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charlie-grusin · 9 days ago

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IT (2017) : Movietalk # 03

With or without a god we are all children – it’s only in the coziness of patterns and routines, the wear and tear of time that makes us assume otherwise that we have grown up, that we have become the adults through the ability to withstand the monotonous mundanity of the real world as so opposed by it. But we do not grow so much as we experience; and we do not change or transform so much as we only shift further towards our truer, greater selves. All it takes – if it can be believed – is a thin resonance, a revelation of the self that is at once demolition and renewal: a toppling of dominoes which finds at its end not a full-scale collapse but a newly-christened bridge, a sudden elapse between the once-impenetrable points of what-once-was and the here-and-now that all at once “creates” before our eyes (then, in a more reasonable understanding after the fact, reveals) the roots of our lives from the inside out. We do not see our schedules, for these are material and therefore immaterial; we see instead our very own inner patterns – our own array of patch-and-stitches we have either caught, earned, or made on ourselves in the days of youth – and how these fabrics and colors, in one way or another, have intercepted, overlapped, and/or taken over our lives in the past and the now without our very knowing. They are little apocalypses with their own five stages, and more often than not they are terrifying. And all it takes is but a drop – a slim, singular, yet altogether complete and pure emotion with the gut-punch of nitroglycerin. Worry... lonesomeness… doubt… they are but a few of the boiling triggers, and they are also branches to that most reactant of personal tides: fear.

2017 was not just the Inevitable Return of the Stephen King Flick, it was also the Year of IT, and my slightly younger, much dumber self had rode on its frontlines like a storm. I read the book whilst trailing away from a nasty sick spell that just so happened to be the sweet little nook of time before the cranks in Movieworld really started churning out the clown bucks, and once I had caught its developing whiffs I kept my eyes and ears on the headlines over that thin span of years, making only light utterances in my company of friends whose only point of reference was the Tim Curry miniseries (yes it’s that movie but this is not a remake it’s a new adaptation of the book have you read it have you read the book IT??). I don’t think I ever spouted any further words about IT back then, even as the project shifted hands from Fukunaga to Muschietti and the tides were starting to be reassured – for all I knew it was a territory known to by me and me alone, a world as strange and exciting as it was when I’d cracked my very first King (and Straub, RIP) back in middle school and just as impossible to put into words (what would I’ve said if any of my teachers and classmates caught in this ailing red state had asked me about what I was reading, not knowing I was deep in the part in The Talisman where Jack’s friend Wolf had gotten the nards to murder a bunch of Evangelical fascist children and was loving every word of it?) – but it turned out I didn’t have to wait for long; once that first trailer came out it was all that any of us could think about – talk about, even. In my circle I was IT’s finest cheerleader, affecting them with accursed knowledge of American literature’s finest, greatest, ever-unsurpassed, ever-imitated-but-never-duplicated novel of love and monsters.

When IT (2017) came out I had no good way of selling my parents to take me to watch it – even though they had given up on shielding me away from reading any “mature” books (let alone King’s) a long time ago and the very first film I ever saw was fuckin’ Commando, them taking me to an R-rated film that prominently featured the premise of monsters killing children still didn’t seem such an easy ask; I saw all three Hobbit films when they were first released and what somehow dreaded me more than having to walk out of that theater with two-and-a-half hours spent watching The Battle of the Five Armies was to hear another agonizing spiel about God and Jesus and the Coming of the Rapture and Tribulation and the Book of Revelations on the long ride back. I admire them. I still do. But I hated that, loathed it – if that was the ride home I could expect from three hours of stupid over-bloated Tolkien shit, what would horses do with a real love?

Fortunately, I had a friend. They had gone to see it opening weekend and loved it so much they were aching to see it again. When I told them I hadn’t seen it despite being IT’s amateur oracle they had offered to take me with them on a late October night. How could I refuse?

Up to now I had ever only believed I’d gone on a single date with someone from school. It was a date with a love as everlasting as an obligatory prom invite on a crumpled slip of notebook paper. We’d gone to dinner, we’d gone to a movie, and even though it was a double date with some close friends of ours it was still by the end of the night an uncomfortable, awkward experience. Part of it was no doubt a slipping across that veil from the young adult to the adult – we were starting to push against each other beyond the restrictive confines of school toward territories never before embarked upon – but now I have no doubt it was a personal trouble, a question so vague even its mark was left unfinished, a river without an end. It was a love with endless pairs of eyes staring at it from every possible angle belonging to faces more familiar than unfamiliar, observant while their backs were turned, glazed with an expectation that was ultimately honed to a final premeditated result which had seemed at first no different than the systems we were already being churned through until you realize in a momentous flash of precognition (an intake of terror) that this time it could go on and on and on and on. We were going to be sweethearts; we were going to be pure, natural; an easily discernible match of inner-clique love that had to stick because it had to stick, it must, and there was no other way around it, it was just that inevitable. One of my parents had mentioned it to a neighbor friend of ours when I got back; he had joked about me being a bachelor, a playboy. I’d laughed with them (just as expected) then I took solitude in my bed to meditate myself to sleep on the hatred I felt for everybody, for myself.

Then I willed its disintegration. It was static. Silent. A meanness, yet numbing enough you theoretically hardly felt it ever happened as if whatever occurred there and then hadn’t ever been at all... yet you could feel its dusts collect to thickets in your nose, its last mysterious jolts of convulsion bristle against the tongue to the brain all the same. We had walked away in debris unaccounted for, not a word more between us. I would wonder, then dare not wonder no more, either afraid to acknowledge the cruelty I was able to manifest or the source of the brutality that laid beneath it all.

But that night. I wonder if there could’ve been something I missed in the mix of our talk and laughter on the way to the theater, in the beats of every squirm and jump the movie managed to get out of us from the back row seats, in midst of all the breathless talk on the drive back that was admittedly made more on my front (as cheerleader I am prone to the asthmatic). I don’t know – only that it can’t help but be a one-sided affair, that even if I were to delve further I cannot ever find a temporary answer or an overall glimpse of that night and our relationship anymore because it is by all accounts too late. You know how it goes – the great exodus of the senior class where we drift away to seek our own corners of the world to such an extent that we first begin to forget those who we only knew mildly at a distance, only to then (though we might attempt its delay) lose touch with the ones we knew more dearly. But ours had been the most distorted and the most sudden, an abrupt separation, all before coming back around not to bitterness (at least I don’t think – I don’t want to think it) but to a flat-line that had no choice but to dissipate the way it did to nothingness. Perhaps it was karmic. I don’t know. Maybe I don’t ever want to know that either even if such a resolution could very well be the most helpful comforting thing whatever it could possibly be. We were supposed to celebrate together, but as soon as we had tossed our caps and shot our concealed confetti cannons he’d ran off to join a party the rest of us had no knowing of. Though some of us might’ve talked – must’ve talked – I never knew the rest. Our next goodbye (the last goodbye) never even felt like a goodbye, least not at first, but as the get-together dwindled away into the evening and as I breathed the birthday cupcake vape smoke that was as alien to me as this strange cubicle-carved apartment with the single dying lamp tucked in the corner I had known it was. And yet in the midst of this own quiet revelation, as I look not in that moment but in the ones from farther back from that scattered gallery of occasional triumphs and resentments I cannot help but want to reach in (reach through) for something, anything. Maybe I want to go back to that night – the most ecstatic I ever felt going to a movie theater – and really talk to them (to hell with the movie), talk to them and ask them and understand them and know them if I can (and this time I really have to listen because there’s no notes to take this time) if they really really knew what it meant when that skinhead-looking motherfucker had posed whether or not we had something for each other while the teacher was off-and-about doing everything and nothing about it and why that now seems to me so close to the opening of Jack Ketchum’s The Lost where the two women sharing this uneasy warmth for each other they could never proclaim are silenced in cold blood by a gun-toting psychopathic youngster, why the first thought I had then was thought of in the delivery of Norm Macdonald on the Weekend Update: “I’m gonna tell ya that is some bad luck when the one who would’ve known you kills you.” So the river goes.

The music is IT’s enemy; same as it ever was. I knew on this rewatch to steel myself against it but damn, right out of the gate? It’s kinda like how these adaptations have opted to let poor Georgie’s arm get bitten off rather than have it be the much crueler fate he gets in the book where Pennywise straight up rrrrrrips this six year old kid’s arm clean off the bone like an insect, but perhaps even that isn’t such a fair comparison – there at least the point of disturbance fairly stayed the same. With Wallfisch’s scoring however there is often an uncomfortable vastness between its good intentions and its end results to a point where you’re supposed to be watching this opening scene that’s meant to be tragic and terrible and all that good nasty horror business but the music it’s hitting you with is going so far the right way the wrong way that it has this unintended mellowing effect to where it becomes more of an obstruction than a compliment. This has probably been said and served a dozen different ways by now, I’m sure – this movie’s like, what, seven years old now (seven years? damn) and it has also likely been mentioned how the rest of the score plays out exactly the same even when it’s not trying to be overtly sinister (it’s all too literal, all too blunt, making its horrors obnoxious and most of its moments of tenderness whimsical to the point of tartness)… but, in a way, it… kinda works? Or it at least makes some leap of sense? Maybe it helps to consider whatever higher bars of potential Wallfisch may’ve had going on here and for Chapter Two (my best guess is something of a mix between John Williams schmaltz and either an easily peeved or mildly perked Merzbow strolling through some gray weather), but I think what eventually lets much of the film’s faults slide back to the shadows from which they came – whether it be the overreliance on score and sound or even the freakin fuckin goddamnawful rock fight scene (I mean whatthefu- really shoddy re-shoots aside why did you turn one of the biggest major turning points of the story into some comical snowball battle and why oh why oh whyy did you have to make the worst needle-drop out of Anthrax right after arguably doing the best one in the film with The Cure!?) – is that unlike Chapter Two much of its negatives are still easily outweighed by its positives (if we were to measure it in beakers it’s probably about a third or a fourth of the whole), and that those positives, when all’s been taken for granted, are still pretty good. Damn good, at parts; bordering on great in others.

What one must acknowledge when they approach IT (2017) – whether it be its own quality or why it had become the big surprise horror hit that it did and why it was the highest grossing R-rated film for quite awhile before other worser, more terrible things proceeded to claim that title – is that it is in its final strokes a YA rendition of IT the novel. Nevermind that the main cast of characters are predominantly young adults to begin with, though that of course cannot be unaccounted for; compared to King’s original book which is so unrelenting and merciless in its bloodshed on adult and child alike it appropriately pulls an epigraph from Clive Barker and Mean Streets(there’d be the usual limb-ripping, the occasional melon-knocking, then there’d be what really happens to Patrick Hockstetter), the film plays itself on a reserved line when it comes to the topic of murder, opting to drag Georgie down the sewers rather than have his marbled eyes fill up with rain, willing to show severed pieces of horrifically maimed children (whether dead or undead, real or unreal) only when obscured by ink or greywater or are near unidentifiable to be mistaken for anything else anyway. It’s not as… sophisticated?… as adult?… not as honed in to the gravities of sudden death as King’s writing often is or as it could’ve been, but the little weight and muscles it has going for here are surprisingly doable (and durable) than one would expect. It rode proudly on the waves of ADA-approved horror adventures and ‘80s nostalgia binges Stranger Things somehow managed to cast first, yet it’s also a film that asks the dreaded question of Who Can Kill A Child? when Bill cocks the captive bolt and aims it point blank to his little brother’s head, and fires. It’s not really his brother, of course, but the image – that primal discomforting thought as striking as the opening massacre from Children of the Corn (1984), as powerful as Carrie or Charlie McGee setting everything ablaze – is Metal all the same.

I’d come out of my first viewing thinking the only thing about the film that could really, truly amount to horror was everything with Beverly’s stepfather – all the lepers and flute ladies were as spooky as they told me but I remembered feeling (and talking about I just had to that night) almost frozen to ice every time she had to encounter that viler beast (and I still felt as such this time around, just as much as I couldn’t help but cheer through abated breath as she knocks that fucker dead-on), but the truth of the matter now is that very much like the book it’s not the clown that’s really scary but it’s the adults – the whole fucking town. Every turn, every glance from the eyes of an elder, is a tyger waiting, daring you to pull away and take back your dismissive act of resistance just so they can pounce on you and pin you down where they want you;it gets (in part) that there are many worse fates to befall rather than a sudden demise by some strange creature from out of the blue, that it really is submission through guilt and confinement, through downright abuse and absolute cruelty by someone as familiar to you as your very household, which can devise an even graver, more permanent death than the one you’ll eventually find in that last great incubator. It’s the kind of revelation that many of us since time immemorial have cast aside as angst (oh you angsty teens with your dour behaviors why don’t you cheer up you’re in America (well you see that’s kinda the problem)), as if that feeling is all trivial and superficial and not at all a real concern that based on circumstances can breach the lanes of life and death as swiftly as an ill sheet of ice on a bad day at hockey practice – what do you mean we’re so worried, so scared all the time? Of course we are! The ice is gonna break and it’s gonna break even further when there’s people like you who will make all our futures a living hell when you keep your selfishness and your arrogance close to your blackened hearts and you keep watching those clown-a-thon propaganda programs until it all gives way beneath our feet and we all drown in stupidity because you were all so preoccupied with the expectation and hope of death and an afterlife that you forgot to teach your children and peers the worth and meaning of life and how we must live it you bastards, you goddamn liars! Now That’s Horror – the never-ending struggle to turn survivalist against anyone or anything slightly older and/or unfairly superior to you who wishes to keep you dead in the mucks – but within it also is the Truth Inside the Lie: with friends like these, you wouldn’t have it any other way. I could be a loser, I may be a lover, but if you don’t think me a fighter you’ve got another thing comin – send you high up to kingdom come where all the gods swim we will. Count on it.

Clowns got shticks, it’s that genetic – and much like any other shtick it is also genetic to get tired of said shtick fairly quick which is often where the masters make their spotlights, leaping not away from the danger of potential mediocrity and failure but towards that sucker (hit that eye of the storm with a pie in the face and a bonk! at the nose). Yet to say Muschietti hadn’t shown any mastery in this films would be perhaps dismissive; it is fair to say he had become more a master of self-deprecating horror (if that be a term) by the time he tackled Chapter Two, and it’s definitely something you cannot miss tracing its more idle beginnings back in Chapter One, but while this film certainly began the duology’s unhealthy reliance on irritating play-to-the-screen rubber-faced Pennywise it was not without a greater counterbalance (it’s like they had themselves well on a Pennywise yin-yang before either slipping (or diving) all in on the yin). Bill Skarsgård screaming and yelping and doing a victory royale emote is annoying now, yes, but Bill Skarsgård teasing his victims, mocking (and miming!) their misery before really going werewolf (holy shit the clown’s got nards!) is right as rain. I had figured by memory alone the entire House on Neibolt Street sequence was going to be the moment the film would lose its gas for good and for all this time round; boy howdy was I mistaken. It doesn’t exactly cross the veil of transcendence to Horror Valhalla but for what it’s worth the thing comes close, I tell ya – it’s that chaotic energy, that bit of gnarly bloodied edge, this symphonic cacophony of worried youth and terror emphasized with growls and that mean mean laughter at the end of every line that really gets to you. Either something of the magic was lost in between the films or what, but man did Muschietti know how to make his tight corners tight back then, how unpredictable anything and everything can be when an adult (or something unlike an adult (or human for that matter)) holds the opportune moment of power against someone as incredibly vulnerable as a child, how suddenly frightening things like a Mr. Bob Gray or a Mr. Marsh can be once they really start to make some moves. All handheld, all close-ups, and with all the powers of the film’s varied strengths it emanates a surrealness that then swiftly swings back to reality – Now That’s Horror. You know how some people often preach about science fiction and fantasy being these great vantage points of genre fiction because they’re capable of reflecting upon our societies’ ups and ills with ease? That may be true to some extents (I’ve seen footage) but yeah right; as if. To me nothing can get any more poignant, more intimate, and much more immediate and down to the point than a meat-cleaving homicidal or a knife wielder on the loose (or in this case a monkey bastard clown sprouting mantis claws in a sewer depths). We can play civil, act coy, be erudite and perceive ourselves the superior all we want – they’re all just alternatives for what we really want to do. Everybody wants to scream. And sometimes, we do.

#it #it 2017 #andy muschietti #stephen king #movie review #consider the following #movietalk #more to come

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boonki · 4 years ago

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“You look absolutely horrible.” For the prompts!

OKAY I KNOW YOU ASKED THIS LIKE THREE HUNDRED YEARS AGO i am so sorry ive had to work a ton lately and have just been so tired, i havent written at all recently

BUT

here you go!! some nice sleepy vibes from yours truly at 2:20 am, apologies if there are any mistakes

_______

The only light on in their shared kitchen space is above the sink, drowning the space in a burnt orange color, like the warm glow of a fire. As he stumbles into the room, Obi-wan nearly misses Anakin sitting at the table, fiddling with droid parts, back curled over and head drooped to study a piece of machine in his hands. How he’s even able to see is far beyond Obi-wan, but he’s learned to let it go throughout the years.

Obi-wan turns the knob on the stove and shuffles the kettle to check for water, startling Anakin out of his meditative state.

“Oh, Obi-wan.” Anakin looks up at him and squints, exhaustion forming neat lines around the corners of his eyes. “I didn’t know you were awake.”

Before reaching up to the cabinet for a well-loved mug, Obi-wan catches how pale Anakin is, how dark purple blooms around his eyes like bruises, how he seems to shrink into himself. Obi-wan has seen Anakin look tired before, especially when he was younger and put so much pressure on himself to perfect his schoolwork, but this is on the particularly bad end of things. Anakin’s hair is greasy, the long curls pushed back and tucked behind his ears, and the small blanket draped around his shoulders does nothing to hide the fact that Anakin is still wearing the same shirt from two days ago. He looks absolutely horrible.

“You look absolutely horrible,” Obi-wan says, the mug settling on the countertop with a clink. “Have you even tried to sleep?”

Anakin frowns. “Hey, you don’t look much better. We’re both awake at what,” his head swivels around as he looks for a clock, and finding none, guesses, “four in the morning? What’s your excuse, old man?”

Obi-wan hums noncommittally at that, amusement assuaging the growing worry nagging at his chest. He pulls a tea bag out of the flimsy cardboard box left out on the counter, and rips the packaging open, letting the sachet dangle into the cup. He lets the silence linger.

With a softer tone, Anakin tries again. “You can’t sleep either?”

Obi-wan pours the boiling water into the mug, watching the color turn into a deep shade of purple, and he gently bounces the bag up and down, encouraging it to steep. “I think you’ll find, my dear padawan, that I’ve evolved past the need for sleep.”

Anakin’s eyebrows flatten, and he snorts. “I’ll make sure to pass that along to Cody, I’m sure he’ll agree with you.”

A smile tugs at Obi-wan’s mouth. “No, I,” he pauses, taking a breath, “I keep waking up. Figured a cup of tea would help.”

All of the mirth vanishes from Anakin’s face, leaving only unadulterated worry. Obi-wan looks down at his tea. They both know a euphemism for nightmares when they hear one by now, considering they’ve created half of them on their own. Fighting a gruesome, bloody, and endless war will do that to a person. Fighting a gruesome, bloody, and endless war where a good portion of the deaths are on your hands, on your conscience, even more so.

The air is still between them, but dense with emotion. Obi-wan rarely admits his nightmares to anyone, and by the myriad of expressions racing through Anakin’s features, he can tell Anakin is struggling with the right response.

Obi-wan sips his tea.

“Sometimes, I,” Anakin starts, clearing his throat, “I wish I knew them better, my men who died. I see them in my dreams.” He’s staring down at his hands, either as a distraction or remembering the blood he’s washed off. The droid parts sit motionlessly beneath them.

Obi-wan leans back on the counter, holding the steaming mug up to his chin. “So do I,” he nearly whispers, grateful for Anakin’s admission, his attempt to empathize with Obi-wan. He wants to say more, wants to sit down and let out the demons haunting his dreams, but he’s afraid that they’d rip all his bandages on the way out and tear him apart completely. It’s easier, he thinks, to keep it all inside, contained, controlled. But in the dim and molten light of the kitchen, with his face hidden in the shadows, he wants to be vulnerable. He also wants Anakin to get some rest.

“Do you want to come sleep with me?” Obi-wan asks, eyes darting up to Anakin’s face.

Anakin’s eyes go wide, and he straightens up in his seat. “What?”

He suddenly realizes what he’s said, and he can feel his ears burn. “No, not like that.” He dips the tea bag in and out of the mug, and Anakin relaxes a bit, though still wary, looking somehow disappointed. “When you were a youngling, you used to crawl into bed with me when you couldn’t sleep. You thought I never noticed.”

“You remember that?”

Obi-wan smiles to himself, gazing wistfully down into his mug. “Of course, dear one. You weren’t the only one who slept better.”

Anakin’s eyebrows are knitted together, his lips parted. “Oh.” He looks thoughtful. “Sure, then. Your room?”

Warmth floods Obi-wan’s chest in anticipation, not at all feeling guilty about his careful manipulation. He knows Anakin could never turn down helping others, it’s in his nature.

Anakin’s little droid project is completely forgotten as Anakin stares at him for an answer.

“Considering I don’t quite feel like tripping over half an engine, yes, my room.” Obi-wan takes one final sip of his tea and sets it by the sink, treading over the cold floor back into his room.

With a scoot of his chair, and loud, heavy footsteps, Anakin follows, sliding Obi-wan’s door shut behind him, leaving the pair in complete darkness. Obi-wan is still in his sleep shirt and shorts from before, so he slips into bed, pulling back the covers for Anakin to join him. He hears the soft thump of clothing dropping to the floor and then a dip in the mattress next to him.

Obi-wan lays on his back, as he assumes does Anakin.

Then there’s a shuffle as Anakin readjusts, and with a slight startle, Obi-wan feels a bare arm rest against his chest, a face in his neck, a leg thrown over his. It’s odd, but rather nice. Obi-wan doesn’t remember the last time he felt so safe.

“Is this okay?” Anakin mumbles into the crook of his neck, blowing hot air over his collarbones.

“Yes.” Obi-wan faintly wonders if Anakin can feel his heartbeat.

“What were your nightmares about?”

Obi-wan considers this. Blood, so much blood, headless bodies strewn over a hopeless landscape, their heads coming to life and blaming their deaths on him, his call, his decisions. Qui-gon, standing in the flames, yelling at him to be better, to have saved him, saved his men, to save Anakin. Stillness, as he stands utterly alone and deserted, everyone finalizing realizing they were better off without him, because he is worthless, unlovable, tainted-

“The war.” Obi-wan answers, his voice cracking. “And you?”

When no reply comes, Obi-wan wraps his arm around Anakin’s back, tracing his spine, the flesh warm and smooth underneath his fingertips. Anakin’s breaths come slow and even, and his hand twitches once.

Already asleep, then.

Obi-wan bites a lip to keep from chuckling. Maybe this is the trick to get him to sleep. He rests his cheek against his hair, presses a light kiss to the top of his head.

“I dream of losing you, dear one,” he whispers out to no one, letting the honesty linger in the darkness above them. He trusts the nighttime to keep his secrets.

When they both wake up in the morning, Obi-wan is sure there will be some level of embarrassment from cuddling, from cracking open their hard exteriors to each other. They’ll probably be sent out to the frontlines and never speak of this again.

He feels the sturdy muscles of Anakin’s sides, the dip of his waist and rise of his hips.

For now, Obi-wan holds him, keeps him safe from the torment of his own brain, and lets him get some much needed sleep.

___

Light billows out from underneath the door when Obi-wan wakes, morning having come and gone long ago.

Anakin has curled further into him, practically seeping into his bones. There’s a leg thrown over his waist, face completely smooshed in his neck, and his arm drapes over his chest, Anakin’s palm cupping the side of his face. Delicate snores come from Anakin’s nose, and Obi-wan’s neck is hot from Anakin’s breath. Obi-wan’s hand is settled in the small of Anakin’s back, the other arm thrown up above Obi-wan’s head.

A languid grin finds its home on Obi-wan’s face, sleep tugging at his edges. He hasn’t felt so well rested in years.

Not wanting to wake Anakin, Obi-wan flutters shut his eyes, and lets himself drift back off, soaking in the feeling of love and security that pool together in his heart.

He can feel Anakin breathing steadily on top of him, peacefully.

The war will have to wait.

#boonki writes #obikin #obiwan #obiwan kenobi #anakin skywalker #anakin #star wars #prompts #ask #sonda walkin #i hope this makes sense #i wrote this at 2 am whats good #fanfic #hurt/comfort #sleep deprivation #obiwan & anakin #obi-wan/Anakin #THEY JUST NEED SOME FUKIN SLEEP DUDE #let them cuddle

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blindbatalex · 3 years ago

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proud to present a carraville royalty au instalment by the one and only raisin anon!

When he thought about it, Jamie had never paced back and forth across a room in worry before. Not that it hadn’t been things to worry about in his life, but he tended also to be the subject of that worry. When you went to fight on the frontlines in a war, you might be worried about what you’d see out there, but there’s not much room for pacing back and forth when you’re marching inline or lying on a bedroll in the middle of nowhere. Here though, in his office, there was almost too much of it.

Gary, the advisors, his guards and the obligatory physician that had to come along for long travels was supposed to be back yesterday, and yet it was past nightfall again and exactly no signs of them anywhere. The scouting reports were due back in a few hours, which was the only sliver of hope he had at the minute, and so, concerned pacing it was.

It really shouldn’t be taking this long. There was no reason for the negotiations to overrun, and even if it did they would’ve sent someone back with news of the delay. A lord was never not accounted for, not when it could be helped. The southerners could be tricky but they weren’t evil or particularly scheming. Roman had his ways, most of them involved bribes, but very little if any, violence.

Someone knocked on the door, and without permission ripped it open with an urgency that for once did not make Jamie annoyed but rather gave hope that there had been new developments in Gary’s disappearance act.

“My lord, the courtyard! You have to come!”

Once upon a time, Jamie had been the undisputed fastest cadet at the military academy. The sprints he did down from his office in their private wing and down to the courtyard put even his best performances as a young lad to shame. He took the staircase three steps at a time, practically flew down the hallway and even had a little time left over to think they really should train their guards’ pace better if their ageing lord could outrun them. The doors from the entrance hallway to the outside was open, and he stopped just on top of the steps as if the elevation would provide some sense of overview of the situation.

The courtyard, normally quite calm at this time of night, was bustling with activity. Horses stomping in distress and frustration, guards and servants and physicians all shouting louder than the next, and in the middle of it, a two-wheeled wagon that had not travelled with them when they left for the negotiations with the southerners two weeks ago. On it, underneath a pile of blankets Jamie could spy a body, lying completely still, and going by the pale hand dangling over the edge, either dead or very close.

“No”

No. He couldn’t live through that, not again, not now, not when only in the last year the kisses and affections had become easier again when the “I love you” was so close to the tip of his tongue. Finally, the ghost of David and what Jamie had done didn’t hang over them anymore, and he had learned to open up his heart and then the gods decided to rip it all up and send him right back there, to the days of heartbreak and tears and darkness.

“No!”

His feet carried him down the steps as fast as they could and over to Connor, who was standing at the edge of the debacle looking just as lost as Jamie felt. That, however, did not stop him from grabbing his elbow and forcing the boy to look at him.

“What. Is. Happening!?”

The poor kitchen aid opened and closed his mouth a couple of times before he managed to utter out a single word, his head turning back and forth between Jamie and the crowd in front of them.

“I. I don’t know. Don’t know, my lord. I was on my way back in from the cellars when I heard shouting, so I came to look and I – “ he was stammering and nervous at being caught somewhere he shouldn’t be and also had no clue. Jamie reminded himself to talk to him later and apologize for scaring him, he usually liked the young lad, but right now he was preoccupied with other matters.

He let go of Connor's elbow and made his way into the fray, to the tight circle of people surrounding the wagon. If Gary was not already dead then at least he wanted to be there, to hold his hand as he took his last breaths, send him off to the gods gently and unafraid.

“Let me through!” he pushed one person aside.

“Let me through now!” he pushed away another

“I need to see him” A third.

“My lord! What - !?”

It was difficult to be heard over all the noise but he persisted nonetheless, pushing past everyone he needed to get to Gary, so he could see his eyes, assure him he was there. Maybe he’d even manage a smile, just one last one, it’d be a shame if Gary died with a frown on his face, because despite his reputation as a bore he was quite good at making people laugh, and making Jamie laugh. Gary should die smiling.

He pushed aside one last guard that stood between him and where Gary lay and steeled himself for what he might see. An ugly scar to match his own maybe, an infected arrow wound, dead eyes staring up at nothing –

“My lord!” someone shouted, but he wasn’t listening.

“I need to see him!”

“But my lord- !”

“Jamie! Jamie! James, stop!”

He was hearing things now. He must be because that was Gary’s voice shouting at him, but Gary was lying half-dead on a horse-drawn wagon, most likely ambushed on their way home from the south, probably somewhere after the mountain pass. He’d send out search parties for the culprits tomorrow, might even join them himself. He shoved a hand off his shoulder.

“He’s my husband!” he tried to make himself heard, but the louder he spoke the more prevalent the tears in his voice became, and he wouldn’t cry. Not here. On his own in their, his now, room maybe, but not here. Not now.

“What?! I’m your husband, you buffoon!”

The same hands grabbed him by the shoulder and elbow again and he spun around to shove them off once and for all. He needed to see Gary, couldn’t they understand that - !?

In front of him, standing up on his own two feet, dark hair smeared with blood but it didn’t look like his own, a gash running down his cheek, he looked tired and worn and annoyed, but it was unmistakably:

“Gary?”

“Yes, you idiot. Your husband, Gary. Are you married to many people behind my back then ?”

“But I? But you?”

He turned his head back and forth between Gary and the body on the wagon, trying to catch up with the reality that he was seeing in front of him.

“It is one of the advisors. They’re doing all they can to save him, but we have to give them space”

Gary’s hands were placed on both his forearms and almost in a daze, Jamie let himself be steered away, back through the crowd and towards the steps leading up to the entrance doors, away from the worst of the commotion.

“But I thought ?”

“You thought it was me? Yes, I gathered. They were aiming for me to be fair, but archers today don’t know how to aim properly”

The joke at today’s youth fell flat, especially as Gary had just admitted it was indeed him they had been going for. It really was a testament, though, to how scared Jamie had been, that Gary didn’t crack any jokes about how they might care about each other after all.

Connor was still standing there overlooking the chaos, but came to stand before them when Gary waved him over.

“Tell the Captain of the Guard we’ve gone up to our wing. He can meet us in the office in an hour”

“Yes, my lord” Connor grew almost five inches at being given a job far beyond what he was normally set to do, and he sent the boy running off with a pat on his shoulder. He grabbed Jamie’s elbow again and together they made their way up the steps and back inside.

“Come now, you. You can stitch the wound for me, and I’ll tell you all about what happened”

And so that’s what they did. After washing off the worst of the grime and blood, with well-practised ease from years on a battlefield, Jamie carefully drew the fine silk thread in and out of Gary’s skin, shaking hands growing steady as reality set in, reminding him that his husband was still alive. Still alive and breathing and safe, and Jamie didn’t have to go through another mourning period.

“Ambush then?” he asked because he couldn’t wait any longer. Gary nodded.

“We had already entered woods when they attacked. We were so close to the King’s Road I’m surprised they caught us there and not further away up in the terrain”

Gary winced as Jamie tied another stitch together. The numbing solution took the edge of, but that didn’t take away from the fact that Jamie was literally weaving a needle in and out of his cheek.

“Desperate bandits?”

Gary shook his head as much as having a needle in your face could allow.

“Bandits pillage and steal, these ones were only out to kill. And they knew James, that's the thing that worries me. They knew I’d be there”

“You think someone tipped them off?”

“They had the Horned Bird on their chest, and somehow felt safe enough to do it so close to the King’ Road. The fact that I was travelling was not meant to be common knowledge either, and yet they seemed to know exactly when to be there”

Jamie pulled the needle and thread through one last time and tied it up. Gary had a fair few of these hunches every now and again, sometimes they proved true and sometimes not, but the fact that the rebel group desperate to start up the war again were the ones behind the attack was decidedly not good news. And just to think what would’ve happened had they succeeded. And they had gotten the information from inside the castle? That really limited the people they could trust going forward.

He traced over his handiwork with his thumb and leaned in to place a kiss over the stitches. This was not a headache he needed right now.

“Well, anyway, I’m glad you’re safe”

“Hmm, you seemed quite worried there for a bit” Gary hummed and looked at Jamie as if waiting for him to elaborate as to what exactly that had been about. Jamie’s cheeks could’ve burned from embarrassment, they might’ve done a few years ago, but really, he was too relieved to pretend he didn’t care. He wrapped an arm around Gary’s waist to pull him closer and nuzzled into his side.

“Was worried, Gaz. Terrified, to be honest. I cannot lose you, Gods help me I never thought I’d say that, but I really, really can’t”

Gary heaved a sigh and leaned against him, almost, Jamie thought with a laugh, as if he was accepting yeah, okay, let’s admit to having emotions and caring about each other. He turned his head so he could place a tiny kiss on Jamie’s forehead and pulled him in tighter.

“You didn’t, James. I’m still here, yeah. I made it home”

Jamie hummed but didn’t answer. The captain of the guard would soon be ready for them in their office and he knew they had to go start what most likely would turn into a rather lengthy emergency meeting, complete with a small hoard of advisors, generals and council members. He wouldn’t be able to just hold Gary like this until at least the early morning again and at the minute that was the only thing he wanted to. Just feel his warmth and his breath and the rumble in his chest as he laughed. To remind himself that this, too, they had survived.

“Home” he echoed, and somehow it felt like an admission of sorts. The I Love You was too far away still, but Home, Home he could do. He had almost forgotten how nice it felt, to have that person, or to be that person, the one who makes the castle more than a stronghold. He hadn’t properly felt it since Stevie, but he did now, holding on to Gary had and being held back, and maybe he should’ve realized sooner, maybe he almost had, maybe that had been why admitting to killing David had been so tough, but either way he knew it now. Something inside of him felt like it settled down, finally, and he brought one hand up to cup Gary’s jaw and held it steady as he leaned in.

“I’m happy you’re home” he mumbled against Gary's lips just as they parted. He was pretty sure Gary understood deeper meaning behind it, as he felt, more than saw, his smile when they kissed again.

“Mhm, me too”

#carraville #royalty au #raisin anon #fic rec #oh this one is GOOD #so tender i dont have the words

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fandomscombine · 4 years ago

Text

The Hargreeves Kerfuffle Part 2: Family Reunion

The Hargreeves siblings x Hargreeves!Reader (Familial Relationship)

BG: The Reader is Number Eight. It follows how you fit into the structure of Season 1 and the family dynamic of the siblings.

This part follows the collapse of The Umbrella Academy during their youth and having the family back together after years apart for the very first time.

I have mashed up the information and some events from both the comics and the tv series. So a heads up for readers who haven’t read the comics, it was hinted in S2 but in the very beginning of the comics, it’s canon that Reginald is indeed an Alien.

The series will consist of 10 parts. Where the reader would have a focused interaction with each sibling. (Eg. After this part, it would be Luther x Reader, then Diego x Reader and so on! –Yes Ben is included)

WC: 4786 (never had I written so much for one part before!)

Contains: Angst. Death- Reginald and Ben (so not exactly a spoiler, but while writing Ben’s scene had my eyes water a bit.) Crap childhood and the Hargreeves being a mess.

A/N: You guys are literally the best! Reading your replies and comments about how much you enjoyed part 1 and are looking forward to the rest of the series, really warms my heart!

>>GENERAL MASTERLIST<<

>>THE HARGREEVES KERFUFFLE SERIES MASTERLIST<<

READ: [PART 1] [PART 3] [PART 4]

>>JOIN MY WRITING CHALLENGE!<<

March 21, 2019.

Never had you thought that you would be back here, looking up the gates of The Umbrella Academy, 13 years later.

There was and still is so much pain associated with this building, this entity, this identity of The Umbrella Academy. That you hadn’t seen it coming- well not exactly completely blind to it. Sir Reginald Hargreeves’ upbringing of children-your siblings, your childhood- had always been shit but you had never come close to imaging it to be as emotionally and mentally damaging as it did.

Children at aged 7 finding out they had powers was great. To a kid, it was a dream come true to be a real-life superhero. It all started out as fun and games but soon, training started to be competitions to outshine your siblings-your competitors whist being told to work together at the same time. It was quite a hard concept to grasp as a young kid, but in order to get any attention and praise from a distant father, a kid would do anything.

By the age of 9, the superhero team of ‘The Umbrella Academy’ was officially announced to the world. The group consisted of the 7 Hargreeves children, publicly known as: Spaceboy, The Kraken, The Rumor, The Séance, The Boy, The Horror, and Foresight.

An 8th child with seemingly no superpower, had been secretly tucked away, hidden from the world and too, distanced away from her own siblings. It was though Vanya Hargreeves didn’t exist.

You did try your best to spend time with Vanya and keep the Sunday sister bonding time with her, but with all your training and missions, combined with all her violin lessons and some other private lessons she often go on with in long periods of time - though she wouldn’t mention what they were- there was absolutely no time to be in each other’s presence, so soon you along with the rest of your siblings slip away from Vanya.

At age 10 was a big year for the Hargreeves siblings, they had kind of successfully protected the city of Paris from the chaos of the Eiffel Tower being a spaceship- yes it did flew away but at least the people were saved- The mission became world wide news and soon every move they made caught the public’s eye. With this led to more intense training and additional etiquette workshops to better the group’s public image.

Reginald being a helicopter parent took a toll on the children, who had coped in their own ways. Luther taking the role of ‘leader’ to heart, Diego with his never ending hero complex, Allison using her power to get whatever she wanted, Klaus fell into the world of drugs and alcohol, Five-the rebel who thinks he’s smarter than everyone even dad, Ben into the world of video games, Vanya became ever more quiet and more to herself, and you-a yes person to dad who calls you his most valuable asset that has ever crossed his path, never wanting to let him down.

Things really started to get out of hand at the ripe old age of 13. Breakfast had been a mess, Five had a massive argument with dad and stormed out of the house. You ran after him, caught his coat just as he passed the gate- the very gate you are standing in front of now.

‘FIVE! WAIT!’

‘WHAT?’ He turned, looking angrier as ever.

‘Please don’t leave.’ You place your hand on his shoulder- damn when did he become taller than you? ‘You both can talk this out. Rationalized things out’ You pleaded.

He shook your hand away. ‘Talk? REALLY Y/N? You think good old dad would dare listen to someone younger than him? TO HIS OWN CHILDREN?’ He snorted. ‘You are daft y/n. I thought you were smarter than this-‘ Five sighed. ‘But a guess you are too much of a daddy’s girl to see things clearly.’

‘I know you didn’t mean that’ You stammered, not letting the tears fall. ‘that’s just your anger talking.’

‘oh but I do mean it. Now if you’d excuse me, I have to get going to prove dad wrong.’

Five makes a step forward but you blocked his way

‘GET OUT OF THE WAY Y/N’ He pushes you. ‘I DON’T WANT TO SEE YOUR FACE ANYMORE.’

As you fell to the ground, you see him blip away.

That was the last time anyone had seen Number Five and his final words still haunts you to this day.

‘get out of the way y/n! i don’t want to see your face anymore.’

To make matters worst from having a sibling disappear and to never come back was to have another sibling lose his life.

The media was quick to publish the news. It was all the tabloid and news outlets seem to care about. The headline would vary but all in all still carry the same heart-breaking news. Be it from ‘The Horror dies in mission.’ , ‘The Umbrella Academy loses the life of another of its members.’ to ‘RIP to teen superhero Ben Hargreeves aka The Horror.’

Oh Ben, dear Ben. Why must he be taken away? You thought. Why?

The mission was meticulously planned and prepared for. You were sure to have extracted all the information on what was to go down and what the villains’ moves were from your vision.

You had memorized that every aspect of that dream- you had 2 weeks to prepare. Everyone was supposed to be safe, but why wasn’t Ben?

Why didn’t reality play out as to what you foresaw? You had never slipped up before. Why had the one time you did cost you the life of your beloved brother? Why?

While sobbing your eyes out onto Ben’s grave, a memory of what seemed so long ago came rushing back.

>>‘I’m sorry y/n.’ He said leaning on your door frame.

‘Ben!’ You exclaimed. ‘I’m so glad you’re back up and running!’

Ben was caught off guard. ‘You—You’re not mad at me?’

‘Why would I be mad at you?’ You questioned, genuinely confused at your brother’s words.

‘Cause, Cause I almost got you killed. I am a monster.’

You sat up straight at those words, your ribs hurt a bit at the sudden movement, but you didn’t care. Your brother was blaming himself for something he couldn’t have controlled.

‘NO BEN!’

Ben jumped from your sudden outburst.

You motioned for him to come closer.

‘Ben…’ looking into his eyes. ‘Ben you are no monster.’

‘But—’

‘uuh uh I’m not done’ You held his hand in yours. ‘You are no monster what happened then was an accident, nobody knew, heck nobody expected powers to just show up. It was beyond anyone’s control. It took us by surprise.’

His shoulders relaxed.

‘It wasn’t your fault. I don’t blame you for what happened.’

He gave you a bone crushing hug. ‘Thank you y/n. You don’t know how guilty I was feeling.’ Voice muffled by your shoulder, which is now wet with his tears. ‘I kept thinking about the pain I caused you and I wasn’t allowed to leave my room even when I begged dad to see you and say sorry. y/n’

‘Shhh shhh’ Rubbing his back. ‘It’s alright Ben. What’s important is that we’re all here now. Alive, Safe and sound.’. <<

‘I’m sorry Ben…’ You choked out.

‘I’m so sorry Benny…’ Wiping his gravestone of your tears. ‘I—I got you killed. I am a monster. I am THE monster.’ You hiccupped. ‘It is MY job to keep everyone same, to do the reconnaissance, to ensure that everyone in the frontline is safe. It is my power to foresee what could go wrong, to avoid disastrous mistakes. And….and I failed, Ben. I failed. I failed you, dad, The Umbrella Academy.’

‘I miss you Ben so much…’ You lie down with an arm across the lawn. Picturing that is was him you’re hugging, that he is really there.’ more than your annoyingly sweet ass could ever believe. I wish you were here Ben, safe and sound. And if you could hear me Ben, I wish you could forgive me.’

Your eyes slowly fall shut from the emotional guilt you’re feeling but a warm breeze passes through like a warm embrace lightening the heavy burden within.

A soft whisper of reassurance and familiar words brings you to peaceful rest.

‘I forgive you y/n. It wasn’t your fault. I don’t blame you for what happened.’

You stirred from your sleep as you felt yourself lifted from the ground.

‘Careful Diego! You might wake her up.’ You hear Klaus say.

All this trauma, stress and was just too much to handle by minors and as quickly as all your powers came, the same goes for the people who left.

Klaus was the first to leave the academy at age 16, who choose to be self-checked at a rehab centre, stating that that was a way healthier environment then this shithole that was ‘home’. Who could blame him? Especially when you yourself were planning to leave.

As much as you wanted to get up and leave in the dead of night, you can’t. You don’t have the heart to leave your remaining siblings behind. No, not in this environment. If you were to leave, you wanted them to go with you, to at least know they would have a good life ahead.

Under Reginald’s watchful eye, it would take time to sort the plan out, but it would be worth it.

And you know just the person to talk to.

‘Heyya Diego.’

‘You’re up to something y/n/n and I don’t want to be in any part of it.’ He says without glancing your way. ‘Not after the pineapple incident.’ Diego’s eyes finally landing on you.

Rolling your eyes, you chuckled. ‘Oh come on Diegs! That was years ago! It was just a childish prank—’

Diego gives you the finger.

‘-Oi! It is not MY fault what Luther did to you; besides you were supposed to take the EAST stairwell, NOT the West.’ You say matter of factly, shaking your head. ‘Ughh no, we are getting out of topic. Diego, I need your help and you have to promise not to tell anyone-’

‘You’re devising a getaway plan, aren’t you?’

Your brows scrunched together. ‘How’d you—’

‘I’m not blind y/n, I recognised the look of someone who too is planning to escape.’

You raise a brow. ‘Too?’

‘Yes, Too.’ Diego edges closer to you. ‘Now, why don’t we save the trouble of potentially ruining each other’s individual schemes and join forces. Team up. More brainpower. And whatnot. Deal?’ Offering his pinky out.

You ignored the outstretched gesture. ‘What happened to being a lone wolf huh? I thought that was your thing now?’ You countered.

‘Like a said y/n, the more brainpower, the higher the success.’ He explained. ‘Say, we do manage to get out or perhaps just leave, like Klaus. Where would we go? Where would you? Hmm?’

‘I… I…’ You honestly don’t know.

‘Exactly. That’s why we team up and once we’re out of here. We stick together for a while till we get back on our feet and figure out what we want then go our separate ways.’

You nod, digesting his words. It seems like a solid plan with ample flexibility before deciding on what to do with your life after. But….

‘Okay…..’

‘Okay!’

‘…On one condition. It would not only you and me. We’ll try to get to convince the others to come along too.’

‘What?! y/n no, that’s too many people on the plan-‘

‘More brainpower, higher the success. Your words Diego. Not mine.’ You retaliated. ‘Besides, we can’t just leave everyone here. It’s miserable here. They’re family Diego.’

‘Fine we’ll tell Luther and Allison.’

‘Everyone, Diego.’ You stared him down. ‘And that includes Vanya. No buts.’

‘Ugh.Fine.’ He points a finger towards your face. ‘We tell Luther, Allison AND Vanya. But I swear y/n if anyone of them rats us out or backs out of the plan. We leave them behind. No pity if they choose to stay in this shithole of a house. They are old enough to make their own decision and to face the consequences.’ He leans back to the bed’s headboard. ‘That’s my final offer. Deal?’

‘Deal.’ You interlock your fingers, sealing the pinky promise.

It was easy to get Vanya on board, as she was the child that received the crappiest treatment from dad. Allison was hesitant at first but after convincing her the real world had so much more to give compared to that of the imaginary perfect bubble she created for herself here in the academy with the use of her power, she was on board.

Luther that ever loyal ‘leader’ of the academy would never dare cross dad, the idea wouldn’t have even crossed his mind. Diego had failed to make him see reason and so have you. Luther only came around to be a part of the escape because Allison had agreed to it.

It took almost 6 months. The time has come. You all had saved up enough money to rent a loft apartment downtown and pooled enough to last at least 3 months on your own.

At 1:00 am. All the remaining 5 Hargreeves are to ready with their backpacks to sneak out in groups, boys and girls, and meet at the rendezvous point, Giddy’s Doughnuts. There, a van would be available for them to drive to the apartment.

The boys were to go first, as to let Diego deactivate the security features of the house while Luther stands guard.

It was only supposed to take 15 minutes tops, it was 20 minutes past now. Something was wrong.

Deciding as a team to check up on the boys, you, Allison and Vanya head down to the foyer.

Upon arrival, you see Luther with his hands covering Diego’s face, Diego who seem limp as a log.

‘Luther what’s going on?’ Allison’s voice rang out beside you.

‘I’m sorry….’ He looks down unto the unconscious Diego in his arms. ‘I just… I just couldn’t.’

‘Number Eight! How could you! How could all of you! Three! Seven!’

The room seemed to turn colder by the sound of the voice. You turn and see Sir Reginald Hargreeves.

‘Dad…’

‘YOU ARE ALL A DISGRACE.’ Reginald spitted.

‘But dad!’ Luther pleaded. ‘I was the one who informed you about their plan!’

‘ENOUGH! NO MORE OF THIS FOOLISHNESS, BACK TO BED---’

‘That’s right NO MORE dad!’ Shouted Allison. She glances at dad then at Luther. A frown etched her face as she commanded. ‘I heard a rumor that you couldn’t move your legs.’

The effect was immediate. The lower half of Reginald and Luther stayed still as a rock while they tried their best to break free. But alas, Allison had the upper hand. ‘I heard a rumor you let us go freely.’ At once, both men calmed down.

And to add insult to injury. Allison focused on Reginald and rumoured ‘And you would leave Diego Hargreeves, Klaus Hargreeves, Vanya Hargreeves, Y/n Hargreeves and Allison Hargreeves alone.’

Luther’s betrayal felt like a stab in the back.

Moving on and creating a new life from the ground up for oneself was hard but having your siblings with you had definitely made it easier.

It took a while to get the hang of things, being 4 young adults with nothing. You missed Mom and Pogo, but you knew that they, like Luther would stick with Dad.

Vanya was the first to take up stack, she provided the finance to pay rent and groceries with the salary she would get from her violin performances at the local theatre. Soon Allison would also chip in from the money she received from her acting gigs.

Diego showed interest into joining the police academy while you wanted to get away from the lifestyle as much as possible, opted to move across the country and pursue tertiary education-because that was what normal 18-year-old do right? For once you want to be ordinary and what better way than experience what student life is all about.

Though there is one teensy detail that was hindering your application. You were home-schooled by your robot mom. There weren’t report cards or grades that any university would accept. Even if there were, you wouldn’t want to go back to that dreadful house.

Both not wanting to lose your newfound passion, you and Diego had an enormous favour to ask.

‘NO not a chance!’ Allison crossed her arms. ‘It��s unethical!’

‘Yes we know-‘ you replied.

‘But it’s the only way.’ Diego reasoned. ‘It’s not fair for y/n and I to not be able to follow our dreams and to finally FINALLY move on with our lives, Ally. While you and Vanya get to live out yours.’

You nodded along. ‘We ask you just this one thing and we’re out of your hair.’

Allison looked between you two as if to decided whether it would be worth it. ‘Fine, just this once.’ She sighs. ’And this doesn’t get out kapeesh?’ pointing her finger.

‘kapeesh.’

‘I’m gonna miss you so much!’ Vanya admitted.

You pulled both your sisters into a hug. ‘I’m miss you gals more!’

Allison wipes her tears away. ‘Don’t forget us okay? Remember we’re only a text away.’

‘Tell Diego that I’m gonna miss kicking his butt when he come back from his officer training, ye?’

Over the years you hadn’t lost touch with your family. It’s been a while since you’ve all together physically, but you do video chat every once and a while and you have a general tab on each of your siblings. Vanya is currently the 3rd chair violin at her orchestra, Diego had channelled his inner batman and believe to be a vigilante keeping the streets and public safe.

As for Klaus, Diego had told you that he hasn’t managed to keep off his ~happy place~ and had seen him in and out of nightclubs.

Allison….Well who wouldn’t know about what she’s up to. A-list celebrity with numerous critically acclaimed movies to her name, one half of Hollywood’s hottest couple and amazing role model for mothers. Ahh Claire that sweet angel, who says that you’re her favourite aunt, that smile of hers melts your heart.

The last you’ve seen of Luther is when his journey to the moon has been televised a couple of years ago. There’s been no news since.

The rattling of the gate brings you back to the present.

‘AH yes, Miss.y/n. He has been expecting you.’

‘Pogo!’ You exclaimed, wrapping him in a hug.

‘So I’m not to late then? Where’s mom?’

‘Grace is with Sir Reginald, my dear.’ Pogo leads you up the stairs.

Looking around, everything is as pristine as usual. ‘I see that nothing’s change’ You noted.

‘Yes, well I was asked to keep it as it always was.’

He opens the door to Reginald’s quarters. There on the bed was dad, looking sickly pale but still alive unlike to what you had seen in your vision.

Beside him wiping away the sweat on his forehead was mom. ‘Oh, my dear y/n I’m glad you could join us.’ She says as if years hadn’t gone by without your presence.

You reach the foot of the bed. ‘Dad…’ you begin.

But Reginald cuts you off. ‘Number Eight. Glad to see that logical and curious side of yours overrides that irrational emotive side.’ His voice weak yet still holds its signature condescending tone. ‘It is your disposition to the voice of reason and mysteries of the unknown that led you here, despite your supposed hatred towards me-‘

‘There’s no grey area, I do hate you.’

He waved his hand to dismiss your interruption.

‘As I was saying, it is of this reason- your control over the impulsiveness that is apparent to all of your siblings who lack control- is why you are my favourite.’

You scoffed.

‘It is true, my dear y/n.’

‘Oh please. You only see me as a “valuable asset”. Remember?’

Reginald nods. ‘I do, but I believe the exact words were “You would do great things Number Eight. To see into the future is a valuable asset to have indeed”. Thus, implying that your ability is the asset not you.’

‘Sure, just rub it in don’t you.’ Rolling your eyes.

‘I hope that you do too remember that also in my own words that you were and still are “the cleverest of the bunch”.’

‘So why am I here, you’re clearly not dead.’ You looked at him again. You’ve never seen your dad so fragile ever. ‘….yet. So there must be something to do with that. Perhaps find your killer?’

On the bedside table, you took note of the cup of tea and medication. Your brain is in super speed, running through ideas on what could have cause him to be so sickly.

‘It could be your meds…..’ You look up. ‘Mom who else has access to Dad’s medication?’

‘Just us dear, Pogo and I.’

‘Number Eight there is no killer. I am dying because of old age, it is quite normal for-‘

‘NO No but the mortality rate is 350 years for the species of—’

‘Ah!’ Reginald’s face showed of surprise which slowly turned into cunningest. ‘so, you know then’ He chuckled.

‘Yes.’

‘Since when?’ He asked genuinely curious.

‘When we first showed signs of powers, some of your notes were written in a language I did not recognised.’ You recalled. ‘So, I did some digging, it took a while but when I found about the secret safe under this very bed and what it contained. Everything became clearer.’

‘Very good. Y/n. Nobody knew about the safe expect myself.’ He looked over at Pogo. ‘Did you know of it?’

‘No, Sir.’ Pogo admitted. ‘Not until now.’

‘Very well indeed. You knew all this time, yet you didn’t say anything. Why?’

‘Because it didn’t matter.’ You shrugged. ‘The only thing that matter in this household was our powers.’

‘Did the others-‘

‘No, they didn’t know. I hadn’t told a soul. It is not my secret to share.’

‘And soon it will be yours.’

‘What?’

‘Number Eight, it is without a doubt my time here is limited. Perhaps as little as an hour.’

Never had you seen someone talk about their death like this. You shiver at the thought.

‘By the fact that you are here now and had seen a vision of me dead means that the block I had place on you to prevent you peering into events regarding me is failing. Failing as my health is.’

You want to be angry. How dare he supress your power. But you stand still as a rock by his confession. ‘why?’ A soft whisper was all you could muster. ‘why?’

‘Because I had to keep my real identity a secret. To prevent you from exposing me.’ He coughed. ‘But turns out, you hadn’t need to use your powers to know that, as what you’ve told me.’ He looked at you with watering eyes. ‘You found that all on your own, yet you did not disclose anything.’ He reached out for your hand to which you accept. ‘For which I am delighted that at least I can say that I have one child, a daughter to be proud of.’

A daughter to be proud of.

You would like to think that you are strong and independent. And those are true. But that small child that all that wanted was to experience a parent’s love and affection. That emotional support of that small child which you thought you had successfully tucked away came clawing its way back to the surface.

‘y/n’ You had almost missed it, wiping away your tears, you leaned closer.

‘Listen carefully….’ Your dad’s chest was barely moving. It was a struggle for him to get the following words out. ‘The end is near, get the others ……and save…..the…..tttiiiimmm’

You never head what came next. Sir Reginald Hargreeves is dead.

Under the setting sun, Reginald looked at peace.

A half moon shines brightly above the house. It had been 3 days and 7 Hours since it happened.

Exhaustion is starting to catch up with you but there is still so much to do.

News channels had broadcasted the breaking news of your father’s death.

You had personally called your siblings to deliver the news, they are to arrive tomorrow for the funeral at noon.

Luther who had been expecting to relay dad his daily report status on the space radio, cussed at you in anger-those were the first words you heard in 12 years- calmed down and said that he will be there in 3 days, in time for the funeral.

‘Sweetie, I brought you some tea.’

‘Thanks mom.’ You take a sip. ‘Hey mom did you think you’re gonna be alright now that you know…. That dad is gone?’

She runs her fingers to your hair. ‘I’m gonna be fine dear, I am stronger than you know.’

You smile at her. You just can’t help but to think what’s gonna happen to her now that your dad is gone. Pushing that thought away-like she said, I am stronger than you know.

‘Now, why don’t we get you to bed.’ She cuts you off before you can say a word. ‘Uh uh. You have done so much already. You need rest especially with the funeral in 9 hours. Pogo and I can handle the remaining task.’

‘Thanks again mom.’

She tucks you into bed. ‘Good night y/n/n. Sweet Dreams.’ She kisses the top of your head. ‘I love you.’

‘I love you too mom.’ As she leaves your room, you realised that you didn’t want to be alone. ‘Mom…’ You called out, almost childlike.

‘Yes dear.’ Grace makes her way back in.

‘Well you stay with me? Sing to me until I fall asleep?’

‘Ofcourse dear.’ She smiles, pulling up a chair beside your bed.

The lull of your mother’s voice sends you to sleep with the memories of the childhood before power. When everything was simple. When there was love in this household.

You awoke to sounds of screams and flashes of blue light. You hurry to your window, it shows the courtyard, a ball of blue chaos small black figures.

You pull on your jacket and ran downstairs, the clock in the foyer shows 11:37am. Crap you overslept! But that means…..that the figures you saw were your siblings. There are early….that’s new.

You arrived in the courtyard just as you see Klaus throws a fire extinguisher at the blue light.

‘What are you doing?!’ Shouted Luther.

‘What is that gonna do?’ Allison questioned.

‘I don’t know!!’ Klaus turned around ‘Do you have a better idea?—Oh hey y/n! Nice to see you!’ He ran over and gave you a tight hug. ‘What a family reunion ehh?’

Before you could reply, the ball of blue gave out a crackle of electricity.

‘Everyone get behind me!’ Luther pushes in front of everyone.

‘Yeah! Get behind us.’ Diego chimed in, pushing Vanya closer to you.

Vanya ignores Diego, trying to get a better look herself. ‘It looks like something is coming through!’

The ball of light exploded, the sudden burst of energy was blinding that you had to cover your eyes.

Then nothing, total darkness.

THUD. You heard Vanya scream.

‘Argh!’

The blue chaos had expelled something….someone.

Luther was the first to speak. ‘Who’s there?’

‘Show yourself!’ said Diego.

As a collective group, you walked towards the mystery person.

Your eyes go wide with shock. No it can’t be, it’s impossible. You must be seeing things.

‘Does anyone else see little Number Five, or is that just me?’ wondered Klaus.

Klaus looked around and saw that everyone showed that same face of disbelief. Pleased to know that it wasn’t the drugs, he snickered. ‘Now THIS! THIS IS WHAT I CALL A FAMILY REUNION.’

Little Five who didn’t seem to have aged a day since you last saw him,

It’s been years but seeing him looking like he did back when you last saw him, you recall the last words he had shouted at you.

‘get out of the way y/n! i don’t want to see your face anymore.’

Five looks down at himself drowned in tattered oversize clothes, wining. ‘SHIT!’

Something is wrong, something is very wrong and you know it.

No way was this all a coincidence for your father to warn you about some impending doom and have Five to reappear 17 years later. It must be related somehow…What’s next you thought……For Ben to come back to life too?

END OF PART 2

READ: [PART 1] [PART 3] [PART 4]

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Would love to hear your opinion on the series so far too!

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dadsbongos · 4 years ago

Text

Brother’s Keeper

Movie/Game/Show: The Boy Dynamic: Brahms Heelshire/Reader (Platonic) Warnings: idk The Veldt spoilers if you’ve never read it (it’s really fucking good), the parents suck and they’re emotionally manipulative Summary: Brahms likes to play with his baby sister. ~~~

“What a pouty little face you have,” Mrs. Heelshire pinched at her daughter’s cheeks, stretching them upward, “Come on, let me see a smile.”

(Y/n) swatted at her mother’s hands, “I don’t want to.”

Brahms adjusted his tie as best he could for the family picture, letting his father take over after a minute of fumbling, “She’s not going to smile; little brat.”

“Hey!” the three-year-old girl whined, lips pulling into an even deeper pout, “You can’t be mean and the birthday boy at the same time, it’s not fair!”

The boy rolled his eyes, “You’re just upset your birthday isn't for five more months.”

“I’m seven, I’m too old for dolls,” (Y/n) muttered, not wanting to mention why exactly she didn’t want the porcelain doll, “Besides, he’s too fragile, if I drop him he’ll die.”

Death was a new fascination with the young girl after the incident. Though, to be fair, most fascinations didn’t last four years nor did they start with the horrific death of your older brother.

“Nonsense,” her father grinned, taking the doll from his wife and holding it out to his young daughter, “he was Brahms’ favorite.”

Brahms was a word that had become similar to “fuck” in the parents’ minds. Off-limits by the punishment of spanking or grounding unless you were one of them.

“Oh,” she murmured, carefully taking the toy and holding it to her side, “I never saw him play with it…”

“Too scared to break the poor thing,” Mrs. Heelshire reasoned easily enough, “Named after him.”

(Y/n) looked at the glassy object, “Why do I need to have him?”

“You’re going to take care of him, Brahms would want you to,” Mr. Heelshire brushed the girl’s hair from her forehead before leaving a small kiss to the patch of skin, “Be good to him, sweetheart, won’t you?”

Mrs. Heelshire nodded from behind her husband, “You wouldn’t want to disappoint Brahms, would you?”

She glanced between her pleading parents and the doll, pursing her lips before hesitantly nodding, “Alright, I guess…”

By the time 1999 rolled around and the only living Heelshire child was to turn eleven, there were no more friends to play in the house with. Emily, who in many ways had been an older sister to the girl, was murdered by some sick monster who lit the playhouse she was inside on fire. Well, maybe the killer didn’t light the playhouse on fire.

“You’re three, how are you going to take it from me?”

Instead, (Y/n) was left to play with her doll. With a party hat on her head, courtesy of the new grocery boy, Malcolm, she wandered aimlessly through the halls. Birthdays were no longer a celebration in the manor; unless it was Brahms’, of course. She held the doll to her hip, looking at the series of paintings decorating the wall; most of them portraying her big brother.

She frowned, settling a hand on the wall just below the largest mural in the hall. Her fingers brushed upon a small crevice dip in the split of colors in the striped wallpaper, brows furrowing at the ledge. She curled her fingers around it, beginning to pull when suddenly it popped apart from the wall. A panel opening up in the middle of the hallway, she looked down each end before climbing through.

Her eyes adjusted quickly enough, arms squeezing Brahms tighter to her form. She began creeping down the secret passageway, not noticing the sounds of her parents screaming her name.

A sudden turn and she took it. A curve in the path and she rounded it. Losing herself in the hidden walkways within her home. It was only when she realized how lost she was that panic settled in, “Mama…?”

She held Brahms even tighter, freehand leaving the doll to bang on the interior of the wall, “Papa! Mama?!”

It was half an hour before the panicking parents found their weeping little girl hidden behind a panel close to the fireplace. She was crying into the sweater on her doll, cheeks heated in the force of her tears. Not even Mr. Heelshire’s gentle hugging and cooing could relieve her of the emotional aches.

“You’re to never go in those walls again, do you hear me?” her mother grit through clenched teeth.

Never? As much as (Y/n) wanted to be on board with the idea, she wasn’t sure about never being able to go in again. Maybe… maybe she just had to be older, more mature - yeah - that sounded about right.

“Just once more,” she immediately calmed down, now speaking through a raspy, whiny post-crying voice, “I won’t get lost this time, I promise.”

Mr. Heelshire looked over to his wife, “Just one more couldn’t hurt, she should learn about the walls, shouldn’t she?”

As soon as the words left her husband’s lips, Mrs. Heelshire shook her head, “Not a chance. Haven’t you read The Veldt? That’s how the parents die.”

(Y/n)’s eyes widened, glancing between her parents as tears began springing into the surface, “You guys will die if I go in the walls again?”

Neither parent confirmed it, though they didn’t deny it either, before sending her off to bed with Brahms. Leaving her to question what the walls were in the dark solitude of her lavish bedroom; empty winnings for a girl who felt guilty enjoying them.

By fifteen, there was an influx of nannies coming in and out of the Heelshire home to care for a supposedly haunted doll. She wasn’t sure if she believed it but the messes and thumping and flickering lights were beginning to be too much to ignore. They all started after the wall incident - the second incident she could add to her fault - and she was forbidden from going back inside.

Panels were left open and soft, high-pitched whines ringing from behind them; it was more terrifying than alluring.

With no more Brahms by her side, in the real body or in doll form, (Y/n) was left to wander aimlessly down the halls thinking about how unfair it was of her parents to rip the doll away from her. All due to the walls’ tunnels.

They handed her a memento to her older brother - they used her guilt; her fault against her - just to steal it away eight years later. She hated her parents for it, no, not her parents. Her mother. Mrs. Heelshire barely even let the nannies do their job half the time, she just wanted Brahms all to herself. She gave that doll a surplus of her attention and countless replacement caretakers and never even gave (Y/n) the acknowledgment of their shared grief.

Barely gave her the mind to say, “It’s not your fault.”

Whipping around at the frail whisper, (Y/n) peeked around every visible inch of the hallway to see if one of the nannies was following her or her father was finally ready to free her of guilt. Yet nobody was there, no mouths to whisper and no audible drafts to blame.

She turned back around and continued walking down the hallway, not as alone as before.

“I’m nineteen, don’t you think I should, I don’t know, explore the real world?”

Mrs. Heelshire simply shook her head, “You can’t leave us!”

“I won’t be leaving!” (Y/n) tossed her arms out in a display of exaggeration, “I just can’t be in this house for the rest of my life!”

“So you will go eventually,” the older woman huffed, crossing her arms, “Brahms and now you.”

That made the teenager freeze. Nothing like the mention of her dead brother to make her question herself. She pulled back from the yelling match to judge and critique every inch of herself. Her leaving the nest wasn’t comparable to dying - and Brahms didn’t abandon them, he couldn’t control the flames. It wasn’t like he purposefully lit the playhouse on fire at his own birthday party.

No, but she could’ve stopped it. She knows she could have.

“That’s not fair,” (Y/n) muttered, though it sounded less like a genuine response and more like she was trying to point it out to herself.

“You know what else isn’t fair?”

“Don’t.”

“Having two kids and the only one alive wants to abandon you.”

Mr. Heelshire watched from the kitchen table, sipping on his afternoon tea quietly to give more space for the sound of his wife and daughter’s argument to permeate through the room. Through the room and into the walls where even the biggest rat hiding inside could hear.

(Y/n) rubbed at her arm, regretting her decision to even bring the topic up, “I’m sorry…”

“Oh, honey,” Mrs. Heelshire cooed, cupping her daughter’s cheeks and pulling at any fat her fingers could get to in the pockets, “It’s okay. Don’t be so pouty, it’s alright.”

She didn’t bother pushing her mother’s hands away this time.

(Y/n) silently dipped her paintbrush into a dollop of vibrant, cherry red on her palette, glancing over her canvas to the muse every so often.

A house can appear incredibly eased and soothed from the frontline and nobody would ever know that inside a family of four was being murdered. They wouldn’t know until the corpses were discovered and the extended family was beating at each other. Vultures flocking to the values left to them by death.

Maria, the newest in the line of nannies, was holding position rather well for somebody who’d never modeled before. Clutching Brahms to her hip with a bright, pearly-toothed smile.

“I saw a few of your works around the house earlier,” the black-haired woman spoke, “Impressive for only twenty-three.”

“Thanks,” (Y/n) strained a grin, she didn’t necessarily prefer silence - you could hear the walls whispering when it was silent - but sadly, her focus wavered with noise, “I just like to paint the nannies; don’t like to forget them so quickly.”

“Oh,” Maria awkwardly chuckled, “well, that sounds nice of you…?”

“Just a personal thing,” the young woman shrugged off before catching something in the frame of her eye, “You’re about to drop Brahms.”

“Shit!” the other woman murmured, readjusting the doll in her arms, “Thank you so much.”

“My mom will go crazy, I don’t want to watch her yell at somebody over nothing,” she pursed her lips, “Not nothing; just something small.”

“Are you serious?” (Y/n) narrowed her eyes at her mother, “You and Dad are leaving for a two-month vacation right before my birthday?”

“You’re turning twenty-eight, dear,” Mrs. Heelshire smiled faintly, “I think you’ll be fine, now if you don’t mind, I’ll go downstairs and teach the new nanny how to properly care for Brahms.”

(Y/n) crossed her arms, watching her father continue to pack his bags, “You’re really just letting her drag you out of town right now?”

“She didn’t drag me into anything, honey,” he sighed, whether he knew how much it hurt her feelings to hear that or not didn’t exactly matter.

“Fuck you,” she grumbled, rushing out of the room and down the stairs, the twenty-seven-year-old woman went into her bedroom, fully prepared to ignore her parents and the new nanny. Blissfully unaware of the pest in her walls, watching with sad eyes and wanting to see her smile.

“Knock it off!” (Y/n) cried out to the man swinging the doll around - a protective instinct burning at her gut as she thought of him breaking it. She immediately regretted the harsh tone when Cole’s furious gaze snapped back to her, “Please… just give him back…”

“Watch it,” Cole threatened, holding the doll further away from her than before, “Pull any funny shit and I’ll break in your pretty little face.”

Yet another mistake against the brute, not that anybody but the secret rat was counting. The first, of course, being his arrival. The last, naturally, was bashing the doll’s head against the lip of a seat.

(Y/n) hiccuped wildly, her burst of tears nearly choking her as Cole shushed the room during one of Brahms’ fits. She’d experienced countless ragers with that doll to blame but this was the worst. Cole put a finger to his lips, commanding the people behind him into silence as he went to the wall, knocking a few times with his ear pressed to it. He went to the mirror next, grinning slightly, “There’s something- “

Before he could finish his sentence, the glass burst apart and forced him onto his back.

As Greta screamed and (Y/n) held her head in her hands in the midst of her hysterics, Malcolm called to the two women.

Large hands pulled onto the mirror frame first, then out came a fully grown man. Brahms Heelshire was alive - and he was big.

(Y/n) fell onto her ass, watching as her previously dead big brother stabbed Colt in the neck with a piece of his broken doll. Brahms lunged for Greta only to be beaten down by Malcolm and when the two were away; (Y/n) did not leave.

She crawled over to his sprawled out form, taking his shoulder into her hands and shaking him slightly, “Brahms…?”

He jerked once - then twice, then pushed himself up, taking a moment to look at his little sister before standing. In a fashion similar to when they used to sneak around the manor as children, he pressed a finger to his mask’s lips before running off.

“I came back for you, Brahms.”

(Y/n) fiddled with her fingers as her older brother was swept upstairs by Greta, following after them like a lost puppy. As Greta pulled back the covers, (Y/n) felt her heart thump wildly in her chest.

Of course, it never helped when he threw a woman across the room.

“Brahms!” (Y/n) shrieked, latching onto her brother’s back and attempting to pull him off Greta, only succeeding when he fell back from his own stab wound.

Greta stopped at the doorway, turning to watch as the Heelshire girl cradled her big brother’s head in her hands in her panic-rich state, “(Y/n), come on. We have to go.”

Looking between Greta and her brother, (Y/n) felt the memories creep back up from the dip of her spine.

“Is that Papa’s lighter?”

Emily nodded slightly as Brahms watched the flame flicker, the little boy speaking up first, “I was interested in it, I’m sure he won’t mind.”

(Y/n) clutched at a lock of her own hair, “You better give it back or I’ll take it myself!”

“You’re three, how are you going to take it from me?” he scoffed before shooing her out of the playhouse, “If you tell Dad, I’ll break all your toys and cut up your dresses.”

She hadn’t told Father - she didn’t take the lighter.

Shaking her head, (Y/n) looked back to her older brother, burn scars on the visible half of his face and suddenly the guilt was rising to her throat again. Her hands smoothed over to the clasp of the mask, carefully unclipping it as Greta ran off to find Malcolm. A wicked sob racked her throat, her voice squeaking up soft and whiny, “I’m sorry… I’m so sorry…”

A hand came up to brush her tears away, Brahms watching his little sister continue to cry, a small, childlike voice peeking through his lips, “Please don’t cry, (Y/n)… I don’t want to see you cry…”

Calming down only slightly, (Y/n) helped her brother sit up, “I’ll stay, I’m sorry.”

Brahms continued to watch his sister’s tears spill, “You’ll stay.”

It wasn’t a question, he barely even bothered to disguise it as such.

“I’ll stay…”

She didn’t really have a choice, not when her parents kept her under lock and key so strictly. But maybe they anticipated Brahms coming back; maybe they wanted her to have no independence so she wouldn’t leave her big brother.

Not that she’d be able to ask them.

#brahms heelshire #brahms the boy #brahms heelshire x reader

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nikkialena · 3 years ago

Text

A Clone’s Desire

You were a rookie padawan who’d finally been selected after a long waiting period at the jedi temple; you were more than a bit excited to finally be out in the field, not like you didn’t enjoy master Yoda’s company and his wise teaching but you couldn’t help but tremble at the idea of being with your very own master and a trooper squadron. Which is why you were superstitiously checking your reflection in the mirror; you wanted everything to be perfect because apparently there were going to be a few 501st clones in you’re squadron, your heart raced a mile a minute as you began scouring your features in the mirror for any kind of flaws.

A knock at the door made goosebumps spread across your skin; you were both nervous and afraid and about two seconds from puking but you pulled yourself together, swallowing the lump in your throat you reached for the bathroom handle with trembling fingertips.

“Your a secret weapon, your going to help the jedi and end the war you are amazing” you muttered to to yourself trying to hype yourself up; you side eyed yourself in the mirror taking one last glance over you’re general appearance, you were dressed in a sleeveless black crop top with a little patch in the middle revealing a bit of cleavage.

A leather utility belt sat lopsided on your waist right above a pair of baggy black camo pants with about fifteen pockets; you had a dozen different varieties of trinkets shoved in your many pockets, Yoda loathed when you did that, always saying how it would anker you down. But you always brushed him off mumbling something along the lines of I got this; taking a deep breath you tried to make yourself stand tall as you opened the door to your room, you glanced around your room making sure everything looked right. Sniffing the air you sighed thankful it smelt decent; another knock on the door made shivers dance down your spine but you slapped your cheeks and put on your tough face, “one minute” you called out as you stood in front of your bedroom mirror trying to decide if you looked presentable. You checked your dark skin in the reflection and tugged the scrunchy from your lucious {h/c} allowing your beautiful curls to spill down your back and along your shoulders, after tearing your eyes away from the mirror you briskly walked towards the door and ripped it open before you could second guess yourself for the fifth time. Standing in front of your door frame was an auburn haired man with a small beard dressed in nearly all white robes; the only color on him being his reddish shoes and brownish undergarments and piercing blue eyes.

“Ah I see you’ve finally decided to join us [Y/N]; well I hope you're ready for your first mission because we leave in fifteen minutes, but first I’d like you to rendezvou with the troopers and introduce yourself. We’ll be holding a mission debriefing in ten minutes in the cockpit; please do try and make sure every detail is crucial on the battlefield. Oh and uh welcome to the team padawan I look forward to working with you. Lets hope you turn out better than Anakin”, he muttered that last part more so to himself you weren’t exactly sure what to do so you bowed and mumbled a soft “yes sensei”.

He gave you a cheeky smile before walking down the corridor and disappearing down a hall, casting one last glance to the mirror you sighed and forced yourself out the room, you weren’t exactly sure where the clones were. So you kinda wandered aimlessly until you bumped into one dressed in a bulky white suit with the occasional splashes of orange decorating his helmet and armor, at first he didn’t notice you no one ever did. When you were designed you were significantly shorter than most of the clones; standing at a measly five feet and four inches but what you lacked in height you made up for in curves. Finally noticing you the trooper took off his helmet and saluted you giving you just enough time to scope him out; he had tanned skin rich brown eyes and a short raven colored buzz cut, a strange marking sat just above his right eye and you held back the urge to trace it with your fingers. “Hello, I’m Sergeant Cody but most people just call me CC-2224, you must be General Kenobi’s news padawan..um [Y/N] was it?”

As his eyes shifted to you, you felt yourself shrink under the intensity of his gaze. The way his chocolate eyes bore deep into your soul almost made you feel naked, “uh yea that’s me” you managed to squeak cursing yourself for sounding so cowardly. For a second his brows lowered as he looked and took in your features but it vanished as quick as it came, however you noticed this and grumbled softly you knew that look all too well. It was that aren’t you a bit young to be a padawan? Which you despised, “I’ll have you know Sergeant Cody I’m twenty” you spat venom creeping into your tone, the look of shock on his face was equally annoying but just like before it melted away so quickly if you hadn’t been paying attention you wouldn’t have noticed. Yet another gift from your makers; most people mistook you for a fifteen or sixteen year old and it was fun at first, but it quickly got annoying. You both just stood in awkward silence, you glaring at him while he avoided eye contact; it wasn’t until another person came up to you that you stopped your death stare and he seemed to sigh in relief.

The approaching male was tall with cream colored skin, short brown wavy hair swept backwards and soft blue eyes, he had a tiny little scratch on his left eyebrow and a cocky looking smirk etched on his features. Unlike the other males you’ve seen he was almost completely dressed in black, or at least a very dark brown you weren’t exactly sure but you weren’t given much time to dwell on it due to him swinging one arm around your neck and pulling you in for a nuggie.

“Hey, squirt look at you all grown up and ready to become a jedi it pleases me that you’re my replacement” he hummed while deliberately ruffling your hair, at first you were dumbfounded and very pissed off that this random douchebag not only forcibly hugged you but also messed up your hair you worked so hard to neaten. But your anger quickly fizzled out as realization settled in and your frowned only deepened, “oh Anakin it’s you how ya been?” You asked, trying to readjust your hair as he let you go and began walking making you and Cody follow, “well you know squirt the usual” he said motioning with a flick of wrist into the air.

“So getting in trouble and causing problems for everyone else” you sang earning a snort from Cody quickly covered by a discrete series of coughs, Anakin’s cheeks turned a soft shade of red for a moment before he brushed your comment off “they call it trouble I call it creative thinking”. “No I can assure you there’s nothing creative about your fighting methods, it's just destructive” a familiar voice interjected into your conversation, you turned to be greeted by the same warm smile from your sensei as he waited leaned up against a wall surrounded by a couple of troopers.

Anakin just scoffed and slapped you on the shoulder a bit roughly; “this guys a riot you're sure to have an amazing time under his watch” the sarcasm in his words was so thick you could almost feel it. Obi Wan just rolled his eyes at his former pupil and motioned for you to enter the cockpit, the meeting began and you just kinda sunk into the back as the generals and the troopers made plans. It’s not like you weren’t paying attention but you just felt so out of place here amongst all these skilled soldiers; sure you were well trained.

I mean freaking Yoda supervised you in the temple, but you’d never been on the battlefield before and it was kinda frightening. “First time in the meeting room” a gentle voice voice whispered, snapping you out of your train of thought, shifting your gaze to your right you were met with a Togurta with bright crystal blue eyes, peachy orange skin and beautiful whit markings scattered across her face.

“How can you tell” you mumbled while letting out a breath you didn’t know you were holding; she smiled and pointed at your fingers drumming against your thighs, ‘oh that’ you thought to yourself of course your body betrayed you it always has. “Yea, I’m fresh out the temple” you whispered and she nodded slowly eyes flickering back to the talking men, “well you don’t have to be so nervous we’re not doing anything to dangerous just pushing back a couple of seppies out of a potential base area” that calms you down just a little bit.”Doesn’t sound to hard” you mused with a soft smile on your face “don’t jinx it” she hissed confusing you, “what?”

She looked at you with a quirked brow “haven't you ever seen a movie, whenever someone says oh that was too easy it gets significantly harder so don’t jinx it”, you nodded in understanding just as you both got called on the carpet, “I’m sorry are we boring you ladies or do you have something to add to the battle plans?” You heard the girl next to you swallow thickly as all eyes turned to both of you and you felt slightly responsible, so stepping up you tried your best not to try and sound like an idiot, “Um well actually we’re trying to push our way into separtiest base right?” A soldier dressed in white and blue gave an acute nod all the while glaring at you with his chilling golden eyes, “well I think it would be wise if I was on the frontlines while the troopers distract the seppies I could sneak in and create an opening for them” you added hopefully but were met with hard stares.

“And just how would you go about that padawan?” The clone in blue growled through his helmet you didn’t need to see his eyes to see the look of doubt written across his face, this annoyed the crap out of you and you allowed a bit of spite to slip into your voice “oh well simple that’s a need to know bais trooper and woulda look at that your not on the list pity”.

You poked out your bottom lip and faked a tear as everyone kind of stared at you in shock; you swear you saw Obi Wan’s eye twitch as he muttered something like oh great and Anakin just had the cheesiest smile on his face. He wrapped his arm around your neck again and pulled you in for a hug; “did I forget to mention we were best friends at the temple”, everyone in the room seemed to tense at that knowledge and General Kenobi sighed. “Lucky me then; that’s not how you speak to your superiors [Y/N] but we’ll talk about that later, just what do you have in mind miss [Y/N]?” You smiled confidently and crossed your arms across your chest pushing up your breast a smidge, “well like I said I’m not supposed to go talking about it willy nilly sensei orders from the jedi council, but I can tell you and general skywalker but that’ll have to wait because we have a mission just trust me I got this.”

The blue clone scoffed a bit watching how intensely General Kenobi was watching you, “you can’t be serious general you're going to leave this to a shiny padawan” he spat a little louder than intended sensei stroked his beard before sighing. “The jedi counsel sent her to aid us even though she’s fresh she must be capable of extraordinary things, I’m trusting you [Y/N] the whole republic is counting on this base can you really accomplish what you're saying?” You felt pride swell in your chest as saluted him “Just leave it to me sir they don’t call me blitz for nothing”, the ride down to the planet was filled with silence as you mentally prepped yourself for the upcoming battle “here goes nothing” you muttered softly as the doors to the dropship creaked open.

#captain rex x reader #thebadbatch #obi wan kenobi #anakin and ahsoka #fanfiction #kinkyshit #lemon #romance #star wars #fuff

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ilovel0ki · 4 years ago

Text

Burning Light

loki x oc

warnings: blood, war, almost deaths

Writing this has been super enjoyable for me. It's based off of Safe & Sound by Taylor Swift and The Central Wars. I really like the song and it gave me a jolt of inspiration.

Some angst and fluff, with a happy ending

Word count: 3.5k

I'm looking forward to have some of you read it. I know it may not reach lots of people but I do hope it brightens up someone's day :)

Unmistakeable clashing and clanging of swords echoed through the once-peaceful city - which lay in eerie unrest. Warriors strapped in bloodstained armour, which was once a lustrous luminescent gold, rushed around with panic-stricken faces, bringing their injured colleages with them. Their faces unrecognisable - smeared with tainted, crimson blood. Eyes once filled with joy and life had become dull with exhaustion. Even the children could tell something had gone quite wrong as they were being scrambled to safety. How couldn’t they, when only hours before they had been blithely engaging in play. Now they were being dragged into the promised safety of their homes. Still, on this side of town, the situation was slightly better.

Nevertheless, the fact was painfully clear; Asgard was at war.

A war that had only just begun. A war that would wreak just as much havoc as any other, unless handled conscientiously. Currently, that wasn’t going so well. The opposing kingdom hadn’t spoken of a reason to wage this sanguinary battle. They just barged in guns-a-blazing. One could only hope it would be over soon.

In the opposite side of town, the infamous Asgardian army, known for its expertise and experience, was busy and bustling. Healers were tending to those caught in the crossfire while others were getting ready to join it. The warriors were determined; they were trained meticulously for situations like these.

One such warrior was buckling up her hefty armor on her body, following that by trying to tie back her flowing vermillion-red hair. Unsuccessful, she stood straight. Tall, dignified and regal; she was a sophisticated beauty. And she knew it.

In need of help, the girl surveyed her surroundings. Brilliant blue eyes darted to and fro to gauge someone who could possibly help. Then, gleefully, she spotted a familiar face walk by. A very familiar face indeed.

With a hastily thought out plan-of-attack, Ilaire sauntered towards the aformentioned person. Wrapping her arms around him, she sultrily whispered in his ear, “Hey, Loki. Could you help me with my tiresome hair”.

Though Ilaire couldn’t see it, a slow smirk settled upon the trickster’s face. Loki turned on his heel and susurrated, “Darling, you need not put on that act. I would help you if you simply asked, after all have we not been friends since adolescence?”.

Ilaire flippantly nodded in answer as a chesire cat grin took over her face at having succeeded in her task. She flipped around to give Loki better access to her hair. Without complaint, Loki took charge of her fiery silken hair and began to masterfully twist her hair into an elegant yet practical fashion, as if he had done it all his life. In a sort of way, he had. With a raised hand, Ilaire tried - in vain - to pass a ribbon to Loki to tie her hair back.

“Don’t bother, I have already used my seidr to place a ribbon in your hair”, Loki acknowledged, amused. “It’s emerald green, isn’t it?”,exasperated, the warrior questioned with her hand on the bridge of her nose.

Loki chuckled in response.

“Well, thank you anyway”, she said as she stood on her tiptoes and kissed him on the cheek.

For a second, Loki’s mask of cold indifference slipped and gave way to something softer, akin to endearment. But it came back up just as Thor’s voice boomed across the army quarters.

“WARRIORS! The next waves must get ready to leave. Wave 32 and 33 get into position in 10 minutes, with Leaders Prince Loki and Lady Ilaire on the frontlines!”.

Centuries ago, Loki and Ilaire had trained together diligently and achieved higher ranks in the army hierarchy together. Both had now been promoted to a Leader position, the second highest position, preceded only by the Chief.

Thor’s information brought a surge of sobriety to the bantering friends as they realised what they were about to go into. They looked to each other, their eyes met and both nodded at the same time with locked jaws and unyielding glares. Synchronised, they turned to their corresponding waves and bellowed, “GET INTO POSITION WARRIORS!”.

A clangour resonated as the warriors began to put the remaining pieces of armour on. Ilaire’s usually welcoming eyes grew dark. Loki’s gaze grew steely. With a grave expression, Thor strode to their area. Without missing a beat, he trapped both Ilaire and Loki in an unwavering hug. It portrayed all of his emotions: distress; fear and concern. As he continued to not let them go, Loki’s choked voice broke out, “Brother, you must let us go”. Reluctantly, Thor pulled back and Ilaire could’ve sworn that his eyes were wetter than before. “Brother. Sister. Be careful. And most of all come back alive,” Thor spoke in a brittle voice.

Somewhere along the line, Ilaire had become an honorary Odinson family member. To Thor she was a sister and to Loki, she hoped she was something more. Still, a new wave of emotion passed over Ilaire as she heard Thor call her his sister. She fought valiantly to not be overcome with tearful sobs.

“Do not worry, Chief,” she called him in unbridled affection “We will try our best”, she replied in a hoarse manner. “Don’t miss us too much,” Loki too replied, with a rare smile and a suave salute.

The red-haired warrior clashed her sword on her shield to catch the attention of her assigned wave. “Alright, team! We’ve trained together for 150 years. We will continue to train far longer than that! We must! So go out and show those brutely creatures WHO’S BOSS!”, Ilaire’s battlecry washed over her warriors.

As the gates opened and perfectly formed formations walked out, merciless stony gazes could be seen all around. Loki and Ilaire stood at the frontlines, the wind amplifying their battle-hardened gazes. They both walked on the bloodsoaked ground, unfaltering, with a mission. As they got closer to the first of the aliens, Ilaire slashed at one, sending it accross the battleground. Beneath her feet, alien remains squelched and the air zinged with bloodshed.

The aliens were a sickly yellow with a strange slimy goo coating them. They were of a medium stature. Not too big but not too small. Ilaire had never seen such creatures.

Loki snarkily thought ‘They’re about Thor’s size. Doesn’t seem like this will be too hard’.

All around the two leaders, fights were breaking out and more yellow creatures were going down with them. Soldiers were slashing and punching with unmatched gusto. A pile of miserable dead opponents was starting to build up. Then something strange happened.

Something no one would’ve expected.

Something that shocked everyone.

Something that made perfect sense considering the earlier bloodshed.

The creatures that had been piled on top of each other started to melt and then meld together. It was a ghastly view. Bones shifting and rotting skin stretching. The creatures had melded together to become one mega-creature. A mega-creature larger than the small aliens before. Larger than Thor.

This truth dawned on the fighting forces and panic started brimming. Nothing like this had ever been faced before. It was entirely unprecedented. The Asgardian army certainly wasn’t trained for this. And judging by the drained, feeble warriors taken back to the healers, the other waves hadn’t realised this either. Alarm bells started ringing in Loki and Ilaire’s minds.

Loki’s mind started racing while simultaneously fighting off more of the alien soldiers.

Ilaire was frantically trying to think of a solution.

All thoughts seemed to evade them. The realm’s greatest minds had gone suddenly blank.

Panic was bubbling and almost tangible in the air.

One of the warriors, thankfully, came to the rescue, saving the situation like it was a damsel in distress. “SEPARATE THEM ONCE YOU KILL THEM, THAT WAY THEY CAN’T MOLD TOGETHER!”.

Ilaire let out a much-needed sigh of relief, yet she knew the real battle still remained. With a new plan, the waves started fighting with renewed vigour. After each kill, the creature was picked up and thrown on an empty space. Swords pierced and clanged, blood spattered and the beginnings of victory were starting to be seen. It was so close yet so far. Right within a hand’s reach, yet victory had not yet been snatched.

As Ilaire swerved to fight off another mega-creature, one approached from behind. WIth her eyes on the creature she was fighting, Ilaire did not notice the second creature. Loki’s mouth started to open in warning as he watched in fright. Unfortunately, his warning was a few seconds too slow. The creature grabbed a fallen sword and gashed at the sliver of skin between Ilaire’s chest and back armour with a mighty roar. Then a few things happened in succession.

A breathy gasp left Ilaire’s mouth as her hands grasped at her side, trying to gauge the situation. Her sword had unceremoniously dropped to the floor and lay lackadaisical. Her hands came away covered in her own blood, as more started to seep out. Crimson. Her breaths became raspy as she fell to her knees, head bowed. Several screams could be heard. Two of those were Loki and Thor.

Loki elbowed and slashed his way with an unmatched rage to reach his best friend. His mind was racing with denial, 'It could not end like this. It would not end like this.’

“Get out of the WAY!” he barked with barely held back anger.

Near the army quarters, Thor was making his way out to the battlefield. He would not sit by idly as his family was attacked. It was his turn.

As Thor reached his brother, he saw him kneeling beside Ilaire, undoing her armor and ripping a shred of his tunic to wrap it around her bleeding torso. “Take her to the healers, I will take care of this now,” Thor uttered quietly, yet if one looked closely, the simmering anger under his words was visible.

Then he yelled and charged towards his sorry opponents.

This left Loki. He looped his arms under her knees and shoulders and picked up Ilaire, and began to carry her towards the army quarters. “Love, look at me,” he spoke softly with a tender gaze.

It was getting harder for Ilaire to see by the minute as more blood was lost and her vision was spotting. “I can’t… I can’t,” Ilaire answered. A weak whimper escaped her lips.

“Yes, you can! Just focus on me”

Loki was starting to jog now, in desperation.

Commandingly, a shrill sound reverberated throughout the air. “LOKI ODINSON. WE ARE HERE TO COLLECT YOU. COME WITH US OR HAVE YOUR REALM FACE THE DISASTROUS CONSEQUENCES”.

Everything was going wrong. How could it have gone so wrong? Too much blood spilt and too many lives being lost by the minute.

Ilaire didn’t know what to do with this new command. Loki continued walking with an unreadable look on his face.

Ilaire struggled to keep her eyes open, but she got through until they had reached the healers.

A healer began to assess her; poking and prodding at the wound. Loki’s deperate voice rose, “Do something! Help her!”.

“The salve may take too long to brew. It could be too late for her,” the healer replied with an apologetic gaze.

“WHAT DO YOU MEAN! HELP HER! I AM THE PRINCE OF ASGARD AND SHE, A LADY OF THE COURT! THERE MUST BE SOMETHING YOU CAN DO!” Loki hissed.

“Prince Loki, we will try our best but there’s no guarantee”.

Loki growled and ran his hand through his hair in frustration. He was mad. He had injured himself too much to be able to use his magic. If only he fought more efficiently, if only he did more - maybe he could have healed her. If only.

After a grueling half hour, the healer gave the confirmation.

A half hour of desperate waiting for the news.

A half hour that seemed miles longer than it was.

Ilaire would make it.

'She's gonna make it'

Loki let out the breath he had been holding and slumped in a chair with relief. He had refused to let her out of his sight. A weary smile took shape on his face and he let out a breathless laugh of joy.

“Prince Loki, take her to the royal chambers and allow her to sleep. Until now she has had to stay awake until her healing was confirmed, in case of her becoming comatose,” the healer instructed Loki.

He walked to the stretcher Ilaire was laid upon and picked her up in the same style again. Ilaire wrapped her arms around Loki’s neck in a hug. “You’re alright,” Loki spoke through deep breaths with a reciprocated hug, rubbing her back to soothe her. Ilaire hugged him tightly. She almost died. She hugged him like it was her last time, because it very well could be. She didn’t want to waste this precious time.

God, Loki was grateful. Grateful she made it. He didn’t know what he would’ve done if something happened to her.

_______

Ilaire was carried to the Royal Palace adjoining to the army quarters. As she was gently dropped on her bed, she spoke for the first time since her attack. She knew Loki would go to the opposing kingdom. He would not wage a war on his own kingdom. “Don’t go Loki,” she pleaded, “I’ll never let you go”.

“Ilaire, I have to go. You know I do,” a tear ran down his face as he spoke the words that would seal his fate. A fate without her.

“Don’t leave me here alone,” Ilaire choked out as hot tears brimed in her eyes. “You’ll always have my spirit. Just think of me,” Loki smiled through the gut-wrenching pain. He really, really didn’t want to leave. But, for once, he wanted to do the right thing. For once, he wanted to earn her friendship.

“Go to sleep, Ilaire. You need it to heal,” Loki cleared his throat before speaking. A protest fought to release itself from Ilaire’s mouth but Loki raised a hand to cut it off. “You know I must do this. There is no use in arguing. I just want you to be safe”, his voice grew hoarse at his last words.

Loki spoke again, “Just close your eyes, the sun is going down. You’ll be alright, no one can hurt you now. Come morning light, you’ll be safe and sound”.

As much as she tried to fight it, Ilaire could not hold off sleep any longer. She wished she could stay awake so that she could convince the love of her life to stay. She wished he didn’t have to sacrifice himself. She wished he didn’t have to go at all. She wished to say and hear so many things that had been left unsaid. But sleep was consuming her. And time was running out. The sand in the hypothetical hourglass was falling at an ever-faster rate.

As her eyelides fluttered, she started to speak, “I lo…,” before sleep consumed her and she trailed off.

She had failed to say those three small words. Three small words. The ones that could’ve changed her life. The ones she will never get to say to him again.

Loki stood and wiped the tears off her face and kissed her cheek, before bringing up a blanket to cover her.

“I love you, Ilaire. I wish we had more time. But we do not. Maybe, one day, we’ll find each other in a another life and live peacefully. Who knows, we could have had a beautiful castle with the most magnificent grounds. Overlooking a view almost as beautiful as you. Or maybe we could’ve had a cottage. On the edge of the woods, next to a crystal clear lake", Loki spoke. He knew as he uttered those words that they will never get to do that now.

Neither heard the words of the other.

With that, he left, making his way back on to the battlefield.

__________

"IT IS I, LOKI ODINSON,” he presented himself. The alien leader made his way to the front. “Goodness, you’re a puny one. Whatever. Chain him, minions”, the yellow leader commanded. Thor watched in shocked silence. But even he knew that this had to be done. The brothers nodded to each other in farewell.

Loki was dragged, in chains, to the ostentatious spaceship of the aliens.

“You have stolen from me, Odinson,” a voice reached him. Loki struggled to remember what he had stolen. There were so many things he had recently pilfered. Then it hit him. He had stolen Maricusan. The most versatile and strong material in the nine realms. This material was used to make the Odinson family armors. And it came from Maricus. The planet known for being deceitful. This meant that their word was false. Unsurprisingly, they were also known for making false deals.

They would not only kill Loki but pillage Asgard too. At this moment, Loki realised he was in deep shit.

A minute ago, he had gone willingly. Now he would fight back. He would fight back to see his brother. He would fight back to see his beloved. With one swift motion, he pulled his hands apart, resulting in the chains snapping with an audible snap. As creatures advanced on him, he kicked and punched while using his clones to distract. Then, through the corner of his eye, he saw an opening in the door, which he managed to slip through.

As he re-entered the battlefield once again, he signaled to Thor. Thor’s eyes widened in shock at the sight of his brother. By now, he too had discovered the yellow Maricusians’ melding properties. The two brother came up with the quickest battle strategy they had ever made and got to work.

____________

In the Royal Palace, Ilaire had woken up. Her sleep was restless and a headache plagued her along with her rampant thoughts. Her beloved was going to sacrifice himself. Or maybe he had done so already. Pain stabbed her heart and tears started to collect in her eyes again. She did not want to be a whiny mess, but what else was she supposed to do? She was helpless against fate.

Sobs warcked her body. Then she saw a glint through her window. She curiously peeked towards it. Then she noticed the ongoing battle. The war was raging on. Now she was confused. Brows furrowed, she looked harder. Then. Then she saw the trademark emerald green and gold. Her heart soared in hope she dared not have.

'Was that Loki?'

She impatiently waited for the man to turn around, biting her nails in nervousness. Sand fell tantalizingly slow in the hypothetical hourglass. Time trickled by leisurely. Never had a moment seemed so long.

It was Loki.

The man was Loki.

A beaming smile broke out on her face as her tears turned to those of joy. She could hear a joyful tune playing in her head. It was a victory song. She felt victorious. She felt victorious for the first time on that horrendous day.

Their eyes met, and their smiles matched. Loki's eyes glinted with affection.

Too weak to join her warriors, Ilaire looked out at the battlefield. Nervously, waiting and hoping. And when the last blow happened, she was lost in felicity. They had done it. They had won. They got through unscathed. Sort of.

Hurriedly, Ilaire raced as fast as she could with her striking injury to get out to the battlefield. She saw Loki and he saw her. He held his arms out and she jumped into them, hugging him ferociously.

“Darling, you should be resting. That is a rather large wound,” he spoke in relief. He was glad to see her.

“You were supposed to die!” she replied.

“Good to know you like me alive,” Loki grumbled.

Like that, the two continued to banter, as Loki walked her back to her chambers, a hand around her shoulders too keep her steady.

When Ilaire entered her room, she started to speak, “Loki, there are many things I wish to say to you. One thing in particular. As I was thinking about possibly losing you, I thought of the things I never got to say”. She paused to gather her breath and to collect strength. She oh-so-very desperately hoped her words didn't come out as verbal diarrhoea.

“I love you. I love you, Loki. I have ever since you picked out that flower bouquet for me. Or when you spar with me. Or when we argue.” She chuckled, “I still keep those flowers preserved because its such a lovely memory.”

She stood with bated breath and nervousness running through her veins.

Loki's face had become softer somehow. His eyes were warm. And when Ilaire realised that this warmth was directed towards her, butterflies collected in her stomach.

“Ilaire, I adore you. I love you with the heat of a thousand suns. Yes, I know that’s cliche. But those are my feelings. You are my beacon when everything else fails. So, I wish to ask you something."

A pause.

Be mine?” he asked with a tender smile and soft blue eyes.

“Say that again,” Ilaire commanded hoarsely.

“Be mine” he smirked.

“Yes,” Ilaire whispered breathily.

Loki rushed forward and gathered Ilaire in his arms, glad to have found his love; his best friend.

“Come morning light, you and I’ll be… safe and sound”

This is what I imagine my OC to look like. Feel free to change as you please :)

Let me know your thoughts and if you'd like me to write something else <3

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reddus-sideblog · 3 years ago

Text

Pathfinder Update

WOOPS ALMOST FORGOT TO PUT A BREAK SORRY ABOUT YOUR DASHBOARD

So, the Ninth Life, Captain Lora’a’s ship, makes good heading towards the once Velakan and now Pragian prison isle. On the eve before the ship arrived Tisiphone produced the Twin Orb, and took Valka through to Bostadt, going with him to “watch over him” while he brewed potions of See Invisible (our trust of Ivan was running ever lower). Once TIsiphone was satisfied that Valka was occupied with making the potions she left to go “take care of some things”.

Valka said for her to say “hi” to Vera for her, and Tisiphone pretended, quite poorly, to say that she would if she did in fact happen to go by the Silver Stag. Tisiphone came back to the Ninth Life the next morning, seemingly a lot calmer and with her carefully washed and braided. It was rare to see her hair so carefully maintained, instead of the usual fluffy mess that it is usually seen in. Tisi had forgotten to buy any further supplies, though. Valka did, however, make the See Invisible potions.

Once the Ninth Life came into view of the prison isle the Stormbreaker let up the wind and cast his gaze at the isle. It noted how the island seemed to have an enchantment about it that caused a permanent effect of rainy weather on the isle, and the construct, seemingly for it’s own amusement, decided that the weather’d be changed to a sunny day, overpowering the local enchantment. And so on what was now a nice sunny day, Ivan and his companions, and Kii, Valka, Nik, and Tisi took to the rocky shore of the island in dinghys.

The island was a miserable rock, sticking up out of the ocean to the West of the Southerlands/Velakor, with a trio of towers sticking out of its heights, and its structure burrowing into the rocky form of the island. Each tower was armed with a ballista, and to the rear (or rather opposite side of the island from The Ninth Life) was a nice, if modest, manor.

Once we made it to the shore Ivan went ahead and talked with the warden commander and seemed to have legitimate papers and explained the situation at hand. The commander went about readying the island’s defences and Valka whined loudly, convincing the warden commander to let us relax in his place of residence before the fighting began. On our way there we saw the kitchen of the complex (Valka hopefully asked if they could get some food, but it had already been lunch time a bit ago and they weren’t willing to compromise).

So the group ended up at the commander’s place of residence, and were allowed to stay there for the time being, until all the screaming and shouting and terrible, terrible battle began. In the main room was a queer game board, set up to be used with miniature soldiers on a mock field of battle. Tisiphone and Valka could not figure out how to play that so they used the miniature soldiers to play chess, which didn’t go particularly well as there was no grid and they kept arguing over which pieces were where/how they could move. Eventually Tisi went off to check on Kii, who had flitted off into the warden’s study, and found her looking horrified at a set of papers that referred to the isle’s prisoners as by monikers, namely Tile-Liker (a halfling jailed for sex-crimes), Merchant (an elf arrested for evading Pragian taxation [Tisiphone said to leave them, as she had little love for elves]), and, lastly, The Heir. The Heir was a human, seemingly of noble status, and being subject to some of the most terrible treatment imaginable, he was kept bound around the clock, and fed little more than table scraps left over from the previous night’s prepared food. Alongside this he was quite regularly to be beaten and lashed, otherwise being left shackled beneath the kitchen of the isle, in the very midst of the fortress. Kii was tearing up as she realized that this very well may be her brother, and realized the treatment he must have been suffering since the Pragian takeover, this whole while. Valka sent out his Clockwork Spy “Edward” off to find that prisoner and inspect him, to see if we could determine if he was our man. The clockwork spider scuttled off to go investigate.

Meanwhile Valka was raiding the warden commander’s larder, and came to notice a rack of wine bottles, up on a higher shelf. He beckoned over Nik, bidding him to help reach the out-of-reach alcohol. Tisiphone chided him, pointedly saying to keep it for a “libation or celebration” once this was over with. Nik stowed away the booze, and Valka pouted. Edward appeared once more, delivering an audio recording of this “The Heir” prisoner. Within moments of the recording playing Kii knew that it was in fact her brother Roland de Velakor. She was beyond elated. After a bit we reckoned that it was about the time that Jodd the Butcher would be arriving, by the sounds of the commotion outside. Everyone drank their potions of Resist Energy (Electricity) and See Invisible. After doing so Kii froze. There was someone in the room with us. One of Ivan’s men.

Kii lept past Valka (terrifying the poor boy) and electrocuted the spy with a Shocking Grasp before he could realize what precisely was happening. This done, the group headed out, with Valka and Abe splitting off and entering the kitchen, above Roland’s holding chamber to rescue the heir. Kii looked about the room and down past the grate with Valka for a moment, before heading back to join the group. As she reached the front courtyard/beach a HUGE crack of thunder and a blue blur sped by, and one of the island’s towers erupted in an electrical explosion, throwing masonry into the sea, lighting men ablaze, and quite destroying the tower. Jodd and his dragon flew about, landing near where our boats had been landed. He leapt down from the saddle upon the dragon and landed and began roaring furiously at the assembled guards, about a dozen in total “I am Jodd the Butcher, Dragon Rider, and I have come to take my brother, Roland! If you dare stand before me I will crush you and throw your bodies to the sea!”

Having seen which way the winds were blowing, and realizing their cause was one and the same, Tisiphone, Nik, and Kii opened up on the backline of the guards, Kii herself stabbing and subsequently Force Punching the warden commander off into the sea at such a furious velocity that his body ripped apart with the force of the blow. Given the treatment of Roland, he probably deserved it. Tisiphone gave Jodd a friendly wave after unloading her repeater’s clip into a man. In the kitchen, Valka melted the locks off of the floor hatch separating Roland’s cell from the kitchen, before unspooling some rope, tying it off, and then shimmying down into the cell. He fed Roland a Potion of Critical WOunds which made him quite suddenly more hale and hardy, though it did nothing to replace the lost left arm and right leg (the arm lost at the lower forearm and the leg not too below the knee).

Jodd’s dragon flew to another tower and devoured the men manning the ballista, and Jodd himself charged the guards frontline and pulped a man’s head with his maul. Flushed Jodd tried to say two things at once, instead saying “Fancy meeting you here again!”, and we engaged in what ended up being a rather swift melee against the remaining guards. Beneath, in Roland’s cell, Valka hid, as someone came to the cell door, looked through the vision slot, then closed it and went off. Valka slowly, but surely, undid Roland’s bonds, before picking him up clumsily and preparing to climb up to the upper floor with him. Kii, however, was finished with the combat, and cast a Dimensional Door into the cell and grabbed Roland from Valka, and returned to the shore with him (leaving Valka to haul himself back up to the kitchen).

On the shore, amidst a spread of corpses that was attracting seabirds, beneath a burning tower, a particularly petty sibling spat began, between a powerful spellsword and a mighty dragon rider. Kii and Jodd both claimed that Roland was their brother, and seemed unwilling to settle on letting him be the brother to both of them. Valka and Tisiphone were a bit taken aback, realizing both how terribly their own bickering with their respective siblings must have come across. Eventually, through the intervention of Roland, Tisiphone, and Valka, we came to know that both Kii and Jodd were half-brother to Roland, through their father (the old man got around, seemingly Jodd was born of an adulterous tryst between the king and a Pragian noblewoman, Roland was, of course, the only surviving rightful heir born of royal marriage, and Kii is of course half air spirit).

Now agreed that Roland was brother to both of them, Kii and Jodd were delighted to be in his presence. Kii had made herself known to Roland only as an elusive, young fae thing, existing largely in secret after being delivered unto the kingdom’s door step by her elemental parent. Jodd, meanwhile, seemed to have known about Roland for sometime, but had held his tongue on it for some time. Once he heard of the regicide of the Velakor family, but then heard that Roland may yet still survive, Jodd had taken it upon himself to become someone with the power to do something about it, pouring himself into becoming a dragon rider of Pragia (he was born to Pragian nobility of course) and using that to find and take Roland back, or die trying. Jodd certainly is an impressive physical specimen, but he truly is only 19, and his attitude often shows it. And Kii...she really, really is a little sister (paradoxically she is actually the oldest by age, but we’ve decided to start stating the difference between “age” and “maturity” with fantasy races, as it can all be a bit relative at times). Roland is a 23 year old man, and still young, but his time has certainly aged him a bit prematurely, and left it’s scars on him, physical and mental.

So, the Nik, Tisiphone, and Valka (of course with Tisi and Nik rowing) took the landing boat back to the ship and took the second landing boat with them, as they’d not seen hide nor hair of Ivan and his men aside from the one spy, and were not going to wait for them at all.

Meanwhile, Ivan waited to spring his plot, knowing that the idiots would blunder down to the island’s lower depths to free Roland. The sounds of battle had died down, so soon enough they would be coming down, by whatever pretenses, to free The Heir, and then he would have rid the world of the last remnants of the de Velakor line. Ivan waited to spring his trap patiently, as slowly it began raining. Ivan and his men would be left on that island until the next supply ship would come by, which may take a up to a year, maybe two.

On the deck of the Ninth Life Captain Valka commanded his servant, the Stormbreaker, to get them away from the wretched island, and so they did. The wine stolen from the warden’s manor was spread about, in celebration of reunited siblings (really, seeing the de Velakors together was heartwarming) and while a drunken Valka came to play against a mildly buzzed Roland (who beat the catfolk handily), Kii approached Tisiphone and asked her about the Southerlander’s clockwork arm, and how she’d come to get it. Tisi took a long draught of the wine and let it come into her system before telling Kii the story, after which Kii asked if she could fashion clockwork limbs for her crippled brother, which of course she agreed to (seeing the young man hobble about was a terrible sight).

Nik, meanwhile, feels a fair bit worse (despite making friends with Jodd’s dragon, Bluon [look he named it when he was like, 10, give him a break]), for his own lack of family. He watches the sea pass by a lot on The Ninth Life’s journey towards the Western Kingdoms (our next destination after a pit stop or two), feeling very lonely as a tiefling among the humans and others aboard the ship.

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lifeofclonewars · 4 years ago

Text

Nu Kyr'adyc, Shi Taab'echaaj'la

*rushes to post this before the month is up* Happy Halloween! This is my contribution to Clonetober! I used the prompts Fives, Cutup, Droidbait, tears, and haunt (because apparently I love writing Force Ghosts lol). Title is Mando'a for "Not gone, merely marching far away." Hehehehe have fun

Ao3 link below, like always

Summary:

Hevy appears beside them before the base finishes exploding.

Cutup punches the gunner in a move that probably hurts his knuckles more than Hevy’s plastoid-covered shoulder before tackling him in a hug. “You self-sacrificing di’kut!”

Droidbait quickly joins the hug. He really doesn’t want to let his batchers out of his sight again. Even if that now means watching over the twins and keeping Hevy and Cutup by him and not what he had originally thought. Kriff, that’s the second time the plan had to be adjusted and doesn’t that just hurt.

His brother squeezes them tight. “I did what I had to,” he says, voice muffled from where he’s buried his head in Cutup’s shoulder.

“We know, Hevy. We understand.”

"Not gone, merely marching far away." But what if that marching on was actually...relatively close?

----

Droidbait is the first of Domino to die. One second, agonizing pain wracks through his torso, the next, his vision goes dark. He blinks and here he is, standing above his own body, Nub, CT-327, and Sergeant O’Niner surrounding him.

He blinks again. “Uh...what?”

The Sergeant gives a half-hearted smile. “We’re marching on. Apparently, that includes watching over our brothers.”

“I, uh...huh.” Droidbait has only heard that term a few times in passing, but he knows enough to gather what his CO means. It’s probably a lot more popular of a term out on the frontlines, even with how early into this war they were.

“So, are we going to follow them, or are we just going to watch the droids take the base?” Nub asks, spurring them into motion. Said droids — the same droids that killed him and Nub, he realizes with a start — are chasing the survivors out of the base and taking it over.

They trail behind his batchmates, somehow able to pass through the closed grate, however odd it felt. Down and down and down they crawl, the tunnels never seeming to end. They crawl for what feels like hours but is probably only ten minutes until the light starts to get more grey and less black. Hevy kicks open the other grate and they jump out one by one.

“What do we do without the Sarge?” Fives asks as they start down the path.

“The reg manual says the next—”

“Wait, wait!” Hevy interrupts Echo, holding a hand up and halting. “Did you hear that?”

The four turn consecutively and Droidbait snorts at the irony of how it looks like a domino effect. Straining his ears, he listens for what Hevy pointed out. A faint hissing makes itself known from somewhere close, but he can’t pin it.

“It doesn’t sound like droids,” Cutup adds.

They’re scanning the rock in front of them. The droids had landed somewhere close, hadn’t they? Could they possibly have reinforcements waiting outside for them? Droidbait didn’t know. He never made it to the front lines and the thirty seconds before what just happened surely didn’t count.

The heavy gunner raises a hand. “Don’t forget about those giant eels.” Ah, yes, the eels Echo talked about whenever someone suggested they try to sneak outside.

Fives tilts his helmet in a way Droidbait knows he’s likely rolling his eyes. “Yeah, I’ve…” Something moves over his head and he tunes out his brother, glancing up.

It’s an eel. And it’s headed right for Cutup.

It snatches him off the ground, screams ringing through the air as it bites down on him. “Cutup!” Droidbait finds himself shouting in unison with his batchmates.

Someone starts shooting and he squeezes his eyes shut, hoping he doesn’t have to see his closest brother ripped in half. The blaster fire resonates in his ears over the screaming and his head swims. So much is happening, has already happened today, and they’re not even in an official battle. He fights to focus again, clenching his fists. When he’s able to open his eyes, Nub’s hand is on his shoulder and the eel is gone. His ears ring for a few more moments.

“Ugh, poor Cutup,” he catches once they decide to work again.

That’s it? That’s all they’re going to do? Say only that and move on? A sob chokes the back of his throat. He gets that they had to move on — sithspit, they didn’t even get to do anything about him, as far as he’d seen — but it feels so unfair. Maybe it was a good thing he never made it to the front lines if this is what it entails.

Nub gives him a little nudge and he manages to shuffle along as they follow the remaining three. Cutup hasn’t appeared next to them, so he must still be alive. In agonizing pain, trapped between an eel’s jaw and—

He needs to think about something else.

Glancing ahead, Echo is tapping around on his vambrace. When had they stopped again? After a minute or so, he stops. “It’s no good, their comlinks are on a different scramble set."

Their…? Right, the inspection team. He wants to hope that means these three get off this blasted rock safely, but just fifteen minutes ago he thought Cutup would’ve been included in that, too.

“I’ll signal them with this flare,” Hevy states, holding it up. Droidbait does a double-take. Where had that come from? Granted, it was Hevy, but Droidbait has no clue as to when he could’ve picked up when they were escaping. Which meant the heavy gunner already had it on him, while watching the scope earlier. He sighs, which draws a laugh out of 327, for some reason.

Hevy lights it up and they hold their breaths. He positioned it well, Commander Cody should be able to see it clearly. Within seconds, more blaster fire sounds out from above. He looks up: the landing platform is almost directly above them. An explosion rocks the ground for a second and debris falls, missing the group by mere meters. As soon as it stops, the final three Dominos pick their way around it. This time, he finds his feet moving on their own.

Two clones stand across from them, in orange and blue armor. Commander Cody and Captain Rex, guns raised and pointed at them.

“Hands above your heads.” His brothers’ hands shoot into the air promptly. “Take your sunbonnets off. Take them off. Now!” While Droidbait questions the Captain’s word choice (sunbonnets? really?), his brothers comply.

The second they come off, the ground shakes. Another eel emerges from the rock near them, a growl escaping it that makes his hair stand on end. Captain Rex fires off a shot faster than anyone in Domino has ever seen, hitting it in the eye. With one last growl, the eel falls to the ground, life seeping out of it. Everyone braces themselves as the impact shakes their footing once more.

Wandering over to the eel, Captain Rex kneels by the eye he hit and takes off his helmet. Droidbait blinks when he sees blond hair. He’d known about the Captain, yes, but that wasn’t a detail that made its way through Kamino-centric gossip (and for good reason).

“Nice shot,” Hevy compliments. The shock and amazement on his brothers’ faces are amusing, but he has a feeling his face looks the same. Even the Sergeant looks impressed.

“The name’s Rex,” the Captain responds, reaching out and touching the eel’s blood. Ew. “But you’ll call me ‘Captain’ or ‘sir.’”

“Sir, yes, sir!” his batchmates call out, standing at attention as Captain Rex stands. When Sergeant O’Niner snorts, Droidbait registers that he, Nub, and 327 all straightened to attention as well, even unseen as they were.

“I’m Commander Cody, your new boss,” the other man introduces himself, taking off his helmet.

Fives talks first. “My designation is trooper two-seven dash five-five-five-five, sir.”

“Wow, did Mr. ‘The-Name-is-Fives’ just say his whole CT number out loud?”

Droidbait spins, nearly knocking himself over in his haste. Cutup now stands to his left, helmet off, a semblance of a smile on his face. Faintly, Droidbait realizes he has no idea where anyone’s helmets have gone in death, his own included. Rather, an overwhelming rush of emotion hits him, making him pause for a second before acting. He’s here! Which means he’s not in pain anymore, but means he died, too. The other three couldn’t go back for him later.

“Bait?”

Flinging himself forward, he wraps his brother in a hug. Arms immediately wrap around his own torso. Plastoid armor makes it clunkier than he’d like, but it still soothes him. The two stand there, reveling in the comforting touch. Ignoring whatever their batchers are talking about, they hold onto each other like a lifeline they technically no longer need. Did that make it a deathline, then? Did that even make sense? Either way, Droidbait never wanted to let his batchers out of sight again. The Sergeant said something earlier… ‘marching on includes watching over our brothers’ or something like that. Yeah, he’ll do that, with both Cutup and his living batchmates.

Cutup and Droidbait stay standing there until Nub taps them on the shoulder and alerts them to the others moving out. They’re going to try and retake the base from the droids, and the Sergeant wants to know if they want to follow behind. Nodding their heads, they set off to observe and support them.

They watch the living troopers take back the base through an odd plan courtesy of the Captain. They watch as Fives gets hit by a blaster bolt in the arm. They watch as a Separatist fleet lands on the moon. They watch as Hevy excitedly picks up a rotary cannon once more. They watch as the handset doesn’t link up with the detonator. They follow after the group while Hevy stays behind to fix it before leaving himself. They rush back up to the base when Hevy doesn’t follow, not caring if the Sergeant and the other two are behind them or not.

Hevy appears beside them before the base finishes exploding.

Cutup punches the gunner in a move that probably hurts his knuckles more than Hevy’s plastoid-covered shoulder before tackling him in a hug. “You self-sacrificing di’kut!”

His brother squeezes them tight. “I did what I had to,” he says, voice muffled from where he’s buried his head in Cutup’s shoulder.

“We know, Hevy. We understand.”

“Love you, vod. Please don’t do that again.”

Hevy responds by pulling them impossibly closer into the hug. They cling to each other, reflecting on what happened and avoiding those thoughts all the same. And if they all break down crying once the adrenaline wears off, well, that’s not really anyone else’s business.

----

Following the explosion, Domino decides to follow their two remaining batchmates around, who had gotten themselves inducted into the 501st Legion. It was, after all, the logical next step. Sergeant O’Niner, Nub, and 327 all leave, having their own living batchmates to look after.

Fives and Echo get to paint their armor shortly after arriving on the cruiser. “You’re definitely not shinies anymore,” Captain Rex reiterates, handing them the buckets and paintbrushes. They thank him and take their supplies to a quiet corner in the barracks near the bunks they were assigned.

They take off their armor and set it on the ground, sitting beside it, Echo to Fives’ right like always. Echo’s looks more organized than Fives’, but Cutup knew Fives likely had a better understanding of where he set which piece. The paint sits in front and between the two of them, lid now on the ground and paintbrushes at the ready. There’s a minuscule portion of red paint on the lid one of them must’ve managed to steal from the medics, along with some grey, black, and, surprisingly, white. Where they got that, he has no clue.

“Any bets on what they’re gonna do?” Cutup asks.

“I have no idea,” Droidbait responds.

The twins stare at the armor for a few moments before looking at each other. “Any ideas?” Fives asks Echo.

He tilts his head to the side. “A few. It’s, uh, easier to think about armor designs than anything else right now.”

Fives nods and rests his hand on Echo’s knee. They sit in silence for a few more moments. “Alright, well, I have this idea, but I’m going to need your help executing it.”

They start with the standard 501st stripes down the arms and cuisses, chatting softly to one another. Except, not quite. Fives leaves white stripes in the paint of his left cuisse: three grouped on top and two closer to his knee.

Hevy narrows his eyes at the armor, abruptly jolting, almost falling off the bunk he sat on.

“You good?” Droidbait asks.

He blinks a few times. “I think the stripes are for us.”

“What?”

“Look at it again.”

Cutup does. Three… and two. Five stripes, five Dominos. Droidbait, himself, Hevy; Fives and Echo. Oh. Fives. His eyes sting and he blinks to clear it.

The blinking works and he continues to watch as they continue to paint more of their armor. They take turns putting a handprint on Echo’s chest plate to match the mark Captain Rex had left. Then, they paint the indented cheeks of the helmets blue to match each other. After that comes the top of the helmets. Echo paints two matching stripes on either side of the fin and then the fin itself. Fives watches as he does this. Once done, Echo pulls out a utensil of some sort and scoots closer. They bend over the helmet together, working on an outline. Handing the helmet back, Fives goes to begin painting while Echo produces a piece of flimsi and begins to sketch.

Most of whatever they designed is blue, starting at the front of the helmet and framing the fin all the way back. Finally, the red is used, forming two small dots and something that, at first glance, he thinks is a triangle. The little point on the short side proves otherwise.

Fives sets the helmet down to dry after that. Cutup’s breath catches in his throat when he sees the full pattern for the first time. It’s a Rishi eel. Not only did he do the stripes, but Fives also painted a clear reminder of what happened to Cutup. Everyone can see it this way. He and Echo are likely to be the only living people who recognize the full significance of it, but that’s something he wants everyone to see and himself to see as a tribute and reminder.

He doesn’t bother trying to blink back the tears this time.

Droidbait shuffles over and sits by him, wrapping an arm around his shoulder. “Bait—” he starts, leaning into his brother’s side.

“Shh. It’s okay, I get it.” He looks close to tears himself.

Meanwhile, Fives and Echo begin to take whatever Echo sketched out and paint it onto their armor. They place it in different spots: Echo on his left cuisse, close to where Fives had painted the three stripes on his, Fives on his right pauldron. This uses up the black, grey, and white, but none of the red. Some of the blue is even mixed together with the white to make a lighter blue they use to frame something.

They set down the pieces to dry, and suddenly, Hevy has tears starting to fall. The armor has a rotary cannon, Hevy’s specialty weapon, framed in a circle. Underneath the circle is a small box, painted white over the blue. In Aurebesh within the box reads, “For Hevy.”

Droidbait stands up and drags Hevy over to where Cutup sits, hugging both of them. They accept it gladly, watching as the twins start painting on the armor connected to the back of their gloves. Hmm, from what they had seen around the ship so far, most brothers didn’t paint that part, and if they did, it was an extension of the stripes.

Instead, they paint a series of circles inside each other. There’s only one thing it could be: a target. Droidbait starts crying, too, and the three of them hold tight to each other as they watch their living brothers finish up and start packing up the supplies.

“Do you think they’d like what we did?” Fives asks, low enough Cutup has to focus to make out the words.

“I think so. They deserve to be remembered. They deserve to be painting their own armor right now,” Echo responds, choking up near the end. Fives pulls him into a hug. They cling to each other for a few moments, not unlike the rest of the squad was doing, before pulling away and standing up to clean off the brushes and give the can back.

If only they could see them now.

----

Coming back to Kamino alive would’ve been interesting. Coming back while dead is straight-up strange. Everything and nothing has changed since they last wandered these blinding white halls. Cadets go about as normal, yet Domino Squad has been irrevocably changed. What are you supposed to think when you watch your two living batchmates wander an area that must remind themselves of you everywhere they look?

Then the battle starts. Droidbait has found that he’s picked up on the Mando’a spoken by the infantry troopers just as fast as Fives and Echo in their time in the 501st. It’s a nice thing, being able to understand their brothers more than just the handful of words that get spread through Kamino. Unfortunately, that makes the battle harder to watch, curses and shouts and pleas being thrown around and yelled as soldiers die and watch their friends die.

Echo and Fives perform wonderfully, as always. From being personally requested to snipe by Commander Havoc to helping 99 to protecting the cadets and even getting the cadets a little battle experience of their own. Cutup fails at holding back a laugh when Fives gives his little inspirational speech, Droidbait almost following suit. Not because it was bad, or anything, but because his vod seemed to be unconsciously crouching to get closer in height with the verd’ikase.

Then… then 99 died. He had, miraculously, appeared right next to them. Hevy still has his arms around him, talking his ears off. Cutup and Droidbait somehow managed to get a hug from him, too, even without Hevy letting go. Now, they watch as the twins chat out near one of the landing pads, helmets off somewhere and the sun shining for once.

Echo, gesticulating with both arms, recites a story from the squad’s cadet days Cutup’s not sure he’s not just making up as he goes. Fives — equally amused and skeptical, if the set of his eyebrows says anything — stands there with his arms crossed.

“That doesn’t sound like anything cadet-you would’ve done,” he comments.

Echo scowls slightly. “Yeah, because I never had any sort of fun with you guys while we were here.” He sets his right hand on his hip, an indignant set to his brow.

“I’m just saying, even if you did it, you probably did a lot more complaining than you’re telling me,” Fives responds, lifting his hand off his arm momentarily.

“I didn’t complain that much!”

“All you did was complain about us not following the rules!”

“That’s...only mostly true.”

Hevy snorts. When Droidbait turns and looks at him, he shrugs his shoulders. “The story’s true, but Fives is right about him complaining more than he’s saying. I was there, I’d know.” 99 nods in agreement.

“Echo, Fives,” Commander Cody says as he and Captain Rex approach the duo, who fall into attention at his words. Droidbait perks up at his voice and turns back to face them completely. What could the Commander have for them next? “You both really stepped up in the heat of battle.”

“We did what we had to do, sir—”

“ —what any clone would’ve done,” Echo, then Fives, says, completing the sentence like it’s no big deal, just like Domino Squad got used to them doing. It was odd to others outside their batch how often the duo seemed to be on the same wavelengths, but they’d been doing it for so long, Droidbait almost stopped noticing when it happened.

Captain Rex steps forward and moves in front of them. “Both of you showed valor out there, real courage. Remind me of me, actually.” At that, Cutup chuckles a little. Droidbait rolls his eyes.

Commander Cody looks at them, a twinkle in his eye. “Echo, Fives, you’re both officially being made ARC troopers.”

Dead-Domino Squad cheers loudly and proudly as the twins look at each other in shock. Everyone on this section of the platform, dead and alive, sports a grin at the words.

“I don’t think the Separatists will be coming back here anytime soon,” Rex states, drawing the attention back to him. “But if they do, Kamino will be lucky to have clones like you defending it. Good job, men.”

The officers salute, Fives and Echo doing their own only seconds later.

Droidbait finds himself standing on the platform with Hevy, Cutup, and 99 long after the officers and their batchers have walked off. They’re celebrating, outwardly excited in a way the twins won’t be able to until they’re in their barracks later. He’s smiling so wide still, his cheeks are starting to hurt. He can’t find it in himself to care.

“They did it! They’re going to be ARCs!” Cutup exclaims again, laughing. “Holy kriff, they really did it! I’m so karking proud of them right now!”

“I knew they could,” 99 says softly. “All of you have that potential. I’ve known since you were the littlest of cadets.”

Hevy hugs him tighter and Droidbait gives him another one while Cutup’s grin grows impossibly wider.

They chat and celebrate for a few more moments, sharing memories and telling 99 of the good times before the disaster on Rishi before Cutup stops halfway through a rambling story he had of some cadet-aged shenanigans Force knew how long ago. His eyes widen.

“Guys, I just realized something!”

“Wow, you can think?”

Cutup punches Hevy in the arm— carefully enough to avoid 99, but hard enough to at least try and make it hurt — and continues. “If we’re already on Kamino, then the 501st is kinda leavin’ them here when they ship out again. And they’ll be here for the next few months, too.”

“Oh.” Droidbait finds himself saying in unison with Hevy. “Oh,” again, with grins splitting across their faces. They have months to figure out how to haunt Bric. This will be fun.

----

Fives has been sitting in the corner of the closest empty room to the hanger since he got off the ship, feet planted on the ground, elbows resting on his knees and hands clasping the back of his head, a vacant stare focused on the ground. The only bit of armor he’s taken off is his helmet, which slipped from his fingers without him noticing, now lying by the door. He hasn't talked in hours and, quite frankly, Cutup is starting to get worried, even if the rest of Domino has been almost as quiet for just as long.

The three dead brothers have situated themselves around him, a protective barrier no one can see. If only they could actually do something for him, anything: talk to him, hug him, just be seen by him.

But they can’t.

It’s quite literally impossible.

In lieu of getting to touch Fives, Cutup found himself wrapped in Droidbait’s arms again. Hevy had paced the room, fuming, until about 2 minutes ago, when he slumped against the wall adjacent to Fives, resting his head against the cool surface, staring at the ceiling. The world feels muffled and Cutup can hardly imagine what Fives is experiencing right now.

He wonders how much longer before one of the 501st comes looking for Fives. He hasn't debriefed yet, nor shown up to the barracks. Someone should have noticed by now.

Maybe they're giving him space. But Cutup doesn't think his vod needs space right now; he needs someone to hold onto him and let him, help him, grieve.

He still can't believe what happened. Another death, that's one thing, especially when they'd expected him to appear right away like Hevy did. But he didn't, so they thought it might take a bit longer like Cutup did. And yet, as much agony dying slowly put him through, he'd rather it have been that than what seems to have happened.

He hasn't appeared.

It's been hours. Too many hours. He's still alive. Fives has no way of knowing. They have no way of telling. And Cutup can't help but feel like this might be a fate worse than death because nobody will know to go back. Nobody will be able to save him from whatever the Separatists plan to do. So instead of dying slowly over minutes, hours, days, he'll be slowly dying over years.

He just wishes Fives would move, show that he's still alive, too, right now. He hasn't moved for at least 10 minutes and his legs are bound to be numb by now. Not that he probably notices.

Why hasn't anyone found him yet?

Droidbait shudders and presses closer into his side. Hevy is now staring at his fingers as he flexes and unflexes them. Fives still won't move. They don't know what to do.

Force, they're going to have to tell 99 what happened. Their ori'vod hadn't gone with them. He's been alternating his time between Kamino, the 501st, and another group of brothers he apparently watched over when they were cadets. Not just what happened, but the aftermath, too, because he will undoubtedly want to hear about how Fives is doing. He always does, but even more so once he finds out.

The door finally slides open. There stands Captain Rex, the top half of his armor off, a few things in his hands. He steps into the room and walks over to Fives, somehow avoiding them even though they're in the way and not visible.

Fives doesn't look up, doesn't acknowledge he notices the Captain in any way. He very well might not, after all.

With the lack of response, Rex crouches down, gets himself to Fives' eye level. "Hey, vod'ika," he murmurs.

Fives glances up and Cutup lets out a small breath of relief. Pain has seeped into his gaze, no longer vacant. Seeing it twists the knife in Cutup’s chest further in, the small amount of relief gone. He has to steel himself for the conversation about to happen; it’s going to hurt.

“Can you talk?”

Don’t know. Don’t want to. Fives signs choppily, left hand still clutching at his hair. That’s good, that’s a response of some sort. That’s still good, right? Force.

“Okay, we can work with that. I’m going to sit next to you, is that okay?” Fives nods, a harsh, quick jerk of his head. Rex does so, setting himself to Fives’ left. (Not the right, nobody else got to be to his right.) He sets the things he brought with him to the side.

Suddenly, Fives’ breath speeds up and he starts tugging on his left vambrace, clawing at the plastoid, trying to get it off. He looks so fragile, all Cutup wants to do is curl up and cry with him.

Rex grabs his hand, stopping the movement. He takes the hand off the armor and keeps it in his grasp. “I’ve got it. I’ve got you, vod’ika.”

Fives breath hitches, not quite a sob, not yet. He signs a small thank you, holds out his left arm, and lets the Captain carefully take off the plastoid and stack it to the side. He buries his head in his right arm, having had to let go to let the armor come off.

Working quickly and only speaking to tell Fives what he’s doing next, Rex takes off the top half of Fives’ armor. Everything from pauldrons to the gloves comes off, leaving the duo only in their blacks, leg armor, and kamas. He reaches back over to the things he brought with and picks up a square. Unfurling it, Cutup realizes that it’s a blanket from the barracks. He drapes it over Fives’ back, tucking him into his side with his arms around him, getting to do exactly what Cutup wants to do.

Hevy — wait a tick, when did he move — throws his arms around him and Droidbait. He knows what the heavy gunner is thinking, what they’re all thinking. If they can’t comfort Fives or tell him what they know, at least he has Rex.

Then, the tears start.

Not just from the ARC, though mostly from him. No, all of Domino Squad breaks down. The situation is hopeless, from either group’s point of view. It’s been building for hours now, but seeing Fives break is the tipping point. They’d been a lifeline for each other, motivating and pushing and being there for each other every step of the way. From decantation through forever. Now that’s gone, torn away by a kriffing extraction mission.

The twins may have spent less time with the 501st recently because of their ARC missions, but Cutup can’t help but be glad that that is where they got their start, who they teamed up with for this last mission. Right now is hard enough. He can’t imagine how much more it would tear at them if they weren’t on the Resolute, weren’t near other brothers Fives knew well.

He just hopes they give Fives more time than normal before his next mission, let him stay surrounded by these brothers he needs by him. Based on how Cutup feels himself, and that’s nothing compared to the ARC right now, he’ll need all the time they give him and more.

Fives buries his head in his brother’s shoulder, clinging to him. “He’s gone. He-he can’t. He can’t be. Rex- I— ” He finally speaks for the first time since the mission, voice cracking, breaking off into more sobs. The Captain holds him tighter, rubbing soothing circles on his back, eyes shining himself.

Why can’t there be a way for them to tell them?

Di’kutla, shabla kyr’am.

----

Fives is starting to understand why General Skywalker hates sand solely from the number of times he’s been on Tatooine. Umbara is quickly becoming that for him, this dark planet full of creatures and plants killing his brothers. Felucia was bad — this is worse. At least on Felucia, they had Jedi who cared about how many men were dying. At least on Felucia, Echo was alive and by his side.

At least they had a general who led from the front, then, not hiding in the back. At least they had a general who didn’t seem to be going out of his way to create tactics to create the most casualties. At least they had a general who, while reckless, they could trust.

Yet said general had been called away again by the Chancellor (why did the Chancellor always need him at the worst times?) and they were stuck with this hut’uun.

They have barely had any battles under him and Fives will count it too soon if he never has to again after this campaign. What a karking disaster.

Blasterfire and crawler tanks and rocket launchers and the HUD having to adjust how dark this planet is and brothers dying left, right and center. Rex wouldn’t listen to him and the General has to hate clones with how he’s insisting they continue even after all of this. The medics are all stressing and overwhelmed by injuries, Kix especially. It doesn’t help that these giant plants seem to be more in the way than proper cover against these tanks.

Felucia was ten times easier than this campaign and they’re still early into it.

He stands his ground, shooting at the tanks with both pistols. Maybe, just maybe, if he's lucky enough, his ARC training will shine through and reward him with a crippling hit to one of them. Not that that has happened yet.

Someone shoves him to the ground seconds before blasterfire flies from an angle he didn’t expect. Right where his head was. He hadn’t noticed anyone or anything over there. Do karking better, trooper. You know better. Especially for the middle of a battle.

“Thanks, vod,” he says to whoever pushed him. He picks himself up quickly.

But there’s nobody near him. Nobody close enough to have shoved him, and it definitely wasn’t the joke of a Jedi that was still hiding in the back of the troops. What the kriff.

He can’t stand and contemplate, though. One oddity hasn’t changed the fact that he’s in an active war zone. Blasterfire continues to be aimed at him and he needs to return it.

Following through with that line of thought, Fives turns back to the battle and files the moment away for later. Later, when, you know, he wasn’t actively trying to not die.

True to his thoughts, Fives finds himself reflecting on the moment as they settle into the airbase.

“You good, Fives?” Hardcase asks as they finish gathering tools to decrypt the hardware on the Umbaran fighters.

“Yeah. Yeah, I’m good.” Whatever face he must be making doesn’t convince him and his brother raises an eyebrow. “I’m doing better than Kix?” he offers.

Hardcase scoffs. “That’s really not that hard post-battle. What’s on your mind?”

He shrugs. “Oh, it’s nothing really. Just… do you ever feel like you’ve got some brothers who are marching on that are watching over you, even during battles?”

A sorrowful half-smile makes its way across Case’s face. Fives wonders who he’s remembering, if it’s a batchmate or close friend or even a recent squadmate. “Especially during battles.”

He shares his own smile. “It’s just one of those moments, that’s all.” No need to elaborate.

“Ah, gotcha.”

Someone calls for Hardcase in the distance. Fives gestures toward where it came from. “Sounds like someone needs you. Better leave, might be that excuse for a general. I’ve got the rest of this.”

The heavy gunner takes a step away, then turns back around. “You’re absolutely sure?”

“I’m sure, Hardcase. I’ll be fine. Hopefully, I’ll be done decrypting it by the time you come back around.”

With a nod, he puts on his bucket and leaves. Fives takes in the tools and the fighter. He could think over things on his own as he works on it. Provided the decryption doesn’t require his full attention. Nothing like a little mechanics to help, right?

Fives doesn’t get the chance to think about the odd shove until after the campaign. By then, it’s the least of his worries and things occupying his mind. Karking Umbara and Krell.

----

Fives is smothered in hugs before he can register what just happened. He had been lying on the ground, in the most pain he has ever felt, Rex pleading with him, mind clouding even worse than whatever that kriffing kaminii did to him. Now, three sets of arms squeeze him, chattering reaching his ears but not registering. He grunts.

"Oh, kriff, he needs to breathe.”

Immediately, the arms loosen but don't back off. He shakes his head, taking in his surroundings. It's his batchmates that are hugging him. "Hevy?"

His vod nods, half a smile on his face. Droidbait and Cutup share their own when he looks at them, too. Hevy, Droidbait, Cutup. They were dead, so he must be, too. Finally marching on after all these years as the last Domino. The realization is half a relief, half a distress. Is Rex going to listen to him? Who’s going to do anything about the chips?

“You sure are hard to keep alive, did you know that?”

“Huh?”

“That one dark planet… I can’t recall the name right now—” for the better, Fives can’t but help think at the mention of it— “but we saved your life then! Well, I did that time. Anyway, we did a few times.”

He remembers a push in the midst of tanks and blaster bolts and no brother being there. His eyes widen. “That was you?”

“Sure was!” Hevy exclaims. “And Ninety-nine, he helped a bit. Oh, he’s going to be happy to be able to hug you and talk to you again. Mostly, uh, because of the whole, you know. That’s not the point I was making. We saw the bolt while you were distracted and pushed you. Other times, it was placing your helmet by you, startling some animals to create a distraction for the enemy, kicking abandoned blasters near you, stuff like that. For some reason, we could only touch stuff when it directly related to your survival. Isn’t that odd? We tried for years but it didn’t change.”

Cutup shoves the heavy gunner’s shoulder. “Force, vod, let the man think.”

“Right, right, sorry.”

Fives finds himself blinking at his brothers, sludging through the last dredges of fog clinging to his mind. “Ninety-nine?”

“Yeah!” Droidbait responds enthusiastically. “He’s not here right now; he’s watching over the cadets on Kamino. So actually, he saw you kind of recently, he just stayed while we followed you to Coruscant.”

He startles as he realizes they aren’t in the warehouse or anywhere on Coruscant. Rather, they’re in some sort of void that looks like the inside of a star destroyer if he focuses. What.

Despite the revelation, breathing is coming easier. Thinking doesn’t hurt as much. He scans his eyes over his batchmates. Droidbait, always the hugger out of them, still presses closest to his left side. Cutup’s to Droidbait’s left, where he has backed off a bit but keeps his hands on Fives’ pauldrons. Hevy’s on his right, one arm looping around the back of his shoulders, the other around Cutup’s back.

But wait, where was...? His brow furrows.

Hevy catches his eye. "Something wrong, vod?" A pause. "Besides the obvious?"

He takes a breath and gulps. "Where's Echo?”

They don’t answer, glancing at each other. His stomach drops. No. He knows what they’re going to say before they say it.

“Fives,” Droidbait says gently, “Echo hasn’t died yet.”

His knees buckle without his permission and Droidbait tightens his arms further, keeping him up.

He left him behind. They had promised each other they wouldn’t leave each other, desperate to cling to their last remaining batchmate. He had thought Echo had broken the promise by dying, but it was really him who broke it. He wasn’t the one left behind like he had thought after the Citadel. No, it was the other way around. He left Echo behind. His fellow ARC, best friend, twin.

His hands shake as he reaches up and rests his head in his hands. Dampness hits his palms and he realizes he’s crying. It’s hard to breathe again. Someone rubs circles on his back, the familiar but long-missing-finally-returned feeling of the other three still around him.

His head spins, the fog that was finally leaving stubbornly staying. He hunches forward, glad to be sitting already.

When did he sit down?

“We’ve got you Fives.” He can only tell who whispers it because of Cutup’s accent. It comes from the same direction as the hands resting on his shins. They must’ve not changed spots, only sat down.

“I left him.”

It’s all he can say, his throat refusing to form anything other than sobs. He broke rule number one. The tiny logical part of his brain tells him that it’s not his fault, it was the Separatist’s for blowing up the shuttle and driving them away, but it gets drowned in the wave of thoughts and jumbled emotions that encompass the rest.

His brothers offer comforting words, soft and quiet. They sit and guard and comfort him as he breaks down. Light touches on his back and shins and side paired with whispers and reassurances and somehow refutes to the thoughts racing through his mind. They get it, too, he realizes. They just had the luxury of finding out a lot sooner.

They sit with him until he exhausts himself. Even then, they make no haste to go anywhere.

He missed this, having his batchers by his side. Even with Echo still alive, this is something he hasn’t been able to experience since the Citadel. Since Rishi, if he wanted to be more literal about it. A silver lining in it all. Slowly but surely, they help Fives put himself back together.

Domino Squad and 99, months later, watch as Rex and the Bad Batch find Echo. They get to watch Echo fight and struggle and work his way back to some semblance of normal. The last Domino standing stays strong, just like they expect him to. Soon enough, he’ll be comfortable with his prosthetics and the Bad Batch and all the new variables in his life, they discuss with 99.

But it doesn’t come. Something much more sinister takes the place of the expected normal. All Fives can do is grip onto Hevy, Cutup, Droidbait, and watch as his twin lives to fight another day and wait.

And wait.

Mando’a Translations:

Di’kut: Idiot

Vod: Brother

Verd’ikase: Private (military rank), can also be used literally as "little soldier" (plural)

Ori’vod: Older brother

Vod’ika: Dear brother

Di'kutla: useless, stupid, worthless; Shabla: screwed up (impolite); Kyr'am: Death

Hut’uun: Coward (worst possible insult)

Kaminii: Kaminoan

Thanks for reading! Feel free to yell at me in the tags, comments, or in my ask box. Happy Halloween!

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morelike-bi-light · 4 years ago

Note

Victoria x Heidi ? i mean, why smeyer never think about it... oh i know why!!!

I’m so sorry I got this late, anon, and I hope you’re still around because the potential that this ship has destroys me... The tragic past.... the betrayal... the misunderstandings.... the reunion. I would absolutely write a fic if I had the time, just picture it...

The utter resentment Victoria would feel seeing Heidi stand with the vampires that killed their sisters... the faint pulse of grief and anguish and the simmering anger in Heidi's heart, choked down by Chelsea's spell, when she sees Victoria tethered to a man so like those who abused her as a girl...

Their story would diverge from canon before Twilight takes place. It's 1998 and Maria, the Egyptians, and the Romanians conspire in secret to build a newborn army to destroy the Volturi, but they will not be so hasty in their execution as they’d been in the past.

For this, they need vampires who are special, including a tracker, so Maria uses her American resources to find James. No Demetri, but he’ll do. Victoria will be a bonus, an unkillable fighter and spy, but she freezes at the proposal, old griefs and repressed terrors gnawing at her nerves. She urges James to say no. He placates her half-heartedly. But they promise him power, and when that fails to entice him, they offer him a chance to play the ultimate game: hunting the most elite of their kind. He agrees, and drags her and Laurent along with him.

Slowly, they manage to pick off the weakest members, targeting whoever leaves isolation, until a fifth of the members have been disposed of. (Some of the nameless ones we know nothing about, for sake of ease.) This strategy only takes them so far, and soon the groups are forced to face each other head on. They meet in battle. The Volturi have the advantage of powers, but there are rebel recruits with powers too, and their numbers - hidden so carefully using powers, strategy, and stealth, because Maria has learned plenty since her first war - easily quadruple theirs. It’ll be close.

The casualties soar, each Volturi member taking out five or six to every one the rebels fell. Victoria works her way to the frontline, and by happenstance, it's Heidi staring opposite her, still as arrestingly beautiful as she remembers. The fight between the two is all instinct, all feeling, and the anger and hurt in Victoria's heart is intense enough to make her feel sick but not enough to stop her from throwing herself on the brunette's back. She's shaken off easily; the two seem to be at an eternal standstill... until a newborn of abnormally impressive speed and strength manages to rip Chelsea's head from her shoulders, and Heidi...

Heidi crumples to the ground at Victoria's feet. In perfect harmony, nearly a third of the remaining Volturi stagger to a stop, some losing their heads for their hesitation, but Victoria is frozen, watching.

A few soft, low, distressed groans rumble in Heidi's throats, as she brings her hands to her head, as her face shifts from that callous serenity into pained confusion. The redhead just stares at the bent over figure of who was once her sister, disturbed, suspicious, curious and worst of all, worried, as the noises fade into whimpers, before stopping altogether.

And then all at once her expression folds into a great, gaping grimace, and from her throat tears a gross, broken wail. It’s a cry like an infant’s, a plea for relief offered with no understanding of why or from what. Around the battlefield, the few others who survived being freed from Chelsea form a chorus. The fighting starts to slow, as members of either side use the distraction as an opportunity to escape the carnage and coalesce with their fellow soldiers on their own territory.

Someone grabs Victoria’s arm - she hisses, eyes wide, nobody touches her, how - and she looks up at Laurent - the terror drains, her body has never flinched away from Laurent, he’s safe -

“Come on, Tigress,” he snaps, neither smooth like silk nor warm like summer and she hesitates. He growls and pulls and he runs, and she is dragged behind him, almost floating, and she only turns around just in time to see Heidi’s wide, black eyes lock on her, igniting with a fury so hot it singes her from a hundred yards away.

“What was that?” she demands in a hush, when they get back to the others, when she crosses over to Maria and bends down low and bends close at the side of her chair.

“You know Chelsea could control bonds,” Maria huffs, not impatient but not gentle either. “Killing her has the side effect of weakening the enemy forces. Quicker, than we had hoped, too.”

“The screaming, Maria,” Victoria pushes.

Maria scowls. “I heard it, too, Victoria! What do you want from me?”

“What exactly have her powers been doing to them all this time?”

Maria’s eyes flutter shut, before she sighs, a performance, but an earnest one, and beautiful, too. “We don’t know. But we are doing all that we can in retaliation, now.” She pauses. “I am sorry, about James. He was... He was not a man I liked to work with, but he had his strengths. And I know he meant something to you.”

Victoria stops, for a moment. She looks around at the others gathering there, few of them familiar, only one of them known. Softly, she thanks Maria and leaves her to plan. She hadn’t even realized that James was dead. She goes to Laurent’s side, and they sit on the forest floor, leaning against one another.

“I know he meant a lot to you,” he says, and she doesn’t reply. “I know you never wanted to get involved in the first place. If you leave now -”

She shakes her head. “I need to see this through,” and when he looks at her, she shrugs, “it’s what he would have wanted?”

He looks away, shrugging in that way of his, and she thinks he knows that she isn’t feeling anything she should. Maybe if she wasn’t at war already. Maybe if he had died some other way, at someone else’s hand, someone who wasn’t trying to kill her, too. For centuries, she’d felt tied to the world by him. Her hips by his jealousy, her throat by his teeth. Her eyes by the time he tried to kill her and her feet by his failure.

Something else is pulling her through now, though, and not by a puppet string, or a leash. A hand, Laurent’s hand, on her arm, and the sound of the most beautiful mouth in the world stretched open in a broken scream.

Miles away, in a shallow cave, that same mouth is smeared with the scent of human blood. The pain had hit first, then the anger, then love, but after that when the hunger had crushed her in its embrace, smothered in the name of duty to a coven that had abducted her from herself, there had been little room for anything else. But now, sated, resting, her mind conjures a face, and a word comes to her lips, unbidden.

“Sister...” she gasps. It’s what Hilda had called them, but it doesn’t feel right.

“Victoria,” she tries again. Better.

A different face slithers into her head.

“Foul creature...” She stands up. “Disgusting tyrant!”

The image of Aro smiles back at her in her mind’s eye, unaffected by her words, distantly amused at best. But she has known him, and his cronies, and his wives. She has memories upon memories of a woman like her who bowed to his every whim for four hundred years, and she has a girl that she loves and the army accompanying her to listen, and now... she has a voice.

“I’m coming, Victoria... I’m coming, rat king,” she sneers, and disappears into the black, red stare flashing.

She will raise that voice to a riot and rip him to shreds.

...

So... yeah. They’re lowkey probably my second favorite Victoria ship.

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h-hewings · 3 years ago

Text

**Tearful Memories (fanfic w/headcanon)**

(Perhaps not all revenants are evil, spiteful versions if their former selves after all. Maybe they resent what they’ve become and long to be restored…)

Being the most trusted friend and ally of Kitana, Empress of the Netherrealm, it was to nobody’s surprise as to why Jade was appointed as the leader of the Netherrealm army. She would walk onto the frontlines, flanked by thousands of demonic Onis, ranging from lumbering tanks to skilled flyers, and guiding them into battle. One of which was from a group of Outworlders, sent by Kotal Kahn, to retrieve Shinnok’s head and destroy it, preventing any possible attempts to resurrect him. The Osh-Tekk forces collided with the Netherrealm Demons, where blood and viscera painted every inch of the battlefield, with the Kastle looming in the background. And Jade was in the midst of it all, alongside Kitana and Kung Lao, using her staff to strike down any Osh-Tekk fool that dared oppose her. In addition, she also utilised her glaive, throwing it like a boomerang and managing to slice through multiple enemies at once.

The battle continued to rage on as the Netherrealm forces began to outnumber their enemies. It was then that Jade encountered a foe that made her stop dead in tracks, not because of the intimidation or their skills, but because she was curious about something. Her glaring red eyes were focused on what the male soldier wore and she made it out to be a mask of some sort, but a sort that seemed extremely peculiar. Nevertheless, she ended up dominating the foolish warrior in battle, slaying him with a decapitation, using her glaive. The head rolled off the shoulders, spurting out blood, and Jade reached down to retrieve the mask. Unfortunately, she did not have enough time to view it.

“Our enemies are getting some backup.” Kung Lao said to her. “We must be ready for them, Jade.”

“Understood.” Came the Assassin’s response, she pocketed the mask behind her chest plates and unsheathed her staff, ready to finish the job. More and more Osh-Tekk soldiers charged into battle, towards the mass of demons, and more blood was spilt, turning the scenery of the Netherrealm even redder than it was before. However, Jade’s curiosity about the mask from earlier is seemingly having an effect on her confidence in battle, as she was unintentionally letting her guard down more often. It got so bad to the point where she was knocked down and almost killed multiple times, before she had to be saved by her peers. Luckily, the Osh-Tekk forces were driven out, and were sent retreating from the realm, carrying their fallen allies with them, as the demons around them roared in triumph. Jade groggily stood up as Kabal dashed over to check on her.

“You look rough.” He pointed out, noticing a few bruises on Jade’s arms, as well as a noticeable tear on her tights.

“I’m sure I’ll be fine, Kabal.” She said back.

“What happened out there, anyways? You weren’t looking your usual self.”

Jade hesitated before answering, as she wanted to keep the mask she found hidden from the others.

“Perhaps my mind wasn’t in the right place today.” She responded.

“Ah, I see.” The speedster nodded. “I think you oughta get some rest to clear your head. Here, I’ll help you back.” And with that, he carried her in his arms and used his Nomad Dash ability to zip away from the bloodied battlefield and over to Jade’s Chamber door.

“Thank you very much.” Jade smiled under her own mask as she stood herself up.

“It was the least I could do.” Kabal returned before he dashed off, leaving Jade alone to enter her quarters. Once she was inside, she immediately locked the door and removed her own mask, showing off her ash-grey face, a mere remnant of her past, yet still just as beautiful as the day she was slain. She had a brief look around her chambers, a dark, gothic room with not much to it, apart from relics hanging on walls and shelves, from her past battles in the Netherrealm. Jade unsheathed the mask she collected earlier and sat on the floor, giving herself a chance to inspect it better.

The colours of the mask itself were not very vibrant or eye-catching, but what made it stood out the most was the shape itself, of a human face, as well as the way the green was painted onto the silver body. Jade made it out to be an old funeral mask, originally made in Edenia. They were typically worn for important events, permanent looks of gloom and melancholy as a vessel moves on to the afterlife. The fact that the mask itself was made in Edenia brought back memories from within Jade’s mind, flowing around like an old film being played on repeat. She smiled as she reminisced about the time she spent in King Jerrod’s council, and her eternal friendship with Kitana, beginning from a very young age, to the point where she knew the Edenian princess for her entire life.

However, one memory soon led to another. Jade’s mind then flashed forward to a terrible event in time, where Shao Kahn invaded and conquered Edenia, murdering Jerrod, forcing Queen Sindel to marry him and taking Kitana and Jade as his captors, where they were forced to serve him, with Kitana as his adopted daughter. The look in Jade’s eyes soon turned from wonder to sadness, remembering the carnage she saw unfolding around her, as well as the murder of her parents, as the realm was purged and left in unrecognisable ruins. Soon, the train of thought in her mind soon turned dark, as another horrific memory flowed into her mind.

And that single memory was one that she had relieved almost every day for years now.

She remembered the hand of a corrupted Sindel thrusting through her chest and ripping her heart out.

She remembered the final gasps of air leaving her lungs as the life drained out of her.

And finally, she remembered air inexplicably filling her lungs as she awoke in an evil setting. And what happened next stuck to her mind like a deadly tumour.

She remembered looking around, her mind in a complete state of panic, having died not too long ago. How was she still alive!? Suddenly, a tremendous burning pain was felt through her entire body, as she raised her hands up, seeing her mocha-brown skin decay into a zombified grey colour. Her eyes widened in horror as the pupils became colourless before flashing a dangerous shade of red. All of a sudden, she dropped to her knees, letting out a spine-chilling scream of pure agony, feeling her mind being corrupted and drained, as a result of Quan Chi’s dark magic. It was like her positive and kind-hearted feelings were being disintegrated to ashes, whilst feelings of evil, spite, negativity and malice took their place. This was a pain that Jade could never have imagined was possible and was far worse than her quicker, and even more painless death. Eventually, the pain ceased and the Emerald Assassin, Jade was no more, for a Revenant doppelganger had taken her place.

As the nightmare played out in her mind once again, Jade stared into the distance, traumatised and full of despair. Her eyes widened in stress as she heard screams of “SOMEONE HELP ME!” and “PLEASE...END THIS PAIN!” Unlike most of her fallen allies who accepted this new form, she absolutely despised it, both before and now. She did not want to be seen as a heartless monster, whose only function is to kill, as it completely went against her own morals. She felt less like a deadly assassin and more like a vessel for carnage.

Tears began to form and well up in Jade’s eyes, upon being reminded of her horrific fate, before she began weeping uncontrollably, her head lowered and her arms clutching the mask, as if it was a treasured relic. After all of the stress that has been packed onto her for years, Jade had finally reached her breaking point. Looking past the negative views on Revenants, she was still Jade by heart. A fallen hero who longs to have her life put back together again, but to the current circumstances, it was impossible. When all is said and done, she is merely the tragic heroine who just wants to go home…

Her cries were louder than usual. Typically, when she had her occasional emotional meltdowns, she would keep it quiet, smothering her noises through gritted teeth or a nearby pillow. This was because she feared that her peers would berate her for being weak. Her fears were about to come true when she heard the door creak open, and she tried to pull herself together, but she failed and continued sobbing in grief. The person at the door was Kitana, who heard her friend’s cries, but rather than admonish her for it, the Empress wore a look of concern on her face as she stepped in, closing the door behind her.

“My dear friend!” She said, her tone sounding worried. “What on earth is troubling you?”

Jade sniffled a bit and leant her head to the side, giving her a look at her broken face. Her eyelids were all swollen and puffy from crying and there were clear wet lines going down the sides of her face, from the tears. Her lower lip wavered before she resumed weeping, causing Kitana to kneel down to her level and comfort her, raising her head up and wiping away a few tears.

“It is alright to cry, Jade.” She attempted to console her closest friend. Despite being viewed as a strict, spiteful and heartless ruler, Kitana clearly showed that she still has some space left in her heart for the one person who’s been by her side her entire life. “Now, I’d really appreciate it if you speak your mind to me. I promise I will hear you out.”

After having literally all the tears drained from her eyes, all Jade could do was let out a depressed sigh.

“Everything is wrong, Kitana.” She explained, sorrowfully. “Through all of these years, I have despised what I’ve become, and not just me, but all of my friends. None of us deserved to be sanctioned to a fate far worse than death.” She looked down at her hands. Physically, they were changed to an undead grey tone, in contrast to her living dark skin, but metaphorically, she knew that they were stained with the blood of innocent people she had slayed throughout the years as a vanguard in the Netherrealm. “I know deep down, that this is not who I’m supposed to be.”

Jade shifted a bit before revealing the mask that she had retrieved from the battlefield. And immediately, Kitana noticed that is was an Edenian relic, worn by some of the maids during funerals. It was a tradition that carried over to Outworld, following the demise of Shao Kahn.

“When I found this mask,” Jade continued, “I was curious about it and had a look, reminding myself about how happier we were, before Edenia was conquered. But then those same nightmarish memories of when we became revenants filled my mind once more, something that has troubled me for years now.” Her voice began to waver off a bit as she continued to speak her mind. “Oh, Kitana. You don’t know how much I despise it here, living as an undead beast for all eternity...I- I just want to go back home!” At this point, she was close to breaking down once more but this time, she barely managed to keep control of her emotions, but not without letting a few tears loose, as Kitana comforted her, placing an arm around her shoulder. She waited until Jade faced her because she, too, had something she wanted to get off her back.

“I know the pain that you feel, Jade.” The Empress began to explain, as Jade looked into her glowing, ruby-like eyes.

“You do?”

“Indeed. I fully agree with you that none of us deserved this fate and deep down, I had even regretted my actions against innocent people. In fact, I used to gently cry myself to sleep for a few nights, whenever one of those situations occur, because I knew that the real Kitana would never mercilessly kill.” As Kitana continued to speak, Jade perked her head up, beginning to understand a bit more about her ally.

“But alas, this is what we are now.” Kitana said, solemnly. “I’m afraid that there is no possible way to restore Edenia at the moment. But this is why we need to try and resist looking at the past and towards the future. Because with enough hope and motivation, I’m sure that we will have it brighter than any moment in our past.” She leaned her body down a bit further to look directly at Jade. “And trust me when I say this, Jade. When it does happen, there will be nothing to worry about. There won’t be any reason to be ashamed of what we are, no more bloodshed to cause around us, no more nightmares about the past. In the end, it will just be the two of us…together.”

Upon hearing Kitana’s heartwarming monologue, a smile formed on Jade’s face as she leaned towards her Empress to lovingly embrace her. Kitana returned the hug, gently wrapping her arms around Jade’s body, smiling and knowing that through hell and back, there will be no separating them. Eventually, they had to split and Kitana returned to her own Chambers as Jade prepared herself for bed and laid down on the soft mattress.

Before she drifted off to sleep, she wanted to take in every word that Kitana said. She had been taught that in order to progress in life, she needed to try and not let the past haunt or shame her. She knew that eventually, the nightmare will be over and she, Kitana, Liu Kang, Kung Lao and others will be free from this curse, able to live their lives. But until then, all she can do is be hopeful, and that is more than enough to ensure herself a better future.

(Thanks for reading! Basically, my hc for Revenant Jade is similar to Kung Lao’s ending in MKX, in that she despises her life as a revenant and longs to be restored, along with her allies. I wish NRS added something like this to give the Revs more personality rather than jobber minions. I imagine Jade & Kung Lao leaving the gang and finding a way to change them back, Liu Kang embracing the evil and planning on invading Earthrealm whilst Kitana is torn between choosing her boyfriend and her best friend)

#mortal kombat #jade #kitana #kitanaxjade #jadexkitana #revenants #i want to cry #headcanon #wholesome #comfort #sadness #ptsd #fanfic

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king-finnigan · 4 years ago

Text

And I Will Find You Still

This is a prompt fill (17. War AU and 37. Letter) for @yourshadow18. (sorry it took a while :( )(also it’s not specified in the fic but it’s ww2)

Uhhhh. Warnings! Major angst lmao.

***

The clock in this classroom has to be broken, Jaskier decides after looking at it for five hours. At least, it feels like five hours, but the clock in question says it’s only been thirty minutes – which could not possibly be true.

The professor’s words start to fade into the background the longer Jaskier stares at the clock, his pen tapping out every ten seconds he counts on his desk.

“-superior and inferior vena cava bring non-oxygenated blood from the rest of the body to the right atrium of the heart, through the tricuspid valve, to-“

It’s only half past nine. Just a little longer, Jaskier tells himself, just an hours and a half more until he can go to the post office around the corner.

Ten seconds pass. Tap.

“-will flow from the lungs to the left atrium, to the left ventricle through to mitral valve-“

Today is the day. The third Thursday of the month. The mail from the frontlines always arrives on the third Thursday of the month – but only after nine in the morning, no sooner. Which means he couldn’t have gotten the letter before class.

Tap.

“-aortic valve, to the aorta, which will branch out in three arteries before continuing down-“

Though, if he had gotten the letter before class, he probably wouldn’t have attended either way, too engrossed in his love’s words, in the fact that he’s still alive to care about his education. He hates the fact that he has to wait a whole month for a single letter, though, hates the fact that his love has to wait a month as well – surely they can deliver mail faster than that, right?

Tap.

Of course, he understands that it can’t be that easy to deliver mail to and from an active warzone, in Africa nonetheless, but Jaskier hates having to wait a month, hates the uncertainty of not knowing whether Geralt is alive and well for so long.

Tap.

He just wishes this war would be over, wishes his love would come home soon, wishes he could hold him in his arms again – God, how he wishes he could hold Geralt again. It’s been so long since he’s last seen him. The last time was the day before his love got drafted, about a year ago. They’d walked around Oxford, close but not too close, hands brushing but not holding. Of course, someone might see – someone might report them.

Tap.

They had ended their day by Peninsula Lake – the same place where they’d first kissed, about a year before that. By all means, it had been a perfect day, that last day, but it had been overshadowed by the knowledge that it was all going to end soon, that Geralt would leave for the war the day after. He remembers crying, that evening, remembers holding his love close, making him promise that he would come home. Geralt, of course, had promised he would.

Tap.

They had both known there was no way he could make sure he held that promise.

“-Mr. Pankratz.”

He blinks, pulled out of his musings, eyes tearing away from that traitorously slow clock to find the professor and the whole class staring at him. Oh, shit. He notices the professor is pointing to a figure drawn on the blackboard of the heart and lungs, and he figures he must’ve been asked a question.

“Uh, the pulmonary veins?”

The entire class breaks out in giggles, and he feels heat rising to his cheeks as the professor rolls his eyes and shakes his head.

“I asked you if you would stop tapping your pen, Mr. Pankratz, but thank you for your contribution to my lesson. Good to know you’re paying attention.”

He feels his blush deepen, and shrinks away in his seat, as the professor continues his class.

He looks at the clock again. Five minutes past half ten. He sighs. Still almost an hour and a half to go. He resists the urge to tap his pen on his desk for every ten seconds that pass.

---

The second the professor starts wrapping the lesson up, Jaskier hastily stuffs away his pen and paper, into his bag, slinging it over his shoulder. He nearly trips in his hurry to get up and get going, barely catching the professor’s shouts of “don’t forget the homework, Mr. Pankratz! Page 381!” behind him as he throws the door open, letting it bounce off the wall, before he starts sprinting down the hallway.

He nearly bumps into a bunch of people, ignores their calls of protests, their angry stares and inquisitive looks, as he runs through the hallways of Oxford. Finally, he reaches the nearest exit, sprinting across one of the courtyards, to the gate. He nearly trips a few times, and almost slips on the wet grass, but manages to make it to the street unscathed.

The post office is only a short walk from there, at the corner of the street, but he makes it within seconds, panting slightly as he skids to a halt, resting his hands on his knees for a short while, before pushing the door open.

The bell tinkles merrily, and Mr. Miller looks up. “Ah, Mr. Pankratz! Is it that day of the month again? Hmm, let me see, lad.”

He rummages through the neat piles of letters on his desk, as Jaskier hops from one foot to the other impatiently, hands itching to reach out and shove all the letters aside, in search of Geralt’s.

“Ah, found it!” The sentence is barely out of Mr. Miller’s mouth before Jaskier snatches the envelope from his hand.

“Thank you!” he calls over his shoulder, as he starts making his way out of the post office, though he’s stopped by Mr. Miller’s voice.

“Mr. Pankratz, sorry, don’t mean to pry, but I have to ask, after a year of giving you his letters and delivering yours to him – who is he? Your brother?”

Jaskier smiles, shaking his head, memories of stolen kisses by the lake, of leaning his head on Geralt’s shoulder as they watched the sunset, of holding each other when they were sure no one was looking, of secret glances, of the brushing of fingers, of hidden smiles, of longing and heartache and love presenting themselves to him. “Just a childhood friend, is all.”

“Must be a very good friend, then.”

Jaskier nods, turning back around, making his way out the door again. “He is.”

The bell rings again softly as he closes the door behind him. He starts walking back to the university, to his dorm, resisting the overwhelming urge to open the letter right there and then – he wants to wait, wants to be able to be alone and truly savour the moment, to really let the words soak into his skin, the scratchy ink into his soul.

But he also can’t bring himself to wait too long – as he starts walking faster and faster, eventually breaking into a run again, letter still clutched in his hand, the early spring wind whipping around his face, through his hair.

He takes the stairs two steps at a time, chest heaving by the time he reaches the third floor – but he doesn’t wait, and starts running again instead, through the hallway, to his dorm room. He’s sure he hears a “wait, what’s the hurry, Jaskier?” from one of the open doors, but he doesn’t stop, doesn’t slow down until he’s in front of his own room.

He fumbles with his keys, nearly dropping them a few times as he searches for the right one, jamming it into the lock when he finally finds it. He hears his door bounce off his bookcase when he opens it, but he doesn’t stop to assess the damage as he closes the door again, locking it behind him – he doesn’t want to be interrupted.

He drops his bag on the floor unceremoniously, heavily sitting down on his desk chair. He all but rips the envelope open, heart thumping wildly in his chest, fingers shaky, breath shallow and quick.

Finally, he takes out the sheets of thin, slightly yellowed paper, a few grains of desert sand sticking to the ink and to his skin. And at last, he lays eyes on the scratchy handwriting, on the words his love sent him two weeks ago from hundreds of miles away.

“My darling,

It’s going to be summer in a few months, I can already tell. The days are growing longer and hotter, the nights shorter and less freezing, the men more tired – I grow more tired as well.

I miss home more, now that spring is coming. I know that the tree outside your window will start to grow green soon, if it hasn’t already. I remember two summers ago, when you opened your window, and reached out to the branches, while I held onto your waist – so afraid you would fall. You picked one of the leaves from the tree, and it was bigger than your hand. Huge it was, but not as huge as the smile on your face, the triumph in your eyes, as you handed me a leaf I never asked for in the first place.

I still wonder what kind of tree it is. Whatever it is, they don’t have them here. There aren’t much trees at all, really, and barely any rain. Nothing to remind me of home, of you, except for your letters. I don’t know if I told you this yet, but I hold them close, wherever I go, and I read them every night before going to sleep. It’s come to the point where I can’t sleep if I haven’t read your letters, if I haven’t seen your handwriting, if I haven’t felt you near, at least a little bit.

They are saying we might be allowed to come home this summer, might be relieved from our duty. I hope so. It’s been well over a year, and the other men are growing tired. And so am I. I’m looking forward to the prospect of being allowed to go home. I hope the higher-ups give us a definitive answer soon.

As per your last letter, I know it’s hard to focus on getting through medical school with the war going on, with the uncertainty of me being alive eating away at you. I understand. Every day, I wonder myself, if it’s going to be my last – and I really, truly hope that if it is, you will know, and you won’t be left waiting for a letter that will never come. But I need to know you’re getting through this, I need to know you’re not failing because of me. I could never bear that thought. So please, keep going to your classes, at least for me, no matter how hard it gets.

It’s growing dark again. The nights here are so incredibly dark - it’s hard to see even a foot in front of you most of the time, until the sun starts to rise again, so I rejoice in the fact that the days are growing longer again. Though that also means they are growing hotter. But as long as I’m home for the summer, I think I can bear a lot more than I thought I could.

Either way, I miss you. I really do, and I wish for nothing more than to hold you again, to see you once more. I hope Destiny will allow me that, at least.

Yours, always,

Geralt.

P.S. I love you, and I love the songs you write. I can’t wait to hear you sing them for me.”

Jaskier sighs, and only notices he’s crying when a tear falls on the paper, smudging the ink a bit. He wipes it away as quickly as possible, desperate not to lose any of his love’s words.

He reads the letter again, and again, and again, before he looks up, out of his window, at the tree. There are small, green nubs on the branches, and he knows the leaves will start growing soon.

Home for the summer. God, how he hopes it could be true, how he hopes to be able to look forward to seeing his love again so soon. How long will it have been, by then? A year and a half? Maybe longer? Either way, any time spent apart is too long, in his mind.

Though, what would it be like? How would Geralt feel? Would he be plagued by the nightmares and the horrors of what he experienced in Africa? Would he ever find peace, or worse, would he hate the peace? Would he find Oxford too boring, and leave? Would he find Jaskier too boring, and leave? Surely, he loves him – God knows how many times he’s told Jaskier so, but would it be enough to keep him? Would Jaskier be enough?

Still, having him near again at least one more time would be enough for him – knowing his love is safe and well and happy, even if he’s not longer with him, would be enough as well.

He sighs, taking a few sheets of paper from his desk drawer, and his fountain pen.

“My darling,

Spring is already making itself known here, as well. You were right – the tree outside my window is starting to grow leaves again. I hope you will be here to hold my waist when I hang over my windowsill and pick a leaf larger than my own hand, this summer.

I long for nothing more than to see you again. Though, I know this life would be so different from Africa – almost boring, even. I do wonder if it won’t be too boring, as well. If I would be enough, still.

I know you would be enough still. More than enough. More than I deserve.

And yes, I am still going to my classes, but I can’t stop thinking about you. Can’t stop thinking about seeing you again, about the way your hair feels between my fingers, the way your eyes sparkle in the golden light of the sunset, the way you make me feel safe and loved, the way I might never see you again. I don’t think I could bear never seeing you again.

I was wondering, if you do make it back for the summer, if we could maybe head to the coast, get away for a while. I know you’re not near the coast, there, and maybe a little vacation would take your mind off things, would make sure you wouldn’t get haunted by what you’ve seen there, hopefully. Maybe we could hire a little cottage on the beach, or maybe we could rent a little boat, sail down the coast, visit different places. I would love that, really. (Though not as much as I would love seeing you again.)

As for the songs, I can’t wait to sing them for you. Maybe I will even write one especially for the coast and when we get there.

Maybe something like: The summer air by the seaside. / The way it fills our lungs. / The fire burns in the night sky. / This life will keep us young. / And we will sleep by the ocean. / Our hearts will move with the tide. / And we will wake in the morning / to see the sun paint the sky.

Or something similar. I don’t know yet. You would have to agree to head to the coast with me before I finish this song, though.

Either way, I miss you, and I hope you’re coming home soon. I wish I could hold you again, and see you safe and well in my arms. I hope Destiny will allow us that, at least.

Yours, always,

Jaskier.”

He rereads his words one last time, before taking an envelope, putting the sheets of paper in it, and closing it. He adds two stamps, before writing Geralt’s name and division on the paper.

He cradles it in his hands, before walking to the door, frowning when he can’t open it. Right. He’d locked it, so he wouldn’t be disturbed again, and, of course, he had forgotten.

He grins at his own stupidity, imagines how exasperated Geralt would’ve looked, if he had been there, and his grin falls immediately. He sighs again, longing in his heart, as he unlocks his door, walking to the post office.

Mr. Miller smiles at him, eyes kind, as he takes the letter, and Jaskier nods his thanks to the old man, before heading to his dorm again. After all – he’s got studying to do.

---

Every morning, over breakfast, he reads one of Geralt’s letters. Every evening, he does the same right before going to bed. The clock seems to tick slower and slower, each day insufferably longer than the last.

Two weeks after he sent his letter, he rejoices in the fact that Geralt must’ve gotten it by now. Every day after that, he grows more impatient as the hours pass by slowly. He hates the fact that he has to wait two weeks for a letter back, but then again, his impatience fades away as he remembers that his love might come home before the summer.

A week after that, he gets a knock on his door. He frowns, closing his anatomy book, wondering who it might be as he opens the door. He smiles broadly as he sees Geralt’s dad, standing in the hallway.

“Ah, Mr. Rivia! So good to see you!”

Geralt’s dad smiles softly. “Jaskier, how many times do I have to tell you to call me Vesemir?”

Jaskier winks. “Just a few times more, I think. What brings you here?”

Vesemir’s smile falls, and Jaskier suddenly notices the dark rings under his eyes, the slight puffiness of his cheeks. He’s been crying. Please tell me they were tears of joy.

“I got a telegram this morning. Thought you’d might want to know.”

He hands Jaskier a piece of paper, who swallows thickly, heart beating in his throat, nausea rising as he opens it with trembling fingers.

“The Air Ministry regrets to announce that your son LAC Geralt Rivia has been killed in action. Letter to follow.”

He stares at the words, barely registering in his mind, though it’s getting harder and harder to read with the way his hands are shaking, with the rain that falls from the sky, smudging the ink.

Strange, he thinks, surely there must be a leak in the roof, then.

He only realizes a few more seconds later that he’s crying. He feels a hand on his shoulder, and looks up, seeing his own disbelief and anger and hurt mirrored in Vesemir’s eyes, before he’s pulled into a tight hug.

“I know you two were very good friends. I’m sorry I had to be the bearer of bad news.”

Jaskier almost scoffs at the words, scoffs at the notion that they were just friends, that he didn’t just lose the love of his life, but he keeps his mouth shut, lets himself be hugged, waits for this moment to pass.

Although – it feels like time has slowed to a stop altogether.

He wonders if he’s going to live in this moment for the rest of his miserable life, will feel this sorrow and pain for all of eternity. Certainly fucking feels like it.

But it does pass, and Vesemir holds him at an arm’s length, smiling sadly at him one last time, before walking away.

Jaskier stays there, frozen in time, in pain, staring at the wall, numbness spreading from his chest to the tips of his fingers, until he can’t feel anything, can’t think anything – other than ‘Geralt is dead’.

Because he is. Geralt’s dead. Gone. Lost. He wonders if it had hurt, to die. He wonders what his last thought had been. He wonders if he had been on Geralt’s mind. He wonders how he even did die. Was it a plane crash? Gunfire? A bomb?

He hears his name in the distance, a hand on his shoulder, a face replacing the wall in front of him. He lets the sensations pass, like birds in the sky, like planes flying by – gone before he can register them, gone before he’s even aware they’re there, high and distant and fleeting.

He turns around, finding his muscles working on their own accord, and he locks the door behind him. He sits down on his bed, then lays down. He knows the tree on the other side of the window has started to grow leaves, he knows they’ll become bigger over time. He knows there’ll be no one to hold him by his waist as he hangs out his window, come the summer, to pick a leaf larger than his hand. He knows there’ll be no one to give it to.

Slowly, but surely, the numbness starts making way for a void, for oblivion, into which he lets all his thoughts, all his feeling fall, watches them disappear over the edge, before he steps into it himself.

He lays there, staring at the wall, barely aware of his own body, of his next-door neighbour knocking on his door, asking him if he’s okay, of the slow but sure passage of time – each second marking another eternity without his love.

---

He lays there for a few days, only getting up when someone calls campus security, who use a spare key to open his door – then threaten to call the mental hospital if he’s just going to lay there and starve himself. They tell him he should get up, eat, drink, stuff like that.

So he does – he gets up halfway through the morning, eats some bread, drinks some water, then sits at his desk the rest of the day, watching the leaves grow ever larger on the tree outside his window. By nightfall, he crawls back into bed. He ignores the knocks on his door, ignores the curious and worried voices of his classmates asking him why he hasn’t gone to class all week. He’s pretty sure one or two professors stop by as well, but he ignores them just the same.

He just sits there all day, at his desk, watching the seasons change, the oblivion in his chest growing with the leaves on the tree, as he waits for a summer he’ll have to spend alone.

---

Two weeks after that fatal day, there’s another knock on his door. He ignores this one as well, staring at the tree, mind blank, his bleeding heart in his lap, for the entire world to see.

Another knock. Then: “Mr. Pankratz?”

He blinks, ignoring the slightly familiar voice, his tired mind occupied with breathing in, breathing out, breathing in, blinking, breathing out. And repeat.

“Mr. Pankratz? It’s Mr. Miller, from the post office, remember?” A few seconds of silence. Breathe in. Breathe out. Blink. “Uh. You got a letter last week, as usual, but you didn’t come to pick it up, so I thought I’d just give it to you.” Silence. Breathe in. Breathe out. Blink. “Right, so I’ll just…” The slight woosh of paper on wood. “Here you go. Uh. Hope you’re doing alright. Bye.”

Footsteps walking away. Breathe in. Breathe out. Blink.

Slowly but surely, the words start registering in his mind. A letter. Got it last week, as usual.

Which can only mean one thing.

Geralt.

Except he’s still dead. He probably sent the letter about a week before he died – letters from the front take two weeks to deliver, after all. So a letter from a dead man – words he’ll never get to hear from his love out loud.

Breathe in. Breathe out. Blink. He considers throwing it in the trash. He considers shredding it up. He considers burning it, letting the flames consume it and him and the rest of this world until there’s nothing left but ashes.

Breathe in. Breathe out. Blink. He gets up, slowly, turning around. His eyes fall on the slightly yellowed envelope next to the door, on the scratchy ink and familiar handwriting and the bleeding heart that’s fallen from his lap, lying at his feet, waiting to be trampled.

Breathe in. Breathe out. Blink. He’s suddenly holding the letter, already sitting at his desk. He doesn’t remember the past five minutes. He all but tears the envelope open, taking out sheets of slightly yellowed paper, desert sand sticking to the ink and to his skin.

His hands start to tremble, his eyes start to tear up. He forgets to blink, as he folds the paper open.

“My darling,

I know it might seem unlikely that I’ll be the same when I come home – impossible, even. And I know you won’t be, either. But I also know that it won’t drive us apart. Trust me, you will never be unloved by me. You are too well-tangled in my soul.

As for the coast, I would love that. Maybe we can take a whole month off for it, even, just the two of us, by the ocean. When I close my eyes I can already imagine the breeze in my hair, the sand between my toes, my hand in yours. It’s a small piece of heaven I carry with me, for now – until I get back.

As for that: they gave us a definitive answer. I’m coming home for the summer.

I’m not exactly sure when we’re going to be leaving, but I heard the others talk about one more mission before they’re letting us go. I should be home within two months, at most, though it’s hard to pinpoint an exact date. After all, who knows how long the mission will take, or how long it will be until we can catch the next plane out of here, or where we’ll be landing, back home – and how long it will take me to make my way over to you.

Either way, I am coming home, I will see you again, so very soon.

But don’t worry about me. Please don’t, love. Don’t worry about meeting me at the airport, don’t worry about running into my arms like in the movies and books. Don’t worry about me.

You just have to wait for me to knock on your door. Because the second I’ve landed in England, I’ll find a way to Oxford, and I’ll come to you as fast as I can. You just have to wait for me because, no matter how much time we’ve spent apart, no matter how long it’s been since we’ve seen each other, I love you now and forever. And I will find you still.

Until soon. Yours, always,

Geralt.”

***

Credit where credit’s due!

Title from “Letter To My Wife” by Miklós Radnóti Song lyrics from “Coastline” by the Hollow Coves Quote “you will never be unloved by me, you are too well-tangled in my soul” from the poet Atticus I’m pretty sure there are some Amazing Devil lyrics in there as well

#squish answers #drabble #ask game #geraskier #geralt of rivia #jaskier #angst #historical au #gerlion #geralt x jaskier #war au #i apologize for nothing

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diaryofabeautyfiend · 4 years ago

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⛔️ This Chapter is pretty violent. *Torture/Canon Typical Violence/ Big Battle

Small Time Witch (30)

Battle preparations were in full swing. Most of the realms armies were to be positioned on the battlefield as frontline forces. Skrýmir the giant from Utgard would lead his armies along with Aesir forces. You warned them of the dog like creatures that came in hoards. At times they were absolutely overwhelming. For that, Thor and Ororo would flank the battlefield to take out as many as possible. You were able to reach Carol Danvers who will be accompanied by the Skrull. On the back end, the Vanir and your coven would maintain a protection spell that would debilitate some of the more simple minded soldiers in Thanos’ army and to shield from air strikes. The Avengers would be on the field as promised to help with the Black Order. The plan was falling in to place. You had the numbers. The problem was radio silence from Thanos.

You exhausted all avenues in the universe to find out his plan. Even Mobius hadn’t heard so much as a rumble from him. No one had disappeared mysteriously from Vanaheim. Nothing really changed except for one thing. Loki’s memories of his time with you were restored. He was a hybrid version of your Loki. Mobius told you he wasn’t the leak. You wanted to believe him but now you were deeply doubtful. You decided to confront him but you had to be as gentle as possible.

You took dinner in your chambers that night. You were noticeably quiet. “Pet, something on your mind?”

“If I say no will you believe me?” He shot you a look that told you he did not in fact believe you. “I have to ask you something. You’re going to be angry with me. We’ll fight about it.”

“Now I’m nervous.”

You sighed heavily, “You should be. Loki, before I healed you, were you still informing to Thanos?”

He looked away from you ashamed, “Yes. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” He cowered at your touch. Did he think you would hurt him? He was afraid of you.

“Loki, look at me. I’m not mad. Loki, look at me.” You could see he was shaking. You stood up from the table and knelt in front of him, “Can he still hear you?” He nodded yes. “Can he hear me?” He nodded no. “Good. I’m going to free you, my love. But first I need you to do something for me. Go get him. Bring him to me.” You kissed his hands and didn’t say anything else. You finished your meal in silence. He could feel how angry you were.

You didn’t believe that Thanos couldn’t hear you or see you when you were in Loki’s presence so you opted not to speak about your plans any longer. Before you went to sleep you rested on his chest and held him tight. He was asleep. You stroked the fine dusting of hair on his belly and said aloud, “I’m going to rip you apart for this.”

——————————————————————

The next morning you were minding your p’s and q’s around Loki. When you had a strategy meeting with the Avengers and X-men you didn’t tell him. When you met with the coven you didn’t say a word. You made Thor promise to watch his mouth and not argue because obviously the man was in pain. You were the general of this army today. Anything that needed to be said to Loki needed to cross your ears first.

Your Avengers meeting was interesting. You knew so much about them and it made you giggle to yourself. Steve was not as soft as when you met him. He mostly looked lost. You wanted to just hug him tight but you knew that would be wildly inappropriate. You decided, to hasten your actual mission, to split up the team. You had a feeling Thanos would split the Black Order to do as much damage as possible. Steve and Nat would join the Warriors, Lady Sif and Heimdall on the Bifrost. Odin would command the rest of his troops from Asgard.

That evening everyone gathered for a feast. One of many feasts before battle. You found your way over to the Avengers table to hang with Thor.

“Princess, have a seat.” Steve pulled out a chair for you and you laughed out loud. You couldn’t tell him why.

“Why thank you, kind sir. I’m sure you’re accommodations are much nicer than an army encampment.”

He laughed, “Oh by far. So you’re from Earth? How did you get involved with and marry a Prince from Asgard?”

“Oh, honey. It is a long story. Another time maybe.”

“Of course. You wear the title well, Princess.”

“Thank you, Captain.” You winked at him and freshened his drink. “Enjoy your evening.”

You made your rounds saying good night. Promising to make good on invitations to visit realms. You finally made it over to the table with Odin, Frigga, your mother and aunts. “I’m going to get Loki prepared.” Frigga looked worried.

“Oh please don’t make that face, Allmother. I feel guilty enough as it is.”

“I just want him to come home safely.” she wiped tears from her cheeks.

“It’s what we all want.” You kissed them all goodnight and asked your mother to sit with Frigga for a while. Odin asked to walk you to your chambers.

“I’m sure I’m quite capable of walking myself, sire.”

“Give an old man the pleasure of seeing his daughter off to bed. Y/N, I’m curious. Has anyone asked why Thanos is trying to destroy the universe?”

You snorted (such a princess), “Does it matter?”

“It’s always good to know what drives an opponent. For instance, love can make people do irrational things. Your meticulous plans are laid before you and something can make any seasoned general snap and the whole thing goes up in flames.”

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Thanos is known as the Mad Titan not the Kind Titan. I’ll be shocked if Loki comes back alive. Whatever you see, what ever he does to Loki, you mustn’t waiver. You must stay composed and trust your plan. Do you understand? There will be time enough to mourn our losses.”

“I hope I have half the nerve that you do in the face of such evil.”

“I have to tell myself the same speech. He’s my son. I would move mountains to protect him. We have to hold steady. Sleep well.” He kissed you on the cheek and went to rejoin the party.

When you entered your chambers Loki was sitting in front of the fire. “Did you have a nice time?”

“I did. I missed you.”

“And I you. I’m ready to go.”

“Lok, why is he doing this? Why does he want to destroy so many lives?”

He smiled to himself, “For love. His mother and father were Eternals. They were terribly beautiful. When Thanos was born, he was not beautiful like his parents so his mother tried to kill him. She failed but ultimately treated him as though he were a ghost. He tortured her until she perished. He just wanted to be loved and accepted. Sound familiar? And then he fell in love with actual Death. Not Hela. This being is death and one of the creators of the stones. She has rebuked him. Denied his advances. So, this is his love letter to her.”

The parallels were obvious. The two of them understand each other on a very deep level. “But you see, darling, Thanos is jealous of me because I have my goddess. He will see our union destroyed.”

“Not a chance.” You pressed your forehead to his and slipped your bracelet on his wrist. With the tiny golden screwdriver you closed it tight. “For luck.”

He kissed you deeply and deeper than any kiss you’ve ever shared. “I love you.” Before you had a chance to say it back he slipped through the portal you opened.

——————————————————————

Thanos sat on his throne watching his daughters argue when Loki returned.

“Ah Loki. I thought you scurried away to the far reaches of the galaxy like the rat you are. What have you brought me?”

“She is alone on Vanaheim. Waiting for you.”

He laughed and looked at Nebula, “Tell me , daughter, do I look stupid?”

“No, father.”

“Do we believe the god of lies?”

“No, father.”

“Should we kill him?”

“No, father. We should torture him and drop him at his wife’s feet.”

Thanos laughed again as he rose from his throne. He grabbed Loki by the neck and brought him close, “You are lucky my daughter is merciful. Gamora!”

“Yes, father!” Gamora rushed to his side.

“Take the god to the dungeons. You and Nebula play nice.”

She cuffed him and stabbed in the side then dragged him behind her. “Please listen to me. He’s going to wipe out half the universe.” Loki croaked and groaned.

“Shut up! You lie!”

“No, I don’t. I can prove it.”

She dropped him on the ground at her feet, “Can you?”

“Sister, don’t listen to him. He is the god of lies.” Nebula grabbed his bonds to continue to the dungeon.

Gamora knelt down in front of him, “Prove it.”

Loki touched her forehead and shared with her the vision of the reality you escaped. He destroyed everything just like her own planet. She could not let that happen again. She also couldn’t betray her father. “It doesn’t matter. No one will ever beat him.” She grabbed him by the hair and took him to the dungeon where Corvus Glaive was waiting.

Gamora hung him to the wall using his bonds. Corvus pulled out his knife and dragged it up Loki’s chest. He used the blade to cut the straps of his armor. He stuck him between his ribs. Loki’s lung collapsed. He was unable to take deep breaths with his hands above his head. He would pass out soon.

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