#and countless spirits and ghosts he was playing hide and seek with

[simpofhans]

hans is a horsegirl with three horses counting two elemental spirits and i love him for that ^^

and he knows the nokk way earlier than elsa did so... he is friends with him on daily basis (not counting few drownings which ended without any harm)

and he also has heavenly horse that is a gift from his mother's ghost but he is not that important in the story.... but he is the cutest LIKE HE IS JUST A FOAL!!!! ^^

[goliath-de-senfina-sango]

Teller of Tales

The trio head through the portal to explore Danny's brand spanking new Sanctuary and are a little awed by all that he managed to make.  They meet a facinating new ghost, who has a deal for them.

ao3

When Danny took Sam and Tucker through the portal and into his Sanctuary, he was glad to see that he wasn’t the only one floored by how much of it there was, or how complex it had turned out. “I don’t think I’ve ever even made a drawing this complicated and detailed before,” he said as they reached the roof of the main portal building and house. It was at the heart of what looked to be a town or maybe even a city, which was surrounded by a dense forest, with a mountain to one side, a massive body of water that Danny would call a lake but that looked so vast an ocean felt more appropriate on the other, and even misty clouds of every kind of color he could see passing by a point of brilliant light. “I’m glad it’s been keeping Walker out as much as it has, and every other ghost too. That means we can explore it!”

“Danny, this place is magnificent!” Tucker wrapped him up in a tight hug and squeezed nearly hard enough to crack his back. “Dude, you made a whole ass town that’s almost as big as Amity Park! I wonder how stocked up this place is. You’ve got copies of our hoverboards here too, so what are we waiting for?”

“I say we take a look at that forest, it’s practically screaming ‘enchanted and full of mystery’, and maybe we can even figure out what all goes on in that head of yours.” Sam poked Danny’s head with a laugh and called up her own backup hoverboard, hopping over the ledge and onto it before Tucker could catch up. Tucker, of course, swerved off to see if he could find anything substantial in the town, which meant splitting up, which had Danny reaching out to grab them both.

“Guys hold up! Are we really gonna go into a freshly made place that I made mostly subconsciously while in ghost form and do it while splitting up? Are we the Scooby gang?”

“Take full offense from this but you’re baby,” Tucker said with a snort. “Your subconscious mind didn’t come up with anything that might hurt us.”

“Maybe not on purpose, but I might’ve made some parts of this place uninhabitable to regular humans, but perfectly safe for a ghost to be floating around in.” After all, a ghostly mind set deeply into a Passion could easily forget things like safety regulations for squishy humans. Young Blood wasn’t even malicious or Obsessive and look at how he’d turned out.

Sam rolled her eyes but circled back around to the boys. “Fine, we can stick together and tour your McMansion together, you lil show off, but if so then how about we take a look at the edges to see what we can learn about how well defended this place is? It’s meant to be your Sanctuary, so you’ve gotta have some way of keeping ghosts out without just shotting at them.”

“We can work our way through the town and out into the forest, guys, you know that right? We’re literally starting from the middle.” Danny sighed, shaking his head. “The defenses are clearly working because nothing’s actually done anything to us yet, they can wait.”

It took a bit of back and forth but eventually, they all decided on a direction to go and headed for the lake instead of the mountain. After all, if the water was safe for humans, they could all go for a swim. The trio set off and found what looked to be empty homes, some buildings that could be shops, a few restaurants that just needed stocking up and customers, and other places that looked all but ready to be populated by people stuck on the ground and people who could fly. There was a warehouse full of Focuses, cameras, and replicas of every robot or project that Danny and Tucker had ever put together before, along with a few that stored Fentonworks non-violent products too. “This place looks like someone’s fantasy dream town where you can sit, relax, chat up a ghost, and then head off into the unknown in your very own - oh wow, Danny is that the Specter Speeder?”

“Well, I may have gone over Mom and Dad’s blueprints a while back for it, but only because I wanted to see if I could develop ya know, a space ship from it.” Danny felt his cheeks burning and gave Tucker’s shoulder a light punch to try and wipe the grin off his face. “Shut up.”

“Actually, the closer we get to the forest, the more ‘port town’ vibes I’m getting,” Sam mused. “Danny, didn’t you say you wanted to be a pirate once when you were a kid?”

“Shut uuup, noo.” Danny pulled his hood over his face, even as he turned invisible. Ok, so maybe it did look like the perfect place for a pirate who hit land on an undiscovered island to have set up their own little town. That proved nothing.

Just as Sam opened her mouth to keep teasing him, Danny popped into visibility and transformed entirely, shooting into the air with plasma gathered in his hands. It felt like the pull of some massive celestial object focused on him and his sanctuary alone, getting closer and closer, and Danny was all but certain he couldn’t do much on his own against it. He reached into his Sanctuary, felt it reach back, and begged it to hide . The partly cloudy sky went dark, the clouds now stretching over the whole expanse of the island, and in the mountain, Danny could feel the hum of railguns warming up and ready to fire like Danny couldn’t on his own.

The clouds were parted by something vast and incomprehensible that sung every song never known by mortal ears, and looking at it was looking upon all that had ever happened throughout the whole of humanity, listening to every story ever told to another person, and Danny nearly unraveled before he could look away. Something like a bell tolled and that massive shape resolved itself into something steadily smaller and simpler, while a voice called out to them - when had Tucker and Sam joined in him in the air? - with a deep baritone voice. “ A̸̢̦̮̥͚h̴͉̟̳͙͈͎̩͡, my sincerest apologies! I hadn’t expecte d any mortals or bridge spirits to be here and so came to investigate this lovely new place in an old er form. Perhaps this is easier on your minds and senses?”

The being settled into the shape of a male presenting person with grey skin, a white shirt, black pants, and a purple trench coat. They were also wearing glasses over eyes that were green at a glance but any lingering eye contact showed every shade of green and violet that could be thought of, and Danny struggled to keep his gaze on the center of the being’s forehead. They smiled with shark-like teeth and held out a hand. Danny, after likely too long, regained enough sense to shake their hand and cleared his throat. “Uh, yeah, this is uh, this is a lot easier. Hi. I’m Danny.”

“Hello Danny, I’m recently going by Ghostwriter! And who might you all be?”

“I’m …. Tucker Foley. Tech master extraordinaire.” Tucker shook off his awe quickly enough and gave the Ghostwriter some finger guns and a grin, shaky as it may have been.

Tucker’s joke seemed to snap Sam out of her own stupor and she shook the ghost’s hand warily. “Sam Manson, curious to meet you.”

“It’s always good to be curious! I came here sensing both a new place to learn about, the gateway to this lovely little planar system, and also I sensed a curious mind like my own seeking new fascinating secrets to uncover. Considering only one of you is capable of creating a Sanctuary, I imagine it’s you, Danny?”

Danny nodded and scratched the back of his neck. “Uh, about you coming here, can I ask uh, what was up with that mind-melting form you were just in?”

“I’ve never properly understood Lovecraftian Horror’s until now,” Sam muttered with a shiver. Tucker elbowed her in the side.

Ghostwriter tapped their chin with a hum and looked around at Danny’s spooktacular bachelor pad and clapped his hands with a grin. “I propose a trade! If I tell you about myself, as the answer to your question is best answered with story, then you all tell me about your selves. Deal?”

The trio looked between each other and nodded, Danny holding out his hand to shake. “Deal. Can we take this to the cafe down there though?” Danny pointed exactly to one of the cafes in his Sanctuary and slowly relaxed his panicked grip on the place. If Ghostwriter wanted trouble he clearly didn’t want any with Danny.

They sat down, Danny found some tea, coffee and all the things required to make hot chocolate inside, and offered everyone. Tucker accepted some iced tea, while Sam and Ghostwriter got coffee, and soon Danny sat down with his own hot chocolate and everyone else’s drinks. They appreciated the drinks and took big sips before the Ghostwriter began to speak.

“Oh, but where to start, where to start? If you have time, I can start even at the very beginning of it all?” The trio looked between each other and shrugged; it was the weekend, they had plenty of time. Ghostwriter seemed delighted by that. “The very beginning it is!” Music began to play, soft and mysterious in their minds.

“Before all that you see around you, before the swirling mists and oceans of darkness, before the very concept of Being, nothing was all that was. No past, present or future, no light or darkness, simply a blank nothingness.” On the table, a portion of the air became… empty, in a way that Danny felt in his soul, and he ached to fill the void. “Now, no one, not even myself or my siblings, knows why what happened happened, but for whatever reason or unreason, something began to Exist. Now, the very first something is what some call ectoplasm, others magic, and countless other names, but my siblings and I simply refer to it as the Realms themself being born.” Green light shone in the center of the void and quickly expanded to fill it up, accompanied by glorious and triumphant music.

“Now, while the Realms were the Something to all the Nothing at its edges, it still had just about nothing in it. So, it got to making things within itself from itself, and after a bit of experimenting with half-formed ideas like any creative soul, the very first Realm - the first universe was created. Inside of this universe, there was a great deal and the forces that be happened to be rather proud of themself but had no one to share their creation with. So, they created a soul, and a vessel to house that soul in so that someone could experience what they had made. There was, however, the issue of longevity, which was solved somewhat easily enough, by moving the soul into yet another vessel.”

The shape of a person appeared, surrounded by others, and a light slid out of one as they fell, before being nudged into the next, back and forth. “Now, what with the flexibility of how the Realms interact with time, the soul of their creation was able to hop from mortal vessel to mortal vessel, back and forth across history. Each time the soul left a body it simply went to the edges of the universe before being guided to its next life. And so it went until all the mortals were gone, but the soul was now so complex from experiencing life as every mortal that it could fit in larger vessels from which to appreciate the world. So, they became each planet in turn, and then each star, and each galaxy and cluster, and black hole, until that universe finally went dark, and the being had been everyone and everything in it across its lifespan.”

The light grew brighter and brighter with each leap it took until it burrowed down deep enough to contain that light, and the images Ghostwriter showed them zoomed out to show a solar system. And from there, the light flowed all around it, even jumping to other systems, until the light was too bright to contain in those planets and so it became all the light there was. Abruptly there wasn’t any light at all. An emptiness that the soul grew and grew to fill.

“And so in the cold, dark, quiet of the seemingly dead universe, the being that experienced Existing in a way the Realms could not did what it hadn’t the chance to between all its various lives with their fresh starts and clean slated beginnings: remembered. They experienced all that they had gone through, the scope of their life unfolding to be felt in its entirety in a way that could only be done when unbound by flesh and stone and plasma confines.”

The darkness shrunk as the grey light grew, and then the darkness was a ball within a green expanse. “And then they Were, and the universe ended with a bang, as they who I call mother and you can refer to as Queen Death, was born into the Realms properly.” The ball cracked and trembled before exploding in all directions, the bits of the cosmic eggshell being tossed to the edges of what they could see on the table. A being outlined in grey that held every color there was within, spun around in excitement, and reached out, taking one of the fractured shells of her egg and molding it like clay into another ball, then doing the same with another.

For a long moment, the trio stared at the little queen Death making universes all around her, Tucker sipping his tea as he did so. While Danny was still processing and Sam struggled to find her words, Tucker set his cup down and cleared his throat. “So, there’s a lot to unpack there, and I presume that you’re one of those souls that finished maturing inside of their universe - what are your pronouns by the way?”

“Ah yes, those, I go by he and him for now.”

Tucker nodded and hummed. “So there’s a Queen of the afterlife then? Queen Death?” Ghostwriter’s face fell from that of an eager storyteller to something sour, bitter, and full of grief.

“Not anymore, sadly. Once Mother had adjusted to Being, she realized that she too could create in this wonderful place from which she came. She crafted for herself a lovely palace made half from concepts rather than stone or metal or wood, though it was made from all that and more too.” Death was shown molding the very mist around her into an intricate and beautiful landscape and building, before stopping and sitting cross-legged in her throne, tapping her chin. “But Death knew something was missing from her experience, something she’d had once before: companionship.”

Death was shown leaving her castle to go and gather the broken bits of her eggshell, and took them into her palace, before splitting one shell chunk in two and twisting the two into eggs. Green light gathered in each of her palms and flowed into the shells. “Mother made my eldest siblings, who would go on to name themselves Entropy and Peace. Unlike with her own experience with being guided into each new life, mother decided her first children would have a less lonely experience.” Blue light flowed from one egg and golden to the other and back, with the guiding hand of Death.

“Peace and Entropy would know each other in a way few still living gods do, for they were each other at times. And when they emerged, they gazed upon Death’s palace and kingdom with wonder, and they were a happy family.” Blue and Gold silhouettes hatched from their eggs, both donning violet. The three laughed and hugged and danced, crafting and playing. “And Death, and the Realms, decided to create again, and this time they would act together. And this time,” Ghostwriter said with a chill in his voice and his drink boiling, “the Realms would act on their fascination with balance.”

A violet light appeared as Death molded an egg all her own, and it pulsed and dripped with what felt to be oddly malicious. Entropy and Peace went about exploring their mother’s world while this happened and even took a few discarded shells to craft a universe of their own. Death and her children soon went about covering the table in art and Realms, along with Realms simply spawning from nowhere. The dark purple egg hatched, and the other universes shook.

“What if I told you that the force that brought Existence into Being made mistakes? What if I told you that gods can die?” Ghostwriter gestured to seven eggs orbiting each other, bands of light flitting between them all. “The third child of Death called himself War, and he was the first to disrupt things and give Peace a job to do.” War walked over and flicked the bands of light between two of the eggs, forcing the soul out into the Infinite Realms early, and it grew into a small green being. Peace flew over, and gently nudged the being back toward its egg, but not before drawing from within a blade and cutting through the tiny being. It returned to a ball shape and flowed back in.

“Ghosts of the dead, as you might call them, are souls set adrift from the path between lives, and Peace made it his job to take them back where they go. Sometimes War did this many times at once, and I, curious, asked Peace to allow a few to stay. After all, they were going to end up here again anyway, weren’t they? And so, we tried that, and due to the boundlessness and chaotic nature of the Realms these ghosts found themselves evolving and mutating over time, some of them fulfilling a passion from their previous life and finding their way back home into the next life, while others stayed here and grew and grew and even figured out a way to reproduce - sexually and not. Those ghosts born in the Realms from the dead we call Deathless because they never died.”

“So you’re the reason we have ghosts and stuff?” Sam frowned at the Ghostwriter and the story unfolding before their eyes froze. “Because you wanted to see what’d happen?”

“The name I first took was Curiosity, my dear, and actually I was the first ghost, made rather curious for a reason. It was something new. If I may?”

“Sorry.” The writer waved it off and the story continued.

“Peace forged a sword within himself that he used to set free souls that had gone too long outside of their shells, their minds dissolving under the pressure of an eternity they weren’t mature enough for yet. Many of the elder Deathless he granted such Peace granting tools, and so when a ghost went mad with age they were cut down and their soul returned to their egg. But if that were the last of War’s troublesome and destructive actions, this tale would have a happier ending.”

The violet War wrapped himself in black and red and forged within himself a ring and from that ring beat drums and played bagpipes and ripped chords that called out to something burning hot inside of Danny that had his chocolate evaporating out of his cup. “A god or a ghost can craft from themselves an artifact of power that embodies their very self, their greatest passion. Peace acted as a knight to Queen Death, while Entropy became the watcher over things, and War… War crafted his own place, a fortress beyond our immediate sight, and started taking ghosts there.”

War took the tiny green ghosts far from the others and brandished his ring at them, and from it a sickly purple light seeped out and infected the ghosts, turning them a toxic looking blend of green and purple. Danny shivered, and Sam set down her coffee, looking pale and furious. “Before we knew what he was doing, we thought of War simply as seeking conflict, as his name implied. But war, oh war is not just violence, it is imperialism, it is slaughter, it is conquest it is a͜ h҉un̵g̸er̶ ̸th҉at ca̴nnot be sat̶ed ųnt͜i̷l ͜all͢ i͏s͝ c̸o̡ns͢umęd ̕an͏d̴ ̕li̷k͝e͞l̢y̕ ev͜en͢ ͟not t҉he̛n.” The sickly purple and red light spread further and further, seeping into the ground and choking the air.

“When the dead forge artifacts that outlast them, they make them from the ectoplasm of the Realms and have them resonate with that ghost’s soul, thus allowing any Dead, Deathless, or even a living mortal with the same soul or at least born of the same soul as the ghost who made it to use it. When one of us does it though, well, we’ve got a universe worth of energy to work with, replenished by the Realms, so we reach inside and forge our relic from our own soul, and a bit of ectoplasm. Queen Death made her crown of Fire as a light to keep back the darkness, and to assist her in managing the ebb and flow of souls across the cosmos.”

The palace courtroom came into view and violet War marched forth toward his mother, his purple and red, and black ring pulsing with the beat of wrath. “As her Majesty Queen Death put to work her latest project of making systems out of Realms that would regulate themselves, her third eldest child marched into her throne room with a ring made from the collective heat and metals of stars within him, his malice, his corruptive hunger that would take and steal and conquer, and he stole from her what was her own, the Crown of Fire that lit the darkness of the Infinite Realms, and with a sword stolen from a Peacemaker he earned his most hatefully spat title, the Filthy Mother Killer.“ The kaleidoscopic crown atop Death’s head turned sickly and purple-green. A sword the color of bone pierced Death’s center and the whole Sanctuary shook with a screech.

“Peace ran to mother's palace to ask what had happened, for all the Realms felt it when Death died, and oh, how realization crashed down upon that which could call itself the Realms themself, and oh how it wept and oh how it raged, as the sword that would cut free the souls lost and tangled in obsession too deeply to pass onto their next lives alone and gave the infant Realms peaceful deaths was used to reach into Peace itself and oh how the Realms wailed with fury as the Fright Knight was forced into being under the service of the Usurper, and struck even his sibling Entropy, now Clockwork, giving them their famed scar.” Gold was encased in bone white armor and it’s violet cloak ignited. They struck blue Entropy and soon the gods all over clashed, and the tabletop was swallowed by a rainbow of violence and dripped with emerald blood.

“And so, the Corrupter of Worlds threw the Realms into the most horrific war, beyond mortal comprehension, as the gods grieved and raged and fought with all they had, but could barely scratch their elder brothers. Until finally, finally, Clockwork sealed Fright Knight away in the nightmares his sword now caused. And finally, Entropy itself rallied their brothers and sisters and we sealed away the vile Mother Killer in the Sarcophagus of Forever Sleep.” Ghostwriter banished the images, his eyes burning amethyst and crimson and he took deep breaths, while the teens leaned back, wary and filled with their own impotent rage.

When finally he seemed to calm, the Sanctuary not writhing and rumbling with the force of his rage, he did a little gesture and the mist coalesced once more into a little stage. A foundation of stone formed and over it lay an ocean and from within it grew a tree of bark and steel, surrounded by breezes likely large enough to dwarf Jupiter’s red spot, mold growing at the bottom of the tree while a star roared to life above it. “Though War was locked away, the Realms did not know rest. So they set to work putting together their daughter's last project: a planar system. And ages beyond time passed, until one day, every god and spirit woke to the sound of a scream. And that, my dear Bridge Spirit, is where I believe your story begins.”

Danny sat there, turning over the story that he’d just been told in his head, and tried his best to process it. He wasn’t sure how to do that, though, with the enormity of it all. So, Tucker cut in for him, like always, but with a rap. “Yo, Danny Fenton, he was just 14-“

“Ai dios- stop!” Danny snorted a laugh and shoved Tucker’s face, and the trio descended into a fit of giggles. “Alright, my story isn’t as much as yours is, but, well.” And so, taking turns picking up where the others didn’t know, they told their story to the Ghostwriter. They could process the meaning of life later.

[aspiratixxn]

A price to be paid

Warnings: suicidal thoughts, canon-typical violence 

Inspired by: Monster (MDZS Animatic)

They’re coming. 

He pants in the demon slaughter cave, the once open space now crowded to the brim with his thoughts. His fears that whisper from the walls he’s built to protect himself. They claw at his throat and his chest. His reflection shows nothing but himself, tears streaming down his face and hand clutching his robes. The brand mark burns. 

They took everything from him. 

No, that’s not quite right. Wen Qing, Wen Ning, Granny, Uncle. They all left because they knew. He was supposed to be protecting them but in the end, he’s still the one being sheltered and hidden away. He raises his hands and they drip with non-existent blood. How much has been spilled by his hands? People who didn’t need to die, innocents he’s killed with his careless actions.

They’re coming.

Everything he’s ever done has been under scrutiny. It’s never good enough, he’s never good enough. He’s tried so hard to do what’s right. Hasn’t he? He grips Chenqing tight, knuckles white as he staggers to his feet. His reflection looks back at him, haunted eyes grey and exhausted. The shadows under them have never been deeper. 

In a sudden fit of anger, he snatches up a stone from the ground and throws it into the pond, sending ripples back and forth that disrupt his image until it’s distorted beyond recognition. Just like how the rest of the cultivation world view him, a caricature of who he really is. The powerful Yiling Patriach, controller of the ghost general and possessor of the stygian tiger seal. 

He wants to curl up and hide away. He wants to lay his head on his shijie’s lap and feel her hands stroke through his hair. He wants to tease Wen Qing and A-Yuan and Wen Ning until they’re all laughing so hard his sides hurt. He just wants, so desperately, to be left alone by the expectations that have weighed on him since he was first dropped in the Burial Mounds. He did what he needed to survive. He knows that. But still, a small part of him whispers that he didn’t have to take in the spirits when they circled him. He didn’t have to craft the seal. They could still have won. 

There are no winners in a war, he thinks bitterly. Just those who live on to take the burden of another day and those who die under the weight of their choices. He’s never wanted to be powerful. He wanted to be recognized and respected like anyone else but this, this wretched reputation has brought more ruin and harm than good. At the beginning he hadn’t cared. It was war after all, fear does wonders when it comes to the enemy. And then when he had taken in the Wen remnants, he hoped that no one would want to poke a sleeping bear. It had, for a while. 

Everything changed at Qiongqi path. It was supposed to be a joyous event, being invited to his nephew’s one month celebration. It was just going to be him and Wen Ning, who refused to let him go alone. It shouldn’t have been hard, even dealing with Jin Zixun’s ambush attempt. The dark spirits whisper to him now, why didn’t you just kill him? It would’ve been easy enough to pass off as an accident. Especially if the eyewitnesses had mysteriously vanished. He could’ve claimed he went around a different path.

Pain splits down through his head and he howls, falling to his knees. It feels like all those shattered pieces of his world are coming for him again. Jin Zixuan’s pained smile, his last words. Shijie’s unnaturally still posture in front of a golden grave. Jiang Cheng’s eyes, glaring and pleading all at once. Lan Zhan’s bleeding fingertips clenched into trembling fists. Wen Qing’s last words. Wen Ning’s apologies, spilling over and over again even as he screamed blame and threw him to the ground. 

His fault. All those terrible things are his fault. He was arrogant, he made mistakes that sent him down this tumultuous path. Forcing himself to his feet, he lurches toward the entrance of the cave. 

They’ll be here soon.

Carrying their swords and their morals high, denouncing him from their lofty thrones. Should he fight? There’s no one for him to fight for anymore. Doesn’t he deserve to die? Shouldn’t he allow him to rip him apart, to repent for the sins he’s committed in the name of… His own twisted brand of justice? He touches a sheathed dagger, one of Wen Qing’s. The gilded hilt feels cold under his fingers, the delicate swirls calling to him. The blade is sharp, it wouldn’t hurt too much. He could take that last bit of pleasure from them, a last act of defiance.

It wouldn’t be enough though, would it. To repay all the lives that have been given up for his own. His debts are so deep that he’ll drown in them. His last breath still wouldn’t be enough to pay off even one act of kindness from his worst enemy. He snatches up the dagger and unsheathes it, the blade shining in the early morning light. Silver, like his eyes. Silver like the bell that lays only a few feet away, the last gift Jiang Fengmian ever gave him. 

He rips the blade through his hair, chopping it off at his neck. So what if he nicks his neck and bleeds a little. So what if he cuts the last reminder of his parents in half. The red ribbon flutters down with the weight of his hair, landing in a soft pile on the ground. He feels a light touch as the jagged tips brush against his neck. His shijie would definitely be upset; she’d always loved playing with his hair. But she’s gone too. He’ll never be by her side again. Not even after death. 

The blade shines as he heaves, gasping breaths. One edge glints red. If Chenqing was made of anything less, it would’ve snapped in his grip already. He lifts the dagger, seeing himself again in the curved edge. More eyes stare back at him. A sharp stormy grey. Warm hazel gold. Piercing amber brown. His own eyes flicker between silver and crimson, resentful energy swirling like dust shifted by the wind. 

What is he supposed to do now? What can he do? Why can’t he do something right for once? 

He stumbles to the wall where he placed the tiger seal. Even through the layers of rock, he can  feel it pulse, calling to him. It would reach out to strangle him if it weren’t being restrained by countless layers of talismans painted in his own blood. He smashes the hilt of the dagger, now sheathed, into the wall and it crumbles easily. The seal reveals itself, bit by bit. 

It was strangely beautiful, in the way that only powerful things are. He drops the dagger and grasps it, feeling it quiver. He clutches his hand tighter until he can feel the sharp edges bite into his skin. He couldn’t even find fault in the wretched thing. It was just a tool after all, and a tool has no intentions. It’s only used in alignment with the wielder. In the end, it’s still his fault. He should’ve left it back in the Xuanwu cave, sunk in the depths. 

But he knows that wouldn’t have worked either. Once its existence was revealed, it wouldn’t be possible to hide it away again. People would still seek it out even in shards. If only they knew how the resentful energy choked when it coursed through his veins. How it felt like setting every nerve on fire and being unable to douse yourself in anything but boiling oil. They’d still want it, even then probably. They’d make lesser valued, disposable people use it so they didn’t have to get their hands dirty. 

Rage flares in his chest as he squeezes until his hand is bleeding. The seal instantly evaporates the red fluid, retaining only the rich iron smell. The energy gets absorbed, a little at first then growing more and more until he’s being enveloped in a cocoon of it. He lets it, lets it take from him. There’s nothing it can take that he wouldn’t give anymore. 

They’ll be here soon.

He can feel their thundering footsteps through the mountain. Hear their shouts through the whispers of the trees. He reaches down deep into the earth and calls upon the dead, who respond with enthusiasm. Some emerge slowly, clawing their way up. Some fly out, their clothes rotting but not quite fully decayed. They crowd around him, leering. To them who come to accuse. To him who teeters on the brink. 

They’re to blame too, they whisper, urging him to go forth step by step. They pushed you to this, they took everything away from you. From us. From you from us from you from us. They dance around him in their jerky movements, limbs not connected to their torso properly. It’s alright, they say soothingly. It’s alright, let go now. Let go and let us protect you. 

He looks at the seal that vibrates in his hand. It seems to smile back at him, the twin tiger carvings and their flickering eyes. Fear floods him, cold and sharp. Is this really right? Won’t this be more blood on his hands, more debts to pay with his life? It doesn’t matter, the corpses around him call. They’ve never paid you a debt, so why should you pay theirs? The wind ruffles his hair, so light now. He wonders if that’s just his hair or if he’s shed another weight by making this decision. 

They shout at the entrance. “Yiling Patriach Wei Wuxian! Surrender now and turn over the tiger seal!” 

He snickers, giggles as he plods forward. Their faces come into view, Jin Guangshan and his ilk, bursting at the seams with poorly masked excitement. Lan Xichen, smile absent for once. Nie Mingjue who’s got a set grimace on his lips but whose eyes shine. And...

Jiang Cheng. 

For a second he falters. For a second, Wei Wuxian thinks to step back and drown in the blood pool behind him. He sees his shijie, standing behind Jiang Cheng and smiling as she places her hands on his shoulders. Take care of A-Cheng, A-Xian. 

Jiang Cheng who he’s failed before too. Who he abandoned. He knows that, though he tried to deny it. It was for the best, he argued to himself. Jiang Cheng doesn’t need the Yiling Patriarch sullying his nacient reign. Jiang Cheng doesn’t need a brash, impulsive person at his side, unable to contribute because he gave up his core. Jiang Cheng who looks conflicted even now, all because of the choices Wei Wuxian has made. He’s put his little brother, no, his former sect leader into this position. 

A strained smile comes to his lips. “You’re here.” His words are meant for no one else, but they still see it fit to take his words for their own. 

“Surrender now! Don’t make this any harder on all of us.” 

He snorts, gestures a hand at the army they’ve brought. Harder for them? That’s the funniest thing he’s heard in a long time. He raises the seal and dangles it in front of them. It’s hilarious, the way their eyes follow it like animals begging for treats. They’ve never had to beg in their lives, have they. They don’t know what it’s like. Another funny thing.

He takes it in his hand again. Squeezes, even as it stings his barely sealed wounds. If they want it so bad, they can take it. He raises it high in the air, the energy screeching around him. It flows into the seal, making it burn hot. They look confused, rustling about with their swords. He forces energy into the seal until it’s unbearable to hold, to feel it drawing from him.

It’ll be over soon.

He throws the seal with as much force as he can muster and as it leaves his hands, the corpses surge forward, chasing it. The human forces bluster backwards, a few almost impaling themselves on their companion’s blades in their haste to get away. Jin Guangshan is screaming something but it all sounds hollow to him now. Nie Mingjue roars something in response, pointing Baxia forward. Purple flashes as Jiang Cheng unleashes Zidian and its motion is supplemented by the waves of energy coming from Lan Xichen’s guqin. 

Lan Wangji isn’t in the crowd he notes a bit late. He raises Chenqing to his lips one last time. Well, maybe he can play this last melody as a parting gift. It won’t reach Lan Zhan’s ears but he feels like he needs to play it. 

The tiger seal hits the ground and shatters into pieces. Shards fly everywhere, a few small ones rolling on the ground while the larger, sharper fragments embed themselves in some bodies, forcing resentful energy into their meridians. More resentful energy explodes, blowing cultivators in all colors back in every direction. Bodies, living and dead, fly in every direction. 

Wei Wuxian takes in the chaos, eyes seeking out only one person. Jiang Cheng bellows commands, protecting his own. He’s grown so much, become so mature. Wei Wuxian feels an inkling of regret that he wasn’t there to see it. But he doesn’t deserve to see it. But there’s some comfort in knowing that Jiang Cheng is just fine without him. He admonishes himself quietly; Jiang Cheng was always fine without him. He was never needed there. 

He raises Chenqing to his lips, breathes what will probably be his last. Jin Guangshan has run away. Nie Mingjue is starting to get overwhelmed. Jiang Cheng herds the last of his disciples into a corner and shields them singlehandedly with Zidian, Sandu flying remotely. He blows, a shrill note that stops everything. Even the resentful energy is frozen in the air. 

Will this be enough? He hopes it is. 

The resentful energy rushes back towards him, urged on by the song he plays. The corpses too begin to haphazardly pile back towards him, grisled hands outstretched and mouths eternally snarling. He plays even as the energy converges on him, pouring into his body until it’s overflowing. His eyes glow the brightest vermillion. He sees Jiang Cheng, just barely through the flurry of bodies, racing forward with Sandu unsheathed. Mouth forming words that he can’t hear or read. 

Wei Wuxian lowers his flute and closes his eyes. Hands tear at his robes, his throat. Energy ruffles his hair, forces air out of his lungs. It burns, quiet and dull. Maybe it’s the resentful energy, taking away his senses. He falls under the weight of energy and bodies. It’s not enough but this is all he can give to satiate their demands even momentarily. 

Even then, with everything he’s given up, it’s never enough. 

[madaraism]

Algea - Part II of Himeros

Ἄλγεα ; The Algea – the personified spirits of grief, sorrow and distress.

Summary: Following the aftermath of Riley’s departure, Liam has pressing royal duties to focus on – namely, producing an heir.

Part I - Himeros // Part III - Aletheia // Part IV - Apate // Part V - Hestia // Part VI - Achlys

Pairings: Liam x Riley, Liam x Madeleine

Rating: Mature

Words: 4220

A/N: Thank you for all the overwhelming reviews for the first part of this story! Himeros was originally intended to be an angsty one-shot but reading all your replies and thinking back to poor Liam and Riley, I felt like I needed to continue on the story. If you ever feel that Himeros was a good enough ending, that is perfectly fine – I just feel the need to perhaps give our poor King some closure. I have decided to add in Riley’s name, just to make the dialogue easier to understand. I apologise again for the chapter…

Inspirations for this chapter – Dreaming with a Broken Heart by John Mayer and Almost is Never Enough by Ariana Grande.

Tag List: @theroyalweisme @hhiggs @itzmequeenb @alicars @cocomaxley @blackcatkita @trianiasti @viktoriapetit @umccall71 @topsyturvy-dream @kawairinrin @jayjay879 @bobasheebaby @choiceswreckedme @queencatherynerhys @laniquelove @philiasperanza @hopefulmoonobject

“For the love of god, Maxwell, I wish you would just stop doing your childish dance moves at every damn court event we are invited to.” Bertrand starts, and Maxwell immediately rolls his eyes, his face filled with glee.

“Hey, it got gloomy alright? Riley said I had to have fun on her behalf.” He defends.

Bertrand snorts as they make their way out of their car and through the entrance of their home. He masks his obvious disappointment on the lack of Riley’s presence for the past two days by jabbing complaints at his childish brother.

“Riley this, Riley that, think about the reputation you’re setting on House Beaumont for once, will you?”

Bertrand enjoys the impression he leaves on people of being a constantly blunt man.

Luckily, Maxwell can read him like an open book – he sees the worry hidden within his brother’s eyes and the constant distraught hammered into his tense shoulders.

He knows he is referring to Riley’s current predicament with Liam. Maxwell places a hand on Bertrand’s shoulder, voice lowering in concern. He hopes his words can bring him a sense of ease. “We’ll figure something out. All our brainstorming can’t possibly be a waste of time. …We owe Riley this much. Now let’s go see how our honorary Beaumont is doing.”

Bertrand’s grey eyes gazes into Maxwell’s.

He knows and appreciates just how hard they have been working for the past few months, no matter how exasperating – endless frustrated pacing in the study, papers strewn on the floor, books upon books in search of some possible loophole.

He places his index finger and thumb on the bridge of his nose, sighing out deeply before nodding and following Maxwell.

. . . . . 

Liam finds out about her disappearance in the early hours of the next day.

He had meant to visit her as soon as he got back, but paperwork had delayed him.

When he arrives at the Beaumont Estate, Liam is surprised to find Bertrand and Maxwell with such neutral faces, welcoming him in.

Bertrand, whose appearance involves his brows slightly furrowed in the presence of Maxwell, showed almost no emotion.

Maxwell, whose appearance beared similarity to a bright sun on a clear day, mirrored Bertrand’s emotionless one.

If Liam didn’t grow up groomed to decipher and partake in the art of body language, he wouldn’t’ve suspected a thing.

Both Beaumont brothers had dark circles under their eyes. With closer inspection, he could see their unshaven faces, the top button of Maxwell’s collared shirt undone, the even more rigid posture of Bertrand.

It appears to him that the brothers had not slept.

“…Bertrand, Maxwell. You two are oddly quiet,” Liam’s eyes trails over to the familiar stairs and hallway that leads to Riley’s room. “I hope you’re not still feeling the after-effects of Adelaide’s champagne?”

“Of course not, your highness. Are you looking for Lady Riley? Unfortunately, she is indisposed for the day-” Bertrand wants to continue but is halted by Maxwell. He gives him a warning look.

. . 

“What do you mean she’s gone? She can’t just be gone. If this is some sad game of hide and seek-” His speech is cut short when a panicking Maxwell shoves the note into his face.

He feels the blood draining from his face when his eyes scans quickly across the card.

Bertrand mutters a string of curse words before he clenches his eyes shut, fingers quickly massaging his temple.

“We must not let the King know.”

Maxwell splutters in protest, “What?! Why not?!”

“Think of how he will be, Maxwell. Our people need him right now. He cannot have heartache ruining his role as King.” His voice is grave, hoping that he is speaking reason into his brother’s ears.

“Bertrand, this is crazy. He already married Madeleine when he is so obviously in love with Riley – you’re telling me he can’t function with a heartache?! What has he been doing for the past few months then?! What about Riley?!”

“Please! Maxwell! We will go find her ourselves,” Bertrand tries to persuade him, panic and desperation in his voice, “It’ll be like nothing happened. Think of how heartbroken Liam will be if he finds out.”

Maxwell’s face hardens at his words.

A stiff nod.

Reluctance played a big part in his features.

. . 

Trust in our King.

Bertrand is taken back from the intensity of Maxwell’s gaze. His own collected stance from earlier seems to falter just slightly.

“I’m sorry Liam,” Maxwell begins, slightly timid. He runs his hand roughly through his own hair, trying to relieve some of the tension building up. “What Bertrand said isn’t true. I’m sorry Bertrand… I can’t bear to lie to one of my best friends about such an important issue.”

Bertrand had always shouldered everything regarding the welfares of House Beaumont. As the first born, he was always expected to.

Yet in this moment, Bertrand truly witnesses the growth in Maxwell. He sees his little brother standing beside him, poised to tell truth – calm, yet ready for whatever Liam might throw in their way.

He swallows, gaze moving cautiously from Maxwell to Liam.

The King’s jaw was clenched, shoulders squared with his arms behind his back – prepared.

Bertrand couldn’t decipher what his eyes read.

Maxwell finally breaks the silence, his gaze focused on anywhere but Liam.

“Riley… She’s… She left.”

. . . . .

He sits in the armchair in her room, the card that she had left for the Beaumont Brothers in his hand.

His eyes follow his fingers, tracing over every curve of each letter, each stroke, each little indent made from the pressure of the pen.

He imagines her writing the message on the desk on the other side of the room, and he finds himself wondering what emotions could have been going through her mind when she wrote this.

Merely over two days ago, they were sitting here in the very same spot, repeating their love for each other over and over.

Repeated kisses.

Repeated ‘I love you’s.

He finds himself stuck in the chair. Every inch of his body seemed to be tied down by endless bags of solid cement, gravity his worst enemy.

He can’t move.

He can’t blink.

He won’t move.

Perhaps if he stays seated, she will come waltzing through the doors, laughing the situation off as if it was a mere prank.

His stomach tightens painfully when he remembers her laugh.

Where did she go?

Where could she have gone?

He finds his mind racing through countless possibilities that could’ve resulted in her departure – every possible reason, every excuse, every tiny detail that he could’ve done.

Was it something that he had done?

His fingers turn numb when he remembers trailing his hands over her body, touching, feeling, caressing – he can almost feel her skin beneath his touch, ghosting over.

He closes his eyes, body still, as he chases over every minuscule moment that they had shared with each other.

He remembers the way the Cordonian sunset gave her a goddess-like glow when they shared drinks on her balcony.

He remembers how she would let his hand fall into her own whenever he let the back of their hands touch ever so lightly.

He remembers the mischievous glint in her eyes when they purposely got lost in the maze.

And he remembers how her body felt against his the last time they touched, the last time that they hugged – how soft, how warm, how at home, and how at ease she could make him feel just by wrapping her arms around him, a hand trailing along his back and another getting lost in his hair.

He remembers the last kiss that they shared. One that was filled with an overwhelming amount of love, one that reminded him of all the trials and difficulties they had experienced together, how it made his body warm and full, leaving him absolutely breathless.

Yet it was one that made his stomach do flips and turns at the sadness, desperation and regret that lingers on his lips.

He remembers how she looked at him when he told her he would see her soon. He had brushed off the wetness in her eyes as if it was nothing but the norm, but upon recalling, it was everything full of remorse and guilt.

He remembers how oddly calm she had looked.

And he wonders how long, and how much effort she had put into leaving him and his country.

But for what reason?

He drags his eyes across the card.

‘Tell him that he is a loving and generous King.’

But how was he supposed to rule without her by his side, even if it were as his mistress?

Not that it mattered – he loves her as if he was already married to her.

‘Tell him that I love him. That I always have, and I always will.’

He could hear her voice in his head, solemn.

He could see the tears in her eyes, the wetness on her cheeks as she would’ve hastily tried to wipe them away before anyone saw – even if she was alone in her room.

And he finds himself letting out a quiet, broken sob.

“Why, oh why, did you leave?”

He doesn’t know how long he spends with his eyes pressed against the back of his hand.

When he feels the accumulated tears backtrail down his arm, and the wetness on his thigh, he looks up with his heavy eyes, her room a blurry mess of white, creams and golds.

And he realises then.

It was such a meaningless court accessory to him that he hadn’t realised he had been staring at the answer the entire time.

He eyes the innocent wedding band on his left hand.

Oh, how stupid he feels.

How blatantly obvious.

He wonders how selfish he had possibly gotten, to ask her out of desperation to remain in the picture while he created a child with another woman.

She was selfless and loving. But no matter just how selfless and loving a person could possibly be, they would always have a bottom line, he thinks.

And he is positively sure that he had selfishly pushed her to her limit.

“Bastien,” He finds himself croaking out as he drags his heavy body over to where her bed is, curling up with his back facing the door.

He hears it open before he continues.

“Cancel my appointments for today, please,” He mutters with his eyes closed. He trusts his security detail to pass on the message.

“Yes, my King.”

“And Bastien…” Her scent from the sheets and pillows surround him. He wants to let it comfort him, but he knows he is undeserving of peace without her by his side.

“Find where she is… please.”

When the door closes once more, he finds himself letting his tears flow. He places his hopes on Bastien’s networks and database. He hopes and prays to every deity he knows that Bastien will find her, and that she will be willing to return to Cordonia to be by his side.

But until then, he allows himself to do nothing but wallow in grief.

Liam had never noticed how awfully big and cold her room, and her bed is without her presence.

He drifts off into a pitiful sleep while wondering if this was how she lived her lonely life in Cordonia when he is away.

. . . . .

Liam loses himself to his work.

He is oblivious to how much time, days, and weeks have passed since her departure.

The card that she wrote sits in a frame on his desk, face down.

Its purpose was contradictory in itself.

Her words serve as a reminder to him as what sort of King he is. It is a reminder of a love that they shared, one that was warm, comforting and passionate.

Yet her words remind him of her disappearance. Her touches, her smiles, her presence – sudden, fleeting, haunting.

The only thing that pushes him out of bed each day is Bastien’s lead on her whereabouts.

“We have airport records and security footage of Lady Riley leaving Cordonia for New York.”

It was the most that they could do within Liam’s power as King.

His messages sent to her number and email were left unread and ignored.

He weeps as he forces himself to reread the card that she had left.

He hopes she does not hate him.

All that he can do now is wait for further leads from within America before he can go visit her himself.

He hopes she thinks of him.

. . . . .

The next time he sees his wife one on one, they have a discussion that is more one-sided, more persuasive, than anything.

It was tactical and surprisingly civilised.

As expected, it was another business arrangement.

Her green eyes were calm, red lips straight.

“No.” Unamused.

“No?” He questions. Their faces matched each other, both blank and void of any honest emotions.

“No.” Madeleine repeats. “You can’t possibly think IVF is a pursuable route for us to obtain an heir.”

“And why might that be?” Liam allows his back to face her sitting form as he pours himself some scotch. He doesn’t let her realise that his brows are furrowed in frustration and disappointment.

He already knows the reason why, and she knows too.

He had only hoped it could be a beneficial option worth considering.

“You already know why.” She ridicules him. “It’s the perfect excuse for gossip to go around the court, public and press.”

Madeleine eyed his unmoving back.

“The reality of the matter isn’t regarding the amount of money we are willing to give,” She presses on, her voice unwavering, “A risk is a risk. Cordonia will not do well with unwarranted gossip of their King and Queen unable to conceive.”

Liam swallows the hard liquor swiftly, the cup settling down on the table louder than he wanted.

Madeleine was not a stupid woman. She holds herself highly as one who is strategically adaptable to her own advantage – or more specifically, advantageous for the sake of Cordonia.

She treats her relationship with Liam like it is a job, and she knows that he does too.

She considers them highly compatible in the sense that they both knew what was at stake, and what needs to be sacrificed for the greater good of the country they both loved.

She keeps her green eyes on his tense shoulders.

There is no sympathy in her features. All that she sees is a simple roadblock that can be easily overcome.

“I hope you’re not planning to go to New York.” She states simply and bluntly.

Liam’s face is emotionless when he turns around to look at her.

How did she know?

“I am not a fool, Liam. Your emotions are all over the place like some commoner’s department store sale.” Madeleine raises a perfect brow at him, “People gossip. The walls have ears. Lady Riley hasn’t been seen at court for over a month and your paperwork has been completed quicker than before.”

She pauses only briefly to gauge his body language. Tense, exhausted, broken.

“I cannot stop you from flying to America but think about what message you’ll be leaving for the press and court when they find out you’ve gone after a commoner who had brought shame on the Beaumont House, let alone on the crown.”

She sees his jaw tighten at her words. She does not particularly care as she knows she speaks the truth, and that he knows.

Liam pours himself another drink. He is quick to swallow the burning liquid, hoping it would numb him completely.

He keeps his distance between them when he turns around to face her. Shoulders squared, chin up, hands clasped tightly behind his back.

He avoids her gaze.

“Have someone tell me the opportune date for each month. I will meet you in your chambers then.”

He swallows thickly as he looks around the room briefly before walking out.

I’m sorry, my love.

. . . . .

The first time Liam sleeps with Madeleine, he is fuelled by the alcohol in his veins.

He refuses to look at her in the most gracious way possible as they let the darkness in the room surround them.

He refuses to kiss, he refuses to caress.

He realises no matter how much alcohol he took in order to numb the pain, it was rendered useless when he had to perform.

So he lets the thoughts and memories of Riley fuel his actions instead.

Liam remembers how Riley’s body would move against his when he kissed her in specific spots.

How she would sigh in pleasure, how she would let his name roll off her lips like it was second nature.

The first time he sleeps with Madeleine, he finds his tears trailing down her back.

He remembers the knot in his stomach and the bile in his throat, threatening its way up as he pushes on with his duty for his country.

He tries with all his might to think of her, and he can almost see, and can almost feel the way she would’ve arched into him when he makes her come.

“Riley… my love… oh, my love…”

When he finishes for the first time, he sits on the edge of Madeleine’s bed with his head in his hands.

He doesn’t look up as she walks off to clean up.

He cries over the guilt of the sin he feels he has committed.

He cries over the missing warmth of her body in his arms.

He misses every inch of her being.

He misses how her hands would cup his face, and how her fingers could just run through his hair and he would feel so relaxed and at ease.

He misses the way she looks at him, eyes full of love and admiration. Full of luck and pride that they had found each other in such a vast world.

Even with all the difficulties they had faced, just looking at her and holding her hand made everything worth it.

His cries are soundless, yet deafeningly loud.

His body aches and yearns for her touch, her presence, her being.

His heart was empty, yet in so much pain.

When Madeleine returns from her bathroom for the first time with her silk dressing gown hugging her curves, she hands over a glass of whiskey, nudging the cool glass against the hand that covers his face.

She looks at him expectantly when he stares at her, his eyes red, lashes heavy from the tears.

He drinks. She fills his glass up, and he drinks some more.

Once his face is dry, he stands up to put his pants back on and to button his dress shirt.

He bows his head slightly, ever gracious, ever regal, as he gives her a quiet apology for his words.

He thanks her for the night before leaving her room.

During these moments, he never looks at her once, never mentions her name.

And Madeleine feels guilt.

Just a little.

. . 

Two years pass as their own arrangement continues.

Twelve times each year, once a month, Liam would have to step into Madeleine’s room.

His legs used to feel heavy, a strong sense of self-condemnation forming in his chest with every step that he took.

Now, he feels nothing but an obligation to get it over and done with.

Liam no longer feels the guilt when Riley’s name forces itself off his lips.

The benefits of the arrangement that they had, he thinks to himself with bitter amusement as he sits on the edge of the bed after another night.

Liam watches Madeleine’s figure walk gracefully over to her en suite to clean up.

He takes his cue to leave.

. .

The Queen Mother was not pleased.

The two years that had passed did not do the crown any favours.

With Constantine’s passing in the last year, Cordonia – and even more importantly the crown, needed stability more now than ever.

She seeks for someone, or something, to blame.

Liam finds the royal physician visiting Madeleine and him more often than he would like.

They tell them that it is normal for some to take a while before they are able to conceive.

The physician is met with a pair of unamused eyes when he tells them to ‘perhaps try to allocate more time in your highnesses’ busy schedules in bed?’.

The King nearly breaks the glass of whiskey in his hand out of pent up rage.

When the physician leaves, he almost immediately follows suit.

Green eyes gaze on the King’s retrieving form.

She knows that their arrangement will remain unchanged.

She surprises herself when she looks down at her lap, finding her hands and nails clenched up and digging into some sorry part of the couch.

She blames the weather for the tears in her eyes.

. . . . . 

A year and a half later on a bleak and cold day in New York, Riley receives the dreaded phone call from Hana.

“I don’t know if he has messaged you yet,” She remembers the worry in Hana’s voice, the quiet mumbles as her best friend reasons to herself, “But then again you don’t want to talk…”

She remembers her hesitant pause, “Riley… I don’t know when they will notify the press, it’s very early on, and very, very secretive, but… oh Riley, it’s Madeleine. She’s pregnant.”

She finds herself on the tiles of her bathroom again, hurling into the toilet in front of her. This time for different reasons.

She uses the baggy sleeves of her cable-knit sweater to wipe away her tears and at the corner of her mouth.

She has been waiting to receive this news for years, mentally preparing herself and her stomach.

She doesn’t know why she is still so surprised that he actually went through with it.

Perhaps some part of her had been hoping, wishing, praying, that he would never.

She closes her eyes and leans back into the cold glass door of her standing shower, wrapping her arms around herself.

She shudders and finds a shaky breath leaving her lips as she remembers being in his arms.

From time to time, she allows herself to drown in the memories she had with him – she misses the feeling of his lips against her own, how his eyes were always calm but so full of love for her.

She misses how his voice would sound when he embraced her from behind, whispering sweet nothings into her ear.

She misses the lucky mornings they would get to wake up next to each other. How his eyes would gaze over every inch of her face, taking in the love that she showed to him through her gentle kisses and bright smiles.

She feels a body rest beside her, a small face on her lap.

And she forces herself back into her reality – cold on a tiled bathroom floor in a small apartment in New York.

She hugs the now four-year-old closer to her.

“I’m sorry, Levi. I’m just having one of those moments, aren’t I?” She murmurs, absentmindedly twirling some of his hair in her fingers.

His dark eyes does not meet hers for a while, but when it does, she’s relieved to see a small smile on his lips.

The boy doesn’t say anything, as he doesn’t know what, or who had brought the tears into his mother’s eyes. He was dutifully observant and mature for his age and has learnt that simple gestures like his hugs can bring some mirth back into her eyes.

She sees every bit of Liam in him – from the softness of his hair to the shape of his eyes, the way that his small nose stands tall within the frame of his face, to the way his ears sit on his head. She marvels at how he has the shape of Liam’s lips, but her volume – just slightly fuller than his.

And when she stares into her little boy’s eyes, they remind her of his when Liam isn’t weighed down with the duties and troubles of courtly life and country duties.

She sighs once more and kisses his hair.

“Let’s go get some cronuts, my love.”

. .

Surprise hits her like a truck once more the following week.

Riley stares at the face in front of her, her own failing to mask the shock. Her hand never leaves her door handle as she readies herself to close it in the person’s face at any given second she senses danger.

She couldn’t help herself but to quickly look around the corridor of her apartment building, coming to the educated conclusion that the person was most likely travelling alone.

Without him?

She could recognise those features from a mile away.

Those perfectly styled golden curls. The red lips painted with precision, always in a straight line, unamused. Those intense green eyes, staring right into her very soul as if the pair of sunglasses on her face is not even there. That damned string of pearls around her small neck.

“Lady Riley, what a pleasure to see you again.” The lady starts, her voice not matching her words.

Without Liam?

Riley stares for the longest time before remembering to close her mouth.

“Madeleine?”

--

Part 3: Aletheia

[cloudycrystalkpop]

One shots masterlist

AUs:

NCT U Predator AU Series Masterlist

Neo Culture Coven Technology AU Masterlist

Folklore AU Masterlist 

Reverse Folktale AU Masterist

Looking Glass AU Masterlist

Underground AU Masterlist

hybrid AU masterlist

covens AU masterlist

Groups:

* SUGA | RESILIENCE | (shifter!) Suga x (witch!) reader | MOODBOARD

she witnessed that no matter what came at him, he always pulled through. he was impossable to shake. | -

* SUGA | LEATHER AND GASOLINE | (Agust D!) Suga x reader + feat. JHope

“i told you one of these days i wasn’t gunna be able to watch your back, and here i am, supposed to be the one stabbing you in the back.” | language, gun violence

* RM | SMOKE | (blue caterpiller!) RM x (Alice!) reader

the way the smoke billowed and curled reminded her of they way his thoughts would whisp around him as they coiled off his tongue. | smoking

* RM | CRAZY = GENIUS | (arsonist!) RM x reader

you can set yourself on fire, but you’re never gunna burn. you can set yourself on fire, but you’re never gunna learn. | mild drinking

* JHOPE | REFLECT | (sun god!) JHope x (moon godess!) reader

she spent her world living in his shadow, but that wasn’t the way he saw it. | -

* XIUMIN | WONDERLOST | (cheshire!) Xiumin x (Alice!) reader

she was lost in the wonder of such a place, and he was lost in the wonder of her. | -

* XIUMIN | CLOVER | (wolf!) Xiumin x (witch!) reader | MOODBOARD

after so many years of being on your own, you now have a gentle wolf to watch your back. | gender neutral reader

* XIUMIN | CRESCENT EYES | (witch!) Xiumin x (hybrid!) reader

as winter melted into spring, so his power drained from him. for the first time in the countless years, he had received no sign from his creator. instead of the guiding light, he found his strength in the shy crescent eyes of a feline. | -

* BAEKHYUN | ATTENTION | Byun Baekhyun x reader

Baekhyun had been ignoring her, and she began to suspect him of possably cheating on her with another idol. | -

* CHANYEOL | LOST BOY | (changeling!) Park Chanyeol x reader | MOODBOARD

lonely little boy, you never really belonged. but that’s alright, nether did she. | -

* CHANYEOL | GUARD DOG | (hybrid! familiar!) Park Chanyeol x (witch!) reader | MOODBOARD

i can’t take care of you anymore | -

* CHANYEOL | STERLING | Park Chanyeol x reader

you always had a curosity with dolls. your father used to bring you robotic ones he made in his tinkering. sometimes, you wondered, if you could bring them life. you blamed that for your later intrest in necromancy. | voodoo, gore

* SEHUN | DARK SIDE | Star Wars AU (Jedi!) Sehun x (Nightsister!) reader

Sehun was unsure of whether or not to trust this witch with an affinity for the dark side. | smut

* JB | DRIPPING ROSES | (knave of hearts!) Im Jaebum x (alice!) reader

silly little girl, i don’t think you’ll much like what you find in the heart of wonderland. | slight gore

* JACKSON | SELFLESS | (dragon!) Jackson Wang x (mystic!) reader

he was cursed for his family, but she set him free. | character death

* JINYOUNG | OF FAERIES AND FORSETS | Park Jinyoung x (faerie!)reader | MOODBOARD

Jinyoung had always been curious about the forest, and what creatures wandered there. | duel endings

* YOUNGJAE | PRECIOUS | (blood slave!) Choi Youngjae x (vampire!) reader + feat. N

he was her most precious possesion. | a little bit of master/slave kink tbh, but not very sexual.

* BAMBAM | SURVIVAL OF THE RICHEST | post-apocalyptic au! Bambam x reader | MOODBOARD

morals are simply a set back in the aftermath. they’ll get you destroyed. | mentions of sexual assault against minors

* BAMBAM | SNOWGLOBE | Bambam x reader

for as long as he could remember, the cold nipped at his nose. The snow dusted his clothes. The trees where always stickly, covered in a layer of shimmering ice. But he always wondered, what lay just past the old lampost. | -

* YUGYEOM | SALT WATER | (siren!) Kim Yugyeom x reader + feat. (cabin boy!) Jisung + NCT

she could hear it, that distant melody. it called to her, cared for her, looked out for her when no one else would. | impiled sexual harassment and assault

* JOHNNY | PROMISE | revolution au! Johnny Seo x reader 

we’ll shout it from the tallest building / we’ll be here when their heart stops beating (inspired by Wake Up by Black Veil Brides) | gun violence, language

* TAEYONG | FREEDOM | (run away au!) Lee Taeyong x reader | MOODBOARD

some kids never learn. | mentions of achehol and cigarettes

* TAEYONG | HARLEQUIN | (yandere!) Lee Taeyong x (psychopath!) reader | MOODBOARD

he would do whatever she asked, more than happy to simply be a member of her cort of jesters, even if that ment his silence. |  mental illness, emotional abuse

* TAEYONG | ROSE COLORED BOY | (prince!) Lee Taeyong x (knight!) reader

a beautiful, youthful prince, the crown jewel of his kingdom, kindhearted and breathtaking in beauty, locked away and lost. frozen in time, forever young as the years pass around him. | reverse sleeping beauty au

* TEN | RELEVE | (dance teacher!) Ten x (ballet student!) reader

he was born with the rhythm in his blood, and his words were kind to those who looked for guidance. | -

* MARK + LUCAS | PRAY FOR THE WICKED | Mark x reader x Lucas | PART TWO

 sin will find you | drug use, sexual themes and implied threesome, some guy x guy 

* RENJUN | EAST IS UP | Renjun x reader

it can take some time to compleatly wake up when you’ve been alseep for so long. | inspired by Jumpsuit by Twenty One Pilots

* HAECHAN | MALICE | Haechan x reader

not everyone get’s to have a happy childhood, some of them tread on shattered glass though hellfire. in that heat you eather burn or freeze. | violence

* JAEMIN | DISTORTION | (yandere! merman!) Jaemin x reader | MOODBOARD

your kind forgot long ago, that it’s sea water that falls from your eyes you simply renamed to tears. | drowning

* G-DRAGON | IN-SANE-ITY | (mad hatter!) G-Dragon x (Alice!) reader

what’s so weird about being a little weird? | -

* N | RHYTHM | (spirit!) N x reader

there is a rhythm in all living things. if you listen, you can feel it’s hum. | -

* N | REDRUM | (ghost!) N x (cannibal!) reader

all work and no play, makes you just so… hungry… | all the warnings. !!!

* LEO | CREATURE OF THE NIGHT | (skinwalker!) Leo x (medicine woman!) reader | MOODBOARD

you don’t talk about them. you never go out by yourself, for fear you might run into one. no one knows what they actually do, for everyone who encounters one and doesn’t get away, disappears for good. | dule endings

* KEN | POCKET WATCHER | (white rabbit!) Ken x (Alice!) reader

her curiosity seemed to always run away with her… but what was curiouser than finding a handsome young man alone in the woods? | -

* RAVI | THE SORCERESS’ APPRENTICE | (apprentice!) Ravi x (sorceress!) reader + feat. (vampire!) Xiumin | MOODBOARD

Ravi had left his coven in search of a sorcerer powerful enough to teach him his full magical potental. | adult and sexual themes

* RAVI | RITUAL | (apprentice!) Ravi x (sorceress!) reader | MOODBOARD

Magic like this is forbidden, and for good reason. | mild adult content

* RAVI | WARRIOR QUEEN | Ravi x reader

she had missed her chance, and now it tore her apart. | mental illness

* HONGBIN | ROOM 217 | Hongbin x reader

The Overlook Hotel is known to be home to some very… interesting spirits. | smut

* HYUK | SICKNESS | Hyuk x reader

sometimes the most beautiful rose in the pained broken one. | character death

* HYUNGWON | TEAPOT | (doormouse!) Hyungwon x (Alice!) reader

sometimes even the smallest things can become large depending on your veiw point. | -

* HYUNGWON + I.M | HALO | (witch!) Hyungwon + (witch!) I.M

divinity magic | -

* WONHO | FLOWER PETALS | (ghost!) Wonho x reader

everything has a story to tell if you are willing to listen. | mentions of rape and murder

* ALL | BELOW THE MARSH | seven deadly sins series

some things hide just below unassuming appearances | seven different endings

* WOOJIN | MONSTER | (vampire!) Kim Woojin x reader

if you look past the gentle smiles, you may find what you believed to be innocence is not as pure as before. | slight yandere

* BANG CHAN | SECOND NATURE | (wolf!) Bang Chan x reader

while she might look at first glance, just like any of the other humans, he could smell the wolf in her blood. Long quiet and sleeping patently. He itched to set that wolf free, and watch her dance under the moonlight. | -

* FELIX | THE BOYS WITH FLAMES FOR HAIR | (reverse little mermaid au) Lee Felix x reader

the deep but gentle voice seemed to haunt you. Playing over and over again in the back of your mind. The fuzzy outline of the boy who saved you waited just behind your eyelids. His vibrant hair reminded you sometimes of the mute boy who had wandered into your backyard… | suicide attempt mention

* TAEMIN | DOWNPOUR | (naiad!) Lee Taemin x reader

he is that heavy feeling in your chest when the sky opens up and pours. he glances at you through the curtain of rain drops, the embodiment of mother nature’s sweat and tears. | depression

* ZTAO | ORACLE | (witch!) Tao x reader

there are whispers in shadows of the magic world. Whispers of a cult of witches, fortune tellers. But these are no normal tarot readers, these are oracles. The whispers warn of the horrible things that happen to those who seek out the members of this cult. | slight adult themes

[esonetwork]

Timestamp #220: A Christmas Carol

New Post has been published on https://esonetwork.com/timestamp-220-a-christmas-carol/

Timestamp #220: A Christmas Carol

Doctor Who: A Christmas Carol (Christmas Special, 2010)

Three spirits, a Christmas miracle, and a sonic shark.

A passenger liner is plummeting toward the surface of an unknown turbulent planet. The captain cancels Christmas as she attempts to save the ship, and as she detects a distress signal from the honeymoon suite, Amy and Rory race in wearing their fun costumes of a kiss-o-gram cop and a centurion.

The distress signal they sent summons the Doctor who signals the ship with a simple text: “Come along, Pond.”

On the surface is a village in the throes of a Christmas Eve celebration. The planet and the artificial storm when the cruiseliner is trapped are owned by Karzan Sardick, a wealthy and heartless man who acts as a loanshark through a business he inherited. To secure the the loans, he cryogenically freezes family members of the borrowers as collateral.

As one family begs for their family to be thawed for a day, the Doctor arrives via chimney. Sardick has denied the cruiseliner permission to be rescued, and the Doctor’s attention bounces from the poor family to the storm machine and the frozen girl. Sardick says that the girl is not important, but the Doctor replies that he has never met anyone who wasn’t important.

The machine’s controls are isomorphic and coded to Sardick alone. The Doctor tries to appeal to his better nature, but Sardick ejects the family and the Doctor with a bout of violence. When Sardick refrains from striking the young boy as the family leaves, the Doctor sees a crack in Sardick’s façade.

The Doctor touches base with the Ponds before being warned to seek cover for the night. After all, the fish that swim through the clouds are particularly fervent tonight. The Doctor is inspired by a Christmas carol playing on the loudspeakers and launches a plan to save the cruiseliner.

Sardick awakens to find his dream projected on the wall of his study. When he was twelve, he wanted to film one of the sky fish, but his father punished him by striking the boy and sealing his window. The Doctor plumbs the depths of this memory, then boards the TARDIS and travels back in time to Sardick’s boyhood, right into the film being projected.

Acting as young Sardick’s babysitter, the Doctor decides to make the boy’s dream come true. Using the sonic screwdriver, the Doctor lures a sky fish in through the window while he and Sardick hide in the wardrobe. The boy is interested in seeing the fish because he missed his chance by being sick at school on the day his class got to see them. When the sky fish nibbles on the line, the Doctor leaves the wardrobe to investigate. He surmises that the fish travels on electrical currents generated in the atmosphere’s high water content. His investigation is cut short by a large shark that eats the little fish and chases the Doctor back into the wardrobe.

On the one hand, the Doctor is pleased because he has a better understanding of the clouds and can analyze the readings (once he retrieves his sonic screwdriver from the shark). On the other hand, the shark rams the wardrobe and pins its occupants against the wall. The Doctor bravely dives into the shark and retrieves half the sonic, but he and young Sardick lament the fact that the shark is dying after being out of the clouds for so long.

As a life support measure, the boy takes the Doctor to the vault where all of the collateral is kept. He travels forward briefly to get the code to the door from the older Sardick, then enters the vault with the boy in the past. The shark has followed them, lured by the fog emanating from the open vault. After a brief chase, the shark is lulled to sleep by the song of Abigail Pettigrew, one of the frozen who has been freed.

The Doctor realizes that singing induces a sympathetic harmonic that the fish like, which is the same principle that drives the cloud machine in the future. The Doctor puts the shark in Abigail’s box and takes his new companions on a ride in the TARDIS. Meanwhile, in the future, Abigail’s portrait has appeared on the elder Sardick’s wall. The shark is set free and Abigail is returned to her box with a promise that they will return every Christmas.

Sure enough, the Doctor and Sardick awaken Abigail one year later, unaware of the countdown on her box. They call the shark with the sonic and take a sleigh ride. The tradition continues as Sardick ages and his future self marvels over the new memories, ranging from New York to the Pyramids.

One year, Abigail asks to see her family again. She weeps as she watches her family have the life she can never have, and Sardick consoles her. The Doctor arranges a small celebration with Abigail’s family. Abigail explains her situation and vouches for Sardick’s character, and the group shares a holiday dinner before Abigail returns to her box with a kiss for Sardick.

The next year brings a Hollywood party for the trio. Abigail nearly reveals the truth about her life to Sardick, but they are forced to leave early since the Doctor has inadvertently become engaged to Marilyn Monroe. Abigail knows that there is nothing to be done, and as Sardick returns Abigail to her box, he tells the Doctor that he’d like to break the tradition in favor of working on the cloud machine.

The Doctor is sad that Sardick hasn’t evolved from his future attitudes, but gives the man his broken sonic screwdriver as he leaves. In the future, the portrait reverts from Abigail’s to Sardick’s father. One year later, the Sardicks complete work on the machine, and while the younger man considers calling the Doctor and resuming the tradition, he turns away.

The future Sardick digs the abandoned sonic out of his drawer, rejects another plea from the cruiseliner, and then meets the Ghost of Christmas Present… or rather, Amy’s hologram. She projects the crew and passengers into the vault, singing Silent Night as a further plea for their lives. The Doctor has told Amy about Abigail and Sardick tells her about Abigail’s terminal illness. The countdown has been tracking the number of days Abigail has to leave.

Amy and Rory reverse the transmission to bring Sardick’s hologram to the ship’s bridge. When Sardick is not swayed, he’s returned to the vault to face the Doctor. The Time Lord apologizes, but then brings the cruel man face to face with his twelve-year-old self. The elder’s heart is broken and he apologizes to his younger self.

The elder Sardick attempts to save the ship but the machine no longer recognizes him since he’s changed so much. Sardick flashes the sonic screwdriver and the Doctor realizes that the other half is still in the shark. Unfortunately, to lure the shark, they need Abigail’s song. The Sardicks release her, knowing that her death is imminent, but Abigail is overjoyed to spend one last Christmas with the man she loves.

Abigail’s song is broadcast into the clouds through the sonic screwdriver, drawing the two halves together. The resonance induces a Christmas snow to fall. High above, the cruiseliner stabilizes and everyone aboard celebrates. As the Christmas mood spreads through the village, the Doctor takes the younger Sardick home.

Some time later, the Ponds reunite with the Doctor. The Time Lord rejects a phone call from Marilyn Monroe, absolutely convinced that it wasn’t a real chapel after all. As the travelers depart for their next adventure, Sardick and Abigail sail the skies in a shark-drawn sleigh.

Steven Moffat promised that this holiday story would be the most “Christmassy Christmas special ever” and “all your favourite Christmas movies at once, in an hour, with monsters and the Doctor and a honeymoon.”

Mission accomplished.

There have been countless adaptations of Charles Dickens’s famous novel, and this one adds a Doctor Who flair to the timeless tale. Karzan Sardick takes the Scrooge journey courtesy of the Christmas Ghosts:  The Doctor takes the role of the Ghost of Christmas Past, Amy is the Ghost of Christmas Present, and Sardick himself becomes the Ghost of Christmas Future (or Christmas Yet to Come). In a sense, Abigail fills the roles of Jacob Marley and “Tiny Tim” Cratchit.

The redemption story is touching and drew me in because of the unique take. We get to watch Scrooge evolve and grow as the Doctor brings the trademark love and compassion to bear. The tragedy of the love affair is heartbreaking, played so well by both Michael Gambon and Danny Horn as both versions of Sardick live through the memories. Katherine Jenkins absolutely sells the empathetic Abigail.

I love the nods throughout this celebration. We’ve heard about the Doctor’s friendship with Albert Einstein before (Time and the Rani), the sonic screwdriver gets destroyed (The Visitation, Smith and Jones, The Eleventh Hour), the psychic paper once again proves not to be infallible (Army of Ghosts, The Shakespeare Code, The Vampires of Venice), and the Fourth Doctor gets a beautiful yet subtle tribute with long scarves as Abigail’s clock ticks to 004.

I could have sworn that Silent Night had been in Doctor Who before now, but research says that I was wrong.

Finally, I’d be remiss not to note Dumbledore. Okay, okay, not quite the wizard, but definitely Michael Gambon, who was far more sinister here than in his five appearances in the Harry Potter films. I love seeing actors I know in productions and roles that are so different than what I’ve seen from them before, and this was no exception.

Rating: 5/5 – “Fantastic!”

UP NEXT – Doctor Who: The Impossible Astronaut & Doctor Who: Day of the Moon

The Timestamps Project is an adventure through the televised universe of Doctor Who, story by story, from the beginning of the franchise. For more reviews like this one, please visit the project’s page at Creative Criticality.

[chibinekochan]

The ghost in the Hospital – Mystic Messenger AU

An Au where the RFA is the RPI (Rika´s Paranormal Investigations).

After tragedy struck, this case is the final straw to get the RPI back on track.

Is Luciel able to save the RPI, or are Jumin´s doubts the final nail in the coffin ?

Read to find out.

Notes: I might write some more cases for them, if there is interest for it.

Feel free to request investigation ideas.

This is part 1

“I thought we been over this like a million times Luciel, we are wasting our time with hunting what simply not exists.”

Jumin sighs exhausted, while Luciel keeps waving a newspaper article around.

“I am sure this time it's real. There are witnesses that saw the ghost. Come on Jumin it's in the city.”

Luciel is not planning to back off.

Jumin just shakes his head.

“I thought we been over this before, the paranormal that you seek is nothing but superstition.”

“Yeah but yet you are a member of the RPI. I never got it why Rika let you join, if you not even believe in such things.”

Luciel seems more amused than anything.

“I joined because Rika asked me to join and at that point it was rather interesting, but now it's quite pointless don't you think ?”

Jumin feels a head pain raising up. He really not wanted to think on the last investigation.

“I know many bad things happened, but don't you think that Rika wanted us to continue ?”

Luciel get´s suddenly extremely serious.

“I really don't know anymore what Rika wanted.”

Jumin´s expression turns to ice.

“I really not want to do this anymore. I have much more important things to do than to hunt phantoms. I already have to deal with that with my friend after all.”

Jumin turns more frustrated.

“I know that you still search for V but still this case... I just know there is something in that Hospital.”

Luciel get´s more desperate.

“I beg you Jumin, this is the last time if we not find anything you can leave the RPI.”

“I think it would be better to dissolve the RPI.”

Jumin gains his calm back, seeing this as a chance to leave the ashes of the RPI.

Till now something was holding him back, something unresolved inside of him.

Something about the way Rika had described her encounter with a ghost.

Maybe this case would finally close this chapter once a for all. This would be just as useless as the countless other cases they had before.

“We have to ask the other members about that one.”

Luciel shrugs his shoulders.

“I know my assistant agrees already, and if we get you to vote on it we can outvote Yoosung.”

Jumin was looking like he was about to close a business deal.

“Okay fine, but I have one condition.”

Luciel has a devilish smile on his face.

“If this condition evolves you getting close to my cat I decline.”

Jumin still had bad memories about Luciel´s last encounter with his beloved cat.

Jumin had to hire a cat therapist to calm his poor princess down.

“Hm, good idea.... but no, I want to hire a medium.”

Luciel shortly got lost in the idea to pet Elly again, but he knew this was more important right now.

“A medium really Luciel ? Fine if that is your wish, who do you want me to call ?”

Jumin had hired several so called spirit guides or ghost whisperers before.

None of them was able to deliver any proves.

“You don't need to call anyone, just make sure that you pay.”

Luciel had an ominous tone in his voice.

“Fine, I will bring my wallet than. I just hope you not plan to fool me with some tricks. If you do that, the RPI is history.”

Jumin has mixed feelings about this, but Luciel is not above playing pranks.

He has no doubt that Luciel would go that far, just to save the RPI.

“Don't worry Jumin this is going to be good. Oh but one more thing, don't tell Jaehee or Yoosung what happens if we fail.”

Luciel has an ominous expression on his face.

“I figured it would be best to leave Yoosung out of our deal.”

Jumin knows that Yoosung would not be happy with their deal. He knows, that it will be the hardest for Yoosung to close the RPI for good.

“I really not want anyone to interfere in this case either. I just know that this time it's real.”

Luciel is overflowing with confidence.

Jumin wonders were Luciel takes his confidence from. He just has the feeling that there is something that Luciel is not saying.

“I will call Mrs. Kang then. Should she just drive to the hospital ?”

Jumin gets his smartphone out and looks at Luciel.

“It will be better if she comes here. We are going somewhere else first.”

Luciel is full of hope again, this not sitting well with Jumin.

“Fine, I tell her we meet at my car.”

Jumin keeps a sharp eye on Luciel, trying to figure his hidden plan out.

It was hopeless, Luciel was ever a book with seven seals to Jumin.

Jumin calls his assistant, Jaehee Kang.

“Ms. Kang, we have a new RPI case. We meet at the car, bye.”

Jumin not let her any break, or any room to disagree.

Jaehee, on the other end of the phone, had barely time to say hello.

She is annoyed by Jumin´s behavior, and these ghost hunts just make her job so much harder.

Still, a job is a job, and so she makes her way to the parking lot.

Once she is downstairs she already sees Luciel and Jumin waiting.

Luciel is as annoyingly cheerful as always, and Jumin looks less annoyed than last time.

Maybe this time they would hunt for a witch then ? These cases somehow ever interested Jumin.

Jaehee, on the other hand could not care less. She was never sure what to feel over the paranormal they are hunting.

“So what is it this time ?”

Jaehee is unable to hide her annoyance.

“A ghost hunt, in a Hospital.”

Luciel is full of excitement.

Jaehee wishes he would contain himself. This hope is vain.

“I see.”

Jaehee sighs in annoyance, why is Jumin even agreeing to this ?

She is sure that there is something going on, but decides to ignore it.

“We should get going.”

Jumin has no time to waste.

“I agree. I will tell the driver the address.”

Luciel makes his way over to the car and talks to the driver, who just nods.

He then gets into the car.

Jumin and Jaehee follow him.

Jaehee is slightly gazing at Jumin, wondering what his hidden agenda is.

The driver, Mr. Kim, starts the car.

“What is with Yoosung, should we pick him up too ?”

Jaehee turns to Luciel.

“Don't worry about him, he is undercover in the Hospital.”

Luciel is smirking.

They ride into the city, and the car stops in front of a theater.

~ I hope you enjoyed this, part two will be out tomorrow.

[hoverbun]

soulstolen

fandom: league of legends character(s): vladimir, elise, karthus, brief appearances of leblanc and katarina ship(s): vladimir/karthus synopsis: After the Harrowing, Vladimir feels haunted.  word count: 5394

 The mist clings to his lungs, infecting his too-human self with an otherworldly infestation. The ghost of claws rest heavy on his throat. The haunting has stayed, deep within his bones.

The Black Mist is not a single collective hivemind of thought and instinct - it is a mass of shifting souls, rolling from the split seams of the veil shrouding the Blackened Sea and the islands that exist beyond. It knows where its cold hands have not been, roaming the land with a coveting, searching urge in its cold grasp, tainting the untainted with a mystic corruption.

To many mainlanders of Valoran, the Black Mist is a Bilgewater sea legend, cursing the sailors who foolishly trust the ocean and the mysteries it keeps. It does not often crawl over the Empire of Noxus, chokehold presence curling its iron fist over its people. It had been a long time since the Harrowing came to Noxus - to live it is to feel the wind drop cold and to see the coastline grow eerily steady against old docks, still water lapping against pilings.

The sky goes dark, first. Then, the wind picks up.

The capital was split, like a skull over marble’s edge. The poor districts beyond the city walls were gutted, slain corpses left on scratched wood - unwanted by the isles’ savage culling, their souls harvested whilst their bodies were left to rot. Bodies are not needed - corpses mangled and torn by spectral weapons left in streets and homes. Noxus is built upon mountains that never were, and the walls that divide the city from its poorer districts kept the legions at bay.

The skies remember how the mist stained the city black. The following days feel raw and abraded, like the waking period after deeply dreaming. To see Noxus, in all its talk of glory in death and pride found in bloodshed, take pause after a massacre of its own people - it briefly, fleetingly, amuses Vladimir.

He was among the living left standing. The taste of death lingered in his mouth. His veins felt empty, a haunting air drying him of blood, essence, and life. Haunted.

His body felt hollow, like his skin had been cut and nothing bled from within, coursing down his arms and limbs in thick rivers of red. His blood grew thin and chilled his bones - the absence of warmth had never bothered him until the mist had loosened its hold over him and dragged itself away, across the continent and back to the blackened islands it came from.

( He does not dream often when sleep manages to find him, when the night is no longer restless and his thoughts recede for one evening. But now he dreams of long bones for fingers, skeletal palms over his wrists and throat, roaming his body and holding him. Searching for where his life beats within him the loudest. Searching for where it may draw him out. It’s never cruel, and it’s never violent - roaming and searching, a careful touch, a slow caress. )

Documentations regarding the Harrowing and the lands from whence it came are rare to find - there are old texts, though often they are untranslated, as well as belonging to nobility he has chosen to separate himself from, - those nobles of Noxus keep them for novelty reasons, something to brag about, something to fill their libraries and vaults with ( he doesn’t like the people emilie introduces him to. they pry, more than nobility with their own secrets to hide should. but they can't ask about the blood under his nails if they can't see it. ).

There’s a song sung in the back of his mind, something like a melody he wants to memorize, hymnals that have the right kind of wrong threat woven into their fogshrouded promise. It caught him and curled itself into the back of his thoughts, heard in the rumbling horde of the Harrowing.

“Do you hear singing, Emilie?”

Emilie LeBlanc offered him a glance, curiosity cut clear over her sharp features, until her interest waned. She always responded to her true name when it came  from him - the matron’s title she had bestowed upon her however many years ago need not to be spoken. “The Kindred cult are in the streets. Do you mean them?”

While there is singing among the followers of Kindred - who walk winding streets as dusk settles over Noxus and sing for those lost, cleansing the streets of the lingering haunt of the Harrowing - the song he hears is more chilling, more slicing . Gouges in the skin that don’t bleed the way they must.

“No. Something else. It’s far away.”

“Then I don't know. You're imagining things, Vlad.”

Of course she wouldn't understand.

( my song is not for her. it is ours. )

The Kindred choir songs are meant to finalize death, close the eyes of the lost and carry their spirits away. Vladimir wonders why they do not revel in the captivating mysticism of the un dead, life beyond life.

He never expected to witness a Harrowing. Either he'd hear of its effects on a neighbouring state - from outlying city states and factions not yet assimilated by the heavy boot of Noxus, to their neighboured kingdom Demacia ( flawed and unpolished as it is, of course it is susceptible to the ravaging spirits from the west ) - or have it kill him before he can breathe its rotten air, tearing his soul from his body like a dissection, swallowing him whole and taking millennia of hemo magic knowledge with it. It was abrupt and sudden, as death often comes.

Vladimir feels a great weight in his bones, exhaustion that feels heavier than the insomnia he is well acquainted with.

“Maybe you're traumatized,” the General’s daughter offers, clicking her tongue like the scrape of her heel on stone, a blade tucked alongside her wrist, cutting the skin, bloodletting the insult. “Scared because you could’ve died.”

“Probably.” He's very curt with the people he's meant to charm. Emilie has told him he blunders through conversations quite often for a man who carries himself the way he does.

“That isn't very Noxian of you, is it?”

He slouches against the stone, looking over the aggregating buildings of Noxus, the fortress’ walls serving as an imposing divider between the recovering city and the untouched beacon of Noxian integrity. A chill ran through the Immortal Bastion, passing through them both like they were stripped of their flesh with exposed flayed bone - curling wisps of wind dancing against exposed marrow.

When it waned, it felt like the fleeting touch of a lover.

He has a single book open, split at the spine over a desk. There is so little to learn. Most accounts of harrowed lands and roaming spectres are tall tales from the shores of Bilgewater, passed along countless tongues and across waters like stones on a lake - finding their home on an empty sheet of paper. Vladimir questions how many sea tales have their merit anymore, if they ever did at all.

( He finds a story of a warlord, a once feared tyrant of a land before Noxus, but he doesn't consider it useful. )

Sleep won't take him. He thinks he's going to die.

It is -

( beautiful. consuming. intoxicating. to feel the caress of death for the first time - )

comforting.

He does not seek council with the High Priestess often.

Elise circles the parlour, her personal finery untouched from the invasion. The walls are tall, silkscreen drapes over wide windows shrouding the ugly Noxian sun. She had acknowledged his entry with a full smile and outstretched arms - when he sat himself without a word, she continued her movements, rigid and held together. She’s anxious as well, but he won’t acknowledge it, for her sake. It’s unbecoming of her.

“All of Valoran is susceptible to the Harrowing,” she states to him in a passing breath (because of course he’s come to discuss it with her, he knows where her pilgrims follow her to, kept in close council with every person who can speak the names of the Black Rose without feeling dread peak in their stomach, breathing in the sinister purpose of the order like they could the once familiar air of Noxus) when her gaze is swept outside an open window, the low breeze harbouring a cold memory casting itself inside. “But I never expected it to come to Noxus.”

“Not while you are in its service?” Vladimir suggests, head lowered, dark eyes on the steel that plates his fingers. Pretending to play Noxus’ courtly games is so tiring. He is so tired. He wants to sleep.

“Its influence has reached Noxus already.” Vladimir does not look at her, but he knows her gaze is on him. “It is not widespread . But it has taken root. Has something angered them? Drawn the attention of the Isles?”

The wind that rolls through the salon grazes his skin with a draining touch, the lingering dread of a stretched horizon etching itself into Vladimir’s bones. Death lingers in the air, from the rising filth in the almshouses turned crematoriums for the countless dead in the capital, to the presence of spirits hanging in the very parlour Noxus’ elite meet in. The memorabilia and religious fixtures Elise had carved from Vilemani skulls seem to rattle and hum with an elegy of the Shadow Isles, carried upon the wind.

He can hear her steps on the marble. She stands to his left, arms curved and crossed over her chest. It is now that Vladimir offers his cold eyes, hollow and bone white with dark rings under swollen lids. His tone is steady and his body stiff. Peaceful sleep has not reached him in years, and he will not show wear of such effect now.

“Maybe they’re questioning you,” Vladimir suggests, tersely. Elise’s stare is cold, and so is his. She speaks slowly, deliberately.

“If She was to question my capability, I can assure you that I would not be standing here.” Elise’s tone carries the haunting echo of a woman who knows what she risks. The price she has put on her life is tremendously high. He respects very few people. A person who knows her death is so easy to reach yet stares it in its eight eyes is one of them.

Between them is a glass table, low to the ground and framed in brass. Elise sits herself across from him, long legs crossed over another, and watches him carefully. Her eyes feel heavy over him, a weighted gaze that looks to split him apart and find his purpose. Skin from bone. He knows that trick too well.

“Has it taken its toll on you?” She asks, watching him through her lashes.

Vladimir looks at the skull behind her. “There's a song.”

“Have you been sleeping recently, Vladimir?” Emilie asks. For a moment, he wants to tell her he doesn’t sleep - apparitions of the Shadow Isles haven’t change this.

He keeps his eyes down, on the silver curled around the tips of his fingers. Emilie clicks her tongue, and leans farther back in her seat, one leg over another. She knows him, and he knows her - as well as she’d ever allow someone to know her, anyway - and because of this, she lets the edge settle back into her voice, and her curt tongue is sharper. “You’ll terrify everyone if you let yourself walk around like that. You look dead.”

Vladimir still doesn’t respond. Emilie drops her hands into her lap. “Vladimir.”

“Yes?”

“Pay attention to what I’m saying.”

“I can hear you fine,” he says, lifting his head and staring at her. His eyes feel heavy and his gaze isn’t steady but this isn’t new , he’s never slept well and he spends many of his nights restless and awake - the exhaustion that has taken over him that is worse than any insomniac episode is what pulls on him, drags his body to the earth and tries to bury him beneath it.

“I want to see it.”

“See what?”

“The Isles.”

She doesn't show the way her thoughts pause and her curiosity piques, or the way her heart beats twice and the light in her eyes is interest over concern. The game Noxian nobility plays is an interesting one - all who participate know that no word spoken is genuine, yet speak to one another with the same heartfelt concern as any other.

“ Why? What purpose do you have there?” There is no back support of the seat she's taken. Elise leans herself back anyway, away from Vladimir, away to watch him.

Vladimir responds by leaning forward, hands curling to loose fists and resting his chin on his flat fingers. He thinks of the empty wind through his windows. He thinks of the way death washed itself over him. He thinks of a song that he has never heard before but can't get out of his head.

“It's calling to me.” He wonders what the shoreline will look like. “When you went, did you have any reason beyond an insatiable curiosity?”

Her silence is consuming, turning over the request in her head like she'd turn a stone in her palm. Nothing subtle, nothing hidden in code or court talk, nothing she can't understand. He lies about many things - who he is, where he came from, who he's killed - but his intentions are always clear, like the hour after a morning fog. “I only deliver disciples of Vilemaw to Her lair. Are you asking to be converted, or are you asking me to deliver you to your burial?”

He smiles. She thinks he wants her God. “I only ask you guide me.”

If she knows he's lying, she's better at hiding it than he is. “I will organize a pilgrimage.”

The air shifts when he breathes in for the first time. The ocean salt fades - familiar and tepid, like the roll of water - and Vladimir can taste death in the air.

The stale rot in the sickly warm air roots itself among the coven of hooded acolytes, rolling dread cast over the shoreline the same way the fog does. Elise carries herself with a determined clarity, too comfortable in the way the wind rolls over her shoulders and the howling silence consumes the island. She is in long dark robes, ceremonial in purpose - dark regalia laced and lined with spider silk hemwork, etching where the cuffs drape down her forearms and curl in the crook of her arms.

He wears a hood to match the mass of acolytes at her heels. The unsteady caution of the isles roll up behind him - skeletal hands that curl like the wisps of fog around his ankles seem to hang over him. He’s urged along.

He’s welcomed inside. He’s awaited.

Vladimir looks to Elise, who smiles to herself as means of routine - the island knows her, and it allows her to walk easy through the mist, bowing to her presence by dissipating. He wonders how it will speak to him. He, too, is willing , as she was, however long ago.

His heels sink into the dirt, damp from a receding tide. Elise turns her head, glancing down at Vladimir, and waits to see his apprehension. She finds none. He knows she’s watching.

“The temple is a means away,” she states, spoken to those who draw their attention to the macabre surroundings of the isles, and also unto Vladimir - he knows what lies within the temple she details. He offers her a look, one that turns her lies over in its hand, considering. She smiles at him, threateningly. Do not jeopardize this. You are not my priority .

Death rolls around them as they embark within the beaten paths of the island, paths framed by flora that hangs between consuming life and peaceful death. The sky is dark, a low moon shrouded by clouds that seem to curl, domed over the mass and its priestess - closing in, winding them tight, crushed between the star-barren sky and the cold, lifeless earth. Flowers that bloom with dried petals hang at their feet. The taste of rot reaches their throats. Vladimir breathes in, and Elise knows that reaction too well.

He steps on something that cracks. Fallen oak branch, or forgotten bone - it’s a sound that resonates an eerie serenity within him. He considers, for a passing moment, he should not find peace.

The song keeps singing to him. It’s louder here.

But it does not come from a spider’s web.

It is then, that Vladimir also considers he is not here to submit himself to the altar of Elise’s sacrifices. It is not in him to stop her, use the knowledge earnt through secondhand gossip passed among the elite of the Black Rose to halt her pilgrimage and spare the lives of her congregation. Even if he cared, found it in him to consider the lives of humans deserving of whatever self-sacrificing mercy he could possibly find within him, they’d die at the hands of the island anyway.

It’s buried into his skull. Death that sounds like a melody. Luring and lulling and pulling him along. Like hands at his sleeves, only nobody is there, clawing at his wrist and taking him where he never feared ( he’s never feared death. it has intrigued him, kept him wondering, but never wanting, never longing. its new hold on him is exhilarating. ).

She knows he steps away when the footsteps over familiar dry earth lose their even rhythm, a pause in the congregation behind her. Elise turns herself around and searches for the dissent, and grits fanged canines when her most interesting catch is gone . One of the women she had brought steps to her left side, passing a glance upward.

“Should we search for him, Your Reverence?” it comes low, and pulls her from her consuming thoughts of budding rage . Elise’s eyes find the ones of her attentive disciple, looking through the fear she tries to bury beneath her skin. The island is cold, and the fog passes through her bones, no matter how she swallows down the anxiety swelling inside her.

Her gaze is sharp. “No.” Elise steps further into the shadows. “The island will claim him soon enough. If it doesn’t, I will find him myself.”

He is filled with the exhilarating feeling of getting away with something he shouldn’t be doing. Every step into the eternal darkness that hangs over the isles, foot over blackened earth, fills him with invigorated excitement. Vladimir does not know where he is running. He hears the sighs of spirits, echoing through the trees and calling for names he cannot recognize, long forgotten by the waning memory of time.

Some sound like his name, but he reasons it's the delirium reaching him, mesmerized by the holy ground he has found, anticipating it awaits his arrival.

He’s breathing deeply, sharply inhaling and exhaling heavily, looking across a horizon that closes in to find the meaning of why he chose to come. Vladimir realizes he hasn’t a single idea what he is meant to do with the death he breathes in, lightheaded on the rot clinging to his lungs and throat. His arms are stiff at his side.

There’s a fog over the islands, not unlike that which had ravaged Noxus, hanging heavy and shrouding the horizon and the lands long beyond it - the water that rolls against the shorelines pull mist from over the ocean, pulling it around him, trapping him with cold air flooding his lungs. There is a wind, and it blows low, close to the ground, passing through the fabric of his clothes. Shapes move within the fog, and the spirits take notice of him.

He’s never been much of a person , but unfortunately, he is alive. Life brought to the Shadow Isles calls upon the attention of the dead.

With a low roll of wind, he comes - a wraith that follows the curling mist, long limbs that hang without use above the rotting earth, eyes alight with the cold glow of a haunted harbour - Vladimir sees no iris nor pupil, nothing within the armoured priest but icy decay. He is unsure if something wills him to stay, or if fear (once thought dead, only dormant) has rooted itself inside his bones. The spirit narrows its glowing eyes, and approaches Vladimir.

Clutched in one hand is a staff. Ceremonial in its own purposes. It resembles nothing of what the spider priestess shares with her coven. He considers running, but the wraith’s free hand is at his throat.

The skeletal hand gripping the frame of his jaw feels like a cold knife, lingering presence of hanging, long dead flesh over the curves of each finger with sharp clawed talons for nails. The wraith has no need to breathe yet exhales vulgar death over Vladimir, eyes void of human spark and lifelingering meaning, leaning in to stare into the white irises of his painfully ( unwillingly ) human shell. He's being watched with an interest that terrifies him. Vladimir feels pulled apart, picked through by death itself, life drawn out of him.

It's instinctive to bring a hand up to the hand clutching him. His own wraps around a thin wrist, and only feels the curve of bone beneath it, wrapped in tattered red cloth. He doesn't push. The spirit pushes his nails into Vladimir’s flesh regardless.

His voice is cold water underneath winter’s ice, lingering on vowels and dragging them through the space between his rotten teeth. It sounds like a voice that didn't die with the rest of its host. “Why are you here?”

The grip doesn’t, can’t tighten. Vladimir knows this. But the tension in the bone feels as if his hand longs to. “I fled a coven, dedicated to one of the spirits on these islands-”

In all of his life, Vladimir is thankful his voice can remain clear when he is lying. He can’t look away from the miraculous sea-green of the priest’s eyes. He fears if he does, he may perish.

“I was drawn here.” The words feel strange around his tongue. He never believed in the common faiths of Noxus - he never found comfort in their words. He doesn’t consider himself faithful now. Following the desires of death doesn’t accredit to any newfound piety, he believes. “Surviving your Harrowing inspired me.”

Death’s grip recedes from him. His talons pull away, leaving pressed lines where they gripped Vladimir’s skin, a cold touch that is not replaced with warmth, but he still misses it. The haunting within Vladimir keeps him still, rooted in the grasp of perfect death. The sea-green is captivating.

There's a slow blink that covers those eyes boring into the bones of Vladimir’s face. The wind howls, and the spirits that hang off him sigh. His feet won't touch the ground, and he continues to stare at Vladimir, whose legs feel rooted and dug into the ground, held down by decaying life. He seems to be considering something.

“It has been a long time since the living have come to meet the dead.” ( He speaks, recalling a memory. ) “For most, your presence is unexpected. Yet…”

He seems to lean leftward, against the sceptre he now holds in both hands. “The presence of a hemomancer - is that what you attempted to do moments before?”

Vladimir nodded. His voice was like a song through a glass hallway - loud and echoing and hollow, a voice of a thousand different lives culled and wound into one. It was captivating. And a little beautiful.

Those eyes, filled with an unholy light, seemed to brighten with anticipation. “So it is you. It was I who left the spirits to sing you my song when I departed your land.”

“Who are you?” a deathsinger was in the old writings he found, but the already little information had even less on this one-

“I am Karthus,” he said, with a smile less sinister, more sharp , with an unknown threat that has Vladimir captivated. “and I have been awaiting you, hemomancer.”

His heartbeat lulls, stilling in his chest - his blood turns to ice when Karthus’ voice rolls through him, a choir wound together in one haunting breath. The voice is familiar in the way the night sky is - ever present, hung over his head with reminders and omens stretched across, holding him hostage in a place he never thought to be. It sounds like a threat, something to scare him - and he's never trusted anyone, and he still doesn't, but maybe there is a way to sate the song in his head.

“Have you,” he tries, flippant, trying to keep as wary of a gaze he can.

“The power present in your nation’s capital could only belong to one person,” Karthus responds, smile as simple as if this is how it was meant to end. “I longed to meet them.”

“You could sense me.”

“Certainly, this capability of mine is not surprising . I knew of men with powers alike to yours in years past - to show an interest in hemomancy’s remaining sole practitioner is a rational desire.”

He is less hackled, posture once more impeccable and hand raised to his own face. He is familiar, but not in manners that Vladimir could name him at any other time - it is the way he is clothed, the insignia across his pauldrons and affixed on his hat. This isn't much different from the robes worn by priests of the Kindred - he recognizes them from Noxus.

“You came once you heard my song,” Karthus speaks again, with a knowing note to his choir of voices, a smile he would not believe residence of these isles to posses. “You are with the coven that passes this island.”

“You know about them,” Vladimir says, and thinks on the fury that must burn through Elise. She can kill another noble, if that's what she wants. He doesn't care, but won't give her the satisfaction either way.

“Their purpose is not a secret here.”

“Their priestess might come looking for me once she's killed them all.” She can try to kill him. “She wouldn't be currying favour with anyone here if she kills your guest.”

Karthus’ laughter is soft, wisps of souls once were curling around air that never was. It has a melody to it Vladimir wants to follow.

“Perhaps I may prevent her from harming you with my purpose of calling you here.”

Vladimir looks at him, directly. The wasting skin, the bones of his face rounded - he has never thought to stare at a lich. “And what is that?”

Karthus touches his throat.

Her mind drifts and her thoughts are distant when she pulls herself from the ritual, venom of the Vilemaw rolling down her curled fingers and over her cupped palm. The hall of the temple is silent once more, with no bones being cracked or silk being pulled, and no whispers of her disciples and final sobs of life. She stands as the final woman above corpses, the offered vials presented to her by the beautiful immortal Goddess she covets life for lined up on an altar bed. Elise does not enjoy this offering.

The vials are placed in a rucksack her last standing apprentice once held. Leather bound and older than the girl who carried it - Elise remembers countless girls before her, and there will be more girls that can replace her. All she can hear is her own breathing. She took no pleasure in this ritual, for a presence remained on the island that she could not account for.

She does not speak to the wraiths, spirits and spectres here. She has no need to. She is certain they are aware of her, and she is certain her favour with the arachnid god buried deep within the islands is what protects her from whatever wrath or curiosity would lead them to her. She never stays for longer than she must. She never searches, never travels farther than the temple she needs to be at.

Her gown is still perfect, silken robes rolling in the cold and gentle breeze that greets her when she steps from the temple’s once sealed doors. Those bodies will keep Her sated for many months to come - wrapped in the webs She has weaved, cocooned in silk. Elise keeps her gaze ahead, steady, narrowed. The wayward spirits that linger in the air like lost whispers croon around her, speaking to themselves in sighs. She is always fulfilled when she leaves, feeling the imperfections of her skin wane and her vision become sharper. She feels alive among the dead.

Vladimir is still at the forefront of her thoughts. She admits this is the most thought she’s ever given about his wellbeing, and saying it like that is far too generous. She knows he has chosen to bury himself within the isles - he wouldn’t be stupid enough to try to escape on the boat they arrived on without her.

Petty, yes.

But not stupid.

He knows he can’t get anywhere.

She can hear the rolling waves against an old dock distantly, water no longer following in a lazy river - and in between the whispering spirits and the dark, murky waters, she can hear something else.

“If you’re going to kill me, you should be quick about it,” she calls into the aether, her long legs coming to a halt. “I do not have time for your dramatics , Vladimir. I am awaited back home.”

The silence remains. She pauses, and then continues walking, head high and without visible care for his antics.

“Are you angry that I tried to kill you?” she asks to nothing, knowing he’s there. “I would apologise, but you should have seen it coming, my dear. At least we have reunited. Walk with me, we will return-”

She stops when he appears. Immediately, it seems to be that he appears from nowhere, but her eyes are sharp once more, and caught the mist sweeping upward from the earth below them, like the trail of fog around her was Vladimir following her. Elise stares and shock strikes her, looking between his lurid and sickly skin and the desecration of the hooded garment she had given him for their pilgrimage. His hands are not particularly human, and the shock turns to fury.

“Where did you go -”

“I didn’t come here for you, don’t give yourself so much credit.” It’s still him, with that agonizingly dry voice and the nasally drawl to every vowel, she knows it - even with the airy tone that echoes his taunt. “You were my method of travel.”

“Who did this to you?” it’s an appalled command more than it is concern, with Elise gritting her fanged teeth in slow boiling rage. “I know who resides here, Vladimir, and I know what they are capable of, as well as how they take lives-”

“He didn’t say.” He’s lying. He’s infuriating. “He offered I join his choir. I enjoyed the idea of necromancy. This is more than what Emilie was trying to encourage in my meditations.”

An eerie realization dawns upon Elise’s face, and the way her eyes widen tells Vladimir just that. She does not darken, only stiffens her resolve. She frowns, and walks towards him, past him.

“Am I to leave you here, or are you going to figure out how you are going to explain this to Emilia’s council as we return?”

He’s quiet. At first, she believes he did not follow, and remained where they stood before. Then she wonders if it was an apparition, the isles toying with her mind as she leaves, prying into her personal concerns and pulling her suspicions forward. But then he speaks, and it sounds as if he is right behind her. Elise doesn’t turn around.

“I’m staying.”

“I will not tell anyone about this. Mostly because I don’t wish to explain where I went.” It was stupid to bring him here. “That Lich is terrible company, I hope you know.”

She turns her head. He stares at her, empty white eyes over wan flesh, the beginning of decay around his eyes where shadows and bruises were but hours ago. His jaw appears set, gritting his teeth that he’s lost his edge over her. Her own smile is insidious.

“I know everything about this place. You don’t know what you’re getting into.”

The wind catches her gown. He hears the distant lap of the ocean.

[fountainpenguin]

So... In your "Zone Swap" idea, does Jazz figure out Danny's secret like she does in the main series? And if so, does she try to help keep his secret without letting him know she's figured it out?

Heh heh. It’s not much of a secret, really. I’ll jot out some AU basics here because I’m still trying to figure them out myself and decide where Jazz fits best in the AU. This is kind of a rough draft, so details may change later. Skim to the bold parts if you want to see the answer to your actual question; this first part is just some “ChalkZone” babble as I gather my thoughts on secret identities.

My goal with ZoneSwap is to swap some signature parts of both “Danny Phantom” and “ChalkZone”, but still keep the characters as in-character as possible where I can while taking into account all the ways the worldbuilding has been flipped and taking creative liberties as necessary (like making Tucker a ghost to give Danny motivation to visit and protect the Ghost Zone).

As a result of this swap, Rudy can now “go chalk”, turning into Snap, and even use the magic chalk in the RealWorld (though the effects only last as long as he stays in chalk form, and erase when he switches to normal). I’ve said that he can switch at will, but really, he needs to be standing inside a closed chalk shape like a circle or a square or whatever. If he can’t find one and he doesn’t have chalk of his own on hand, he’s stuck.

He can no longer create portals at will, and has to find them instead. I think they pop up on certain chalk surfaces at random, kind of like the Ghost Zone ones do: for example, instead of drawing the underwater portal in “Water Water Everywhere”, it would have opened itself, flooding the quarry, and Rudy only would have known about it once it started attracting attention. 

I can’t decide yet if he would have tried to repair the breach while in regular form or chalk form. Hmm. I’m thinking the ZoneSwap version of this episode would share some similarities with “Life Lessons” from “Danny Phantom”, by which I mean that Reggie would go chalk and try to help Rudy save the town.

Ooh, yes. They go chalk and have to act like they get along in public because the whole town sees them and thinks they’re superhero and sidekick or something, even though they can’t stand each other. Then when the rain finally arrives, he and Reggie end up stuck under a ledge or something in the quarry / nearby area and have to watch the water rise while Penny runs frantically off in search of an umbrella, heh heh. 

As much as Reggie doesn’t care for the wonders of ChalkZone, he still appreciates the world as his escape from reality, and he doesn’t want to see it found or destroyed. Presumably, he’d use his cape like a scarf to hide his face and better conceal his identity. Gotta have secret identities! (So, for the most part, it’s Rudy who has the secret identity now, not Danny).

Rudy also has to deal with dangerous Zoners escaping into the RealWorld, and Reggie the Red, Vinnie, and Terry are bigger threats too. Finally, he’ll dissolve in water if he’s in chalk form and it will hurt a lot.

Danny, following his being zapped by his parents’ basement portal, still has ghost powers, but in this AU they only work in the Ghost Zone. Even though the Phantom look doesn’t carry over, he still calls himself by that name when addressing other ghosts, because they feel more comfortable with him that way.

He still has ghost enemies, but makes lots of ghost friends too, including Tucker, who’s been dead for the last two years. He can also create portals into the Ghost Zone through the thermos at will, but only so many before the thermos has to be recharged. Probably by dipping it in the portal in the basement and filling it with “ghost soup”.

ZS!Danny’s entire deal is, whereas Rudy is a fighter now, Danny becomes a lover kind of by default. For some reason or another, ghosts can’t survive outside of the Zone for longer than a few hours or days (not sure how long yet, but preferably hours for plot reasons). This might be because they can’t breathe, or they can’t maintain their connection to the world (the assumption being that the Zone is the only thing that keeps them grounded) and they fade away permanently.

There would need to be a definite negative association with fading for Danny to react the way he does, so perhaps instead of just fading, a ghost becomes “corrupted” when away from the Zone too long. They might start to dissolve, losing pieces of themself and some of their sanity. Ghosts who were once friendly, helpful spirits might transform into bitter nightmare creatures and act like feral or even rabid animals. Yes, now we’re getting somewhere.

Anyway, unfortunately, lots of ghosts either don’t know this, or believe it won’t happen to them (Imagine the stories that get in the news sometimes about parents putting their kids in risky situations at national parks, such as by spreading honey on their children to attract bears. Or compare it to teens who regularly have unprotected sex but don’t consider the possibility of getting pregnant or contracting STDs. That sort of mindset. “This is the kind of thing that happens to someone else”, “I’ll be careful”, “I know what I’m doing”, etc.)

Let’s face it: The Human Realm is attractive to ghosts. Technus wants to get his hands on all the flashy electronics that Walker doesn’t allow in the Ghost Zone. Skulker wants to hunt. Box Ghost wants to add to his collection. Ember wants to play her music in front of adoring teen crowds. Tucker wants to hang out with his friends. Other ghosts want to explore, visit friends and family, or just simply cause trouble.

Danny has watched his parents chase down countless of these “rogue” ghosts that I compared to feral, rabid animals here. And they’re terrifying. After reuniting with Tucker in the “pilot episode”, I presume, he learns some missing pieces from Tuck and puts together this whole “being away from the Zone too long makes these ghosts lose themselves”. 

So, he and Sam take it upon themselves to inform all the ghosts about such dangers / keep tabs on which ghosts are out and prioritize which ones need to be caught and returned first. Unfortunately, Danny probably gets pegged as a liar or something, so few ghosts are willing to go quietly back to the Zone and he has to lure them into the portals he creates with the thermos.

And there are some ghosts who are well aware of the danger, but come to him seeking aid, so he has to solve their problems, I guess. Something like that.

Basically Danny’s existence revolves around befriending the restless spirits he can and trying to better their afterlives while having a strict “ghosts are supposed to stay in the Ghost Zone” policy that no one listens to (especially a guy named Vlad who wants to exploit ghosts in some way, possibly by making them pay to leave the Zone? My original idea was that he firmly believed ghosts should be free, but I’m not sure how that will work with this “rabid ghost concept. And later in the series he’d start sending them Danny’s way by painting him as a villain for trapping him… I’m thinking Vlad had a daughter named Ellen who just recently died and he’s also trying to find her. Hmm… Thoughts?)

And of course, on the flipside, Rudy plays hero by keeping Skrawl, Craniac, and various other baddies in ChalkZone while at the same time keeping Vinnie and Terry out of it, and dealing with his school life and Reggie. He has to go chalk in order to draw stuff with the magic chalk, and he’d draw lots of things to fight for him (as opposed to attacking physically) while of course sticking to his oath to never again draw a living thing because he can’t handle the stress.

I’m loosely trying to imagine these two shows as if they were designed and written by the writers of the opposite show, therefore resulting in CZ being a darker and more actiony show and DP being cuter and more focused on world-building. That’s kind of tough though, because I can’t just remove all the awesome worldbuilding from “ChalkZone”, and a show about teenagers and ghosts tends to be angsty by default. I’m trying to find a middle ground.

To answer your actual question, everyone in Amity Park thinks ZS!Danny is a loon who runs around being a goofy ghost hunter like his parents. Since Danny can’t use his powers in the Human Realm, Valerie is Amity Park’s big hero. Instead of Phantom getting his name dragged through the dirt, the citizens of Amity Park by default attribute all of Danny’s good deeds to her, even if she only showed up at the very last minute when the cameras arrived. It’s equally as annoying to him as it was when everyone considered Phantom a villain.

Jazz would have to go into the Ghost Zone to realize that Danny has these ghostly abilities. In the Human Realm, he has to chase ghosts while fully human. Their parents would obviously be thrilled that he wants to join them in the family ghost-hunting business.

BUT Danny is trying to help and rescue ghosts, while his parents want to catch and study them. I think the big secret for Jazz to learn in this AU would be that Danny is using the portal despite their parents thinking it doesn’t work. 

She would learn (possibly during that “Snap Out of Water” parody that I nicknamed “Tuck, Tuck, Loose”) that Tuck is a ghost now, and Danny and Sam are friends with him and regularly sneak off to visit the Ghost Zone. I think she would want to be helpful, but her helpfulness probably has its limits.

Jack and Maddie, I guess, would be very worried/upset with A) Danny for befriending a ghost behind their back, B) the fact that he’s been getting in their way and preventing them from catching ghosts, and/or C) having potentially dangerous adventures in the Ghost Zone, or something along those lines. Once Vlad becomes involved, that would add another factor into the equation.

OR! About a year ago, Bill Burnett (one of “ChalkZone”’s co-creators) confirmed that a human who spends 24+ hours straight in ChalkZone will turn into a Zoner permanently, and said that if the show hadn’t stopped airing, we would have met a “British aristocrat kid” who had suffered this fate, and who teamed up with Skrawl in a big special episode (and Bill hints that this is why Skrawl kept stealing magic chalk since only a human can use it, even though we never found out why he was doing this in the show itself). 

So, I could take that detail and add it to this AU too- ZS!Jazz might find out through her parents (or probably Vlad) that the more time ZS!Danny spends in the Ghost Zone, the more corrupted and “rabid ghost-like” he’ll become (possibly because he’s half-ghost, so Sam might be immune). She might tell Danny this, but he would be upset, and they’d get into a fight over who knows more about ghosts, since he’s the one who’s visited the Zone more. 

Maybe he would begin showing signs of feral/rabid corruption, and she has to keep this from their parents while she struggles to find a cure, despite Danny constantly snapping at her that he’s fine and she needs to get off his back. With him being partly dead, maybe he suffers the same way as the other ghosts when he’s not in the Zone, but his development was delayed. So like, he can’t stay in the Ghost Zone without negative side effects, but he can’t stay out of it without negative side effects either.

If ZoneSwap were a show then Danny would probably show subtle signs the whole season, but the topic of his corruption would probably be the Season 1 finale or something, or maybe Season 2 (Personally I like the idea of Dash building a thermos of his own - possibly with Vlad’s help - as the last scene of Season 1 so he and Danny have the same weapon as a nod to Reggie and Rudy both using magic chalk in “Reggie the Red”, so we’ll make it Season 2).

So yes, in a way, Jazz would discover Danny’s ghost side. Even if he doesn’t become the same exact Phantom he does in canon, he’s still half dead and would presumably be of interest to his ghost-hunting parents, so she does her best to keep him off their radar.

I’m still kind of working out the details, but I’m getting there! I have some vague plans for this AU already figured out, but most of this I’m making things up as I go and get to answer Asks like this~

[writer59january13]

DESPAIR RING uninvited GUEST

Despite countless factorial permutations

and combinations, this cyber surfer avails two alms

(one from alma mater, thee other handily gifted from alma papa)

seeking succor asper sum er set Maugham

mull eight mom mee whiz sic cure ring

(via chemotherapy and radiation) human bondage,

boot metastatic carcinoma snatched away futuristic pharmacological balms

so glad experienced being tethered in utero umbilical connection

and this brother smothered and overly mothered,

etched bromide, which hankering calms

embryonic sensation this corporeal being lacks constantly subjected to exams

from hard school of hard knocks, which i bewail sets back and gloms

mine aim to revel in blissful contentment, but circumstances decrees otherwise

cursing this chap tubby haunted by veritable elfin grotto dwelling phantoms

hovering over sweet clover dials a mirage

yes...iris sieve blurbs from gals and two guys

that span the World Wide Web, and exude

premature ejaculatory ecstasy, puzzled if fie totally tubularly trod a tedious trek

along the boulevard of broken dreams

what happenstance oft finds thyself to flail

amidst difficulty to maximize

optimal opportunities searching for Holy Grail

or whatever constitutes such lofty

personal objective, perchance being hale

and hearty of body, mind and spirit

spurs the furies of fate tut test this primate

while he aims to gallop with mighty industrial

vim and vigor leaving a virtual soundcloud

of dust, though mindfulness helps

to pass go, and chance avoid jail

time, then maybe monopolized feedback offered

to this toothless mwm quasi-vegetarian

enjoying poetry stone soup, yet also subsisting

on supplementary vitamin packed glue tin free NON GMO gluten free

fruity tall tales for a male forty-two years shy sans Bing a centenarian,

which span of life best cut short with a nail  (possibly nine inches) hammered into faux coffin, cuz this imp doth turn pale

at the prospect to fill up a space of land best utilized by birds - such as quail

Mongoose, or ibis (though aye n'er saw one), where cremated ashes sail

across some verdant plain under cerulean skies putting to rest every travail

which thoughts of dem eyes spells relief since homelessness -

therein lied the rub but dove vine intervention    

cooed not comb sooner main impetus explaining this rambling spiel

(since completion a moot point since amazing grace smiled)

the warp and woof ova gauzy veil imperceptibly looms closer upon

turrets of my digital sea faring gun whale

and thus desperation finds pleading salvation. (since completion a moot point

since amazing grace smiled) before mine danse macabre

doppelganger draws dagger punctured skein tight

as a yank key notched belt housed within mine impenetrable 

hermetically sealed invisible bubble drapes with blackened

Hades hued habiliment therein dwelt sinister saboteur mastermind

marauder of Hubble piercing fiery ocular rift presence unseen but felt  

demands sacrifice once into bowels of Hades 

force at Devilled Pitchfork to traverse river Styx with unadulterated gelt,        

which known phantasmagorical double diabolical self amidst aftermath 

from Armageddon rubble astride charred global ruins

entire civilization melt planetary paroxysm

prognosticated by Maya sages  with 11th hour stubble

birthed Darth Vader nemesis  evil upon earth he did pelt

annihilating mankind, the derelict species that fueled trouble

hence evil twin appointed apocalyptic malevolence spelt

desiccation, humiliation, and laceration upon once verdant veldt

with mass crematorium desecration left horrific blistering welt.

Tan Sichuan Countdown to Homo sapiens extinction 

predicted millenniums in past to occur December 21

two thousand and twelve (that date elapsed without incident

but beware unexpected cataclysmic circumstance)

after con comma tinted common era, whereby catastrophic spark

detonating inferno incinerating blast eradicating extant flora

and fauna bereft sans hegira with no means to interrupt the die 

since the dawn of civilization cast. Impossible to escape

ominously predetermined quaking fate of human rat race

nor turn back hands of time with origin of species on clock face

thus ticking closer to hour of doomsday without faith to brace

allowing, enabling, and provide Gaia to redeem terrestrial space

vestiges teeming billions graced erased criminal minds without a trace

forcefully relinquishing simians planetary stranglehold amazing grace

proffering tabula rasa for another dominant species to claim the place.

Sirens promulgate emergency toward impending inescapable cataclysm,

yet no place to run or hide lest one boards rocket light-years away,

which makes suspense thrillers birthed by John Grisham

enviable plot to keep total Earths’ destruction at bay.

mice elf, a lifetime americaonline Meme bur hastens to convey dire

crisis sparking electric nom de plumeHarris40tude a papa who did sire

deux darling daughters, yet for ages hive stung

with hurt early, whence fatherhood did fire meow n childhoods' end fostering people strangers fork get dish

comb bob yule hated communication,

per S0S sprinkled with awe shucks corny, Egret - letting opportunities

take flight aspire, now pleasures soft as gossamer feather bedding

down play hardened angst riddled psyche, where ire

Ronny gully stubbornly thrives amidst adversity as father time spins gyre 

row scope at greased lightening speed, intimating with dead reckoning to hire

grim reaper, who whiz patient as Job, and exemplary at ridding mire

and muck bogs down this dada robbing

existence with joie de vivre, where funeral pyre

doth flickr-beckoning GoDaddy, cuz Juno I haint gonna hear angelic choir

or equivalent enlightenment re:  home sweet home, this atheist doggedly didst tire

so haim trying keep sea legs one step ahead of tipping point

envision self pitched into abyss, thus end of wire.

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

now, asper that unwelcome deathly still intruder

tis thee demise of life i.e. known

(among other names) as grim reaper

accompanied by ghost of

John (toot till loo to you) Bankhead Magruder.