart so he is not permanently excluded from having any special outfits as punishment. Narinder wears fancy robes (who happen to be loose and warm while being special - otherwise he'd complain)

The Lamb wears one of the leaked fleeces since I loved the red riding hood aesthetic.

In the end this turned more into biographies than actual explanations but its 3:30am, Im sleep deprived and I wanted to get my thoughts out because I start having memory problems again YIPPEE

[katakaluptastrophy]

Can we talk about Magnus in Harrow the Ninth? Because there's a tendency to paint him as this constantly cheerful figure and he's not - he's just very Fifth.

He's the only person who seems even slightly upset about the whole gun-toting horror thing:

“Did the Sleeper get them?”

“Only by assumption,” said Harrowhark, while Abigail’s dolt of a husband said, “I bloody hope so.”

“Magnus,” Abigail said, a touch disapprovingly.

“Well, if the Sleeper didn’t, that’s two maniacs with an ancient weapon and a love of blowing off faces, dear,” said Magnus.

And he's got a very low opinion of Silas:

"She won’t tell me what he said to her, just that he ‘was horrid.’”

“Cheeky little so-and-so,” said Magnus. “If he were my son, I’d give him something to think about. I’m not surprised he’s gone to ground.”

“I would hope your son might be of different character,” said his wife, half-smiling.

“Protesilaus should have biffed him.”

“It’s strange,” said Abigail, ignoring her husband’s exhortations to biffing.

Behind the jolly Jeeves and Wooster-esque talk of biffing people, let's remember that this is Magnus - who from Gideon's POV never saw a teenager he didn't want to adopt - earnestly wishing that a grown man had hit a 16 year old kid.

And when Harrow explains that she thinks she saw him jump to his death, Magnus isn't particularly sympathetic:

“We should have made him a greater priority,” said Lady Pent.

Magnus said, “I’m not certain.”

and

“We didn’t need him,” he said bracingly.

Abigail said, “We need everyone.”

“I never thought he was quite the thing.”

This "never quite the thing" line is the same one Abigail uses when she says Ianthe shouldn't have become a Lyctor and you get the sense it has a quite specific meaning on the Fifth. You get the distinct feeling Magnus is saying "good riddance" in response to a teenager's apparent suicide.

And then of course there's Magnus' conversation with Harrow as the River bubble collapses, as Harrow debates whether she should leave her body to Gideon:

She said: “If I go back, it will finally destroy her soul.”

It was Magnus who stepped forward and looked at Harrow face-to-face. And perhaps she felt that more keenly: that he was the man who had, in Gideon’s own words a lifetime ago, been nice to her cavalier. His mouth was hard now, but his eyes were as kind as they had ever been. And kindness was a knife.

He doesn't pull any punches in laying out his understanding of the situation to Harrow:

“This whole thing happened because you wouldn’t face up to Gideon dying,” he said, which was a stab as precise as any Nonius had managed. “I don’t blame you. But where would you be, right now, if you’d said: She is dead? You’re keeping her things like a lover keeping old notes, but with her death, the stuff that made her Gideon was destroyed. That’s how Lyctorhood works, isn’t it? She died. She can’t come back, even if you keep her stuffed away in a drawer you can’t look at. You’re not waiting for her resurrection; you’ve made yourself her mausoleum.”

His wife looked at Harrow’s face and murmured, “Magnus, you’ve made your point,” but he uncharacteristically ignored her.

He's trying to get through to her in a very fraught situation, but he's certainly not pulling his punches:

“You’re a smart girl, Harrowhark. You might turn some of that brain to the toughest lesson: that of grief.”

Abigail is also trying to talk her out of things, but she's much more discursive and apologetic. Magnus is kind, but it's kindness as a knife, not a cushion.

Magnus is so often written off as just a silly, goofy character, when he's more complicated than that. He's allowed to have a very real frustration with the River bubble and with Harrow, however much he does also care for her and want to help her.

And you know what, he's a CFO stuck in a horrorscape with his delighted ghost nerd wife and a bunch of soldiers. He runs with it - he cracks one of his House ordinal jokes while physically tackling a gun-toting ghost and makes a decent go at it before getting shot. But he's very much out of his comfort zone, angry, and no longer entirely held back by propriety.

[kachowden]

(Tw: Somewhat nsfw themes, disturbing descriptions, unhealthy idolization)

Surely,

I want to write about a man who is obsessed with you.

His love for you evades all reason without even trying.

Your being consumes his thoughts, mind and soul

Breathing means nothing, so little, if it means he can’t feel you next to him.

Basic human pleasures are lost on him in your presence. He does not need to eat, nor drink, nor sleep, for he believes your love will sustain him. Resurrect him.

“I love you. I love you I love you oh god I love you.”

Do not part with him, do not leave him he will surely perish if you do.

He’ll kiss yours hands, yours wrists, every finger and palm. He will praise your life above every god or flower between breaths.

The desires he feels for you are sinful, pathetic in comparison to you. His hands claw at his own skin, a cage that holds in his deepest depravities. Disgusting, ugly lust burns inside his bones. It feels terrible. It feels horrid. It feels amazing. Surely, he would never be able to fulfill you the way he wishes.

But he would be so grateful if you let him try. Just a taste?

Please?

Please haunt him. Haunt his dreams- His dreams, that are so blissful yet dull. He cannot feel you in his dreams. Even if they speak of you in his arms, he cannot feel you. He would rather be awake. Rather awake in your arms, in your breath and in your eyes.

He is jealous of himself. The one that holds you in his dreams.

He’d let himself drown in you. In your eyes, in your skin and in your tears.

No never your tears. If you cried he’d die surely.

Please please please

God if you kissed him just once, just once please just one kiss- he won’t ask for more he promises -oh god please just one kiss

But he doesn’t believe he’s worthy of your kisses. Surely he’s not, not someone as divine as you. He does not deserve your love, your touch or your kisses. Even your eyes on him would be too much.

Don’t look at him like that. He can’t handle it. He’ll melt, surely

Please take pity on him.

Surely you will?

[fairuzfan]

Hey! Ignore if you please but I'm genuinely curious how Muslim leftists are a thing as hierarchy and inequality are inherent in the religion. What is your personal views on it and what does faith mean to you if I may ask?

It's really disorienting for me seeing Muslims who've had pleasant experiences with Islam considering my own experiences have been horrid, having lived in Iran. I understand religion itself is amoral and can be used as a tool but when establishing Islamic law in society is a must in Islam and the abuse it brings about can be justified by the ayat and hadiths within it, isn't it fair to assume that The Purpose Of A System Is What It Does? Like are we ignoring the fact that Iran's supreme leader wants to conquer the whole region and create a single homogeneous Islamic state and his justification is the holy text.

Again I understand that personal faith is different from systematized religion. Tasawuf is pretty cool for example and only focuses on the spiritual connection of self and Allah, that's why I'd like to know your thoughts on it and how it works for you alongside your leftist beliefs.

Thanks 🙏

I'm not gonna lie, this is kind of a weird ask. I'm not Iranian and I can't speak on that but there are billions of Muslims around the world first of all and not all Muslims practice the same. Like, there are different sects of Islam. So to make overarching statements about things that are "inherent" go Islam like this is really odd?? I don't think it's true that inequality is inherent in Islam....

But establishing a single Islamic state is not a 100% must in Islam like how hajj and Salah are...? Like it's not a requirement for you to do as a Muslim. The only things you're absolutely required to do are things like Salah, Zakat, Hajj, etc and even those things have exceptions. The absolute requirement of Islam is to take the shahada and believe in it.

Even between Iran and Saudi Arabia (a government which I hate) there are pretty obvious differences. So like to make Iran the end all be all of what constitutes as a government that operates with Islamic law is kind of a weird assumption to make.

I don't really want to comment on this beyond what I said. It's not like any other government in the world is much better?? Seems odd to single Islam out with the rising Islamophobia that results in the ravaging of SWANA.

But if you're asking me personally why I'm muslim, it's because I grew up being taught that justice is a core principal of Islam. My parents always emphasized "always stand on the side of the oppressed" as something Muslims should do. The hadith that personally always stick with me as a guiding principal is:

Anas ibn Malik reported: The Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, said, “Even if the Resurrection were established upon one of you while he has in his hand a sapling, let him plant it.”

And this ayah:

O believers! Stand firm for justice as witnesses for Allah even if it is against yourselves, your parents, or close relatives. Be they rich or poor, Allah is best to ensure their interests. So do not let your desires cause you to deviate ˹from justice˺. If you distort the testimony or refuse to give it, then ˹know that˺ Allah is certainly All-Aware of what you do.

And this ayah:

O humanity! Indeed, We created you from a male and a female, and made you into peoples and tribes so that you may ˹get to˺ know one another. Surely the most noble of you in the sight of Allah is the most righteous among you. Allah is truly All-Knowing, All-Aware.

But yeah I always think back to these ayat and hadith when I need to.

[blooberrytea]

I've dug two graves for us, my dear

~

Summary: Set in the time of the Red Plague. A crestfallen Mage, who's thrown themselves into their work to escape their sorrows, realizes that their days are numbered.

Pairing: There isn't one exactly! Has a mix of mentions of Julian X Mc and Asra x Mc

Word Count: 1.1k

A/N: okay okay, walk with me. I've been plagued (ha) by ideas of what the apprentice went through when they realized they were sick. That is really all this is-- BUT I do have ideas for actual character pairings that aren't angsty. I really want to write a one-shot where Asra is reteaching the apprentice things after they're resurrected teehee

Also! I know Asra uses they/them pronouns and that the game uses he/him-- so for the sake of having no confusion, i've used he/him in this fic :)

--

By the time anyone had noticed, it was too late.

You were on your way to the dungeons; Mindlessly making your way through the lavish halls. Walls were lined with paintings, mostly of The Count. Dozens of plants were meticulously placed throughout the space, no doubt a touch of The Countess’.

The dungeon was the current home of Vesuvia’s finest doctors. They worked tirelessly, like ants. Like bees. Like the disturbingly red beetles that invaded your home town.

It was a rather horrid scene; stuffy, grimey. It reeked of death and decay. Not an ounce of sunlight reached these depths, your path guided only by dim candle light.

The steps sounded wet as you descended, the distant dripping of water accompanying their tune.

Few months had passed since you joined the doctors in their quest for a cure, since the plague began terrorizing your city. Asra had insisted the two of you leave Vesuvia, flee to a safer place until the illness died off. You couldn’t bring yourself to abandon your people. Your neighbors, your friends, the patrons of your shop.

Asra told you someone else would help them, that you couldn’t play hero, not to endanger your life for strangers.

If you wouldn’t do it for yourself, then to do it for him. Because he couldn’t risk losing you.

Evidently, the mage was going to leave with or without you. While Asra settled some place far far away from the disease, you settled in the dungeon– Closer to illness than you had begun.

You lightly knocked on the door to Julian’s office, noting that it was unlocked before stepping inside. You placed a stack of books on his desk, leaning over his shoulder to glimpse at his current work.

“Leeches?”

Julian nodded, not once looking up from his scattered papers. You couldn’t remember the last time you’d seen the doctor in daylight, or even just above the dungeon. He typically made visits to the Count, but if you had to guess, he hadn’t done that recently either.

His eyes were red from lack of sleep, the skin around them discolored. He almost looked sickly.

“I believe the plague may be blood related. Leeches will aid me in testing that theory.” He murmured as he continued to write, his hair falling into his face.

“And if it is blood related?” You questioned, tilting your head at him.

“Then I’ll have to develop yet another idea on how to handle that. It will likely… Also involve leeches.”

You sighed, “Can I pull you away for a moment? You’ve been in here for days.”

“My dear, I would love to join you. But I fear Questaor Valdemar may take a scalpel to my abdomen if I move from this chair.”

“Julian, I must insist—” You started, laying a hand on his shoulder. He only shrugged it off, using his hand to wave you away. You frowned.

Deciding that you were going to make no progress in removing the doctor from his office, you left. Considering you weren’t a doctor, you were only able to assist with so much. You spent your days mulling over medical journals, scouring every book in the library. You were more of a research assistant than anything. Your job was to find information you deemed important, and drop it off on Julian’s desk– So that he could spend just as many hours pouring over them and trying to decipher a cure.

You were certain Valdemar would keep him chained to that desk if locking the door wasn't an option.

Outside of the palace, you spent your freetime making charms. Small sachets packed with herbs, sealed with a spell and a prayer– Meant to ward off the Red Plague. It was your attempt to use your magic for the good of others, and it was simple enough.

Unbeknown to most, there was another pandemic brewing: Fear. The people of Vesuvia were beginning to lose hope. Most were beginning to believe that your city would come to be wiped off the map.

So you produced charms with the intent to reduce anxiety, to keep away nightmares, to promote peace in one’s soul.

It was almost ironic.

Content with your work for the day, you opted to head back to your shop. It was getting late now. You’d spent your entire day holed up in the palace library. You listened to maids skitter about, listened to various members of the court as they passed by, at one point Countess Nadia slipped past. With Lucio bedridden, Nadia had taken to dealing with kingdom affairs. Not that she hadn’t been handling most of them already.

The library was your sanctuary. It was where you’d found comfort after Asra left. The shop held too many memories, and you weren’t keen on wandering Vesuvia at its current state. You mostly kept to yourself, lost in the thousands of books the palace held. Julian was the one to draw you out of your little corner. He pointed you in the direction of magnificent reads, he dragged you to a rowdy bar on the south end, he filled that void Asra had left. In the short time you’d known him, you’d grown rather fond of one another.

It pained you to watch him waste away in that dungeon. He’d pulled away in the last few weeks, overworked with orders from Lucio and Valdemar. It wasn't his fault that he didn’t notice.

No one noticed. You barely noticed.

It wasn’t until your limbs grew so heavy you could barely walk.

Maybe it was the nightmares, or the ridiculous amount of stairs you had to descend that left you feeling exhausted. You told yourself it had to be either of those.

When the tips of your fingers began to turn red, you pleaded with the divine.

Please let it be anything else.

You caught a glimpse of yourself in the mirror one morning, just before dawn broke.

At first you thought maybe it was a trick of the light, but then you doubled back– Shaky hands pressed to your cheeks.

It was unmistakable. The pearly whiteness of your eyes was gone.

In its place was deep, dark crimson.

You let out a broken laugh, almost maniacal.

The tears flooded your eyes in an instant.

It was absurd. The irony was almost too much to bear– The healing mage contracting an illness that marked them for certain death.

Your laughter only grew as you sank to your knees, clutching your chest as you struggled to breathe. When you inevitably didn't show for work today, they’d send someone to your door. You would be shipped off to the Lazerat with every other tragic soul.

You lay crumpled on the floor for what felt like hours, maybe even the entire day. You watched the sun rise and shine through your windows– watched the light dance between your trembling fingers, basked in the warmth of its rays. Then watched it fade as the sun dipped beyond your view.

[elfieafterdark]

Further thoughts on Harrow's feelings towards Alecto. I'm remembering the scene in htn Harrow, desperate and alone, tries to reach for physical affection with Alecto.

Begging. Pleading. Needing in such a horrid way. Which also brings to mind the scene where Gideon the First attacks her in the bath, and she was at very real risk of falling for Ianthe in all the wrong ways.

Alecto straight up dips. But, honestly? The more I think about it the less convinced I am that Harrow has the hots for her. It's some kind of love, I don't doubt that. But there are a lot of different kinds of love.

For example, we all know deep down that she also loves Gideon. But it's less of a reverent thing, It's not "I need to live forever just in case she wakes up" like Alecto, it's "I cannot live without you."

I think both of these statements sort of illustrate the differences in her love for these two.

Knowing what we know about Alecto now, which is exactly what Harrow knows about her, coupled with the fact that she's on a quest to find God in its truest form... FOR WHATEVER REASON (I bet she wants to ask them to resurrect Gideon properly).

I think she views Alecto as a closer approximation of divinity compared to John Gaius. A closer being to God. As Reverend Daughter she'd be extremely devoted to spirituality, it's not a surprise.

But I don't think that's mutually exclusive with her love for Gideon. Which is far more human, both and how she acts and how hard she fights for it. She fights harder for Gideon than she ever has for Alecto.

Her words to Gideon, again I think it's a horrible tragedy that they don't interact at all for two out of four books, ring of true romantic love. "First flower of my house, you were the best Cavalier ever." Is a lot more romantic that "I have loved you all my life, please kill me uwu."

I dunno, I will once again acknowledge that It's a possibility that I'm coping. However, there's little clues I'm still sorting through.

All I know is I can't fucking wait for Gideon and Harrow to hash out all of their problems together in Alecto. I fully expect them to, and I'll be pretty disappointed if they don't.

More to come.

[scenicphoenix]

Concept Botw au. Link wakes up not with amnesia, but with too much information. He wakes up in the shrine of resurrection with totk link’s memories. And totk link wakes up with Raru with Botw links lack of memory.

Time paradox AU. Uh oh they got swapped in the time stream!!

Two choices for Botw links memory, he has start of the game totk links memory, or he has end game tot links memory and he feels like he is going through a horrid ground hog day situation

[m-to-the-6th-power]

When Jeannemary Chatur opened her eyes she expected to see The Ninth sitting across the lyctor laboratory. What she saw instead was the face of Abigail Pent smiling warmly down at her, Issac and Magnus over either shoulder. Jeanne's heart jumped into her throat at seeing Issac wanting to jump up and hug him, but when she fully processed the adults standing there it was an icy fist around her oesophagus. Jeanne refused to let tears well up, fighting down the emotion until Abigail folded her into a hug. When Abigail pressed Jeannemary's feverish eyes against her cool clavicle, the tears would not be stopped. 

Jeanne cried like the child she never truly was, not even noticing the absence of Isaac and Magnus as her arms wrapped around Abigail like a vice. Jeanne tried to stop speaking, but apologies would not stop falling from her lips between sobs. “It was my fault Abigail, I'm so sorry, I didn't mean it. I promise I didn't mean it. I was just angry. I promise I was just angry, please don't be mad. Please don't leave again, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry.”

Abigail gently moved Jeannemary back to look her in the eye, gently stroking her hair and rubbing a cool thumb over her temple. “Jeanne, darling, what are you talking about?” Abigail asked, voice gently coaxing. “You have nothing to apologize for.”

“But I do,” Jeanne wailed, unable to meet Abigail's eyes, focusing on the steady movement of her ribs expanding and contracting with breath. “When you hushed Issac at the dinner I got so angry. And then after that when you told him to not get our key, I just thought... I wished that you weren't there. I wished that we could've existed without you hovering over our shoulders. Stopping us from doing anything you thought was dangerous.”

Abigail opened her mouth to respond, but Jeannemary cut her off. “Whatever was in the facility felt my emotions. It knew that I was angry. So it's my fault you died, if I hadn't gotten angry you and Magnus wouldn't have been attacked. I stopped loving you for just a moment, and because of that you died and-”

Abigail hushed Jeannemary with a gentle thumb over her lips, strong workers hands gentle on her mandible. “It wasn't a ghost and it wasn't spirits Jeanne. My darling sweet girl, it was the Seventh. The thing pretending to be Lady Septimus. When I was down in the facility, I found traces of her. Traces that were old. When you and Issac called, we tried so hard to answer but she blocked us.”

Abigail paused for a breath, marshaling her thoughts before continuing. “I know it's hard to believe, but I do remember what it's like to be a rebellious teenager,” Abigail said, lightly tweaking one of Jeanne's earrings. “I know you can only imagine me as a teenager using stone tools fresh from the resurrection, but I wasn't young that long ago. You're 14, which to me is so very young. But you're also the oldest you've ever been. The oldest you ever will be. You look in the mirror and see a young woman, fully capable of making her own decisions because you were never able to be anything else. I look at you and I see a child in the horrid throes of puberty. I can't help but want to wrap you and keep you safe Jeannemary.”

“I don't need to be kept safe!” Jeannemary snapped, anger damming the flow of tears. “You were the one who needed protection. If we had been with you, if you hadn't been so worried about our safety, maybe we could've beaten them. Or maybe they wouldn't have attacked at all. But because you decided that the Fifth was going to annex the Fourth, control the Fourth, you died. And Issac died trying to avenge you! Your choices cost you your life, which was terrible but it was your own life to lose; but they also cost Issac his life, and I can't forgive you for that.”

Abigail reared back, letting the metaphorical slap land clearly. “I'm sorry Jeanne. I'm sorry for getting you wrapped up in the mess that we made. If I had known, not what would happen, but that it would harm you and Issac in any way, I never would've taken that first step off the shuttle. Because while my final cause was the lyctor... my true death came when I was foolish with that first step.”

“Why did you take the step at all?” Jeannemary asked, honestly curious. “Why follow directions from someone that you didn't know had your best interests at heart?”

Abigail worked her hands in the air between them, like kneading dough. “Because, that first step, and every step after was to be in pursuit of my passion. I didn't take the step because I didn't love you or Isaac or Magnus. I took it because I thought I was safe. I was never hurt before, and so I thought I wouldn't be hurt now. I thought that someone with a better vantage must've been looking out for my safety before asking me to embark on some foolish errand. But they weren't, and I was complacent in my mortality.” Abigail took both of Jeanne's hands in hers, stroking her thumbs over Jeanne's knuckles. 

“Who did you think was looking out for you?” Jeannemary asked, looking down at Abigail's hands, shoulders losing some of their tension.

“I know it's probably quite silly,” Abigail began, “But I thought the Emperor must've been looking out for us, for all of us. There were strange energy signatures coming from Teacher and the other priests, so I thought that they must've been communicating with him somehow. But, I was wrong, if he was watching he didn't see fit to save me.”

“He's the King Undying, he's God,” Jeannemary protested. “Why wouldn't he save you? Why would he let any of us die? He asked for us, so he has a duty to save us doesn't he? Maybe he'll bring us back once this is all over.”

Abigail did not have the heart to share her suspicions with Jeannemary about why the Emperor would let her die, or why he would not put forth the effort to save the Fourth. “He might try that,” Abigail allowed, “He is God, but he was a man, with all the fallibility that entails. Sometimes people with too much power don't realize how to use it for the good of those under them. But that's a conversation for tomorrow, let's go and see Issac and Magnus.”

When they saw Magnus and Issac, Issac had an arm thrown over his eyes in teenage grief. “Magnus... Maaagnnnuuuusssss, that's a terrible joke Magnus.”

[iridescentgleam]

as night eclipses day (know the sun won't ever rise again)

Hi, did someone ask for Leshycat angst? ...No? Ah, well, too bad, I guess. I'll just leave this here then. read it on Ao3 Word Count: 2,493 TW: Main character death and a brief mention of violence and maiming (although it is never depicted and no detail is gone into).(Note to avoid any confusion: My Yellow Cat's name is Rowan.)

The sky is bright and clear as Lambert casually makes their way to the temple for the morning sermon. They can hear their followers go about their morning routines all around, some just waking up and heading to breakfast while others are hard at work, having been awake for hours already as their job requires them to be. Nothing of note will be happening today, but their followers seem to be in good spirits anyway, conversing good-naturedly over berry bowls and stopping for small talk on their way to the refinery or the lumberyard. All things considered, today is shaping up to be a good day, they think.

Which is why the guttural scream coming from the direction of the shelters takes them so off-guard.

It’s a horrid, awful noise that Lambert can only compare to the feedback that was filtered straight into their brain whenever one of the bishops emerged in front of them back when the Old Faith was still around. It is not a typical mortal scream in any regard, but, somehow, it is familiar to the lamb in a way they cannot quite place. Even after the person has stopped screeching, the sound echoes deep into the woods surrounding their community and leaves the lamb’s ears ringing violently.

The flock is silent when the echoing finally stops. All chatter has ceased, and even the sounds of people working in the stone mines and lumberyards halt. Everyone, the lamb included, is stunned by the scream. For a moment, nobody is moving at all.

And then, in that same terrible voice, someone cries out, “LAMB!!!” and instantly, Lambert knows why they recognize that scream.

It’s Leshy.

All eyes turn to Lambert, the curious, confused, and concerned all wondering why someone, let alone Leshy, would be screaming for their leader on a day like today.

But Lambert knows why.

It is only after the second, “LAMB!” though, that they take off running. Because if Leshy is calling for him, that can only mean one thing has happened. -----------

It is natural for followers to grow old. This is the way of life and death, and by the time their followers become elders, the lamb makes sure they are well taken care of and ready to greet death with open arms, unafraid of what comes after.

Of course, for some, death is not the end, but rather another bridge to cross in the road of existence. Lambert is guilty of reviving followers who they believe truly earned their right to continue on past what is supposed to be the end, but only if they know that it is something they want. Many of their followers are perfectly content to embrace eternal rest, after all. It is because of this that they do not take resurrection lightly.

They know what can happen if a follower who does not want it gets resurrected.

Thus, it is customary to ask elders what they wish for themselves when their time comes to retire from work. Many have family members and friends they want to be reunited with in the afterlife, so it is not a hard choice for them. Some simply crave the pleasantness of eternal rest. Others still tell them that they would be honored to continue to serve the cult, granted they were chosen for revival.

After many, many years of asking this question, they start to be able to predict what a follower will wish before they ask them, even without reading their mind. Certain types of people are more inclined to choose one path over another, so it does not shock them when a strong, nurturing type chooses to be reunited with the family he lost due to heretics or a burly, hard-working type asks if she could serve the cult longer. Some change their minds as their end grows nearer, but, for most, this is a question they have entertained for a long while before Lambert ever asks it to them.

Very rarely do they receive an answer that truly surprises them. They ask the question more as a formality than anything and simply end up nodding along to the follower’s explanation for why they chose the answer they did, even though Lambert can easily deduce why themselves.

That’s why, when Rowan -the diligent head farmhand for more than twenty years- says that he wishes to pass on peacefully and leave it at that, Lambert is already nodding along with a pleasant smile on their face before they can even process what is being said. When they finally do, they find themselves rearing back as if struck physically by the shock of what they just heard.

“I’m sorry?” they can’t help but ask, glancing down at the yellow cat as if they were seeing him for the first time.

“I wish to pass on, Leader. When it’s my time, I do not wish to be resurrected,” he reiterates, his tone even and almost carefree,  although the lamb can still sense the faintest bit of apprehension in his voice.

“...You haven’t told Leshy yet, have you?” they find themselves responding in a considerably more somber tone. It isn't really a question, although it comes out of their mouth like one. They already know the answer because... “Otherwise, I would have heard about it by now.”

Rowan dips his head, his graying whiskers barely skirting his chest. It’s all the confirmation the lamb needs to see to know that Leshy, indeed, has not been informed of this.

“You do not know how to tell him,” Lambert deduces, their voice becoming soft, almost coaxing. “You know you will have to eventually.”

“I am aware, yes,” the cat whispers back in an almost pained tone of voice. “But I do not want my last days with him to be ones of sadness and anger.”

“So you will go on letting him think that this state of yours is simply temporary and that you will rise again shortly after you pass?” they ask, casting a side-long glance at where Leshy is currently on the other side the cult grounds, blissfully unaware of the conversation Lambert was currently having with his partner.

“If I must do so to maintain the peace, then that is what I shall do,” Rowan replies, a steely sort of determination entering his tone. Much to their chagrin, he seems willing to die on this hill. They get the sense there is nothing they can say to talk him out of it.

They have half a mind to stomp all the way over to Leshy right now and tell him exactly what Rowan is telling them, but something in the yellow cat’s expression stops them from doing so.

After a long drawn-out silence, he eventually states, “I’m sure Leshy will find another lover eventually. And I want that for him, I truly do! He’s terrible at letting people in, but, deep down, he’s sweet in his own way, and he’s been taking care of me for the past few months, as he has done for all the time we’ve spent together. He’s funny too, and he has a great sense of humor. Really, what’s not to love?” He laughs softly to himself with a fond smile, as if he’s thinking of something Leshy had said long ago.

Suddenly, the lamb’s heart aches as they get a full sense of what Leshy will be losing. Rowan truly loves Leshy, that much is plain to see, and anyone with eyes (or even without them) can see how enamored the ex-god is with him as well. Lambert desperately wants to shake the cat by the shoulders and snap some sense into him, but they can tell that this decision is not one he has taken lightly. There is very little anyone could do to talk him out of this.

So the lamb concedes. After all, it is simply not their call to make. -----------

As Lambert approaches the shelter area, they can hear the sounds of Leshy’s agony loud and clear. There is clearly another person there with him because they can hear him snapping at someone in between whispered sweet-nothings to a lover who can no longer hear them. Really, he's speaking in frantic, half-baked sentences more than anything. Sometimes, it’s just soft, barely there mutters of “...my camellia, my camellia…” over and over again before morphing into blind rage in the form of earth-shaking cries of “YOU! YOU!”

If it was hard to hear, though, it was even worse to see. The lamb hesitates for a moment as the scene comes into view, swallowing down a lump got stuck in their throat before continuing on.

Leshy is kneeling over Rowan’s body, both hands blindly fisted in the cat’s robes as he alternates from focusing his attention on said cat to the other cat that happens to be in the vicinity.

Narinder, for his part, looks stoically down at Leshy grieving his dead partner, seeming exceptionally detached from his brother’s grief. The bridge that had been burnt between the two a thousand years ago seems yet to be rebuilt.

When Narinder looks up and makes eye contact with Lambert, his only reaction is a casual, “Lamb, deal with this nonsense,” and a thrash of his tail. Once they approach the scene fully, the black cat hardly spares him another look before turning on his heel and abandoning his brother with little more than a second thought. Lambert knows, though, that he will not stray far, as is the nature of an older brother, however estranged.

Narinder’s words seem to have gotten through to Leshy, despite his immense grief, though, because the ex-god of chaos whirls his head around to face them so fast they worry he might have seriously strained his neck. If he did, though, he doesn’t say anything. He simply gently cradles the body of Rowan in his arms and hoists the cat up into a bridal carry like it is the most effortless thing in the world. If Lambert didn’t know better, they would simply think Leshy is carrying Rowan because he fell asleep again somewhere, as is typical for an elder of his age.

The lamb instinctually flinches back as his body is thrust at them like a broken toy by a child. “Fix him…” the ex-god hisses in an otherworldly voice. “I declare it. NOW!”

Any hope Lambert might have had that Rowan told Leshy about his decision promptly shrivels up and dies in their chest.

Well, they thought, it’s been a good run, at least. It was nice knowing you, Red Crown. Please give my regards to Narinder when you promptly return to him after my death.

When the lamb makes no move to immediately remedy the situation, Leshy takes a step forward and presents Rowan’s body to them even clearer, as if it were possible for them to somehow miss it the first time. “Well?” he hisses, his voice dipping in and out a vocal range that was achievable by mortals. “What are you waiting for?! I am not speaking in tongues, am I?!”

They send up a silent prayer to any other gods that may possibly be out there and listening to them at this very moment as they reply, “...I can’t.”

For a moment, Leshy falls silent, seemingly stunned, before the rage returns stronger than ever. “What do you mean ‘YOU CAN’T?!’’’ he hisses, sounding truly like a god again, despite his continued presence in his mortal form. “YOU ARE THE ONLY ONE THAT CAN!”

Woo boy, time for the moment of truth, they think, before just deciding to spit it all out in one go. “Rowanaskedmenottoresurrecthimimsorry,” they reply, half tempted to shut their eyes against the onslaught they know will be coming.

Leshy falls silent again, this time for a longer period of time. The silence rings loudly in their ears, almost as deafening as his screams, if not more so. It’s eerie, watching all the fight seep out of Leshy like a snuffed candle. “What… what do you mean?” he eventually asks, his voice no louder than a whisper. This time, he truly does look like a child, his expression open and vulnerable as he turns to face his late lover, despite not being able to see him.

The lamb takes a deep breath before answering. “He didn’t want to tell you because he didn’t want you to be mad, but he asked specifically not to be resurrected. He said he was ready to move on.”

Oddly, it seems like the whole world has gone still. No birds are chirping, no insects humming. It’s all disturbingly quiet. The kind that tells you something is wrong. Lambert should have seen the signs before they all came crashing down on them.

“No… NO! YOU ARE LYING, YOU FILTHY LAMB!!!” he howls, throwing himself forward at the lamb despite still cradling Rowan’s corpse in his arms. “HE WOULD NOT SAY THAT, HOW DARE YOU LIE TO ME!! I WILL HAVE YOUR HEAD FOR THIS!”

“I’m sorry, Leshy,” they tell him sincerely, and that seems to be all it takes to break him, truly.

If they thought the scream he let out the first time was guttural, this one is just brutal. It sounds like it scrapes Leshy’s very mortal vocal cords raw as he falls to his knees and lays his late lover’s body back on the ground. Sobs and screams fight for the ability to leave his throat as he throws himself over Rowan’s corpse and cradles it tight to his chest. Black ichor quickly soaks the bandages that cover his face, so much so that the liquid starts leaking and quickly stains yellow fur as black as ink. As black as death. All Lambert can do is stand here and watch as Leshy starts pleading with his lover as if he were still alive.

“Please don’t leave me here alone! How come you get a choice and I don’t?!”

His cries echo around the silent grounds of their cult and permeate deep into everything that can hear his grief. Eventually, though, there is a limit to the mortal vocal cords, and Leshy’s wails of grief die into hoarse shrieks that fade away with each passing vocalization. Still, the ex-god will not give up Rowan’s corpse for anything. He fights brutally as a few cult members come by to collect Rowan’s body for burial, using instinct as his only guide. He successfully maims two of their followers because of it, but Lambert can’t find themselves too torn up about it after witnessing Leshy’s grief in its purest form. Rowan's body will need to be collected eventually, lest it rots, but it can stay a while still before Leshy realizes clinging to it will not bring his lover back.

For now, though, the lamb watches as Leshy, throat screamed raw, weeps over the body of one of their most successful farmhands. Watches and, for some reason, find themselves crying too.

[kneecapandribcageinverter]

Complicated feelings about new COTL update. The one where you get to heal the Bishops.

I'll admit, I had complicated feelings about the Bishops being resurrected in the first place. See, Narinder has this whole questline about him grieving, but now it's kinda been rendered moot? But not really, because now he has to actually CONFRONT his siblings after... well, everything, and there was a lot that was lost and will never be the same even if they ARE back, so it's not like there's nothing to mourn.

Then there's the bishop regeneration quests in the new update, where you heal their maimed bodies, restoring their eyes, ears, throat, skull, whatever. Leshy can see, Heket can speak, Kallamar can hear, and Shamura can think straight again.

Somehow, this feels like it cheapens the experience. Part of the reason it was such a big deal was because it was irreversible. This family did things to each other that couldn't be undone or taken back. But now that it HAS been fixed, it makes the problem seem trivial, which in turn makes the solution seem trivial.

But I don't think this is necessarily a bad thing. I don't think it's a bad thing at all, when I think about it some more.

You hear a lot of people talking about how sad they get after losing their favorite followers, and I experienced something similar during my playthrough, but... I noticed something interesting. Once I got the resurrection ritual, I sorta stopped caring when my followers died. Before, I'd think "just you wait, I'm gonna bring you back as soon as I can." but now that I CAN, it doesn't seem important to do anymore. I just love that psychological effect, how godlike power makes mortality seem so trivial and inconsequential.

See, the Lamb is a god. Doing things like this is a godly thing to do, and this casual mindset about it is... divine. This game has gods coming to grips with newfound mortality, sure, but that's not what it's about. It's about the Lamb losing their mortality. Seeing these once profound moments rendered hollow by their own power is the POINT. This is a game where mortal limitations and restrictions are meant to be overcome. Time and time again, the Lamb overreaches what was allotted to them, and time and time again, they find that what seemed so high above them is not only within their reach, but right in front of their face. Like the opposite of Tantalus, the highest boughs bend down to allow them to harvest whatever fruit they crave, and the tide rises to quench their thirst.

Another thing I have a love-hate relationship with is the comparison between the questlines that you've got. You bring the bishops low, sure, that's your job now. But then, you're charged with saving your mortal enemies, offering your own followers lives as payment to do so.

Now, I liked the variable nature of most sidequests. You can be the salvation or doom of... basically anyone. You can help Sozo poison himself to death and then rehabilitate him. You can protect Plimbo's ship from the angry Witnesses. You can reunite Forneus with her kids. You can reignite a lighthouse, preventing people from being lost at sea. On the other hand, you could offer your followers to Midas, or become a cannibalistic slave trader's favorite customer. There is the infamous Fox questline, in which you sacrifice your followers and Ratau.

What I have complicated feelings about is that... we have the option to save our foes, and we have the option to betray our faithful. If we choose to be vindictive to our foes or loyal to our flock, that's not a quest option, that's just non-progression.

What I mean is, we can't choose to protect our flock, or the lands of the old faith, from these other threats, we can only choose to either do business with them at the expense of our allies or other innocents, or simply ignore them. Likewise, we can't hurt the bishops in a way that isn't DIY follower interactions. Sure, we can keep them in a pillory forever, or permakill them in a horrid way, but that feels more like torturing a Minecraft villager than actually taking revenge against the character.

What's more is, to fulfill the "good" sidequests, we have to betray our followers by feeding them to doors, or sacrificing them to resurrect Aym and Baal.

It's like... I'm oversimplifying, but the choices we have are: Being good to our enemies, being bad to our allies, or just choosing not to do those things. (Sure, there are follower quests, but I'm not putting "pick ten flowers for me" on par with "end a life to get me out of hell.") This peeves me off a bit. But I understand this too.

Remember what I said earlier about the Lamb going through an arc about not being mortal anymore? This is another result of that. These quests represent that, even with the "you can't turn it down, you can only decide not to do it yet" thing. See, you might decide not to betray your followers now, but... time will pass. With infinite time, infinite things will happen. You will outlive your own willpower, and eventually cave in even to the least appealing temptation.

The Lamb values saving the bishops for the same reason the player does: Because they're actual characters with significance to the player. To us, the followers are random NPCs, and to the Lamb, they'll eventually wind up feeling the same way. After so much time, their faces blend together, their voices fade to unintelligible babble, etc. But the Bishops were a Big Deal to the Lamb once upon a time. Even if it was because they were enemies, they were IMPORTANT. It's someone that still means something. I figure it's sorta like how AM in I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream keeps a handful of humans alive so that it still has something to do stuff to, and freaks out when they die. It's not about mercy, it's not about forgiveness, it's not about affection, it's about having something around that can make you feel something after all this time.

Complicated feelings, but it's a good game.

[boyfridged]

when it comes to fridging, what is uniquely horrid is not only that on the meta-level the aim is to expand a narrative of another character; it’s also that for that to happen, in-universe, the grief ought to be even more objectifying than it is naturally. it becomes, in a sense, voyeuristic. inappropriate. the image of the dead character is, by necessity, distorted and flattened down. even in real life, studies of bereavement hallucinations show that the dead come to either guide the mourners to peace or taunt them with guilt. in text their voice is that of fears and hopes of others too, but notably, never with a further reflection on their desires that could be at least an afterthought for grievers in real life. and that’s also why the resurrection stories have so much (psychological horror) potential when it comes to these characters – because they come back to the reality in which their pain no longer belongs to themselves, where the trauma of their death has been exploited and their identity contorted. they’re confronted with an idea of themselves that is either demonised or idealised; a saint and a martyr, and find that there’s little space left for their authentic selves. or perhaps, alternatively, they morph into that faux form, and it becomes questionable if they are still the same person they used to be. the problem of post-mortem survival of identity already poses a challenge because of the nature of crossing the line between the spheres of the dead and the living; but what about the dialogical nature of forming an identity? cemeteries belong to the living; they decide which picture will be engraved into the tombstone. and it might be, that even with no corpse underneath, the image will preserve and haunt even the revenants themselves.

[riverhag2]

my favorite characters die in my favorite media all the damn time

my current hyper focus is a tragic opera that ends with my blorbo having his life flash before his eyes in a horrid fever dream where he's confronted for perhaps the first time with how horribly he's failed everyone he's ever loved and then he dies

death isn't the problem

pointless and hurried stuff-her-in-a-fridge death that doesn't actually even serve the narrative purpose cobbled together as an after-the-fact explanation is the problem

the idea that Izzy's arc was "over" is frankly ludicrous

he'd only just begun to rediscover the parts of himself he'd buried away or lost to piracy, to Blackbeard, to Ed

he'd only just found love with the crew

he'd only just started the arc that Stede and Ed set off on in the beginning of s1

his death does nothing for his character

it also does nothing for anyone else's

smarter people than me have spoken extensively on why the "mentor/father figure" thing is just outright non-existent in the text

even without that, the show is obviously trying to use Izzy's death to free Ed from the mantle of blackbeard and that would be a valid and interesting narrative choice if you'd set that up at any point before the last five minutes of the last episode but um

Ed had already begun the work of releasing himself from blackbeard, and even when he dons the leathers once again, it's not even the tiniest bit for Izzy's sake nor in any way at Izzy's insistence or encouragement (and in fact, Izzy had already encouraged him to step away from it)

whatever is still tying Ed to blackbeard, it is textually very much not Izzy

Izzy's dying sentiment of "they love you" holds no water because out of Ed, Stede, and Izzy, only one of them has actually connected with the crew this season and it sure as fuck isn't Ed

Izzy's dying admonition of "you're surrounded by family" is immediately followed by Ed and Stede fucking off and leaving the ship

there's nothing in Izzy's death that serves Ed narratively

there's apparently then the argument that Izzy is representative of old piracy, a dying world, and therefore he must die (which, ok, fine, but to what end?) but that's *actually insane* in the context of a show entirely about starting over in middle age

killing a character is often a good narrative choice, but if you're gonna kill him, doing it with a stray bullet in the middle of his arc in a way that does nothing to further anyone else's narrative is at best a cheap emotional punch

death also is the problem though

in a show where mortal wounds seem to pass almost unnoticed amongst our heroes, casual death by a stray bullet is bonkers

in a show where the only real villain is a cruel and corrupt state, to punish with death someone at the mercy of that cruel and corrupt state is bonkers

most importantly: in a show that presented itself as ultimately being about queer outsiders finding family in each other, there's no good reason for any of the foundlings to die

even assuming they're planning some miraculous resurrection for Izzy in s3, they work very hard to show you precisely how dead he is here

they want you to know and believe that he absolutely is dead

Lucius falls into the sea in a way that no one ever once believed actually meant he was dead

in contrast, we watch the light go out of Izzy's eyes after he tells Ed he's ready to go

we see him buried in the dirt

if this truly is meant to be impermanent, then it is even more cruel and meaningless than if they actually just killed him for nothing and no amount of "indestructible little fucker" foreshadowing redeems it

I hate everything about this ending, for everyone involved

it's such a disappointment

[legobiwan]

Whumptober Salvage: Episode 1

I obviously did not do Whumptober this year as my October schedule was INSANE. Now that I have a good percentage of my life back, I want to make up for this, as I have some cool ideas and I need the challenge of writing on a schedule.

I can't guarantee that I can produce something every day, but I'm damn well going to try. Caveat that these shorts (ha, "shorts," they said, laughing) will be less polished than my usual work (much less edited, if at all), as I'm using this as an exercise to get my writing back in shape before tackling my larger projects.

Today's theme: Forced to Choose

Today's author commentary: This was supposed to be a short. It ended up just over 2,000 words.

Warnings: Major character death

~~~~~~~~~~~

Bleck is dead.

They’re out of options, out of time. The last gambit with the Pure Hearts was just enough to break through Super Dimentio’s shield, to make him vulnerable to attack. (It, not him, Mario reminds himself as he bounds forward, executing a messy somersault that delivers him a mere breath from the angry slam of a gargantuan boot that would see him flattened in an instant). 

It was a bizarre piece of irony that the loyalty of Bleck’s minions could resurrect the Pure Hearts for one last encore performance, that the same people who attempted multiple times to kill Mario and his friends, the ones who ushered in the end of all worlds without a second thought, the ones who corrupted his little brother - 

If they live through this, they’ll get no thanks from his mouth.

But that’s a thought for later, for when the dust had settled and the worlds remained standing. (The worlds would remain standing. Mario won’t let it end any other way).

Mario sprints towards a rectangular pillar, kick stepping his way to the top. He’s certain to plant a foot directly into the grotesque likeness of Dimentio’s smiling mask as he clambers upwards, landing on the narrow platform just in time to hit the decks as another one of Super Dimentio’s missiles flies over his head. 

Too close, he thinks, shoving himself upright on trembling legs.  

They need to end this now. Peach is waving her parasol, trying to attract the attention of the enormous creature as Bowser booms from behind, ricocheting from platform to platform until he’s near enough to unleash a torrid stream of fire aimed at the back of Super Dimentio’s head. 

It’s enough to send the creature staggering, if that’s what the spastic, jutting movements of the sickly elongated neck could be called. But Bowser’s retreat is too sluggish, the Koopa not quick enough to avoid the retaliatory swing of an iron foot to the gut that sends him hurtling across the blank room, Bowser crashing into the far wall with a thunderous roar.

There’s no time to think, the small opening possibly their last hope of survival. Mario acts on years of well-honed instinct as he summons Carrie and Cudge in quick succession, riding the little boxy platform straight into Super Dimentio’s face, rearing back with Cudge to deliver a devastating blow to the bridge of the gigantic monster’s nose.

The resulting shriek is like a thousand sharpened nails being drawn down a chalkboard, a screeching static that melts with the creature in real time, feet dissolving into bubbling, swirling puddles of acid, legs less collapsing than imploding, a house of skeletal cards upended, each joint falling to the ground with a hollow bounce. 

A line of tiny, fire breathing molecules eat their way up two-toned smock and white ruffles, leaving a disembodied neck and head to float freely over the empty floor for a long second before the creature’s head comes smashing down to earth with a horrid splat, the force of the collision cracking the monster’s jaw in two, the upper portion of the head now unhinged from its base, the gaping maw open at a wide, unnatural angle.

Mario slides to the edge of a crumbling platform, the echoes of Dimentio’s mask now wiped from the edifice. Gingerly, he hops to the floor, limping through the smoke-shrouded scene to join the Princess and Bowser, who are keeping a safe distance from the now-malformed mockery of his brother’s face.

“Is…is it over?” Peach asks, wheezy. She puts a hand on Mario’s shoulder. He’s not certain if it’s a gesture of comfort or evidence of the toll the battle has taken on her. “Did we -”

“Ah ha ha ha ha ha ha.”

Terrors seizes in Mario’s chest as the decapitated head of his brother laughs, the unhinged jaw popping and creaking with each pulsating syllable. Peach’s grip tightens on Mario’s shoulder, her fingers digging into sore, bruised flesh as she lets out a horrified gasp. Behind him, Mario can feel the heat rising from Bowser’s fiery exhalations, the Koopa grinding his fangs together as he lets loose a dangerous, guttural growl.

“You think this is the end?” Dimentio’s voice bounces off every surface of the high-ceilinged room in a nightmarish symphony of sing-song mockery. “This isn’t finished. The Count is dead. And there is only one means of escape.”

The jaw detaches even further, the upper piece of the head bending back with a tortured squeal of viscera and metal. There’s a low rumbling, the earth beginning to tremble beneath Mario’s feet. All at once, the head of Super Dimentio lets out a rusted, phlegmatic bark that seems to emanate from the invisible depths of a diseased chest, and with it, expels a soft, human-like object in a spray of gooey, greenish fluid.

Mario’s heart stops in his chest. “Luigi,” he whispers, breaking free of Peach’s iron grip to sprint towards the prone form of his brother. 

Please be alive. You have to be alive. Oh my God, please. I’ll do anything. 

Relief floods past spiky adrenaline as Luigi begins to stir, Mario covering the last distance between the two of them by sliding on his knees across the smooth, marble floors, coming to rest at his brother’s side. 

“Luigi?” He’s pawing at his brother’s chest, his legs, his face, Mario doesn’t know what he’s looking for or what he's even doing aside from trying to account for all the little bits and pieces that make up his brother, to hold Luigi together by sheer force of will, as if he were a broken vase just waiting to fall to apart.

“Mario?” His brother’s grey-green eyes focus on his own, the dreamy, half-hypnotized look now melted away in favor of sharpened anxiety. Luigi grabs Mario’s hands in his own, using his brother to leverage himself up to a sitting position. 

“Mario, what happened? Where are we, why am I - “

The words die in Luigi’s throat as his gaze lands on his own bloated, distorted image, jaw jackknifed away from the upper part of his skull, blackened moustache now seeping with a gooey phlegm streaked with crimson, the wide, unblinking eyes criss-crossed in impossible directions. 

The ground trembles again, this time with enough violence to send a set of pillars toppling into a pile of broken concrete, the linear shapes and angles of Bleck’s castle seeping trails of pustulent white down the dark walls of the chamber. 

“Oh my God,” Luigi rasps, shuddering.

“Ciao, Luigi,” the bodiless voice of Dimentio greets.

Luigi squeezes his eyes shut, grabbing at the sides of his head with both hands. “No. No, no, no. This can’t be real. It didn’t happen. None of it happened. You can’t be real!” he screams, bringing down a shower of debris from the cracked ceiling. 

“Careful, mon ami,” Dimentio chides with a small chuckle. “This reality seems to be contingent on your mood.”

Mario wraps a protective arm around his little brother. “It’s over, Dimentio. You lost.”

“Is it, though?” The mouth of the monster has stopped moving, frozen in a gaping expression of demented awe. Only the eyes remain animated, dark, swirling irises pinballing off the walls of jaundiced sclera in a chaotic polyrhythm. 

“One last surprise! Ah ha ha ha ha. I may be dead but the Chaos Heart is not. A piece of it lives on, and while it does, nothing can stop the end of all worlds!”

A thunderous crackle booms from outside the castle, the room, reality itself teetering to the side as chunks of marble and plaster cascade to the floor, revealing an open wound in the ceiling through which the violet eye of the Void swirls, tempestuous.  

Luigi grips his brother’s shoulders, his voice high with panic. “Mario, what are we going to do?” 

“We’re going to stop this, Luigi,” Mario grits. “Right here. Right now.” He turns towards the head of Super Dimentio. Black skin is peeling from its cheeks, an ear dangling to the side by a single string of flesh. “Alright you bastard. You’re obviously done for. Where’s the last part of the Chaos Heart?”

“Where else?” Dimentio laughs, the teeth of the monster now crumbling to dust one by one. “Inside its perfect vessel. Just as it was foretold in the Dark Prognosticus.” 

Reality phases in and out of a sickening double, a photographic negative overlaid with a collapsing present. Peach and Bowser scramble over to join Mario and his brother, Bowser shielding the brothers from the worst of the falling detritus with his shell, Peach unfurling her parasol, situating it as best she can over both her and Bowser’s forms.

“Whatever it is, Red,” he growls, “we gotta do it fast.”

Mario nods. “What’s the vessel?” he yells over the rising clangor, pushing his brother further into Bowser’s protective embrace. 

“You mean who is the vessel,” Dimentio cackles through half a disintegrating face. “It’s quite simple. Destroy the man in green.”

The man in…

Denial tears through Mario’s chest.

“Liar!” he screams, jumping to his feet, oblivious to the hailstorm of matter pelting his body. “You’re a fucking liar!”

There’s no answer to be had, the last physical remnants of Dimentio carried off by the whirling Void, the space the head had occupied now a congealed puddle of tarry emerald. 

“Shit!” Mario yells, leaping out of the way of a massive piece of scaffolding. Something grabs at the straps of his overalls, pulling him under one of the last standing arches, bright, fuchsia lightning setting the room afire with a violent crackle.

“Lou, what are you doing?” Mario demands, shoving his brother further into the shadowy alcove. “You could have been killed!”

His brother is silent, gaze fixed on the ashen floor. Outside, the tumult crescendos to a booming, percussive explosion, rattling the very foundations of the castle. Small wisps of violet are beginning to reach down from the heavens, each eddy scraping a few more atoms of reality with it.

Luigi locks eyes with his brother, biting his lip.

“Mario - “

“No.” He knows what his brother is about to say. What he’s going to ask Mario to do. He grabs his brother by the back of the neck, pushing their foreheads together. “Don’t you dare. Don’t you fucking dare.”

“Mario.” His brother cups either side of his face, a movement so gentle Mario thinks he might cry. “I remember it all. Everything. Let me - “ Luigi’s voice cracks. “I need to make it right.”

Something awful crawls up Mario’s throat, a tight, squeezing thing wrapping vice-like fingers round his vocal cords.

“It wasn’t your fault, Lou,” he manages to force out through a tangle of emotion. 

Luigi gives a small sob. “I still did it, though.”

A low moan sounds from the sky, a deep, bass drone not voiced by any creature of this existence, as if it were the fundamental tone of all of reality.

Mario slides his face into the crook of his brother’s shoulder. “I just got you back,” he croaks, wet. “I can’t - I can’t - “

“You can’t let the world end because of me,” Luigi says, petting the back of his brother’s head before gently guiding Mario to meet him eye to eye.

“Let me be the hero for once.” Luigi gives a watery smile. “I’ve got this one,” he says, giving Mario’s cheek a fond pat before turning to walk into the maelstrom. 

Mario stands frozen as he watches his brother walk away, his thoughts and emotions encased in a sticky amber, his body either unwilling or unable to put a stop to what is happening. As his brother reaches the edge of the threshold between safety and annihilation, he pauses to look over his shoulder. 

“I love you, bro,” Luigi says. 

All Mario can do is give a simple wave back. 

It will have to be enough. 

Luigi huffs out a small laugh, waving back in kind. “Ciao, Mario.”

His brother disappears into the rainbow-hued whirlwind, the world coalescing into a single point of darkness.

[skaruresonic]

https://www.tumblr.com/skaruresonic/758536567626383360/the-dangers-of-free-will-what-dangers-being

"even if we're speaking simply from the POV of "Eggman almost destroyed the world when he regained his free will," does one bad apple really outweigh the fact that most people aren't environment-destroying madmen? does that give Eggman the right to deprive everyone else of their free will?"

Eggman is inarguably an irredeemably horrid monster with a long track record of gleefully subjecting innocent people to nightmarish fates. there should have never been any question on whether or not he deserves death.

This is what gets me. The people defending idw sonic's morality don't comprehend that different individuals with different histories will require different approaches.

Comic stans: If Sonic thinks it's fine to kill Eggman then that means he's fine with killing everybody

Uh no???

It's like asking why Sonic sentenced Erazor Djinn to eternal damnation but let Merlina go with a quick pep talk. It's because both cases were utterly incomparable and would naturally require different approaches.

Comic stans: Well if Sonic is fine with punishing irredeemable villains then why doesn't he kill Eggman?

Same reason why Sonic always survives impossible situations or gets outright resurrected after dying. SEGA is not gonna kill off their mascot or the mascot's main enemy. We have to remember there's a bit of a corporate aspect in all of this

Why is this so hard for some people?

This part of your post also stuck out to me "does that give Eggman the right to deprive everyone else of their free will?""

Eggman wants to turn everyone into unthinking machines specifically so he make them worship him forever. That's not exactly a desire or choice based on morality. All Eggman wants is the satisfaction of having power over all living beings.

The only way anyone can defend the idw sonic comic is by making up deranged nonsense and forcing themselves to believe in it.

Comic stans: If Sonic thinks it's fine to kill Eggman then that means he's fine with killing everybody

Uh no???

It's like asking why Sonic sentenced Erazor Djinn to eternal damnation but let Merlina go with a quick pep talk. It's because both cases were utterly incomparable and would naturally require different approaches.

I think the thing that really gets me is half the time I'm not even particularly arguing for or against Sonic killing Eggman as a solution to anything because what would that solve?

The point is moot. As long as there's a Sonic the Hedgehog(tm) franchise, Sonic and Eggman are going to continue fighting each other. The unstoppable force vs. the immovable object. As it should be.

Instead, I'm trying to point out how little Sonic regards Eggman's welfare in the games. That Eggman lives despite Sonic's attempts and extreme negligence should logically attest to Eggman's hardiness and resourcefulness. He's one slippery motherfucker. That's pretty much the size of it in the games.

Yet people interpret

"Sonic, personally, does not care whether Eggman lives or dies. He frequently leaves Eggman behind in explosions or other similar scenarios of the doctor's own making. In other cases, he ignores Eggman's pleas for help or puts Eggman in dangerous situations while neither knowing nor caring if Eggman survives, such as blowing up his Eggmobile with a rock or stealing his jetpack nozzle and sending him plummeting to Earth. "In fact, Sonic has acted so negligently towards Eggman that if he were charged in a court of law, he'd be looking at second degree homicidal negligence, the failure to protect a person which resulted in preventable death. All this should tell you the extent to which Sonic regards Eggman's welfare."

as

"I think Sonic should slaughter all of his enemies. No mercy. Mercy is for wimps."

Granted, not everyone strawmans the point this hard, but it's frequent enough to warrant the occasional facepalm. We're talking about how Sonic treats Eggman in the games, right? So why are we dragging how he treats every other villain into the conversation as if that's germane to the topic at hand?

Of course Sonic is going to treat his enemies on a case-by-case basis. However, I'd argue that the most common examples - "sparing" Metal in Heroes and Merlina in SatBK - aren't precisely the moments of mercy that people portray them as.

Putting aside the fact that Sonic was not the one to "rehabilitate" Knuckles, Shadow, or Silver, folks seem to forget that he charged the Dark Queen with seeming intent to kill twice. He didn't know she'd put up a shield when he lunged for her the first time. And the fact that he repeated the blow just raises questions.

Once, maybe it's an "in the heat of the moment" thing. But twice? Twice, you want somebody dead. Conveniently, I've never seen anyone mention that part of the pre-boss cutscene when they talk about Sonic giving Merlina the flower.

Sparing Metal... Yeah, no. He didn't. Metal passed out, and he ran off. Leagues different than taking Metal home and patching him up.

And idk, it seems weird how folks are unable to accept that sometimes, despite everything, Sonic does square up and kill. Yes. That is something he does on occasion.

It doesn't need all of these caveats and asterisks about how it doesn't count as "real killing," like it needs to be clarified that Sonic the Hedgehog isn't a serial killer. It's not like "he did it out of necessity" will suddenly cause Emerl to un-die at the end of Battle. It's not as though "he helped Shahra" renders "he sealed the Erazor Djinn in the lamp for all eternity and tossed it into the furnace so that the Djinn, if he didn't die just then, suffers eternally in a place no one can find him" moot.

---

Comic stans: Well if Sonic is fine with punishing irredeemable villains then why doesn't he kill Eggman?

Same reason why Sonic always survives impossible situations or gets outright resurrected after dying. SEGA is not gonna kill off their mascot or the mascot's main enemy. We have to remember there's a bit of a corporate aspect in all of this

Exactly.

[peninkwrites]

We're trapped in the belly of this horrible machine (And the machine is bleeding to death)

Tommy was going to break into the prison, he was going to kill Dream, even if he had to crawl in there with nothing but a knife to do it. An alternative to when Tommy and Ghostbur snuck into the prison to kill Dream.

Crossposted to ao3

(CW: claustrophobia, heat exhaustion, fear, panic attacks, ptsd)

~

Tommy will do this alone.

At first, Tubbo and Ranboo had wanted to come with him, but Tommy couldn’t let them do that.  He wasn’t sure why he refused them so adamantly, maybe because he didn't want to put them at risk, maybe because he didn’t want them to see the kind of person that man made him turn into.

Then, he considered Ghostbur.  He didn’t pose a threat to anyone, so surely Sam would let him into the prison, but when it came time to ask, to let him in on the plan, Tommy had taken one look at those pale, vacant eyes, and he just couldn’t.  Ghostbur wasn’t meant to go in the prison.  Something so gentle, so hollow, could not endure the very air that permeated the halls of Pandora’s Vault, let alone what resided in its heart.  Tommy could not endure what resided there.

He would do so nonetheless, and he would do it alone.

Sam’s design is a beautiful, horrid, living thing.  Tommy has seen how it works from the inside, and he explained every mechanism in great detail to Tubbo.

Tubbo, who had wanted so badly to join him, who had said, “really, bossman, do you think I’m gonna let you do this alone?”

And Tommy’s reply had been too simple, too desperate.  “Please.”

It had not been that one word, rather, the way Tommy had looked at him, pleading and needing him to give in and let Tommy do this.  There were some things Tubbo could never refuse, at least never refuse again, and Tommy asking something of him was hard to resist.

Ranboo was easy.  Ranboo, who, like Ghostbur, didn’t remember and didn’t want to do any harm, the difference being, when Tommy told him to stay behind with Tubbo, he had understood, he had been afraid for his friend in a way Ghostbur was incapable of being.

Tubbo, even as he had not been allowed to cross this line with his best friend, would do everything he could to help him.  Tommy, for all his pretenses of fearlessness, he’d told his friends about the prison.  Barely, and through trembling breath and a dizzy head and a face still bruised post resurrection, but he had told Tubbo enough.  Tommy needed this man dead, and he needed to be the one to do it.  So Tubbo listened, he thought out what he believed the plans could look like, and he offered Tommy something terrible and reassuring.

“Look, there needs to be a ton of space for the redstone to operate, not to mention vents to get in fresh air, probably decent-sized ones since he’s gotta be pumping the heat out of the main cell and getting fresh air in.  I’d imagine he doesn’t have the vents into Dream’s cell connected directly outside, he probably has a lot of them to diffuse the heat before he pumps it out, and if I were him, I’d have the ones pumping fresh air in go under the water, just to add to the cooling.” Tubbo tries to focus on the practical, on the analytical, assessing the functionality of a mechanism and nothing more, and not on the fact that soon his friend was dead set on crawling inside of that machine.  “I wish I had those stupid blueprints, if I could see the actual design I could work out a proper flaw no problem, this is just– it’s guesswork.”

“Come on, Tubster, you’re a fuckin’ genius!  I know you can figure something out,” Tommy says, trying to sound enthused instead of desperate.  Every minute he spends, even out, even free, even alive, his skin crawls knowing Dream breathes just across the water.  He has to do this.

Tubbo frowns, doubtful.  “Sam will have made the vents pretty small.  They need to be bigger than typical air ducts, just for the amount of heat he’s generating, but he’d definitely want to make sure, well, make sure nothing like what we’re planning on doing could happen.”

“Okay?” Tommy asks, pacing from foot to foot.

“Tommy… Aren’t you claustrophobic?” Ranboo asks carefully, looking too tall sitting beside the table in Tommy’s war room.  This is where Tommy had taken him after they had first met, this is where he had let Tommy drag him into mischief.  Tommy thinks Ranboo somehow looks smaller than he had then.  Tommy feels smaller too.

“I mean–” Tommy laughs nervously.  “Hardly anymore!  For a little while there I was, but– but I’ll be fine.”

Tubbo and Ranboo look at him and they don’t believe him, so Tommy tries another way, an old reliable method.  “Please.  I– I have to do this.  I already feel like I’m trapped in a little box all the fucking time knowing he’s out there, s-so, I– I have to.”

Tubbo and Ranboo exchange an indirect glance.  Tubbo refocuses on his loose notes, on the haphazard outline of the interior of the prison Tommy had pieced together for him.  He’s trying to work in negative space, to build a safe path out of absence.  “Right.  Well, we’re not sending you in the vent where the heat comes out, so we gotta find where he pulls cool air in.”  Tubbo has a hundred other concerns, the first ones coming to mind being that the actual drop into the cell could be far enough to do some real damage, that there would have to be lots of strong fans to do the actual venting, and how easy it would be for Tommy to die like that.  “A-And the vent should probably let out throughout the building.  He couldn’t let the redstone get too hot, it could fuck up the wiring.  So, if it gets to be too much, Tommy, you can always pop out.”

Tommy laughs, barking and sharp.  “Right, right, and how do I break the vents and shit when I wanna take a little rest, eh?”

Tubbo gives him a look.  “I dunno, Tommy.  Same way you plan on breaking through the fans or the grills that are definitely gonna be blocking up the vent?”

Tommy scowls.  “You’re the clever one, figure it out!”

“Milk?” Ranboo suggests halfheartedly.

“Nah, there’s two elder guardians to like, make sure that doesn’t happen,” Tommy waves him off.

“Not even long enough to break through one iron bar?”

Tommy shrugs.  “Fuck if I know!  I just know every five seconds it was boom! Elder guardian, elder guardian, elder guardian!” Tommy mimics firing a gun like the elder guardians had come at him like bullets.  “With the– with the freaky noise and shit!”

“Got it, no milk,” Ranboo says, eyebrows raised.

“And, Tommy, I don’t think you’ll be able to wear armor.”

“What?” Only now does Tommy falter.

“Well, even with the fresh air coming in, at some point you’ll have to crawl through a vent in a sea of lava, right?”

“I… I guess.”

“Tommy, you’d get fried in there.  I’m not kidding, even in Netherrite, when that stuff gets hot enough, it could literally start to burn you.  You don’t wanna make it that far and get convection baked, do you?”

“Convection ba–” Tommy sputters.  “No, no I do not.”

“So no armor, then,” Ranboo sighs.

“No armor,” Tommy mutters, his stomach in knots.

“Well, we won’t be able to know if any of this is a possibility until we look at the prison and see how big the vent is, right?” Tubbo points out.

It was, surprisingly, not all that difficult to find.  The decorative lines of iron bars on the exterior were not, in fact, all that decorative, and in the bottom of one of the alcoves, there was not blackstone behind the bars, but instead open space.  Just standing there, they could feel the air being tugged in.  Additionally, the size of the vent.  It was small.  Too small for Tubbo to fit, too small for Ranboo, beanpole as he is, but Tommy thinks it’s not too small for him.  He’d never really put on all his weight again after exile.

“Psh,” Tommy rolls back his shoulders with a scoff.  “I can squeeze in there!  No biggie.”

Tubbo and Ranboo once more share that stupid fucking worried look between them.  “It’s… it’s pretty small, Tommy,” Ranboo says carefully.

“And I’m just a little guy!  Come on, look at me, Ranboo,” Tommy says with his usual perfect puppy-dog eyes.  “I’m just a poor wittle guy!”

Tubbo, resigned, once more focuses on logic.  “Still, it’s… it’s small, Tommy.  How are you planning on dragging an axe with you in there?”

Tommy shrugs.  “I’ll figure it out!  I can always kill ‘im with my bare hands!” Tommy squares up, no longer a little guy and once more brave and swaggering.

“We can plan back at the house, I don’t wanna hang around here longer than we have to,” Ranboo murmurs, scanning the surrounding sea warily.

When they return to the house, it seems it is not to plan further, but to dissuade him.

“Tommy, I really don’t think you can manage it.  Like, that vent was tiny.  You won’t be able to crawl all the way on your knees.  Like, even if you can fit at all, you won’t be able to even move enough to reach into your inventory.  You’ll just be able to keep crawling.  Sam designed it so a person couldn’t fit in there.  Are you really expecting us to believe that doesn’t scare you?” Tubbo tries emphatically, a hint of panic evident.

“Nah!  Not gonna get scared by a fuckin’ vent,” Tommy scoffs.  “A-And!”  He scrambles for a bright side.  “No detector shit on the inside of that, so if I break the bars, it won’t tell Sam or nothing!”

“I know you feel like you need to do this, but if you actually like, can’t…” Ranboo trails off, unsure of where to go from there, because there isn’t anywhere to go.  If it’s impossible, Tommy can’t do it.  Convincing Tommy of that is a different matter.

“I can do it!” Tommy sounds more desperate now.  “Why the fuck wouldn’t I?!  I can fit in there, it just probably won’t be much fun,” a panicked laugh.

Another exchange of knowing glances that makes Tommy want to claw his friends’ eyes out.

“Tommy, what if we take a pause, and… reevaluate?” Tubbo offers.  “There’s gotta be a way in, bossman, nothing is unsinkable, as they say.  But I don’t think this is it.  What if… what if you give me a few days to work on it?” Tubbo tries.

“Work on it?” Tommy says doubtfully.

“I’ll see if I can figure out more about the redstone!  Maybe we can… hack the keycard system, or get you inside another way to a spot where you can open the doors using the redstone!” Tubbo hopes he sounds convincing, that Tommy will think it’s at least possible.  Honestly, Tubbo has no idea.

Tommy scuffs his feet on the blackstone floor of the war room.  “Fine, fucking hell, if you can come up with something in a few days, I’m all for it, but otherwise, I am goin’ in the vent!”

Another fucking glance exchanged.

“Alright, that’s the plan for now, then,” Tubbo agrees, but Tommy notes he doesn’t promise.  He doesn’t say that it’s a deal or it’s even the plan, just for now.

“Good,” Tommy says irritably.  He stares at his two friends with the feeble, frustrating realization, that they don’t think he can do this.  They don’t want him to do this, and they seem to think because they’re so worried about him it’s within their rights to stop him.

He doesn’t know why he thought they understood that when he says he has to do this, he’s not exaggerating.  He’d say it’s this or kill himself, but he already knows where being dead leads, and that’s not a way out either.  He has to kill Dream.

So Tommy waits, and once he is alone, once he has convinced his friends he’s agreed to wait, he goes to the prison.  He’s grateful at the start of this process he’d made sure to tell them both how much they meant to him.  It wasn’t perfect, but it was a goodbye of some sort, because it’s obvious to him, maybe it’s even obvious to Tubbo and Ranboo, that he won’t be coming back from this one.  If he manages to crawl all the way to that cell, how the fuck is he going to crawl back out?  No, he’ll do what he came there to do, and then he’ll wait for Sam to check in and let him out.  Or maybe he won’t let him out, maybe he’ll keep him there again, this time for murdering his only prisoner.

Tubbo was right that he couldn’t take an axe with him, it’s too tight, he doesn’t know how he’ll do this as is, let alone dragging that with him, so instead, Tommy has a knife.  It’s small enough he can keep it between his teeth.  He can’t bring a pick either, not that it would do him any good, so he has a few sticks of TNT.  He’s tied it with chord and threaded his flint and steel on it so he can keep it around his neck.  He’s got three sticks of the stuff.  He hopes that’s all he needs, if there’s more than three fans to blow up, he’s fucked.

Tommy waits until it’s well into the night to start walking, glancing around, constantly expecting someone to appear despite the lateness of the hour.  He wishes he hadn’t tied the tnt around his neck right away.  He could’ve made up some excuse for walking around at night, but someone would definitely question his morbid looking suicide collar.  It’s late, and therefore dark, with scant moonlight, but Tommy won’t have to go far once he leaves the light of the server, so he shouldn’t have to worry much about mobs.  Still, entering the blackness lit only by veins of lava threaded between the ramparts, it makes what he’s about to do a lot more tangible.  Tommy stares through the metal grate, already breathing hard.  Surely just from the climb up here.  He’s brought a few more things, things that won’t follow him inside.  A night vision potion, a fire res potion, and a bottle of milk.  Eight minutes on each potion.  He’ll have eight minutes of light, eight minutes of protection from the heat.  Tommy drinks the milk.  He breaks through the iron bars just in time to flinch away from the elder guardian coming down over his eyes.  He tosses aside the pick and the iron bars.  He stares into the dark and downs the potions, first night vision, then the fire res.  Being able to see what awaits him does not make it any less terrifying, but with the potion he can now see a drop off about ten blocks into the prison.  He hopes it’s not far enough of a fall to kill him; that would be a pathetically short attempt at a break in.

Tommy stares into the vent, knowing the clock is already ticking on his potions.  He cannot wait anymore.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck–” Tommy hisses through his teeth before muffling himself by putting a knife between them.  A knife.  That’s all he needs.  Dream is weak and armed only with potatoes.  Now Tommy has the advantage.

He starts to crawl.

The tunnel is so narrow his shoulders scrape against the sides, it’s so low he cannot crawl on his knees and instead must wriggle forward, dragging himself inch by dreaded inch on his elbows.  Tommy feels sick.  He cannot hear his racing heart over the ominous tones of the elder guardian and the distant low hum of the vents, and the sounds make it feel like it’s Pandora’s Vault itself breathing around him, the air still flowing past him, still being pulled in, is its slow, steady inhale.

Tommy could maybe back out at this point, but then he reaches the drop off.  With the night vision, he sees it’s only a drop of about six blocks, more than survivable, but definitely not climbable.  Tommy almost wishes he’d brought ladders before recalling, as Tubbo had said, the vent is too fucking narrow for him to even reach down to his pocket to access his inventory.

Tommy stares down at the point of no return and gets dizzy.  He starts to back up.  The way out is only ten blocks behind him, backing up hurts worse than crawling forward––he keeps hitting his head on the top of the tunnel––but he only backs up maybe a foot before he stops.  He rests his forehead on the floor of the vent and tries to breathe.  He feels the moisture accumulating on the blade with every exhale.

You have to do this.  He cannot still be out there.  He cannot be able to do this to you again.  To do this to anyone else.

You have to do this.

Tommy crawls forward.

He stares down into the dark, now realizing he has no idea how he’s supposed to drop down there.  It will have to be head first.  The vent is too small for him to turn around.  Tommy pulls himself forward, inch by wretched inch, until he dangles over the edge, the corner of the vent digging into his waist painfully.  Tommy stares at his own stark white hands against the black, held out as if to keep something at bay, but he knows they’re there to catch him.  That’s all he’s doing.  He’s not shielding himself from an axe or a fist, he’s just going to catch himself.  Tommy wriggles forward a bit more, and a bit more, and then his center of gravity is over the edge and he falls.  Tommy cries out and drops the knife, it nicking the corner of his lip on its way out, but he catches himself.  His wrists ache sharply, as do his palms, but he hasn’t broken anything.

Tommy pauses only for a moment to ease some of his trembling, but he has to keep going.  He’s currently trapped himself in a very uncomfortable handstand.  Tommy winces, his left arm aching in painful protest as he raises his right to grab the knife and put it back between his teeth.  This corner where the two ducts meet is the only point with enough space where he could have, in theory, accessed his inventory.  He didn’t think to bring anything.  He sort of wishes he’d brought a gapple, just to get some courage.  He knows it’s a bad habit, but that feels so trivial right now.  Tommy, knife back between his teeth, slowly starts to turn around until he is facing the next duct, still upside down, blood is starting to rush to his head, making him feel heavy and strange.  From here, he slowly lowers himself to the ground, pushing his torso into the next tunnel until he sits at an angle, legs pointed upward, resting against the wall of the duct he had fallen down, and laying on his back in the next one.  Tommy also realizes the temperature has dropped.  Tubbo must have been right, these ducts must run over the water to cool the air further, or maybe Sam even has pools of water inside the prison to do so.  As he lies there, the blood begins to redistribute through his body, his legs still up in the air, but his head no longer feels weighted.

He’s not sure if he’ll be able to rotate so he can crawl forward again, but the thought of trying to shuffle down the vent on his back sounds fucking intolerable, so he still has to try.  Tommy pushes himself further into the vent using his legs, and once he’s all straightened out, he tries to turn.  Tommy shuts his eyes tightly, wincing as his shoulders are crammed between the top and bottom of the vent.  It hurts, it hurts shoulders, his collarbones, his muscles as well as his bones protesting with sharpness and aches, as nonetheless, he crushes himself between the rocks, still pushing, still forcing himself to turn.  He muffles a cry as his skin is scraped raw through his shirt as he nonetheless drags his shoulder to the other side until finally, there’s give.  And he’s back where he’d started, laying on his stomach, breathing hard, knife still between his teeth.  The prickling sharpness of the pain on his shoulders tells him he’s bleeding, that what’s dripping there is not just sweat, although he’s definitely sweating too, even in the brisk air from outside, but Tommy ignores it.  It doesn’t matter.  There’s no going back now.

The thought hits him like a ton of bricks––or perhaps a familiar blast of TNT––and he cannot go forward for a moment, consumed by a deep rooted, animalistic terror that he has just buried himself alive.  If he were to try to back up right now, the exit is not waiting ten blocks away, but rather at the top of that little ledge.  Tommy once more presses his forehead to the stone beneath him, elbows tucked into his chest, breathing hard, wheezing and desperate, eyes open wide, staring at the unnaturally visible blackstone beneath him.  You have to do this.  You have to do this you have to do this you have to do this––

If Tommy were facing the other way, maybe he could jump, grab onto the edge, and hoist himself up, but he’s not facing the other way, so there’s nothing he can do except keep going.

That fact is almost calming.  He can only move forward, and that lack of choice, that simplicity, it allows him to function again.  Tommy refuses to think about what lies behind him, about ocean air and moonlight and the ability to stretch out his fucking arms, and only thinks about what lies ahead.  Tommy looks up.  About twenty blocks ahead, there is a turn.

He keeps going.

It’s painfully slow, and it’s painful as well as slow.  Even though the width is a bit greater than the height, his already bloodied shoulders still drag irritatingly along the sides, his knees keep on colliding with the stone painfully, his forearms too do not appreciate being forced to drag all his bodyweight forward inches at a time, but he just keeps his eyes fixed on that bend in the vent, as if trying to convince himself that just around the corner awaits open space and light and freedom and oh, is that carrot cake?  And Henry, good to see you!  How are you, my dearest cow!  Thank you, for the apology, Wilbur, why don’t we all go home to L’Manberg and everything will be fucking perfect!

Tommy lets off a muffled laugh that sounds more like a whimper, his internal monologue a distraction for only a few feet, and then he reaches the bend.  Around the corner is not paradise, rather, another long stretch of blackstone, and at the end, he sees the spinning blades of a fan.  The moment he reaches the corner, the low hum of the fan is doubled into a dull roar in his ears, the steady thrum of the blades whirring along is overwhelming.  Tommy stares at it warily, as if it might suddenly start spinning toward him, one hand going to the bundle of TNT heavy around his neck.  Not yet.  Tommy, somehow the prospect of blowing something up in this tiny tunnel does not terrify him, but rather spurs him on, gives him a tangible goal beyond endless ducts.

Tommy thinks his knees must be bleeding now too, his elbows are stinging as well, but he can at least see his elbows, and while they’re definitely scraped, not enough for bloodied drops just yet.  His brief enthusiasm certainly didn’t help, not that being slow and cautious could save him from any harm.  The echo of the ducts had made the fan loud enough, so being this close isn’t much worse, but it’s certainly not something he can crawl through.  The blades look awfully sharp, spinning too fast for him to see through them clearly, so he does as he’d planned, and slips one stick of TNT loose from the bunch.  His eyebrows furrow, unable to frown with the knife between his teeth.  He’ll have to back up super fast if he doesn’t want the rest of the TNT to blow up in his face.  That is going to be hard and it’s definitely going to hurt like a bitch.

Tommy places the stick of TNT down wedged in the corner between the edge of the fan and the duct and begins to hit steel to flint.  Sparks, the hiss of a fuse, and Tommy has never crawled faster in his fucking life.

He scrapes his head against the stone, busts up already bloody knees, and fucking eviscerates his elbows, dragging himself back through his own now visable trail of blood scattered along the stone, but he makes it almost back to the bend in the tunnel when the TNT goes off.

Tommy should’ve covered his eyes, maybe held up his hands over his face, but he’d been so desperate to get away, to keep an eye on the fuse, he’d stared unblinkingly directly at the blast.  The sound echoes along with the force of the explosion, hitting him hard. Tommy has no sense of what a miracle it is his head wasn’t cleaved in two by shrapnel, instead he’s more preoccupied in an older, more reliable terror.

“Put your armor in the hole.”

“Do you want to be a hero, Tommy?”

“Or I’ll kill you.”

“We had to send a message.”

“How about you get in the hole, Tommy?”

“God help anyone who gets caught in the crossfire!”

“Our story will never be over.”

His life has been ripped apart by explosions too many times and by too many people.

Tommy covers his ears, eyes closed even as the light of the explosion is seared into his eyes.  He’s bit down even harder on the knife, the metal making his teeth ache, his lip bleeding worse, and all he can do is take desperate, wheezing breaths through his nose, tears joining the clammy sweat already covering his face, as his whole body aches with tension.  He’s rigid as a board, wishing he could curl up into a ball, but he can’t fucking move and it feels as if the walls are snaring tighter, like they’re wrapping around his very lungs and oh god I don’t want to die down here.  I don’t want to die here.  I can’t I can’t I can’t I can’t–

Tommy doesn’t know how many precious minutes he wastes before he seems to register he’s still alive, he’s still generally unharmed, and there is no one bearing down on him to do him harm.  His eyes are no longer left flooded with white from the explosion, and the night vision is still doing its work for now.  He doesn’t know how it hasn’t been eight minutes yet.  It feels like he’s been down here for fucking hours.  Ahead, Tommy sees the fan has been torn to bits, and he thinks it might have broken a few blocks as well.  Tommy, spurred on by the thought of being able to fucking move scrambles forward with more urgency, all the more careless as his body has already been scraped up, he doesn’t know what more harm he could do.

The stone gets hot underneath him, not painfully so, almost a relief after the chill of the past tunnels, and he can see bits of burnt metal and tries to push it out of his path.  Tommy realizes with a funny turn in his stomach like he’s skipped a step, that he could’ve just drowned himself.  The coolness in the air makes him think he’s now under the water, and he just tried to blow a fucking hole in it.  Tommy registers what had saved him from that fate, feeling deranged and a bit stupid.  There had to be space for the redstone wiring, so this particular section of the duct had more stone around it.  Hopefully that means he won’t drown himself at the next fan either.  At the point where the fan had been, there is enough stone broken apart that Tommy can sit up, and he thinks the relief of it might kill him.  Tommy sits up, body aching, every muscle relieved to be able to do something beside lie flat and shuffle forward.

The relief might actually kill him, because he can’t imagine he has much time left on his potions, and he has no idea how much further there is to go.  Tommy’s whole body hurts, and it is that ache in the quiet, in this moment of rest, that gets him moving again.  He’s been scraped open against stone before; head bashed against obsidian, ribs cracked against stone, over and over until it stopped, until everything stopped, except for the pain.

Tommy crouches down in front of the next stretch, knees aching, swallowing back sickness, he takes a deep breath, returns the knife to between his teeth, and resumes his toil.  Another dozen blocks ahead, another turn.  It is not until he gets closer that he realizes, it is at this point that the duct goes up.

Tommy freezes.

He’d been prepared for a fall, but he must be fucking dense as a brick, because he hadn’t prepared for a climb.

Tommy has no choice but to continue forward.  He’ll at least get to stand up, he supposes.  It is here, that the droning hum of a fan resumes.  Tommy reaches the corner, and looks up at spinning blades far above him.  It must be fifteen blocks at least.

Tommy also realizes, he’s going to have to turn around again.  Thankfully, this way, his shoulders are at the bend in the vent, so there’s enough room he doesn’t destroy them again against the walls of the duct, but his hips certainly don’t appreciate it.  Still, after some wriggling, he’s sitting up at the corner of the duct, legs stretched out, sitting upright.

Now what?  What the fuck are you gonna do?  Sprout some spider legs and scurry on up the sides?!

Tommy takes the knife out of his mouth, leaning back against the stone, taking deep, shaky breaths.  “Fuck…” he sighs, staring up at the spinning blades too high above him.

He tugs out another piece of TNT a little hopelessly.

“Aw, Tommy, did you really think you could kill me?  That you could get to me all on your own?  You’re weak and pathetic.  And you were stupid enough to find another way to die, huh?”

Tommy shudders, Dream’s mocking voice crawling from his subconscious, rage mingling with disgust, until Tommy yet again forces himself to keep going.  He stands up, he slides the TNT back into the length of chord, and puts the blade between his teeth.  Staring up at the fan, he feels a bit like a wingless, burrowing version of Icarus reaching towards the sun.  Tommy plants his hands against one side of the duct, narrow enough he has to bend his elbows, and presses his back against the other side.  He pulls his knees up as much as he can, feet planted against the wall beneath him, so he’s wedged himself between the two sides of the vent.  The grip of his sneakers seems to hold, especially considering how fucking narrow it is.  Okay.  He can do this.

Tommy presses his hands flat against the opposite side, letting the tension between that and his back support him as he pulls his legs up a little higher.  Progress.  He begins to inch-worm up the vent toward the spinning blades.  His shoulders continue to get scraped raw against the stone, and the tunnel is so narrow he can only move up a few inches at a time, but he’s moving .

The sound of the fan is getting louder, he glances up intermittently to see how close he’s gotten, and about halfway up, the lights begin to flicker.

At least, that’s Tommy’s first thought as darkness flashes over his vision, before he recalls that there are no lights.  There’s only his night vision potion, which is currently running out.  And then it does.

“No!” Tommy cries out, panicked, lucky enough to catch his knife not blade first on his legs.  He fumbles for it in the black, hissing as his fingers find the blade instead of the handle, but he holds onto it tightly, gasping for breath.  He cannot relax.  He cannot stop.  He needs to keep pressing against the walls or else he’s definitely going to fall far enough to hurt himself.

He cannot see a fucking thing.

Tommy doesn’t think he’s experienced darkness this consuming since Limbo.  This is the kind of blackness that he cannot comprehend existing in the living world, but nonetheless, it does.

There’s no light forward.  Not for a long time.

There’s no light back there either.

“H-Help me!” Tommy doesn’t know why that pleading slips past his bleeding lips, but he can’t help it.  He doesn’t know what to do.  “Anybody!  Please!  Please, someone help me!  I’m stuck!  I’m fucking stuck down here!  Hello?!”  His own voice echoes back, and he hears his own terror a dozen times over.  Hello?! Hello?! Hello..?!

Tommy wants to cry again, but he has a feeling if he starts sobbing he’ll lose his grip on the wall and tumble down and end up in a heap of broken legs.  Tommy is still breathing hard, he’s still shaking, and he still thinks any moment he’s going to fall, crying or not.

That’ll really give you something to cry about, eh?

Tommy suppresses a shiver.  I’ll give you something to cry about.  Tommy can’t figure out if it’s something Dream ever actually said to him, or if it’s just too fitting so he can still hear it in his voice.

I’m gonna kill him.

Tommy stays aloft, he keeps himself pressed to the walls of the tunnel, and his breathing slows.

I’m gonna kill him.  Those words feel almost like an oath, or perhaps a prayer, whatever it is, it’s enough that he keeps moving upwards, the sound of the fan blades warning him as he gets closer.

The sound is close enough, the pull of the air strong enough, he thinks the fan must be only a few more feet above.

Okay, how are you gonna blow it up?

Tommy once more fumbles to take out the piece of TNT, staring at it––or rather, staring at where he thinks it is––and tries to figure out how the fuck to do this.

It’ll have to be a gamble.  He cannot think of a reliable way around it unless he feels like sacrificing his fingers to the fan blades.  He’ll need to light the TNT, and then chuck it at the fan and pray that it sticks.  If it falls through while already lit…

Maybe he’ll get lucky and manage to put it out before it goes off?

Tommy laughs weakly around his knife, feeling more than a little deranged at this point.  He wedges the TNT between his knees, feeling for the flint and steel around his neck.  Tommy makes one spark, he doesn’t hit the fuse, but that moment of light leaves Tommy almost giddy with relief.

It’s not Limbo.  You can see light.  It’s not Limbo.

Tommy makes it spark again, and he’s so startled that he manages to hit the fuse blind on the second try, he almost panics.  He grabs it, fumbling and desperate, heart racing, and throws it up at the fan blades.  He sees that hissing speck of light disappear through the metal, and then it starts to drop back down.  Tommy’s heart is beating in his throat.  There’s a dull clang! and the light stops there, caught on the other side of the fan.

Tommy cannot pause to relish in the relief, because right now he would be best served being about six blocks lower than he is currently.  Tommy lets out a stream of unintelligible curses from around the knife in his mouth as he lets himself drop, catching himself about ten blocks down with jarring pain that knocks the wind out of him and absolutely fucks up his knees.  Tommy has about a second to brace at that point, with enough sense to cover his head, as soon there are shards of hot metal ricocheting down the vent.  Tommy grits his teeth as something cuts open his arm, burning it too, and another piece of hot stone bounces off of his head before clattering down to the bottom still a good ten blocks below, and then it stops.  No more shrapnel rains, he is not dead, and there is no longer the dangerous drone of the fan threatening to shred him to ribbons if he kept climbing.  Tommy looks up, before remembering he can’t see a fucking thing, rendered worse by the brief flash of light.  He could be shuffling up into exposed blades of hot metal.  He won’t know until he moves.

Tommy’s whole body is in agony, the muscles of his legs are screaming at him as he’s been forcing them to keep him aloft for far too many minutes now, but nonetheless, he makes them go a little further and he’s somehow fortunate enough they don’t give out on him.  Tommy is startled to fall backwards, and that sudden loss of tension almost sends him slipping back down the chute, but at the last second he scrambles to push his legs out straight and keep himself steady.  He’s reached the explosion point, and therefore a ledge.  Tommy sits back further, legs now resting on the other side of the alcove, forced to stoop over as this explosion broke away less stone than the last, but nonetheless, for a moment he can sit and rest.

And once more, that relief reminds him that he doesn’t think he can keep doing this, even as he knows he has no other choice.

The potions have run out.  Maybe you can just rest?  There’s no reason to rush anymore.

Yeah, and you’ll sleep your way to the bottom of this fucking vent and kill yourself.

Tommy needs to move right now, or he’ll pass out before he can even try.  He can’t see.  For all he knows, the next bend is twenty blocks above him.

Or it could be two.

You can make it up two.

Tommy leans forward, one hand feeling for the lip of the alcove so he doesn’t bash his head on it, the other supporting his weight against the bottom ledge.  Tommy rests his feet on the ledge on the opposite side, and uses his hands to shimmy up the tunnel until he’s almost standing up straight.  One leg at a time, he pulls his knees back up to support him.

Inches at a time, he keeps moving.  He feels blood flowing more steadily from the cut across his arm and he realizes how lucky he is that the bit of stone that hit his head wasn’t moving at the speed of a bullet from the explosion and had instead probably bounced off the edge and lost that momentum against the stone instead.  Lucky.  None of this feels especially lucky to him.

Then Tommy’s knees hit open space instead of stone.  The tunnel is narrow enough that at this angle he doesn’t send himself falling back down to what is surely a fatal drop at this point.  Tommy freezes, scared to move and risk losing any of the tension currently stopping him from turning into Tommy mush at the bottom of a hole.  He doesn’t know how to move forward head first.  His knees are currently what’s keeping him anchored into the new section of tunnel, and if he moves them back to actually crawl forward, he’s pretty sure he’ll slip and kill himself.  Tommy slowly, carefully, keeping his back pinned to the wall to support himself, reaches forward with fumbling, blind hands for the ledge of the next section of tunnel.  Tommy will hold on, and pray he can support his own bodyweight with just his skinny fucking arms, and then he will lower his legs and lean forward.

It feels like a teetering balancing act, his palms flat, and the upper half of his body leaning forward just as he allows his legs to drop back down into the tunnel below, but enough of his torso catches on the ledge that he doesn’t kill himself.  Tommy, eager to be away from the drop off, kicks himself forward, wriggling back into the narrow but blissfully horizontal tunnel ahead.

Maybe Tommy is imagining things, or maybe the vertical section of vents had been bigger than the tunnel before, but he swears it’s somehow gotten narrower.  He can barely move his arms, he cannot bend his legs enough for them to be of any help moving him forward, and each painful pull of his forearms pressed to stone, dragging him ahead a few inches, also scrapes his already bloodied and raw shoulders against the stone.  Tommy suppresses every evil and rational thought warning him he’s about to get stuck, that he’s about to wedge himself in here so tightly he won’t be able to get his arms free at all and then he will die here, slowly and painfully.

It’s also warm up here.

After the damp chill, maybe it should have come as a relief, but it’s very warm up here.  He must be in the lava now.  Tommy manages to wipe sweat from his face.  It burns every scrape it touches, which is probably 70% of his body at this point.  Tommy should have saved the fire res.  It ran out down in the cool damp of the last duct, and now he’s going to boil unaided.

Tommy has once more crossed a point of no return, all he can do is go forward and hope he can make it to the end.  That is one solace, even as the stone pressing in around him gets hotter, not quite burning him yet, but something close, he at least knows he’s almost there.  He’s in the lava now, and next is Dream.  Tommy is finding it hard to breathe.  Not only because taking a deep breath is enough he can feel the tunnel wrapping even tighter, but the heat as well.  Tommy knows cool air was being pulled in through the vents, but considering Tommy has been hard at work blowing up every fan that did so, he knows that whatever cool air had been coming in before is definitely hot again.  Without the cool air, is it hot enough in here to actually kill him?

Tommy buries the thought.  He cannot afford to think like that, all he can do is push forward, to drag himself inch by wretched inch, to let his skin sear against stone that is only getting hotter.  There’s no light.  Even as lava must glow brightly only a few blocks away, the tunnel remains pitch-black.  Tommy cannot make out the next bend in the duct, he cannot make out any light, there is only the immediate walls pressing in on him, there is only the heat, and the sound of the lava bubbling, as if mocking him in his efforts, and eventually Tommy just stops.  He needs to keep moving, he knows stopping is all but embracing his death sentence, and he knows death is not going to offer relief.  But he can’t do it anymore.  He just needs to pause, to catch his breath.  The walls pressing in, touching his shoulders, searing the front of his body, all of it reminds him he cannot stay here, but he’s so tired.

You can lay down and die, Tommy.  But not until Dream dies first.

Tommy tugs himself forward, elbows burning, barely keeping his head off the ground, kept from collapse only by the heat, and he tugs himself forward again.  His limbs ache, weak and struggling to move any further.  His mouth is so dry.  He’s scared he’s going to drop the knife.  Tommy takes the knife from his mouth, holding it in his hand tightly, the leather-wrapped handle hot, the metal hotter.  He’s close now.  He’ll need to have his knife ready.  Tommy doesn’t know if the end is in sight, but it has to end somewhere.  It cannot go on forever.

Tommy stops moving, and blearily, frantically, he thinks he’s stuck, his shoulders are burning up, his knees, his arms, his stomach, but the vent hasn’t gotten any smaller, he’s just gotten weaker and moving has gotten harder, hurts worse.

Tommy weakly remembers a different time, the antithesis of this moment in its entirety, he remembers escaping, he remembers talking himself down from suicide and fleeing over snow, the way the cold had burned then too, and he had felt like he was going to live again.

Here he was, trapped, heat closing in, clawing his way back toward Dream, not an open expanse of snow, but blackness and the world closing in on him.  His weakness grows worse as he dares to think, what if Tubbo was gonna come up with a better idea?  What if you did this to yourself for no reason?

He cannot afford such a thought.  It’s not an option.  The only choice is to move forward an inch, and then the only choice to will be to move forward another.  Tommy has been looking down for a while now, his head feels too heavy, so it’s only when he’s close, close enough that he can see the outline of his trembling fingers, see the shine of the knife, does he realize there is light again.

Tommy looks up.  Ahead, shining up from the ground, light.

Tommy crawls more frantically, his breathing coming out in wheezing, whimpering gasps, but he still holds onto his knife.  He buries the more innate, animal need to move and breathe and see, and focuses on what makes him human.  He’s going to make it there, and then he’s going to kill Dream.  Tommy sees one last barrier, one last set of fan blades, rotating more slowly than the last and guarded by iron bars, and he fumbles for the last stick of tnt.  Tommy hesitates for only a second on the thought that a few blocks away is a sea of lava.  He’s hot enough as is, the lava pouring in can’t make him much hotter.

Tommy sees his own hand, outlined from the light below, light a spark, and then the fuse glows.  Tommy had forgotten he had to get the fuck away.  Perhaps too late, he crawls back into the heat and the dark.  He covers his head with already burnt hands, and then it goes off.  Tommy feels the blast, but no shrapnel comes his way, even as he hears the screech of broken metal and crumbled stone.  Tommy looks up and savors one more shred of luck.  The vent was angled down, in a small drop off, so Tommy was shielded from most of the blast.  No lava pours in, but Tommy has exposed something else.  Sensors.  The redstone blinks back in warning and Tommy knows he is once more on the clock.  He crawls forward, despite all his exhaustion, all his pain, he’s determined.  He can do this; he has to do this.

Tommy tumbles head first back into that awful cell, catching himself with already burned palms, clinging to his knife like a lifeline, and then he’s on the ground.  Tommy thinks he must have sprained his left wrist, but his right one, the one with the knife, is doing just fine and that's all that matters.  It’s cooler in here.  Barely, considering Tommy had been blocking up the cooling system, but it is.  It helps that he can move again.  Tommy doesn’t get the chance to stand before there is a figure towering over him.

“Tommy?!”

Tommy flinches back––how can he not?–– as he sees Dream in all his pathetic glory, hair longer and matted, a little bruised, without a mask, and merely baffled by the sight of him.  Then Dream sees the knife, and Tommy starts to stand, he starts to swing, he’s going to gut that man, to shred him to fucking pieces so he can never hurt anyone ever again–

And then Tommy is back on the ground, chest aching, the wind knocked out of him as he struggles to process what happened, to comprehend that after enduring all of that, after fighting his way here through the veins of this awful slice of hell, he could still fail.  His blurred vision focuses back in on Dream, still standing over him, still puzzled rather than afraid, and still holding the knife.