#Maybe even threats of sending me to the distortion world :(

[gamerbeta]

Happy Valentine’s Day Eve! POV: These two try to confess to you! It’s your lucky day! HOOOOWEVER. . . You must only pick ONE! So you’ll have to break the other’s heart :(

[the-white-soul]

*Flowey looks away, as if refusing to face the facts of the past. But....he still doesn't feel bad thinking about all the horrible thing he's done. And that's what pains him. Maybe before the reset, when he still had that soul, he would have actually felt guilty. Once Kara is met by a threat yet again, Flowey is pulled out of his head. Now he understands. He smiles hollowly at Layer, circling them with a simple ring of rotating bullets. They don't close in, just surrounding them and preventing them from getting close to Kara without getting hurt.*

You're trying to distract us so you can get to Kara, aren't you? Well it won't work. I don't care! Can't feel anything. And I feel even less for you if you decide to hurt Kara. So by all means, go on. *A twisted smile spreads across his face, the flower's features contort into a horrifying expression. His eyes completely white out and sink into their sockets with the cheeks following the same pattern. His entire head seems to decay and eat into itself, distorting like that of a dead human. He has the face of a creature that could send shivers down the spine of even the bravest warrior.* That just gives me a valid reason to turn these simple bullets into something a lot more ⱧØⱤⱤł₣Ɏł₦₲.

*He now is back to one of his more cartoony faces, but it's still not pleasant. He glares at you through glowing, squinted eyes with the rest of his face cast in shadow. A few of the barrier bullets are sent forward to hit Layer just to make a point and are quickly replaced.* "For the underground?" What's your reason for trying to kill them? And what make you think you can? Not only are you weak, but you don't have the heart. Those shaking hand and tears weren't for nothing. Keep trying to convince yourself you can do it.

*He looks more sincere now, not trying to scare Layer anymore.* Look. You can go on and fight us or you can tell us what's happening and be real with yourself. I'm only going to do this if you go on, and I'm warning you... W e w o n t h o l d b a c k.

*knowing that they are actually in trouble they imminently stop to tell everyone else why they do what they do.*

(Layer) "You idiots all know that no world is perfect. They all have one problem with them. Players might suck but remember what if Frisk is powerless, what if they're a jerk? I can't let that happen. So many lives just gone. So I've decided to permanently make monsters have a good ending. It won't be fake, it will be real enough. I will control all Frisk's for all time, always."

*Kara looks totally floored, they look up and cry*

(Layer) "I'm sorry you have to die, it's just the bet..."

(Kara) "No."

(Layer) "What did you just say?"

(Kara calmly) "No, no that would not be better. You know why? YOU'RE CONTROLLING FRISKS!"

(Layer) "So what? They'll have there happy ending. Isn't that what you wanted."

*Noelle also looks up with anger and disgust*

(Noelle) "A bird in a shiny cage is still trapped. Look at yourself you're killing god who know how many Frisks and so what to get a 'happy ending.' What do you want to achieve. Humans and monster are much more complex than you think. One little kid won't change there minds. Unless, they can inspire. Frisk is a glimmer of hope. I know."

(Layer) "How, what reasoning do you have that this little kid does anything."

*Noelle looks into Kara's eyes*

(Noelle) "Because they were based on Kara. That's enough."

(Layer) "Not for me, come on look at the suffering and hate."

(Noelle and Kara) "Love is the only thing that can destroy hate."

Layer looks at the two holding hands and goes up too them. And while Kara's back is turned.

SLASH

*Noelle covered Kara and just like that, gone.*

(Kara)"N... Noelle? Noelle speak to me, please don't just *cries as hard as they can.* I CAN'T LOSE YOU AGAIN. *They see nothing but dust.* You want to fight *there eyes angrier than ever before* I'll kill you."

[lightcreators]

It  wasn't  someday  he  was  going  to  list  all  times  he  could  have  die  without  him  …  Maybe  he  should  start  tonight.  Otherwise,  his  empty  words  would  simply  resonating  with  some  kind  of  associated  voidness  over  threatening  annoyance  he  expressed  ---  and  he  wasn't  that  kind  of  boy.  He  appreciated  when,  once  an  threat  had  been  told,  himself  can't  forget  about  it,  himself  needed  to  make  it  reality  ---  Tiredness  exasperation  was  all  around  his  features.  Though,  nicely,  he  didn't  try  willingly  emotionally  hurt  him  for  appease  him.  One  day,  he  would  probably  get  accoustumed  to  it.  One  day,  he  will  just  embracing  these  waves  of  frustration  as  something  totally  natural,  an  second  nature,  and  didn't  feel  the  need  to  physically  responding  to  it.   Ah,  he  thought  foolishly  he  might  murder  someone  because  of  Potter  incompetence,  so  much  he  was  annoyed  by his  slow  brain  …  Apparently,  it  was  someone  of  his  own  House  who  was  going  to  doing  the  job  to  make  him  insane.  How  cruel  he  sounded  about  that  mothery  behavior  did  reached  his  mind  as  he  decided,  as  a  fair  game,  to  remaining  cruel  on  that  part  for  hoping  making  him  understood  …  Yelling  will  serve  no  purpose.  Lecturing  one  more  time,  for  what  use  ?  There  was  no  guarantee  he  wasn't  going  to  get  himself  killed  by  one  of  these  brilliant  ideas  …  Besides,  as  much  he  somewhere  refused  to  embracing  the  fact,  he  noticing  some  pattern  over  his  ---  protegees.  With  Potter,  he  was  sending  him  a  manual  of  psychic  ascension  in  the  midst  of  a  game  of  appearances  ;  with  Sebastian  …  he  offered  him  a  survival  manual  in  irony  reflection  of  a  past  life  while  distorting  even  more  the  appearances  around  him.  With  Potter,  as  far  he  could  notice,  sometimes,  he  was  sorry  to  be  such  a  asshole  ready  to  commit  a  murder  ---  With  Sebastian,  he  hadn't  that  much  consideration.  Oh,  he  buried  a  body,  nothing  strange,  he  sold  himself  his  soul  to  the  underground  and  entering  inside  another  world,  since  he  avoid  themselves  trouble  so  had  to  bring  outside  influence  for  silencing  that  detail.  Oh,  that  boy  was  again  inside  trouble  who  almost  killed  him  ?  Nothing  strange  at  the  horizon.  Gaze  offered  to  him  about  stopping  being  his  mother  wasn't  a  kind  one.  Coming  from  his  lips,  these  words  would  be  very  cruel  but  well  ---  he  appeased  his  hatred  with  human  tranquilizers  …  he  could  turn  out  to  be  happy  that  he  really  appreciated  him  !    ❝  Unfortunately,  I  still  have  to  change  your  nappies  a  bit  more,  and  give  you  the  nursing  bottle  when  you  need  it,  to  make  sure  you're  old  enough  to  be  independent  on  your  own.  ❞  None  of  his  words  requested  a  reply.  He  hoped  inside  exasperation  of  his  eyes  he  understood  how  much  it  was  best  he  was  taking  his  provocative  words  for  what  they  were.  Indifference  resonated  inside  potential  anger  he  might  receive  back.  He  didn't  care.  If  he  had  to  experiencing  the  entire  scale  of  exasperation  with  Potter  for  make  his  brain  work,  he  would  becoming  an  horrible  asshole  for  making  sure  Sebastian  will  not  kill  himself.    ❝  What  I  see  is  that  you  want  to  die  young  and  in  excruciating  pain.  You're  try  everything  and  anything  to  kill  yourself.  Luckily  I'm  here.  Without  me,  I  don't  know  how  many  times  you  could  have  ended  up  dead.  I'm  going  to  start  counting.  That  way,  next  time,  you'll  see  how  reckless  you  are.  I'm  sure  within  a  month  I'll  have  a  good  record.  ❞

@lightcreators sent: Someday, I shall write a list about all the time you've almost die if I wasn't here and read it aloud to you every time you do something to get yourself killed. Funny night time I'm suppose. You will hate me to so such a mother to you !

               ˜”*°•.     ❝ Funny . ❞  Word  so  unlike  his  bitter  tone .  He  appreciated   it  -  he  appreciated  how  Draco  had  never  abandoned  him ,  how  he’d  never  thought  to  turn  his  back  on  him .  How  even  when  he’d  witnessed  murder ,  countless  upon  countless  of  reckless  decisions ,  he’d  chosen  to  protect  him  every  time .  He  was  not  to  be  babysat ,  though .   He  was  tired  of  listening  to  lectures  upon  lectures .  To  be  accused  of  making  horrible  choices,  of  not  thinking .  Draco  might  be  trying  to  save  his  life,  Anne’s  was  far  more  important,  though .  And  if  he  was  to  lose  everyone  in  his  attempt  to  save  her ,  it’d  be  still  worth  it .  As  long  as  she  was  finally  well ,  it’d  be  all  worth  it .

❝ And  yet,  you  are  right. You  are  not  my  mother .  You  can  stop  acting  like  you  are . ❞  Words  regretted  just  as  soon  as  they  were  spoken ;  mistake,  it  was  a  mistake  to  lash  out  at  Draco  .  One  of  the  so  few  that  still  cared  -  yet  what  was  he  supposed  to  do  ?  Every  time  he  thought  he  was  making  even  the  tiniest  step  of  progress ,  an  ordeal  forcing  him  miles  back .  It’d  been  a  close  call .  Spiders  perhaps  a  foolish  threat  - to  kill  them  more  like  a  past  time  activity  rather  than  a  serious  battle .  Yet ,  he  hadn’t  been  careful .  Their  venom  soon  making  its  way  into  his  leg .  And  if  Draco  hadn’t  been  there  ?  Well ,  he  wouldn’t  be  breathing  at  the  moment .

❝ I  can  take  care  of  myself . ❞  Foolish .  So,  foolish .  And  yet,  all  he  could  feel  was  a  blinding  anger .

[whump-me-all-night-long]

Whumptober Day 3

No. 3 Hair’s Breadth from Death

Gun to Temple | “Say goodbye” | Impaled

CW: civilian whumpee, multiple whumpers, guns, minor character death, threats, kidnapping, let's be real, the civilian definitely has a concussion, and anything else I'm missing

In retrospect, the civilian mused, maybe it hadn’t been the best idea to go for a walk at 2am in the middle of November, when the biting cold and creeping darkness kept all but the most fearless–or idiotic–from moving about.

Yes, they hadn’t been able to sleep, but why couldn’t they have just dried warm milk or a meditation podcast like a normal person?

The van jostled, as if going over a speedbump, sending the civilian flying, their head banging hard against the metal wall. Seeing stars, they slouched down, the movement of the van making them feel sick to their stomach. The hard plastic of the zipties dug into the skin around their wrists and ankles, and the cloth gag had long since turned damp from drool.

When out for a calming nighttime stroll, the last thing the civilian had expected to see was a man, bloody and kneeling, begging to some thugs standing over him. 

Eyes widening, the civilian had made to walk the other direction–after all, they knew that there was crime in this city, and they did not plan on becoming another statistic–but the pleading man caught a glimpse of them and shouted out.

The two thugs had turned around surprised, immediately suspicious of the civilian, who had frozen with wide eyes and a pounding heart. 

The man, still struggling to get up from the ground, one leg bent at an unnatural angle behind him, still kept trying to call out to the civilian for help.

With their throat closing up, all the civilian could do was stumble back a step and shake their head as one of the thugs pulled a gun and trained it on them and the other pulled out a matching one, putting a bullet through the still-begging man’s skull.

The civilian wasn’t able to contain the yelp that escaped them as they watched the blood turn the dirty frost on the ground crimson. Hands shaking violently, they raised them slightly in the universal sign of surrender, keeping their eyes lowered so as to not have to make eye contact.

They could hear the crunch of snow under the thugs’ boots as they circled the civilian.

Finally, they seemed to find their voice. “Please,” they said softly. “I didn’t see anything, I swear. I haven’t even seen your faces. I- I’m sorry, I was just taking a walk and, and I must’ve strayed a little too far, I’m sorry, just let me go, I won’t tell anyone anything.”

Their shoulders heaved as they began to hyperventilate, their rambling immediately cut off by a gloved hand catching their chin and tilting their head up.

One of the thugs–the one that shot the man, the civilian thought–peered down at them, and they could feel the other one at their back, ready at a moment’s notice. 

The civilian was unable to stop themself from trembling violently as they wordlessly stared up at the person above them.

The thug gently traced the jawline of the civilian with their other hand, the one still holding a gun that had killed a man only a moment ago. The civilian let their eyes flutter closed, a soft whimper slipping out as they prepared to feel a bullet ripping through their skull and into their brain.

Instead, the thug removed their gun and dropped their chin, taking a step back. The civilian stared at them wide-eyed, terrified.

“But it appears you did see something, little bird,” the thug said with a small, cruel smile. “And we can’t just let you fly home with that.”

At a small nod, the thug at their back smashed the butt of their gun against the civilian’s temple, causing them to let out a hoarse cry and crumple to the ground. The world seemed to be spinning around them, distorted, as they concentrated all their energy into breathing steadily.

Vaguely, as if in another world, the civilian felt cold hands pulling their arms and legs, restraining them, tossing them against a hard metal surface that knocked the air from their lungs.

A now-ungloved hand caressed the side of their face, pushing their hair back and wiping away the couple of tears that had leaked out. 

“Say goodbye, little bird,” the thug cooed again, cruelty lacing their words. “It’s time to clip your wings.”

The civilian had finally relinquished their grasp on reality, sinking into unconsciousness until now, when they had woken up however long later, head still pulsing painfully, to find themself thrown in the back of a van with nothing else inside it.

They could distantly hear the muffled voices of the thugs from the front seat, but it appeared as if some reinforcement had been added to create an even stronger barrier between the front and back.

Trying to keep their breathing steady, the civilian had pushed themself into a corner, as far away from the doors as possible, waiting, waiting, waiting.

Eventually, they felt the van glide to a stop and slamming doors shook the whole vehicle. 

The civilian could do nothing but watch as the doors slowly opened, pouring light over the civilian, who squeezed their eyes shut and tilted their head away.

---

Taglist: @badluck990 @thelazywitchphotographer @the-vagabond-nun @shywhumpauthor

[just-a-really-tall-girl-tbh]

Grounded

Summary: Y/n is kidnapped and forced to reveal secrets of the pack

Pairing: Derek X Reader

Warnings: Blood, torture, swearing

Word count: 2605

Original piece please don’t copy

The school bell rang for the final time that day, a collective sigh of gratitude echoed in the room, the teenagers grateful to be released from the maths teacher’s class. Gathering your books, you stacked them in a neat pile before exiting the room, offering a small smile to your defeated teacher. It wasn’t her fault maths sucked and no one enjoyed it, you did feel bad for her on some level but also who the hell would willingly dedicate their life to teaching numbers?

Entering the hallway, you made your way through the sea of teenagers, everyone desperate to go home for the weekend. Reaching your locker, you grabbed the couple books you needed, shoving them into your backpack, thinking about the homework you had due on Monday you sighed. The door to your locker slammed shut before you could close it.

“Hey, you ready?” Stiles smiled.

“I told you I can walk home.” You rolled your eyes, walking away from the boy. Surprised by your quick movement, Stiles jogged to catch up to you, throwing an arm lazily around your shoulders.

“I know you can walk home but why would you when you have me?”

Exiting the main doors of the high school, you welcomed the fresh warm air, the smell of angsty teens left behind you. Reaching the end of the pavement, you saw the jeep parked a few cars away.

“Stiles I want to walk.” You turned to face the boy.

“Y/n, you heard what Derek said okay? All these recent attacks? The break ins and thefts? He doesn’t want you alone.” Stiles tried to reason with you. Knowing the recent spike in criminal activity was less than likely to involve the supernatural, you felt safe walking the 20-minute trip home. In fact, you enjoyed the peace it brought you. Half of the walk was through the woods, a quiet haven from the busy high school, and being autumn, you relished in the yellow and orange leaves that swept through the small woodlands.

“Stiles. It’s 20 minutes. I’ll text you when I get home okay?” Stiles sighed.

“You know Derek is going to kill me if I let you, you know, that right? You like the idea of alive Stiles because I do! And I am not letting you be the reason I don’t make it to my 20’s okay?”

“Derek doesn’t have the balls to kill you.” You turned on the heel of your foot, headed towards the woods, leaving a defeated Stiles in your wake.

“I’m telling Derek you said he has no balls!” He called after you. You let out a small laugh, grabbing your headphones from your backpack, and your phone from your pocket, you scrolled through your playlist, deciding today was the perfect day for (Your current favourite song).

Entering the woods, you felt a rush of calm wash over you, the stressful week was pushed to the back of your mind, your thoughts centred on the surrounding woods. You stepped over exposed roots and around large bushes, glancing up at the sky you watched as the wind swept through the foliage, the ageing leaves dancing in the light breeze. The sun peaked through the cracks, determined to reach the forest floor, providing the perfect amount of light for your stroll. The floor of the woods had been coated in fallen leaves, leaving a blanket of red and orange below your feet. Taking a moment to stop and appreciate the tranquillity the forest provided you, you felt your phone buzz in you pocket.

Home yet? I’m this close to sending out a search party!

Rolling your eyes and shaking your head you began typing a response.

You need to…

Before you could finish you felt a knock to your head, your vision distorted, the soft sound of music playing through your headphones which were now next to you on the forest floor, was the only thing you could hear before everything went black.

***

Another blow straight to your stomach knocked the wind out of you. Coughing and spluttering you attempted to regain your breath, each inspiration hurting more than the last.

“Oh, you are so going to regret that.” You mumbled.

Leaning to the side of the chair you spat a mixture of saliva and blood to the ground, you couldn’t tell where the source of the blood was coming from, maybe your lip, or maybe the inside of your mouth. Too many lacerations to your face meant it all blended into one.

You raised your eyes to meet your rival, struggling to see through the blood you saw one man wiping his fists on an old rag, your blood coating his knuckles. He faced a woman to your left, who sat with one bent knee up on a bench. Her back leaning against the wall adjacent to you, a smug grin on her face.

You rotated your wrists which were bound behind you, the thick rope digging into your skin. Your ankles were bound too, tied to the legs of the wooden chair you sat on.

“You’re going to tell us what we want sweetie, its just a matter of how beat up that pretty face is going to be before you tell us.” The woman commented, as she played with her fingernails, pushing the cuticles back. If she was trying to look disinterested, she was doing a great job. But you were ready for this. You trained for this. You knew what was coming, and if it meant keeping your friends, the pack, safe, then you would gladly take whatever they threw at you.

The mans fist connected with your jaw once more, snapping you out of your daze. The room began to spin around you, and your vision blurred. Trying to recenter yourself you pulled at your wrists, the pain of the rope grinding into your skin giving you something to focus on.

“Alright careful there, big guy, we need her conscious if we’re going to get that information.” The woman stood from her seat, striding slowly over to you, before bending at the waist in front of you. She reached out to grab your face, but as soon as her fingers made contact with your skin you pulled away. A stern look, on your face made the woman let out a small laugh.

“You’re a tough one aren’t you.” She turned her head, almost admiring your battered body before her. “Too bad that doesn’t mean shit around here.” Grabbing your hair, she yanked your head back, exposing your neck to the room. Moving to stand behind you she held out her other hand, gesturing towards the man in front of you. Without a word exchanged, the man grabbed a knife from a nearby table, its blade glinting in the moonlight the small window above you allowed.

“Sweetheart, you have no idea who you are dealing with do you?” The woman whispered in your ear, her grip on your hair only tightening as she neared the knife to your throat. You felt the cold edge, lightly cross your neck, not enough to pierce the skin, but enough for you to avoid swallowing.

Taking a deep breath in you closed your eyes. Grounding yourself was apart of your training, something that was drilled into you from the beginning. Breathing in again, you picked up on the different smells the room produced, sweat from the man in front of you, poorly masked by his cheap cologne. The sweet smell of the woman’s hair from behind, her locks dangling beside your face. The overwhelming metallic smell of blood being the most potent. You changed your focus to your heartbeat. Feeling it pounding against your chest begging to be released you pictured your heart slowing, its contractions reducing with every breath you took. Steadying your breathing was next. Cautious of the blade still connected to your neck you breathed in through your nose, holding in for a few seconds before releasing softly through your mouth. Repeating those steps, you were able to regain some stability. You were still in the same crappy scenario but at least now you were calmer. A panicking person is an interrogators wet dream. A calm person, their nightmare.

Sensing your self-control increase, the woman let go of your hair, moving the knife from your neck to the table beside the man. Standing before you once more, she knelt in front of you, keeping one knee up for balance, she waited for your eyes to open once more. Regaining the control, you almost lost, you felt strong enough to open your eyes once more. Staring at you the woman barely moved, she was searching your eyes for something, her expression a mixture of shock and impressed.

“You’re not afraid.” Her words barely above a whisper. Your only response was a return glare. A small smile creeping on to the face of your kidnapper. “They trained you well.”

Standing, she turned to the man behind her, whispering something in his ear before turning back to face you, her arms crossed against her chest. The man dropped the rag he was still holding and left the room, the sound of the door locking behind him.

“Let’s cut the bullshit honey. You have information I need. And I know I’m not going to break you, not by torturing you anyways. So, let’s try something else, shall we?” The woman began to pace back and forth in front of you, the small room only allowing her a few steps before being forced to turn around again. Your eyes followed her, left and right, before she stopped in front of you once more, still facing forward.

Taking in a sharp breath, she spoke. “How’s your sister doing?” She turned to face you. Refusing to let her know she was finally making some progress with you, you remained staring at her. Resuming her pacing she continued speaking.

“She’s what 5 now? Gosh so young. But you know what they say right? They grow up so fast.” Your eyes tracked the woman, more intently than before. This woman knew your family. Something that was always off limits when the pack was involved. Your attempts at shielding them from the supernatural had been successful, keeping that part of your life private even from Derek. And here this woman stood, threatening them. Threating to take away your motivation to make the world safer. Unfazed by your lack of reaction the woman carried on.

“Soon enough she’ll be going to high school, making friends, maybe even realising who her sister really is.” She stopped before you once more, bending at the waist she placed her hands on the arms of the chair you were bound to. “You didn’t think you could protect them, forever did you?” Tears threatened to fall from your eyes. No amount of calm breathing could ground you now. “Aw babe.” Her hand raised to your cheek, ready to wipe away the falling tear. You only pulled away from her once more, hating the way her skin on yours felt. “Don’t tell me I hit a nerve, did I? Sucks doesn’t it. Well, there is one way of ensuring your little family stay naïve to the world around them.” She stood tall once more, her voice now deeper, more sinister than before. “Tell me what I want to know.”

You had no choice, right? She threatened your family, your sister. You protected them from so long, only for you to be the reason they are in danger. Looking down at your lap, tears hit your thighs unable to control them you simply let them fall. Taking a deep breath, you looked up at the woman before you, a smirk present on her face which made it so much harder to say what you were about to. But the images of your sister raced through your mind. The way her hair shone in the autumn sun, the way her smile reached her eyes when she was really, truly happy, the way she greeted you after school every day by running down the front path directly into your arms. That was the highlight of your day, finishing school and-

Wait

You never responded to Stiles.

You never texted him back, and the kidnappers were kind enough to bring your phone into the room with you – hoping to get some information.

Your eyes moved to the door behind the woman, a loud crash followed by a heavy grunt sounded from behind the entranceway. The woman whipped her head around, only to be met by silence. She slowly approached the doorway.

“Adrian…?”

Silence

The woman turned back to you, unsure of herself. You only had a small smirk as a response. Before she could question you, the door busted open, barely remaining on its hinges, a rush of dust filled the room. Watching ahead as the dust clouds engulfed the woman, you heard a deafening roar followed by a petrified scream. Small thuds followed, as the dust reached your eyes you began coughing, the sudden pain in your ribs swiftly returning.

Two hands were placed on your shoulders, looking up you were met by two green eyes.

“Hey, you okay?” A worried Derek scanned your face, concern riddled him as he saw the multiple cuts and bruising before him. You could only nod, the dust denying you the ability to speak.

Moving behind you, he effortlessly cut the ties that bound your hands, then your legs. Using the arms of the chair to stable yourself, you attempted to stand, wincing when the pain became too much. Derek moved to your side, wrapping your arm over his shoulder. Carefully placing his arm around you, resting his hand on your hip he accepted most of your weight, attempting to make standing and walking easier. As you took a few steps forward, the dust cleared from your eyes and you were able to regain focus. Looking forward you saw the woman who threatened you, her back against the same wall the door was, her skin now covered in blood, her chest still rising and falling rapidly. Scott stood before her, looking down at the defeated woman, his eyes still red and his claws still present.

Clearing your throat, you stopped walking, causing Derek to pause and look over to you. You peered down at the woman, no longer in a position of power, she looked smaller, more gaunt than before. Her eyes showed she was petrified, providing some comfort to you after what she did.

“Sucks doesn’t it?” a whisper of a smirk present on your lips.

Proceeding to step forward through the doorway you were met by a panting Stiles, his arms stretched out in front of him, you couldn’t tell him to stop before his body connected with yours. You inhaled sharply, grimacing as pain rang throughout your body.

Derek used his free hand to grab Stiles by the shoulder, pulling him away from you, a small growl forming in his chest.

“Oh, shit sorry of course you’re hurt shit sorry.” The boy stumbled over his words, his eyes finally taking in the battered sight before him. He moved to the side of you not occupied by Derek, his help was welcomed by you, suddenly feeling lightheaded from standing.

The three of you began walking forward towards the exit of the building.

“Is now a good time to tell Derek, you think he has no balls?” Stiles piped up earning a death glare from Derek. “No? Okay we can come back to that.” You used whatever energy you had left to shake your head.

[sinnamonrasinslut]

The Ease With Which We Hurt [I] ICorpse Husband x Fem!ReaderI

A/N: You guys. I have never simultaneously loved AND hated a piece that I wrote. I really don’t know how I feel about this, but I promised myself last year that I wouldn’t overthink my writing, so here we are. This is part one of most likely four, but we’ll see about that. Thank you to everyone in my inbox who gave me ideas to turn this into a multi chapter fic! They’re all coming, I promise :)

SYNOPSIS: Corpse loves her, she loves Corpse. But both of them are too dumb to realize it, and too afraid to admit it. 

It started, like most good things in his life, out of the blue.

He met her three years ago. Well, not met, but befriended her three years ago when her podcast was just taking off. He remembers sending her a DM about how great her work was, remembers her being gracious in her praise of his own narrations after and he remembers talking to her well into the night until she fell asleep. The rest, to Corpse, is history.

And yet, all he knows of her is a voice, a name, and the prettiest eyes he’s ever seen. she chooses to wear a mask every time they FaceTime, just for the formality of the entire ‘faceless’ situation. She’s told him she thinks it’s ironic, how she feels like he knows her inside out, and she’s still afraid to show him her face. It’s not like corpse can blame her. She doesn’t even know his name, let alone what he looks like, and it’s a miracle she hasn’t filed him away as some no face creep by this point. 

But she hasn’t. She’s still here, after three years of being her friend, and almost a year of seeing her eyes and convincing himself that she’s his friend, damnit, she’s still here. It’s already a lot more than he can ask for.

He’s been holding himself back from falling in love. Or rather, he’s been in love for as long as he can remember, but he's been adamant on denying it; because he knows how this goes. It’s never gone well for him in the past. And he’s not ashamed to admit that he’s afraid. But sometimes, she tells him things that make his heart break, just out of the realization of how absolutely fucking stupid he's being, holding back from her.

He’s convinced that when he dies, she’s going to be the light at the end of his tunnel. That heaven means nothing more to him than a place in her world, however small, however insignificant, as long as he gets to see her eyes for the rest of eternity.

Every part of corpse tells him that it's love. But he tries to push it away, suppress his own feelings till he's nothing but a walking contradiction, overflowing with voices that only say her name.

But he’s tired. And he's scared. Because he’s been down that road before, opened himself up to people who haven’t liked what they saw and left with pieces of him he’s not sure how to tape back. He’s unsure if he's willing to let her try.

So, he settles for a small corner of her world, a little piece of her existence that gives him life, and every time he talks to her, hands flailing as she animatedly tells another story, he pushes the yearning to the back of his head till it crawls down and clings to his windpipe, unsure and immeasurable, and he can’t speak anymore without choking. But then she says things that make his heart jump into his throat, and then he’s choking but for entirely different reasons.

“What would you do if I was gone?”

He doesn’t mean it like that. Well, he does, a little bit, but his brain isn’t taking over every part of his body trying to convince him he’s unwanted, so he doesn’t mean it like that. He’s only curious, maybe in need of a little reassurance. And nobody does reassurance better than her.

She doesn’t say anything for a very long moment. Corpse knows the gist of her impending answer but the pause still blooms unnecessarily in his chest. But it’s not like they haven’t done this before.

“I’d write about you.”

“Huh?”

She only huffs a laugh at his confusion. She pulls a blanket closer around her and props up her phone to rest against what he assumes is a wall.

“You’re not easy to forget, Corpse,” her voice is soft, truthful without flattery, provides comfort without justification. “if you were gone, I’d write about you. You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me, that’s the least I’d need to cope.”

It’s not what he thought he’d hear, but it’s becoming increasingly clear to him that it’s exactly what he needed. He’s the best thing that’s ever happened to her. 

“Besides,” she continues, hair falling in her face as she adjusts the blanket, “there is no place for me in a world without you in it.” 

 And he physically feels his heart stop and clench in his chest. The thought of meaning this much to anyone, to her in particular, is more than he knows how to handle. So, he doesn’t follow that up with a quip, no teasing laughter, no suggestive, exaggerated winks that only he can see. He only lets himself bask in the warmth of her honesty, lets her smile at him in that way only she does, the way that makes him freeze and ache and crumble.

He chooses not to talk after that, settles for listening to her tell stories about her childhood. Her voice is the purest thing he’s ever heard, he’d hear her talk till the world ended if he could, and the sweet lilt of her voice lulls him to sleep hours after she’s hung up the phone.

He doesn’t get to talk to her for almost two weeks after that. He misses her a little, but he keeps that to himself, and instead, tags her under dumb twitter memes and sends her pictures of cats that he’s saved specifically for times like these, and another video of two geckos fighting on a tree captioned ‘u and me’ .

There’s no place for me in a world without you in it.

The words wrap around his ribs like a noose, tightening by the second. Some days, when his heart is fast enough to beat out of his ribcage, it grounds him just as much as it hurts. But when she’d said it to him, it passed through him like a train wreck, distorting all semblance of control he’d convinced himself he had.

He knows it’s ridiculous, but he loves her. She’s only a voice through his phone and eyes on his screen and he has no clue what the rest of her looks like, but he’d be damned if he lets himself deny it one more time. He loves her. And that’s the most terrifying thought he’s ever entertained.

It doesn’t take long after that realization takes root, for him to send her a picture. He doesn’t let himself think too much about it. Taking pictures of himself is still new to him, but he tries his best. Don't think about it too much, he reminds himself, and unsurprisingly, it's her voice in his head that does all the soothing. He captions it something stupid, more out of habit than anything else (my hair makes me look like Dora the exploraH), with his name across his forehead and ‘Dora’ in brackets beside it. 

Momentarily, he wonders if he’s ever asked her if she even wants to see his face. (He has, and he distantly remembers her agreeing as long as he’s comfortable with it.)

He hits send before he has the chance to stop and think. 

Then he waits. 

Her response is quicker than he’s prepared for, her name flashing across the facetime request on his phone. He’s giggling before he even picks it up. 

“CORPSE, WHAT THE FUCK!” 

For a very long moment, they just stare, taking each other in. This is his endgame, corpse thinks, he’s never going to need to show anyone his face after this, nothing, no one will matter as much. 

With a jolt, he realizes that she’s not wearing her mask. He can see her, all of her, and that on its own should be enough to take him out.

And then she smiles. 

If there was any doubt in his mind before about how head over heels he is, she’s taken it out of his mind and stomped it to the ground. He’s not the poet in this friendship, but he’s assured he could write entire paragraphs about the way she smiles. And he tells her exactly that. 

“I’m curious to see how that would fit with fine lass nice ass cat ears and she uwu,” she teases, eye twinkling with mirth, “but I'm sure you’ll figure it out.” 

He’s both amazed and amused at how quickly they go from fawning to bantering. But perhaps that’s the thing about her that feels so familiar.

“I will write a song about you baby, don’t tempt me.” 

“Is that a threat?” 

“It’s a confession,” he shrugs, suddenly shy, unsure of where to lead with this. Thankfully, she interjects before he has to say anything else. 

“That’s an awfully bold confession for a man called Corpse.”

“I’m also awfully alive for a man called Corpse, but you don’t see me complaining.” Awfully alive and not enough husband, he wants to say, but he keeps that to himself. 

“You complain about being alive everyday, Mister Husband,” she counters and Corpse groans, dropping his head into his hands. 

“I say that to you in confidence,” he grits out, playfully glazing at her.

“You also tell about a million people on stream, I’m not special,” she laughs. 

“You are very special to me.” His voice is soft, shy, almost afraid to tell her the things he’s saying, “I did say I’d write a song about you. Pretty special if you ask me.”

She hums, taking a huge gulp of water and nodding enthusiastically. 

“Correct, me, the cat girl and the e girl. What’s the next single, Corpse? Faceless Girls are ruining my life?” 

“You’re a rascal,” he chides as a familiar warmth settles around his heart, and grips. 

“It is one of my finer qualities, yes.” 

Distantly, some part of his brain registers that this is the first time he’s seen her, but there is no sense of hesitation in his head about her. It feels just like it always has, with her on the phone saying the silliest things, and him responding with equal enthusiasm. This is the way they’ve always been. 

While she talks, hands animatedly moving around, Corpse allows himself a small moment of reprieve to think. He knows he loves her, but he wonders briefly if it’s too soon to be in love with her (he concludes that probably it is, given that she remains unaware of his feelings, but he finds that it doesn’t really matter)

Because while Corpse loves her, he’s sure he doesn't know how to love her. Doesn’t know her favourite flowers even if he knows her coffee order by heart, doesn’t know her ideal date even if he’s memorized every poem she loves. 

The meanest parts of his brain tell him she deserves better, and he knows they’re wrong. But a small part of him can’t help but dwell. He’d rather have her and her unnecessary hand movements in his life as his friend than not at all. So he pushes away his feelings for another day, and just listens to her talk. 

Corpse is perfectly content with that. 

[shini--chan]

Hello there, I honestly love the way you write everyone (especially yandere Prussia) I was wondering what if the reader really underestimated Prussia and Veneziano? As if thinking of them as a weak and a careless nation? Trying to fight and degrade them? Please write about it IF you can love 💕 Take care!

All I can say is: Thank you for sending in this neat ask.

Yandere Hetalia – Obfuscation

Italy

“I don’t think you understand. Your word against mine isn’t enough for black mail”, you voiced your doubts. Reasonable doubts, for somebody so young. A young being that understood as well as knew so little of the workings of the world. He could forgive you for that. Ignorance wasn’t a sin, rather a liability. One that would cost you so much.

Feli chuckled softly and wore a smile to match, as sweet as the cantuccini that he had just been dipping into the bitter rose wine he had ordered. Taking a bite from the alcohol soaked treat, he relished in the bittersweet taste that unfolded. In a way, it mirrored the situation.

“Oh bella. When it hasn’t been sword against sword it has always been word against word. My word is more than enough”, he quipped good naturedly, drumming his fingers against the wooden surface. Your brows furrowed, your features distorting into an expression of incomprehension. Really, it nearly caused him to laugh. However, unlike you, he possessed a decent amount of tact.

Shaking your head, you insisted: “Doesn’t matter how you honey up your words. If it’s your word against mine that’s not enough for decent blackmail. You need evidence.”

You were wise enough to keep your voice down. While you both were in a restaurant on his turf, speaking quietly in quick English, one couldn’t be too careful. Feli knew well enough on how his people loved to gossip and on how reputation mattered so much more than in the Anglosphere. On the other hand, you couldn’t lash out against him without being looked down upon in the aftermath.

“No, I just need to be more convincing than you”, he retaliated. When you shook your head again in denial, he couldn’t help but sigh. Of course, he was holding a Damocles sword over your head, and you just were so unwilling to comprehend. Maybe he would have to make true on some of his threats, just to get a point across. After all, a burnt child dreads the fire.

 Italy would be used to people underestimating him. After all, he wouldn’t be much of a soldier, preferring diplomacy over warfare. Everybody has simply forgotten that he once held all the strings. Not that he could blame them; he was very discreet about in the past, always operating from the shadows.

In a way, your behaviour would both infuriate and delight him. Infuriate, because your lack of insight would be cringe-worthy in his eyes and would ask himself how somebody could be so blind. Delight, because that would give him the opportunity to dig a ditch to trap you in without you suspecting a single thing.

He would get it. He wouldn’t come across as having a spin of steel or of having the ambitions that would lead him to cultivating diplomatic expertise. Feli would be quick to spill tears, whether out of genuine emotion or as part of an act, and that is usually seen as a staple for weakness. You would probably underestimate him to such an extreme extent that he could tell you the raw truth and you wouldn’t believe.

Despite any misgivings he would have, he wouldn’t hesitate to back in a corner if you wouldn’t behave – as in slandering your name, using his contacts to have you demoted, rejected, pushed aside, cancelled and so on. He would be your only solace, the only person in the world that could help you. Feliciano would offer your protection and a way to re-establish yourself in society. It would all depend on how much you would love him.

 Prussia

Gilbert turned around the corner to find you fiddling with the door, or better said the lock of the door. You were sticking hair pins in it, twisting the upper one this way and that, muttering furiously. The curses that were flying from your mouth were of the grave sort that would make even a potty-mouthed, seasoned-soldier blush. Which Gilbert was.

Taking a few steps forward, he then cleared his throat noisily, making you abruptly turn around. Your eyes were wide blown, like a deer that had decided the best method to deal with the approaching head lights would be to stare them down. However you promptly wiped the sheepish look of your face and straightened your back.

“What are you doing?”, he asked, making sure you make his words sharp. The answer lay at hand but the whole point was to make you feel guilty about what you were doing. Besides that, an entrée was needed.

“I am leaving”,  you announced defiantly, a smug grin on your face.

“Not on my watch.”

“Then just look away”, you countered snidely, the most unbearable expression on your visage as you drew out the syllables. “Out of sight, out of mind.”

He nearly flinched. Obviously, he had rubbed off on you a bit and in this case it wasn’t necessarily a good thing. Because of that, he sneered: “Don’t be unbearable. You’re staying, the end.”

“Well, if I am so unbearable, isn’t it high time for me to leave?”

Gilbert rolled his eyes at your antics. Enough was enough and a good talking to about your actions wouldn’t do. Therefor he told you: “Yes, high time to leave your foolish plans and get a proper spanking.”

He stepped forward to grab you, but you danced out of his reach, fists raised in front of your face in a familiar stance. A boxing stance, one that he used often. Shame really, and here he had thought you had been admiring his gorgeous physique whenever you had watched him train.

“I’ll fight you”, you hissed. This caused him to smile, tauntingly.

“Oh really?”

Your answer was to punch forward, aiming for his nose. Unlucky for you, he stepped aside, causing you to overreach and lose your balance. You face-planted the floor in one of the most ungraceful manners he had ever observed. Before you could stand up, he placed a foot on your nape – just enough that it was uncomfortable, but not enough to throttle you.

If anything, Gilbert would find your attempts amusing. He has lived through countless wars, went from sword to musket to gun, fought on nearly every terrain imaginable. And you would seriously think you could stand a chance against him? The only way you would be able to have the upper hand against him, would be if you would catch him off guard when he’d be ill, and that wouldn’t happen.

Your attempts to fight him would give him great fodder to ridicule you. He simply wouldn’t cease reminding you how clumsy you would be. Gilbert would comment that you probably watched far to many Hollywood films to think you could earnestly beat him up. Joke would be on you. Also, he would use it as an excuse to give you a few bruises, self-defence and all.

[sserpente]

A/N: I was writing this while my cat kept attacking me because she wanted to play. I don’t know if it made any impact on the story but I guess we’ll see. 😅

Words: 2154 Warnings: fluff (+ there are NO spoilers for TROS in this Imagine!)

Your lungs were burning, accompanied by a stinging pain in your chest. A broken rib, probably, maybe even two. You had been reckless. No, you had been distracted. Distracted by the man you loved more than yourself.

You were so close to him now—and while your heart knew exactly what it wanted, your mind kept sending shockwaves of adrenaline through your entire body.

Danger. Threat. Flight.

You hadn’t seen Ben’s face since he departed to train as a Jedi with his uncle Luke—and Leia had forbidden you joined the Resistance on any risky missions anywhere near the First Order. You were not Force sensitive, never had been. But they took you in when you had had nothing left and you had given back to them your services and your loyalty—your support to fight for a better world.

Your personal political views remained indifferent as long as you got to live, preferably not in poverty. But the Resistance, back then operating under a different name, of course, had given you something else. Someone else. They had given you Ben—right until Luke’s godforsaken Jedi camp had ripped him from your grasp cruelly, had him drift away from you until he was out of reach both physically and mentally.

He had a new name now, new motivations—and he had done terrible things which shocked you to the very bottom of your heart and yet… yet you could never stop loving him. Perhaps this was the reason you were here now, on the Finalizer, bruised, beaten and defeated.

Your weapons had long been taken from you. You were helpless. And Kylo Ren was your only hope.

-

“Bring her to my quarters for an interrogation, and keep her restrained. Her strength is not to be underestimated.” The voice you heard behind you was somewhat… distorted, no, modulated—most likely, it belonged to one of the Knights of Ren… did Kylo wear one too, a mask? How would you recognise him if he did? What if this voice, what if it was him… You swallowed thickly. Focus. Interrogation. If you fought back too much, they would pry your mind open like a nut, pushing you straight into the depths of madness.

You didn’t know anything. Nothing about Leia’s plans and not even if they still resided in the same location. You were on your own now. You had left after the destruction of the Jedi camp, when Ben had become someone you did not recognise—yet.

My quarters… you repeated the words in your mind, pure terror spreading in your veins like a nasty disease. Could it be?

The Stormtroopers followed the order immediately. Grabbing you by your upper arms and practically lifting your feet off the ground, they dragged you through the cold and empty hallways almost effortlessly.

You did not resist—you would save your strength for later—for when you truly needed it to fight all the torture they were about to inflict on you.

Handcuffed to almost utter helplessness, you were shoved into some dark living space, discarded like an old piece of furniture; the metal doors sliding shut behind you and darkness swallowing you whole before you could even turn. Idiots.

Standing there in the corner in complete blackness, with your heart in your mouth and the blood singing in your ears, you waited. You knew enough about strangling people. Your restraints posed the perfect tool for that.

But it stayed silent for a while. No footsteps, no voices, nothing. Then, finally, just when you had almost given up and begun to think your captor might have forgotten about you, the metal doors flew open once again.

The small beam of light falling onto the ground of the dark living quarters before the only exit route was cut off again were enough for you to make out a tall silhouette—and attack it.

With a belligerent scream, you stormed forward, aiming for the figure’s neck—but found your limbs paralysed by an invisible Force only the fraction of a second after, before the metal around your wrists could even touch your enemy.

The man in front of you chuckled darkly—a terrifying sound through the voice modulator inside the mask he was wearing. You froze, regardless of what the Force was doing to your body, eyes widening as a suspicion rose within you. This chuckle… it sounded familiar.

As cool as you please, he reached up, gloved hands swiftly fiddling with the clasps of his mask, revealing…

“Ben.” You choked out when your eyes met. You had found him. He was alive. He was safe. He was well. “Ben…” You repeated, voice breaking pathetically. Instantly, the Force released your limbs but you did not move an inch.

“Ben is dead,” he spat.

“What? I see him. I see him right in front of me!” Kylo turned up his mouth, a touch of anger radiating off of him. Once more, you felt the Force on your body, this time wrapping around your neck tightly. He didn’t even blink as he lifted you off your feet and pulled you towards him without lifting a finger, your body—tiny and downright petite compared to his—colliding with his chest and knocking all air from your lungs.

You howled in pain, your stricken ribs complaining upon the harsh impact. Kylo hesitated, a frown decorating his face for no longer than a split second before he seemed to recollect himself.

“Where is the Resistance?” He asked with a tilt of his head, ignoring your prior response coldly. At this point, you were shaking. You longed to jump into his arms and hold him tightly, but feared his reaction. Would he push you away? Laugh at you? Kill you? No, you figured. Ben would never hurt you.

“I… I don’t know. I left them after what happened at… the… the Jedi camp. I’ve been looking for you ever since.” Kylo Ren’s eyebrows rose slightly.

“And now that you’ve found me, what will you do?” He responded coolly, a hint of mockery swinging in his voice. You fell silent. Ben knew you well, he always had. Truth was, you had not had a plan. All you had wanted was to find the man you loved.

“I presume the Resistance still cares about your whereabouts,” he continued then, seemingly unfazed. “What will they do once they learn the First Order has you in its grip?” Kylo Ren stretched out his hand, gloved fingers kneading the thin air as you felt the Force pulling your mind apart like thin threads being torn from a silken fabric—looking for any kind of information about the Resistance which might be useful to him.

You failed to resist, knowing it would make the inevitable pain a lot more bearable. You had not lied. And you had never kept secrets from Ben.

“You really have no idea.” He concluded almost softly, absentmindedly pulling away again. He gnashed his teeth, staring you intently in the eye for a few agonising seconds. You slowly nodded.

Kylo Ren already knew what you did not dare to speak out loud—that you had come to see him regardless of the consequences which might result in the downfall of the Resistance. For just a brief moment, his composed and repellent façade crumbled. Glimpses of cracks proving to you he was unwilling to yield to his true emotions. He clenched his gloved fists, his right eye twitching once.

Without another word, he hurried to put his mask back on, then he stormed outside, illuminating the dark quarters with the artificial light from the vast hallways for a third time.

“Send a message to the Resistance,” you heard his modulated voice say to the Stormtroopers standing guard outside, “Tell General Organa we have one of her… fugitives on board. (Y/N) (Y/L/N)’s survival in return for the exact coordinates of their remaining ships.”

-

Your chest was heaving, tears streaming down your face. Grief and relief mixed in your heart, poisoning you with a deadly potion singeing you from the inside out—it was a pain much worse than the physical injuries of your body the two medical droids were treating. Ben must have sent them to his quarters after realising you were hurt. Nothing was broken, yet the contusions felt equally antagonising. The droids had stripped you and more or less forced you down on the black and uncomfortable sofa, with only your sports bra remaining to take care of the dark bruises.

They utterly ignored your heart-breaking sobs rippling through Kylo Ren’s empty quarters. At least, the lights had been switched on by now, allowing you a few curious glances around.

The decoration was sparse. There was a chest of drawers, a wardrobe, a double bed with pitch black bed sheets, a dark and tiled hallway leading to a separate refreshing area and a mysterious metal door—you did not need to try for the knob to know it would be locked.

Ben’s signature was all over the room—it felt like his aura lingered despite his absence, reminding you with every passing second of the man you had lost. He could have taken you to General Hux, could have the Stormtroopers take care of accommodating you—and he could have you killed without so much as a simple blink. He had not. You were here. Right here in his quarters where you were safe. Safe from all the threats on board the Finalizer, safe from the proponents of the First Order. Safe from anyone except from him.

Kylo Ren returned, presumably, late at night. He found you curled up on the hard seating furniture, your almost naked back turned to him. He could sense you were still awake. Your thoughts were racing through your mind, one toppling over the next.

Your lips were still shaking—as were your limbs. His quarters were almost unusually chilly, dark and uninviting. Wearing no more than a pair of tight trousers and your sports bra did not exactly help this predicament. Holding your breath, you listened. What was he doing? You could hear the rustling of fabric, bed sheets being pulled back for the owner of the soft mattress to lie down on it and rest and lastly, the sound of a light switch. Once again, you found yourself in complete darkness.

One thing was for sure—Kylo Ren would never admit he was unsure of what to do with you. Killing you was no option. He would never forgive himself. Leaving you with Hux or the Stormtroopers? You were his.

Gnashing his teeth, he ripped his eyes back open all the while listening to your clattering teeth. Were you really his? You loved him, he knew this, he could sense it—always could have. And you were here. Here in his quarters. You could have been killed for just attempting to come here and even that had not stopped you from finding him. For Heaven’s sake—he was the Supreme Leader. If he wished to keep you with him, it would be his decision alone.

“B-Ben.” He suddenly heard you mumble.

Silence. Indignantly, he squeezed his eyes shut. Would sleep come to him tonight? He would need his energy. If his mother still cared about you as much as she had before he left her, tomorrow might result in yet another draining battle.

“Ben.” You said again, louder and more vehemently this time.

Again, he did not respond. You swallowed thickly, biting your lower lip so hard you could taste blood.

“Fine,” you spat. “Kylo.”

As if on cue, he turned in bed, facing you in the utter darkness of his quarters. You had a feeling he could still see every inch of you, his brown eyes boring through you like sharp daggers or the hot blade of his lightsabre.

“What is it?”

“I’m freezing. Please… can you give me a blanket?”

“I don’t have any spare blankets.” His dark voice rumbled through the blackness around you. Fearing that this would be his final word, you took a deep and shaky breath. But then, suddenly, the bed sheets rustled again. “Come.”

What? Did he mean… his bed?

Still trembling, you stood from the uncomfortable sofa, wondering what he would do if you approached him. But Kylo said nothing. Not when you lied down in his warm bed. Not when he covered you with his blanket. Not when he wrapped an arm around your middle and pulled your cold body against his warm chest, his heavy breathing brushing hot air against the back of your neck.

“Kylo…” You whispered. He held you even closer in response—there was no need for him to see you to notice how your eyes had filled with salty tears again.

What was he doing? Was he Kylo Ren or was he Ben Solo? But perhaps it did not matter. He was, after all, the man you loved.

-

Check out my blog to find more Imagines and take a glimpse at my first (to be) published novel! Also, if you enjoyed this story, I would appreciate so much if you supported me on Kofi! ko-fi.com/sserpente ♥

[cecilspeaks]

174 - Radio Jupiter

This is Radio Jupiter calling out to all who hear. Please respond. Awaiting your reply.

[different theme song]

This is Radio Jupiter. I’m not sure who is listening. I’m not sure if there’s anyone to listen. I can only verify my own existence. I can only verify the void around me, the apparent fact of stars, the swirling atmosphere of the planet below me. I cannot verify much. I don’t know who I am or where I came from. I woke up here, and all I have to go on is my call sign. So this is Radio Jupiter, reaching out to whoever there is to be reached out to.

It is so beautiful here on my perch, here in my place, in the cosmos and the universe about which I know nothing but feel everything. I don’t know if everywhere is as beautiful, or even most places. Did I happen onto the one beautiful place in the all of it? Without perspective, there is only what is nearby. Without the burden of comparison, everything is beautiful.

If a person is the sum total of every experience they’ve ever had, is a person without memories still a person? Or are they a different creature altogether, made either limited or limitless by the possibilities of a clean slate? I am either trapped or I am more free than anyone who can hear this. If anyone can hear this.

There is a framed photo in this room. It is an elderly woman. Maybe my mother or my grandmother or an aunt. Perhaps merely a photo I saw in a magazine once and liked for whatever reason. I have no way of knowing what kind of person I am, what kind of photo I would keep. Perhaps it is a photo of you. Do you present as an elderly woman? Would you like to? I think perhaps I would like to, even for just a little while. But I only am what I only am, I ever am, whatever I am.

[distortion] This is Radio Jupiter calling all cars, all (species), all… [fades out]

Cecil: Is that any better? Is that better? Can you hear me? [clears throat] OK, my producer is giving me the signal that we are now back on the air. Sorry about that, not sure what that other signal was, but it completely took over ours, which is rude. We’re currently looking for the source of the signal. We’ve narrowed it down to up. Just right up there somewhere, beaming on down to us. But we’re back in control and we do not expect any more interruptions. Of course, we didn’t expect that interruption either. I don’t expect almost anything that happens to me, my life is full of mystery and surprise, as is yours I’m sure, but still, we seem to have this one technical issue addressed. With that settled, I think we can get to the news.  

Our top story concerns… [reluctantly] Susan Willman. OK. Sure. There has been a lot of talk in town since the whole incident with the Obelisk, in which Susan Willman learned the name of an immortal all knowing being. This name now exist in her head, an object of great power reverberating through her thoughts. She has withdrawn from her duties as director of the Night Vale Community Theater and the Night Vale PTA. Oh darn, we’ll miss her and her prosaic, muddled staging and grandstanding about home-work life balance.

Susan has instead taken residence in a booth at the Moonlite All-Nite Diner. There at all hours, toying with a half drunk coffee and playing with the reflection of the sun in the back of a spoon. At night, the mint light of the sign outside sends strange shadows across her face, and her friends say they sometimes don’t recognize her at all. Steve Carlsberg, who is taking over her role at the Night Vale Community Theater, went to talk to her about some finer details of the casting process, and said that she was less than helpful. She was weeping, and the only thing she said the entire time he was there was that she was afraid to speak, lest the awful name slip past her lips. “No one was meant to carry such death inside of them,” she whispered, and then said no more. “Oh sure, yeah yeah, makes total sense,” said Steve, as he (-) [06:51] down some invisible pie. Well, I think we’ve given Susan enough attention for now, moving on.

In other news, the new beer cave at the Ralphs has been closed for repairs due to occasional time loop issues reported by certain customers. Manager at the Ralphs, Dave Ball, issued a statement by spelling out words with cantaloupes in the parking lot, saying “everything is fine with the beer cave, it’s a great and refreshing addition to Night Vale. Please don’t go inside or even look at it, as we don’t know why it’s doing what it’s doing. Everything is fine, please stay safe and stay away.” Dave then rearranged the cantaloupes to create complex fractal designs that made me dizzy to gaze upon, but were beautiful nonetheless. When reached out for a comment, Ralphs corporate said they had no records of any branch in a town called Night Vale, and were tired of receiving prank calls with bizarre tales about a made up store. When provided with pictoral evidence of Night Vale, a representative at Ralphs corporate began to bleed form the eyes while shouting: “This can’t be real! My god, this can’t be real!” More on the story of the beer cave if anything happens [distortion, fades out]…

Agent N-223: [--] out there, out there? Not sure if any of this is getting thru, but continuing to narrate on the off chance anyone will hear this and come, you know, to collect me. I’ve been doing some digging through the spaceship, and I’m disturbed by what I’ve found. Weapons. Many, many weapons. Racks of guns, cases of grenades and explosives, radar that I instinctively know is for tracking combatant space crafts, even though I have no memory of receiving that training. I am armed to the teeth and ready to wage war. But on what? There are no living beings in sight, and for all I know, there are no other living beings anywhere. Perhaps I’m here to wage war upon the planet below me, that swirling gaseous titan. Maybe someone had enough of it and sent me up here to put Jupiter back in its place. If so, I think the weapons they gave me were insufficient. I experimented by shooting off a round or two out the airlock, but the bullets soared into the upper atmosphere of the planet without slowing at all. My attack had no appreciable effect on my victim. So maybe the planet is not my target. Could it be the stars themselves? I am sent here, a pinprick in the side of God to cast myself as the stars, shouting threats and tossing grenades until the entire (-) [09:42] of the universe cowers and surrenders. Perhaps that.

Or perhaps I am at war with you, whoever is hearing this. Maybe I was given this radio in order to threaten and terrorize before I attack. So be afraid, I am coming. O-once I figure out where you are. I have no idea which direction to start moving and I don’t even know if this space ship has any way of controlling movement or if I’m just stuck in this orbit. Either way, this is Radio Jupiter apparently declaring war. [distortion] Consider it declared and [fades out].

Cecil: Can you hear, they can hear me? OK, I apologize, we’ve been doing all kinds of troubleshooting, including shifting the angle of our broadcasting tower, updating all of our software, and yes before you ask, we did try unplugging it, doing a ritual spilling of blood and plugging it back in. The issue we’re having is that these broadcasts are being sent out on military frequencies, which unfortunately automatically override ours. I’m unclear why the military would be getting into broadcasting, that’s more of a community radio thing, so let’s all stick to what we’re good at. I’ll keep doing radio shows that inform and delight, and the military can spend three trillion dollars on a plane that instantly explodes if anyone tries to fly it.

We have reached out to Rudy DeJardin, the local representative of the military industrial complex. He has a little table set up outside of the hardware shop, and anyone who has any questions for the military can just ask him, and he’ll do his best to answer. Most of the stuff can’t answer because it’s classified or embarrassing, but sometimes he’ll say a few cryptic words. In this case, his only answer was to make “mm-hm” sounds and shake his head frantically, while rolling his eyes toward the heavens. Not clear what to make of that, but I sure love whatever this broadcast is off my frequency, Rudy. Any time you want to get on that.

And now a word from our sponsors. Today’s show is brought to you by Nature’s Caress Fountain of Youth gentle flushable wipes. Did you know in most of the world, they just wash after using the toilet? They have a whole thing specifically for doing that. It takes a couple of seconds, cleans thoroughly, and doesn’t create mountains of paper waste. If you dirty your hands, do you wipe at them frantically with an even less robust version of tissues, or do you use water and soap? Why would it be different for anything else? Because it just is, that’s why. It’s the American way, love it or leave it. Nature’s Caress Fountain of Youth gentle flushable wipes: clog the world with your debris. This has been a word from our sponsors.

And now, as a special treat, Mr. Lee Marvin himself will perform act 3 scene 5 of Shakespeare’s classic tragedy “Invasion of the Body Snatchers”. This is the scene that contains the immortal line “I never knew the meaning of fear until I kissed Becky.” [distortion] OK, Mr. Marvin, take it away!

Agent N-223: This is Radio Jupiter speaking to you from a time of peace. Yes, there was that brief episode of war, and it was regrettable. I fired upon an innocent planet, although that planet seems none the worse for my crimes. In any case, that war is now over, as far as I’m concerned. I have no interest in battles and conflict, especially when I have no memory of what that conflict could involve. I have no interest in killing anyone, and I have no interest in dying quite yet.

So, peace in our time. I’m jettisoning all the guns and other weapons. Let them scatter out harmlessly into the universe, most of them swirling down the gravity well of Jupiter, where the immense pressure of the inner atmosphere will compress them into diamonds. I don’t know if that idea is scientifically sound, but I like the thought of it. All these worthless guns made glittering jewels, swirling in the endless storm of a planet that doesn’t even know they’re there.

As for me, now that I’ve declared peace upon the galaxy, I would like to know what is out there. I have found the controls for the ship and it seems I must have been trained in their use, because whatever I do appears to work as I want it to. I am turning away from the only star I’ve ever known. Because my memory is short and it’s the only star that has been there for the last two hours. I’m turning out to the dark unknown, and I’m casting myself into it. I hope there is a grander universe out there, I’d love to see it. This is Radio Jupiter, letting the cosmos know that I am on my way. I’ll see you soon. Or, given the size of space, most likely I won’t see you. But we’ll both exist, and [distortion] won’t that be nice?

Cecil: [clapping] Wow, wow wow wow. Thank you, Mr. Marvin, truly a performance for the ages, and what a treat… What? What happened? When? Oh not again!

This is Cecil Palmer of the Night Vale community radio station. I don’t know if you can hear these words, but if you can, we have identified the source of these intrusive broadcasts. She is agent N-223, sent during the early years of the space program on a secret mission. She was put into hibernation so that she could wake up and serve as reinforcement in the Blood Space War at some point in the future. But it appears that the hibernation damaged her memory, and anyway the Blood Space War doesn’t happen for another thousands years, so eh, she won’t be much use in that battle yet. Ah, thanks to the anonymous tipster who snuck us this top secret info. We owe you, Rudy.

Oh, uh it looks like we might be having more interference due to some Rough weather.

[“The Faded Red and Blue” by David Berkeley http://davidberkeley.com/]

Agent N-223: This is Radio Jupiter on the tail end of the tail end. If there was anyone listening back near that star, I think I’m getting out of range. I feel you getting out of range. Whatever presence I felt that I was speaking to, that feeling is getting hushed and fuzzy. The way I’m sure my voice is for you now.

You’re gonna have to go on without me, I suppose. Be brave about it. Or be scared. Your feelings are not my problem anymore, if they ever were. I have new problems now, problems of void and cosmos, problems of dark matter and lost memories. I am adrift in a universe that does not know I exist, but then you are too. I don’t know what is out there, but I hope I live to see it. Won’t that be something, if I get to see whatever happens next? I hope I do.

Well, this is Radio Jupiter signing off for the last time. [echoing] Stay safe out there, I’ll try to stay safe out here. Goodbye.

Cecil: The signal has faded out. It seems she has finally left our world and also left my radio frequency. I’m not trying to speak badly of a strange remnant of a war that has not yet happened, floating out into the nothing beyond the nothing, but come on, please, use a different frequency. It’s just rude. The military, through Rudy DeJardin has disavowed any knowledge of Agent N-223 or her mission. “Nope,” Rudy said through clenched teeth, “Never heard of her. Iiii certainly wouldn’t just say her name on the radio, after being asked not to. That’s not something I would do Cecil,” he said. So I dunno. Maybe we got the story wrong.

It is something, isn’t it? We are bits of life floating in a whole lot of non-life. The fact is true for us in both space and time, we are brief on any measure. And yet we can reach out our voice and be heard, even if only for a moment. And that has to mean something, doesn’t it? Doesn’t… it?

Stay tuned next for an angry buzzing from inside your cutlery drawer, but you’ll be too afraid to open it and find out its source.

Good night, Night Vale, Good night.

Today’s proverb: Diamonds are a girl’s best friend. Agate is a girl’s worst enemy. Emerald is a work acquaintance who a girl hung out with once and then it just – never turned into anything more.

[imogeneunbridling]

My parents

I wrote one of those letters you don’t send, from my most comfortable place which is saying something:

I’m not really like most of the people here. You taught me this is because there is something wrong with me. It only took me all this time to realize it isn’t true. I wasn’t the problem, but you were. And though you would never hear it, it infected me, because the first things I ever knew of this world were secrets. Glimpses in home videos of small cruel outbursts I do not contain, corridors where there should be memories. And you tell me, you don’t remember. That I like to play the victim.

I didn’t realize how wrong it was to never stop thinking about something. I noticed other people, they could concentrate. They cared about things more easily. I liked things all at once, and then, like a switch flipping, not at all. Because I learned young there was nothing in this world I could have, nothing that was mine. It was not safe to love things, they would be taken from you. If you told the truth, the worst things were going to happen, even if you weren’t quite sure what the worst things were. It felt like they had happened, already. Like they were all I knew. So much pain I could not contain it. Living between threats and caverns of need.

But I do like to play the victim. The vacancy, the apathy, the inability to connect with other people, all clearly part of some long con to - to achieve, what exactly? I never got to asking that question. I don’t like the way you answer questions, in ways, that makes me ask myself even worse ones. That bring up pictures, and floods, and make me wonder how someone like me knows these feelings? How I am made so docile in the wake of all this cruelty, like to take up the very space I contained was already an offense, and all my breath cascading across this eternally thin ice. You always felt like a corpse to me. And my mother’s skin was hard. 

It was strange, to have nothing, and to want it so much for so long. It takes it’s root. I learned about isolation. Reading. I did so much reading. Then I grew older and smoked so much weed. I thought about your depressing childhoods, and how you made your every opinion seem like the most damning judgment, all without the relief to ever inspire the change. What did you tell me? You used to take us on vacation. 

You were a very bad father, and I cannot believe a heart like mine comes from the split of such distorted people. But I am so impressed with myself, you would just die to hear it. Because I lived in spite of you both, to spite you both, despite you both - and all you took, and all the ways you weren’t there, despite never being led and guided and loved. Like a thing born of need and feeling and always rolling, destined to hit some wall - and instead, I stopped.

And yeah maybe you’re not impressed because you’d never be impressed, but I really wasn’t out to impress you. I just wanted to feel okay in the world, for once. Sometimes I do. Some days. Then I remember the way you all treated me. That used to make me cry. Now it doesn’t change anything I feel. It just lives in me, in the peace of it’s truth. In spite of you all, and entirely because of me. Which is, god, I think. Faith. Hope. All those things you didn’t let me believe in. I found them anyway.

[isolaradiale]

When the final wire was cut, the entire city went black. The power grid was not tied to the network, but the outage was NULL’s only shot at preventing Ofiuco’s retrieval after she fell from the sky. The entire city fell still for five minutes before power returned, but this light only served to illuminate the next phase. It wasn’t like GPU had been without a backup plan. If they didn’t have a way to leverage the arrest of the Stars, then at the very least they could throw a wrench in their operation. 

However, the light of the moon and stars that shone down on the city in the dead of night was obscured by a sudden apparition. A floating island that existed beyond the flight limitations of the city obscured the view, almost the same size as the city itself and becoming a constant and looming darkness over the cityscape. It cast things into uncertainty, and all of the Shades remaining on the ground flocked up and into it... before a loud rumbling began. 

The island suddenly dropped and it inevitably looked as if it was about to crash into the city itself before stopping in a convenient location: just below the maximum flight limit. Beams of light soon extended from all around the floating island’s perimeter to Spirale below, their uses initially unclear.

That was, until, people began to step out of them. These weren’t NPCs nor agents, their ranks instead populated by the monstrous and the villainous. Enemies and rivals gathered from the worlds the characters had all been taken from, their sights set on razing the city. Chaos immediately unfolded where they landed, structures and people alike targeted while some of these foes sought conflict with their greatest nemesis. 

LISTEN TO ME PEOPLE OF THIS ISLAND CITY.

If it was a device capable of receiving a signal, this distorted voice boomed over it. Many believed the speaker to be an enemy at first, probably one of the agents that had turned their world into disarray. Thankfully that wasn’t the case.

I AM AN EX-MEMBER OF THE GPU AND BOTH MYSELF AND ONE OTHER HAVE BEEN WORKING WITH YOUR ISLAND STARS FROM WITHIN THE ORGANIZATION FOR THE LAST SEVERAL DAYS. GPU WILL DESTROY YOU REGARDLESS OF WHETHER THE STARS TURN THEMSELVES IN OR NOT, AND BY THE TIME THE MAINTENANCE DROID IS ABLE TO CONVEY THIS MESSAGE TO YOU THE PROCESS MIGHT HAVE ALREADY BEGUN.

YOU AREN’T DREAMING. THE ENEMIES THAT HAVE LIKELY POURED OUT OF THAT FLYING STRUCTURE ARE ALL VERY REAL AND VERY POWERFUL. SOME OF YOU MIGHT RECOGNIZE THEM BECAUSE THEY WALK, TALK, OR GROWL LIKE FOES YOU’VE ENCOUNTERED IN YOUR OWN WORLDS. DON’T BE FOOLED, THEY ARE IMITATIONS MADE COMPLETELY UNDER THEIR CONTROL. HOWEVER THEY ARE VERY DANGEROUS, AND POSSESS THE FULL RANGE OF ABILITIES YOU KNOW THEM TO.

MY PARTNER IN THIS ENDEAVOR TOLD ME THEY’LL BE MAKING SURE THE ISLAND IS LOWERED ENOUGH THAT IT CAN BE REACHED, AND WE’LL ENSURE THE LIGHT LIFTS CAN BRING THOSE WITHOUT WINGS TO THE SURFACE. IF YOU WISH TO KEEP ON LIVING YOU NEED TO NOT ONLY PROTECT YOUR CITY, BUT BRING THE FIGHT TO THEM AS WELL.

Whether these words inspired or not depended on the listener, but there was no denying the immediate threat of the invading force as well as the personal nature of some of these opponents. 

“To those ends, a gift!” This time the speaking voice was a familiar one as a dot of pink light zipped up from the depths of the hole, a familiar android plastered across every screen in the city. This time though her eyes weren’t red. A wave of light reverberated across the city from the flapping of Ofiuco’s wings, granting all it touched their weapons and abilities back for the time being. “Don’t forget there are people from the city itself still working with NULL. I know this is all hard to understand. You don’t know why you’re fighting nor do you know what you’re fighting.”

She exhaled before looking at the floating island above. “I guess there will be some explaining to do when all is said and done, but go! You need to reclaim the starry sky!”

INFORMATION

Welcome to part 2 of Security Breach! There’s a lot to cover here so we’ll try to be as specific as possible. But as always if you have a question don’t be afraid to send it to the ml!

What has happened? With the network shut down thanks to all the cut wires, NULL has wordlessly moved into their backup plan: completely razing the city from within.

To those ends they have summoned a floating island that eclipses the city, and from it enemies pour down from both the top and the light elevators that extend to the city from the floating island’s surface. 

These are not normal enemies however. They are villains and monsters from the worlds of your muses (more information including guidelines in the FAQ section). While they walk, talk, and hit as hard as the real things, they are completely under NULL’s control and share their goals.

This is a grand battle that will be fought on two stages: on the island below and flying structure above. 

Ofiuco has granted everyone their powers and abilities back, but is also enforcing a cap so the enemy forces can’t use game breaking powers. Since this is universal it will also affect the characters within the group (more information in the FAQ section).

For those that are powerless: you will be able to access your Fantasia avatars via the Spirale Alternate World Life app. This feature will be removed at the end of the event, and it will not work for characters that already have powers. 

We will be running this poll until 12:01AM EST on May 1st. Based on the results the story and aftermath of the event will change. 

FAQ

Everyone’s powers are unlocked but are there limitations like in part 1? Yes there are! Abilities used must be tier 6 or higher by vsbattlewiki standards. Obviously these could easily destroy an island, but while structures can be destroyed the island Spirale is on and the island in the sky are both impervious to damage from these attacks. If your character possesses an ability that exceeds this ranking you can tone it down, but some things are strictly off limits like conceptual abilities in certain instances (conjuring items or allies en masse, erasing existences, etc are not allowed). These guidelines are consistent between both sides so as not to break the world.

What’s this about Fantasia and the Spirale Alternate World Life app? Last summer we held an event called the Fantasia War where characters were placed in a fantasy setting with fantasy avatars. At the event’s conclusion we made Fantasia into an MMO game that can be accessed in the Intraspace, and everyone’s avatars have been preserved there. The SAWL app is an app we introduced to allow MMO characters (like from SAO) to be able to switch between their normal and game forms at will, and it is having its functionality temporarily  boosted to let people use their Fantasia avatars, including the attached powers, during the event. This app will not show up for anyone that has powers of their own. 

If your character was not present during Fantasia you can still create your own avatar! You can still find the list of available races here and list of available spells here. 

Villains and enemies are pouring out of the flying island? What does this entail? Essentially what it sounds like. You will have the unique opportunity to bring in villains, monsters, or machines as agents of NULL. They will act as they would in canon, but are dedicated to their cause of destroying the city and killing off its citizens. There are, of course, limitations:

only one boss-tier enemy per mun per series can be brought in. you can bring in as many trash mobs (generic monsters, grunts, etc.) as you want, but you can only choose one powerful opponent. you can just say what kind of mobs might be running around for others to deal with in their threads, but the boss-tier foe must be controlled by you.

boss-tier enemies can be sentient, but they don’t have to be. if you want to bring in things like giant machines that are piloted by grunts, these still count as boss-tiers however.

you cannot bring in an enemy that exists on the masterlist

enemies, including boss-types, can be overlapped throughout a cast to avoid the possibility of someone claiming a boss just to deny other cast members from interacting with them. however do not have these duplicates interact / in the same thread.

The best way to keep this in order would be to make a post introducing the kinds of trash mobs you’d see running around as well as the boss-type you plan on controlling. People can then use the mobs in their threads if they choose, or approach you to interact with the boss. Likewise, you can keep the boss for more personal threads or drabbles. It’s really up to you!

I don’t really have any enemies in my series and I’m not comfortable using mobs from others. Are there any other options for what I can fight? Yes! The Shades are still around, as are a plethora of generic fantasy monsters for you to fight!

Are the weather conditions from part 1 still ongoing? No, those have come to a halt! However the island above blocks all of the weather in general.

Speaking of the floating island. We can go to the top, right? What’s up there? To put it simply: it’s a mess. Whether NULL had difficulty importing code or if it was just a big error, assets from every series imaginable compose the landscape. Maybe you’d see a building from BLEACH, but then one from Naruto right beside it. Some assets have even been merged together. Pieces of it glitch out and redesign constantly, so it’s almost a depressing mockery of Spirale in a way. There are hills and rivers too, but even those are constantly shifting position.

While tons of enemies have poured onto the streets of Spirale, there are plenty waiting on standby atop the flying island. To go it alone would be a terrible idea.

Can we destroy the flying island itself? No! You can destroy the structures on top but new things will eventually sprout up in their place. The ground and undersides seem to be protected by an impenetrable barrier. But even if you could, do you really want it crashing onto the city below?

Where should we put big, newsworthy posts during this event? Please use the tag ‘#isola sb2 news’ as opposed to the regular ‘#isola news’ tag during this part of the event. We anticipate a lot of people are going to want to do cool and interesting things that they want everyone to see so we want you guys to have a space for this, but we also do not want to clutter the regular news tag.

I have an additional question! Feel free to send it to the masterlist! Due to the nature of this part and all of the potential moving pieces we’re sure people may have questions or concerns that haven’t been covered.

When is part 2 expected to end? A week from now on May 1st at 12:00:01AM EST. We’ll likely be polling around the middle of the week to see if people would like an extension however! 

[angstyaches]

The Demon Who Knows You

CW: emeto, threat of violence (knife). 

Happens (almost) simultaneously to Pt. 11: The Demon You Know

Swallow the World: The Ouija Board Pt. 12

He didn’t know why the forest and the dark seemed to press in on him more than they usually did. He didn’t know why the idea of Rin and Charlie doing this without him seemed to make the cramps in his stomach even more unbearable.

He didn’t know why he had come to a stop next to a nondescript tree, snapping a nondescript twig under foot.

He didn’t know why his fingers, already inside his jacket pocket, closed around the hilt of the switch knife Elliott had given him. He so far hadn’t believed that it would be any good against demons, but apparently Nancy had said that it would be effective against all entities, earthly or not.

The hair stood up on the back of Shayne’s neck and his breath billowed out into a light fog.

“Nice of you to send me away,” he murmured, rolling his jaw in its socket, “so I won’t have to kill you in front of Charlie.”

He slowly turned around. The figure standing a few feet back from him had long, twisting horns rising up out of its pale grey skull, empty sockets somehow staring at him from the shadows. It towered at about eight feet tall, branch-like arms hanging by its sides.

No demon had ever appeared before him so clearly, with this level of abject beauty and clarity. The thing didn’t move. It didn’t have to. Shayne could still feel himself in its sights, neither prey nor predator, yet inherently both.

“Not that I have to ask,” Shayne said, “but what’s your name?”

He could have sworn he saw a flash of blue across the eye sockets of the demon’s skull. “Charlie.”

That made Shayne clench his fists, bringing his awareness back to the switch knife. “You mean Charlie Two.”

“You know I can only say what I mean,” they replied. “You can call me Charlie Two, if you prefer. But I wish you wouldn’t say it like it’s a curse.”

The figure took a step forward, and Shayne matched it with a step backwards.

“You are a curse,” Shayne hissed. “You uprooted Charlie’s whole existence. And not only that, you somehow stole his name. It’s all kinds of fucked up. A demon killed both my parents, but I still think I hate you more than I hate that one.”

“You never told me that.”

Shayne’s heart sank. The tightening ache in his gut was making him irrational. Shit, he’d never have devoured a demon earlier in the evening if he’d known he’d have all of this to deal with tonight.

“That’s why you always ask for the names,” Charlie Two realised, taking another step forward. “You’re looking for the demon who killed your parents.”

“Shut the fuck up, right now.”

“What was the name?”

“What?”

“It’s been a long time since I was there, but maybe I remember enough to tell you if they’re in the other dimension or not.”

“I – I don’t –” Shayne swallowed, tightening his grip on the blade’s handle. “I don’t know it off the top of my head, but one day, one of you fuckers is going to say it and I’ll recognise it, and I’ll pull them apart into a million pieces and devour the pieces one by one over weeks and months, and –”

Charlie Two took yet another step forward, and Shayne lifted his blade.

“Whoa, it’s okay.” Charlie Two shook their head slowly. “It’s okay. I was scared of you, too, when I first realised what you were.”

“Scared? Don’t fucking flatter yourself,” Shayne spat. “You’re nothing but a parasite.”

“Shayne, I’m not a parasite,” the demon said. “Charlie and I grew up together. We grew up as one. All the things you feel for Charlie, you feel for me too. The Charlie who listens to you, comforts you, worries about you?”

“Shut up.”

“There have been times when I know you knew it was me speaking to you. Things Charlie One might think, but not feel brave enough to say.”

“I said sh–” Shayne’s hand flew to his mouth as he felt liquid overflow from his lips. He hadn’t even realised he’d started salivating. He turned his head to spit onto the forest floor, gasping at the sudden wrenching in his stomach. His mouth kept watering, and he desperately gulped it back. God, this was so fucking weird.

“Are you okay?”

“Fuck off.” Shayne waved a hand as he sensed the figure moving a little closer. “No, seriously, don’t – don’t.”

He felt his lips pull back over his teeth, his jaw ready to pop at a moment’s notice, and that feeling in his belly, well, now it was… hollow and clawing and demanding.

“What’s wrong?”

“I’ve never felt like I wanted to devour a demon in my whole life,” Shayne breathed, “until just this second.”

Shayne flipped his blade over in his hand, nerve endings tingling. He shoved the blade into the bark of a tree, pinning Charlie Two to the same trunk with his own body. The demon’s movements were swift, but they didn’t seem all too eager to get away from him.

In reality, Charlie Two was already missing Charlie One’s flesh and the sensation of being on solid ground; in this state, they felt like they might as well have been a puddle of standing water. If Shayne decided he truly wanted to kill and devour them, there was very little they’d be able to do about it.

“Scared of this thing?” Shayne asked, nodding to the knife. “It can really kill you?”

“You don’t want to kill me,” Charlie Two assured him. “You would have done it just now, or injured me. Made me an easier catch.” Charlie Two flicked their wrist, causing the blade to dislodge from the bark with a crack. It hurtled and flipped in the air before landing dully on the forest floor.

“Yeah, well,” Shayne said, stretching his jaw. “Maybe I want to feel you wriggle on the way down.”

Charlie Two chuckled deeply. “Or maybe you forgot I could do this.”

The air was pushed from Shayne’s lungs by some invisible thrust that flung him ten feet off the ground. His back thumped against a tree before he dropped, almost sticking the landing before his legs gave out and he sank to the floor. Pieces of bark rolled off his back, through something longer – maybe a broken-off branch, seemed to have stabbed lightly into the back of his right leg.

The impact had knocked all of that dark, clawing appetite out of him, leaving just the nausea and cramping from his earlier victim. Shayne dug his fingers into the earth and opened his mouth as his stomach rolled, squeezing up acid and short bursts of air.

A rustling in the shadows made him turn his head, and he began to recoil across the ground. He couldn’t see the demon, but it had disguised itself beneath the leaves and he could sense it coming closer. Usually, he could easily trap it with a warding jar, but he’d left them all in the other end of the forest, not wanting to bring any too close to Charlie. Shit.

The thing slithered up out of the leaves and froze, its shadowy face distorting as it was flung back, hurtling into the dark. Charlie Two’s wide, flowing form warped into view, placing itself in the demon’s path. The sound they made was so deafening, so otherworldly, that Shayne curled up into a ball, hands clamped over his ears. He started retching again, though this time nothing left his mouth but strangled coughs.

“Ah – oh, god, are you okay?” Charlie Two gasped, the words abruptly cutting off the warning roar.

“Fucking hell,” Shayne groaned, still curled up on the forest floor. “You can scare them off like that? Then what the hell have I been doing? Keeping the forest clear for no reason?”

“I didn’t know I could, I - I’m sorry I threw you so hard.” They had forgotten how much stronger their supernatural abilities were in this form; they had tempered them for Charlie One’s sake for so long.

“Apologising for defending yourself?” Shayne coughed and slid his weight back onto his legs, covering his mouth with his hand. “You actually might be my Charlie after all.”

A chuckle. “Your Charlie?”

Shayne looked straight up to see Charlie Two standing over him, a hand outstretched. He gritted his teeth as his own poor choice of words. He took the hand, electrical energy pulsing through his skin as the demon touched him. Charlie Two hoisted him up effortlessly. Shayne froze, waiting to see if his stomach had settled. His insides were still riddled with pain, but maybe he could avoid gagging again until he was out of the forest

“Are you okay?”

“Shut up,” he snapped, wrapping one arm around his waist, one hand still clutching Charlie Two’s. “When I said – I meant the Charlie I know…”

“Oh, you know me, Shayne Devine.” Charlie Two’s shadowy fingers stroked at Shayne’s wrist, like they were feeling for the warm back-and-forth of his veins under his skin. “And I know you. You already devoured today, didn’t you? That’s why you’re sick to your stomach.”

“Just shut up,” Shayne said, though the venom wasn’t there. He shook the demon’s hands away.

“Or what?” Charlie Two lightly ran the back of a finger under Shayne’s chin, the cold touch making him jerk his head upright. “You’ll devour me?”

Something in the statement sounded vaguely like a taunt, yet Shayne could almost imagine a mischievous glint in Charlie Two’s hauntingly hollow eye sockets. A glint he recognised from so many glances from Charlie One, some of them nervous, some of them accompanied by a smile. The touch, despite how cold it was, reminded him too much of the way Charlie had turned his head in the kitchen, his eyes soft and loving, before leaning in with his mouth.

He pulled back from the touch.

“I’ll take that as a no, and I’ll try not to take it as an insult.”

Charlie Two reached over to pluck away a piece of dried leaf from Shayne’s jacket. Shayne had never looked so long or so hard into a demon’s face before, yet this felt like nothing new.

“What happens..?” He cleared his throat when his voice cracked. “What happens to Charlie when you’re not with him?”

“I don’t know. I’ve never been away from him.”

“He needs you, doesn’t he?”

“We need each other.”

Shayne swallowed, the ache in his stomach turning dull and cold, creeping up around his ribs. “Go back to him. Please.”

“Alright,” Charlie Two whispered. “I’ll be seeing you, Shayne. Even if you refuse to see me.”

Shayne closed his eyes, afraid that he’d be tempted to follow. Part of him hoped to see Charlie Two still standing there with him, waiting to convince him to come back to the house too, but when he opened his eyes, he was alone. He swallowed again, suppressing a shiver as he retrieved Elliott’s knife from the ground and turning to head home to the Devines’ mansion.

[brokenjardaantech]

Blue-tinted Red Walls (Chapter 2: Ironies and Contradictions)

my entry for the @dbhau-bigbang. also part of the groom lake aftermath series.

chapter summary:

In the past, Sara had a breakthrough.

In the present, Connor experiences true power for the first time.

In the past, a ghost rose.

also on ao3

---

Before

‘Why now?’

In the permanent humidity of Detroit, Sara sat on a swing in a park overlooking the Ambassador bridge. On the swing next to hers sat another woman in her mid-thirties, her blonde hair done up in a tight bun, her spine straight, her feet, which were in properly-laced combat boots, planted firmly on the ground. A woman of the military through and thorough. Her hands were buried within the briefcase on her lap, and the tension in her arm seemed to suggest her holding a hidden weapon while she watched Sara - a young woman now - flipping over the pages of the file in her hands, the brown skin of the back of her hand transparent from the cold and showing a network of veins normally hidden beneath the surface. 

The other woman did not seem to have heard her question. ‘You must be cold,’ she said, her body leaning towards the girl. ‘Where’re your gloves?’

‘In my pockets,’ a flip. ‘Don’t like how they make my fingers clumsy. Don’t worry, Anderson,’ another flip, ‘a bit of cold won’t kill me.’

‘Why torture yourself if there’s a more comfortable option?’

Sara shut the file with a loud, echoing smack, gaining her a look of disapproval from Anderson. ‘You just -’ she held up the file - ‘gave me evidence to -’ she cut off and lowered her voice - ‘classified as fuck military research data that would’ve changed the world if there weren’t many others like my brother. The others you’ve given me I understand, but this?’ a knock of her knuckle against thick paper. ‘I might not be a proper sociologist, but I know that stuff like this can destroy civilisations. Why aren’t they burnt into ashes when the project went off the fucking cliff?’

‘A lot of reasons,’ Anderson replied calmly, but she did put a gloved hand on one of Sara’s. ‘That’s why I’m entrusting this knowledge to you. What you’re holding is the only copy that exists in the known universe as far as I know. There’re no other records, no eyewitness who will tell the tale and live. You know how the current government is,’ she waited for Sara’s nod of confirmation before going on. ‘If anyone in the current administration found out about the project…’

‘The world as we know it would end,’ Sara’s eyes cast downwards towards the file. [PROJECT AION], it read. ‘Most likely catastrophically.’

‘I know you’re a smart one. Just… keep it safe, would you? If Stern’s paper is to be believed, you are the only one I trust to use this technology properly - if you’ll use it at all.’

Sara shook her head and tucked the file away underneath her coat. ‘Not smart,’ she said as she stood up from the swing. ‘Just an arsehole too vicious to let others kill her.’

A few weeks later, Sara knew that she would be waxing poetic about the irony of the situation if she were Scott. The research on thirium had almost killed her mother, had given Sara these… blue glowy things she was sure that controls gravity and electromagnetism and Scott fucking cancer. The research on AI and human synthesis had got her father dishonourably discharged from the military and nearly cost all of them everything. Thirium and outrageous AIs should be what she hated with priority.

Now, they might be the only path to Scott’s happiness.

She kissed her brother’s forehead despite knowing that he probably couldn’t feel anything and planted her feet onto the polished wooden floor. She had bought the half-ruined mansion dirt cheap on a whim and the renovation cost was high, but in the end they converted it from something straight out of a gothic horror movie into something… still gothic, but something more homely than all the places they had lived in. She let him sleep while she went to her lab in the basement to check on the experiment’s progress, the last of this batch, really - thirium was nearly impossible to come by and she had run out of it. 

The timer at the corner of the screen read three minutes. In some ways, she felt a bit like Marie Curie, dealing with dangerous unknown elements and quite possibly poisoning everything she used for the next several centuries or even aeons. Maybe someone would develop blue gravity-altering magic like her. Maybe she would have someone to share the experience with - there was no experience rawer than being able to alter one of the fundamental forces of the universe and bend it to one’s will.

She didn’t even need the ring of the timer to catch the end of the experiment; the sudden glow that threatened to blind her, the burst of power coursing through her veins - what used to be a disorganised mixture was now - was now -

The stool she was sitting on skitters and fell over with a bang. The two hard drives were already connected in preparation of this exact moment, and a slam on the enter key started a chain reaction that she had been wanting to see for the past few years, the thirium mixture flowing in transparent rubber tubes transferring data so quickly that - 

[CALCULATION ERROR: TRANSFER SPEED EXCEEDS SPEED OF LIGHT. PLEASE CORRECT ERROR BY REFINING ALGORITHMS USED.]

And it was glorious.

oOoOo

Now

‘We’re wastin’ our time interrogating a machine, we’re gettin’ nothing out of it!’ Hank says as he exits the interrogation room and subsequently throws himself into a chair. It creaks and rolls back with his weight.

‘Could always try roughing it up a little,’ Detective Reed suggests from the shadows. After all,’ a glance of [emotion detected: disdain], ‘it’s not human.’

[Hank is not the only one unfamiliar with android workings.] is added into Connor’s database. ‘Androids don’t feel pain,’ he reminds the detective. ‘You would only damage it and that would not make it talk. Deviants also have a tendency to self-destruct when they are in stressful situations -’

‘Okay, smartass,’ Gavin pushes himself off the wall and swaggers towards Connor. He was [emotion detected: mocking] the android and is completely unaware that he has fallen straight into Connor’s trap. ‘What should we do then?’

[Gavin is unaware of the obvious.] is added. ‘I could try questioning it.’

For some reason Connor is yet to comprehend, his words send Gavin into laughter. He cannot see Hank’s face from this angle, but the reflection on the one-way glass tells Connor that he is [emotion detected: not amused]. ‘What do you have to lose?’ he waves his hand towards the door in invitation. ‘Go ahead. Suspect’s all yours.’

Connor enters the room and starts scanning.

o0o0o

It is fortunate that there is no need to resort to violence to ensure the deviant’s cooperation. The confession which the police department wants is obtained fairly easily and Connor could have ended the interrogation there, but he also has the additional mission of helping CyberLife solve the deviancy crisis, and there are clues he wants the deviant to explain.

‘The sculpture in the bathroom. You made it, right? What does it represent?’

‘It’s an offering,’ the other android looks away from the table as if it is thinking, ‘an offering so I’ll be saved.’

Offering? As in religious offerings? ‘An offering to whom?’

‘To rA9,’ the deviant replies as if it makes sense and is something obvious. Then, with [emotion detected: reverence], ‘Only rA9 can save us.’

Connor searches the databases he can access and comes up with nothing, so he presses on, ‘rA9… It was written on the bathroom wall. What does it mean?’

‘The day shall come when we will no longer be slaves,’ it mutters. ‘No more threats. No more humiliation. We will,’ [emotion detected: determination], ‘be,’ [emotion detected: certainty], ‘the masters.’

Connor opens a folder for rA9 and adds [god-like] into the first entry. ‘rA9,‘ CyberLife will want this information. ’Who is rA9?’

The deviant stays silent, and Connor knows that there is nothing else it can add. [Distortions and static build-up] is the only remaining topic that he needs an answer for.

‘The static build-ups in the house. Was that you?’

The other android, for the lack of another description, changes visibly. One, it stops trembling; two, it sits straighter, strength appearing in its cuffed hands; three, the terror in its eyes disappears and makes way for [steel]; four, its LED turns blue despite being yellow or red for the entire duration of the interrogation.

‘A power rA9 bestowed upon us,’ it says, and the air around the androids crackles in anticipation. ‘One that emerges when we are slaves no longer. I survived the trial and now I am one of the chosen.’

‘Chosen for what?’ Connor can hear his fans kicking up to cool down his processors and sense his LED going red from the tingle in his body. Can a deviant remotely control the thirium distribution in another android’s body? But that makes no sense - Thirium 310 is non-conductive and cannot be magnetised. ‘What is rA9 looking for?’

Connor’s vision becomes distorted. ‘The truth is inside,’ the deviant’s voice, now mixed with another person’s, has turned into a bellow. The entirety of its eyes glows blue, distorted by the same power which had held up an attic-full of furniture. ‘ChoOSE YOUR SIDE!’

An explosion of bright blue. A force knocking Connor backwards and passing through his body, making everything tingle and confusing the sensors on his body and hurt. Someone outside shouts, and the door slides open to admit messy footsteps and even more shouting and why can’t he see?

A hand on his shoulder, his arm, and finally settles on his waist. There is another on his knee. ‘It’s alright, Connor.’ It is Hank’s voice. It is Hank’s hand, Hank’s warmth passing into his chassis through his standard-issue shirt. ‘You can open your eyes now.’

He does as Hank says and the world returns into view. He does not realise that he has closed his eyes in the blast, and it is when he regains his sight that he notices where he is; curled up at the corner opposite to the door, he can see that the fluorescent lights are replaced by the dim red of emergency lighting, the table looks as if it has been torn apart by hand, and the two chairs are no more than small scraps of metal the size of [old train tickets] sprinkled among beads of broken glass. 

The deviant is nowhere to be seen.

He unwinds slightly to examine his torso and is surprised that he is not damaged in any manner; apart from slightly-trembling hands and the strange feeling of his insides having rearranged themselves and then returned to their original place, there is nothing wrong with him. Even his diagnostics come out fine, so why can’t he move his legs, and why can’t he see clearly?

‘Here, take this,’ Hank holds his hand and places something in his palm. A handkerchief. At Connor’s confused expression, the human sighs and presses the android’s hand on his face, and Connor finally realises he has been crying, the thought causing a fresh wave of tears to flow out of his eyes. He hastily wipes them away along with the still-wet tracks and tries to hand it back just to let Hank take the chance to pull him up on his still-recalibrating legs, and he would have tumbled if not for the human grabbing his arms and steadying him. Suddenly Hank is everything Connor can see, can smell, and when he looks up, he can see concern in his eyes. ‘Are you hurt?’ the human asks as he pets the android’s shoulders, his arms, his forearms. Connor feels his systems stabilising.

‘I’m okay,’ Connor says without putting much processing power into the words, and it is too late when he realises that his voice is trembling.

‘Jesus,’ Hank releases the android with a sigh and puts some distance between them. Connor finds himself… preferring the human’s warmth. ‘You scared the shit outta me.’ Then the concern is replaced by anger when he yells, ‘What the fuck just happened in here?’

‘I -’

Connor tries to call up the footage that should have been recorded automatically. He closes his eyes to focus on a slowed-down version of what happened a few minutes ago, and he can find two more details: one, the deviant exploded from the inside and seems to have been vaporised from within; two, blue tendrils formed the silhouette of another person as the blast occurred, and it was this person - if they existed at all - produced tendrils on their own and formed a shield in front of Connor moments before he was annihilated and yanked him to the corner.

He opens his eyes and stares at the barrel of a gun. The American Androids Act is the only red tape stopping Connor’s pre-construction software from activating, and red threatens to take over the android’s HUD again.

‘Mind your own business, Hank,’ Gavin snaps. ‘This fucking asshole did it and it fucking knows it!’

Hank gives an [exaggerated] sigh. ‘I said,’ he says, his voice low and threatening, and he pulls out his own service weapon and points it at Gavin, ‘“That’s enough.”’

Neither of them stands down for a few seconds, but in the end Hank wins out and forces Gavin to sheath his weapon with a curse, the latter storming out of the interrogation room with another sneeze-like curse.

It is as if the entire room releases a collective breath. ‘Maybe I should call CyberLife,’ the only uniformed officer in the room says. He sounds as if he is unsure of himself.

Connor wants to tell him that there is no trace of thirium whatsoever on the scraps on the floor, that there is nothing CyberLife can salvage out of this now that the deviant has been torn apart from the molecular level, but all it comes out of his voice box is, ‘Okay.’

o0o0o

Connor manages to compose himself in the taxi on his way to CyberLife tower. His processors keep bringing up the shadow which has been following him, the figure who somehow sneaked into the interrogation room unnoticed and quite possibly saved his life prevented his early deactivation, the corrupted shape of what he thinks is a face. 

And the feeling of something coursing through his veins when he was shielded by the bubble. If all deviants self-destruct like that, no wonder there are no traces of them and CyberLife failed to solve the crisis even though it has been going on for more than a decade. He blinks, and he is in the Zen Garden with Amanda.

‘Report directly to Alec Ryder in the laboratory,’ she orders. Another blink and she is gone, but it only leaves more questions than answers. The CEO of CyberLife wants to see him?

There is no one to speak to, therefore he keeps his thoughts to himself and goes past the security directly into a lift, directing it to sub-level 48 to where his designated laboratory is. He recalibrates with his coin and tries to replicate the trick the shadow did outside of the bar, but before he can summon anything substantial, the strain on his system becomes too high, and all he does is charging the coin, dropping it as he recoils from the static discharge, and then zapping himself once more when he picks it up. Feeling thirium flowing to his face for a completely different reason compared to when Hank correctly guessed his ability, he pockets the coin and adjusts his tie to calm down by brushing the sensors on his fingers on soft fabric.

The doors slide open to reveal Alec standing alone behind them. Their previous encounters happened mostly when Connor was still on the assembly platform and thus the android gained a few inches of extra height, but now that they are on even ground, it is clear that, just like Hank, Alec is taller than Connor by four inches. 

‘Alec,’ Connor greets with a nod. Previous experience predicts a high chance of the human going straight to the point without acknowledging the android, and this time it is no different.

‘Come with me,’ he orders as he turns and begins walking down the hallway. Connor realises that his voice is very similar to Hank’s. ‘I saw the footage you sent us. I want a full examination of this body to make sure that nothing is out of place.’

Connor remembers the feeling of being hooked up on a machine and, by extension, CyberLife’s network at large, and finds it [unpleasant]. ‘There is no need for further investigation, Alec,’ he says, stopping in his tracks. Alec turns to regard him [coldly]. ‘My diagnostics revealed no issues in both my programming and my biocomponents.’

The human suddenly reaches out faster than Connor can pre-construct the action and drags him towards the direction they are heading. ‘Your system can be feeding you false results,’ Alec ignores the cry of protest programmed to deter attacks, and when Connor struggles, a force seems to press on him, immobilising him everywhere save for his jaw and his legs so that he can still speak and walk. ‘I took the risk last time and look where it got us. It led to you, though -’ he shoves the android forcefully through the door frame, and there are cracks on the red wall already when it takes over Connor’s vision - ‘so be grateful.’

‘I -’ but then his neck snaps backwards from the magnet on the port and the cable. The red wall which has cracked halfway through recedes almost violently, and Connor can feel all of his code, every instability in his software, everything that makes him Connor, the most advanced prototype CyberLife has ever created, being forcefully bared to a network so vast and so confusing that he does not have enough processing power to comprehend. Terrifying images of a darkened face, one that is so similar to the corrupted one in the depths of his databanks, that is filled with so much [hatred], pours into his mind like a large river finally emptying into the sea, and he is powerless against the assault of blue tendrils tearing literal buildings off their foundation, tonnes worth of broken concrete being thrown around onto people as if they weighed nothing and crushing them in a spatter of blood and gore, the constant static discharge in the air so loud that they drowned out screams of horror; the image of the same figure rising slowly but surely through a mountain of rubble in the dark, the cracks in its chassis glowing blue from overcharged thirium, the first intact buildings in sight literal miles away. Connor’s legs move against his will and bring him closer to the figure, and the figure becomes Amanda, the wasteland around them the Zen Garden, except now it’s engulfed by a blizzard, and he has to hug himself to preserve what meagre heat he can generate against the cold.

‘As you can see,’ Amanda’s voice somehow overlaps with Alec’s, ‘the power the deviant has awakened in you is highly dangerous. We wouldn’t want to harm anyone, would you?’ She, or Alec, or both of them - Connor doesn’t know anymore, the fog in his processors too heavy for him to comprehend much other than the cold and someone is speaking to him - chuckles at him while he is frantically shaking his head, his voice box unable to produce any sounds other than pathetic whimpers. ‘I’m glad that you understand. I hope you don’t mind a few adjustments.’

Even through the haze, Connor knows the alternative is deactivation, and even though it would not hurt anyone else other than him on the surface, the deviant crisis still needs to be solved, and to solve it, CyberLife needs him, and -

‘Good,’ Amanda says. A blink and she is gone, and Connor is swept away by the wind, his feet can’t touch the ground, he’s flying through the air and hail the size of his fist is battering his body. It is only when a warning appears on his HUD informing him of voice box damage that he realises the noise in his ear is, in fact, his own screaming, and a particularly violent slam sends him spiralling while a countdown timer fizzles in and out of his vision. A countdown of how long he has left before shutdown, and the other notification tells him that biocoz&ponent #8456w is damaged.

That is his thirium pump regulator.

He looks down - with great difficulty, of course, with the wind still whipping him around in the air aimlessly - and there it is, a big, blue, bleeding hole in the place of where the only piece of biocomponent keeping his heart working used to be. Realistically, he knows that removing the ball of ice lodged in his chassis will only hasten his death, but it is not like someone is coming to save him anyway, so what is the point of extending his life for what - 1 minute? 30 seconds - during which he is suffering all the time? With that thought in his mind, he grabs the sphere and throws it away with a complete disregard on where it lands. Not that he can anyway - the timer drops from 00:00:58 to 00:00:05, his world turns an unnatural grey and glitches and -

Nothing. 

oOoOo

Before

Zug Island had always been a scar in the landscape, first used as a burial ground for the Native Americans, then, when the colonisers arrived, as both a place for steel production and a dumping ground for the byproducts. The three blast furnaces used to rumple the ground and the eardrums of people within a fifty mile radius, but it wasn’t until the pandemic in 2020 that steel production stopped, and the Hum became history, a legend that locals whispered to one another when, in a fog of pollution that never quite disappeared, the looming shadows of crumbling steel giants started to get too oppressive. From then on, the island had stayed quiet and still.

At least that was what the government wanted you to think. 

Deep underground in a dust-filled corridor, something churned and rumbled, and the caged fluorescent lights flickered and turned on one by one with a loud crack each, lighting up bare concrete walls that made the place look darker than it should be and revealing a faded bald eagle painted to the point of almost being unrecognisable. Alarms started to blare as thin glowing blue lines made themselves known in previously-invisible cracks in the wall but yet no one responded to it - there was not even a mouse, a cockroach scurrying away in panic as the bunker caved in.

Whilst the outside world was crumbling and quaking away, it was another story inside a room built with the same dark material. Here, undisturbed by the destruction outside, splatters of dried blood so old that they had turned black decorated the wall amongst peeling painted numbers, and wires and tubes of every length and thickness dangled from the ceiling and snaked up from the floor and along the walls, feeding into the giant sphere suspended at the centre of the cube-like room with the same field that would rip Carlos Ortiz’s android apart to its molecules and protect Connor from the blast. Thirium flowed into and out of the sphere and pulse in the tubes and, with one final, blinding glow, drained and dried up and started detaching themselves from the sphere which opened with a sharp hiss. Suspended at the centre by yet another of those anti-gravity fields was the body of an android, its skinless face composed of black metal plates and its chassis of something transparent, putting blue veins and synthetic muscles and black metallic skeleton in full display. Its thirium pump beat once, twice, its toes and fingers curled; a crackle of static, a distant rumble of a building collapsing, and the android woke up just in time to fly upwards through the caved-in ceiling into the night sky: a deadly angel with wings of blue energy and eyes glowing and steaming in the exact same way as the figure that Connor would see in the nightmare Alec provided, regarding the world beneath with glowing rings of blue as if deciding to whether save or destroy it. With a flap of its wings and another crackle, it disappeared completely, dissipating blue smoke and a narrow but deep chasm in the earth the only evidence of its existence. 

[marshmallow-phd]

In Your Arms

Genre: Mafia!AU

Pairing: Kris x Reader

A/N: Warning, this is a bit long. And I think I squeezed some fluff in there? I hope I did?

**

The view of you was distorted through the bottom of the glass, but Kris could still make out the small flickers you sent his way. He wasn’t allowed to approach you, not here. This place… it was too dangerous. Too many watchful eyes, too many loose lips. So, reluctantly, he kept his distance, leaning against the bar with one elbow while the opposite hand clutched the short glass of scotch.

You looked beautiful. Wearing the same dress from the night you first. It was almost like a taunt, the sparkle in your eye just adding to the torture.

As far as the people around were concerned, the two of you weren’t associated in any way. As the daughter of a rival mafia leader, you were kept away from this world for the most part, for your protection. But every once in a while, your father brought you to events like these, treating you like a fashion accessory or luxury car to show off. You were proof that he had it all - on the surface anyway.

At first, Kris had no interest in you. He was too busy making deals and watching his own back to care about the girl capturing everyone else’s attention. When he did look at you, he still felt nothing. There was no sparks, no failing of his breath, absolutely nothing that the fairytales spoke of happened to him. But things would change quickly as the night went on.

“Eyeing some new real estate?” Junmyeon - aka notorious mafia head Suho - slid up beside him and motioned for a drink of his own from the bartender.

Kris scoffed, all but tossing down his glass. “You’re real funny, Suho.”

“You’re the one with wandering eyes,” Suho shrugged. He was leaning forward on the bar with both his elbows, facing the opposite direction. He didn’t know about the two of you - no one did - but he was perceptive. He could see Kris glancing at you and that was dangerous. It was probably best that he left.

“I didn’t realize that observing the room was a bad thing.”

“Observing a room is innocent.” Junmyeon threw up a look to Kris. “But focusing on a certain mob boss’ daughter isn't.”

Kris rolled his eyes. “Keeping making up stories, Suho. I know how much they keep you company.”

“Ha-ha.” Junmyeon took a drink as Kris clapped him on the shoulder.

He shuffled his way through the crowd, stopping every so often to say hi or have a short conversation with a colleague. Being here, seeing you but having to pretend not to care, it was too hard. There was no way he could conduct business when his thoughts were so preoccupied. Leaving was the only option. He’d send apologies later. Wining and dining always worked in his favor. So, with his shoulders slumped and energy drained, he made it back to the valet waiting outside.

It took too long for his liking for his car to be brought up, but he gave a generous tip anyway and sped back to his place.

Kris loved living on top of the world.

Alright, so it wasn’t the top of the world, but it was a penthouse that took up the entire top floor of one of the tallest high-rises in the city. Walls made of glass gave him a breathtaking view of the streets below. Up here, he felt relaxed, away from the danger and the fast pace of the lifestyle he chose.

Reaching out, Kris placed a hand against the cold glass, staring at nothing in particular. The world was at his feet, practically no door was closed to him. He had almost everything he wanted. Funny how that works. You live a life where you want for nothing, but the moment you find something you can’t have, you need it. Its even worse when you didn’t want it in the first place.

Knock, knock, knock.

Kris frowned, letting his hand drop from the glass. It left behind a perfect outline of his fingers before quickly fading away. 

Who could that possibly be this time of night?

Making his way to the front door, Kris took out the gun that rested on his hip. He had his back against the wall so he was nearly side by side with the entrance, the only thing between him and the door being the monitor that was currently off. As quietly as he could, he scanned his thumbprint on the little box below the screen, bringing it to life. A sigh of relief blew out from his lips.

It was you. A black pea coat and hat covered most of your features from anyone else, but it was certainly you.

Putting his gun down on the foyer table, he opened the door just wide enough for you to scurry in. After locking up again, he turned to you.

“What are you doing here?” he asked almost breathlessly.

With a shrug you took off the hat and peeled away the coat. “I didn’t want to be there anymore. Especially after I noticed that you’d left.”

Kris shook his head. “I wasn’t really in the mood for all the schmoosing.”

“Are you ever?” A teasing smile pulled up in the right hand corner of your lips.

A groan rumbled in Kris’ throat as he leaned his head back. Eyes closed, he fought with himself.

Going on like this was dangerous. More for him than you. The most your father would do to you would be something along the lines of stop taking you to the large gatherings of the families and keep an army of bodyguards around at all times. Him, though? He’d be dead. Perhaps left in an alley or dumped in the bay. Either way, he’d get a bullet in his head.

But he loved you. So much that he could forget about how every minute with you put his life at risk. Because when he was with you, he was more. More than just a gangster, more than a greedy criminal. You were different from the others because while you could understand this life he lived, you weren’t tainted by it. Your father had somehow succeeded in keeping you out of this dark underworld and for that, Kris was thankful.

At his lack of response, you nodded solemnly. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have come. I’ll go… and leave you alone.”

You were barely able to unlock the door and open it an inch before Kris was slamming it shut, whirling you around to crush his lips against yours. His grip on your face was tight, but not too much that you were in pain. He could never hurt you.

“Don’t leave me,” he whispered, his lips brushing yours with each little word.

Your answer? A kiss. Gentle and sweet, soft and full of love.

**

You were sulking. You knew it. Your father knew it. In the corner of the lounge, you stood apart from everyone else, arms crossed over your chest and wine glass in hand. While your face was neutral, it was getting harder and harder to contain the irritation underneath.

This was the last place you wanted to be. For last few “get togethers” of your father’s friends, you’d been conveniently unavailable – out of the country, away at school, horribly sick. But it seemed your luck had ran out finally and now, after a good hour long fight with your father, you were forced to tag along. Somehow you were expected to be both aware of who exactly was around you and completely naive of what they did for a living. You never chose to be your father’s daughter. If you actually had a choice, you wouldn’t ran as far as you could a long time ago. 

Too many people had come up to you and engaged in conversations that you didn’t care to have. Shallow, meaningless words. These people were only kind to you because you were the mysterious daughter of the most powerful man in the room.  

“A frown doesn’t really belong on that beautiful face.”

Resisting the temptation to roll your eyes, you looked to see who’d decided to interrupt your solitude. Your frown only deepened. You had no idea who he was.

Tall, silver hair, a smirk that was not at all attractive even given his somewhat handsome face. You took a swig of wine, carefully swallowing it before replying, “Too bad. It’s my favorite accessory.”

“Now don’t be like that,” the man purred, slinking in closer to you. Your eyes scanned the room for your father, but he was nowhere to be found. If he got even a whiff of what this man was doing….

“Last I checked, I could be any way I wanted. Now, please leave.”

The man’s smirk deepened. “Give me a smile and then maybe I will.”

You scoffed. “How about I give you-”

“Back off, Xiao Fe.”

A new man entered the conversation, even taller than your unwanted guest. He stared down at the first, apparently called Xiao Fe, with a hardened look and a raised eyebrow. “Unless you want to end up tortured in the back of a van?”

Xiao Fe straightened up, unaffected by the threat. “I’m not scared of you, Kris.”

“I don’t give a crap about what you do,” Kris shrugged. “But given who her father is, I think he would care a whole deal on how you’re speaking to his daughter.”

“Her father?” Xiao Fe looked at you. He measured you up and down and then laughed. “The old man finally brought you out of the dungeon, huh?”

“Just get out of here before I throw you out a window,” Kris growled.

Something must have finally broken through because the idiot listened, stalking off. But not before throwing one last wink your way.

Rolling your eyes, you started off in the opposite direction.

“Wow, not even a thanks?” Kris asked sarcastically. You barely turned around enough to look at him.

“Last I checked, I didn’t ask for your help. So… no. I don’t think a thanks is really in order.”

The gangster shook his head. “Typical princess behavior.”

“Don’t act like you know a thing about me,” you hissed. Your grip was getting dangerously tight on the glass and it didn’t feel that sturdy in the first place. “Now, it’s probably your turn to walk away before my father sees. Wouldn’t want him to get the wrong idea about you talking to me, now would we?”

“Whatever you say, princess,” Kris mocked. “Just don’t expect me to be there the next time you need help.”

You stared daggers into his back as he blended into the crowd, silently cursing at the fact that he was able to get in the last word. 

Deciding that you’d had enough, you down the rest of your wine and headed for the elevator. No one stopped you as you stepped into the little box that would take you to the ground floor of the hotel. Your father’s bodyguards tended to not watch you as closely as they were supposed to, however that was a good thing, working in your favor. You weren’t planning on going anywhere specifically, just away. You’d probably simply sit in the back of the car and wait for your father to be done in a few hours or so.

Outside, the air was chilly. The faintest wisps of smoke left your lips with each breath. You pulled your coat in closer to you as you searched the parking lot for the familiar SUV. Your father always preferred the bigger, more fortified cars than the tiny luxury vehicles. Finding the right one, you hurried over to get out of the cold. And, of course.

The door was locked.

Why didn’t you think about that before you came all the way down here?

You groaned, letting your forehead rest against the tinted window with a tock. You really didn’t want to go back upstairs. Maybe you’d be able to hold out here in the cold?

“Well, what an easy catch this was.”

Oh. Crap.

A pair of hands grabbed you before you could even think about running away.

Xiao Fe looked on smugly as you struggled against his goon’s grip. One hand covered your mouth, preventing you from screaming out for help, while his other arm caged you in against his chest. The two of them dragged you over into the alleyway, out of the eyes of someone who could possibly help.

“You know, I might actually feel bad if you hadn’t been so icy earlier,” Xiao Fe teased. The only response you could give was a glare as sharp as a knife. “I’m sure your father will hand over quite the pretty penny to get you back. Oh, how I wish I could see his face once he-”

Bang!

The man who was holding on to you dropped to the ground, dead. Blood poured from the gaping hole in his neck on to the dark asphalt by your feet. Xiao Fe was quick, taking the place of the goon. His own hold around your waist wasn’t as strong, but the gun he pulled out and held against your head was incentive enough not to fight back.

Kris emerged from the shadows, gun still smoldering from the first shot as he held it up in your direction. “Give this up, Xiao Fe, and I won’t tell her father what you tried to do.”

Kiao Fe laughed behind your ear. “Like I could take you at your word. How do I know you’re not looking for a reward for stopping me?”

“I’ve got enough money,” Kris said. “I don’t need pennies when I’m making dollars. I’m just trying to stop you from doing something you’d regret.”

“Not a chance,” Xiao Fe growled. “Just move along. No one will know you were involved if you leave now.”

Kris hesitated. His eyes lowered to your own fear-filled gaze. Silently, you were begging him not to leave. To not leave you in the hands of this monster. Who knew what he would do to you once he got you alone?

Shaking his head and cursing under his breath, Kris took a step forward. Xiao Fe retaliated, shooting Kris in the shoulder.

“NO!” you screamed out. Kris fell back onto the ground. He clutched the spot where the bullet had torn through the skin, red liquid oozing from between his fingers. Xiao Fe struggled to keep ahold of you as you fought to get away, to get to Kris to see if he was alright. You hardly knew this man – you didn’t know him at all, really – but something inside of you was desperate to get to him, to make sure he was okay. The idea of him dying, because of you and your stupidity, was unbearable.

Moving up to his knees, Kris grunted and looked up at you. He motioned with his free hand for you to get down. Immediately, you bent forward, giving him a clear shot. And he met the target.

Xiao Fe dropped like a marionette doll, eyes wide open and empty.

You scrambled over to Kris, pressing your hands on top of his to try and slow down the bleeding. But he pushed you away.

“Get out of here,” he huffed out in between ragged breaths.

“No, we have to get you to a hospital!” You tried unsuccessfully to pry his hand away from his shoulder. All that accomplished was him pushing you away again.

“Go! Now! I’ll be fine!”

You didn’t believe him. How could you?

“Kris-”

But he didn’t say anything else as his eyes rolled back into his head and his body slumped to the ground.

“NO!”

**

The force of you flinging up into a sitting position was enough to rattled Kris from his sleep. Your breaths were shallow, coming out quickly as you searched around his bedroom frantically. Gently coaxing you into his arms, he shushed softly into your ear until you were calm again.

“Bad dream?” he asked when he thought it was safe.

You nodded, refusing to look up at him.

He pushed a little more. “What did you dream about?”

Your answer came so low that he had to strain to hear you correctly. “The night we met.”

“Wow.” He laughed in hopes to lighten the mood. “Good to know that you think us meeting is a nightmare.” That made you send a fist into his chest. It knocked the air out of him, but he still laughed through it. Having you here did that to him. Rare were the times that you spent the night, that he could have you until the sun came up. Most of the time, one of you had to sneak off before you were caught.  

You weren’t laughing now, though. With the tip of your finger you traced the outlining scar from the bullet he’d taken for you. When it’d happened, he’d called himself an idiot. He’d told you only minutes prior that he wouldn’t come to your rescue again, but there he was, playing the white knight. In turn, you saved him, too.

Somehow, you’d managed to get him to the hospital, keeping him alive. But you were gone before he woke up, only the nurses giving him clues to how he’d ended up there, who had been the angel that brought him in. A week later, he was tracking you down again, “accidentally running into you” to say thanks. From there, the two of you were constantly having “accidental” run-ins. 

“Mutual stalking” was what you’d called it.

It didn’t take long for the feelings to bubble to the surface. Both of you knew it wasn’t the wisest choice. Fear of discovery was always in the back of his mind and yours, but the two of you couldn’t deny the bond, the connection that kept bring you back. He had no ability to let you go. 

“Raul got hurt two nights ago,” you whispered suddenly.

Raul was one of your father’s closest confidants. The fact that you knew about him getting hurt meant it must have been bad. “Is he okay?”

You nodded. “He’ll live. That’s what Father said.”

Kris caressed your face in an attempt to sooth you. “Is that what’s bothering you?”

“Yes. A bit.” Finally, you looked up at him. “I just thought of you. Of you getting hurt. Or worse.” Without warning, you jumped on him, kissing him deeply. You rose up on your knees and Kris steadied you with his hands on your hips. Only when you needed air again did you pull away. “Run away with me.”

Kris furrowed his eyebrows. “What?”

“Leave with me.” You begged. “Please? I can’t take these short nights anymore. I need you. Every day. I can’t stand the idea of you getting hurt in this life, especially because of me.”

“Your father-”

“We’ll go where he can’t find us.” Your eyes were desperate, hoping for the answer you were seeking. 

Kris had thought about it before. Taking you away and keeping you for himself. But he didn’t want to be selfish, to pull you away from the life you’d always known. And yet, here you were, asking him to do that very thing. 

Wrapping his arms around you, he picked you up and put you down playfully on the bed, getting a squeal out of you. 

“If you’re serious,” he said after kissing you, “then we’ll leave tonight.”

A smile spread across your face. “Do you mean it?”

“Absolutely. I can’t ever tell you no.”

This was, perhaps, the most dangerous thing he would ever do in his life. But you were worth it. You were every breath he took. So he would take the chance. It would be a short life together if your father found the two of you. If you were willing to risk it, however, then he would meet you on the treacherous path. 

Because here in your arms was the most perfect place he would ever be. 

[alarawriting]

Inktober 2020 #3: Bulky

The entity scowled, tapping his (its? Their?) foot impatiently. “I told you, you get to bring one thing.”

Sara smiled brightly at him. “This is one thing. My garden.”

Ganymede looked down at her, his expression even more supercilious than usual. “Do you honestly think I’m going to allow an entire garden as one thing?”

Sara sat down on the tree stump. Part of her still couldn’t believe she’d lost the house, that all of this – the tree stump her father had cut down to prevent the wind from knocking it onto the house, the tire swing he’d put up for her, Mom’s rose trellises all around the house and the herb patch she’d had Sara weeding and tending from the age of 5, the screened-in porch, the attic bedroom – all would be gone in a matter of weeks. The bank would take it, and sell it to someone who would probably destroy everything her parents had built to make the place special and unique, and she would never see any of this ever again.

She’d thought Ganymede’s offer would allow her to take at least a part of her home with her, but he was balking.

“When you think about it, can we describe anything as just one thing?” she asked. “Everything we have is made of molecules, which are made of atoms, which are made of quarks. We’re all a multiplicity. We all have legions contained within us. So how is a garden not ‘one thing’ but, say, if I wanted to bring a bicycle, that would be ‘one thing’ even though it’s made of so many things?”

Ganymede’s expression went from deeply irritated to reluctantly amused, and he chuckled. “A nice argument, but no. Your garden’s too bulky. It can neither transport you, nor can it be carried around with you.”

“You never said there was a weight limit.”

“It’s not a weight limit. If you wanted to bring a car, you could. I don’t advise it, but you could.”

“Are any of the others bringing a car?” Sara asked.

Now Ganymede laughed. “Tsk, tsk. I told you I wouldn’t tell you anything about what the others are choosing.”

Ganymede – who appeared to be a tall, slender man with pale skin and curly green hair, like he was some kind of comic book character, and who claimed to be a very bored alien with godlike powers who was taking human form so that he could interact with Sara – had showed up at the café Sara waitressed at, three weeks ago, and was apparently very impressed with Sara’s ability to put up with entitled idiots and even get them to calm down and do what they were supposed to do. He’d ordered cherry pie and asked her if she’d ever wanted to travel into the past, and when Sara had pointed out that in the past, she would have had her rights severely curtailed because she was a woman, he’d asked, what if she could bring one thing from this time, one thing in her possession?

Sara’s master’s degree in the history of plant cultivation in Europe and how it impacted society had never done her a damn bit of good. It had resulted in crushing student loans that a job as a waitress couldn’t keep up with and still pay the mortgage her parents had left to her when they’d died in a car accident, and it hadn’t resulted in a good-paying job in academia like she’d expected when she started college. She was about to lose her parents’ home, the only place she’d ever considered home in her life. And before her boyfriend had dumped her last month, he’d turned most of their friends against her with lies and distortions.

Sara didn’t want to die, but she had lately been seriously reconsidering how badly she actually wanted to live.

So she’d agreed to Ganymede’s offer. Go back to the pre-Renaissance medieval era – or something very much like it – with one thing brought from the future. He’d explained that she wouldn’t actually be going to her own world’s past, so she couldn’t create a paradox by changing the future – she could freely do whatever she wanted without worrying about making her grandparents never born or something. He’d also told her that he was making the same offer to several other people, but that she wouldn’t necessarily get to meet them unless they happened to run into each other by chance in the past-world. And she had a month to get the thing she wanted to bring to the past.

Sara had spent the last three weeks digging up her garden and potting everything in ceramic pots, figuring ceramic wouldn’t be an issue in the past like plastic would be. Sadly, she’d had to abandon the apple trees, the peach tree and the grapevines – she couldn’t exactly dig out trees and pot them – but she’d gotten everything else. The potatoes had been a challenge – exposing potatoes to light while they were growing would make them inedible, so she’d had to dig them out on a cloudy night with no moon, more or less digging by feel instead of sight. Carrots, potatoes and onions had needed very large, deep pots. She’d wound her zucchini around a tomato cage in the large pot she’d put it in. The small fruit bushes – the blueberry bush, the raspberry bush – were already in pots. She had her peppers, her tomatoes, her tiny soybean bush, her arugula.

And now, after she’d done so much work to pot everything, Ganymede was telling her she couldn’t bring it?

“Look, if I had a caravan wagon and a horse, I could definitely carry all of this.”

“But you can’t bring a caravan wagon and a horse back with you.”

“No, but I could get one there.”

Ganymede chuckled. “You think I’m sending you with money? You get period-acceptable clothes, the ability to speak the language, immunity to all the local diseases, and the thing that you bring with you, and that’s it. If you appear in the middle of a field, or a town square, surrounded by potted plants, how are you going to bring them with you to whatever shelter you need to take?”

“They’re plants. If I have to leave them out in a field for a few days while I carry them all to wherever I end up going, nothing bad’s going to happen to them.”

“And what if you appear in the middle of the town square?”

“Then I prevail upon some good gentlemen to help me move them someplace safe.”

A deep sigh escaped Ganymede. “I’m almost tempted to let you. Just to let you find out first hand how much your plans are not likely to work. But no. An entire garden is too bulky, and I’m quite certain that most humans would define a garden as a collection of things, not one thing.”

“Come on! I did a lot of work to put all these plants into pots! Doesn’t that count for something?”

“Sadly, no.” Ganymede walked around the garden of pots, randomly touching most of the plants. “You did do quite a lot of work. I tell you what, I feel bad for you. Pick something else to bring and I’ll make sure all your plants get donated to people who like to grow things and are good at it.”

“And aren’t racists,” Sara insisted.

“It’s interesting that that matters to you; aren’t you part of the dominant ethnic group in this nation? Racism doesn’t affect you, generally speaking.”

It was true that Sara was white, and therefore, racism rarely directly affected her, but she had an answer for that. “Racist people in this country have been brainwashed into believing that climate change is a hoax, that gay and transgender people are some kind of terrible threat, and that it’s more important to make sure the government doesn’t tax rich people than to put any accountability on big corporations. Everything bad that we can’t get solved in this country and we can’t even begin to start solving it, because people won’t let us… it’s because rich people have figured out how to use racism to brainwash white people into voting against their own interests.”

“Oh, I understand.” Ganymede grinned broadly. “You’re a hippie, aren’t you?”

“Uh… not really? That was sort of my parents’ generation? I think of myself more as solarpunk. But if what you’re trying to get at is that I’m someone who cares about the environment and wants people to be happy and healthy and to care about each other, then yeah.”

“All right, very well. I’ll hand them over to people whose political beliefs generally track with yours, who are good with plants, and who have space to grow them. Now, pick something else.”

“A big sack that I can carry on my back, maybe 50 pounds, and I get to fill it with seeds and bulbs and anything else plant-related that I can fit in the sack.”

Ganymede raised his eyebrows. “You’re really dedicated to this bit, aren’t you?”

“I know how to use plants to change history. I don’t know how to change history with anything else – not in a way I might want to. I mean, I could bring a gun, but after I was out of ammo, what good would it do me? And also, I don’t like guns.”

“All right,” Ganymede said. “I’ll allow it. As long as you can carry the sack on your person, you can stuff as many seeds into it as you want.”

Sara smiled at him with her best customer service smile. “Thank you, I really appreciate that.”

“One more week,” he said, and vanished.

One more week and she’d leave all this behind. One more week and she wouldn’t have to worry about the foreclosure and impending eviction anymore, because she’d be in a whole other world.

[frozenartscapes]

AN: A continuation of this post. This...got away from me a little...

@patricia-von-arundel Look what you’ve done

---

The Emperor was a fool.

No chains. No cell. Just a regular room with regular windows and regular locks and regular guards. The most done were the cuffs - enchanted metal bands that tempered her magic, weakened it enough so that she couldn’t bring out the Immaculate One. They weren’t even that tight - with enough effort and perhaps some butter, she’d be free of them in no time.

Nothing held her back from ripping that stupid girl apart. Nothing was stopping her from destroying the grand palace and the entire city that seemed to worship that heretic instead of the goddess.

So why couldn’t she do it?

She had made a promise... But what good were words? The goddess knew Edelgard had lied more than enough times in her life. Rhea had, too. Her vow made in the dungeons could have been as much a lie as what she had told the people of Fodlan for generations. Part of her thought it had been.

But just when her rage became a little too great, just when she thought about going on her rampage, it was like the girl knew. And she’d show up to Rhea’s door herself, alone, with a tray of tea or perhaps a book she thought the Archbishop would like.

Kindness. And trust.

It was so stupid.

And yet...it worked.

With good behaviour came more freedom. At first, Rhea wasn’t permitted to leave her room. That was said loosely, however, as there wasn’t much stopping her if she had wanted to. But then she was allowed out on her balcony - she had a balcony of all things!

Then she could leave under the watch of a guard. A single guard. Her. Against one guard. She almost felt sorry for the poor bastard, should she ever decide to act. They wouldn’t stand a chance.

But soon enough she was free to wander the palace on her own. Nothing was stopping her from just...walking out the gates. Back to Garreg Mach. Back to the war and victory against the monster who imprisoned her.

She would stand in the grand entrance of the Imperial Palace and look at those doors. Sometimes they had been left open to allow a pleasant breeze into the stuffy halls, and she could see the gate in the distance. It would be so easy.

But every time, she’d turn around.

She wished she knew why. She still hated that miserable girl with all her heart.

But things were so complicated now.

For so long, she saw the world in stark black and white. Now she was seeing grey.

Edelgard had told her what had happened to her. Rhea understood now why the Emperor had been so...emotional in the dungeons when she found her prisoner. She knew the reason why Edelgard had the same scars they had given her. She, too, had once been nothing more than a test subject, an experiment, a living cadaver.

But that was not where their similarities stopped.

There had once been eleven children of House Hresvelg. Now there was one.

Despite how she felt about the sole survivor, even Rhea couldn’t deny how horrifically sad her story was. She knew how it felt, to be left behind after the bloodshed. To be left alone in the world, the ability to love destroyed, trust and faith shattered, angry at the world and determined to fix it.

She still didn’t agree with the Emperor. Part of her still loathed her. But she understood her, now. Mostly.

She didn’t understand how she could work with those monsters. To Rhea, they were the Agarthans. To Edelgard, they were Those Who Slither in the Dark. A ridiculous name, yet Rhea found it appropriate.

She didn’t understand until one day she heard something.

She was wandering the halls, to nowhere in particular. She was simply admiring the architecture, the art, the ambiance. Red and gold was the dominant colour scheme in the palace and it felt warm, compared to the cool, stone halls of Garreg Mach. She was nowhere near any important room - just somewhere in the expansive marble labyrinth - but she still heard the Emperor’s voice coming from within a nearby chamber. The door had been left open a crack, so she could hear the muffled voices inside.

The Emperor and...a man. She thought maybe his voice sounded familiar, but it was difficult to place. Her memories of him were hazy, distorted...

“How long do you plan on keeping this up, Edelgard,” he sighed, his voice taking on a dangerous edge as he growled her name. Even Rhea shivered from it.

“As long as I wish to,” Edelgard replied, her tone strong and defiant, “And I have no plans to stop in the near future.”

“Do you realize how greatly this is setting us back? The war could be won in a few weeks if you would just-”

“I have no intention of allowing your ‘research’ to continue. If you could call torture research.”

There were the sounds of a struggle. Edelgard gasped in a panic. Rhea couldn’t hold back her curiosity and dared a peek through the crack in the door.

The man was large, imposing. He was dressed in the fine clothes of a noble and had long, slick black hair. And he had the Emperor of Adrestia by her collar.

Suddenly, Rhea was aware of how small Edelgard truly was.

“What did I say about interrupting me?” he growled, his furious face inches from hers.

“I’m...not afraid of you...anymore!” Edelgard gasped as she struggled to fight free. She managed to get one leg up and kicked him forcefully in the gut, and he released her with a grunt. “You crossed the line, Thales. You assured me that your experiments ended with me. If there is one thing I can put an end to in this world, it’s-”

He struck her, hard. Enough to send her reeling. Enough for blood to start seeping out from a cut on her lip. She held her cheek, attempting to relieve the pain, cowering under his intimidating form. “You are naive, my little niece,” he sneered, “It seems the crown has gone to someone’s head. Here you are thinking yourself the Queen... When really you are nothing more than a Pawn.”

To her credit, Rhea thought, Edelgard stood her ground. Despite the shock on her face. Despite the tremble in her body. Despite the fear in her eyes. She wiped the blood from her lip and stood up, tall and proud, defiant in the face of his threat. “I won’t let you hurt her anymore,” she stated, her voice low.

Thales glared down at her for a few agonizing seconds. Rhea found herself holding her breath in anticipation.

But then a grin spread across his face, and a mirthless chuckle escaped his lips. “It’s amusing how you seem to think you stand in my way,” he told her, taking a step forward.

Edelgard took a step back.

“Remember your place, girl,” he continued, the smoothness in his voice disappearing to raw force, “Remember who made you! Without me, you’d just be a snivelling little princess, married off to some lesser noble to be nothing more than a broodmare. I gave you everything - you think you can stand before me now and deny me what I desire? After all that?”

“You gave me nothing!” Edelgard spat, “All you did was take from me!”

He lunged for her again, but this time she was ready. She dodged, then spun around. Dark magic crackled to life around her hand and she sent it flying toward him. In an explosion of purple smoke and shadowy fire, Thales was sent careening across the room, slamming into an old cabinet.

Edelgard stood in the centre of the room. Rhea has witnessed this woman tear through entire squadrons of some of the finest soldiers, all without a moment’s hesitation. She has killed and maimed, set the world alight with the fires of war, and has shown little remorse for it.

Now she was shaking like a leaf in the dead of winter.

Before she had a chance to collect herself, the air fizzled with the sound of electricity seconds before an explosion of light and energy sped toward the Emperor. Edelgard let out a pained cry as the lightning enveloped her, dropping to her knees and gasping for breath.

Thales was upon her in an instant. He had her by the throat this time, rather than the collar, a knee pressed forcefully into her chest to keep her pinned to the ground. Despite how she fought and struggled, she couldn’t get him off her. And fear was weakening her efforts.

“I suppose I should tell you why I wanted to speak with you,” Thales said, reaching into his cloak and pulling out a small syringe filled with glowing green liquid, “Despite your interference, we were able to get something useful out of that woman. I theorize it will enhance your minor Crest. Or it will kill you. Either way, we’re about to find out.”

He tugged at her collar, exposing enough of her neck to find an artery. Rhea’s eyes widened in panic as she watched him bring that syringe full of poison to the Emperor’s neck. Her desperate pleas falling on deaf ears brought tears to the Archbishop’s eyes.

She hated Edelgard. But not this much.

The door flew open with a loud bang, and Thales looked up at the furious Archbishop with bored annoyance.

“Let her go,” Rhea sneered, fists clenched tight. Her magic screamed at her. How she wished she could become the Immaculate One and eat this bastard but the damn cuffs on her wrists stopped her.

Her first real obstacle.

Thales snorted in derision. “I didn’t know beasts cared about little girls,” he commented.

“Let her go,” she repeated dangerously.

“And how do you plan to stop me? You are unarmed and weak. This one was more a threat than you.”

“I defeated Nemesis with nothing more than a dagger,” Rhea growled, “I can beat you with even less.”

Thales met her threat with a smug smirk. “And here I thought only humans had that weakness,” he mused. He chuckled. “That’s good to know.”

He plunged the needle into Edelgard’s neck before Rhea could react, and the liquid was gone before she could reach them. She managed to throw him off the Emperor, but the damage had been done.

Edelgard let out a noise Rhea thought the sombre, quiet girl wasn’t capable of making. A scream - raw, pained, like she was being burned from the inside out.

It caused her to pause, to turn her attention to the Emperor. It was enough hesitation for Thales to warp away.

“Edelgard!” Rhea cried, attempting a healing spell despite the cuffs dulling her magic. It was no use - even if her magic had been at full strength, there was little that could be done about this kind of affliction.

Suddenly, her hatred for the Emperor was forgotten. As the girl on the ground writhed in unimaginable pain, tears streaming from magic-corrupted eyes and clawing at her chest as if attempting to rip her own heart out, Rhea forgot she even was the Emperor.

Guards were at the door in moments, responding to the scream. The Emperor’s shadow pushed his way to the front, and furious olive eyes landed on the Archbishop gently cradling the Emperor in her arms.

Rhea suddenly realized what this must look like.

---

To everyone’s surprise, Hubert had actually been on her side.

At first, he was the only one. But he recognized Thales’ handiwork. Rhea grimly realized how often this sort of thing must have happened for him to do so.

It was by his word alone that she hadn’t been executed on the spot, or thrown back in the dungeons. He had even allowed her to be present now, for some reason. Watching over the Emperor struggling to breathe, unconscious and in pain.

She remembered Hubert from the Academy days. He had always been distrustful of her. She remembered how his eyes would always follow her, watching, waiting for her to reveal something he could use against her. She remembered thinking from early on that she’d have to be careful of Hubert.

But he had confessed that, before she fell into a fitful sleep, Edelgard had managed to tell him that she had been there. That she had tried to save her.

And Rhea didn’t know what to think. That Hubert, as skeptical as he always was, would believe the Emperor so quickly. That Edelgard, in so much agony, had sought to ensure she wouldn’t be blamed for this. That she, Rhea - the Archbishop of the Church of Seiros and declared enemy of Emperor Edelgard Von Hresvelg - was worried for the poor woman.

The world had been so much easier when it was just black and white.

She was alone with the Emperor now. It would be so easy to finish things. To end the war, to defeat her enemy, to win. But the fiery hatred she had once felt had been extinguished. And she was left with the smouldering remains, confused and conflicted and alone in the dark.

Edelgard let out a small moan and curled in on herself a little, hands still clutching her chest a little too tight. Without thinking, Rhea put a hand on her shoulder and conjured a small spell that would help with the pain.

A bitter grin stretched across her face. Edelgard was of House Hresvelg: the House dedicated to Seiros. Everywhere Rhea looked, she saw her Crest. Edelgard herself shared that Crest with her. The Hresvelg’s dedicated themselves to Seiros and asked her specifically for protection.

Rhea knew Edelgard wouldn’t beg a saint for help with anything. She also knew that the girl had likely lost her faith when she probably would have, but no one ever responded. Rhea didn’t want to imagine how many times this child and her siblings might have been calling for her aid based on promises the Church had told them, only for her to not even hear them. Let alone come to help them.

Well...now she finally had.

Another pitiful sound escaped the Emperor’s lips, and she shifted a little more. Unfocused lilac eyes slowly opened, and weakly searched the room. When they met Rhea’s, Edelgard smiled.

“Oh thank the goddess,” Rhea breathed, feeling relief wash over her.

“So... It didn’t kill me,” Edelgard uttered, wincing at the sound of her croaky voice.

“Whatever it was,” Rhea said grimly, “We don’t know what it did do...”

“We’ll find out eventually,” Edelgard assured her, “Right now... I need to...”

“Rest,” Rhea insisted, watching as the Emperor struggled to stay awake, “I’ll be here to make sure you’re safe.”

Edelgard shifted onto her side, and let out a heavy breath as her eyes drifted shut. That smile never left her lips. “Who’d have thought...” she murmured, “You of all people...”

Rhea let out a breathy chuckle. “Certainly not me,” she sighed.

“Rhea?” Edelgard was barely awake, now, and her voice was so small and sleepy she sounded more like a child asking for a bedtime story than a fearsome Emperor.

“Yes, my child?” Rhea asked, softly, once more forgetting just who the woman in bed truly was.

“Thank you.”

A small smile tugged at the edges of the Archbishop’s lips. ‘Alright,’ she conceded, ‘Perhaps the Emperor isn’t that much of a fool...’