#and defective i need them to survive

[bunnyb34r]

This depression, have even less energy than usual, no motivation to do anything but have "me time" doing crafts in my room alone, shit better fucking end with January.

[bonefall]

Honestly I like Twig because she's torn. She literally feels like she has to pick Violet and her dad because she'd be letting them down and they'd hate her if she chose to stay with Thunderclan. This eventually leads to her expressing clear boundaries later, but she's just a sad meow meow.

It seems like that's the general consensus; people seem to like Twig because she's in a state of constant suffering and can't get a decisive victory, ever. Okay, I can get behind that; this poor girl's a butt-monkey.

She makes more sense to me when she's an adult, having troubles training an apprentice, having love troubles with Finleap, torn between two Clans... it's the secret childhood meetings that are stumping me.

(and also there is no goddamn time in Bonefall AVoS to explore her relationship with Finleap christ AVoS is such a mess OTL Darktail is dead by the 4th book and the narrative just shambles around for 2 books)

I'm thinking Twigpaw can just be a small plot device of sorts for Violet in Bonefall AVoS, at least at first. Needletail is openly defying the Kin by sneaking Violetpaw out of the cult to go and meet her sister, a very dangerous thing to do in a Cult situation.

Show that Needletail is keeping her morals when everyone else is being rapidly indoctrinated.

I'm still working on it though

[fading-event-608]

Recently the syndicate of chemists in Lebanon has issued a statement warning people to not go near the blast sites due to alleged use of depleted uranium by Israel. (link - you need to scroll till the statement in Arabic). The screenshot of their statement on twitter was shared here on Tumblr and I’ve seen multiple people expressing scepticism regarding the source. Some people linked an article (link) from anti-Hezbollah 'democratic' newspaper 'L’Orient Today' to ‘fact-check’ - because of course they can’t read Arabic and are discontent with a twitter link.

This is my short summary of the article: they confirm that Israel has used Depleted Uranium (DU) weapons, not only in Lebanon but also in Gaza in June of this year and between October and December of last year. They establish a history of the use of Depleted Uranium, and include examples of its use in Iran in 2003. Israel doesn't directly talk about their use of DU, but neither are they hiding it - because there is no law that forbids the use of these bombs by Israel, there is no treaty regulating the use of DU weapons. There were several resolutions calling for a moratorium on the use of DU weapons in the UN and EU Parliament, the latest of which was in 2022, but these have failed to stop their use (those who have used them also includes both Russia and Ukraine). The article ends with an ominous addition that the Israeli army has been found guilty multiple times of using white phosphorus, which IS prohibited against civilians or civilian property under international law. (You probably can already tell that their defense is that they do not use it against civilians)

There is another article that was published in early September this year - LINK - I highly encourage you to read this one yourself, as it is quite short, especially when considering the amount of information it contains. As this one is more easily accessible, I won’t summarize it - please take it in yourself. I will say, however, that this article’s author, one Dr. Busby, worked with colleagues to conduct several investigations into the use of uranium-based weapons in both Lebanon and Gaza. In 2006, Dr. Busby asked his colleague to collect multiple samples from a crater left by what was suspected to be Depleted Uranium weapons. Samples from an ambulance air filter were also taken. Dr. Busby and company found not only the  presence of depleted uranium but also of Enriched Uranium. Here’s the paper: link.

Enriched Uranium. In 2006.

By 2024, all of the laboratories that Dr. Busby had used to Conduct the investigation have closed their doors either to him or in general. Busby’s letters to the UN, as well as papers detailing evidence of the use of enriched and depleted uranium are either dismissed or ignored, rendering it unlikely that there will ever be the “official” source for these claims that certain people now see fit to demand. And even if the UN did accept those letters and did push for ban of those weapons - would Israel comply? Genocide is ‘illegal’ under international law, and Israel still faces the case in ICJ, but what will that ICJ do if they rule that Israel is guilty? What would UN do if they accept evidence of Israel using uranium-based weapons? Scold them and write a fine?

The aspect of the deployment of nuclear weapons considered the most horrific is - and has always been - the fallout. The idea that all nuclear weapons would leave evidence - again, fallout - behind was born into the cultural consciousness through various cold war era PSAs, as well as other media inspired by these horrors, potential and otherwise. The weapons Israel is using here do not create fallout, however. But do not mistake them as harmless - they are still highly carcinogenic. They cause birth defects, as well as various other illnesses - mysterious illnesses, or at least mysterious until doctors attempting to treat them register that their patients have been exposed to enriched uranium, after which point the mystery goes away. 

In a sense, the horrors advertised by cold war PSAs and films like Doctor Strangelove, the promise of some explosive end brought about by some fool in the US pushing the wrong button - these serve to draw a veil over the continued use of nuclear weapons that have been ongoing since this technology was first harnessed for violence. This is a severe danger to the people of Gaza, and we can’t ignore it simply because we have developed in our minds too much faith in the loosest understandings of nuclear warfare.

I think many of you are familiar with a boiling frog story. The story goes that if you put a frog in a pot of boiling water, it will try to climb out. But if you put it in warm water and very slowly heat it, it will be so accustomed to the temperature it will eventually be boiled alive. It’s not very authentic, of course - in reality the frog will try to jump out as soon as it deems the water temperature uncomfortable. Just like you would try to get out of the bathtub as soon as it gets too hot for you or try to warm yourself up when you spend too much time outside in winter. 

But some of it still rings true. At what point will the UN, or ICJ, or some other white savior wannabe decide that Israel has done too much? What is that ‘too-much’ point that makes them try to protest, and what would that protest be?

As in case with Tumblr, it seems that the boiling point, in fact, has already passed and people grew accustomed to deaths of Palestinians. There are thousands of posts about the situation in Gaza, and the whole Palestine, Lebanon, Yemen, Syria… They get a lot of attention by both zionists and Palestine supporters. There are also hundreds of Gazans that came to Tumblr in hopes to escape the genocide by asking people to cover evacuation and survival costs. Do they get the same attention? Barely. Arguably zionists are more invested in interacting with those posts - they mass report them and harass Palestinians. And even if the fundraiser post gets a lot of attention, it does not necessarily translate into a lot of donations - people just assume that someone else will donate instead of them.

You can’t stop Israel all by yourself. You can’t convince the UN or try to progress the ICJ case by yourself. You can, however, do small acts that will contribute to Palestinian resistance. Go protest, go boycott, and please, please, please, go donate to Palestinian fundraisers.

Falastin’s family are under constant threat in Gaza. She’s been fundraising to save them since late June, and yet they’ve only recently gotten to just over 5% of their total goal - a little short of $10,000 USD. They’re still in Gaza, and still in need of funds for survival. The longer they are trapped there, the more they need - not just for food and water, but also for medicine, shelter, and clothes. Each time they’re displaced, due to inadequate time to pack, they lose more supplies, and their needs increase. Give what you can so that they can survive this, and please share their fundraiser as much as you’re able regardless of whether you can donate, just in case someone you know might be able to help. Not just here on Tumblr, on other social media, talk to your friends, coworkers, family, in group chats and in discord servers.

Please keep in mind conversion rates before donating:

10$ = 103 SEK

25$ = 260 SEK

50$ = 519 SEK

100$ = 1,038 SEK

[ragingbullmode]

🚨 URGENT RELIEF FOR GAZA FAMILY 🚨

as of 26Sept2024 currently @ $20,300/$30,000 ‼️

my original post lost traction, but i am crowdfunding for lana, a 15 year old displaced in palestine. lana has a congenital heart defect & needs life saving medication to survive.

edit 10Aug2024: lanas campaign has been vetted by @/beesandwatermelons on insta- she is line #8 in the emergency/priority tab !

ive included her story, as well as the messages she sent to me when the occupation dropped more fliers to displace her & her brothers again. i am not on insta, but below are the exchanged messages between the two of us about how her account & other fundraising on her behalf have been deleted, as well as the distress of halted donations due to the ‘conspiracy’ concerning palestinian fundraisers.

please consider leaving her a message or reply on the post, she appreciates them !!

if you provide proof of donations $15 & above i will do a quick commission for you similar to the examples below !!! please DM me if you have any questions !!!!!

EDIT 29Sept2024: PLEASE CLICK FOR THE NEW DONATION POST‼️

[kasagia]

Game of survival

Pairing: young president! Coriolanus Snow x fem!rebel! reader Summary: The worst enemy is the person who betrayed you when you trusted them with all your heart. The person you told all your secrets to, the person you loved more than your life—the best friend who suddenly turned on you and stabbed you in the back and right through your heart, using your weaknesses they learned with the time they spent with you. You and Coriolanus have been each other's worst enemies since that fateful day at the lake in District 12... Inspired by: Game of survival - Ruelle Warning: 18+; a little smut; Coriolanus chases you around his presidential palace; I had a completely different idea for it, but it turned out that way...; Enjoy!; Taglist: @aoi-targaryen @il0vebeingdelulu @chelseyyouraverageluigi Coriolanus Snow's Masterlist ~•♤♤♤•~ Main Masterlist

You hold your breath as you sit on the roof of a building.

Through Sniper Rifle, you watch carefully as the president of Panem gets out of his car. You only see the outline of his bleached blonde hair before he disappears into his presidential palace. The car drives away, and peacekeepers start circulating around the building again. An impregnable fortress. Seemingly.

"I hope you have a plan." Joseph mumbles next to you, moving into position next to you. "We must act quickly tonight. Get in and out before the peacekeepers find out what are we going to do."

"First, you have to shoot him. I won't leave there without seeing the life drain from his eyes." You reply, preparing to leave the roof.

"Do not worry about it. Everyone would like to be in my place. I don't miss the target." He replies confidently, with an arrogance in his voice that you don't like. But you won't lecture him. The other hunter never liked being told how to do his job. You caught animals; he caught real people. He had more experience in this area than you. But could Coriolanus still be considered human?

"That's not what I'm thinking about. It's a game of survival. Him or us. You have to play it smart. Don't underestimate him just because he's from the Capitol, Jospeh."

"I bet he didn't even hold a gun in those well-groomed hands of his." You shudder. The screams of Sejanus and Lucy Gray echo in your head. Coriolanus' screams. The sounds made by mockingjays...

"I doubt it." You answer briefly and go out to the staircase.

You pass through several of its inhabitants before reaching the basement. Before you open one of the rooms, you look around to make sure you are alone in the residential basements. You quickly open and close the door behind you. You move the painting, some kind of marriage portrait of a general and his wife, and go through a hidden passage. It was a tunnel dug under the building, which led to a small room where the most important members of the rebellion slept. The rest were to arrive during the day. For a special evening event.

"You need to be more careful." Meg tells you as you return to base. "The peacekeepers seem to be breeding in their barracks. I saw twice as many of them on the streets as yesterday. And guess what?"

She slaps her hand flat on the table. You walk up and lean down, seeing the wanted poster for you. Alive, not dead. Whoever turned you in would get a ridiculous amount of money.

"I have a nicer jaw shape." You comment and pick up the wanted poster. You throw it in the air and aim the dagger at it, nailing it to the earthy wall of your shelter.

"I don't know what you did to Snow, but even his advisor, who ran his presidential campaign and defected to join us, isn't so... passionately wanted by him and his men as you are." She says, wincing when she can't get the dagger out of the wall. You roll your eyes and walk over to her, pulling out the dagger easily and handing it to her with a mocking smile.

"Old disagreements and a minor difference of opinion." You tell her, walking over to the map of the Capitol and the plan of the presidential palace. "I doubt he even remembers why he's so pissed at me. That was ages ago. 10 years. Maybe more. But as you can see, bastards like him hold grudges for a long time."

"People gossip, you know. That you are not suitable for this job. That you had some feelings for him that would make you hesitate to pull the trigger when necessary." She says, walking towards you. She places her hand on your back, making you look at her. "If you don't want to, don't say it. But I need to be completely sure that you won't betray us."

"I'm not the one who is supposed to kill him. We have Jospeh to do that. But believe me, if necessary, my hand won't shake. I am a hunter. My job is to kill. And an animal like him is well within my hunting range. He... he has done too much for me to feel sorry for him. And believe me, if anyone has a reason to kill him, it's me. I have something to take revenge for. So if you don't trust me, then trust my rage. After all, there is nothing like a mad woman, is there?" You ask, sending her a meaningful smirk.

And even though you pretend to be so confident in front of her and any other rebels, deep down, you know that it's not all that simple. Things between you and Coriolanus... were complicated. And anyone else in your situation would hate him with all their hearts, but you couldn't just stop loving him. Maybe you were actually weak, but if you learned anything from Coroilanus Snow, it was how to pretend to be stronger than others. Even when you were in a shitty situation.

"Good. Prepare yourself. We start at dusk. For the Districts."

"And for all the fallen. Let the odds be forever dead." You finish.

Meg nods and leaves you alone with the maps and plans. Your task was simple. Sneak through the guests at a masquerade party, get into his office, and plant a bomb. Just in case. Only if Joseph hadn't managed to kill him. You were also supposed to set a few other traps for President Snow. And since you were the best hunter in Panem, there was no one better for that job.

You've been preparing for this for months. You have figured out all the escape routes, emergency exits, peackeeper patrols, and their plans to secure the reception at the presidential palace.

Tonight, everything will be resolved, your past will be finally a closed past, whether you want it or not.

Either he or you will die tonight. And if you were sure about something, you were sure that you wouldn't pass away so easily.

You never expected that Coriolanus Snow would become your worst enemy.

Or at least that's what you think as you drive through the Capitol. You sit in the backseat, staring at the streets and people passing by, as your chauffeur and fellow rebel take you to your destination.

Ever since Lucy Gray returned from the Hunger Games, she has been praising her mentor. She said that the boy she met gave her invaluable support and help, and that if it weren't for him, she wouldn't have survived on her own in the arena.

Her stories make you imagine him as an angel. Blond curls, sky blue eyes, helping a poor girl from the district, a man with a good heart—everything fit. And you were confirmed in that belief when you saw him for the first time and realised how handsome he really was.

How were you supposed to know then that Coriolanus Snow was really an angel, but a fallen one? How could you recognise the devil through the disguise he had created for himself?

You were certainly not the first or the last to fall under his spell, to believe in the façade of a good man, to see him as a hurt boy who needed love and tenderness. At least you wanted to believe you weren't the only one naive enough to ignore all the clues and signs that he wasn't such a saint after all.

It started inconspicuously. Like all disasters. And you, having lived in District 12 for so long, knew very well what bad fate, misfortune, and catastrophe were.

But nothing could have prepared you for the coming of Coriolanus Snow.

He was charming. Oh God, and how much he was. Sejanus didn't pay much attention to his surroundings, but Snow picked up on every little detail, no matter how insignificant it may have been at first sight. Lucy Gray fell into Plinth's arms. And you became infatuated with a devil who seemed to be as observant as you.

"Lucy Gray's friends are my friends." The brunette guy says that and takes a step forward. You shift your cautious gaze to him, but he doesn't seem to notice that you're wary and reaches for your hand, pressing a kiss to the back of it. "Sejanus. Nice to meet you."

"Y/N." You say, removing your hand from his grip. "I used to say that too. And then she took me to feed her snakes. The poisonous ones. The worst 3 minutes of my life."

"3 minutes?" He asks curiously. You notice someone moving behind him—another man—who is whispering something to Lucy.

"She ran away screaming." Your friend giggles and throws her arm on Sejanus' shoulder. You roll your eyes at her as she laughs at you, not hiding the smile that begins to form on your lips.

"That's not true. I didn't scream. I saw a rabbit and went hunting." You mutter, feigning offence, which only intensifies her laughter.

"A hunter who is afraid of snakes?"

Someone's question distracts you from Lucy Gray. Behind her, you notice the man who was whispering something to her earlier. He steps out of her shadow and stands a few steps away from you. You look him up and down, and by the way Lucy is comfortable with the other peacekeeper and his appearance, you assume he must be her mentor. Coriolanus Snow. And damn her, he was really hot.

"I am afraid of what I have to be afraid of, private Snow. Just like a hunter should. You never know when the danger will come that you will turn from a predator to a prey." He watches you carefully, listening to your every word. And by the small smile he can't contain, you know that you've managed to make him curious and defend yourself enough for him not to discredit you.

"It's Coryo when we are among friends." He says this, nodding at you. He does not extend his hand to you like Sejanus did, nor does he attempt any other greeting that requires physical contact. Weird. You wonder if he would be attentive enough to sense your discomfort.

"We should get going. The Covey is probably waiting for us. Will you come tomorrow? I think we have a lot to talk about." The brunette asks them with a smile and stands on your other side, taking your arm.

"Su..."

"We will escort you." Coriolanus interrupts his friend, still looking at you. "We wouldn't want anything to happen to you. There are... quite a lot of people hanging around here tonight." His gaze shifts to Lucy Gray for a moment, and he nods for her to lead.

"He may be a rebel, but he is also chivalrous. Come then, gentlemen." She laughs and places her other hand on the crook of Sejanus' elbow. Coriolanus adjusts and walks on your other side, maintaining an appropriate distance, so he is close but not touching you or brushing his arm against yours.

At one point, the crowd of people won't let you walk four in a row, so Lucy and Sejanus take the lead. You and Coryo follow behind them, a little apart. There's a strange silence between you. You shift your gaze to his, and you see that he is already watching you.

"I think I should thank you for saving her. It's not that easy to keep that tramp out of danger. And believe me, I know what I'm saying; I've known her since we were children."

"Yes, she is very… alive. But that was just my job as her mentor." He says this as you both walk down the dark streets. The moonlight and a few lanterns illuminate it so much that you can walk freely in the dark without tripping over any protruding stones.

"Was it also your duty to become a peacekeeper and come to 12?" Your question clearly surprises him. He didn't expect anyone to connect... the events or have the courage to ask him about it. Lucy Gray didn't do it. But you weren't Lucy Gray. You were better. And he was starting to see it.

"It wasn't... planned." He says this and clears his throat, looking at Lucy Gray and Sejanus laughing together about something. "But I'm not going to stay here long."

"Did you come here for her or for him?" You ask, seeing his jaw clench as he watches them both.

"None. I just had to do it." He responds dryly, clearly not wanting to talk about it further. You didn't know who he was jealous of, but you could recognise that feeling in others' eyes perfectly. And he was definitely jealous. You only wondered about what. About Lucy Gray, Sejanus, or just about what was between them?

"A lonely wolf. I see." You comment and turn your head towards the Hanging Tree.

Coriolanus takes the opportunity to get a better look at you. You don't have an outfit as bold and colourful as Lucy Gray. You were rather quiet and thoughtful. He couldn't' say that he wasn't captivated by the aura that his former tribute had around her, but he somehow found himself feeling better in the silence between the two of you than he ever felt around Lucy Gray and her wild personality.

You had also really beautiful eyes.

"And what about you?" He asks, wanting to get your attention again.

At first, he stayed close to you just to spite Lucy Gray, but after she obviously ignored him, he had no intention of talking to you anymore. But something about you drew him to you. And maybe it was your caution; maybe he wanted to break it and set it as a challenge, a distraction while he was in District 12, or maybe he just wanted attention? He did not know. It irritated him how much he wanted to see your eyes sparkling teasingly in the lamplight again. 

"Me?" You looked up at him, giving him your full attention. He almost smiled. Almost.

"Are you remaining here for her or for someone else? I know there is a need for good hunters in many other and better districts. Why are you stuck here when you could be hunting somewhere else? Have a better place to live?" He asks, unable to understand you.

You obviously didn't feel comfortable in District 12. No one could. And he knew from Lucy Gray's histories and his brief observation of your actions that someone like you, with your skills, could easily get a transfer to a wealthier district. But you didn't. He wanted to know why.

"What if I like it here?" You ask with a shrug. He frowns, looking around. You are passing by mouldy buildings, some houses are made of ood—you say it while they walk down the poorest alley in 12. Coriolanus believes he saw a rat running in front of you, but he doesn't want to think about it.

"Here?" He asks with disbelief and a hint of disgust in his voice, to which you giggle, almost laughing.

And instead of Coriolanus being offended and threatening you (he's a peacekeeper after all; he could make you spend a day in detention, and if you were anyone else, he definitely would do that), but somehow Snow can't do anything but smile, while admiring you.

However, he takes his eyes off you, even though he's tempted to look at you longer. He can't afford to have another weakness. To have another Lucy Gray. Although he doesn't think you'd push him away that easily for Sejanus or anyone else, like she did.

You and he were similar. Both of you were withdrawn, silent, observers, taking into account the threats. You did not play heroes with bravado and did not count on good luck, only on their own minds and skills.

"No, not here. I am not mad yet." You say, snapping him from his thoughts."The forests are beautiful. The fields. Rivers and lakes. The rest of Panem is industrialized. Concrete and factories everywhere. There is... a kind of peace here if you close your eyes to certain things. Maybe you will stay here long enough to find out about it by yourself." And something about you—the warm tone of your voice and the sparkles in your eyes as you talk about your favourite places—makes Coriolanus feel a sudden urge to stay here for a while—just as you suggested. Since he was going to be here for a while anyway, he might as well have some fun... right?

"I could use a guide." He says this before he can even think about it, as he sees Lucy Gray slowing down, obviously getting closer to your house.

He didn't know why he cared so much about seeing you again. You were nothing. Just a district hunter. He would leave the 12, find a way to get back to the Capitol, and forget about everything that brought him here. But damn, that little smile of yours made him feel butterflies in his stomach. He was pathetic. And he hated himself for it.

"I can be one."

"Aren't you afraid that people will see you with the peacekeeper?" You raise your eyebrows, shocked by his words. "I saw you looking around. Don't worry. She specifically directs us to streets that are... less frequented." He reveals his observations to you, and for the first time since you two introduced yourself, he sees that the note of fear and caution has disappeared from your eyes for a moment.

Your curious look causes him to have heart palpitations. That was weird for him. Maybe he was sick? He just hoped he hadn't caught anything from those bar rats.

"You really are perceptive, aren't you?" You ask, and he shivers, feeling your analytical gaze on him.

Coriolanus can't say he doesn't enjoy the thrill of excitement as you both try to solve the secrets the other is hiding. Talking to you was… nice. Most of the peacekeepers were as dumb as nails. Muscle mass and nothing else. And he had grown tired of Sejanus's moralising talk a long time ago. Talking to you would be good for him in some way. He wouldn't go completely crazy here. At least that's how he tried to explain to himself his strange and sudden desire to meet you again. And often. Very often.

"I was told so." He says this as you arrive at the door of your house. Coriolanus looks around carefully and is pleased to see that this is one of the better, quieter alleys. He makes a mental note to take more night shifts here. Just to keep an eye on you.

Before you walk into your house with Lucy Gray, you turn to look at him one last time.

"Well, I hope you won't miss the Capitol too much... Coryo." And when his nickname leaves your lips, he knows that this won't be the last time he sees you.

He watches as the door closes behind the two of you, taking in the last sight of you. He returns with Sejanus to their unit, completely ignoring his chatter about Lucy Gray as he thinks about you. Over time, he will find that he will do this more and more often. Thinking about you.

But neither of you knows how much you will regret this night in the future.

You walk up the stairs of the presidential palace wearing a beautiful white dress. Your mask fits to the top of your face, revealing only your mouth, chin and part of your jaw. You feel terrible, but you have to somehow blend in with the crowd of rich assholes who are enjoying their president's birthday party while district children tremble at the thought of the upcoming 22nd Hunger Games.

The only thought that comforts you is that he will die before dawn. And that you can have a glass of champagne.

You give your cloak and fake invitation to some peacekeeper the poor avox who are waiting at the entrance to serve everyone gathered. It makes you want to vomit when you think about how the man you let touch yourself became such a monster who decided to sew their mouths shut instead of cutting out their tongues.

Of course, with a red thread.

You go deeper into the room. You try to stay in the crowd, not on the outskirts, so as not to catch anyone's eye and so HE won't be able to see you. It may have been 12 years, but you're not sure if he forgot about you enough to not recognise your figure in the crowd. Maybe you tormented his nightmares as much as he tormented yours. You hoped to. Bastard didn't deserve to sleep soundly like a baby.

You're standing in a group of people, listening and laughing at the stories being told, and you're about to excuse yourself and browse around the big villa a bit and place some of the traps when suddenly you hear a tapping on a glass. You turn around with the rest of the people, making sure you're neither in the front nor the last row.

You freeze as Coriolanus' voice echoes through the room.

You have prepared for this moment many times. You predicted thousands of different scenarios for your first meeting, after... that special, rainy day at the lake when you went your separate ways. And you thought you were ready to bear the sight of him. But as soon as you look up at him, you feel your heart beat nervously. And not in that exciting way when you see your prey and are ready to attack.

As you sing a forced 'Happy Birthday' with other people after his speech, you allow yourself to steal one brief glance at him. He looks different.

More mature. More dangerous. Stronger. Powerful.

The golden mask, the only one of its kind in the room, covering his nose and just a small part of his face, the part around his eyes and eyebrows, only emphasises this more clearly.

And the red colour of his suit, along with all his... dominant attitude that emanates from him, are enough evidence of the red flag he was that you didn't notice when he was a peacekeeper in a blue uniform. His hair is longer and slicked back with gel, emphasising his rough, hard jawline and piercing blue, icy eyes. The man who stood in the middle of the room was dangerous. So much so that you felt nervous, thinking about how the hell you were going to kill him today.

You had a plan, but you knew that in every pursuit of prey, there were risks that could not be predicted. When hunting a bear, you don't face it with all your strength. You are waiting for the moment to attack. And now, looking at Coriolanus Snow in all his glory, you began to have doubts about your plan and the abilities of the other rebels. Maybe you will have to play the first violin this evening and aim a gun at him yourself. You shiver at even the thought of it.

And then his eyes find yours. For a very short while, but enough to make you shiver under his glance.

He blinks at you, then shifts his gaze to something or someone else. You feel a lump building in your throat, the words of the song being forced out of your mouth with a more and more trembling voice. He recognised you. Or not. You did not know. His subsequent actions didn't indicate it, but he had been staring at you for far too long to be sure of anything.

You don't like how quickly you're losing control.

That's why you leave at the first opportunity, hiding in the bathroom upstairs. You wait for the peacekeeper patrol to pass, and when they go to the second floor, you start setting up traps at the different spots of the presidential palace. You decide to forget about the events from a few minutes ago for a moment. Only peace will save you. You know about it. That's why you do everything to forget about his icy irises.

Well, at least until you have to go back to the ballroom again.

"A little higher." He whispers in your ear behind you, his hand wrapped around yours, as you aim his shotgun at the deer. "Eyes open, breath held, muscles tense."

You shoot and hit the animal. The gun bounces slightly, but Coriolanus holds you close and tight enough that you barely change your position, only trembling slightly as the gun clicks off.

"I prefer arrows, but thanks for showing me how to use it." You say cheekily as you approach the deer you have aimed perfectly at.

He shakes his head at you, slinging the gun over his shoulder. He watches you as you kneel next to the deer, preparing it to be carried to the district.

"You know, my teachings aren't free." He says this as you get up and walk towards the river to wash your hands. He takes the deer's body and obediently follows you.

He had the day off today and decided to use it to spend time with you. Lately, he's been running away from everyone more and more often to walk in the forest with you. You were talking and fooling around. Coriolanus has never felt so... free as with you. He could get used to this. If he hadn't experienced the comforts of the Capitol. He knew you would get used to the capital. Maybe he'd even let you go on little trips and escapades in the woods once he got back there with you as his wife. Of course, only with him. And with peacekeepers guarding you two, he didn't want to end up like his father.

"Isn't it?" You ask with that mischievous smile of yours, washing your hands in the river. "And here I thought you were noble, private Snow."

"Stop it." He growls menacingly as you don't call him by a nickname he loved to hear from your lips. But you can see by the sparkle of amusement in his eyes. A smile spreads across your face as you continue fooling around.

"Only that? You know that I love to tease you too much to just stop..." He cuts you off mid-sentence, leaning down and capturing your lips in a kiss.

You freeze for a moment, feeling his lips brush against yours and his hand run through the back of your hair. Even if you wanted to pull away from him, you couldn't because of the way he wrapped his hands around you. You should feel trapped and outraged by his behaviour, by the fact that he didn't ask for your permission or leave you the chance to pull away. But all you could do then was grab him by his dog tag and pull him closer to you.

You moan into his mouth as you find out that kissing Coriolanus Snow is the most pleasurable thing in the world.

You place your hands on either side of his neck as he grabs your waist gently, pressing your bodies as close to each other as possible. His lips caress yours gently at first, testing the waters. When he sees that you're not pulling away from him, he deepens the kiss, completely taking over the control that, surprisingly, you willingly give him. You've never been kissed like this in your life. So desperate, so needy, so possessive. And you know that you will never feel this way with anyone else in your life.

And for the first time, you have the opportunity to feel that moment that has been repeated so often in books—kissing someone until you have no more oxygen left in your lungs. Because before him, no one wanted you enough to give you half the sensations that Coriolanus gave you. And you suspected that he felt the same.

"I had this type of payment in mind." He whispers hoarsely, resting his forehead against yours. His eyes are closed, giving you the opportunity to admire his face up close. And god, he's perfect. In all his ounces, you can't even imagine how ethereal he must have been in the Capitol. (The perfect devil, tempting you until you fall.)

"Oh... um... well... be careful… with such a low payment you may be… taken advantage of by some girls." You manage to gasp, gathering the remnants of your mind that weren't occupied with the thought of him and the heavy breathing he was taking because of you.

"There is only one girl in this terrible, musty place, for whose special attention I can get anything she whishes." He says this, opening his eyes and cupping your cheek tenderly. And if your nature were any different (or if he would use a little more of his charm on you), you would melt under his touch, but you couldn't resist the opportunity he gave you.

"Anything, you say..." You mutter in mock thought with a smirk. And all Corilanus can do is smirk stupidly when he sees the familiar spark of malice in your eyes.

He enjoyed challenges, and he liked it even more when he beat you every time in your 'little fights and teasing'. He liked that you weren't completely submissive and that you could fight and banter with him instead of trembling in fear and trusting him blindly. You were almost his equal. Not that he was searching for one. But of all the girls, he knows you were the closest to his perfection. He just needed to work on your compliance a little bit before he could take you with him to the Capitol. After all, you couldn't tease him in public.

"Don't tease." He warns, humming as well, a smirk blooming on his lips despite his attempts to fight it off. He could afford a little... frivolity in the district. He would act completely differently in the Capitol, but for now, he enjoyed every carefree moment with you he could get. He couldn't remember the last time he had had to worry about the opinion of society.

"Oh, but that's the funniest thing to do now..." You continue with a smirk, leaning in to steal a kiss from him. He accepts it with a smile that quickly fades as you pull away from him and run away, laughing.

"And what is this?!" He shouts, running after you.

"A hunting lesson! I won't kiss you for yours in return, Snow!" You reply with a laugh, speeding up.

You ran away from him for an hour until you got tired of it all and ran into him laughing, deciding that he'd had enough of him chasing you for now. He immediately took you into his arms and kissed you, holding you tightly to his chest so that his rapidly beating heart was palpable to you. You placed small kisses on his snout as he held you tightly in his embrace, panting.

"Promise you'll never run away from me. That you'll never leave me." You raise your eyebrows in shock at his request, but you don't question it. You simply nod and press a kiss of promise to his lips as he pushes you against the nearest tree.

Your kiss becomes more feverish, more urgent as you feel his hardness through his peacekeeper uniform. Just a few weeks ago, you would have despised yourself for being so close to him. But it was your Coryo. That's why you don't interrupt him when he unzips your pants and takes them and your underwear off in one move.

You hold your breath as he kneels in front of you and grabs your hips with an iron grip. He presses a kiss on your thighs, teasing you and leaving little bites and bruises there before graciously shifting his attention to where you really need it. You moan, biting your lip to keep from screaming as he slowly circles your clit with his tongue, teasing you to no end. He pushes your hips against the tree every time you try to push against his tongue from a different angle. This frustrates you even more, especially after the gun slung over his shoulder shifts, causing the barrel of the shotgun to dig into your stomach.

"Coryo..." You moan, scratching his head as you try and futilely try to grab his close-cropped hair. He moans at the feeling, stimulating you even more.

He takes pity on you, putting more effort into his work as his fingers start to hit the spot that made you lost your mind. The bark of the tree digs into your back, but all you feel is Coriolanus; your entire world is limited to the movements of his fingers that bring you unimaginable pleasure that cannot be described in any words. All you can do is moan his name, which he finds flattering enough to make you cum around his fingers. Although he had no plan to let you cum when he started to play with your sweet cunt. You were making him too soft for you...

His tongue teases you as he licks along your knee, up your thigh, to stop a few moments before the place where you really needed him to reach your peak of pleasure. He smirks and suddenly bites into your thigh, causing a scream of his name from your lips to echo through the forest. He grunts, licking and sucking the spot on your thigh that he bit, feeling how he hardened in his pants by simply sucking your skin and fingering you. He loved every single sound you made because of him. If tasting you on his lips wasn't as tempting for him as it was for now, he would just kneel there and watch how you kept chasing your orgasm on his fingers.

"Scream for me, my little hunter." He says this and leans forward. His nose teases your clit before he finally licks you, testing your taste. He moans as his favourite flavour spreads across his taste buds. If he had you in the Capitol, he would never starve, he thinks as he begins to fuck you with his tongue, collecting everything that his skillful fingers caused to flow from your little pussy. For him. Because of him. His.

You grip his arms tightly, his gun somehow twisted so that it was pressed against your leg and stomach, but you don't care as he kneels in front of you and sucks the senses out of you through your cunt. You can only moan loudly and scream his name, digging your nails into his shoulders as you pull him closer to you as he makes you come. He licks up everything he gets for his work, leaving nothing to leak from your thighs onto the forest floor.

Coriolanus feels his hardness pressing against his pants, but chooses to ignore it. He won't take you like some district barbarian in the woods. He will do it well. Maybe even in the Capitol... you would look beautiful, wrapped in the most expensive sheets. And while you catch your breath and try to recover, he wonders how he's going to get his little hunter with him back to the Capitol when Dr. Gaul replies to the message he sent her.

He adjusts the gun hanging on his shoulder and stands up, licking his fingers off of the remains of your sweet juices. Unimaginable pride rises in his chest, as does a feeling of possessiveness when he sees your knees shaking and you barely standing, leaning on the tree behind you. He chuckles, remembering the sight. He will definitely think about it, while jerking off himself when he will be alone at the barracks.

"I will always catch you. No matter how long it takes." He says, taking you in his arms when he sees that you're unable to stand on your own in your post-orgasm haze. Another thing that increases his ego.

You didn't know how much that sweet promise would turn out to be a bloodthirsty threat. So you let him carry you through the forest as you both headed back to 12.

The next day, you were delivered money in exchange for the deer you and Private Snow had hunted together. From his superior, Commander Hoff. Even then, he was using you for his own gain.

"Are you lost, miss?" You stop in your quick steps. You curse internally when you hear his voice in the hall. You were about to go downstairs and go to the ballroom. But no. Coriolanus Snow always had to screw up your job.

"Mr. President." You say, trying to change your tone of voice as you turn around and see him. "I was just looking for a spare bathroom."

"Ah yes. Women's ones seem to be… very crowded. Have you made it, little bathroom hunter, or do you need help?" He asks, walking over to you. He shouldn't be here. Certainly not that close to you. Meg was supposed to focus his attention on her and flirt with him. You didn't know what the hell he was doing on the first floor instead of in the ballroom celebrating his birthday.

And when he called you a hunter, you tried your hardest not to shiver in fear at the thought of him seeing through you. But if he recognised you, would he act so... calm around you? Peacekeepers would probably have surrounded you long ago if he had...

"I did it, Mr. President. Ah! Happy birthday! May you watch over us for a very long time." You wish him well, and he just smiles. This isn't one of his forced, political smiles. No.

It was a wolfish smile, a dangerous one. The one that he had a habit of showing you when he managed to outsmart you tracked you down in the forests of District 12.

"Thank you, my darling. You wouldn't deny a man his birthday wishes, would you?" A shiver runs through you as his irises focus on you. His tone is quieter and darker as he asks you a seemingly innocent question. But you know very well that nothing about Coriolanus Snow is innocent.

"Of course not, Mr. President." You reply courteously, already afraid of what he might want from you.

"Great. May I then?" He asks, sticking out his hand as he asks you to dance with a polite smile (if the devil can wear one).

"With great pleasure." You say, placing your hand in his. Without knowing why, you feel like you're putting it in the mouth of a lion... or in this case, a snake.

He holds your hand tightly as he helps you down the stairs. He doesn't let go of you for a second, and once you reach the dance floor, he wraps his arm around your waist and presses you against him, making you feel all his muscles hidden under his clothes. His eyes also never leave yours, which makes you very uncomfortable. Your anxiety only gets greater as you can't see the faces of the other members of your rebellion in the room.

"Nervous? Don't worry. You dance great." The smirk never leaves his face. And that's the kind of sly smirk. Of course, you dance great. After all, he taught you that himself in District 12.

"Thank you, Mr. President." At one point, the dance requires him to turn you around and press your back against his chest. You shiver as you feel his breath on your neck, then on your ear as he leans down, so he is very close to you.

"Do you think I'm stupid enough not to recognise you, Y/N? That I don't dream about you every night? That I didn't notice you when you and your ridiculous group of district dogs burst into my presidential palace?" You struggle, trying to break free from his grip, but he only grips your hip tighter, enough to surely leave bruises in the form of his fingers.

Coriolanus presses his lips against your temple and nuzzles his nose into your hair, inhaling your scent. You shiver in his arms at the familiar feeling of his closeness. You feel the gun hidden under his vest press against the back of your back. A tender reminder of how you both were still enemies and a deadly threat to each other.

His hands roam over your body, exploring you as much as he can manage in a crowd of people. But you doubt anyone would dare point out how he presses his crotch against your ass, forcing you to feel every last bit of him as he continues whispering darkly into your ear. "I've been hunting you for so many years... only for you to come running straight to me, as always. I honestly couldn't have asked for a better birthday present. Let's play a game. Our favourite, darling. Try to escape, my little hunter." He hums as he finally lets go of you.

You're not wasting your time.

You don't turn to see him smirking mockingly, to see the way his cheeks have turned slightly pink from the adrenaline and excitement coursing through his veins, or to see the way the bulge in his pants has become slightly more visible.

You run away from him without looking back, pushing through the crowd of people who are leaving in panic after the announcement that they must leave the villa immediately as a result of the detection of an attempted assassination of the head of state.

But not everything is lost yet.

You saw a few familiar faces in the crowd of people, including Meg and Joseph. And you know that if you want to save your plan and the members of the rebellion, then you have to get Coriolanus' full attention. Make him drop his guard and focus entirely on you.

That's why instead of trying to escpae you stop at the foot of the stairs leading to the first floor.

You watch the crowd of people storming towards the exit. Peacekeepers are pushing through them, some trying to catch the more suspicious ones and interrogate them; everyone is focused on the exit door. So you had to go upstairs. You see Coriolanus slowly walking out of the ballroom. He looks around for you, and when his eyes catch yours, he stops, examining you. You kick off your high heels and run upstairs.

You run forward, hearing the clatter of his shoes close behind you.

You avoid all the traps you have set and hide in one of the rooms. Your feet feel icy from the cool marble you're walking on, but you don't pay much attention to it. Your heart is racing, and you try to breathe as quietly as possible as you hide behind the curtain, listening.

The first thing he does is open all the doors. Of course, carefully and not by himself. He was fully aware that you might have some unpleasant surprises in store for him. He was made very aware of it by one of the peacekeepers who went with him and unlocked the mechanism that caused his beautiful crystal chandelier to fall on the soldier's head.

The maids will have to clean the blood from the white marble again. The next time he renovates the villa, he will have to think about a more... useful floor colour.

"Guard the remaining floors and all exits. Two of you stand by the stairs. I'll take care of this one myself. You go and catch the rest of these street rats." He orders them in a dry tone.

He knows full well that he can fight you alone, and he will do it much better than this bunch of idiots. You weren't just a pure force. You were the mastermind. And only Coriolanus was smart enough to follow your way of thinking and catch you. Just like he always did.

You hold your breath as you hear the footsteps of the peacekeepers spreading across the floor. Only Coriolanus remains. You hear his breathing and his slow, methodical steps. You can imagine him analyzing the hall, looking for traps and potential threats you could prepare for him.

"You know you can't escape, right?" he begins, his footsteps echoing off the walls of the empty, silent corridor. "You've been slipping out of my hands for too long, little hunter. Do you think I don't remember our lessons? That I don't know your systems and customs? I don't know that you packed the entire presidential palace with your little surprises. What a pity that you will never catch me in any of them..."

You hear him enter the room next to you. He drops something to the floor and steps away, closing the door with a bang as the mechanism activates, spreading corrosive gas across the room that was intended to hurt him.

"Really? Such a school trick? I thought you knew better than to test such... childish methods on me, darling. I remember you telling me about something like this after a particular night at your apartment. Can you believe that I remember much better those lessons during which you were moaning and screaming my name?" He chuckles, sinisterly, darkly at the memory.

And then you hear a step. And another one. And another one. Slow, unhurried, and careful. It was so quiet that you wouldn't have heard them if the villa wasn't as quiet as it is now.

He was approaching you slowly and saliently, just as you taught him all those years ago. As usual, he turned out to be a very talented student.

"I never thought you'd be a rebel. After all, you were always so submissive to me... especially under me. And wanting me dead... you know I've killed and turned into Avox for lesser crimes against me and the Panem? But don't worry... your mouth and tongue are too useful for me to take the pleasure they can give away from me ever again."

He starts whistling, checking another room. As you hear him pulling the covers off the bed, you slowly emerge from your hiding place. You take a small step closer to the bathroom and freeze as the floor creaks beneath you.

"Spikes embedded in the mattress? Were you hoping to seduce me and put me on this deathbed? We can always try this... on a less lethal mattress, of course. What would you say, little hunter? Pardon. My sweet rebel?" You close the door quietly behind you and look around the dark room. Window. Maybe if you could open it...

"All these years, and you still use the same perfume." He grunts and closes the door behind him. You shudder, realising that he knows you're in this room. You tighten your hand on the knife hidden in the sleeve of your dress and wait in the cold bathroom for his next steps. "Don't you have a little Deja vu? It reminds me of when you and Lucy Gray ran away from me. That bitch is still hiding. I suspect you don't know where, but you are in contact through some letters or something. As soon as I find her, I will kill her on the spot. I know very well that she was the reason you left me. Don't get me wrong, I'm also angry at you for that... but not as mad as I am at her."

After Sejanus was hanged, he and you planned to escape together. And God, you loved it. You would have sacrificed your whole life for him if it weren't for Lucy Gray, who told you the truth about your beloved devil. So when he came out of the cottage near the lake, worrying about how you had been gone for too long and looking for you with a gun in his hand, you ran away.

"Y/N! Y/N, where are you?! Y/N! Y/N! I will find you! There is no fucking place you can hide from me! Can you hear me, hunter?! NO FUCKING PLACE! YOU ARE MINE! YOU WILL BE ALWAYS MINE! I will mark you like cattle and tie you to my side forever!"

You dream of his screams at some night.

"You promised you wouldn't leave me! You lying bitch!"

You hear his footsteps in the other room as he opens the curtains and checks to see if you're outside the window.

"You think I won't find you?! That you can crawl into a hole that I can't get you out of?! YOU'RE MINE, Y/N! Alive or dead, I don't care! YOU BELONG TO ME!"

You hear him take steps towards the closet, opening it and throwing things out, making sure it's empty. You hear him knocking over several items—the bed, the armchairs. You hold your breath as there is complete silence. He's probably looking at the bathroom door.

You feel your heart beating in your chest just as fast as it did that day when you hid from him as he walked around with a gun, screaming and calling for you. And you almost left. You almost left, wanting to fall into his arms as he kneeled in the middle of the forest and cried, smelling his mother's scarf that he gave you and which was saturated with your scent. But before you could, he screamed and started shooting at the mockingjays in the trees. So you ran away.

And you've been running away since then, hoping that you were a terrible teacher to him and that he would never find you...

"If you leave willingly, I will spare you the unpleasant part, my little rebel. Maybe you can even convince me to forget your transgressions completely… well within reason. However, I suspect that my bed is more comfortable than the floor of a prison cell. Don't you think?"

Maybe if he had used a less mocking tone, if you hadn't heard the pleasure dripping from his voice at his superiority over you and the excitement at catching you, then maybe you would have left willingly. You shake your hand, holding the knife tighter in your hand. No. You wouldn't leave and let him catch you without a fight. He has done too much to you and to other district people to pretend he's not a monster.

"I count to three." You hold your breath, stopping yourself from shaking. The cool air gives you goosebumps as you wait for him to take a step closer to the bathroom's door. "One."

You hear the rustle of fabric; he must have taken off his jacket and probably his mask too. You reach up to your face and untie your own mask, taking it off with a trembling hands.

"Two." Before he enters the room, you hide, so you're standing behind the door, which Coriolanus opens before he counts to three.

Another trick you taught him. Act unpredictably. Don't warn the prey about your next step, and don't let it catch you by surprise.

That's why Coriolanus stands still when he sees the bathroom window open. Your mask lies on the windowsill, taunting him as the moonlight reflects off the silver thread from which it was sewn and glows, tempting him to follow the trail.

That's why, as soon as he comes to the window, you quickly step out from behind the door and close it behind you with a bang.

A moment later, you hear his curses and quick footsteps. You run forward and enter the next room, being careful not to activate any mechanisms. Just as you close the door behind you, you feel him grab the handle on the other side.

In a panic, you do the same and pull the door towards you, wrestling with him. You know it won't get you very far. Coriolanus was stronger than you. He would get inside quickly. You had to think of another way to escape and create distance between you.

"That's enough, Y/N! We had fun, but that's it. You have no way to escape. You know it damn well! Be a good girl and get out." He growls at you, trying to push the door open and get inside.

"So you can kill me?! Hang me like Sejanus?!" You ask angrily, wrestling with him at the door. You feel yourself getting weaker, so you make an instinctive decision. You let go of the door and ran to the window, opening it. You turn around as the door slams shut. You two are standing in the same room again.

You look at each other carefully. You both breathe quickly, analysing each other's possible movements.

"You know I would never hurt you." He starts by taking a small step towards you. You step back to the open window, and he freezes. You may have been on the first floor, but the presidential palace was huge. If you jump out, you will smash into the asphalt and die. And he won't win. Coriolanus cannot afford this. That's why he's standing still for now.

"You killed people. How was I supposed to know I wouldn't be next?" You accuse him, trying to keep your voice from shaking. Your mind analyses all the possibilities. You're tempted to jump. Free yourself from him once and for all. Make him lose. Although this time.

"You could have trusted me. Just a little longer."

"Sorry, I have a survival instinct. Very strong survival instinct." You say this, avoiding his gaze. He takes advantage of your distraction and takes a step towards you, which you don't notice because you are too busy thinking of an escape plan.

"Not that big since you came here. For what? To kill me? Will you stab me in the heart, Y/N? Will you shoot me? Will you poison me?"

"You left me no other choice." You growl at him, furious, tightening your grip on the dagger.

"You don't want to do this. I know you. If you really wanted me to fall into a trap, you'd make it so that I couldn't move my damn foot an inch without activating something. So I'll ask again. Why did you come here?"

You do not know. Really. You can't answer his question.

Because... Yes, you hated him. And yes, you despised him. And yes, you were afraid of the monster he had become. But nothing could change the fact that, deep down, you loved him. You cried hundreds of tears because of him, which ricocheted off the walls of the wall you so eagerly built around yourself and your stupid hearth so no one else would be able to hurt you again. You didn't let anyone else get to know you. Not like Coriolanus did. He was the only one who saw the real you. The part of you that you were so afraid to show anyone else or to even look at them by yourself.

"Y/N. Look at me." It's not a request. This is a command. Subtle, but still. And you know, that's all he'll give you. Commands, expectations.

Never look your prey in the eyes. The first rule you taught him. The only one he always broke.

Maybe because of sadism? Maybe he enjoyed watching realisation shine in his victims' eyes as they realised he was winning. But you can't resist following his command and looking into those icy irises you once knew so well.

Or maybe he really cared about you more than anyone else. You'd like to believe that.

"I can give you everything. The whole world. All you have to do is trust me." He says, taking a few steps closer to you. You bite your lip. You can try to run away, but you know he will catch you. You weren't on your own turf. And he had a hundred tracking dogs, ready to find you. Crook.

"Trust you? After everything you've done?" You mock him. But he doesn't answer. There is perfect silence in the room.

Before you know it, he runs towards you. He activates the mechanism, causing a crossbow arrow to pierce his arm. He ignores it in favour of reaching out to you. He quickly injects something into your neck, holding you tightly against his chest. You stabbed him in the stomach. His blood spurts onto your dress as he makes sure you can't move, ignoring his wounds for a moment. Of course, he retaliates by tightening his grip on you, leaving his fingerprints on your skin.

"So you chose the hard path. Too bad, my little hunter. For you. I'll be damned glad to have the opportunity to train you. I will make you the perfect first lady, my darling." He whispers in your ear, and as you fall unconscious in his arms, you realise one terrifying thing. He caught you. He won this round.

You have to put plan B into action all alone.

You foresaw that your plan might fail and that someone would betray you. That's why you and Meg came up with... a contingency plan. After all, you had to keep your promise.

You're not leaving this presidential palace until you see the life drain from Coriolanus Snow. It will be your prison until then. A golden cage. No matter how long it will take... Or at least try to convince yourself that you have to do it. Because you know you must do it for the good of Panem. That you can't back down from anything at the next opportunity. You can't hesitate. No matter how much you will be drunk on the blame and pain of killing him.

It was a game of survival. A game only you and Coriolanus knew how to play. You had to win. For the good of people. To stop the suffering he caused.

After all, the caged wolf was still a threat. Even for poisonous snakes.

PART 2 (last)

[pure-incense]

With summer rolling around, remember that our Pokemon companions have to deal with the heat too! Not every pokemon can beat the heat, especially some ice types, so here are some tips and tricks to make sure you and your team get to enjoy the summer!

1. Never leave your partner alone in the car while it's turned off! Cars can be a hot and sweaty nightmare even with the windows down and the AC blasting! They're even worse when you're locked in with little airflow and no water! If you have to leave the car, take your pokemon with you in their pokeball!

2. Make sure you have some shade nearby, and use pokemon safe sunscreen when it applies/is possible! Not only does the sun contribute to the heat, but plenty of pokemon risk drying out or even getting burnt if left out in the sun for too long! This includes many grass types! While many do appreciate the sun, there is such things as too much for some species!

3. Water! Bring so much water! A lot of people think the little water they have on them is enough! It's probably not! You need a lot more than you think, especially on a hot summer day, and you need even more if you plan on bringing your pokemon with you! Many water and grass types especially need plenty of water to stay stress free! Bring a large reusable bottle with you for yourself, and I like bringing a second bottle for my team as well!

4. Be aware of their types, and do research on that specific species! The Alolan subspecies of ninetails can spend a good amount of time in the heat compared to some other ice types, but just barely as they still prefer the colder mountain peaks! Fire types can survive extreme heat, some even living in volcanoes, but some like Houndoom and Arcanine may still want to let out excess heat by spewing smoke and flames and should be allowed to do so to prevent them from getting uncomfortable! Figure out what strategies and schedules work for you and your team AHEAD of time, and don't be afraid to ball them if they seem to be struggling!

5. POKEBALLS! USE THEM! I have mentioned them a few times on this list but it needs to be said! While some pokemon may dislike their ball, and being cooped up for long periods of time can cause harmful effects, a few minutes to an hour in their pokeball to cool down if overheating or avoid having to deal with the heat in general is harmless and usually tends to be downright beneficial to many pokemon! Please do not risk your weavile getting heatstroke because it dislikes it's ball! A short amount of discomfort so you can safely bring it home is always worth it. I know some people may be worried about the heat breaking the pokeball, especially in hotter climates, but you don't have to worry! Unless the ball has some sort of defect or was badly made, most pokeballs are built to withstand extreme temperatures to keep up with the wide variety of pokemon and demanding journeys some trainers end up on! If you're still nervous, you can purchase specialty balls made by independent craftsmen and small businesses specifically built with a focus on dealing with extreme temperatures and preform a ball transfer.

Obviously there's probably plenty of things I forgot or couldn't include! If you have anything you'd like to share about helping our pokemon friends stay happy and healthy during the hotter months of the year, you're totally free to add to this post!

[yourcousin-vinny]

if we go with the idea that kallus grew up as a latchkey kid in the lower levels of coruscant and had to scrounge and make do until he got into the academy, you bet your ass he loved the military school routine. the routine was exhilarating. making lists and plans and being able to complete them? reliable daily schedules and meals? reliable rewards and consequences? addicting. he didn't have that kind of stability or time horizon growing up, so when he gets a routine he revels in it. he can plan for a future now.

of course, under the empire that means he (and everyone around him) subsumes himself to the routines and wills of the imperial machine. but at least he knows what to expect, even when it's terrible, even when it goes against what he fundamentally believes. and once he knows what to expect, he knows how he can subvert it as fulcrum. (imperial regularity is good for many things, including monitoring guard shift changes and tracking an admiral's meal times.)

as fulcrum though, that time horizon shrinks again. he doesn't expect to live beyond it, so what routine remains is a talisman he clings to. maybe that's how thrawn finally catches him: his irregular actions to throw people off his trail became too regular.

in the rebellion, newly defected, the freedom from such strict routines is overwhelming. some defectors go the ice-cream-for-breakfast route (or, like sabine, a clearly visible break from the empire's enforced conformity), but others don't know what to do with themselves. kallus throws himself into what he knows and what he misses: the work routine. input, output. task, complete.

the rebellion has a routine too, but in the way live theatre has a routine. there isn't always a closing bell; sometimes you hurry up and wait for six hours and then aren't off your feet for the next twelve. there are tasks and protocols, but you gotta be ready to adapt at any moment to what reality throws at you. (the empire rarely-if-ever had to adapt to what the rest of the galaxy threw at it because it was the rest of the galaxy.) there's a level of chaos that kallus is capable of handling, but that chaos is every day now. meals happen when he can get them, same with sleep, because the work routine he tries to set keeps getting broken. he never had to set a work-life balance before because it was either all life (all survival) or all work (and the empire tells you when to eat and sleep). the routines were always set for him.

so yes, kallus is infinitely glad he defected and yes, he is infinitely grateful to the ghost for taking him in, but little gods, how does anything get done?!

I think the first personal boundaries kallus sets that are his alone, not dictated by a higher institution, are about when the spectres are allowed to bother him (see: pester him to drink water and drag him to the tapcafe for a break) and when they need to leave him to his duty. it's nowhere near the routine that shaped him, and that's a good thing, but he does need some things to set his chrono by. he wakes at 0500; returns from a run by 0540; first cup of caf in yavin's pre-dawn light at 0610; draven enters intelligence at 0619. the rest of the day could be anything else, but these 4 are fairly consistent.

at some point he realizes that the time horizon he has now, in this life where very few things are guaranteed, is based less on when the mission is over or when the war is over and more on when he gets his next meal or sparring session with zeb or his next drink with rex or his next meeting with cassian. because all this work he does is for these people, and if they aren't in his future then it isn't worth it.

[xmalereader]

Simon Riley x High Ranking! Male Reader

☆ — MASTERLIST — ☆

Requested: Could I request a Ghost x male reader story. Male reader is also in the Task Force 141 as a high ranking officer. He never goes out on the field with the others. Ghost and male reader know each other for a long time and are together. (You can decide if they are married , etc). So reader is very shy and has an innocent and introverted aura. (Wears glasses, barely talks etc.) That’s also why they all were surprised when they found out that Ghost and Reader are together, because Ghost is… well Ghost. So, the reader defects to Makarov and because of the reader Makarov succeeds. So the 141 ‘hates’ reader and sees him as a traitor. So Ghost has to decide, if he is loyal to the Task Force or his lover. [You can decide what happens of course and also if reader survives and etc. Just don’t make a twist were reader goes back to 141 or kills Makarov :) ]

WARNINGS/ CONTENT: Language, angst, hurt/no comfort, specific details to reader, Soap being soap, mentions of Makarov, MW3 mentions, slight fluff, more dialogue, betrayal, simon is ruined.

WC: 3.4K

TAGS: @dzeilan

NOTES: I may have over done it with this fix but at least I got it finished 😂 but anyways hope you enjoy this request! I tried my best to keep it angsty and tempted to make a second part but for now I’m putting it in the maybe drafts. I decided to end it in a semi cliff hanger!

Task Force 141 was monitored and by someone above Price. Not many people knew who it was but they didn’t hear stories about the man being ruthless to his team, always giving them the hardest missions and dealing with the most deadliest and dangerous people. Everyone thought figured that he was a cold blooded man who stayed cooped up in his own office, never leaving or joining the field like the rest of the others. That’s. how everyone saw him.

When in reality he was the total opposite which surprised the 141.

In reality he was quiet and only spoke with authority when meeting up with the team, but when alone he was very closed up and not very social with the others, keeping to himself and not getting close with the others. Y/n had heard the gossip floating around about him and usually ignored it. He was a higher ranking than anyone else and could have easily found a way to stop the murmuring, but he wasn’t that power drunk to do something stupid.

Only his team knew what he was really like, he’s spent enough time with Price that he’s warmed up to the captain, always addressing him as ‘sir’ each time they meet only for Y/n to remind Price that he doesn’t need to call him that whenever they were alone and considered the man as a friend. Price was actually the one who approached him about building a team of his own, wanting his approval and guidance.

Y/n was surprised by this and intrigued by what he had in mind. When Price showed him the files of the people he wanted in his team, he can’t help but hide his small grin when his eyes land on a familiar name, finding it funny that he would be the boss to his own deadly boyfriend that everyone feared, wearing that scary mask that only made his silence much more deadly and intimidating for others.

He had told Price that he wanted to review the files first before giving an official approval, getting the time that he needed to review each soldier that he chose and memorizing every little thing about them and finding them impressive by the second. It didn’t take long for him to approval Price’s team and granting the man permission to gather them up and move on with a mission regarding Hassan during that time.

As much as Y/n hated being out in public and in front of others he had no choice but to be present during the time that Hassan was terrorizing the world. Many other soldiers had a chance to finally see who the scary man was only to grow confused when they saw him for the first time, wearing glasses while he squints at some paper work and maps, trying to figure out Hassans next location or if could find any other information regarding the man.

He would stay up all day and night looking for anything to help him, cooping himself up in his office with papers scattered around and computer opened as he did his own research. How he received a high ranking title he will never know, but his skills brought him this far.

Those quiet nights when everyone is sleeping a shadow creeps inside his own room, hovering over him from where he sat. He can feel their presence and doesn’t move his eyes from the computer. “If you are here to force me into bed, then I will have to decline.” He speaks up, hearing a familiar chuckle and tilts his head back to find Simon standing over him, hands on the back of his chair as he wore that skull mask over his face, gear gone and leaving him in black clothing and a jacket.

“You’ve been working day and night with no sleep.”

“How do you know I haven’t slept?” Y/n raised a brow and lowers his head to focus back on his computer screen only for Simon to place his fingers around his neck, using his index finger to tilt his head back in a gentle manner as he stares down at the man.

“You have bags under your eyes.” He moves his fingers up his cheek and grazed his finger under his glasses near his eye, noticing the lack of sleep from his own lover. “You know I can’t sleep.”

Simon lets him go and sighs as he watched his lover focus back on his work and moving maps around as Simon watched him from behind. “You won’t lose anything if you sleep.”

“But Hassan—“

“Is out of sight. For now.” Simon cuts in, using his own authority voice on his lover in order to get some sense into him. The two have been dating for about a year now, keeping it on the down low and preventing anyone from finding out. Y/n over ranked Simon and doesn’t know how the others would react when finding out that he’s dating their deadly weapon. He knows that Simon cares for him and his health and wants to make sure that he at least gets some rest.

“Fine…” He mumbled out and with that Simon reaches over to close his computer the room grows dim and the only light shinning through the window is the moonlight. “Time for bed.”

“I’m not a kid.”

“You sure act like one.” Said Simon, chuckling at his own words which makes Y/n roll his eyes and cracks a tired smile. He gets off his chair and follows Simon to bed as the other soldier helps him out by removing his glasses first and setting them on the desk with the rest of his stuff and gets him into bed.

These nights are special to them since its the only time that they are able to spend time together without getting caught, having to sneak around like high school teenagers in order to avoid any trouble, but sooner or later they’d have to let the rest of their team know. As he snuggled up against Simon he lets out a deep sigh, feeling exhausted from all the work his mind was all over the place thinking about the mission and the things that could be happening without their knowledge, but they had no ability into knowing it.

“Stop thinking.”

“Can’t help it.” Y/n mumbled out in the dead of night.

The silence of the base was killing him and he hated it. “Your thoughts are loud.”

“You telling me that you can read minds?” Y/n raised a brow at Simon while chuckling. “If I could read minds I would have gotten to Hassan by now.” He did have a point.

Y/n lies his head on Simons chest and taps his fingers against his stomach as he thinks. “I just worry for everyone and I’d feel guilty it something happened to you and everyone else.” When Y/n received such a high ranking he didn’t expect the amount of stress to come with it since he was in charge of his own team and deciding the fate of the mission. When he got his first team he had to take multiple risks, almost costing him the lives of his own soldiers which devastated him.

There were times that he wanted to leave his rank to get rid of the guilt that he felt only to learn that he couldn't’ always save everyone even if he tried.

“Not everyone can be saved, Y/n. It takes one life to save millions.”

But it also takes one mistake to risk millions.

After last nights reassurance, Y/n is able to work a lot better all thanks to Simon in forcing him to sleep. Tracking their target was getting easier, finding the locations and sending in the proper help in order to get rid of the missiles that were lost. It wasn’t until Shepherds betrayal that they were separated.

Y/n had lost communication with his team and Simon, stuck back in base where the shadow company was taking over Alejandro’s people. He caught on quickly when chaos erupted in base, collecting his things quickly and hiding them in the vents and getting his own gun ready when facing the shadow company.

Even though Y/n looked like an innocent man due to how quiet he is around others he was also deadly when others were in danger getting through the halls and gunning down anyone who came after him, not hesitating to fight back as he sneaks around the halls and onto the second floor where he makes his escape, he uses one of the shadow companies uniforms to get through the base without being noticed, making it through the gates and towards their radio station.

He uses it to communicate with the rest of his team, checking up on them and hoping that they are still alive. His anxiety spiked when he doesn’t get a response fearing the worst has happened to Simon, fearing that he’s lost the one person he loved. He wasn’t one for crying, but the lack of response was bringing him to tears, close to giving up and heading back down to hunt Graves down.

“Are you crying?”

Y/n gasps, turning around quickly with his gun out when coming face to face with Soap. “Soap.” He sighs in relief to see him alive as he lowers his gun, ready to scold the man only to see Simon climbing over the wall along with Rudy. His eyes widen when the land on Simon. “Simon…” He shoves Soap aside who's left flabbergasted and makes a beeline towards Simon, not hesitating to hug the man and sniffling against his shoulder. “You dumb bastard, why didn’t you answer? I thought you were dead!” He was mad at Simon for making him worry.

Simon smiles under his mask and warps his own arms around Y/n, relieved to see him too. “We got caught up trying to get here.” He responds back, pulling away and cup his cheeks and cleans his tears away unaware of the audience.

“Uh, what the hell is going on?” Soap finally decides to speak up by this shocking discovery.

It wasn’t until after they rescued Alejandro that Y/n tells his team about his and Simons relationship when regrouping. He expected Soap to be shocked by the news while Gaz and Price technically already knew about the relationship but never said anything about it until further confirmed. Y/n couldn’t be happier to have them.

“So what do we do about Graves?”

Everyone turns to look at Y/n waiting for him to make the final call only for Y/n to surprise everyone by his response.

“Do whatever you want.”

He lets Price take the lead on this one, coming up with plans to get rid of Graves and his men after what he did to them. Y/n remains at the safe house along with the others, guiding them through the coms where he was safer and giving out clear orders on Graves location when they all went back to base.

The entire day was hectic, taking down Graves and Hassan on the same day and recovering the last missile gaining a victory. Everyone was finally able to relax and head back home to rest before being called out to another mission. Things were fine until they weren’t.

After a year since their last mission, Y/n had spent most of his time at base, helping out with the simple things and helping Price out as always. Until he received anonymous messages through his private number the only one who knew his number was Simon along with Price and the others and no one else. He received the text the day that Simon went out with the others for a drink, staying back home to relax for a bit until eh got that message.

He was about to ignore it until private information about him and his entire team was sent to him, threatening him to listen or else his friends faced the consequences. Y/n would have taken action to find out who was messaging him and take them down quickly only to realize that this person knew far more than anyone about him and Simon. He was forced to keep these message hidden from Simon if he wanted to prevent a lose.

Y/n knew that Simon was smart and would slowly grow suspicious by his constant phone checking and the amount of times that he’d flinch out of fear when receiving those messages. Simon wasn’t one to jump to conclusions, especially with his lover but the amount of time that he kept his distance was slowly irritating him.

Simon was able to corner him in his office when back at base after finding out about Makarovs escape. “Somethings wrong.” He points out, getting Y/n’s attention as he leans back against the wall that he’s caged in. “Nothings wrong.” Y/n couldn’t allow Simon to know that was responsible for Makarovs escape at the prison.

“You’ve been distant and quiet.”

“I’m always quiet.”

“Not this quiet.” Simon knew him well enough to see the smallest changes.

Y/n’s anxiety grows by the second as Simon looks him dead in the eyes. “I’m worried about Makarov.” He blurts out, trying to throw Simon off from his real worry. “The most dangerous man escaped and we can be facing something far bigger and I’m worried on what we have planned.” He continues on, noticing how Simon finally relaxes when getting an answer even though it wasn’t the truth.

“Will get him and stop him before anything else happens.”

“And if we can’t?” Y/n wants to tell Simon the truth, but he can’t risk losing him. “We will.” He feels his gloved fingers caress his cheek as a way of soothing his worries.

“Now lets figure out how to take down Makarov.”

Y/n spent the last hour listening to Price form out the plan, memorizing every little detail in order to report it back to Makarov. It took him some time to figure out that the man he’s been communicating with was none other than Makarov, threatening him and his friends for information about their plans to stopping him. As guilty as he felt doing this behind their backs, behind Simon’s back he had no choice but to do it.

After their meet up he’d find a way to communicate with the Russian man sending him everything he knew about their plans only to get a response back from with a notification of millions of dollars being transferred to his banking account. That pushes him over the edge, his anger getting to him as he throws his phone against the wall, smashing it into pieces as he groans in anger. He was doing this to save his friends not for money and yet Makarov goes and pushes all the right buttons.

Because of Makarov the transfer was shown under the list of information trading. When Simon and Soap were sent to interrogate Milena about Makarovs next location they were expecting themselves to find some answers only to come up with more questions when Y/n’s name shows up on the list.

Soap is the first to point it out to Simon when it shows up on the computer. The two refuse to believe that Y/n had been communicating with Makarov only for Milena to laugh at the two.

“Why do you think Makarov isn’t here? It’s all thanks to your little birdie on the inside.” Her own lips form a mischievous grin when Soap glanced over to Simon who remained quiet under his mask, clearly processing everything and denying the fact that his own lover would turn their backs on them. On him.

“You’re wrong.”

Milena raised a brow as she crossed her arms. “Am I?’ She questions. “He told Makarov that you were coming for him, told him about the plans and the bombings and now he knows about the stations.”

Simon stops himself from killing the women, not believing a word she’s saying only to think back to their previous failed missions. Every time they were close to getting Makarov he always escaped them clearly finding a way around the problem as if he knew about them. Simon left the island fuming, anger boiling inside of him as they flew back to Makarovs last destination a base hidden in the train station.

Soap can tell that Simon isn’t happy about the discovery of Y/n betraying them and working for Makarov. He knows not to ask about it since the man was already too upset to even talk about it and focused on their arrival. Simon communicated with Price and Gaz about the location and to meet them there.

Getting down to the station was chaos due to Makarovs soldiers trying to kill them resulting into him and his team getting separated and laving Simon on his own as he takes down as many soldiers as he can. From the corner of his eyes he spots Makarov getting through the station. “Makarov spotted.” He speaks through his coms, alerting the rest of his team.

“Take the shot!” He hears Price shout from the other end getting permission to kill Makarov.

Before Simon could take the shot he’s shoved to the side when the other side of the station explodes, ruble collapsing around him as he groans and leans back against a wall. His ears are ringing by how loud the explosive was and the amount of shouting he hears through his coms is ignored as he tries to get up, feeling pain shot up from his arm makes him wince, realizing that he’s injured. The place is merely collapsing and knows that he has to get out of the station before its to late.

As he gets up from the ground he hears a giant grown across from him, holding his gun up as his eyes land on one of Makarovs soldiers. He was to pissed off to care about their injures and cocks his gun only to stop when the soldier coughs harshly, reaching up to remove their own helmet and mask, revealing Y/n’s face.

Simon froze when his eyes land on him.

Y/n groans and placed a hand over his abdomen where he feels pain and turns to his side, trying to get up only to gasp when he hears the sound of a gun cocking, looking over his shoulder to face Simon.

The two are frozen in place unable to move by the realization in their faces. Y/n wants to speak up to defend himself from everything but knows that he can’t not after what he’s done. He slowly moves to stand, hand still on his abdomen as he keeps his eyes on Simon and a hand out in surrender.

“Simon…”

“Don’t.” Simons voice is harsh, hand tightening around his gun.

Y/n expects that tone as he shuts his own mouth. It wasn’t until rumbling is heard, the walls around them were about to collapse and they had to get out before it was to late for them. “The place is going to collapse we have to go.” Y/n tries to convince Simon to follow him out of the subway station if they didn’t want to get crushed.

“Simon.”

“Why?” Simon finally speaks up. “Why should I go anywhere with you?”

Y/n swallows nervously. “Look I can explain once we get out of here.” He takes a step forward to try and pry the gun from Simon only to freeze when Simon holds it up, keeping it pointed at him. Y/n knows that Simon won’t kill him if he wanted to he would have already.

“You were helping Makarov you helped him escape you helped him do all of this.” Simon nods at their surroundings the place was full of faint screams of panic from the citizens and the sound of his teammates voices were close by as they shouted for Simon. The place was falling apart all because of Makarov.

Y/n’s breath was picking up, grown into panic as he quickly tries to explain himself. “I didn’t know it was Makarov he was going to kill you—I didn’t have a choice—!”

“How long have you been lying to me?”

His breath hitched when hearing Simon’s words, unable to respond back as he opens and closes his mouth, words caught in his throat. He’s been helping Makarov since the beginning of everything and telling Simon wouldn’t change his mind about him.

Not matter what he says or what he tries it wouldn’t work. He’s broken the trust between them the trust that Simon gave him only to see it crumble away. Y/n takes a cautious step forward, ready to apologize for his mistakes only for the place to crumble, giving them both the time to escape. Only this time they don’t escape together.

[ilisteria]

I am sorry for what I'm inflicting upon the world

Behold, the Crayon Eaters Primarch, a totally (not) serious lost Primarch OC

Legion Motto proposals:

"Every Colour Imaginable, Every Planet Imaginable, Everything Imaginable - All Under His Light" or "THOU SHALT TASTE THE RAINBOW"

He came from a civilised world known for synthetic dyes and lacquer, but past that literally nothing was notable about his childhood. He grew up in a nice lower middle class family and just really liked crayons and once was stranded in a forest while on a camping trip so he ate his pack of crayons to survive. Turns out they taste good(to him). He found out about the name Crayola from a box of decrepit crayons he discovered in a time capsule, and he thinks crayola was the old word for colours in some lost language.

The paint splatter on the white chestpiece, knee joint, left palduron, and cloth strips were from a legion tradition of visiting orphaned children after a campaign and letting them paint on plain white armour. The armour pieces would then get clear lacquer poured over them for use to mix and match with ceremonial garb.

Tipirius was executed and his world exterminatus'd after the world's government declared Dandelion Yellow - which was was Big E's second favourite flavour of crayon - discontinued because of a shortage of the chemicals needed to produce it.

-

I don't know what else to write, he's literally a shitpost character and completely normal and well adjusted like 30k Guilliman.

I'd imagine he would be considered a defective Primarch, maybe the contemplative II legion Primarch who was far too human to agree to commit mindless slaughter in the name of the Emperor's distant dream.

[thatdraggo]

Hello Everyone in the Objectified/COTH fandom! I’m creating my own comic about multiple razor packs being at war. It would also be about religious beliefs, homes, and how different packs live. Not all of them can live in forests.

This would give more depth to the forest dwellers we know and love.

So, I’m asking you all to send in your own Razor ocs to be put in the comic! Since I’m not too creative. I need rulers for each pack (4), (4) Stone guardians, civilians for each pack (so about 10) and (2) other main characters!

If you want your oc to be added, please provide a short description of characteristics, the pack wanted to be in, and a reference sheet in a reblog, and not through a message! Thank you!

Here is the pack list and description

Pack Safety: Safety guard hoods and masks that come from a slit on their heads. Most mysterious and deadly pack. They will kill with no hesitation anyone that differs from the “standard archetype” of Pack Safety. A usual defect dealt with is their hoods either not completely covering the face and or not being able to slide on and off. Usually developed by kits “too loved” or too hated, due the hood coming automatically on when under stress. This “disability” is sometimes developed by war veterans too, meaning they have to be executed. Long razor heads with not very much variation in color. Usual beastial type is coyote beastial, if not a coyote beastial, immediately assumed to be a hybrid and is quickly killed with the snap of a neck + the mother’s as well. Live in common pine forest.

Pack Seaside: An aquatic pack that lives on riverbeds and under streams. Have beautiful voices like sirens and fins / gills all around them. Small webs in between talons / fingers. Usually tropical fish and seahorse built tails / fins with alligator limbs other than tail. If furry, usually have Beaver beastial roots

Pack Echo: Usually have draping wings connected to their arms like wyverns, large ears, and night vision. Usually the only razor pack with ears and long tails. They kill or leave kits to die with damaged ears or other injuries, due to the inability to survive in such conditions in the mines and caves they live in. Usually have dragon / bat beastial roots.

Pack Guard: The most loose in control pack, usually with hybrids from other pack types. Thick rubbery glands around face, and usually have magical powers related to thunder (electric razors) only razor type to be able to purr, a signal only used by their pack. Have glowing glands that light up in dark caves/ at night. By far the most artsy and creative pack. Least fearsome pack, though have the most physical strength by far. No definitive beastial type, but bear beastial ancestors were painted on their trees and canvases. Live in common pine forests

[drdemonprince]

Hi I keep thinking back to your book unmasking autism, I recently was diagnosed with level 1 by my new psychiatrist but with losing my healthcare I feel lost on how to function without medical assistance. I typically mask and been learning how not to, but it always feel at the opportunity cost of more money, overly explaining to family or grief. I’ve been in a loop of feeling I shouldn’t exist due to my disability and it a sad feeling.

I am so sorry to hear that you are going through this. I'm certain you already know this, but it's not the case that you shouldn't exist because you are disabled. The vast majority of people on this planet find it absolutely soul-sucking and exhausting to present as what gets called "neurotypical" at work. It's too many hours of pretending to be someone you are not, with no space allotted for your full humanity, with not enough energy or hours left behind to look after oneself, have nourishing authentic relationships, and ample space to recover, be playful and joyful, and dream. Every person requires ample time and space for themselves to recouperate, and to listen to the actual feelings that they have inside, and capitalism instead demands that we suppress all of it, and it can slowly eat away at us and make it difficult to access authentic pleasure or connectedness. For Autistics it's especially pronounced because we are such a bad mismatch with what capitalism demands, and because we need so much energy recovery time, but it's simply the case that you are not broken or defective for failing to fit within such an oppressive system. It is that system that should not exist, and that terrorizes everybody, to varying degrees. I bet if you look at the most "well adjusted" hard working people that you know, you see how their lives have been totally ruined by overworking and killing what's wild and free about themselves, or what used to be those things.

I have spoken to hundreds of Autistic people in the situation you are in at this point, and I have found that for the majority of us, embracing our disability and articulating our needs means that very dramatic changes have to happen in our lives. Some people have to reorient how they interact with their families, establish new boundaries, push to really educate them on neurodivergence, go no contact, or rethink what family means to them altogether. Lots of us leave careers or switch to part-time or remote work, or have to get incredibly creative and resourceful in order to survive in a way that we can stand: going on disability benefits, public assistance, living with friends, pooling resources, going off the grid in some way, finding some side hustle or scam that makes it possible to survive, doing sex work or freelance, taking on childcare or eldercare duties for a friend who is employed, or something of that nature are all options I've seen a lot of unmasking Autistics pursue. None of these options are ideal, and they all come with significant costs and risk factors. But then, so does killing oneself slowly with work.

I have a whole book coming out next year in March about these specific considerations, with lots of tools and decision trees and research and quotes from other Autistics. The book is designed to help Autistics who are in that second stage of their unmasking journey sort out what a life where it is possible to be less masked means for them. Where can they live? Who is gonna support them? What matters to them in their life? How can they reset their relationships in light of their neurodivergence? What does it mean to grow old as a disabled person? These are the kinds of questions the book will hopefully help me explore, and discover the best answers for themselves. Of course, many people would say that their only way out of this is the downfall of capitalism, but I personally am of the mind that we have to make that end happen ourselves by working less hard, consuming less where possible, leaning on other people, providing support to our neighbors, becoming less reliant upon our employers and the government, and building our collective escape from the capitalistic machine. And we can all have some small part in that, even if only for ourselves and those immediately closest to us. That's enough.

I hope that you find a way of life that is sustaining and feels whole and good for you. As neurodivergent people we do things very differently. And that is both the curse and the beauty of us. The prescribed script we've been given for how life is supposed to look is never going to work for us. Indeed, it's not working for most anybody else either. There way forward will not be easy, and the lot you've been given to deal with is not fair, but there are also millions of other disabled people just like you who are leaning on one another, slowing down, refusing to play into the existing system's hand as much as is possible for them, and making a new world. And just by pondering the things that you are, you're helping already to make that new world too.

[zuko-always-lies]

List of Azula AU/fic ideas

Better parenting Ursa

Azula raises Katara AU (and continued) and more

Azula and Katara get friendly postwar and talk about their brothers.

Mai is significantly older than Azula and Ty Lee AU (Older "sister" Mai)

Jin works at Iroh's teashop but finds out about his past

Zuko tells Azula about the Spirit Water

Ursa and Ozai get along better, and it's not a good thing AU

Imperialist Lu Ten survives the war and tries to regain his throne afterwards

Zuko finds out more about his nation AU

Revolutionary Azula takes over Ba Sing Se AU

Three different AU ideas in one

Favoritism in the royal family is a little different

What if Zuko had a nonbending twin sister (who he doesn't get along with).

Zuko's daughter changes how he sees Azula

Zuko and Ursa try to isolate Azula ("for her own good")

Ozai gets exiled and the Gaang stupidly ally with him

Earth Kingdom ends up with custody of Azula postwar and support her bid for the Fire Nation throne when Zuko starts another war with them.

The Gaang tries to figure out why Zuko joined them.

Dangerous Ladies find Ursa in Book 2

Azula and Toph fake dating

Zuko/"world leaders" try to force Aang to take away Azula's bending and he's very much not OK with it.

Azula is thrown away to the NWT postwar as a trinket and Chief Arnook adopts her.

Comics! Ursa's letter about Zuko being a bastard gets out.

Zuko and Katara lie about what happened during the Agni Kai

An exiled Azula finds Fire Imperialist! Ursa postwar

Aang has to save Azula from being executed by Zuko

Zuko's defection during DoBS goes very badly for Mai

Zuko joins the Gaang at Ba Sing Se, but it ends poorly

Zuko killed Azula during the Agni Kai, and now he has to deal with the consequences.

AU idea where Zuko keeps Azula permanently imprisoned in bad and torturous conditions postwar, and Izumi finds out about when she’s relatively young, and draws exactly the sort of conclusions about her parents that you would expect. Not to mention being terrified that she might be treated the same way if she missteps…

Ozai never declares Zuko and Iroh traitors

Iroh-Azula roleswap au

Zuko asks Azula for help with his firebending

Zuko wants Azula to like him but doesn't get why she doesn't like him (postwar)

Katara has an arranged marriage with Zuko and Azula tries to get into the good graces of her sister in law

"Katara is supposed to have an arranged marriage with Zuko, but she falls in love with Azula instead."

Another take on Zvtara (arranged marriage) and Maizula.

Azula-Katara AU idea (or: Katara runs into an Azula who has changed a lot in some ways and not very much in others)

Zuko is actually Ikem's son

Firelord Azula ends her brother's exile

Azula raises Izumi (it's complicated)

"AU idea: Azula commits suicide out of despair, and just about everyone is convinced that Zuko had her murdered or at the very least “encouraged” her to do it."

Dangerous Ladies get banished/declared traitors and Azula basically gives up. Mai has to step up her place

I have to say, “Zuko has to deal with finding out that Ursa very much isn’t who he believed she was” remains excellent fanfic fodder.

"AU idea: Ursa is more aware of Ozai’s abuse and potential for abuse than in canon, so, right after her exile, she seeks out Iroh and charges him with protecting both of her children."

Firelord Iroh treats Azula in a really screwed up way.

"AU where Azula dies during the latter stages of the war or right after it, and Mai is the only person who ever morns her as a person, not as a politically convenient symbol (Ty Lee runs away from her complex feelings on Azula as much as she can)."

Dark idea

"Since so much of the fandom is convinced that Azula is Zuko’s older sister, I need an AU where this is true and Zuko is just as throne-obsessed as canon and spends all his time trying to usurp his older sister."

"AU where Ozai has a heart attack and dies right after the fire siblings return to the Fire Nation, and Zuko and Azula have to pick up the pieces. Meanwhile, the Gaang are plotting to overthrow them and bring the war to a close once and for all..."

King Kuai adopts Azula as his heir

Things get complicated, darkly (Azula exiled postwar AU)

What if Zuko tried to be a good brother

"I really need an AU where Lu Ten returns and is pissed over Ozai’s usurpation, so he kills Ozai, seizes the throne, and continues the war. Of course, Iroh ends up supporting his actual son in all of this, and the conflict in the Fire Nation ends up boiling down to Zuko and Azula vs. Lu Ten and Iroh as the situation spirals toward civil war, at the same time the 100 years war continues."

"Maizula AU where Mai married Zuko, but he died not long after Izumi was born, and Azula and Mai are secretly carrying out a relationship while raising Izumi and ruling the Fire Nation as her regents."

Azula joins the Gaang with a twist...

"The chaos which would result if Lu Ten showed up alive again in Book 1 and launched a rebellion against Ozai in pursuit of “his” throne."

Ursa opposes Firelord Zuko

Iroh tries to kill Azula during "The Chase"

Mai and Ty Lee on trial for "war crimes"" and Azula has to save them

This is very long list, and people are welcome to steal any ideas they want from it for their own use.

[alaska-mii]

ventriloquist.

if the doctor took a shot at procreation that did not involve the blueprint of his own genetics.

else, the strange case of dr. jekyll and mr. hyde if hyde seperated the good from his evil. [il dottore/reader]

this is purely indulgent. have no expectations and i hope to at least leave you flabbergasted. comment or send a note (pretty please?)

cw: descriptions of bodily harm, character death (minor plot device), creative libreties when it comes to how the segment system works

--

Everlasting winter seeps the vigour from those unaccustomed to the endless barrage of blizzards. When there is little else to be done, he observes the unraveling of lesser minds, the horror in their visages when the shadows morph into monsters borne from the palace's coldblooded regality.

He scoffs at such displays, for the specimens they have picked apart within the laboratories are more than enough to ensure total mental devastation for those spineless scum.

Needless to say, it's mirthfully ironic that the phantom haunting the palace halls does the opposite. A being given life amongst the sterile madness many have borne witness to before death, by hands that have served as executioner.

It is the cause for a sickening buzz of enthusiam in the fields of machienery and dissection and every persual of knowledge in between, a fevered wave that swept through darkened chambers and left an ecstatic glow in its wake. A marvel beyond marvels, they gush, for they have fabricated synthetic life. Bizarre, riddled with the libreties taken for a prototype. Yet, its flesh wraps around built bone and heart pumps nonhuman blood and. You are able to breathe.

Some have already denounced it from their attention, for it does not benefit their utmost agendas. Like insects to a light, so many others still are simply starved for a chance to have their ways with the source of all the zeal. An uninterrupted, thorough study of all its intricacies on first-hand account.

Fate was the revered scapegoat fools pinned their troubles on when, in actuality, they should have forsaken the butcher. He was above both the condemnation and praise of destiny, but he finds it deliberately designed, how you effortlessly fall to his lap.

The great halls twisting farther from the gates to Zapolyarny Palace are dimly lit, aglow only by the grace of the elemental energy pulsing within every crystal of ice. There are no guards stationed this deep into this cold fortress, for here is where Her Majesty harbours Her cherry-picked soldiers.

Noise from both the industrial and departmental iron fists the Fatui wields is far. Here, he roams for the frozen tranquility and the lack of anything with the ability to talk. Here, he finds you.

The first time he happens upon one of your escapades, he does not immediately drag you by your hair—if only to sift through the abnormal sheen of each strand—back to where more of him are eager to do the same. He, instead, waits, eyes fixed on the alcove you've tucked yourself into, and observes.

You are considered defective, to the indifferent, for possessing the inconveniences of humanity. For being so utterly, grossly imperfectly perfect. A mere mirror of mortality, so similar to them.

He sees what they mean. The rise and fall of your abdomen is irregular, as if you need to remind yourself to pump air into your lungs. Everything you do is intentional, conscious. The only subconscious prompting you exhibit is the instinctual urgency for survival.

As you are now, you show no signs of abandoning the little pocket of privacy you've convinced yourself into having for the simple fact that nobody has, as of yet, plucked you out of your hiding place.

How stubborn. For as long as you are confined within these glacial halls—as they are the only world you have known outside that of confused suffering—you will likely deny the necessities that await you at the laboratories, with his Segments.

You will refuse to undergo experimental agony at their probing hands again, even if that means rejecting basic subsistence, so long as you are away.

After all the trouble that went into your creation, well. An intervention is due.

"The plaster gives you away," he idly says, tracing his eyes over the bandages springing down each polished limb. The material starkly contrasts the peculiar pallor of your skin, from both afar and closer scrutiny.

Predictably, you startle from the perturbed stupor that blended you into your surroundings, the inanimate quality of a vessel unused to the functions of life. Through this action alone, one can tell that you are not of mankind.

A likeness to an unearthly mannequin with the makeup of humanity to hide its artificial truth.

Should the only exposure you get barring himself be the myriad of servants and recruits reckless enough to roam where they should not, you will never truly be normal.

“There is an abnormal shine to your skin. Highly reflective,” he remarks. Then, if a bit indulgently, “Are you made of plastic?”

He recieves no reply. The adrenaline of discovery persists to rush through you, backed into a literal stone corner as you are, so he cedes to simply contemplate you. It would be unwise to provoke a frightened animal, no matter how unthreataning. It's rather dissapointing how you failed to notice his approach, but one must start somewhere. You must still be acclimating to sound to heed the rustling of the tapestry.

With the lack of a response, he does not bother to pretend at subtlety while he surveys. The telltale aspects of their research—harrowed eyes and sullen, skeletal bodies; bloated, pulsing mounds of skin gushing Elemental residue; writhing graveyards of lacerations and exposed entrails narrowly considered alive—are nowhere to be found on the being before him; from the crown of your head to feet clad in soft leather, you are virtually untouched by the burdens of this realm. No inflammed blemishes on any seamless stretch of skin, not a single jagged scar from some overtly-rehashed childhood trauma.

A poor reflection of the vulgarity in humanity. You truly are a plastic doll entirely of their craftsmanship.

Being called a blank slate would be far behind you, however. He is not blind to the indications of bodily harm on your person, the excited cuts traced along the sheen of your arms and legs beneath snugly wrapped plaster.

The most damning, perhaps, are those glossed, glass eyes that speak of untold horror. In lieu of anything beyond basic bodily reaction to danger, he sees the recognition of potential agony in the unmoving rings of your irises. He is held in your vision—or, perhaps, realistically, it is the other way around—and he sees fear. Internally, he laughs, for what kind of creation fears its creator?

That, for some unrational reason, agitates him. It's sensible, he supposes, for you to be fundementally afraid of those sharing the same visage as your tormentors. He would have given you an experience to understand the concept of self-preservation, otherwise. Perhaps he would have acted upon the thought of dragging you, partly to see if you would struggle, back to the pool of predators, toothed with needles and a greed for answers to the questions your existence produced, were you so imperceptive to thoughts that involved your suffering.

Arbitrary. It would be wasteful, his time alone with you is already tremendously scant.

It is nigh imperceptible, enshrouded by the shadow the tapestry casts as you are, yet he notices the blink nonetheless; it took you just beyond the average limit to resume breathing and twofold that to will away the unavoidable onset of dryness. The minute shift in your eyes, portraying what he believes to be your rendition of curiosity, makes all the difference.

He forces himself not to smile, reels himself to a semblance of neutrality, but your wariness does not falter. Clever thing you've proven to be, he has to remind himself that you haven’t yet been taught to speak.

Conviction settles, smoothing over the initial doubt. He seldom acknowledges—let alone appraises—trivial things such as decor, but he endeavors to commit the canters and folds of the palace ornamentals to memory, the dark nooks you seek to see sanctuary in, if only to unearth your fruitless search of solace every time.

--

The color you see most is red.

When you came to be, your eye was pried open. Had they not done so, you would have never dared to open them, only ever knowing darkness. It made your shiny skin slick with the very same terror of their red eyes and red-dipped hands that had your heart thumping around your chest with the need to hide.

If they did not make you feel a pain that aches like the ugliest kind of red so much, you even think that you would have thought it nice.

Some of them cover their faces, even if it does nothing to hide the prickle of their stares. The masks save you from seeing the shade only they seem to have. It is how you know the man who found you was one of them.

Before they showed you how to breathe on your own, you had a mask of their own. It pushed your mouth open and pumped air down your throat, into your lungs.

You do not miss it. You have nothing to hide.

After the encounter with one you have not seen before, another calls you back to those rooms with sharp smells that stings your nose, with sharper, glinting lines that sink inside you and resurface with more red.

Their mouths move, pointed teeth glinting in the nauseating lights, making sounds you do not understand.

You think they are trying to ask you where you have been. If it was a good idea, knowing that you would just end up here, with them, all over again.

If you knew how to, you would ask them why they brought you here. How they made you if they did not know what flows from your beating heart to fingertips that do not feel like yours. Why they keep you alive if only to force upon you a fate worse than death.

If you knew how to move the flesh in your mouth, to clink your teeth to make words with meaning, you would ask them why they did not spare you the curse of singularity and just make you another one of them.

Made your hair pale blue, teeth that can hurt instead of clatter when it happens to you, made your eyes red like theirs.

For now, all you are able to do is choke out noises with a mouth you do not know what to do with when the metal lines sink too deep.

—

The second time he finds you, the whipping winds of Snezhnaya have blown elsewhere for the afternoon, like a colony of carnivores stalking its next hunt. Soliditary animals bear better results from the chase as they need not share the fruits of their labor.

Although the pale rays of the sun dwindle through the overcast skies, many have taken to basking in the brief reprieve the weather has given them in the last dredges of autumn. How one could ever find the unescapable fields of white above and below comforting is beyond him, with or without the storms of knife-like ice bridging the gap.

The second time is not as innocently accidental as the first. He had been anticipating the next opportune moment to intercede. The bottomless, manmade wells of your eyes have been occupying a better portion of his thoughts.

Unnoticed beneath an airy archway, he finds himself enthralled in the benign sight before him; perched in a patch of unfiltered sunlight from a window too small to wriggle through, in an uninhabited nook resting unused on an overtly opulent wing granted to those only of his perstige, is you.

He has seen you drenched in the dark, like watery ink staining over parchment, with remnants of fear persistent in how you beheld him. There was cloying rapture in your ruination, intrigue to be found in how you were created with an underlying wrongness yet they still find ways to taint you still.

Now, utterly engrossed in a bubble of wonder, fear is nowhere to be found on your sunbathed form. The dilluted hues of the fleeting daylight washes over a body he has never before seen so alive. A steady stream of muffled sun spills around you, an island parting a river in half, only emerging when the tides are favorable. It mutes the shine of your skin and you look terribly healthy.

It casts a faint halo—a dying ember or a brewing blaze, only time will tell—around your sillhouette, around a being not quite mortal yet far too polished a figure to be anything short of otherwordly. Had Celestia not been so loathesome with life, the coronation for your ascension to godhood would have been disgustingly glorious.

It caters to a certain satisfaction, watching curiousity ebb into those glass eyes and flow forth from unsure appendages that your conciousness has yet to settle into like ill-fitting articles of clothing. The childlike wish to explore is written in starry signs on your face, streaked with lovely lines in the uncrackable curve of your ever-so-slightly widened eyes.

There is pride that is always present when the product of his research comes to fruition, but somehow, seeing unsynchronized fingers stutter towards a stray crow that sweeped in from the window overhead is diferrent. Unprecedented.

The bird is a haggard pest, cocking its head at your approach, beady eyes perpendicular to yours, and he has never seen you so enchanted. Never has he had the opportunity to ever drink in the sweet, novel nectar of your wonder. Never has he seen you free from the misery that muzzles you so, as constant as the life they breathed into your lungs.

The crow skips away from your reaching fingers and he ponders if you knew how much smiliar you are to the skittish animal, only you were eathbound and unable to take to the skies. You perservere, however, captivated by the existence of the smaller lifeform and its freedom, having recovered from the unsurety when it unceremoniously flocked into the room.

Its wings flutter provocatively, a telltale sign of the bird’s wish to take flight. You pushed the animal too far, startled it to a point of irreversable distrust, and now this novelty will slip through the window and your fingers like liquid, as if it was never there.

A figment of your imagination, a manifestation of your own desire to fly. To break free and harness the tempests, fleeing from the world and all that roots you to the ground.

You realize your folly, or perhaps simply came to the realization that this ebony oddity will soon disappear as swift as it made itself known, and dart your hand out as a last, desperate attempt at understanding how it mastered the winds and scorned those enslaved to gravity.

The tip of your forefinger barely brushes against a feather when a beak repels the insolent indiscretion, hooking beneath the nail as it pecks down.

Skin breaks, blood drips in weak rivulets. It lashes to and fro in a cawing heap of indignity and you do nothing, reverting back to the frozen surrender from before.

A silent forfeit.

Dots of red curl down the inside of your hand. He watches the first drop fall to the stone below, then moves.

You only shatter the solemn stupor of staring at your bleeding finger when the lack of animal shrieks finally reach desensitized ears, but by then he is long gone. In his place, he bestows upon you a gift; the mutilated carcass of the crow, feathers ripped out and beak broken open. A warning.

Framed with a weeping pool of blood, its wings are torn into crude halves, crookedly splayed wide in stark constrast to the crimson. A blotch of lumpy ink in the margins of a paper. A mistake.

Hours later, after the sun retreats below the blanketed horizon and the swarming storms begin blowing whips of the weather through the rattling window, the splatter flakes on the cupped palms of your numb hands. There will be a scolding, for carelessly allowing its dirty talons near an open wound, for the state of your index finger, for clasping the mangled crow carcass so closely to your clothes.

Hours later, it will be catalogued that your glands are indeed capable of producing crystal clear tears. The overflow stains your cheeks and warps the glass of your eyes. They will condescendingly coo over you, heal your pecked hand, only to slice open more of your skin with beaks sharper than any predator with an animalistic fervor all over again.

—

In the heart of the solstice, when the moon loiters the longest, the echoes of night terrors haunting the barracks drown out the screams of the unfortunate. The others know this well, and perhaps the begging of the damned peels from the Haeresays louder than its usual volume in summer evenings.

Alas, idling agents often delude themselves to more nonsense for the rumor mill when they huddle together for warmth, and every whisper eventually reaches him. The majority of the humdrum is about their lives outside the Fatui—despite it being against conduct to share personal information—gossip about the Harbingers' pastimes, and so on.

There is a select pool of hushed stories, spread by those cursed—or blessed—with an authentically personal account, however, that he freely, actively savors in.

A ghost roams the inner halls, they claim, a victim of the vile experiments those scientists partake in.

The wiser fools know better than to discuss the deeds the Doctor committs, lest they share the same fate as the poor soul. The spirit seemed so pitiful, though, that they cannot resist sharing their grievances.

I hear the Second himself had a hand in their death, more prattle on, rattled. Refrain from approach! Haven't you heard of what became of those who wandered too close to the labs…

He hears all and amuses himself with their ignorance. Naturally, quiet thing you are these days, you listen as keenly as he.

Your creators have taken the stunt you pulled rather lightly. Were your fate left to him, he would have the stainless soles of your feet burned for daring to bite the hand that feeds.

In that regard, he isn't quite in a position to complain, enjoying your escapades far more than he had initally expected. You make a rivoting game of hide-and-seek; a childish play he never bothered himself with, muddy roughousing that failed to ever appeal to him.

Each time he ambushes you, you sport more signs of their influence. In the gaps between your chases of a dilluting desire of freedom, the influx of interest in you brightens. Correspondingly, there comes the need to have a stake of authority on the identity they forged, wholly built with and upon their efforts.

Thus, they are so meticulous when it comes to you. There is nothing in the dingy dredges beneath the castle that is more precisely handled than their very own prized project. Your constitution is similar to that of theirs, except all your needs are adaquately met: ample food, water, and clothing, because heavens forbid that you perish at the hands of something as mundane as a cold; an infliction they discovered you were capable of.

That isn't to say you are swimming in luxury, however. While you are obsessively fussed over like a beloved taxidermy, and educated through miscellaneous means since a widely accepted agreement is wildly unlikely, there are those that take advangtage of your vulnerability.

You are taught that the insicions inflicted on your fake flesh—never permanent, for what good is there in shredding the canvas of a masterpiece—is inevitable. That you would do good letting them ply substances of all kinds into your mouth, delighting in every crack of the inanimacy you cling to when the pain of being alive is too much.

Anything that cannot be regained will be cleaved off in an endevour to know your limits. You will be bent, battered, and broken. They are severely adamant of keeping every part of your material body inorganically original. They strike scars that will mend with the intention of altering to their fufillment.

Which leaves your malleable mind as, unfortunately for you, free teritorry. They aren't so reckless as to leave you mentally unsalvegable, but that mouldable, cognizant, tantalizing mound of flesh that lies between twin elastic ears is far too tempting.

He is sure that the winding bandages that envelop more skin every time he has you for himself match the contradictory net of lies woven within your skull. Undoubtably, the day he calls you daft is the day the experiments and lies have shaken you beyond saving.

The day you are summarily tossed aside like a memento that has lost its value, finally left to rest, will not be for many moons to come. That, he is certain of.

Alas, he can't quite tell if you are acivetly pursuing or preventing such a notion.

--

A period of time that he does not care to enumerate passes. The third time he finds you alone, you are curled on the wooden frame of a sprawling window within one of the many libraries the palace houses. The one you chose was disgustingly grandeur—a resplendent chandelier streaking shadows across your form, shelves made of marble, books merely props among the opulence.

Instantly, he knows something is amiss as he takes your chin with the slightest lift of his index finger and thumb, having grown bored of watching from afar.

You still beneath his touch and obediently, forcibly relax, long accustomed to such scrutiny. He is eternally displeased that they have not yet found a means to read every thought that flicks through your eyes as they will it, but such a milestone would only be a testament to the enroaching of your expiry date.

The fidgeting is new. You are still static in a way that befits a purposless spirit, but have slightly settled into a body you lacked the chance to grow into. An outlet for the developmental adjusments you are undergoing.

The incriminating back-and-forth of your nails and the wayward slide of your gaze, glass eyes slid away from his, tells him whatever secret you hide will be better left to fester. A bud that he, decidedly, intends to let bloom its sordid petals until he picks it at its peak. He wants to know what scandalous flowers you are capable of bearing.

He concedes, satisfied. With an final indulgent tap to your left cheek, alight with the blindingly white snow outside, your eyes unnaturally motionless where they refuse to meet his. He seats himself near the tips of your folded legs, replacing the rest of the library from your sight.

There is something wrong about your already muted pallor. You are naturally still, but today you are listless. It would seem he caught you in the aftermath—or, perhaps, midst—of an ongoing test.

He eyes your confusedly downtrodden face, as if frustrated by the amounting weight of your own body, if you were even capable of such an emotion. It would seem that one of them hadn't taken too kindly to your frequent dissapearances and made the decision to tighten your leash.

He doesn’t bother prying more clues from you. “What have they done to you?”

As if heeding the command of string, you lift your right arm, brandishing a thick tube portruding from the meat of your limb. He follows its path to an imposing intravenous stand he hadn’t noticed before, hidden in the velvet folds of the curtain.

Well, that is something. A Segment with a short fuse finally decided your frequent dissapearances trespassed the line of disobediance.

Hitching you to an IV is certaintly an effective impairment that will also make for endless entertainment, watching as you drag it around like an unwilling pet. Were one to look any further than the surface, the circumstances portray you with the collar instead.

He does not find this unreasonable. You have taken to exploring Her Majesty's vast algid domain, how a last of its kind species might roam the territory of a new era, still under the illusion that you might find a unreachable crevice they won't be able to extract you from. Had there not been so many of him to share you with, you would not know anything outside of every morsel he sees fit to handfeed you. Nevertheless, he finds the privacy you're so desperate to maintain far more interesting.

The common consensus is that the knowledge of your existence reaching any of the other Harbingers at all is undesirable. Thus, they are always there to reel you back.

Some more forcefully than others.

He coaxes out a solemn affirmation to return, lest you canter too far to the wrong side of the knife's edge. You and he both know that how he treats you, no matter his ulterior motives, is better than a harsh jerk of your wrist, a cruel scratch to resistant skin, every new set of stitches after a bout of chemically induced unconsiousness.

He considers the inanimate company you've kept, which may as well be a heavy metal weight, and the tube, chainlink bounding you to it. The fluid encased in unlabled glass is evidently a mild sedative, concocted to render your escapades brief and less far flung. Why they do not simply shackle you to the maw of their dingy realm is beyond him, but perhaps he and his Segments' sentiments for treatment are not as dissimilar as he fancied.

Vainly, he would prefer you confirm a speculation he is already certain of. He ensures there is no lingering mirth in his voice as he says, "Tell me."

It takes a few moments for his words to reach you. A negative of this solution, in this particular scenario.

"…fatigue," you reply, if a bit unsteadily, the words unseemly on your tongue, "increased hunger and thirst."

Throat hoarse with unuse, you fumble with your consonants, linger inconsistently on your vowels. You struggle with control over your own tongue, teeth clacking together, and it does not escape his notice.

Rationality abandons him, then, as he is overcome with the profound urge to steal you away to an unreachable crevice that will harbour you both. There will be no need for you to be taught the constraints of language, for every sound you make with that tongue—forged by their, his, hands—is saccharine nectar to his own. Every cut and bruise on your body will be of his doing, and you will worship the blotted reds and blues and purples as he does the cavas he rapturously paints upon.

The sheer amount of will he must invoke to reign in any idication of his desire, made more urgent with how you look ever-so trepidatious at the lengthening silence, is alarming. Taxingly familiar, yet not quite. He twitches to hold, cradle, squeeze. He does not invision gouged eye sockets nor infested decay.

The whitening knuckles fisting the fabric at your lap, slightly weaker than usual, is a flighty tell of yours, one of many, that he has memorized. It is the reminder he needs to compose himself. Just barely. "They have you on sedatives," he manages. "What you feel is induced lethargy, likely to negate your tendancy to flee."

The dejected crinkle to your face suggests that you thought as much. It endears him so, concerningly, that he nearly regrets lying if only to console you. Instantaneously, he annoyed with his own thoughts.

For a brief moment, he leaves you to ruminate this new restraint to inspect his own thoughts. That surge of such potency, an all-consuming blaze, setting aflame compulsions to act upon vehement impulses. This is a disturbingly reaccuring experience as of late, and he is certain that you are the one holding the match, no matter how unwitting.

He wouldn’t be so bothered by a wholly emotional occurance such as this, were it not so irritatingly tangible. It springs forth through his nerves, itching to lunge and ravage. Reduced to physically tampering down impulses and mentally extinguishing that encompassing intensity is maddening, and worse, familiar.

He is reminded of a point of interest, hightened by the anticipation of discovery and an overtly chatty Amurta Dastur. An anomoly. An overly determined presence that refused to keep a wise distance from him, cheerfully provoking him to debate about this topic and that.

Familiarity bred contempt.

The demise of Sohreh was sealed the moment she believed ocassionally riveting conversation could sway him into ever viewing her with romantic interest.

That same swarm of indescribable emotion that sprawled forth when she smiled a moonlit smile of pity for him, for the detatchment she foolishly misinterpreted as lonliness, was what spurred him to reach for her neck. Meagre plates of miscellaneous foods toppled over, forgotten, and eyes that were blinded by sentimentalities widened in shock, soon clouded with what he could only interpret as betrayal.

She thrashed in desperation at first, a instinctual preservation for life driving kicks and placating blabbering, but he watched as she sent a last, pleading look to him filled with nothing but disgustingly misplaced sympathy.

It only inspired him to constrict his fist tighter around her wind pipe, focusing on the ripple of her final breath through paling lips. Eyes rolled obscenely back into her head, her nigh permanent blush bleeding into a icy blue. Head tilted away from the waxen moon, parallel to his own as he hovered above the corpse he created.

The creases in her cheeks from that absurdly happy smile, rivaling the blinding beam of the sweltering sun, only made him ponder how they would fold were it torn from the full flesh of her face.

You are a life born from death and persistently claw for one free from the latter. An object that tries so hard at humanity, that perserves even at the edge of complete corruption, reduced to the whims of those that brought you to being. A sapling burgeoning still in a barren wasteland. He wants to see it flourish.

The familiarity is disconcerting. He does not want to lay lacerations on an empty shell nor shape a deteriorating design. Should you meet your end, it will not be by his hand.

He does not want to see you, in all your miserable mortality, die. The realization is thunder after the calamitous lightning. How inconvenient.

You will be his undoing.

This is worthy of concern, knowing his other selves could possibly experience the same burn to lay waste, depending on the lucidity of their mentalities. The only difference that leaves him at a disadvantage is the fact that they can hew and hack and heal to their hearts’ content, with your one-of-a-kind existence as their terribly loose justification. Although he has no intention of putting a scalpel to your skin in any clinical capacity, he craves to see you unravel in ways no more noble.

There is nothing to be done about his current lack of an outlet for his impulses. He, however, needs to find a means to an end that does not involve yours. Quickly, lest the itch to fist around your throat becomes untamable. If he finds temporary reprieve in antagonizing you—a mistake he would never have made otherwise, as he finds cultivating attatchment far more effective for control—then so be it.

“What are you hiding from me?” he decides, less questioning and mostly accusatory, worsened at the sheer disbelief at how you ever thought you had the privellage of privacy.

The glass exterior breaks and the effect is instant. He is both relieved and irked at how it pacifies him so to watch that predictable fear prompty overthrow the peturbation that seems to have taken permanent residence on your features. A primal reaction you have dubious chances of ever relinquishing, given the routines of probing that mark your days and skin.

Oh, well. An intervenion was predetermined and planned, after all. He would have rathered a suitably detached position where he may observe from afar, but he had been forced to dispose of that idea in its entirety. He'd have relished witnessing whether you would act like a dog with a bone or an unfaithful lover, shamefully stealthing about. Now, you would merely have to adjust accordingly to an audience who has an inkling of the plot.

He sighs, vexed, unwilling to know if you sputter out a flimsy excuse or surrender yourself to however he decides to punish this misdeed, despite how enticing the latter seems. "Learn from this. You would do well accepting the fact that constant survaillance on your every action is unavoidable."

It's humourous how your lips purse minutely, courtesy of being caught redhanded. He suspects, mildly humored, that you were confident in your ability to perserve a semblence of clandestinity. Whatever could be so important that you do not immediately confess your misdeeds?

“…will you tell the others?”

He sees the flicker of wavering hope in your eyes, perhaps the sting of wry loathing directed at yourself for ever allowing something as useless as having faith. He recalls the blatant distrust on your expression when he first met you, the feral exhaustion of an old street cat. You are sprouting; retracting cut claws, inching ever-so-slightly closer to his outstretched palm. Seeing such a sight before him is pleasing.

“As if,” he amusedly scoffs, sated. Disclosing the existence your temptingly private pastime is sure to guarantee a burnt bridge. Rebuilding another would be tedious and the original is particularly charming. “You’ve come so far from the illiterate fawn stumbling about the palace pillars. Or have I overestimated you?”

He has nothing to gain should he even imply you withheld anything at all within that bleeding-heart skull of yours; they would pick your brain like a murder of crows, uncaring if a morsel or a feast awaited them inside.

“You have not,” is the rushed reply. The sound of your voice, reassuring, pleasing, thrums something addictingly irrational beneath his skin. A gloved knuckle twitches and he dismisses it, refocuses.

It’s droll how fine a line it is; he can’t decide if you are hoping like the guilty or pleading like the sentenced.

Silence hangs in the chilled air between the heavy velvet curtain and the frosted glass panes, harassed by a stirring storm. He lets it, deliberately, if only to let your fears fester just a while longer. He contemplates whatever could possibly cause you to muster up the nerve to delay the unavoidable bloodshed; be it yours or that of this mystery.

It could hardly be one of those overly haughty scientists working in the division. The self-proclaimed scholars tend to believe themselves of more importance than the lowly station they were assigned to and topple over the cliff’s edge to the serrated shallows below. They rarely resurface from the repercussions of their failures.

They shouldn’t be so dissapointingly dim—although, he supposes, he never had any high expectations to speak of in the first place—that they even consider the notion of meddling in an expirement privy only to the Doctor himself. It would be more probable that you have sealed a tedious death for a member outside his jurisdiction.

“You do realize that you are condemning yourself and this secret to the consequences of your actions, yes?”

You recede, limbs locking up, marble eyes unfocusing as if you do not want to face the truth either. He notes this as a defensive tactic you use every so often; when there is nowhere left to run, you retreat into yourself. Knowingly or otherwise, he has yet to conclude.

He wonders if what troubles you so is the memory of the crow. Wonders if you think them immune to mutilation. After all, they have no feathers to pluck and have blabbering mouths where a beak would have been. Altogether a lifeform with skies of potential yet lacking the means to reach them without aid.

No matter. After this silly charade of yours, ending on his terms alone, you will learn.

—

These days, there are three things you cannot forget.

One is the cherries their eyes char when you follow their rules. They all have them. Rules that overlap and go against each other, but even so, you become the perfect pupil. Even the bright apples at the center of the masks some wear seem to flare a little brighter (darker?) when you do exactly as they say.

That gets harder, though, when multiple are with you at once, which is often. Their dissapointed corrections feel like hundreds of blunt branches at your skin.

You do not know if the painful pang to your chest is scarier than the warm, fluttering feeling in your stomach when red does not shed after the curved glint of pointy teeth.

You attest it to the fact your flesh is spared. Not to any other reasons besides.

Two is something you must not ever falter in maintaining. They will not break you beyond repair, you have been told. As such, you are terrified of what fate befalls you both if (when, in truth, but you have not lived enough years to learn from past mistakes) it comes to light.

A thought you cannot even touch in passing lest your guilt is spilled for them to see, to shame, to sever.

A secret.

You went to somewhere you have never been to before, a corridor closer to the distant noise you hear during the day. Slipping through a pair of aged wooden doors, already a strange sight in an unforgiving place like this, you were eased into a warmth you had no idea existed among the cold metals that made.

They would never let you go here. Sometimes, when they find you in corners of the castle nobody has been for centuries, your eyes have gone itchy and your nose runny. They say you are allergic, some clasping a gloved hand over half your face to stop your sneezing.

A lot of them chide you when you try to sctrach behind your eyelids, but one gathered a handful of dust to blow straight at your face.

By the time you were brought back, your eyes were watery and a blurry color too close to theirs.

A fire crackled on in a tucked-away fireplace, further cracking this room away from the what lies beyond the doorway. You thought they loved the cold. Walls upon walls full of binded words were lined neatly one after another, and you walked between them like old friends.

You were not stranger to books. They made you read an endless amount if you were not under their examination, leaving you lost in a confusing labryinth of ink. Eventually, you learned what you were meant to, read the tomes tossed at your feet.

These ones were different, though. Strange books in a stranger room. A room you do not, right now, wish to leave.

Head hung sideways to see the worn spines, you went over each one slowly, body heavy with a feeling that made you think of wool. The Boar Princess, The Fox in the Dandelion Sea, The Heart’s Desire…

It shone a teal you have not seen before and a pleasant purple. Something told you this one would be a read you will not regret. Returning upright, you reach a hand to tug it from where its pages were left without light for who knows how long, sliding it out from between two others of its brothers.

The book fell into your waiting hands with a cloud of dust. The tip of your nose tingled, face tightening with a sudden sneeze.

You clamped the book to your chest with a forearm, hand wiping over your nose and mouth. That only spread the dust from the cover over your face, and you jumped back a little with a second sneeze. And another.

“Oh, my,” a voice floated over to you, a voice that reminded you of the room you stood in. “Are you quite all right, dear?”

It was not one of them, that relieved you. You glanced over.

A woman clothed in too many criss-crossing fabrics for the blaze of the fireplace held a hand over her heart, a look on her face that had you wanting to duck your head and apologize.

You did not. Instead, you dared to look at her fully, and was met with a deep brown like that of the aged doors, floorboards, and bookshelves.

Black hair steaked with gray, wrinkled eyes that were not red. She stepped forward, wooden planks creaking, but your feet were rooted to the ground. She was not one of them, and that terrified you.

“Has the it gotten that awful in here? I haven’t a clue how it looks outside-in. Been holed up in here for so long that all those pesky dustmites don’t bother me anymore.”

The woman reached into a fold in her layers of color and held out a handkerchief with an odd pattern. You stared at it, dumbfounded, debating whether to make a dash for the door.

“You’ve reminded me to do some sprucing up around here.” A smile spread across her painted lips as she nodded towards her offering. “Oh, I have many more, you needn’t worry. Keep it.”

She placed it into your hand and pointedly stared at you, smiling, with those twin tree stumps until you took the handkerchief below your nose. Then, with a gentle swish of her skirt, she dissappeared behind the bookshelves once again.

When she did not return, you slipped back outside the room as quietly as you did going inside. The squares of the handkerchief felt foreign in your hands. New. Different from the lone feathers on windowsills you liked to keep.

Before your time alone ran out, you hid the handkerchief away on your person. By the time one with curled tufts of blue and grassy robes took you away, you were many twists and turns away from that corridor.

It was something you have never done before, going back to that kind-faced woman. At first, you used the handkerchief as an excuse, because you felt unfit to take care of it. Something bad would happen to it in your hands, that you were sure of.

That time, she kept you for tea.

You had only ever drank lukewarm water. But before you could get a word out, she opened a tin of biscuits too. You had never eaten anything besides the same meal carefully crafted meal plan you were made to consume everyday.

After you finished your cup by the time the woman—old crone of a librarian, is what she called herself—took her second sip and polished off the tin all by yourself, she invited you on any evening you wished to read together by the hearth, a smile on her lips that warmed you better than the fireplace.

You could have said no. Exited through the door while she stood to find more biscuits.

The empty teacup glinted in the firelight. You wondered if they saw you as tableware too.

—

“Are you my family?”

You know well that it’s safe to ask a questions like these. They never punish you for asking questions and needle you instead whenever you try to surpress yourself to the point of outburst, however minor.

The quickest response is amused. “I suppose you’re at the age where you want to play house.”

“Family is a loose term used by those who wish to feel entitled to others under the pretense of obligation.” Contemplative, distantly engaged. You can imagine the uptilt of his lower eyelids. “You are a creation of ours that happens to have the most lovely freethinking consciousness.”

“Freethinking? An overstatement, you don’t think, given that—”

“Then I assume you believe that the influence of a third party would simply be splendid—”

A conversation between two of the same person escalates into another argument. Like clockwork, they will continue until they reach a stalemate or until something relevant to that Segment of his life is weaponized.

You convice yourself that you cannot hear them, thoughts straying someplace else.

—

The librarian painted a world so much more wonderful than the one you live.

She told tales of great mountains that widthstand hurricanes, serpentine rivers that thrum with elecrticity, of the song and dance bursting from bustling villages. The landscapes she paints are your favorites; you can’t wrap your head around the vast fields and seas she speaks of. The librarian hails from Fontaine—a nation you had only known for its condemned future and its even more condemnable Archon—she tells you with a softeness, and that her family died while she was working here.

Here, you learn when to keep quiet. When she asks of your background, you remember the days before the Doctor showed you emotion and act as such.

Truthfully, you do not know much of this palace of ice aside from the Doctor and Her Majesty, the Tsaritsa. You know that all those you have met serve Her and are part of an organization called the Fatui, but beyond that, you know little.

Here, you also learn to lie when staying silent isn’t an option. It’s something you cannot even fathom to do to them. No matter where you hide, they find you. Naturally, no matter what pretty words you use to hide the truth, they will know.

You say you’re sick, when the bandages peek out from your clothes. They are healing you (only to hurt you all over again) and that the IV is to cure your illness. Something on her face looks like she wants to keep asking, but the librarian kindly talks about another novel instead.

Here, you learn that the Doctor is a being that you cannot hope to put into words. In another tongue, maybe, but you still struggle with the one they teach you. He is everything—your past, present, and a future without him, them, is no future at all.

Sometimes, when the library gets too stuffy and the tea too bitter, your mind brings you to the coldness of steel and the tang of metal that has become another safety, another secruity.

You don’t know what you would do without them. It was stupid of you to dare to challenge the one certainty of your life.

Much later, after shelves’ worth of stories of what transpires beyond the ice and snow, after that enchanted starry-eyed look on your face privy to the kitsune and the melusine lingers damnably longer, there will be carnage.

The homely wooden planks of the library will be splattered with sinew, the vase housing flowers that strain through the temperature shattered, the carpets soaked with red, red, red. A horrible, sweltering red.

“Fables de Fontaine,” he recites with a tone of dull disinterest. “Mindless children’s tales. You gain nothing from animals rambling about simplified concepts you have already been taught.”

He tosses the book into the fireplace by its spine. The flames hungrily consume the pages yet the permeating heat does nothing to quell the brittle tremble in your hands. You feel as fooled as the crow who threw its catch to a silver-tongued fox.

Truly, you are far worse, for you have fooled no one but yourself.

Your gaze is tied to the bright tendrils of flame. A distraction from the mangled, breathing mess sprouting forth rivulets of blood. You wonder, distantly, which of the two resembles the streams of scorching lava from Natlan the closest.

The fire crackles with greed once the parchment turns to lumpy ash.

He picks another aged tome innocently resting on a spotless shelf. A surge of dread strung your heart taut at the sound of every step.

Like a coward, you squeeze your eyes shut. The ruined woods and wools that grew to resemble something of a comfort—an embrace to retreat to when the fresh pricks and gashes stretching awfully under the bandages become uncountable, a home—is hidden from sight as you try to imagine how it was before blazing retribution.

He languidly reads the title, “Wind, Courage, and Wings.” The bland cadence of his voice wreaks another wave of shaking. Each step is a plummet further down the slippery slope of agony you’re closely acquainted with. “The beloved rambles of Mondstadt’s drunken bards.”

There is a slight twinge of scathing mockery in his words now, and with it, standing becomes punishing. You open your eyes, for the black conjures nightmares of your reddened skin taut with stiches and redder eyes. Something begs you to remain on your feet. An inky shadow bleeds forth in front of your toes, wrinkling the threadbare carpet beneath it, and its caster soon follows. The burden of your mistakes weigh too heavy on your hysteria-addled head, so you cannot look away as the familiar hardbound is presented a ways away from your limply hanging hands.

“A bird with clipped wings is only under the misguided impression of freedom,” he says, breath brushing against your earlobe. “You know your limits well and still threw yourself off the cliff’s edge.”

You could never hope to decipher every meaning laced into the venemous words uttered directly into your ear, the contradictory thorns of patronage and the twinge of fondness that left you reeling, but the gesture was painfully clear; you were to atone for the sins you have comitted.

The fire crackles on in perfect harmony with the librarian’s anguished sobs. The molten hues of anger do nothing to warm the guilt shallowly soaking your feet, even if it feels as if you were drowning in raging waves of reckoning.

“Repent.”

You can feel the serrated smile in the timbre of his voice. The book is immediately clamped within your clammy hands in your haste to run.

To retreat from the wicked comfort that etches bone-deep, nestling into your wobbly joints. You won’t allow yourself to relax into the stringed reassurance of a puppeteer.

Yet, even when there are several steps seperating you from him as draw near the raging fireplace, the farthest thing you feel as you pour the fluttering pages over the metal grate is in control.

—

A thumb wipes across your cheek. “The dust was unsightly. I draw the line at ash.”

“The sores you would get from chains are far better as opposed to this. What next, will you be trekking in dirt after poking about the gardens?”

“Farewell to any particularly maternal gardeners.”

She is dead. He killed them and they treat it like how they treat the countless of tears in your flesh. Your face becomes a muddy mess as tears begin falling from your eyes.

Smoothly, pairs of cherries unbllinking at you, the hand on your face slides to hold your jaw firmly. It does not feel comforting. “Aren’t you still so childish.”

“Such commitment to the act!” another cackles, combing your hair back from your forehead. You want nothing more than to duck away and hide. “Save your tears. There will be much more bloodshed at your hands to come.”

They become indistinguishable from one another around you, and even if you see their too-tight grips and condescending caresses for what they are, a cage is still shelter nonetheless.

[vodika-vibes]

Hi lovely.

If your requests are still open and you don't mind, could I pretty please request a little pick-me-up drabble?

I've recently had some surgery and am not recovering as fast as the drs expected, and my mental health is kinda in the pits.

I'll happily take anything fluffy but maybe something Halloween or bonfire themed, with Crosshair, Rex, Echo or Fives?

Thank you!

⊂⁠(⁠´⁠･⁠◡⁠･⁠⊂⁠ ⁠)⁠∘⁠˚⁠˳⁠°

Trick-Or-Treat

Summary: When you defected from the Empire, you expected to be hunted down and killed. You didn’t expect Crosshair to defect with you and move into your home. And you didn’t expect an easy friendship to form. And you didn’t expect that friendship to blossom into a romance.

Pairing: TBB Crosshair x F!Reader

Word Count: 1298

Prompt: I went with Halloween, but it's really more of an Autumn vibe

Warnings: Uh...ridiculously fluffy

A/N: So, originally this was going to be Rex, but he's so hard for me to write and I don't know why, so I went with Crosshair instead. Anyway, I hope you recover soon, and I hope this story offers you a little bit of comfort!

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“How long have we been living here, kitten?” Crosshair asks from where he’s pulling his boots on by the front door.

“Long enough that we’re allowed to vote in local elections,” You reply as you squint at the pamphlet in your hands, “Why? You wanna move?”

He scoffs, “To where?”

You lift your head to look at him, “Don’t your brothers live in a tropical paradise?”

“Yeah, the problem is that my brothers are also there. Kinda removes the paradise part.” Crosshair quips, and then he shoots you a look, “Kitten, where are your glasses?”

“I don’t need those things.”

“Yeah? I’d believe that if you weren’t squinting to see me. Go put them on.”

You roll your eyes but vanish into the next room to grab your glasses. The fact that everything actually is clearer when you’re wearing your glasses will go with you to your grave.

“Anyway,” You say as you step back into the front hallway, “Why were you asking?”

He glances at you, “What do you think about buying some land near the lake and building a house?”

You hum thoughtfully. “I think it sounds interesting. We could use some more space, couldn’t we?” You add with a glance around the front hallway. “Of course, a bigger place means we’ll always be hosting and you hate hosting.”

“I make so many sacrifices for you.”

“Yes, your life is so hard.” You agree solemnly, “How ever will you survive?”

He glances at you, a teasing grin on his lips, “It’s alright. I got a cute little thing on the other side of town—”

You fling a stuffed bear at his face, which he catches effortlessly, “There’s no one cuter than me.” You announce, even as you self-consciously touch the frame of your glasses.

Crosshair straightens and walks over to you. He presses a light kiss against your temple, and then another one against your lips, “You’re right, there isn’t. Sorry, kitten. Didn’t mean to poke.”

“It’s fine.”

“It’s not,” Crosshair lightly squeezes your hip, “I forgot that you don’t like those jokes anymore.”

You shake your head and reach up to press a finger against his lips, “It’s fine. I’m just overly sensitive.” Your smile widens as you trace his lips for a moment, and you giggle when he catches your wrist to press a light kiss against the pad of your fingers.

“You’re allowed to be sensitive.”

Stars, you love him so much.

“If you say so,” You say in a sing-song voice, “Anyway, where are you heading?”

“We need candy and toys for the kids tonight,” Crosshair replies lightly, “Someone,” He continues with a pointed look at you, “Ate all of the candy.”

“Whaaat? Who would do such a thing?” You ask with wide-eyed, and totally fake, innocence.

“Uh-huh, am I supposed to pretend I didn’t see you stealing the candy?” You grin at him innocently, “That’s what I thought. Anyway, I also have something I need to pick up.”

“If you give me a few minutes, I’ll come with you!”

Crosshair lightly taps the tip of your nose, “Not this time, kitten. Didn’t you say something about raking leaves?”

Your lower lip juts out in a pout, “You get to go shopping, and I have to do physical labor?”

“You even went out and bought those silly orange trash bags—”

You gasp dramatically, “They’re not silly!”

“They’re a little silly.” He kisses you quickly, likely to stop an argument before it properly begins, and then tosses your gardening gloves at your face, “I’ll be back later.”

“Yeah, yeah,”

Crosshair glances at you, “Love you.”

A tiny smile lifts your lips, “Love you more.” He tosses a grin in your direction, and then he’s gone. For your part, you heave out a sigh, and pull on your boots, before heading towards the garage.

You might as well do some raking while he’s gone.

Later, much later, after the sun has set and all of the candy and toys have been given out, and there aren’t any more kids wandering the streets looking for candy, you’re curled up on the couch with Crosshair.

“That was a lot of kids,” You murmur as you wrap your hands around your mug, “I think this is the first year we didn’t have any candy leftover.”

“Lots of people have moved in over the last year,” Crosshair points out tiredly.

“True enough,” You set your mug on the coffee table and shift so that you’re able to lay your head on his shoulder, “Did you manage to finish your errand, earlier?”

“Of course,” Crosshair smoothly shifts so that he’s laying across the couch, tugging and adjusting you as well, until you’re laying on top of him, “I did that first.”

You fold your arms on his chest and rest your chin on your folded arms, “Well?”

“Well, what?”

“What was the errand? I thought, maybe, it was something Halloween-related, but I didn’t see anything unusual.”

“Nosy,” Crosshair chides.

“You knew that about me already,” You counter with a pout.

He chuckles, “Yeah. I did,” He watches you for a moment, and then his hand comes up to press over your eyes, “No peeking, kitten.”

“Aww, come on!” But you don’t even bother trying to move his hand off your face.

You feel him shift under you, and hear him moving around, and then he stops moving, “Are your eyes closed?”

Immediately, you snap your eyes shut, “Yes.”

“Good girl,” He moves his hand off your face and presses his hand against the small of your back. “Alright, open your eyes.”

You do as he asks, and blink, surprised, at the box sitting in his hand, “What’s this?”

“Generally, when one receives a present, they open it to find out what’s inside,” Crosshair replies with a roll of his eyes, though his hand slips under the hem of your shirt to rub small circles against your lower back.

“I know that,” You sit up so you’re straddling his hips and take the small box, “I’m just surprised you got me something, it’s not my name day.”

“Do I need a reason to buy you something?”

“Mm…guess not.” You open the box and freeze when you see a small velvet box inside the white box.

Carefully you pull the velvet box out and set the white box to the side then you slowly run your fingers over the soft material.

Crosshair’s gaze is soft as he watches you, “Are you going to open it or just admire the box?” Even his voice is soft as if he doesn’t want to break whatever spell has fallen over the living room.

You shoot him a look but don’t answer him. Instead, you open the box and your breath catches in your throat.

You thought, maybe, he bought you earrings.

But this…this is a ring. A thin band with a dark red gemstone surrounded by, what looks like, diamonds. It’s beautiful.

“...Cross, this is—”

“I love you.” His voice is soft, “I want a life with you, more than what we already have. I might not be able to make you rich, but I promise that we will be happy. So happy.”

Your eyes are burning with tears, you never dreamed that he would propose to you. You’ve never been so glad to be wrong in your life.

“Yes,” You slide the ring on your finger, and it’s a perfect fit.

“Yes?”

“I’ll marry you, I’ll do whatever so long as we can stay together.”

Crosshair grins and pulls you back down so he’s able to claim your lips with his, “So,” He murmurs, “A good treat then?”

Finally, happy tears leak from your eyes, “So much better than candy,” You agree with a laugh as you cradle his face between your hands.

@imabeautifulbutterfly

@n0vqni

@bad4amficideas

@justiceandwar98

@mira-loves-star-wars

@tiredbi-peach

@dukeoftheblackstar

@trixie2023

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@falconfeather23435

@etod

@bb8-99

@kiss-anon

@continous-mistakes

@yoitsjay

@liz-stat

@cc--2224

@adriennelenoir

@cdblake1565

@sweater-sloot

@heidnspeak

@wax-birds

@silly-starfish

@lonewolflupe

@maniacalbooper

[sleepyfan-blog]

Runneth Over

This is the next part in Cedric’s adventures in the Astartes Husbandry AU, and specifically the Introducing New Primaris Black Templars arc. For other adventures click here and here. First. Previous. Next.  

Tagged:  @egrets-not-regrets @kit-williams @bleedingichorhearts @i-am-a-dragon34 @undeaddream @gallifreyianrosearkytiorsusan

Warnings: Misconceptions, physical violence, poor coping mechanisms

Summary: Cedric and Melinth have a conversation. 

“... I had plans for the day, Chief Apothecary Melinth. Is there a particular reason why you called me into your office today?” Cedric asked, doing his best to project a mask of calm, even as resentment and frustration boiled inside of his hearts, threatening to cause problems if he let them. He would not lose his temper again. 

“I have several questions to ask of you, and they are important. Sit.” Melinth ordered, pointing at one of the chairs.

The younger apothecary obeyed wordlessly, suppressing the desire to grind his teeth in frustration, or cross his arms over his chest and scowl. “And these questions cannot wait until I have completed what I wanted to get done for the day?”

“Correct. As you may already be aware, I have been studying the gene-seed that was implanted in your two dead brothers. In part to see whether or not the Mechanicus somehow altered the structure of the organ itself, among other reasons.” The older Apothecary explained. “While the technology available to mortals and created by them in this time period are… Crude to say the least, we have been able to recreate certain much better technologies within a select number of bases, this being one of them.”

“... Is there a point to this, sir?” Cedric asked, trying to resist the temptation to roll his eyes as the other droned on. “As I told you earlier, the Mecnanicus did tell us Primaris Marines that we all have hybrid gene-seed. In order to try and reduce the likelihood of us developing or having certain gene-seed defects. We were told that our geneseed stock came from loyalist primarchs, as using traitor gene-seed, even stock from before they turned traitor, is heretical.”

“So you have said. DId you know that the Mechanicus are not the only ones who were working on trying to improve the astartes blueprint, and had access to different kinds of gene-seed stocks?” Melinth asks, as he seemed to be attempting to stare holes through Cedric’s body by the force of his eyeballs alone.

“I did not, though that doesn’t surprise me. Is there a particular reason why you are telling me this?” Cedric asked, realizing that he’d slipped a little in not addressing the other properly “... Sir?”

“Both… Malachai and Lestras, was it? Both of their gene-seed is sixty-percent  of the line of Dorn, which is what we were expecting. Do you know what the remaining 40% is? Any guesses or suspicions at all?” Melinth asked, leaning forward a little in his chair.

“Given that about sixty percent of all loyalist chapters are sons of Guilliman in part or full in M42… I’d hazard that the answer to that is probably Primarch Guilliman?” Cedric answered with a slight shrug of his shoulders. 

“That’s not - wait, what?” Melinth asked, startled “How? That makes no sense. There were seven loyalist Primarchs who survived the heresy. That is a fact. So how did Primarch Guilliman’s Gene-seed spread so far?”

“His is the most stable, of all of the Primarchs, including the First. Lords Russ, Khan, and Corax all vanished into the warp, to return when the Imperium’s need was at it’s highest. Lords Vulcan was brutally killed and lost - though the Salamanders and their successor chapters hope to one day find him. Lord…” Cedric hesitates for a moment, trying to remember if he’d ever been told when, exactly Melinth was from. Did he hail from a time before…? If so, this was an unfortunate time to reveal to the Imperial Fist that his Lord Father was Probably Dead. “Lord Dorn has been lost to us for a long time as well. He vanished one day during a bloody battle, with only one of his powerfists - arm included - to be found. The lord of the first is rumored to have once again been seen walking in Imperium Nihilus, accompanied by his sons- both those who were always loyal to the Imperium and those who had forsaken their vows after Lord Johnson vanished, presumed killed by his treacherous second in command.”

There was a flash of… Something across Melinth’s face as the older Apothecary listened to his words. The other stood as Cedric finished speaking and stalked around his desk towards him. “I don’t know how much of anything you, or the other allegedly Loyalist Alternate Marines I can trust, if anything. Did you know that Fabius Bile of the Emperor’s Children has been creating clones and astartes for thousands of years? That mad butcher is amongst the most skilled geneticists alive in any time period that has him in it. The remaining 40% of your dead Brothers’ gene-seed are of traitor legions. Specifically a twenty-twenty split of World Eater and Word Bearer. Both of their genetics indicate that they were cloned, rather than made naturally and taken to become Astartes.”

Cedric was on his feet and part of him wanted to back away as the older Apothecary got in his face. Fury at being called a liar swelled in his chest and he hissed back “I have been truthful as far as I know to every question you and the other firstborn marines have asked me, as much as my vows as an Apothecary allow me to be! Speak plainly, rather than dancing around the point like a throne-damned Alpha Legionnaire!”

“Fine, then. I suspect that none of you were created by Loyalists. What I think is that the group of you were actually created by Fabius Bile in order to infiltrate loyalist chapters. Whether or not you know that and are purposefully working to weaken those chapters or gather intelligence… Or you are sleeper agents, planted in those chapters and unknowing of your true purpose and you genuinely believe the things you say… I cannot tell at this time.”

“And what gave you that idea?” Cedric asked, his voice dropping into a low growl, furiously insulted at the accusation “You’re completely wrong on all counts, but please. Enlighten me as to what your thought processes is, so I can help you know the truth.”

“You and your alleged Primaris Marine brothers are incredibly skittish of older marines. Loyalist, renegade, chaos, it does not matter. All of you are wary of us, despite none of us having ever done anything to hurt you. While I understand wariness towards traitors of varying stripes, if you were created by loyalists, you would not fear us, the way you do.” Melinth states, voice hard and accusatory. “However, if you were created by Bile, deep down you would have an instinctive wariness of all factions, given that Chaos uses Bile’s creations as cannon fodder for the most part. Renegades would either kill you or force you to work for them, and us Loyalists would likely mercy-kill you to put you out of your misery and to keep you from falling into the hands of our enemies.”

Mercy kill. Mercy kill. Mercy kill. That phrase rang over and over in Cedric’s head as the older Apothecary continued to rant and blather on at him. Fury and anxiety warred for dominance in his hearts, and when the other gestured particularly sharply at him, Cedric’s body automatically flinched and took a half-step back, to avoid being struck by the Angry Firstborn Marine. “I’m not one of Bile’s creations. None of us are. We were created by the Mechanicus, as for the reasons why we are wary of all firstborn marines… We have ample reason to be, from our experiences in M42.”

“... That. That kind of reaction right there. The way that your body is still tense but hunched, like you’re expecting me to strike you. Have I ever once shown that I would strike a fellow loyalist out of anger?” Melinth growled, stalking closer to Cedric, or rather he tried to.

Cedric’s body automatically backed up, towards the door to the office as his mind scrambled to find something, anything to say. His dumb-fuck mouth decided to blurt something out before his brain to mouth filter could alter it “Just because none of you in this time have hurt me, doesn’t mean that was true in M42! You wouldn’t be the first firstborn son of Dorn who beat me because you were angry! Not even the first Apothecary to do so.” His mentor had been furious when he’d found Apothecary Alinciet physically training him in such a way, and forbade the bastard from ever coming near him ever again. He still had some of the scars of that physical altercation on his arms, though.

“... Explain to me what you mean by that. Right now.” Melinth ordered Cedric, voice thundering loudly in his ears, echoing off of the walls of his office.

“... No.” Cedric breathed out, barely louder than the rapid beating of his hearts in his ears.

“What do you mean by no?” The older apothecary growled, stalking towards Cedric again “I have you a direct order, Astartes. You will answer my fucking question. Who. Hurt. You?”

“Why should I tell you? It’s not as if firsborn Marines are in danger, which is the only thing you fucking care about!” Cedric hissed back, his eyes going blurry as tears threatened to fall from his eyes. He really needed to figure out why he was crying so fucking much. “And don’t spew grox-shit about actually giving a fuck about me or my brothers! You just accused us of being some of Bile’s creations, seconds ago! All of whom you would happily kill to be rid of!”

“Hold on, that’s not what I-” Melinth started to lie.

Cedric did not want to hear empty platitudes or lying grox-shit anymore. Which was why he committed the sin of interrupting a superior officer by hissing “LIAR! I am not the liar of the two of us, it is you! You don’t give two shits if I or my brothers live or die! If you did, you would not have handed our primary care over to a fucking Hydra and a chaos-corrupted death guard! Do not stand there and pretend to be pure of heart and standing in good faith when you long ago washed your hands of those of us among the living. When your only interest in Primaris comes from what you can learn from carving up our dead.” 

Melinth was up in his face, hands moving to grab at him and Cedric’s body reacted on instinct to defend himself as the other was not dressed in the black and white of a Black Templar, nor the robes of an off-duty Older Brother. Which is why Cedric ducked his grab, rolling to one side and kicking the bastard in the back of his weaker knee with lightning speed and devastating force.

Melinth cursed as he started to fall, twisting his body and going into a combat roll, grabbing something from under his desk.

Cedric did not give the older and more experienced Astartes time to recover, launching himself at the bastard, slamming into the other’s chest shoulder first and sending the other bodily into the nearest wall. 

Books and knick-knacks flew off of the bookshelf that Melinth landed heavily next to. He grunted in pain and growled “Stand down marine!” 

“No! You do not get to call me a twisted abomination meant to break my chapter and then try and take it back! You’re just like THEM! Simply more subtle and all the more insidious for it!” Cedric hissed, hauling the smaller marine up by his shirt before lifting and throwing him through the air at the other wall.

There was a satisfyingly visceral crunch as the older marine hit the second wall. He wheezed and scrambled towards the panic-button in his room “What… Like who, do you accuse me of being?” His breathing was shallower, and there was a bit of blood on his lips, where they had split.

A wicked, cruel thought occurred to Cedric. A dark vicious part of him nearly shivered in delight at such a thought, before he balked at his own dark desires. He would not beat this miserable shithead into his deathbed, like certain Firstborn bastards had done to countless of his brothers. He had to be better than that, or he would never be able to look any of them in the eye ever again. And he would prove Petras and the other detractors right. “You’re a primaris Killer. You may not be from M42, but you let Malachai die on that surgical table. I know you did. You’re far too skilled an apothecary and were too well provisioned to have not been able to… To save him. You gave us away to Chaos and renegade Astartes. It is only their curiosity and desire to see us willingly come to their side, along with the treaty that stays their hands from murdering us.”

“Primaris… Killer?” Melinth wheezed as he pushed his way back up the wall with his hands, staggering towards the panic button.

Cedric thought about stopping the other from getting it, but a wave of bitterness and lethargy locked his limbs in place, despite the rage pulsing through his body that nearly robbed him of his senses “Primaris Killers are a shorthand way for us to refer to loyalist firstborn marines who have killed more than one Primaris Marine because they wanted to, or in a fit of murderous rage. Not because the Primaris Marine was showing signs of heresy, not because they needed to be culled for medical reasons either.”

“I did not. Let Malachai die. I tried to save him. He was. Very badly injured. Even if we had a spare Dreadnaught to put him in, that would not have saved him.” Melinth answered, the hand that reached out for the “please help me” button shaking a little. 

“So you claim.” Cedric spat out “I have precious little reason to trust any firstborn marines with myself, much less my brothers. Some of whom I’ve had to watch die twice from the same wounds that they were given by-” His voice cracks, breaks, falters. He cannot, will not, volunteer this information without checking with those who had been killed by The Fucker and getting their permission to do so. He will not expose such a weakness without them agreeing to such beforehand. “-by a Primaris killer. If you think we are Bile’s creations, ask that Night Lord Apothecary if we are or not. He should be able to tell you, if he’s who I think he is.”

With that, Cedric turned on his heel and left Melinth’s office, slamming the door behind him. He stormed down the hallway, intending to head to the bakery that Roland’s bonded ran and worked in. Maybe they’d let him knead some of the dough? It would help him work out the fury boiling in his system without causing more destruction.

Instead he nearly physically ran into a green and gold blur that turned into Captain Ash’val. “Ah, there you are Cedric! I was wondering if-” The Salamander began to ask, starting to reach out to Cedric as he spoke.

The young Apothecary, who would normally be quite content to help the other with whatever he wanted, or allow the very tactile Astartes to hug him when the other wanted, deliberately stepped out of the other’s immediate grabbing range and interrupted him “I don’t have time for idle chatter today. I am helping Ramiel arrange the funerals for Malachai and Lestras, ideally everything should be ready to go by the end of the week. That way the temptation for you firstborns to carve them into little pieces and study them is removed. So that, at least in death, they will have a measure of dignity and respect afforded to them.” 

Ash’val made a small choking sound, as if someone had just slit his throat.

They hadn’t, because Cedric briefly looked him over. He was physically whole and intact, and therefore Not His Problem to deal with right now. The young Apothecary darted around the stone-still Salamander, moving swiftly out of the base and ignoring anyone who wasn’t an actual Brother of his when they called his name. 

Someone was following him, so Cedric dipped into the cross-training that Claude had absolutely insisted that all of them learn on how to be stealthy. He managed to shake the Firstborn who’d been following after him in the densely crowded streets of the mortal city before making his way to his favorite bakery, and to one of the few firstborn marines he genuinely and deeply trusted with both of his hearts. 

[avionvadion]

Ortho: "Those pieces of wood are not just sitting on their skin; they're rooted deep into their heads. If we tried to force them off, it would not end well! Furthermore... Eleanora Quince's health is deteriorating rapidly. The wood seems to be interfering with another magic already engraved deep in her body. She... may not survive the night if we can't discover the cause of these roots and how to remove them."

Listen, ya'll. I have October mapped out.

Halloween preparations start on September 30th (Divus says they have a "month" to prepare.) The Magift Tournament is in mid-October, so I'm going to have it take place on the 17th. Playful Land will be taking place a couple days after the tournament but a couple days before Halloween Week. (18-24th, as Ortho gives us a decent timeline at the very beginning of the event to work with, so it'll be one of those days) Halloween Week is the last week of October. (25th-31st, exactly seven days.) 

Considering everyone will be turning into living puppets, I'm treating that magic as a curse. Furthermore, Eleanora can not have another curse overlapping the one she already has. Thus, she gonna start dying.

There's already gonna be lasting drama from Book Two featuring Ace, but oooooooh boy this is gonna get DARK.

Especially since Eleanora would absolutely be considered a "defective" puppet. Once she starts visibly deteriorating and losing life, Fellow will most likely tell his "boss" that one of the puppets seem to be dying from the spell. If he does that, then the boss will probably tell Fellow to "toss the defective one overboard" and into the sea.

They can't restore her to normal and let her tell everyone what happened, but they can't sell her as a living puppet either. Easiest way to get rid of her is to toss her overboard while she's still being transformed.

Fellow probably won't dump her into the water right away, though.

Human trafficking is one thing, but murder is another. (Really? That's where the line is drawn?) So he'd probably be keeping an eye on her condition to see if she actually dies or not, checking her pulse every now and then, etc. Contemplating his life choices and why he's still working for such a rich asshole who treats him like utter shit.

As time passes, Fellow probably comments that Eleanora will end up becoming a "pretty corpse" after all, unlike her friends who will be living puppets, and Lilia will be pissed at that but can't really do much since he's also paralyzed from the wooden curse.

ALSO, since Fellow IS a card-

I'm trying to rationalize why and when he might end up joining NRC.

The only reasons I can think of after watching his SSR story and reading his voice lines, is that he realized he needs to actually learn the stuff he wants to be able to teach for when he eventually gets the funds he needs to build a school for the poor and the people with little to no magic. Because, even in his SSR story, he laments that he can't teach Gidel a whole lot of stuff since he himself never went to school.

(Him teaching Gidel how to read was the cutest damn thing oh my goodness)

But how did he get into NRC, when he doesn't have the magic for it or the cash? How was he able to establish himself as a student with Gidel as his "other half" similar to Idia+Ortho and Yuu+Grim, so he can build up his knowledge and make a proper game plan?

My idea is, he managed to catch Kalim in town and sweet-talked him into speaking to his parents, mentioning the offer Kalim spoke of before back in Playful Land, and at his behest Kalim's parents bribed the school into letting Fellow and Gidel attend, sponsoring the boys as Kalim spoke very highly of them. (Similar to when Kalim was supposed to be in RSA, but was transferred to NRC so he wouldn't be separated from Jamil.)

That said, I do think it would also take a couple months for Fellow to come to terms with his situation and make the decision to attend NRC after all.

As such... I leave you with this to consider:

Fellow showing up after winter break is over, at the start of January, just before GloMasq and Book Five. Thus being left with all of the boys who were nearly turned into puppets who still have grudges, and those who have grown fond of El after she saved them realizing this was the man who almost KILLED her, while Eleanora and Grim are off at Noble Bell College.

He will be in for a talking to, and poor El is gonna have to fight for her life trying to calm Malleus' rampage when they get back so Gidel doesn't lose his older brother. XD