#Is my blaming of a child irrational - perhaps

[unfortunatehyperfixations]

The finale has me irrationally angry at Chris. I know and understand he is a child and it was traumatic to see Kim, but he’s also 13 not 5. When Eddie went through his PTSD arc they had Chris ask if he was the one who made him sad and Eddie assured him he wasn’t. This episode they had Chris act in a manner designed to inflict the most pain and sadness on his dad. He called up his grandparents rather than buck or his aunt who live nearby knowing his Eddie’s relationship with them. He asks to leave Los Angeles, his friends, his girlfriend(s) to go stay in EL PASO with grandparents who constantly shit on his dad and deceased mother? Then to have Eddie’s parents not be like cool down before we do something we can’t take back they do the opposite and encourage Chris to flee his problems?

Maybe it’s my need to defend and protect Eddie at all costs, even with he makes bad decisions, but he acted the way he did out of grief. Chris and his parents seem to be acting out spite.

Also, Buck should have hugged Eddie. Eddie is always doing that thing where he kinda hugs himself; he is yearning for affection. Will no one offer this man some physical comfort.

[vanillaxoshi]

Experience in Suffering - Elementals Seperated AU

“So, you’ve found your way here. Greetings”

It looks up, or at least try to face the direction of the voice. No need to even use its scan, it could already tell who it is.

The spirit of light, the light of misfortune, origin of greed-

(Fellow sinner…)

But how? How could they wake from the Moth’s Dream? Is it because they are a spirit? The robot’s system was running in whatever ways it could to find an answer. Cross referencing from the Spirit of Dreams herself is out of the picture, as she was the one controlling the dreams. So why?

“I can see the gears turning in your head, it would be better if you used that for other things though” The spirit said, and it remembered. Now is no time to stand by, it has an order to follow.

Apprehend the spirit of light.

The gears within it began to churn and form, changing its fingers into cannons and guns, but the spirit remained there, simply watching. How irrational. If they had told it to get on with things, why aren’t they doing anything?

“You’re not going to go ahead and fire?”

No, not when it has its suspicions. Experience tells the robot that if one seems very confident, it means that one has a plan. It had only been able to grasp a small fraction of the spirit’s memory before, which amounted to a lifetime of memories.

Just what do they know?

The spirit descended, landing right in front of the robot, making it move back. What is the spirit doing? Do they have a death wish? It can pull the triggers right here and apprehend the spirit that way.

But it can’t. Something in the back of its mind tells it that won’t work. Perhaps a faulty old gear, against better judgement it once again lowers its weapon.

“Usually, I like to save my thoughts for all things logical and practical, but I find philosophy becoming increasingly prevalent. Much to my dismay, I’ve been forced to face it outright” A false sigh escaped the spirit, as fake as their demeanor.

“We’re quite similar are we?” What do they mean by that?

“I don’t know if it’s only the extent of your powers, or some cruel irony, you just had to choose my most painful years. I don’t blame the child creating the dreams, twisting events to fulfill my desires at that time. It made me realize something”. Despite not having eyes, the robot could feel the spirit’s gaze.

“Despite being awake, we are both dreaming, dreaming of a better time”

They took a step forward, it floated backwards.

“Both long to return to that kinder past, maybe with our knowledge we could have fixed everything”. No, no it doesn’t. Yes it does

“But we can’t can we? It’s impossible. The only way left is forward. Fearing more pain we tell ourselves to walk the easiest road ahead of us. Fighting back hurts so we stopped fighting completely”. It wished its ego systems weren’t active, so it can’t comprehend these thoughts, but the robot can’t shut down that program no matter how hard it tried.

“Hoping for the day we simply stop functioning”. Are they trying to understand it? To achieve some form of sympathy? If that’s it then sadly, it won’t work.

It never did before, no matter what…

“No choice but to keep our accursed existence, only look at past sins as if we’re reading things in a book-“

It happened so fast. How did its sensors not catch that? The robot could only question, as its right arm is now in the grip of the spirit of light.

“It doesn’t have to be this way though. Allow me to demonstrate how to look at one’s sins in the face”

The emotions flooding its systems right now- Is it fear? Shock? Horror? What even is going on? No events like this has happened in the past! It felt its palm being turned over- Stop it! Stop this!

Just remembering the existence of the left arm, the robot pointed it at the one in front of it. Cease this insanity now foolish spirit of light-

“Zaphkiel. Yod”

A loud bang went off, but it felt no damage. In fact, there’s damage at all. What did the spirit point at?

The silence is deafening. The android robot dare not move, fearing the touch on it’s misshapen hands might leave, that there would be a thud on the floor, and the spirit would be gone, meaning it had failed it’s mission.

It felt as if time had slowed to a stop, before it heard that voice again.

“Well… That was a certainly a trip down memory lane. I knew your power didn’t have something as silly as a 100 year limit” It sounded as if the spirit was smiling ear to ear, taking delight in its horror, a feeling it doesn’t want to experience again.

Welp, been a while since I actually wrote something. Wanted cool Solar and maybe drop some lore of mah boi Remiel. I also just discovered editing the texts

We got remiel!!

Those lines in the end are added hmmm

Reading this more thoroughly

solar being eerily poetic to Remiel and Remiel just not comprehending whatever is happening being with Solar

The android crossed out, so this period Remiel hasnt considered himself much of a person just a robot with a job to do

Trying to supress what makes him less of a robot too

And Solar is helping but in a not so pleasant way? Like help Remiel through this crisis of his despite both of them just gone through a recap of what Neira did for them

[lanwangjiismyreligion]

Warning: This post ist about personal experiences with emotional and narcissistic abuse in families. Please be aware that this content can eventually be triggering, thank you.

Yesterday I got an e-mail and it was written in regards to an article I posted on my small German blog last month. This article was my personal attempt to talk about a phrase I heard a few weeks before:

"Aren't we all a little bit narcissistic?"

Here is the link to my article. It is written in German but feel free to share anyway:

I took this phrase and made it the title of my article. I wrote about how such a phrase minimises and trivialises the harm of certain personality traits and in the end shifts the blame to the victims of emotional narcissistic abuse. This kind of societal gaslighting is often used in Germany, unfortunetly.

And this e-mail was such a touching feedback that made me think like rather spontenious: perhaps I should write some kind of memoir where I can collect and share some of my experiences so far? It would be so much nicer to have a book than just posting short articles on my blog ...

2 Seconds later, a shrieking voice screamed in my head: Am I out of my mind??? How could I think I had the skill or the guts to pull this of? How dare I'm that arrogant to think that this is a good idea? Do I want to be the next Stefanie Foo? How insolent, how prespumptous, how overbearing, how absurd and irrational ...

After my inner selfabuse faded a bit, it dawned me: It doesn't matter what I start writing the anxiety of trying and potentially standing out in the open is always there. It scares the hell out of me to be successful doesn't matter how small this success is.

And here ist are some more crazy thoughts:

I don't really think that, well, I know it sounds ridicules, but I don't really know if my experiences are qualified enough to justify writing a memoir.

I'll be blunt: Perhaps on an absurd level of self gaslighting I am not sure if I'm "traumatized" enough. Yeah, even as I write this, I feel that I must be crazy to think that my parents had been that bad.

Because its all so fresh, I mean that I' m able to recognice the possibility that I could be a narcissistic abuse survivor. After I published my fantasy book in September 2023 I started to feel fatigued and anxious instead of being happy. But I couldn't stop writing and I wanted to be a selfpublisher, so I fought. I was live on Instagram, reading chapters, I found an real life writing community were I'm active and do readings, I'm now a member of the team that runs the community, yes, I am successful in a small way.

But marketing was and is so, so scary, the thought of making my book - and in the end myself - public alone was and is terrifying. Yes, I did some things but it was far, far less then some "normal" selfpublisher does in a commercial writing carrier on average. Really far, far less.

I have not an official C-PTSD diagnosis.

I just discovered that in my family was some strange sickening pattern between children and adults that seemed to come from parts of my grandparents and that my parents showed the same behaviour, perhaps a little bit of a variant. My father showed this entitlement, he did the silent treatment, showed impulsive rage, one day something was okay, the other day not, so there were no rules, the jealousy he showed toward my friends and male lovers, he did the triangulation thing with me and my older sibllings, like I was the golden child but later I turned into a scapegoat within days and so on.

It took me until last year to recognize that depression, burnout, immune system problems, heart and blood preassure problems and anxiety where all normal illnesses we younger ones are dealing with until today. Some of these things I associate with PTSD or C-PTSD now, but actually I cannot say for sure because no one diagnosed me or the others. But depressioen and Burnout were diagnosed but it wasn't put into a connection as consequences from emotional abuse.

But this e-mail showed me that it seems there are people out there without a chance of getting a diagnosis who can identefy with my experience and now I'm sitting here thinking in circles:

[maggzblair]

2023 year in review fic writer asks: 8, 19, 21? please and thank you.

First of all, hello friend! Hope you’re well and I miss talking to you. Hopefully we get to more in the new year.

Second of all, thanks for the questions! Let’s get to them, shall we?

8. Did you write for a new fandom or ship this year?

I actually did not write for a new fandom or ship this year, surprisingly enough! I thought that 2023 was the first time I wrote Gilmore Girls fic, but I guess the summer/fall of 2022 just completely slipped my mind. So, no, but hopefully I will further expand my horizons when it comes to writing in 2024!

19. Share your favorite opening line.

Now this is definitely a difficult task, to choose a favorite of many great lines from this year. I

can honestly say that there is not one opening line that I don’t like, but there is one that rose above the rest this year. It comes from my latest fic actually, a post-series Gilmore Girls AU called “If Twenty-One Was the Loneliest Number”.

If twenty-one was the loneliest number, twenty-three was perhaps her darkest sister. 

21: Share your favorite piece of dialogue.

Again, we find ourselves in another of the Gilmore Girls fics that I wrote earlier this year when the motivation was driving me. In this story, however, it comes with a possibly very divisive discussion of whether to continue with an unexpected pregnancy or decide to end it. I thought that it was very true to both the characters themselves and what could have happened if those infamous last four words had occurred at the end of the original series instead of the revival and I am still quite glad to see that the readers of this particular story have largely agreed. So, from the story “Falling Slowly”:

“Hey, Ace,” he finally said, pausing for a moment. “What’s going on? You said you needed to tell me something.”

The words seemed trapped on the end of her tongue, unable to come out. When they did however, it was in a rush only she could manage. “I know you probably didn’t want to hear from me again after your proposal, I mean…I don’t blame you for not wanting to talk to me. I know I didn’t give you much choice in calling me back either because I didn’t even tell you what was wrong,” she said, working herself up into a signature Gilmore ramble. As it turned out, that was the only way to push past the terror and finally admit to someone more than herself what was happening, damn the (hopefully) irrational fears of her inadequacy and that Logan would end up just like her father, leaving them both behind. Or maybe, just maybe …he wouldn’t. “I’m pregnant. I’m pregnant and terrified and the first thing I could think to do when the test turned pink was call you because I love you and I miss you.”

Silence reigned for what felt like an eternity, the only indication Rory had that Logan hadn’t ended the call was the sound of his breathing on the other side. She had shocked him, which wasn’t at all surprising considering she still felt the same way, but the longer he didn’t speak the more she felt uneasy. Was this the first heartbreak her child would experience, before she had even decided whether or not they would exist?

“Logan,” she asked softly, needing to hear him say something , even if it a less than enthusiastic response.

When he did finally reply though, it was entirely unexpected. “Are you alright? How are you feeling?”

How are you feeling? Was that all he could ask?

“I’m… I don’t know. I haven’t even left the bathroom yet,” she said, knocking her head back against the vanity when she heard exactly how that sounded. “I came in here to take the test but I can’t… I couldn’t make myself leave yet. If I leave, it’s real.”

Logan sighed and Rory could just imagine him, standing in the kitchen of the house he had bought for them, making himself a cup of coffee but wishing it was a scotch. Rory knew she wished she could have something alcoholic at the moment, or at the very least the biggest cup of coffee known to man, but the child currently growing inside her definitely wouldn’t like that. “I’m pretty sure it’s real whether you leave the bathroom or not, Ace. I don’t know much about kids, but I know that.”

“That’s the problem! I hardly know anything about kids, I’ve never really been around them! I mean, sure, Lane’s boys are really cute and Davey and Martha are fun to hang out with sometimes, but I never imagined having one of my own. Especially right now, just when everything seemed to be falling into place,” she said, standing and starting to pace. “I mean, I’m supposed to be in Iowa on Tuesday to cover the Obama campaign! How can I spend what I’m hoping is the next eighteen months on the road pregnant? Then with a baby?”

“You know you don’t have to do this, right?”

The question, simple and yet incredibly complicated, stopped Rory in her tracks. He was right, she didn’t have to do this, but could she stomach the fact that doing this meant…

“Are you saying you would..,” she said, voice trailing off before asking the question that would give her the choice she needed. 

Logan finished the question without a moment of hesitation. “Support you if you wanted an abortion? Yes.”

“Wow.”

[askmalal]

Addard stood, rigid, amongst the ashes of her great work. Her eyes were red - not from weeping, never for the Emperor’s daughter, his favored child, but from the soot. The ash. The smell of things burning that should not burn.

Just a few yards beyond, a group of men knelt in the ash, prostrate before him as if they were kow-towing to some lord of Old Cathay, which, perhaps in some sense, he was.

“This, all of this, you brought upon yourself,” the Emperor of Terra fixed the kneeling men with a face devoid of emotion, eyes like the silence before a coming storm. “This… all of this.” The captives could not face his gaze.

She had seen Barbarian warlords stand against an onrush of landships and fail to meet the Emperor’s gaze. The armies under the command of these men had resisted her Legionaries for longer than anyone had estimated they might. Others had of course resisted longer. But these men, their soldiers…the Lords Marshall had confidently predicted a victory in a matter of weeks.

Her father, the Immortal Emperor of Terra, turned his gaze to her. It did not soften, but it was more sympathetic. The gaze of an approving father sharing an uncomfortable necessity with a favored child.

“How many?” He asked.

“Twelve hundred. Much of Fifth Cohort. Mourned By All.”

“Mourned By All,” the Emperor repeated, nodding his approval. “And theirs?”

“Difficult to say. We believe we have eliminated -“

“Murdered.” Spat one of the prostrate men. “You murdered them.” He was a smaller man, wiry of frame. He was still looking to mud beneath him, but his words were bold enough.

The Emperor looked to the man. “And who are you?”

The man stiffened. “What does it matter? You’ll kill all of us two. Make a desert of this place and call it peace.”

“Perhaps,” the Emperor replied. “Perhaps not. Your people showed incredible bravery. And to take as many Legionaries with you as you did… Still, as I say, you are ultimately responsible for this.”

The little man shook his head. “I may be smart enough to show deference. Too fearful to accelerate my own demise. But I won’t be lied to. Too many of my own people died to stomach this.”

“Again, I ask,” the Emperor replied patiently, “who are you to speak so boldly?”

“I am a soldier. That is all that matters.”

“And the others?” The Emperor gestured to the nine other men there in the dirt. “Are they not your leaders? Your politicians?”

“The ones dressed like soldiers,” the man replied, “are not always soldiers. Some are both. Some are good men. All did their duty, which is more than I can say for our King, or our Nobles. But why does that matter? You have blamed us, all of this, for this atrocity of a war.”

“You were offered peace. Autonomy.”

The captive growled audibly, “My people have been conquered, reconquered, and then conquered again. Each time we have thrown off the yoke. We have no desire to be your servants.”

“I did not offer you serfdom or penury; I offered you autonomy. I spoke to your King. I told him what we could do for your people.”

“You said nothing to our people.” The captive replied, “you spoke to a fratricidal, drunken, Hetman. He does not speak for my people.”

“And whom,” the Emperor approached the group, waving his own Praetorians aside, “do you speak for?”

This angry little man, Addard judged, was a brave man. He was also a dead man. There was no question of this. Her father could be kind, but he was on a crusade; and that mission could ill afford such complications.

“I speak for myself. I speak for the men you killed. It is I who killed two score of your own. And I who would kill two score more.”

“Why fight for this king, O Slayer of Legionaries?”

“I fight for my people against your daughter, the burner of worlds. I fight for my people against your Legionaries, the ravagers of cities. I fight for my people against you, defiler of altars. The king is dead. Dead by his own hand. He fought for no man but himself. May he forever choke on the poison he drank.”

“Your people practice an irrational faith.” The Emperor’s voice was stern. “They are dominated by superstition and fear.”

Addard felt a tang of regret. She kept her mouth shut. He would reveal himself when ready, she knew. Not before. If she could only share the message…

“Kill me if you must, oh Emperor of Terra. But know this: I will not have you blaspheme my gods. They are foreign to you. You have not known them. Do not presume to judge what you cannot see.”

“There is noting to see,” Addard found the words forming. “For, your gods are false.”

“All gods are false,” the Emperor replied. “Science tells us…”

“Science tells us a great many things,” the little man growled, “many useful things. And every few decades, it says new things. Centuries ago, it told us men could not fly. And now they can. That the Old Earth was flat. And now it is not. That human beings would never settle beyond our womb world, and yet here we are.”

“This is the nature of science,” The Emperor countered, “any search for the truth must evolve as it grows.”

“The truth?” Now the dissenter laughed quietly, “the truth. Tell me, Emperor of Man, as some call you, how many names have you born?”

“Many,” the Emperor acknowledged.

“And which is your true name?” The little man countered. “I am Sextus. I have always been Sextus. And you are?”

The Emperor did not answer.

“A man of learning,” this ‘Sextus’ continued, “must accept that very little can be proven true. That very little can be proven false. Our understanding is merely the lens through with which we view reality. I place my faith in things that are true to me, but cannot be fully understood by you. I have felt things, seen things…”

“Personal experience,” the Emperor replied, “is not proof.”

“And being open to the wisdom of both science and the undefinable means recognizing that the worth of things cannot be judged solely upon our limited capacity to prove them true. You came to my home. You promised a thousand, thousand little things. And when we failed to bend the knee to you, you did not stop to consider why. You simply, “ he raised his head and nodded toward Addard, eyes still downcast, “loosed your dogs. Your bullets, bombs, and bayonets killed tens of thousands. The common regiments who fought alongside your supermen robbed and raped as many as the good ones tried to save. You are a murderer. This much can be proven.” Sextus shook his head, ruefully, “the reason for it. The reason cannot.”

The Emperor considered the man. “Stand up, Sextus.”

“At last we come to the killing, then.” Sextus sighed. He stood, shook off the dirt, and made a point of wiping the filth from his uniform. “If you are a man of honor,” said Sextus, “you will tell my mother, should she still live, that Sextus Cornelius Castus died with dignity. I shall give you proof.” He focused his eyes on the Emperor. “Are you a man of honor?”

In her life since coming to join her father, Addard had never seen an ordinary man hold his gaze for more than a few moments. To gaze directly into the eyes of the Emperor was to see beautiful and terrible things. She could do so. She had learned. So could her brothers. So could her…

“And if I ordered my praetorians away,” the Emperor said, his voice firm, “and told them to leave us for fifteen minutes. What would you do?”

“I would make you drown in your own blood. Or drown in my own, rather than be your boot lick.”

The Emperor nodded approvingly.

“Then come with me, Sextus Cornelius Castus, and I shall show you the reason.”

- Sextus is reunited with the Emperor, “The Stars Asunder”, August Richter (1937/38)

[mehrangaiz]

Homesick

I’d like to say I’ve been doing the best I can But that’d simply be untrue I grew distant, somehow more independant And made empty promise I couldn’t fill

You wouldn’t call a wounded animal responsible Just as you wouldn’t call me mature or wise I’m simply devouring the trauma served on my plate And trying to be everything he’s not (but I’m afraid his mistakes defines us both)

I made a nest out of needles, eggshells and people pleaser tendencies I took my heart to the doctor’s office and overdosed it with morphine I hid my melancolia and gulped down my sorrows like it was business as usual Spoiler alert: it wasn’t normal or ordinary, and sure as hell not easy

I clawed at my chest until I was hollow In my ribcage lays a child’s needs, yet to be tended to I needed him, I wanted him, I sought out for him I blew my birthday candles with a change in his heart as my only wish

They say a father is essential to the development of people like me Perhaps that’s why I’m so relentless with my love, my care and my devotion I want to make up for the loss of not having a dad, at least one not good enough I give my love to those who don’t deserve it, but can you really blame me?

Sometimes I chastise myself for giving so much—too much—to people who don’t give back I know I strike others as odd, and I know it’s probably not healthy to be so open and vulnerable But I also know this is just another attempt at trying to humanize myself, at giving them a reason To feel guilty the second they try to define me by trivial and utterly meaningless characteristics

I filled the room with his negligence and took his absence out on myself I destroyed whatever was left of my soul and girlhood I bruised my knuckles trying to conquer an unworldly monster In hopes that someday, somehow, this would pay off in some form or another

I desperately searched for humanity in his ruthless eyes Looking, looking, looking for signs of life, for a pulse running through his sickly veins If only I could hope hard enough, if only I could close my eyes and sigh And finally murmur my goodbye to a man who didn’t deserve me

So when I did, when I had the epiphany that men like him can’t change I clung onto the one that seemed slightly available, as if I were four again Awoken from a bad nightmare, trying to climb in bed with a warm body But the waiting was what killed me more than my actual father

Damn my father, if I can get even a centimeter closer to this man, I’ll be cured Don’t call me irrational, for you would just be talking to the little girl in my being She’s tired of being buried, she’s sick of the adult steering this sinking ship And so she will hang onto this newfound hope just like she did before, just like she always has

It’s time for change; I convince myself as if it’s a prayer I must recite to grasp salvation It’ll be different this time around; I’ll pour my heart out to fill his crevices and craters If he’s a monster? He won’t be any worse than the man I loathe with every cell of my body Even with the ones he’s responsible for building, for the ones he has poisoned with his rotten heart

And if he’s different, if he turns out to be my redemption, my lord and saviour I shall be cleansed of the sins I committed – for the footsteps I took that faltered I will love wholeheartedly without hesitation, without rationality or any sanity I swear, Lord, this will be my turning page only if you grant me this privilege

But sometimes I try to snap out of it too, I try to drown my desires I try to reason with myself, the past, and an unrealistic future I do not deserve living Perhaps the line between damnation and salvation are too close for this circumstance I’m sure this will be the regret that haunts me when I get older, when I’m on my deathbed

On second thought, is it really a desire, a craving, a want? It feels more urgent, it’s desperate and needy, always ravenous and all-consuming I’m sure I sound fucking crazy by now but you can’t call a child’s needs a craving You can’t call me insane for wanting something I never had, For someone that was guaranteed to never be mine from before I was even born

I try to rip open my sternum, I claw at my ribcage, only this time in desperation for being whole I’ll sacrifice every ounce of this dishonourable blood for a chance, for a possibility In the name of fate and destiny, plausibility and feasibility be damned The odds are stacked against me but so are the gods above me, surely planning my demise

If I lose my mind it won’t make much of a difference now, will it? I’m already cursed with the fatal flaw of an inherently treacherous heritage, And so I will do the bidding when it comes to this, I will be homesick for arms that have not yet held me (and probably never will, but who cares?)

[hellmouth-manor]

starving beings were in the alley i wandered in || minami || trial mm.9 || re: alou

Minami has stood, string wrapped around her fist, considering Alou's words while the rest of the group (mostly) lays into him. She's been thinking about if she would take his offer, to suffer for all of eternity so everyone else could be safe. 

...Actually, that's a lie. She didn't have to think about that one very hard, so she moved onto thinking about other things Alou has said.

That those things on the corkboard existed because of him, for him, so he could run this game. That her wife had died, that she had died in such a way to drive Minami to rock-bottom out of guilt, all for someone like Alou. ...But can she really blame him for that? Wasn't it just the same...

She looks up when Poppy stands, pride-- this time for someone else, thankfully, not herself-- obvious on her face. That's enough of an impetus for her to address Alou again.

"To answer your question--"

 She's not sure if he feels it, but she snaps the string around her fist anyway, cutting off the remark from a soft voice.

"About bein' tortured for eternity, or whatever it was. I would accept it. ...Buuuuut I don't think a bunch of people here would let me, not to mention outside of here, so I guess I'm shit out of luck."

She'll have to find another way to get her soul back. How hard can it be?

She thinks about what Alou had said after that, the same point Nike had contested. Being made to run the game. 

Perhaps surprisingly, people's purposes were something she'd had to talk about quite a bit. It came with the territory of having a robot for a child. Daishin could only think of things in terms of a machine, and Minami herself understood machines more than people. Having to explain to them that there was no directive for them to follow and that they could do whatever they liked was a conversation that came up every few months. She had had a similar conversation with Poppy, actually, she recalls. What it must be like to live as a machine, with a purpose to follow as your whole existence. How humans waste their time caring about morals and fearing death, but a robot would only care about that if you told it to.

Ah, but that was right... she had explained that Daishin struggled, because they didn't understand why people acted the way they did. People were irrational. She thought that it must be difficult to be a robot, and look like a human and know how to act like a human, but be surrounded by real humans you could only copy and never truly understand. 

Minami looks at Alou and she wonders about what he's been made into. If it's the same for him. It would be maybe the first time she truly understood him, if it was. 

...Of course, she can't just ask. 

"No you weren't."

So she argues, instead. 

"Made to run the game. I mean, maybe your family made you that. But you're just a person. So... sorry that no one got to you before they decided that for you. Seems like it's too late now. But no one's made to do one specific thing. People ain't machines. Maybe if you'd gotten my lessons on engines you woulda learned that."

Still cracking jokes even now. Minami seems far more relaxed. She feels clearheaded. She's still angry, and that much is obvious looking at her, but she doesn't feel the need to yell.

"You still suck fuckin' shit at answerin' questions, by the way. What, did they tell you what you wanted out of this, too? I don't think so. I mean, you must have things you want for yourself. I'll give you another shot at it, 'cause I'm sooooo generous and nice.

What was it you wanted?"

Something nudges at her memory, and she frowns briefly. A string brushes her hand, and she tears at it as she reaches into her pocket for her notebook and flips back much closer to the start.

"...Yeah, that's right... your execution. I can't imagine you havin' Micah test that. You know, with the kid and all. You musta come up with that one, I think. Too personal. Seems kinda weird to make your own execution that way, unless you were just tryin' to fit in with everyone else's, but I dunno... what was the point of it?"

[pleckthaniel]

okay i had to move to desktop because this is going to be a lot

onestar’s relationships with his family headcanons time

(cw discussion of death and grief; detailed and in-depth discussion of emotional, psychological, and arguably? sexual? domestic & child abuse. i had a hard time determining what specific warning tags to put on this post so if you think ive missed something dont hesitate to point it out please)

morningflower: not necessarily the closest siblings in the world for much of their childhoods, but when she had gorsekit at a very young age and his father died suddenly, they suddenly became much closer as onewhisker stepped in as her primary support system. (their parents were also already gone at this point.) remained very close throughout their young adulthoods; morningflower specifically requested onewhisker mentor gorsepaw to help get the apprentice out of his shell. however, after gorsepaw died they both reacted very differently. morningflower struggled a lot with her grief and also had a hard time not holding it against onewhisker. onewhisker, meanwhile, blamed thunderclan for letting their interpersonal fight ‘spill over’ to the other clans, planting the first seeds of his resentment towards them. as a result of this divergence, after gorsepaw’s death morningflower and onewhisker/star were never as close again.

ashfoot: not bio siblings. she was born a rogue and came to windclan at about 8 moons, and at some point she and onepaw/whisker became close and basically adopted one another as siblings. (in my headcanon version of wc, this kind of relationship is not like SUPER frequent but not entirely uncommon.) however, after a series of incidents (the prey-stealing stuff in tnp, him getting with whitetail, the whole mudclaw drama) she slowly realized he was no longer the cat she thought he was, and maybe never was to begin with. at first she tried to stand by him, ignoring her growing doubts, but after he became leader and grew increasingly irrational and paranoid she started to just openly defy him. she now resents him with that special flavor of betrayal that comes when you used to genuinely love somebody. however, she stays on as his deputy out of a belief that she, and perhaps she alone, can manage his irrationality. for his part, onestar still calls her ‘sister.’ if you asked him, he couldn’t tell you why. (it’s out of the misguided belief that if he pretends their relationship hasn’t fallen apart, she’ll one day come back around to him again.)

crowfeather: onestar sees crowfeather as family, because he’s ashfoot’s kit, and especially because they were still close when crowfeather was born. onestar’s protective of him, though also deeply disapproving and generally expects to be disappointed in crowfeather’s behavior; this means he often comes off as very patronizing to him. for crowfeather’s part, he is very annoyed by what he perceives to be onestar’s intrusions on his life. they are not as close as onestar thinks they are, or wants to think they are.

whitetail: he mentored her, and he wasn’t even bad at it, though perhaps a tad overprotective because of what happened with gorsepaw. whitepaw had a crush on him, and he was kind of dimly aware of it, and, at times, probably semi-subconsciously manipulated her with it. i... don’t know if i would call it grooming, but it also wasn’t not grooming. there was no intent involved on onewhisker’s part - he simply liked attention and here was someone giving it to him, someone who happened to be vulnerable to his tendency towards emotional immaturity. soon she became a warrior, and that might have been the end of it. but shortly after, the thing with smoke & darktail happened and onewhisker panicked and went to the one cat he knew would basically mother a litter for him immediately no questions asked. whitetail was sort of.. uneasy about all of it? but also delighted that he finally returned her feelings, so agreed. by the time they get to the lake and the kits are born, they have both sunk into deep, deep denial as to the utilitarian nature of their relationship, convincing themselves they’re actually In Love.

heathertail: of all his children, heathertail is certainly most unambiguously onestar’s favorite; he saw himself in her pretty much from day one, on account of her looking just like him, and she was very much His Little Girl. he sees her as something to be protected, puts her on a pedestal. has very high standards for her, but she is generally capable of meeting them, so neither of them are at all aware of this until the first time she actually fails him (post-eclipse battle, when she responds to trauma with essentially catatonia and starts to fall behind in training). despite adoring her, he is never genuinely emotionally vulnerable with her, always concerned with saving face; as a result, they aren’t as close as they could be and he is sharply aware of this, and can’t completely figure out why it is. for heathertail’s part, she started off completely idolizing him as a child and was proud to be similar to him, including intentionally and unintentionally modeling her behavior after his. over time, as she matured and started to see more and more of his sweeping bad side, she started to subconsciously dislike him more and more, but, since she still idolized him, this manifested more as self-loathing. after the darktail revelation (and the subsequent revelation of the origin of onestar & whitetail’s relationship), she just hates him openly, having been given what she subconsciously feels is a “real” reason to do so. at the same time, because they are so similar, she can generally understand his motivations and even sympathize with them, which she hates.

harespring: kind of another golden child, in a more roundabout way. onestar sort of made harespring the Responsible One from day one, expecting him to look after his siblings and his mom. onestar sees him as something to be molded, something that can be shaped into the perfect son and successor. he has very high standards for harespring as well, but harespring is pretty much unable to meet them from day one, seriously straining their relationship. it’s like, onestar wants to be coming at harespring from a baseline of approval, but harespring continuously fucks up in such a way that onestar feels like he cannot be approving. eventually, this disapproval becomes habit so that even when harespring actually does perform up to onestar’s standards, onestar cannot help but be sort of cold and weird about it. the desire to keep up with his father’s expectations is what initially caused harepaw to turn to the dark forest for more training and better mentoring. he is very aware that he has been deprived of a genuine, warm and loving father figure and is definitely jealous of what he believes heathertail is getting from onestar. after the dark forest battle, onestar makes harespring deputy partly as a strategic move to make it clear that there is no weakness within windclan nor within his own family; partly as a show of approval for harespring’s development as a warrior. in this one thing, onestar is sort of willfully blind to harespring’s having fucked up, which is deeply disorienting to harespring. from that point on, their personal relationship is sorta overtaken by their professional one.

kestrelflight: onestar just doesn’t really care that much about kestrelflight. he’s glad, theoretically, that one of his kits is a medicine cat; that’s something to be proud of. but he just didn’t vibe with kestrelkit, focusing more on his more outgoing siblings, and that lack of care built into habit built into the foundation of their relationship. at this point, the best case scenario on a given day is that onestar remembers kestrelflight exists long enough to get annoyed at him. for kestrelflight’s part, he’s deeply hurt by his father’s complete lack of regard for him. as time goes on, he learns to cover this with a kind of feigned apathy towards onestar, but he’s also a fundamentally very compassionate person and can’t help but to be somewhat sympathetic to onestar for having driven away virtually every other person in his life.

[lubdubsworld]

Blackberry Winters.

Part 1

Check part one for warnings 💔

Part 2.

Namjoon stared at his mother, her words registering but not quite sinking in. He blinked, a couple of times and swallowed dryly, trying to gather his wits that felt like they'd been scattered to the four winds. There was a dull ringing in his ear, a feeling of impending horror and he had to fight to bring himself back to the present.

"She is...?" He couldn't even say it. Somewhere in the back of his mind he realised the irony of it. It wasn't supposed to makes him feel that way. The reason he had taken her to bed was for this : a heir to take over the duties of the head alpha after him. And yet, he knew that he couldn't just ignore all the things that would come with having a pregnant mate. All the added responsibility.

At the heart of it , Namjoon was exhausted.

He had been trained for this position but it didn't make it any easier. His wolf yearned for solitude and serenity, peaceful quiet where he could contemplate life and all its mysteries but the duties and responsibilities kept piling up. He had no time to indulge in such whimsical fantasies. From daybreak to sundown, he drowned in problems that demanded solutions, issues that required his intervention and he was always giving so much of himself to so many.

It was as taking a toll.

And now here was the promise of another new soul. A pup. Fully dependant on him for survival. It was hard to be ecstatic.

" Why do you look so surprised? Have you not been sleeping with her?" She frowned, moving closer to the small wooden bench in the corner of the room. She sat down, primly adjusting the large swathes of her skirt. Even at her age, she was a beauty and despite being a widow, she was treated with great respect by all the wolves in the clan.

" I have... Of course...I just didn't expect her to ...so soon. " He muttered hesitantly. He made a quick calculation, Conceived at the end of autumn meant the child would be born at the end of summer. Rains and more rains. He would have to commission the weavers to make a lot of warm blankets and thick bedding for the babe. And make sure that all the birthing huts had their roofs mended. He felt an ache in his chest. He knew he had to have a heir. It was part of what he was responsible for. But he wasn't ready to be a father yet. Especially not with someone like her.

" You haven't been very subtle in your disdain for her, Joon. It makes me wonder of perhaps I have failed in teaching you the ways of a husband." His mother's sharp voice made him wince.

His parents had been deeply in love with each other. His mother had been an equal contributor in running the clan, his father's most trusted confidante. He couldn't imagine having something like that with the woman he had rather recklessly chained himself to for life. But he couldn't be openly defiant in front of his mother.

So he bowed.

" I've tried to talk to her mother. She looks at me like I'm some marauding villain."

Lady Kim scoffed.

" Because, for all she knows, you may as well be one. Think of who she is, how she was raised. Her mother died when she was eight and she has been keeping house for her father since then. It Is a miracle she knows how to read a few words and to write her own name. Old man Gong is unkind and cruel and I've only ever watched him treat her like an unruly dog that needed discipline and never like his own flesh and blood. She knows men to be cruel and powerful and capable of doing her great harm. Add to it your status as the head of the clan, of course she thinks you're dangerous. "

" am I to be blamed for her childhood now?"

" Don't be obtuse. That is not what I'm saying. I just want you to consider her upbringing, before you write her off as dramatic or hysterical. "

Namjoon sighed deeply.

" Alright, mother. I'll try to talk to her again. "

And he knew that he had to. If he wanted some semblance of peace in his life, he would have to make an effort with his wife.

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

Jiah sat by the haybale near the barn, cross-legged on the dirty floor as she watched Misu and Loshim, two of the stable boys tend to the horses. She stared at the careful way they brushed the large beasts, their tone gentle and soothing as they murmured reassurance to the agitated animals. She found it fascinating, how even an animal that powerful could feel fear and anxiety. It made her feel better about her own shortcomings.

From a very young age, she had known of her flaws. She was jittery, prone to cold sweats and breathing problems, easily frightened and absolutely terrified of confrontation of any kind. Her parents had been, to put it lightly, unkind. They had seen her as a burden, as something broken and useless and cumbersome and that had done nothing for her self esteem.

To make matters worse, they didn't let her attend lessons with the other omega girls, her education limited to scribbled writing on granite with chalk when her father was feeling bored or charitable. She could read a few words with difficulty . Could write her name out if you gave her some time and patience.

At first, her ignorance had been embarassing but over time she realised her education wouldn't serve her much purpose.

She thought of herself as something temporary and fleeting. Not meant to leave any lasting impression on the world. So it was alright if she didn't know what every other girl her age did. She was going to live and die in that hut near the boundary walls..... She would have no use for fancy words or exotic dances.

Or so she hd always believed.

So when the head alpha had asked for her hand in marriage, she had nearly passed out from her heart giving out.

Namjoon was seven years older, almost thirty winters old and she had only ever caught glimpses of him when he came to check on her father's watchpost occasionally. He was a tall man, strapping and intimidating with dragon eyes that glowed red. And one evening he had stopped by her side when she had been tending the beets and potatoes in the small vegetable garden out back.

He had stared at her for a few long minutes while she had sweated in nervousness and then he had promptly asked for her father. When the man had Stepped in and told her father that he was looking to make her his bride, the old man had been jubilant while Jiah had been confounded.

She hadn't wanted to say yes but she had been too much of a coward to say no. Besides, she didn't know if saying no would have any repurcussions....she didn't want to risk offending the literal head of the entire clan. What if they banished her? What would become of her then?

And so she had said yes. And here she was.

Mated to the man for life, her wolf connected to his and his mark on her neck and now....his child in her womb.

She felt the familiar stirring of panic, digging her nails into her palm to ground herself .

Jiah had long come to terms with the fact that her mind was not her friend. It sometimes tried to attack her , tried to make her feel irrational things. It convinced her that she was a bother, that she was useless, that she was a burden. It also tried to tell her that she was in danger, that she had to run and avoid and get away, even when she was perfectly safe.

When she had first come here as the head Alphas new wife, her brain had wrecked havoc on her senses. Had made her feel like a hunted animal, always cowering and hiding and trying to disappear . Namjoon had tried to be friendly, tried to be courteous and all she had done was hide and recoil, skin ice cold and words practically non existent. She hadn't said a word to him those first few days and even the bedding had been a nightmare, her entire body stiff as a board and she knew that he had probably felt like he was making love to a corpse.

She regretted it. Deeply. But there was not much she could do about it now. Besides she wasn't sure she even wanted to. It was obvious her husband's affections lay elsewhere. She had seen the way he looked at that courtesan. Had seen him sneak out for walks with her, had seen them huddled together in the room with all the scrolls and leather bound books.

Jisoo was a beautiful omega, well read and trained in musical arts. She played the gayageum and the flute, knew how to entertain guests with a perfect ceremonial dance and she was always at the helm of every festivity, dressed in vibrant fabrics and full of life.

She was also madly in love with Namjoon.

Jiah sighed, watching the horses paw at the dirty stable floor. She wanted to get to know her husband, yes. But she knew that even if she did, he would only find her wanting and inadequate in all ways.

And that was just not acceptable .

She maybe self aware when it came to her short comings but she also had her pride.

She would rather live like this. Tucked away like an embarassment, hidden like a dirty secret because then there would be no piercing gaze weighing her against her peers and declaring her broken.

Yes.

Pregnant or not, she wanted nothing to do with her husband.

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

" Are you feeling well now?" Namjoon's voice startled her, eyes going wide as she looked around the resting quarters , gaze finally falling on the man standing near the large table on the side. Namjoon was bent over the rough oak surface , papers spread out in front of him, an oil lamp burning bright nearby, casting a sepia shadow on the man himself and she hesitated, debating the pros and cons of excusing herself to go see his mother instead. Maybe claiming a headache?

In the end she did neither, resolving to at least make an effort with this.

" I'm well, alpha. " She swallowed the lump in her throat. " I'm sorry for inconveniencing you. "

He straightened, turning around to look at her finally.

" Do you wish to move into another room?" He said briskly and she startled.

" Another room?"

" Now that you are with pup, there's no reason for us to keep sleeping together. I prefer having my own space. "

Jiah felt the blood rush through her ears. This shouldn't hurt but it did and she could feel the self loathing flood her senses. She stared down at herself, the lack of beauty and the utter lack of any kind of elegant upbringing. Of course he didn't want to stay with her any longer. What had she been thinking , agreeing to this farce of a mating?

" I... Alright. "

Namjoon turned away from her.

" Good. I've already arranged for all your things to be moved to the west wing , next to the gardens."

Far away from his rooms, Jiah thought bitterly. The sudden realization that Namjoon had been looking for some sort of brood mare and not a mate hit her . And it suddenly made sense that he hd picked her.

Someone easy to boss around.

Someone who wouldn't demand anything from him, loyalty or affection or attention .

And it irked her for some reason.

Why did he get to treat her that way? Why must she put up with it?

But she stayed quiet because she wasn't sure what to say.

" You can leave now, Jiah. " He said dismissively and she hesitated before stepping out of the room.

And she wondered if with her departure, someone else would be taking her place in his bed.

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

Authors Note : would you guys like first person narrative or should I continue in third person? 👀

[robininthelabyrinth]

Spilled Pearls

- Chapter 23 - ao3 -

Lan Qiren woke with a start at the sound of something slamming to the point of cracking – a door thrown too hard, perhaps, or the shattering of a piece of furniture under the strength of a powerful cultivator.

Dazed at having been woken so abruptly at such a late hour, he at first thought that the sound was an aberration of some sort, someone making too much noise by mistake, even some cultivation maniac doing exercises in the middle of the night that had briefly lost control, but then the sounds continued, crashing and slamming and even indistinct shouting.

Indistinct, and unfamiliar, but still recognizable – that was Wen Ruohan’s voice.

Lan Qiren had never heard him shout before.

He stood up, instinctively checking over his clothing and fixing his forehead ribbon, and padded out towards the door to the hallway. The array used to create enough silence to let him sleep was glowing faintly, doing its work against overwhelming odds, but Lan Qiren didn’t hesitate to dismiss it and pull open the door, poking his head out to see what was going on.

“ – what use are you?” Wen Ruohan was shouting, some distance down the hall. “Good-for-nothing bitch! What do you think I got you for in the first place?”

He was standing outside his wife’s door.

Lan Qiren had not seen Madame Wen on this visit, other than in passing. He’d been relieved to discover that he had heard accurately and that she had not suffered on account of what she had done, except perhaps as a result of her husband making clear that he would give her exactly what he had promised her out of their marriage and nothing more. Despite that, every time she saw him, she generally had an expression that resembled smelling something bad, and he didn’t especially want to deal with her irrational jealousy. 

(Lan Qiren could understand and even appreciate the truth that she had shown him, but it didn’t mean he appreciated the reasoning behind her actions - just as Wen Ruohan might appreciate the cunning and ambition demonstrated by her actions, and begrudgingly acknowledge that the real fault for their divide was his own actions, but not feel any more inclined to her as a result.)

Lan Qiren thought he might have to deal with her more, particularly on the few times he had visited little Wen Xu, who was already a size or two larger than he’d started out – it was simply shocking in terms of how much time had passed since he’d had his argument with Wen Ruohan – but he found that the child was largely being watched by servants, not the Madame, who was busy ruling the social scene of the Nightless City. Whether that was true or merely an excuse, by now it was clear that they were in mutual agreement that they did not want to spend any time in each other’s presence.

She was also, very clearly, refusing to let Wen Ruohan into her bedroom.

Lan Qiren couldn’t blame her: he’d never seen Wen Ruohan in a state like this. His clothing was mussed up, his hands clenched, his face red, his aura frighteningly strong and overwhelming, his monstrously powerful qi roiling the air in the hallway into an incipient storm – and even from the distance he was standing, Lan Qiren could smell the distinct odor of strong liquor, suggesting that Wen Ruohan had overindulged in alcohol at some point after Lan Qiren had gone to sleep. Based on casual mentions in prior conversation, Lan Qiren knew that Wen Ruohan’s cultivation level was so high as to render him largely unaffected even by significant drinking, but the fact that he had bothered to try to seek solace in the wine jar suggested that there was something incredibly wrong with his mental state. 

It wasn’t a qi deviation - the violent emanations were unsettled, but not distorted - but it wasn’t good, either.

Wisdom would counsel that Lan Qiren keep back and not get in Wen Ruohan’s way.

Righteousness, on the other hand…

Anyway, Wen Ruohan was his sworn brother. What sort of brother would Lan Qiren be if he took only the good and not the bad?

“Da-ge?” he called, stepping out into the hallway. “Da-ge, come away from there.”

Wen Ruohan turned to him, and his expression was frightening. “Fine. You’ll do,” he growled, and it was only because Lan Qiren had grown wiser and stronger that he realized what was about to happen and dodged before Wen Ruohan could grab him, darting back into his room.

Wen Ruohan followed him in.

“What happened?” Lan Qiren asked, still backing away. “You were fine at dinner – what happened since then?”

For some reason, that set Wen Ruohan off again, turning his attention away from Lan Qiren, and he grabbed the table and threw it into the wall, smashing it all to pieces. 

“That fucker,” he snarled, his eyes blank and distant. He wasn’t angry at Lan Qiren, that much was clear, but he was filled with ceaseless rage, and he was taking it out on everything around him. “That fucker got married! He’s got a son!”

Lan Qiren blinked. “…what?”

Smash went the cabinet, and all the various things on it. At least Wen Ruohan hadn’t started in on the paintings, which were the only aspect of the room Lan Qiren actually cared or worried about.

“Who got married and had a son?” Lan Qiren asked, even though he knew it would only inflame Wen Ruohan further. At this point, it was clear that Wen Ruohan’s had gotten stuck in his chest, like black blood that needed to be coughed; he needed to vent his anger or else it would curdle within him and he would suffer. “Normally that’s a good thing, a cause for celebration. Why is it bad here?”

“Because it’s Lao Nie!” Wen Ruohan burst out, and Lan Qiren rocked back on his heels in shock.

It wasn’t that he hadn’t known that Lao Nie had been unusually distracted these past few months, even most of a year – the way he’d ignored or disregarded Lan Qiren’s letters about the situation with He Kexin, the breezy and almost manic tone of his replies to Lan Qiren’s brother, which Lan Qiren had seen, it all spoke of distraction and carelessness, all typical of Lao Nie, albeit of far greater severity than usual.

Nor was it truly a surprise that none of them had been informed: the Qinghe Nie had always been idiosyncratic about their personal details, unusually secretive and fiercely proud of it. They did not share their birth date or even year, other than for arranging a marriage. If Lan Qiren had thought about it, he wouldn’t have been at all surprised to find out that Lao Nie would have married and had a child all without having shared any information on the subject until afterwards.

Only…

“But aren’t you – with him?” he asked, and knew immediately that he had asked the wrong question.

Wen Ruohan roared and smashed yet another thing, sending a palm strike through a dresser and denting the stone wall with the power of it. “He’s mine,” he spat. His eyes were even redder than usual, the sclera becoming red alongside the iris; it made him look almost possessed, almost as if he really were having some sort of qi deviation. “He’s mine, damn it! Who is he to give himself to another? And he didn’t even tell me…!”

They were definitely in a relationship, Lan Qiren confirmed to himself. His guess had been right. There could be no doubt about it. And yet, despite it all, Lao Nie had –

No, he couldn’t even express surprise. Lan Qiren knew Lao Nie, knew what he valued and how he valued it: Lao Nie had always been passionate and powerful, strong and superior, friendly and often kind, and yet at his core he was ruthless, careless, and selfish, just like Wen Ruohan was so often selfish. He did not concern himself overmuch with questions of righteousness, other than to the degree necessary to win glory to his sect as one on the righteous path. After his sect, which he valued most of all, he was an indolent pleasure-seeker, with terrible taste in partners, the more dangerous the better; Lan Qiren had seen him flirting with people left and right long after he’d concluded that he’d entered into a relationship with Wen Ruohan.

In the past, Wen Ruohan hadn’t seemed to mind. If anything, he’d even encouraged him, looking smug and amused by the flirtations, taking the other man’s victories as his own; during one incident that Lan Qiren could recall, he’d all but applauded when Lao Nie had successfully wooed some rogue cultivator and taken her back to his bed, turning instead to his own separate amusements after.

Then again, that wasn’t a marriage.

(Of course, Wen Ruohan himself had also gotten married…)

“How dare he,” Wen Ruohan said, panting a little from his own exertion, clearly more moved by the feelings raging within him than any type of physical exhaustion. “How dare he – does he think I’m desperate? Pathetic? Does he think I’d run after him, begging and humiliating myself..? I don’t need him at all!”

He turned once more, and this time his gaze focused on Lan Qiren.

“I have something of my own already,” he murmured, and this time Lan Qiren wasn’t fast enough to stop him as he caught him up in his arms, slamming his back against the wall.

Lan Qiren tensed, suddenly for a moment back in his rooms in the Cloud Recesses, looking up at a different brother who wanted to hurt him – but no, Wen Ruohan wasn’t the same, Wen Ruohan liked him. He was acting out of fury, not malice; there was no He Kexin here to goad him on, nothing like that.

Even the force of being pushed against the wall hadn’t actually hurt – Wen Ruohan had been careful even in his mindless rage, making sure that any impact was cushioned by his own arms rather than Lan Qiren’s back; Lan Qiren hadn’t even had the breath knocked out of him.

“Da-ge…!”

Wen Ruohan didn’t want to hear him. He put his hand on Lan Qiren’s mouth and pressed down, cutting off speech at once. They were pressed together so closely that the movement inadvertently dragged his sleeve onto Lan Qiren’s throat, almost making him gag, and he instinctively tried futilely to kick his way out – it didn’t work, of course.

Wen Ruohan pressed up against him, the front of his body burning like flame against Lan Qiren.

“You’re mine,” he said, reaching in to nuzzle the side of Lan Qiren’s head with his cheek. “My blood brother, bound by oath and blood; my shining pearl, untouched by the world. All good things should belong to me.”

Lan Qiren reached up to try to push away the hand at this mouth, wanting to speak even though he did not know what he would say, and at first he thought he’d done it. But then suddenly he was in motion, his back landing hard on the bed he’d been given, the impact softened by the blanket Wen Ruohan had wrapped around him when he’d brought him back to the Nightless City from the Cloud Recesses. Shocked by the unexpectedness of the abrupt movement, he gasped, a wordless inhale rather than any coherent words.

Less than a heartbeat, and Wen Ruohan was on top of him, pressing him down. His body seemed even hotter than usual, as if his whole spirit were aflame, his qi boiling in the air around them until Lan Qiren had the impression as though he ought to be able to see steam; his hands were hot where they pressed down on Lan Qiren’s shoulders, his lips burning as they pressed against his collarbone, and between his legs there was something hot pressing against him, too.

And still, Lan Qiren – was not afraid.

He wasn’t sure why. He’d been terrified when it had been his brother who had stood against him, disgusted when it had been He Kexin pawing at him in ways he did not and had never wanted, but Wen Ruohan, who was bound to him through nothing but a tricked oath…

“Da-ge,” he whispered. “Please stop.”

Wen Ruohan stilled. He didn’t get up or pull away, but he didn’t make any further movements.

“Please let me go.”

Wen Ruohan’s breathing was harsh in his ear. “You, too, little Lan?” he asked. “Just like him, making me think – don’t you like me?”

“I do,” Lan Qiren admitted. He might be stupid when it came to social interactions, might be slow and miss things that were obvious, but even he could figure out what Wen Ruohan meant, with his confession of how Lan Qiren lingered in his thoughts and in pressing him down on the bed like this while mourning the loss of Lao Nie, his lover. And maybe sometimes he needed Cangse Sanren to point things out to him, but most of the time he knew himself. This past week had made clear enough that he enjoyed Wen Ruohan’s endless indulgences in a spirit that was more than just pure brotherhood. “I do like you. But I don’t like – this.”

Wen Ruohan was silent for a long moment.

“Not this, with me,” he finally said. “Or not – at all?”

“At all,” Lan Qiren said. He had thought when he was younger that he might change, but he was increasingly sure that he wouldn’t, that this was just what he was like. “I was never like the others my age. Even Yueheng-xiong, who I would’ve thought loved nothing but mathematics and explosions, has found himself distracted by the shape of the one he likes. But not me. I don’t yearn the way they do. I can love a person’s spirit, but I never much cared for the flesh.”

“Love,” Wen Ruohan echoed, his voice oddly uneven. “You speak of - love?”

“…isn’t that what we’re talking about?”

Wen Ruohan laughed, a jagged and choked up thing, and then he pulled away, letting Lan Qiren go, sitting up on the bed and burying his face in his hands. The qi around him was still too-hot, overwhelming, pulsing with his feelings, even as his shoulders shook and he stared blankly at the wall; any other man, and Lan Qiren might think he was crying, but he could see Wen Ruohan’s face through his fingers, and there were no tears there.

Perhaps he’d forgotten how.

Lan Qiren slowly sat up himself.

He could still feel the mild stiffness of old healing injuries, but he ignored them and got up off the bed, going to the one side table that had yet to be destroyed – the one where he’d laid his guqin to rest. It turned out that Wen Ruohan had only destroyed the things he himself had put into the room; he hadn’t touched anything of Lan Qiren’s.

Lan Qiren settled in front of his guqin and began to play.

Out of all the compositions he had created, his favorite was the one he had first created at the Nightless City, that strange hypnotic melody that brought to mind spilled pearls, but unlike some of the others he’d worked on, it had never felt fully completed. The music wrapped itself around the listener, at first intimate and then oppressive, a heavy stone in their chest and pressure on their skull, growing darker and darker, just as he’d written it – but now he played onwards, elaborating on the theme in ways he hadn’t planned or expected, letting the solemn notes brighten, the overwhelming pressure turning from suffocating into safe as it became clear that it would cause no harm, the storm passing by overhead and leaving things clean and clear and better, the lingering euphoria of finding oneself supported, rather than alone.

When his fingers finally stilled, Lan Qiren looked up and saw Wen Ruohan sitting there with his back straight again, hands resting gently in his lap, eyes closed as if in meditation and face calm once more. His qi no longer coiled around him, lashing out; it had settled once more.

“You will,” Wen Ruohan said without opening his eyes, “be an excellent traveling musician, little Lan. People will fight for the right to hear you, and you will never go without an audience.”

Lan Qiren hesitated, not sure what to make of such a compliment, or what Wen Ruohan meant by it. He’d only intended to play something to help him settle his qi and soothe his rage, which he’d clearly accomplished. He hadn’t even meant to play that particular song, other than in the way that he tended to default to it when he had nothing else specific in mind. It had always been unsatisfying, like an itch, but now it finally felt complete.

“Da-ge –” he started to say, not knowing what he would say next, but at any rate he never had the chance to continue.

“When you do finally go to fulfill your dreams, leaving the dust of the world behind you, I hope that you visit the Nightless City often,” Wen Ruohan said. His tone was still calm, settled, but not, Lan Qiren observed, peaceful: there were all sorts of seething emotions underneath it. “But for the moment, I think it is better if you return to the Cloud Recesses.”

Lan Qiren hesitated once again, this time feeling a little hurt. “You don’t want me here?”

“I do,” Wen Ruohan said, and his lips curved into something that was not a smile; it seemed almost painful a shape to contort into, and his eyes reflected no humor at all when he opened them. “Very much. Ah, little Lan, if only you knew…despite that, I would still have you go. Having made my views on you clear to your brother, it should be safe, and I do not want you to see what beast I make of myself when I am denied.”

Lan Qiren bowed his head a little. “About Lao Nie…”

“I know what he’s like,” Wen Ruohan said. “I’ve always known, from the start. If you had asked me a few days ago, I would have said that I did not have any illusions…”

He smiled bitterly.

“It seems that I misjudged myself.”

“I’ll go,” Lan Qiren said. He didn’t especially want to, but Wen Ruohan wasn’t in a rage, nor lashing out unthinkingly. To refuse him would be to deny him, to treat him as if he could not make his own decisions, and that, he thought, would be worse. “If you want me to, I’ll go, and later, I’ll return.”

Wen Ruohan said nothing, but he watched as Lan Qiren pulled on some more clothing, not caring which one it was, and did his hair back up in the simplest style, favoring speed over substance; he packed away his guqin and his sword and one of the paintings that he had liked best, but took nothing else – after all, it wasn’t as if he were going away for good.

He made it to the door before hesitating, then turned back to look at Wen Ruohan, who was still watching him.

“Is there anything…?” he asked haltingly. “Something I can get you…?”

“Send one of the maids to me,” Wen Ruohan said. “Any of them, it doesn’t matter which. If they’re still hanging around in the family quarters after an eruption like that, it can be seen that their ambition has overcome their good sense, making them a perfect match for me. It would be a shame to deny them the fruits of their victory.”

Lan Qiren didn’t quite understand, but he knew enough to get the gist; he felt his cheeks and ears go hot. Still, he had offered, and it wasn’t something he was willing to do himself, so there was really no basis for refusing to pass along the request. He nodded and slipped out – as Wen Ruohan predicted, there was one of the maids lingering at the far corner, looking around in blatant curiosity. She was pretty enough, Lan Qiren supposed, with an upturned nose and a slightly arrogant air, her clothing carefully arranged to be just a little mussed in a way that Lan Qiren understood most men to find attractive.

“Your sect leader is in my room,” he told her, and she blinked at him. “If you go to him now, he’d probably accept. Up to you, though.”

She stared at him for a moment, then nodded. He left, his head held high; when he glanced back anyway, he saw her going into his room, hair patted down and clothing even more carefully arranged – Wen Ruohan hadn’t been wrong when he speculated as to her ambitions. The life of a powerful sect leader, Lan Qiren supposed: desired but never known, as distant from those around him as Lan Qiren but as a consequence of his position rather than his inclination.  

He would definitely return, Lan Qiren decided. Perhaps he would even make the Nightless City the first destination on his travels. After all, why should he not? Was Wen Ruohan not his sworn brother, too?

Yes, Lan Qiren thought. That was right.

Wen Ruohan deserved to have someone possess him as he longed to possess others.

[hotchley]

For your 500 thing: 4 from the angst list with Hotch and anyone else, platonically? I like the prompts you've chosen too. Very angsty haha

Hehe thank you! I chose Reid, because it worked so... yeah. This is not to be seen as me infantilising Reid or as H Crit because it's not. People say things they don't mean when they're hurting. There will come a time when Reid doesn't hesitate and Hotch forgives himself. It's just not written here.

It went over 1.5k... let's just ignore that. Umm... Set sometime between Nameless, Faceless and Haunted. There's no real comfort.

4: "shut up! please. just shut up."

Trigger Warnings: past child abuse, intrusive thoughts, references to canon-typical events and violence

read on ao3!

With hindsight, moving Spencer to the same hospital as Aaron was not the smartest idea the BAU had ever had. Not when traumatic and painful events caused them to react in opposite ways. When Spencer was hurt, he didn't stop talking, so terrified that if there was even the slightest indication that he was weak, everyone would leave. And when Aaron was hurt, he completely shut down, still scared that making his existence known would lead to hurt.

But at the time, they had only been thinking of Derek. He had been running himself ragged, trying to manage the BAU in Aaron's absence, and caring for both his teammates who were in different hospitals, because he was coincidentally, the only person that either of them would listen to.

Perhaps they were more alike than anyone gave them credit for.

So Spencer was moved into the same room as Aaron, because when the team came, they came to see both of them, and it was apparently good for the two patients to socialise with each other and try to maintain their bond. At least, that was what everyone said to them. In reality, it was just easier to only have to have certain conversations once. Especially the ones about Foyet.

Because even though both of them would be out of the field for a while, and had lost so much of the independence they prided themselves on, the situations were not the same and they never would be. Spencer had been shot in the leg trying and succeeding in saving a man, and the perpetrator had been arrested. He had gotten justice.

Aaron had been stabbed nine times in his home, the place he had a right to feel safe in, by a man so evil that there was no chance of ever reasoning with him. Foyet had gotten away, and he'd taken Haley and Jack with him. The only people Aaron seemed to live for, were gone. He hadn't gotten any sort of closure. Nobody seemed to understand that, because everyone kept saying him and Spencer could relate to each other. But they couldn't. And he was sick of hearing it.

But he tried to hide that bitterness. Spencer wouldn't have been shot if he had been there. He would have been the extra set of eyes needed to finish the letters, and they would've worked it out sooner. They would've all been fine, if he had done anything other than frozen when the bullet wedged itself in the wall beside his hair, close enough to make his ear ring painfully. His anger was irrational, and the result of trauma. Everyone else understood his emotions were all-consuming and overpowering, but he didn't. To him, the anger and resentment were just another sign he was becoming his father.

He wasn't. But he would never allow himself to believe that.

Spencer knew that his and Hotch's situations were different. That Hotch blamed himself for what had happened to Haley and to him. That Hotch was hiding how he truly felt, probably to protect him. That things were going to explode sooner rather than later. He just didn't know how much sooner than expected it would end up being.

Rossi had swung by in the morning, and that visit had set Aaron on edge. Rossi was trying to help, he was, but his method of doing it wasn't helpful. It never had been. Not for someone like Aaron, who needed something that was not his best friend telling him how the BAU had been fine without him. Or how the children seemed to be fine. Or how victims could recover.

When Rossi left, Reid took the crutches beside his bed and hobbled over to sit in the chair that he'd vacated. They had both been encouraged to try and be mobile without going beyond their limit. Only Spencer had listened.

"If you want him to stop talking, you can always tell him," he said gently.

Aaron turned away. "He's just trying to help."

"But he's not. I think we can all see it."

"Spencer, I don't know what you're trying to do but-"

"I don't care if you resent me. I care that you're lying."

"I'm not lying."

"Really? So if I asked you whether or not you resent me, you could look me in the eye and say you don't? If I asked you whether you blame yourself for my injury, you would say no, and mean it? If I asked you who was responsible for Haley and Jack going into WitSec, you would say Foyet? If I asked you how you feel, would you say hopeless and angry? Would you?" He snaps.

Aaron stares, and Spencer feels the heat rise to his cheeks. Hotch is still his superior.

"I'm sorry, that was out of line."

"No, it's- you're right. I am lying. But-" he swallows, unused to being so vulnerable, especially with someone like Spencer, "I have to. Lie that is. I can't be honest. Not about this. Not with these feelings."

"Why? You've been put through horrific trauma. I think you're entitled to feel like shit. I feel like crap."

Aaron looks at Spencer, in all his hopeful innocence, and understands the subtle invitation to be honest for once in his life. To let someone else save him. To have a normal conversation, with no ulterior motives or secret conditions. To have someone just care for him because they love him, not because they want anything in return. It's that final realisation that makes him take a leap of faith.

"Because if I let myself feel the anger, I will never stop, and then I will never be any better than my father." The words taste like failure, and he hates himself for saying them as soon as they leave his mouth. Who is he, to do this to a subordinate? To make someone else take responsibility for his issues? He wants to take the words back as soon as realisation dawns on Spencer, but he can't.

All he can do is close his eyes, and pretend he is somewhere else where whatever comes next cannot touch him.

"You know those thoughts don't determine who you are," Spencer says, and nothing about his tone has changed. He still cares about Aaron. Aaron, who has to blink back tears because he always forgets how many terrible things this boy has seen.

He tries to tell Spencer to stop, that he doesn't deserve to be called a good person, but the words won't come.

"I can tell you don't believe me. Well let me tell you a story. Once upon a time, there was a FBI agent that panicked so much during their gun qualification that they failed. And the man that had been practicing them, who had every right to lash out, just nodded and asked if it was his fault. If there was anything he could do to help. And then he trusted that agent with his life. Without hesitating," Spencer said. It felt like he was talking to Henry.

Aaron needs him to shut up. He cannot hear this story. It is his life, so he knows how it ends, but he cannot hear that ending right now. Not when the loss of his family is still so raw and painful. Not when it consumes his every waking moment.

"And after the case was over, he raced to the hospital, and he stayed in the waiting room until his son was born because he refused to leave his wife for a second longer than necessary, even though she had given her blessing multiple times for him to go save people. She said that he changed more nappies during his paternity leave than most men do in their lives."

"Spencer-" Aaron manages to say.

"Abused children can break the cycle. They have broken the cycle. They continue to do so. You said that once. Do you remember? You told Vincent Perotta that not every victim goes on to become a killer. Because some grow up to catch them and you are one of them, you just-"

"Shut up! Please. Just shut up." He doesn't mean to shout. He doesn't mean to make Spencer flinch. He doesn't mean to sound angry. He doesn't mean to say the words. He doesn't mean to do any of those things, but he does, and he won't ever forget how terrified Spencer looks.

He did that. He did that, with nothing more than his words, and he cannot believe what he has done, but he has, and it's a terrible thing. And everything Spencer just said has been disproved. Everything.

"I'm sorry," Spencer whispers, turning away.

"No. No, please don't be sorry. You've not done anything wrong. Spencer, look at me. Please. I'm so sorry. I shouldn't have said that. I didn't mean-"

"Yes you did. Don't lie to me."

And Aaron has lied about enough. He won't lie anymore.

"I am sorry," he says, even though it won't ever be enough.

Spencer smiles slightly, but then he goes over to his own bed. He closes his eyes, and pretends to sleep. He carries on pretending when Aaron walks over for the first time in three days, and kisses his forehead, much like he always does for Jack. He carries on pretending as Aaron sighs, and whispers an explanation too honest for repetition.

Aaron truly is sorry. Spencer truly does forgive him. The words are never said again, not to him, but that's the worst part. No matter what either of them do, Spencer will always remember and hesitate, and Aaron will never forget or forgive himself.

[nozomijoestar]

Cannot get this out my head so just remember what I said about these two becoming more like each other and turn that into an entire piece, if you think abt it they're the same character interpreted two ways as is (tws for one sentence of body horror)

The philosophy of the Trikaya came to mind so I tried to embody it in sections and at times blurring together; my paragraph length is deliberately formatted to show the differences in character, have fun trying to decipher what the paragraph lengths mean for each character mindset

I couldn't decide 100% on what Susumu Hirasawa song fits them best so for now (lyric index) I'm considering Moonlight/Shadow of the Moon, The Master's Mountain, A Strange Night of Omnificence, and Venus

Individually Reina's Hirasawa character song is Day Scanner, Kumiko's is Snow Blind

For non Hirasawa music there’s You by Kazami off the Samurai Champloo ost / Eternal by SCANDAL (lyrics)

Also Yūko is listening to Tupac's Life Goes On & Me Against The World

There was something different. Not a bad thing surely, but different all the same. Was it Kumiko standing straighter than usual? No perhaps it was the way her jaw set while weighing decisions. Maybe it had to do with ease of her touch, or the resolve that could flash like lightening through slow motion at random in her gaze. 

Whatever it was and why didn’t change its singularity against all else. It was a difference. The concept sent a chill rippling through her; she imagined a figure being peeled back then rearranged before being resewn. A terrible nausea took her then and her playing faltered. Her fingers may as well have become lead on the trumpet valves. She stopped and lowered her trumpet ever so carefully. Change. Would Kumiko one day forget her sound?

Why had Reina stared at her like that after practice? Was there something in her teeth today? No she couldn't be silly. Reina would never see through her over anything trivial. If you asked Kumiko, that intensity easily took its place as the scariest feeling anyone worth more than five minutes of effort had shown her. But she wasn't saying Reina, or anybody, came off as some pet project! It was just...she couldn't give everybody equal time. There were only so many pieces of herself to split for everyone. There were only so many Kumikos before she burst at the seams. At least, these days there were. She preferred that; she knew what the alternative made her.

If you asked her to rank them though, Reina had a slice so huge it was unfair. Kumiko was sure she knew it too. So why had her eyes grasped her heart? She felt a repeat of the feeling now as it struck her even in memory. She was naked before that stare- like her whole being had unfurled the moment Reina's presence approached. Like she saw herself outside her own body. Like Kumiko could die fulfilled.

Her fingers slid over the cool brass of her euphonium. The way the sensation prickled her skin made the air sharper, let it flow through her touching everything before she exhaled. It didn't come frantic but steady and coaxed.

She brought the mouthpiece to her lips and played. Her eyes closed amid the cicada calls in this familiar nook under the shadow of Kitauji's building. Her feet planted easy on this ground that'd received her sweat and blood without complaint season after season. She played.

She played a note for everything, for every breath gave rise to a memory. High notes lifted joyful moments like bubbles meeting the sky. Low notes spiraled their way up beside them in hesitation, but rising nevertheless. Soon the divide blurred and she no longer knew where the two separated.

Together they soared from her; the music a tapestry woven in on itself over and over. The feeing was older than her, older than anyone she knew living. Notes wandered, whole passages surged endless. The piece that wasn't a piece vibrated her blood. The sound rattled her bones. She played.

Her fingers burned exhaustion asking so much of the euphonium. She didn't dare stop. A little more and it'd take a true shape and-

From everywhere a calm that stood side by side with anticipation washed over her. There came the sound of footsteps. Reina turned the corner eyes widened by a hair and lips barely open. Her cheeks had gone flush coloring her like a human sized red crayon. Seeing her in shock drove Kumiko's mind frantic and buzzing until all she blurted out after scooting backward was-

"Do you have a fever?"

"........I could ask you the same thing. Here."

The water was cold and the bottle sweating condensation. Drinking it melted her adrenaline into lava. Her body aches as if scrubbed raw beneath the heat under her skin. The world spun just for an instant before Reina pressed a second water bottle against her neck.

Kumiko yelped, jumping out her chair and scrambling to keep her euphonium from crashing to the floor. Her shoe trips but in an instant Reina is behind her holding her upright. Water from the bottle Kumiko clutched splashed across their skirts and sleeves. When she registered the cold dripping down her knees the picture of what she'd done snapped into place. Before she could control it her voice stuttered out.

"T-T-thanks. Sorry for the mess."

"It's fine. Come and sit."

She let herself be guided by Reina's hand. When they sat side by side the world became right again. Kumiko still gasped and wheezed as she let Reina's fingers tidy her hair. Over time the motions had graduated from bumbling to meticulous; she couldn't clearly remember a time Reina hadn't been doing this anymore.

"What were you playing? I've never heard it."

The tone to her words made Kumiko's stomach sink a little. It wavered between curiosity and scolding; yet at the same time found itself half smothered by her quiet voice. Had she been at it that long? Her body certainly said more than either could.

"Nothing. Was just free-styling and stuff...practice."

"Practice doesn't almost give you heat stroke."

"Maybe not for you, but if I'm special too now then I have to catch up. If I don't there's no point."

Reina's laugh burst from her clear and free. Kumiko's eyes widened. She knew exactly what was coming. The way Reina's black hair draped down her shoulders, the way this angle teased at her nape, the crinkle of her eyes and wiggling eyebrows as her head was thrown back; everything was Reina, and it emptied her mind. She remained staring with her mouth slack like an idiot when she heard it. Now Reina's voice became love.

"You're awful." 'Don't you know we're already alike?'

Reina had finally deciphered Kumiko's new attitude three days ago. Perhaps. Almost. Maybe. Her hunch was solid. Now she needed proof. She wanted proof so bad her blood boiled. Voices leaked through the band room doors. Picking out Kumiko's laugh was child's play. It had a warm quality she couldn't describe even as it calmed her heart.

She entered and wrestled the surge of emotions she couldn't pick apart coursing through her. Her expression remained flat. Calm. Centered. Reina Kousaka did not roar at the world before an audience.

For whatever reason Kumiko had yet to notice her in their crowd of bandmates. She slowed her steps, kneeled near a wall pretending to search her bag. Kumiko sat with Midori and Hazuki today. Their conversation filled her ears, stoked her irrational fear. That fear which hung over her heavier than a headman's axe. That fear who's tendrils constricted her heart at its leisure.

'You wouldn't abandon me without a word would you?'

Childish, Reina Kousaka!

"That part is so tough. My mom's been putting dinner aside when I come home late."

"You always practice real hard Hazuki. It'll be worth it. That's what Nationals are all about! Don't you think so Kumiko?"

"Lately it sounds like my breath control's gotten stronger. When I play the sound is talking...or something like that. I wanna give it all I've got. So I'm glad we're going for it."

"Who're you now? Reina?"

They giggled even as they complimented her after. It didn't matter, her mind raced. What emotions had coursed now rose to a flood. She felt her heartbeat through her tongue. Pride? Kumiko felt...pride in playing...because of her? At the very least with her as a reason?

"Kousaka what're you doing?"

Yūko loomed over her causing Reina to smack into her pink headphone wire when she turned. She flinched and rubbed her nose. She looked up at her; her mind blanked.

"Checking my things."

"You must have a museum in there to be checking your bag for three minutes straight. You look super weird, what's going on?"

No quips or barbs loaded in response; nor could anything dampen the joy already swirling in her head. Besides, any qualms with Yūko were long outgrown. Why dwell on what was settled? Her body still tingled. Kumiko was proud because of her.

Yūko kept staring in anticipation as the song blaring through her headphones faded into another. Reina noticed that little twist of the mouth she did whenever she got impatient. Reina's lips moved to answer her but Yūko cut her off.

"Fine. You don't have to tell me. It better not divide the band though."

"...It's between me and Kumiko. No one else."

"Oh. In that case uh...if you want to talk to someone..."

Watching Yūko look away and scratch her chin awkwardly made her swallow a laugh. Instead she smiled and nodded. Maybe she should blame her mood but a calmness settled her back into reason. Like a bridge connecting, a hand outstretched, she grasped Yūko's kindness. It was good to be alone, not lonely.

"I will. Thanks."

Nights on Mount Daikichi were more natural for them than breathing. Cloaked in the silver and blue of moonlight they glowed at first glance. Countless lights below lit the city like a map of stars. Like gazing up at the sky on Tanabata to find Orihime and Hikoboshi. The cicadas buzzing filled in their silence that wasn't silence. They held their breath even as they breathed.

"When you think about improving, what does that really mean?"

Reina inched her pinky atop Kumiko's. Kumiko did the same. Her head went back as she watched the sky.

"Hmmm...probably a road. There's a place far away just enough for me to see. I don't know everything it has; I know because of that, chasing it makes me better. I used to think it had to stay straight once I started. Kinda stupid, 'cuz I take turns on it all the time. You?"

Reina paused a moment, face contemplative.

"There are stars. Most despite sitting in the sky are far from the moon. Most burn out. Some fall. Fewer get their chance beside the moon. Their light shines the longest. Their light inspires people."

"Pft hehe, there you go saying stuff like a book character again. That's just like you. Is there any room for the band up there?"

"...Maybe..."

"Is there any room for me?"

Without warning Reina leaned closer; her expression went stern. Her voice faltered though it tried being firm. It was the softest tone Kumiko had heard in her life.

"Don't ask stupid questions."

"Ok. I won't."

Their foreheads touched and the cool breeze turned warm on their skin.

"What do you think of the others then...past and present?"

Kumiko shut her eyes. Aoi. Haruka. Kaori. Natsuki. Shūichi. Nozomi. Mizore. Midori. Hazuki. Yūko...Asuka.

The faces of all who's paths intersected and footsteps left prints as guides, tethers connecting her to the universe, appeared in her mind. Each had drawn on a blank sheet of her soul. They were nowhere near her yet she felt them echo. They were her as she was them.

"Unrivaled under Heaven."

"Now who's talking like a novel character?"

"Cut it out." Kumiko replied through a chuckle.

Their eyes met. Reina smirked but only for a pause. She inched forward, asking a question. Kumiko shut her eyes again.

The kiss was unlike anything before and possibly after. An explosion of sensations though they didn't move a muscle. There was no time to remember it yet each second couldn't be forgotten. Feelings of melting, soaring, absolving, each melded and surpassed bliss. The result transcended any name they could give it. A release.

They pulled away. Both panted for air then examined each other as if for the first time. They no longer looked; they saw. They no longer knew, they understood.

Many questions were on the verge of pouring; instead Kumiko cupped Reina's cheeks and smiled. Her thumbs brushed off the forming tears. She didn't say a word when Reina fell into her arms. She simply rested a hand on her head and held her trembling body.

The moon's brightness peaked. If you asked her, it'd moved a little closer.

[thinkingisadangerouspastime]

grief

Written for Day 6 of @aangweek! Read here on AO3.

~*~

6. grief - and when i can’t be with you dream me near / keep me in your heart and i’ll appear

Aang took a deep breath as he stepped onto the balcony of Iroh’s tea shop in Ba Sing Se. The air was… well, not cool - it was never cool during Earth Kingdom summers, even if it didn’t get quite as hot as in the Fire Nation - but it wasn’t overly warm, either. The humidity wasn’t too extreme in the evening, though if anything Aang appreciated the slight gravity to the air. It was… grounding.

Fitting for the Earth Kingdom, but perhaps an odd sensation for an airbender to seek.

Still. Aang found a certain comfort in the air’s heavier presence. It was there. Surrounding him, clothing him. He was there, existing and living and breathing in the moment. In the present. In the now.

Only… He wasn’t.

No, Aang was in the past, as he was wont to be. Particularly on that day of all days. If he closed his eyes, the Southern Air Temple sat before him, alive and carefree and in its prime as it had been… a hundred and one years ago. If he listened, he could hear the laughter of students learning their first airbending technique from the monks. Echoes of the past. If he took a deep breath, he could smell freshly-made fruit pies, sweet and tangy like those he’d whip up with Gyatso.

Sometimes… Aang could pretend nothing had changed at all.

Of course, the truth was that everything had.

Aang sighed, opening his eyes to stare down at his wooden necklace. Engraved in the center was the symbol of his people and their element. Today was a day of celebration, he knew, but the heart didn’t often lend itself to such clarity.

It was the first anniversary of the end of the Hundred Year War. The first anniversary of the Fire Nation’s defeat. The first anniversary of a new, peaceful era. A cycle of cruelty had ended, and a future of harmony had begun.

Well, perhaps it wasn’t quite so simple.

A ghost of a smile graced Aang’s lips. How the past lingered on.

His friends were inside the Jasmine Dragon, laughing and teasing each other just as they’d done a year ago. They were relaxing after a long day of political tasks and dull meetings and formal celebrations, a decision for which Aang could not blame them.

Soon, they would join him on the balcony. Aang knew this. His friends never let him be alone for long.

But for now, Aang basked in the stillness. And he breathed.

“Greetings, Avatar Aang.”

Aang blinked upon hearing his name. Or rather, hearing his formal title. Of all his friends to join him first, he’d suspected it would be Katara. Maybe Zuko. But not… Well, who was Aang to question the workings of the universe? It was far more powerful than he.

“Grand Lotus Iroh,” he said, bowing to the older man. “Is there something you need?”

Iroh chuckled. “I suppose I don’t ‘need’ anything, but I will remind you that it is not necessary to address me so formally. Just ‘Iroh’ is fine.”

Aang gave him a small smile. “On one condition - you have to drop the formalities for me, too.”

Iroh’s chuckling became full-on laughter, booming from the man’s stomach. “Oh, you sound like my nephew. He can’t stand it when I address him as the Fire Lord.” He smiled at Aang. “I accept your condition, Aang.”

Aang found himself laughing, too. “Thank you, Iroh.” He’d always been fond of Zuko’s uncle. For one, Iroh had given him memorable - powerful - advice on their journey into the crystal catacombs together. And two, it was clear as day just how much Iroh loved Zuko, and how he tried to be the doting father Zuko had never had. In that respect…

Well, he reminded Aang of Gyatso. A little bit. Caring for a person with every bone in his body, guiding a child through responsibilities thrust upon them that they were unprepared to bear, and loving a little boy who wasn’t their own son. Who didn’t need to be.

“Are you alright, Aang?” Iroh asked, pulling him out of his thoughts. “I noticed you withdraw from your friends in my shop with a rather…” He paused. “Pensive expression, I suppose. I simply wanted to check on you.”

Oops. Had he already given himself away?

Aang shrugged, returning his focus to the cityscape of Ba Sing Se before him once more. Lanterns lit the streets as laughter and music filled the air. “I have a couple things on my mind. Nothing too serious.” A smile tugged at the corners of his lips. “I’d say it’s been a long, busy day, but I don’t want to imply you weren’t there for as much of it as I was.”

Iroh chuckled. “Perhaps I was there for most of it. But my responsibilities are certainly not comparable to those of the Avatar.” He, too, turned to look out over the city. “However… This day presents conflicting feelings to you, does it not?”

Aang stiffened as Iroh’s comment sunk in, wondering how on Earth the man could have known what was on his mind. But he soon relaxed, realizing it wasn’t exactly difficult to put two and two together. And moreover, Iroh was simply… well, he was an observant person. Zuko was his nephew, after all. During Zuko’s banishment, Aang had a feeling Iroh had needed two sets of eyes in the back of his head to keep track of him.

“That’s one way to put it,” Aang admitted, a soft smile inching onto his lips. “But I didn’t want my overthinking to ruin the festivities, so I came out here.” Even from the balcony, he could hear Katara and Sokka squabbling about the significance of a particular Pai Sho tile, soon interrupted by Mai dryly informing them that they were both wrong.

“I am sure your friends would not -”

“I know, I know,” Aang interrupted with a laugh. He looked down once more at the wooden beads hanging around his neck. “I think I just needed… a minute of quiet. With myself.” Himself, and the past that ever influenced the present.

Aang glanced at Iroh, hastily adding, “It’s okay that you came out here, though! I don’t - I don’t mind the company.”

Iroh gave him a warm smile. “Since I am here, would you like to share your thoughts with me? About your conflict, that is.” He stroked his beard. “Please don’t feel pressured, of course. But if you speak, know I will listen.”

Aang allowed a pause to pass between them. Gathering his thoughts. A moment of silence, filled only by his friends’ muted voices from indoors and the cityscape chattering around them. Then he sighed.

“It’s not a big deal, really.” Aang gently clasped his wooden pendant, fingers tracing the curves engraved in the center. “A year ago, I defeated Fire Lord Ozai. And I am happy about that. Happy that the war is over. That we won.” He exhaled slowly. “But if I think too much about it…”

His hand tightened on the beads, and Aang found himself looking anywhere but at Iroh. “I chose to spare Ozai’s life. I don’t regret that decision, because affirming and upholding the beliefs of my people is - is -” Aang blinked back tears, and he took a sharp breath before he continued. “One of the reasons it was so important was because I’m the last of my people. I’m the only one left who can uphold our beliefs.”

Aang bit the inside of his cheek to avoid breaking into sobs, but against his will a few tears slid down his cheeks. “When I think about it like that, when I remember how part of my choice was because - was because they’re gone -” Aang couldn’t finish, his teeth sinking into his tongue to stop a choked sob from escaping.

 The absence of his people was a never-ending ache, a pain rooted deep in his bones. And some days were more agonizing than others. Even days that should have been happy ones.

Iroh nodded. “I see,” he said after a pause, once Aang had wiped his eyes and eased his unsteady breathing. “I hope you understand, Aang, that your grief here is not irrational. While grief is seldom controllable, and often leaves us confused…” He shook his head. “It is not irrational. Your feelings here are what you need them to be.”

Iroh gave Aang a sorrowful look. “I regret that I have so little advice for you, Aang. The decisions of my ancestors, my brother, and my own may have caused irreparable damage to the balance of this world. Worse, in doing so, they stole everything from you. And for that…” Iroh shook his head. “No words can express my apologies.”

Aang exhaled slowly. “Not everything,” he finally said, once he was certain his voice wouldn’t waver. “Guru Pathik told me that my people’s love for me has not left this world. That it was reborn in the form of new love.” He gave Iroh a warm, if watery, smile. “You… remind me of Monk Gyatso. The way you take care of Zuko, even though you aren’t his father. Because it doesn’t matter. You -”

Aang’s voice caught in his throat. Iroh didn’t comment, and Aang collected himself before he continued.

“You still love him,” he said, maybe a little wistfully. Spirits, there were times Aang missed Gyatso so much he couldn’t breathe. “You still love him, and you would do anything for him.”

Iroh gave Aang a soft, sincere smile. “That is the highest praise I have ever been awarded. Thank you.”

Aang looked down at his beads once more. This time, he noticed Iroh’s gaze following them, too. “And… the Fire Nation can’t take my grief from me. I will always remember my people, and I will always work to keep their memory alive.” What was the future other than a world built on the past?

Iroh nodded. “Grief is nothing if not love,” he mused. “Grief is all the love we have for someone, for something, that no longer has a place to go.”

Aang nodded, eyes watering for what had to be the umpteenth time since their conversation started. Grief was love. All the love Aang had for his people that he kept in his heart, love so jam-packed it made his chest ache with pressure about to burst.

But love was reborn. Every day. Reborn in his friends.

In his family.

Aang turned, wrapping his arms around Iroh in a tight hug, an embrace the older man gently returned. “Thank you,” Aang whispered. “For taking care of Zuko. For listening to me. For…” He exhaled. “Just for being here.”

Iroh shook his head. “No, Aang. I am the one who must thank you.”

Aang wasn’t sure when he started crying. He wasn’t sure when his friends joined him on the balcony, either. But when they all wrapped their arms around him in a massive, ridiculous, everything-he-could-have-ever-wanted group hug…

They were Aang’s present. His friends grounded him, keeping him in the now. And yet, if he opened his eyes?

Aang suspected he would fly.

~*~

idk how much i like this ficlet either lmaooo. regardless, aang deserves a million hugs and his friends will always be there to provide them!! i hope to see you tomorrow for the final day of aang week 2021 - love. (here's a hint: an overabundance of fluff. also, everyone's a little bit in love with aang! which is practically canon.) thank you for reading!

[96thdayofrage]

Instead of sharing in the outrage of Nia’s brutal murder, they came with fury for being tagged in a post that they felt challenged their own perceived feminist accomplishments. There were grand displays of defensiveness, demands that they be acknowledged for all the things they had done for black people in the past, and a terrifying lashing out that included racial slurs and doxing.

The fragility of these women was not a surprise to me. In a crucial moment of showing up for our marginalized community, there was more concern about their feelings and ego as opposed to the fight forward for women as a whole. What could have been a much-needed and integral display of solidarity and true intersectionality quickly became a live play-by-play of the toxicity that white-centered feminism can bring to the table of activism.

It is the type of behavior that rests under the guise of feminism only as long as it is comfortable, only as long it is personally rewarding, only as long as it keeps "on brand." But if the history of this movement taught us anything, it is that intersectionality in feminism is vital. We cannot forget the ways that suffragettes dismissed the voices of black women, sending them to the backs of their marches, only for black activists like Ida B. Wells and Anna Julia Cooper to make major moves while fighting for the vote in tandem with their fight for rights as black people—ultimately shifting the shape of this country. If there is not the intentional and action-based inclusion of women of color, then feminism is simply white supremacy in heels.

Going up against liberal progressive white feminists who refuse to let down their guard of “ultimate liberation” to actually learn from women of color—who have been fighting this fight with grit and grace for generations—is the most straining part being a black feminist activist. Still, as disheartening as the actions of many of these women who were "called in" became, my highest hope is that this bizarre episode serves as a lesson, a dissection if you will, of what toxic white feminism actually looks like. Let's take a dive into a few of the items in The Toxic White Feminism Playbook:

TONE POLICING

When women of color begin to cry out about their pain, frustration, and utter outrage with the system that is continuing to allow our men to be murdered, our babies to be disregarded, and our livelihood to be dismissed, we are often met with white women who tell us perhaps we should “say things a little nicer” if we want to be respected and heard.

SPIRITUAL BYPASSING

The easiest way for white women to skirt around the realities of racism is to just “love and light it away”. When confronted with ways they have offended a marginalized group with their words or actions, they immediately start to demand unity and peace; painting those they harmed as aggressive, mean, or divisive.

WHITE SAVIOR COMPLEX

Many white women insist that there is no way they could be part of the problem because of their extensive resume of what they’ve “done for you people.” Instead of listening to what the women of color are trying to express, they instead whip out the Nice Things I’ve Done For Black People In The Past, which often includes everything from “says hi to the black man next door every single morning” to “saved a black child through adoption and treats them just as nicely as my white children.”

This is the most common of all. White women get so caught up in how they feel in a moment of black women expressing themselves that they completely vacuum the energy, direction, and point of the conversation to themselves and their feelings. They start to explain why race is hard for them to talk about, what they think would be a better solution to the topic at hand, and perhaps what women of color can do to make it more palatable.

As these things play out over and over again, it is made painfully obvious that many white women believe that the worst thing that can happen to them is to be called a racist. Let me be clear, it is not. Seeing your child gunned down in the street by the police unjustly is much worse, being turned away for medical care due to race and underlying biases by medical staff, resulting in death, is much worse, being harassed by authorities only to be charged yourself instead is much worse.

But even moments of explicit dehumanization to the black community haven’t been able to rally the majority of liberal white women to join us in our fight for racial justice. I've learned through my work that white women seem to only digest race issues when it is reframed in the light of (white) feminism. So I often have to lay it out this way:

When you try to exclude yourself from the conversation of race by saying things like “I don’t see color,” or “I married a black man and have brown kids,” that's just as irrational as a man saying there is no way he could be sexist or misogynistic because he has a daughter.

When you seek to not be lumped into the conversation about oppressive systems against marginalized people, because you view yourself as woke, you are essentially screaming “not all men.”

When you try to rationalize police brutality by saying “but black people also kill black people,” you’re coming in with the same argument that men have when they say “she shouldn’t have worn that skirt, she deserves to be raped”.

When you walk into black or brown spaces and “suggest” how they can more aptly reach white people on the topic of race you are basically mansplaining, only now it's whitesplaining how people of color should approach their own activism.

When you begin to feel defensive about the conversation of race, demanding explanations, it is like a man walking into a women’s space saying: “Make me feel more comfortable in this moment, even though the point of this space is sorting out how I make you feel uncomfortable everyday in multiple ways.”

So what does allyship actually look like? Accepting the reality of this country's dynamics. White skin yields white privilege and an ally is willing to use their privilege to fight with and for those who are marginalized. Allyship means voting for elected officials who have a track record of ensuring the most marginalized among us are heard and advocated for. Allyship means using your sphere of influence whether it be your dining room table or the boardroom of your company to call out racist actions and ideals. Allyship means uplifting the voices and experiences of people of color so that we are not continuously drowned out and ignored.

"Many liberal white woman have an immediate reaction of defense when someone challenges their intentions."

What makes allyship so hard for most? Many liberal white woman have an immediate reaction of defense when someone challenges their intentions. And it is in that precise moment they need to stop and realize they are actually part of the problem. It is never the offender who gets to decide when they've offended someone. If you feel yourself dismissing the words or experiences of people of color—because you think they're "overreacting" or because you "didn't know" or because "it has nothing to do with race"—it's often due to your ego, not rationale. Listen and learn, instead.

Dr. Robin DiAngelo, a white woman sociologist who studies critical discourse, reminds us in her new book White Fragility that “the key to moving forward is what we do with our discomfort. We can use it as a door out—blame the messenger and disregard the message. Or we can use it as a door in by asking, Why does this unsettle me? What would it mean for me if this were true?”

Racism is as American as pie. In order for the feminist movement to truly be progressive and intersectional, white women must face this fact and begin to take on their load of work. We are long overdue to dismantle this system, which, if it is not intentionally and aggressively addressed, will defeat us all in the end.

[atinybitofau]

M I N G I ➟ mafia au

MAFIA HUBBY MINGI 2.0

part one

• “Who’s that?”

• San works for almost anybody.

• that being said, trains Mingi’s men when needed to.

• so when he decides to show up during a car show rehearsal organized by Mingi himself isn’t surprising at all.

• loves to roam around for shits and giggles too.

• but seeing a woman briefing experienced mechanics at their car hoods seemed more than just shits and giggles to even the likes of him.

• Wooyoung wipes at his greasy hands and smiles at the floating hitman. “Mingi’s girl.”

• “Mingi’s girl?” San whips towards him in question.

• “Haven’t you heard about X?”

• “That racer guy that shredded him months ago?” San chuckles at the memory of rumors. “Who hasn’t?”

• “Well THAT racer guy happens to be a girl. And sex on legs over there happens to also be Mingi’s new wife. Her first appearance out of the dark doesn’t just surprise you, you know. Everyone here can’t take her eyes off her.”

• and neither can Mingi apparently,

• now approaching you

• who just like you, stands out from the bustling gang crowd,

• custom leather trench coat and fancy ring on his finger to add to the awe.

• the people in the room gawk as their boss and leader wraps an arm around you,

• shocked more or less that a man of his demeanor could get shieldless like that.

• “Hey, baby.” you keen at the sound of his voice, turning your head to kiss him back on his lips. “Thank you for coming today.”

• you fit under his arm like he promised.

• where you belong at most.

• “You know I don’t mind.” you hand a wrench to one of his men you helped in front of you. “But I can’t say the same about the stares I’ve gotten since I walked in here.”

• Mingi’s peeved when he hears your displeasure.

• only wants the best for you.

• would give you everything you’d dream of.

• just for his queen.

• he turns his head in the space over yours to say something into your ear so only you can hear. “Do you want me to do something about it?”

• “No.” you place your hand against your husband’s chest, the once greed for the limelight gone once his attention was all you craved for. “Mr. Song, you have plenty of things on your to do list to do rather than what I’d like for you. I’ll be fine.”

• he growls, eyes glaring like a dog at the men who stared behind the both of you. “Mrs. Song, you know I’ll do anything to make you the happiest woman alive. If you’d just tell me what that is, perhaps you would be happy.”

• you turn up and lay a kiss against his stubble jaw before reassuring, “I am happy, Mingi. I already am.”

• but he thinks he isn’t enough for you sometimes.

• still hates himself for relying on an ally— Seonghwa to watch over you while you finish your studies.

• to his discontent always.

• trying to convince you that you could stop studying all together.

• but you aren’t greedy anymore.

• you have what you need.

• him.

• what fame, fortune, and class could never buy.

• “Mingi-ya.”

• you two are interrupted by some familiar faces. “Now I think you’ve forgotten to enlighten me with your current affairs. Who’s this little gem you’ve managed to snag for yourself here?”

• Mingi protectively towers you,

• body close to consuming yours as the men smile in your direction.

• “Choi San.” your husband forces an airy chuckle. “What a pleasant surprise.”

• “Not as pleasant as yours I see. And what’s your name, gorgeous?”

• you look up at Mingi.

• knowing better than to play with his temper.

• especially in the eyes of other men.

• “Go on, baby.” he whispers lightly by your ear. “Introduce yourself.”

• “Y/n.”

• the cunning man keens. “Ah. The scientist from south side. Seonghwa has spoken of you as well I think. Though Mingi’s affairs were never boastful enough to strike an interest, those rings tell another story.”

• “Ha ha. Enough patronizing, San.” Mingi rolls his eyes at his playful friend. “This is my wife you’re speaking about me to.”

• “It’s nice to know Mingi’s settled down.” San admits genuinely. “If you ever need anything, don’t hesitate to ask us.”

• the one beside him, as you came to as know Wooyoung—

• Mingi’s best driver that you’ve met countless times,

• keens at you too.

• “A race here and there won’t hurt anyone either. We’ll leave you two to it. See you lovebirds later!”

• you feel glad.

• knowing Mingi was surrounded by good people despite his.. situation.

• and how yours had turned for the better upon falling in love with him yourself.

• you can’t imagine what your life would be without this man.

• and his eyes tell you the same.

• “I’m sorry for them..” Mingi walks you away and towards nothing in particular. “They’ve known me for so long and like to embarrass me here and there.”

• you giggle at the flustered state you only manage to get him in, shocked others were able to as well.

• “Your friends are kind.” you kiss him again, never being able to reach his lips if he weren’t offering them to you. “And I’m grateful for you and them. Even if they like to tease you.”

• he brings your face in his large hands and kisses you tenderly.

• “I promised you the throne and you always show less of a role than me. You used to want it.” he mumbles with a sigh. “Am I not worth as much anymore?”

• Mingi was everything he needed to be.

• ruthless, sinful, and fatal.

• but in the times he’s reminded that you were his everything?

• he’s everything he wants to be.

• “I’ll stand beside you as your woman, my love.” you revel in his attention, only liking the lime light when it reminds everyone of who he belongs to. “But your role can never be shared. Not a competition to me.”

• he sighs in relief against you.

• peppering you in endless kisses.

• reminding you too of who you belong to.

• “You won my heart, y/n. What more of a race than that?”

• he leaves again.

• because he has to do his own bidding as the mafia king.

• but you’re just a college student that won his competitions as a masked street racer.

• now you’re back to reality— college. waiting till the clock strikes so you’d be back in his arms again.

• you miss the attention you get from your husband dearly.

• hoping for too much after a not-so exciting fight from the both of you a couple days prior.

• his extravagant entails to keep you safe sometimes getting the better of him.

• but you’re surprised when you see San and Seonghwa standing by the rails of the stairs,

• looking disheveled than ever.

• “As much as I love you guys picking me up from school in place of Mingi, I’d much more love to see my husband trying to make up for his own fights.” you glare into their worry. “.. Is he alright?”

• “Try not to make a scene..”

• “As long as he’s not dead, sure.”

• Seonghwa glances to his satan clone, “I wouldn’t say dead..”

• you take the wheel after Seonghwa informs you,

• that your husband recklessly put himself in a line of fire,

• distracted at most by his roaming thoughts.

• how his head hadn’t been screwed on straight for the past nights after your fight.

• you’re racing against everything,

• a long time since you’ve been behind the wheel like this.

• the two in the back in awe by your abilities.

• but you’re more stern on seeing your god forsaken husband.

• not willing to spare him even if things aren’t good between the both of you.

• “Baby?”

• you sigh in relief when you see Mingi staring out the bedroom windows eyebrows furrowed,

• face tethered and bandaged and wounds fresh still.

• he doesn’t answer you when you walk over to meet his glare, sitting beside him on the edge of your shared bed.

• “Baby, look at me.”

• “I don’t see why you’re here.” he coldly snaps his hand away from you, showing his true colors in light of his situation. “Only pitying me when I’m sick.”

• you roll your eyes. “Don’t act like a child, Mingi.”

• his jaw clenches as you scold him for his attitude. “I don’t know what Seonghwa told you but this has nothing to do with you.”

• “Sure.” you lean your hand on his bed, eyebrow cocked up. “Because you always put yourself in a fire fight after I tell you never to.”

• he growls at you. “You do things I tell you not to too! Don’t spin this on me.”

• “Mingi, you sound ridiculous.” you sigh sitting yourself in between his legs, hands upon his jaw. “Stop being so temperamental. I only asked you to lay off the eyes while I attend Hyemi’s bachelorette party next weekend and you’re going out on a whim trying to make a point.”

• yes.

• that’s how trivial the issue was.

• “And I told you already that you going to that bachelorette party is my eyes or nothing at all. What more now that every single enemy I have knows what you look like? Not to mention the disgusting men that’d be present trying to yearn at the likes of you.”

• “You’re worrying for nothing, Mingi. I can take care of myself.”

• “Out of the question.” he snarls at you. “With me as your husband, you don’t need to take care of yourself. That’s my job.”

• you roll your eyes and chuckle. “Fine. If it means keeping you from doing stupid irrational things, you may do as you please.”

• of course it bothers you.

• how possessive your husband gets.

• but he is your husband.

• you also can’t blame him.

• “And in return, don’t ever go into dumb firefights with your men if you aren’t needed. You know better.”

• you ground him as his hands longingly reaches for you, forehead against yours. “I’m sorry..”

• Seonghwa and San watches from the doorway,

• how the younger melts in your hands.

• how well you’d actually be taking the throne beside Mingi—

• maybe doing his job better than he could.

• but Mingi’s boss for a reason.

• and your his for one too.

• “I love you.” you mumble against him. “Just to remind you, you won my heart ages ago. And not a single thing would make me lose to you. Not one.”

@atinybitofau

[ladywynneoutlander]

Letters of Outlander

Jenny Murray to Jamie Fraser, TFC Ch. 99, September 16, 1771

Brother,

  Well. Having taken up my pen and written the single word above, I have now sat here staring at it ‘til the candle has burned almost an inch, and me having not one thought what I shall say.  It would be a wicked waste of good beeswax to continue so, and yet if I were to put the candle out and go to bed, I should have spoilt a sheet of paper to no purpose -- so I see I must go on, in the name of thrift.

  I could berate you. That would occupy some space upon the page, and preserve what my husband is pleased to compliment as the most foul and hideous curses he has been privileged to hear in a long life.  That seems thrifty, as I was at great pains in the composition of them at the time, and should not like to see the effort wasted. Still, I think I have not so much paper as would contain them all.

  I think also that perhaps, after all, I do not wish to rail or condemn you, for you might take this as a just punishment, and so ease your conscience in perceived expiation, so that you leave off your chastising of yourself. That is too simple a penance; I would that if you have wove a hairshirt for yourself, you wear it still, and may it chafe your soul as the loss of my son chafes mine.

  In spite of this, I suppose that I am writing to forgive you -- I had some purpose in taking up my pen, I know, and while forgiveness seems a doubtful enterprise to me at present, I expect the notion will grow more comfortable with practice.

  You will be curious to know what has led me to this action, I suppose, so I will tell you. 

  I rode to visit Maggie early Monday last; she has a new babe, so you are once more an uncle; a bonnie wee lassie called Angelica, which is a foolish name, I think, but she is very fair and born with a strawberry mark on her chest, which is a charm for good.  I left them in the evening, and had made some way towards home when my mule chanced to step into a mole’s hole and fell. Both mule and I rose up somewhat lamed from this accident, and it was clear that I could not ride the creature nor yet make shift to travel far by foot myself.

  I found myself on the road to Auldearn just over the hill from Balriggan. I should not normally seek the society of Laoghaire MacKenzie -- for she has resumed that name, I having made plain in the district my dislike of her use of “Fraser,” she having no proper claim to that style -- but it was the only place where I might obtain food and shelter, for night was coming on, with the threat of rain.

  So I unsaddled the mule and left him to find his supper by the road, while I limped off in search of mine.

  I came down behind the house, past the kailyard, and so came upon the arbor that you built. The vines are well grown on it now, so I could see nothing, but I could hear that there were folk inside, for I heard voices.

  The rain had begun by then. It was not but a smizzle, yet the patter on the leaves must have drowned my voice, for no one answered when I called. I came closer -- creeping like a spavined snail, to be sure, for I was gromished from the fall and my right ankle gruppit -- and was just about to call once more, when I heard sounds of a rare hochmagandy from inside the arbor.

  I stood still, of course, thinking what was best to do. I could hear that it was Laoghaire shedding her shanks, but I had no hint who her partner might be. My ankle was blown up like a bladder, so I could not walk much farther, and so I was obliged to stand about in the wet, listening to all this inhonesté.

  I should have known, had she been courted by a man of the district, and I had heard nothing of her paying heed to any -- though several have tried; she has Balriggan, after all, and lives like a laird on the money you pay her.

  I was filled with outrage at the hearing, but somewhat more filled with amazement to discover the cause.  That being a sense of fury on your behalf -- irrational as such fury might be, in the circumstances. Still, having discovered such an emotion springing full-blown in my breast, I was reluctantly compelled to the realization that my feelings for you must not in fact have perished altogether.

                                                                              September 18, 1771

  I dream of Ian now and then. These dreams most often take the shape of daily life, and I see him here at Lallybroch, but now and again I dream of him in his life among the savages -- if indeed he still lives (and I persuade myself that my heart would be some means now if he did not.}

  So I see that what it comes to in the end is only the same thing with which I began -- that one word, “Brother.” You are my brother, as young Ian is my son --  the both of you my flesh and my spirit and always shall be. If the loss of Ian haunts my dreams, the loss of you haunts my days, Jamie.

  I have been writing letters all the morning, debating with myself whether to finish this one, or to put it into the fire instead. But now the accounts are done, I have written to everyone I can think of, and the clouds have gone away, so the sun shines through the window by my desk, and the shadows of Mother’s roses are falling over me.

  I have thought to myself often and often that I heard my mother speak to me, through all these years. I do not need to hear her now, though, to ken well enough what she would say. And so I shall not put this in the fire.

  You remember, do you, the day I broke the good cream-pitcher, flinging it at your head because you deviled me? I know you recall the occasion, for you once spoke to Claire of it. I hesitated to admit the crime, and you took the blame upon yourself, but Father kent the truth of it, and punished us both.

  So now I am a grandmother ten times over, with my hair gone grey, and still I feel my cheeks go hot with shame and my wame shrink like a fist, thinking of Father bidding us kneel down side by side and bend over the bench to be whipped.

  You yelped and grunted like a puppy when he tawsed you, and I could scarce breathe and did not dare to look at you. Then it was my turn, but I was so wrought with emotion that I think I barely felt the strokes. No doubt you are reading this and saying indignantly that it was only Father was softer with me because I was a lass. Well, maybe so, and maybe no; I will say Ian is gentle with his daughters.

  But then Father said you would have another whipping, this one for lying -- for the truth was the truth, after all. I would have got up and fled away then, but he bade me stay as I was, and he said to me, quiet, that while you would pay the price for my cowardice, he did not think it right for me to escape it altogether. 

  Do you know that you did not make a sound, the second time? I hope you did not feel the strokes of the tawse on your backside, because I felt each one.

  I swore that day that I should not ever be a coward again.

  And I see that it is cowardice indeed, that I should go on blaming you for Young Ian. I have always kent what it is to love a man -- be he husband or brother, lover or son. A dangerous business; that’s what it is.

  Men go where they will, they do as they must; it is not a woman’s part to bid them stay, nor yet to reproach them for being what they are -- or for not coming back.

  I knew it when I sent Ian to France with a cross of beechwood and a lock of my hair made into a love knot, praying that he might come home to me, body and soul. I knew it when I gave you a rosary and saw you off to Leoch, hoping you would not forget Lallybroch or me. I knew it when Young Jamie swam to the seal’s island, when Michael took ship for Paris, and I should have known it, too, when wee Ian went with you.

  But I have been blessed in my life; my men have always come back to me. Maimed, perhaps; a bit singed round the edges now and then; crippled, crumpled, tattered, and torn -- but I have always got them back. I grew to expect that as my right, and I was wrong to do so.

  I have seen so many widows since the Rising. I cannot say why I thought I should be exempt from their suffering, why I alone should lose none of my men, and only one of my babes, my wee girl-child. And since I had lost Caitlin, I treasured Ian, for I knew he was the last babe I should bear.

  I thought him my babe still; I should have kent him for the man he was. And that being so, I know well enough that whether you might have stopped him or no, you would not -- for you are one of the damnable creatures, too.

  Now I have nearly reached the end of this sheet, and I think it profligate to begin another.

  Mother loved you always, Jamie, and when she kent she was dying, she called for me, and bade me care for you. As though I could ever stop.

                                 Your most Affectionate and Loving Sister,

                                  Janet Flora Arabella Fraser Murray