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darklyndsea · 1 year ago

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I feel the need to scream my WIPs into the void

content warnings: everything. Just horrible, horrible people doing horrible, horrible things. But from the POV of someone who's burned out on being horrified, so it's mostly non-graphic! MOSTLY.

Fandom: Highlander

Characters: OC, Horsemen

It's been 2500 years.

When I write it out, it seems so long ago. It was a long time ago, by anyone's standards. Even most Immortals don't make it to 10000, much less 2500. But that's the nature of memory, especially Immortal memory: when you come across something that reminds you enough of a memory that's vivid enough, it's as if it happened yesterday. And if there was only one memory in my life that was vivid enough for a flashback, it would be the day the Horsemen killed me. You never forget your first, right?

You don't know what it was like. Even with a vivid imagination, how can you truly know what it's like to be peacefully at home (those from so-called "civilized" nations would have you believe that barbarians know nothing but war, but my people were peaceful) and have the gods descend upon you? How could you, growing up after the gods had left? We all died, and it was a mercy. Gods are capricious—they don't need a reason to destroy you if it is their will, and there are far worse fates than death. In those days everybody knew that. We weren't worried about why the gods let bad things happen to good people, not like you do these days, not any more than an atheist would ask why a tornado chose to destroy his house. The gods were forces of nature, and their agendas had nothing to do with good and evil. They weren't omniscient or omnipotent, merely powerful beyond the comprehension of mere humans.

Have no doubt: the Horsemen were gods. They were Immortals, yes—even in the Camp we realized that they were physically no different than us. What killed us (and we knew that well) would kill them. That didn't change the fact that they were gods. Their power over life and death was absolute. Their power over how we lived was just as absolute. What more is necessary to be a god? Our gods weren't infallible. They weren't deathless.

The gods killed us all on a whim, and I was the only one unlucky enough to be chosen as their plaything. I wasn't surprised, of course: I was born under a bad sign, as some would say. Not from the wealthiest family, not the prettiest—my marriage prospects had never been good. But I would have been married anyway—if it hadn't been for the accident.

I was a child, too young for marriage although I was old enough to know my prospects. Old enough that I was out on my own on some task or another when the cliff gave way beneath my feet. I'll never remember much of what followed—too much pain, followed by fever and pain. The gods alone know how I survived a double amputation with a Bronze Age level of medicine. As long as there have been men, there have been amputations, but gods know, if they did anything right it was only by accident. I doubt anybody thought I'd make it, and likely most thought it would have been kinder to let me die—who would want a wife who didn't have legs? But then, just as now, many will do their best even if they think it won't work out well—better to be able to say you tried than to carry the guilt of having given up.

There was pain. There was fever. Somehow, I survived. Some years later, the gods killed us all, and somehow, I survived.

So many Immortals believe it's a miracle when they survive their First Death. I never had that illusion. Surviving was never a miracle for me, only more punishment. Punishment for what, I didn't know—maybe punishment for no reason at all. Maybe for some wrong my unknown ancestors had done. Maybe for something I had done myself—I couldn't think of any way I had affronted the gods, but that didn't mean I hadn't.

Laid out like this, it sounds like I spent all my time agonizing over it, and maybe over all my years I have accumulated a lot of time thinking about it, but that's spread out over my whole life. At the time I mostly just accepted it. Shit happens, you deal with it. Live, grow stronger, fight another day.

They took me, before I even revived. I was no sheltered fool; I knew the stories about the Horsemen (and can you conceive of how much of a rarity it was to ride horses, that they were The Horsemen? Not you, growing up with planes and trains and automobiles, horses a thing of the past rather than the bleeding edge of progress) and had seen enough of their progress through our town to know that none had survived, not down to the youngest infant. Some they had their sport with first, others they killed quickly, but they killed them all. I was quiet—not, mind you, because I thought I'd escape, but because was I to be at any time in my life after I lost my legs? I was dependent on others for every aspect of my life, and when you're in that position it's a bad idea to make your caretakers regret taking care of you. The age may claim to be more civilized now, but that fact hasn't changed.

I didn't expect to escape notice, and I didn't. It must have been the Quickening that gave me away in the end, that faint sense of a pre-Immortal, because he showed no signs of noticing I was there until he locked eyes with me with a suddenness that was startling. And then, of course, he killed me.

Sometimes I wonder what they thought when they first saw me, an Immortal with no legs. Did they debate beheading me right away? Did they wonder if my legs would grow back like a lizard's tail if I stayed alive? Whatever their initial thoughts, they left my head on my neck and took me back to their Camp.

It wasn't all bad. I'm not dismissing what they did: whatever you can imagine, they did all of that and more. Rape and torture were standard, as they always have been whenever there are slaves (don't let anyone try to pretend otherwise), and unlike others they didn't have to play gently with their toys: all of us were Immortal. They could kill us, and we'd come back healthy for the next time. Caspian was a cannibal with slaves—it wasn't unusual for him to make one of us cook and serve the meat he took from the cook's own body. Kronos was lactose intolerant and never met a cheese he didn't love (look, not all of the horrors of the Horsemen were of the murder-torture-rape variety). But you can't live in an environment for that long and not find some good. Or maybe you can, but if that's the kind of person you are then you won't last long as an Immortal. I was there for longer than your country's been in existence, no matter which country you're from. There were horrors that still give me screaming nightmares, but there were good things too.

I don't know how long the Horsemen were together, how long they kept a Camp full of Immortal slaves. Every day, every year, was the same. Every one was different. The only law was that They shared everything with each other—all else could change at a whim, and as the gods They were, They didn't bother with consistency. Their inconsistency was so consistent that it all blurs together in memory. I didn't keep track of the years at the time—we all knew we'd be there until They killed us, whether that was tomorrow or lifetimes in the future. None of us aged, so there were no life events to mark the time, and we certainly had no reason to pay attention to what happened outside the Camp. Nations rose and fell, and what did they affect us? It couldn't have been less than a thousand years, though—and that number is a very low estimate, likely far too low. But as an estimate, it's as good as any I can give.

Unless you were there, you couldn't imagine what it was like—what we didn't realize until long afterward. There was no Game in the Camp. The Horsemen didn't play—we certainly wouldn't have survived if they had. They had the swords—axe, in Silas's case—to play, but that was never their raison d'être. Certainly, I don't expect They ever held back if any Immortal waved a sword at them, but that's just self-defense. Who among us would? Any other Immortal, though—we were all taken to the Camp. A thousand years of captured Immortals—all living together without the Game. We knew it existed—enough of us had been Immortal before the Horsemen came that the rest of us had been taught all the Rules. But none of us could stand against any of the Horsemen. If any of us didn't know that immediately, They were quick to teach us until we knew it deep in our marrow. If there could be only one, it would be one of the Horsemen, so what was the point of us trying to play it?

So many of the ones who die quickly in the Game lived with us. Elders, children, cripples . . . babies. Never before or since has there ever been anything even close to what we had. We had the peace, however violently enforced, to be a people, to see each other as more than only enemies. The cost was great—many would say too great—but not everything it caused was horrible.

I was one of Their court jesters, so to speak. We all were at one point or another, I think, but I was an amputee and thus had more inherent entertainment value. They'd force me to run on my stumps. Races against children, against other cripples. Siccing dogs on me so I'd try to run (you did not harm the animals, no matter what they did to you, not with Silas around. You could only run and hide, and it never worked anyway). They'd forbid anyone from helping, so I'd be forced to find a way to get around on my own or suffer (more) deaths and indignities. Was it humiliating? Yes, of course. Was it at all out of the ordinary for the Camp? No. The lives of each of us were made harder in ways ranging from major down to the smallest annoyances. It was so common that we didn't even care what embarrassments happened to others so long as they weren't happening to us at the moment. Not that it ever felt like that when you were the target, the that's human nature for you. It's always about yourself.

Even as we were entertainment for the Horsemen, we were also their support staff. We tended the herds, we cooked the food, we made the cheese, we bleached Methos's ridiculous white clothes white again after they got blood on them. And I ended up as the chief administrator of the whole mess. What, you think one of the Horsemen wanted to deal with all of the boring details? They only interfered when things weren't running smoothly, when they didn't get their entertainment or Kronos didn't get his cheese or the horses didn't have enough to eat. The rest of the time, it was my job—and I made sure to do it well, because if I didn't—well, there was a difference between being the entertainment of the day and being punished. Sometimes I managed some small kindnesses for us, when the Camp was running smoothly enough that the Horsemen almost managed to forget I existed.

Early on, Methos taught me to read and write. It wasn't a common skill in those days, and to teach a rare skill like that to one who had never had power of any sort—do you think he knew what he was doing? Or was I just the only one who didn't have another job to do, the only one who could spend hours each day on tasks that seemed useless and weren't even entertaining to watch? I didn't care much about his motives at the time, only that it was a mental torture rather than a physical one (at least when I got it right). Oh, he taught me so much—though perhaps "taught" is a misnomer. I certainly wasn't given any choice in the matter. He taught me to read, and to write. To do math, as much as existed then. Languages didn't take much effort—although we had our own language built from the languages of all of us, we still spoke our own languages as well, so we were all polyglots out of necessity. Poetry—he expected me to memorize epics and recite them on demand, and compose ones of the exploits of the Horsemen. I must have been the most well-educated woman in the world by the end of the first century, and that lent itself well to coordinating the Camp's activities.

I can hardly remember what my family called me before we were all killed. It hasn't been my name since that day, not really. When I woke, Methos called me "Mouse." I've always assumed it was because I was so quiet, both in Quickening and in sound. I suppose he might have had other reasons, but who was I to ask him questions? He said "jump" and I didn't pause to ask how high. A god changes your name, you accept it. I haven't been anything else since, even when I've gone by another name. Quiet was what I was—and after the Horsemen I had all the power.

I never got louder. It's too deep a trait to change, I think. But I was the one with the plan, the one who knew what needed to be done and how to get it done. I was the one to take the blame when things went wrong. I was the one to ask for favors or for information. Me, the quiet little mouse with no legs.

The Camp was horrible by any measure subjective or objective, unless you were one of the Horsemen. But that wasn't—couldn't be—the only thing it was. To me, it was the place where I found my voice—and learned to stand on my own two legs.

I wiggle my toes in the grass one last time, and go to meet my god.

#highlander #wip #fanfiction #completely unedited #why yes i am going to add even more horrible things they did when i edit it

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the-composer · 2 years ago

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✘ ❝ s' kinda funny really, th' fact that the higher plane is so fixated on results. it's always th' goal t' reach th' absolute end and process it for data on humanity an' further research into th' human soul an' it's..... potential. how it works within' the UG. ❞ he's projecting a bit here; knowing full well that he too, to a point exists within this set of morality but something in it changed. something that flicked in him like a light switch that made things make sense.

❝ knowing th' following, consider this scenario. yer a salary man whose focused on your field of work. you want success. you crave it an' pour yourself into yer work and- finally, ya get it- but, it comes at the price. neglecting your partner. you are barely home and if you are, you aren't giving them attention and all you do is focus on what needs to be done t' set up yer success for the next day. an' if you have extra time off, you make yourself scarce because you are so behind on things in your personal life that you don't make time for them. eventually, your partner whose goals are different than your own, gets tired. they leave you to find their own happiness and you jus' can't understand why. you brought in money. you put a roof over their head an' yet they've decided to repay your hard work with 'abandoning' you, you've done everythin' th way you were raised t' find success the way you were told an' in th' end you lose a support system you didn't know you needed. ❞ he crosses his arms over his chest, rocking back onto his heel as he explains something that was all too common in the RG.

❝ it's been my experience that those who dwell in th' Real Ground only know this thing lil thing called Illusions of Grandeur. It's a system of action that they have known since birth, instilled in them to not go beyond the beaten path. Most of them don't even tend t' realize they follow it- unlike you. you saw the repetition in it. decided you needed out of it an' now you see things from a different perspective. ❞ he put his attention on his composer now, narrowing his eyes on him through his sunglasses before grinning at him. there was so much in that that didn't need to be said. the reason why Yoshiya didn't walk within the RG's light like those he looked over now. a new name. a new path forward. ❝ case an' point bein', if you don't learn t' enjoy th' failures in life, you really start missing out on what it means to live. ❞

now he arrives at his real question. the one he had to ask himself to really get it. as an angel and as a being within' his composers court. an angel who was asking bigger questions of the higher plane knowing full well that this line of thinking went against the hivemind.

❝ so... here's my question, boss. if you could follow your set path to yer ultimate final destination, without ever having to experience failure or regret, would you do it? an' to add to it, would you call that kind of existence 'livin'' a full life? ❞

✘ honesty hour. // accepting

❝ No, ❞ he replied without skipping a beat. ❝ Life is not infallible. If you were to breeze through it, you'd learn nothing about what it means to actually live. The `failures' are lessons to develop your character. Regret, too, can serve as a valuable learning tool. It indicates that you've recognized a mistake or a missed opportunity. It allows you to reflect on what went wrong, which can lead to something more introspective in terms of growth. You remember not to take anything for granted. You know what to do better.

Regret can be a great kick-in-the-ass wake-up call to reevaluate your life as well. Life is messy. That's what makes it real. I would have jumped off 104 all over again if it was that or take the salary man route.... I do have to wonder if the salary man may have had a family in his future, but he started out pursuing monetary career success for himself. Sure, most — especially here in Tokyo — are raised under the pressure of succeeding, quantity over quality. It's tragic. The Higher Plane isn't much different... Now that you are invested in humanity and have seen all the diverse domains in which happiness lies, wouldn't you just hate being back up there, serving that role you had... a drone, no voice, essentially just a mindless instrument? Life isn't meant to be worked through, or sleepwalked through. It's not an illusion; it's an experience. I'd prefer the pain of exploration over the anesthetized stroll without any enlightenment. ❞

#catncore

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lewis-winters · 4 years ago

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one day, dick says; they're a lot like us. and lew, sleepy and barely coherent, lifts his head from its place on dick's belly and squints at his husband, illuminated so gently by the morning light that he looks like a deity lit from within by some holy fire. who? who is like us?

psyche and eros. dick clarifies, running fingers through lew's ink black locks, laced through by precious silver. from that book i was reading.

ah, the library recent. lew rolls until they're face to face, dick's arm under his neck and his blue eyes smiling brands into lew's own like the sun does at its most glorious. all the while, dick's fingers never part from his hair. he leans into their warmth and sighs. tell me why, then, professor.

well, they love each other, for one.

ah, yes. a must.

but i don't think eros meant to love psyche as much as he did.

lew snorts. now you're losing me, baby.

no, listen. dick laughs, gathering lew into his arms so he may press the following words into the curve of his stubbly cheek, lips like petals, soft and sweet and warm on lew's skin. the arrow got him, dug itself into his thigh by accident-- he didn't mean to. he really didn't. he was there on orders, he had expectations to meet. a higher power to please. but when he'd gotten there, he'd seen a boy so beautiful, he forgot it all and forgot himself, forgot that he's not as infallible as he likes to think he is. he's a god, but what does that mean against his own arrow, his own heart? in one swift moment, he's in love with this beautiful, impertinent boy asleep on that gentle slope of a hill behind their barracks, and what's he to do?

lew swallows around the lump in his throat. so what does he do?

he takes the boy away. it takes a few years, but he takes him away, to a farm in a land all their own. lew feels more than sees the smile dick lets loose at that. it happened swifter for them than for us-- eros had wings. i had a parachute. but as far as analogies go, that's pretty good, don't you think? lew giggles, both at the question and at the flutter of dick's eyelashes on his temple. butterfly kisses. so sweet his teeth ache. anyway, he takes him away and once there, safe and sound, eros asks him for nothing except one thing.

dick pulls away then. still close, but now distant enough to catch lew's eye, to hold his gaze and give what little emptiness that is between them the illusion of a chasm. lew's blood runs cold, so cold he's frozen in place. like psyche might have been, the night a promise had broken, the night a measly candle powered by the whispers of doubt had illuminated the face of a god.

lew knows the answer, and because he does, he doesn't bother with the question. i broke your heart.

you broke my heart, dick echoes, blue eyes so clear and sharp, like shattered glass in the moonlight, like spilled whiskey on their cerulean kitchen tiles. many times. over and over. you broke your promises and my heart and like eros, i broke yours by leaving.

the lump in lew's throat grows bigger and he turns away like he'd been struck, the stinging in his eyes matching the sting of the memory from years ago, of that one harsh night on those train tracks, watching his love fly from him, watching the man who'd never given up on anything give up on him. his worst nightmare.

dick brings him out of it, though. takes his long, elegant fingers and hooks them under lew's chin to gently guide him back to their cocoon of warmth, where he can press petal soft lips to the curve of lew's cheek, to the corner of his mouth, to his eyebrows, the tip of his nose, and his eyelids until the water trailing down his face is nothing but smears, a mere nuisance in the face of all the tenderness, all the love.

but you fought, dick reminds him, runs his fingers through lew's hair again, and smiles when lew smiles, crows feet around his eyes making him look decades younger. you fought your way back, through hell fire and against your own demons, you fought your way back to me, and when i got my head out of my own ass i fought my way back, too. back to you. back to this.

dick, lew sighs, reaching up to hold dick's face as gently as dick holds his. reverence in every brush of his fingers against freckled skin. you said a bad word.

dick kisses him, then. proper and long, sweet and powerful, just like ambrosia and nectar, the promise of something ever lasting and immortal passing through lew's lips and filling his chest with warmth, the golden light that lit dick from within just moments ago filtering through him. making him precious and loved, cherished and missed, beautiful like he had once been but more so now that he isn't a doll to be admired, a reluctant heir to a legacy he wanted no part in. dick kisses him and makes lew a god. lew kisses dick and makes him a slave to his own arrow.

when they part, they are equals. intertwined and connected. together at last.

you're getting sappy in your old age, honey. lewis tells him with a breathless chuckle.

dick doesn't reply, all he wants to say reflected in his eyes and in a story told thousands of years ago, the spoken words stuck in his throat. but it's alright. lew hears him loud and clear all the same.

he gathers dick in his arms and kisses all he can reach. i'll tell you a secret, lew says, to soothe dick's trembling, the remnants of another life where they might have lived apart. eros hit psyche with an arrow, too, did you know?

dick blinks, butterfly kisses against the crook of lew's neck. he did?

on that hill in fort benning. lew laughs. i woke up and i swear, i saw an angel. i knew then. i would let you take me away anywhere.

#band of brothers #winnix #lewis nixon #dick winters #bob aus #does this count as a greek mythology au #psyche and eros au #nah it's just old man winnix #being sappy in bed #estrella_marie

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djemsostylist · 4 years ago

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I’ve had this post brewing for a while, and every episode I put it on the back burner, but this one more than any made me think it might be time to just get it all out.

Because this episode, more than any of the others, illustrates how utterly and completely alone Eda and Serkan are without each other. They are surrounded by people, but all they ever really have is each other. And I think, fundamentally, it comes down to the fact and Eda and Serkan bear the emotional weight for both of their respective friend and family groups.

I think in a lot of groups, there is one person who seems to be the emotional center. They are the ones who are seemingly the strongest, most put together, and ultimately, have the fewest “problems”. For Serkan, this is truer than Eda, who at least seems to always have the support of the girls when she asks. But they are both, ultimately, the emotional and social of both of their groups, while really only having each other for support.

Serkan:

The loss of Serkan’s brother elevates his position to both his parents. (I’m going out on a limb and assuming, based on pictorial evidence, that Serkan was an ‘oops’ baby. His older brother looks to be in his mid 20s in all their photos, making him anywhere from 10-15 years older than Serkan.) To his father he bears the weight of a legacy he was never supposed to have. He must be the future of the Bolat line, the perfect son, the consummate business man. To Aydan, he is quite literally her entire world. With being unable to leave her house, Aydan builds her entire life around Serkan. He is her only source of human interaction outside of Seyfi. Serkan moves home so that he can be there to support his mother, but he also brings her the social and work interactions she craves but no longer has. He works from home often enough that his mom can come over and interact with his friends, she calls all of his employees regularly. He bears the weight of both of his parents emotions, hopes, dreams and expectations. Aydan says it to him after the whole thing with Eda’s parent’s is revealed--sometimes one person has to bear the weight of the family.

With his friends, Serkan is nominally one of 3 bosses in the business, but as Erdem says, what Serkan says, goes. I love both Engin and Piril, but neither of them have an ounce of backbone. Engin listens to Serkan and offers advice, but he’s ultimately spineless--he’ll never actually challenge Serkan on anything, even when it’s warranted. He takes everything so incredibly passively, and that goes for when Serkan is hurting too. Piril seems to like Serkan at the distance he stays, and their relationship seems mostly professional, although she is clearly one of his closest friends.

And Selin, of course, never knew or understood him. I think this is why he is so drawn to Eda. To everyone else, when Serkan says “I’m fine” or “leave me alone” they listen. They shrug and go “okay sure” but Eda never has and never does. She sees past the façade of “I’m a perfectly infallible person who never has any problems” and pushes him when he needs to be pushed, challenges him when he needs to be challenged, and doesn’t listen and walk away when he says “I’m fine.” I think a lot about episodes 15-17 Serkan, and how utterly bizarre it is that everyone just sort of shrugs at him. He literally goes from his happiest ever--he’s planning a move to Italy to be with a girl he loves, and while it’s never entirely clear who actually knows this plan, Leyla certainly does, which means it’s likely Engin and Piril do too. So you have a man go from happy and in love to breaking up with his girlfriend, making a career ruining mistake, withdrawing completely, and everyone is just like, “wow. shame.” Engin is like “gee buddy, you must be really upset about Eda to have done this” and the second Serkan snaps at him he runs away. It’s Eda who literally holds him and tells him she will never leave him, never give up on him, will always be there for him. Or take his panic attack in 11. Aydan tiptoes around him, Selin offers to have Seyfi make him tea and leaves when he says go--and I guess Engin and Piril don’t question anything when leaves the office looking like he wants to die. It’s Eda who holds him, Eda who stays. Always.

Never is this more evident than in 29. Serkan is literally traumatized--he suffers from memory loss, brain damage, and apparently back pain that may also be affecting his hand. And when he calls (or Selin) his mom and says ‘don’t come’ Aydan’s response is to...not. She just goes “well he said not to” so she doesn’t. She leaves him there, alone, with someone she knows her son doesn’t love or even care for, because once again, she doesn’t care. It’s all about her. She wants her son back, so she is going to take the shell. And then he comes back and his friends are like “oh, damn, can’t believe you forgot Eda, do you want to remember” and when he says no, they are like, “oh, okay.” They don’t even push Selin about her manipulation, other than to be like “but he loved Eda.” Does Engin even talk to her? Aydan certainly says nothing. And they are literally just going to stand by apparently while he gets engaged to Selin and just mutter under their breath. Once again, Eda is the only one who really cares, who knows his heart, who believes he can come back. The others seem content with the Serkan they have, because at least they have the part they want. I mean, Piril and Engin don’t even appear to have been running the company in his absence, that seems to have fallen on Eda as well. Once again, Serkan is at his lowest point, and the only person who seems to care is Eda.

Eda:

Eda is, quite literally, the glue that holds her found family together. Other than work, the girls seem to have no life outside of Eda really. And sure, part of that is the restraints of the show, but it also seems pretty believable.

Ayfer, like Aydan, has her entire life and identity wrapped up in Eda. Other than work, Ayfer’s entirely life is Eda--and Eda’s friends. She had no life of her own. And Eda, for the most part, does nothing to challenge this. Sure, she wants to go to Italy for a year, and Ayfer seems to encourage it. But judging how absolutely lost Ayfer looks when she does leave, I think it’s safe to say Ayfer was at least a little bit relieved when Eda lost the scholarship.

So when Eda gets with Serkan, Ayfer is SHOOK. Because here is a person who, quite possibly, can take her away. (Let’s be honest, Cenk was not a worry here). And not that Serkan would keep her from being with Ayfer, but Serkan does very much become the most important person in her life, and I think that is the root of why Ayfer hates him so much (and why Aydan didn’t like Eda either in the beginning). Ayfer isn’t sure how to function without Eda, and she also isn’t used to having Eda be so independent. She likes when Eda does what Ayfer wants, and that is mostly what Eda does.

Ayfer, and the girls, also handle Eda much like Serkan’s friends handle him. They listen, and offer the occasional advice, but they don’t push, they don’t challenge. Ayfer just says “no” to her relationship with Serkan, but that isn’t support, that’s wanting control.

When it comes to support, the girls at least are better. They are better than Engin and Piril, and they certainly always have Eda’s back, but they also usually need her to ask first. And without her guidance--they are sort of lost tbh. They are certainly miles ahead of Serkan’s friends, but still lack the ability to do things independent of help.

Ayfer, is of course, utterly useless. Episode 29 is, quite literally, the first time we see her truly support Eda since maybe episode 10? Or earlier? It’s a welcome change, and hopefully one that stays going forward...maybe?

But then look at all of Eda’s past traumas. They affect her, physically. Her fainting thing could actually cause very serious injury--how many times has Serkan saved her from face planting on concrete? And Ayfer is always like “well, that’s our Eda” when Serkan from the very first is like “yeah, this is very much not normal and I’d like to help.” Even with her claustrophobia. Ayfer and the others shrug it off as an Edaism, but Serkan is the one who wants to help.

I guess my point is, Serkan and Eda seem to have a lot of support. They seem to have people who are there for them. But especially for Serkan, it’s an illusion. It’s not real and when it matters, they don’t really have the support. Serkan said, as he was leaving, that he was leaving things safe and with trusted people until he could come back for them (Eda and the wedding). And the people he trusted most weren’t there when they needed them. At all.

I hope going forward that this is something that is addressed. That when Serkan need people the most, all he had was Eda. That they both need for other people to take on their emotional and mental burdens sometimes. And that found families only work if they are actually there, through thick and thin. Not just the good times, but all the times.

I want Serkan to come back to himself, and then I need him and Eda to quit Art Life, leave the holding to Ferit, move to Italy or France, start their own company, and not let anyone but Ferit, Ceren, and Melo visit. For a long time. And Seyfi. he can quit working for Aydan and become a nanny to their kids.

#sen çal kapımı #serkan bolat #eda yıldız #Edser #this is just me rambling #but yeah anyway #i know what it's like to be the one that always seems okay #and how it feels when people see that you aren't #and care enough to ask

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escapingdestiny101 · 4 years ago

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The Braid

Loki is accustomed to being in places he's not supposed to be. It's one of his hallmarks: getting in and getting out, sometimes anonymously and other times with great fanfare. He's good at it. He's always been good at it, even as a child.

When they were young, young by the standards of any species, Loki particularly loved to sneak into Thor's room at night. His brother slept so soundly that Loki could rearrange the furniture in his room, enchant his clothes to cause itching or to turn invisible, hide nettles in his shoes... Loki pranked Thor so many times that eventually Thor would become paranoid if he woke up and found that his room had been undisturbed in the night.

That was a long time ago, but hopefully Thor was as sound a sleeper as he had always been. If the grimy, ramshackle ship that was currently groaning under Loki's feet hadn't woken Thor yet, nothing short of a claxon or a call to battle would.

This is a major violation of his parole, Loki is well aware. But he needs...he has to...it's important. Important enough to risk being vaporized by the ridiculous TVA and their equally ridiculous rules.

Loki freezes as Thor turns slightly in his sleep. He waits until the makeshift hammock stops swaying before inching closer.

Thor looks worse than Loki has ever seen him. His hair is lank and tangled. Even in sleep his brow is drawn like the weight of his burdens follow him even into dreams. If he opened his eyes, Loki knows that one of them would be brown instead of the cold blue lightning. Physically, he's a mess. Creeping closer still until he's hovering over his sleeping brother, Loki closes his eyes as he feels the aura of Thor's instinctive, elemental magic wash over him. It fills his senses; crackles against his skin, smells like rain and ozone, leaves a metallic tang on the back of his tongue. Loki's breath catches. It's like coming home. For all that Thor looks like a disaster, he's still Thor. Still Loki's brother.

Clearing his throat quietly, Loki chastises himself. Now is not the time for sentiment. Well, it is, but Loki has a purpose for this breach of parole and it's in his best interest to get on with it.

Pulling a small knife, a real metal one not an illusion, from one of his many hidden sheaths, Loki contemplates his task. It had been on Thor's right side, yes?

The knife is sharp but it still pulls and skips as Loki uses it to cut off a small section of his own hair. He winces at the sensation. Even after all Loki has been through, hairpulling remains one of his least favorite feelings. That's probably why he and Thor had resorted to it so often as children.

Lock of inky black hair in hand, Loki takes a deep breath and begins the most dangerous part of his mission.

Thor's hair is a tangled mess. Loki combs through it with his fingers as best he can but there's only so much he can do without a comb. Loki begins the braid at Thor's temple, incorporating his own lock of hair as he goes. His hands are steady despite his nerves. He thinks his mother would be proud, not just of the skill with which he has created the braid but with the sentiment, the gift behind it.

After a few seconds the braid is complete. Two small gold clasps are affixed to the top and bottom of the plait to keep the dark strands from falling out.

Loki steps back to admire his work. It's perfect, much better than the knotty mass that Thor had apparently fashioned for himself after Loki faked his death on Svartalfheim.

Though his mission was complete, Loki lingers. He knows it's unwise; he has already given Thor his memento, it's time to return to the TVA before he's missed. The familiar itch of wanting is what makes him pause. A terrible idea forms, making him smile briefly. If anyone notices, Loki will be in even deeper trouble.

Trouble is what you're good at, Loki hears Thor say so clearly in his mind that he has to check to make sure that his brother is still sleeping.

Taking the knife in hand once more, Loki trims a short piece from the back of Thor's head near the hairline above his neck where it will be less noticeable. Once Loki returns to the TVA he'll braid the golden lock into the same place on his head where he had taken it from Thor's. It needs to remain hidden for obvious reasons, but more importantly it's a secret just for Loki. A talisman of sorts, to keep him tethered to something he thought was lost a long time ago.

Loki twists Thor's hair around on itself into a loop so that it doesn't fall apart in his pocket. With one last, long look at his brother, Loki pulls himself away and activates the device that will return him to the TVA.

Thor wakes several hours later, no more rested than he was when he first fell into a fitful sleep. Above the general din of the clanking of the ship, Thor can hear Rocket and Groot with Quill and Korg's heavy stone footsteps over the metal grating. The sounds of home, he thinks, with only a touch of bitterness.

Rolling out of his hammock, Thor stretches, arms raised above his head to work out the kinks in his back. The smell from his armpits nearly makes him gag. Time for a shower.

He waves at Draxx and Mantis as he passes, heading towards the ship's shower room. They wave back distractedly, barely looking up from the holo they're watching. That's fine, Thor's not in the mood for conversation very often these days.

Stripping his mismatched armor, leathers, and sweatshirt and dropping them in the recycler to be cleaned, Thor waits for the water to warm up. He inspects his beard in the cracked mirror over the sink; he should probably trim his beard, or at least groom it. His hair is a rat's nest as well, maybe the next time they stop for supplies he can-

With shaking, cautious fingers, Thor gently runs his fingertips over the new plait. Woven expertly through his own blond hair is a dark, inky black lock. It's silky to the touch, a stark contrast to the rougher blond hair. Straw, his mother used to call it, in both color and texture.

It's impossible. It can't be. But how else could it have happened? Who else could have done it, would have known? Mantis's hair was the right color and length but no one on the ship would have known what the gesture meant. Even if they did they know and understand the cultural and sentimental value, they wouldn't have bothered.

Thor stared raptly at the braid, once again back where it belonged and looking better than the hastily made one that Thor had created years ago. The gold clasps had a particular Asgardian motif that Loki favored.

Loki had fooled Thor twice before. By the Nine, Thor hoped Loki had managed to pull yet another miraculous escape out of his seemingly endless sleeve.

How had Loki gotten aboard the ship? Where did he go?

Striding out of the washroom, unconcerned by his own nakedness, Thor searches methodically around his bunk. Loki isn't infallible; if you know what to look for, Loki occasionally leaves a trace.

There! On the floor, stuck in the grooves of a grate, a glint of silver catches Thor's eye. A small throwing knife. Gingerly, Thor picks it up, expecting is to dissolve into green light. It doesn't. The knife is cold against his palm. A throwing knife, small and light, meant to be lost. Loki kept so many on him that he probably never realized it was missing.

"Quill!" he yells, gripping the knife so tightly it digs into his palm.

"What?" Thor follows the captains voice to the galley. "Whoah, man! I don't know how y'all did it on Ass-guard but around here we at least cover our junk!"

"We need to find the owner of this knife," Thor says. He ignores the desperation in his own voice. Thor knows how he must look, naked and crazed and brandishing an ornate knife in Quill's face, but he doesn't care. Loki is out there, somewhere, and Thor is going to find him no matter what.

"Let's roll back the crazy for a second," Quill says, covering his eyes with his hand but peeking through his fingers to look at the knife. "Fancy. Whose is it and why should I care?"

"The blade belongs to my brother."

"The dead one?"

"It was in my bunk when I awoke, along with this" Thor explains, gesturing to the braid in his hair. Quill looks at it uncomprehendingly and Thor is not in a frame of mind to explain.

"So you're telling me that your dead brother snuck onto our ship, braided your hair, dropped a knife, and somehow disappeared without waking any of us or setting off the security alarms?"

"We have security alarms?" Rocket asks, grabbing the knife out of Thor's hand to inspect it. After a few seconds he returns it and declares, "Yeah, that's that fancy Asgardian metal stuff alright."

"It does sound like something his brother would do," Korg pipes in.

Quill sighs and rubs his hand over his face before turning around dramatically. "Ugh, fine," he relents far more easily than Thor had expected. "On one condition: you go put some pants on."

"I agree to your terms," Thor declares. He returns to the shower room to make himself presentable. Along with a haircut and a beard trimming, Thor adds a set of armor or at least matching leathers to his mental list of things to get at their next stop. He doubts that Loki will be easy to find; he needs to be ready for anything.

#loki series #loki fanfic #loki #thor #loki and thor #my disaster child

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secretshinigami · 3 years ago

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Clockwork and god

Author: @karl-the-stingray For: @transbb Pairings/Characters: Mikami Teru, mentions of Yagami Light Rating/Warnings: Suicidal thoughts Prompt: Mikami reflects on his regrets while in prison Author’s notes: Writing this fanfiction was… an experience. It was a lot more difficult than I thought it would be, however it was also way more interesting to write than most things since it’s kind of different from what I have been writing for the last couple of years! It’s a little bit shorter than I hoped, but I hope you’ll like it anyways!

________________

His cell was plain and small.

It was solitary confinement. Teru did not mind that; he was taken outside for what he assumed was around an hour every day, given food thrice per day and he could ask the guard for various items to be given to him the next day.

He did not request anything.

The first day he woke up, he kept his eyes closed for a while, wondering why this place felt very much unlike his home. Then he remembered, and wished he had died in his sleep.

He rose, stretched, and ate the meal already waiting for him in front of the heavy metal floor. Then he laid down, and thought.

As a child he had never been religious; but he had wished he could have been. The world, and lives on it, were supposed to be beautiful, peaceful. People were supposed to work together for a better society, for humankind, not destroy and trample down others for the sake of their own selfish desires. Was there truly nobody besides himself who understood, nobody who cared? The accident had been just that, an accident. The price of his mother for four evildoers had been painful at first, but in the end it had been worth it.

If there is nobody to target those who have done evil, I must do it.

Had he not been right?

Of course he had been.

Teru did not regret being a prosecutor.

On the second day he woke up covered in sweat; he couldn’t remember what he had dreamed of, but judging from his pounding heart it must have been a nightmare.

He let his mind wander while he ate, and found himself recalling the warehouse. A single stray from a god’s path had caused him to end up here, had caused the god-

God? What god was there anymore, now that Light Yagami was dead?

He replayed various scenarios in his head over and over again; no matter how he looked at it, the failure was his. How could he have let the forged note fall into his hands, replace the real one?

Teru had been the fall of the order.

However, he was not angry at himself. What he felt could also not quite be called “sadness,” no, it was the knowledge of his failure causing him physical pain, making him wish he could have sacrificed himself to let the new order last and flourish.

Teru regretted not being good enough.

On the night before the third day, he could hardly sleep; Light Yagami kept appearing in his dreams, screaming.

Teru considered himself a rational person, someone who would not be shaken by irrational emotions and the world around him. He had had organized his entire life, made himself work like a precise clock, oiling all the gears in his everyday life with care.

Why did nobody wear wind-up pocketwatches anymore?

Why were they left behind to become rust and scrap metal?

Tradition cannot persist when the world wants to move on; it must adapt, slowly and smoothly. Change the gears one by one, change the casing, and while the clock is still a clock it has now become suitable for the new world, perhaps even assisted in building it. Teru, too, had at times changed small details, slowly adapted; even when he had to replace a gear his task stayed the same, much like regardless of its components a clock still must show time.

The sudden deaths had been the first gear to be replaced in his clockwork of a life. He had not been alone anymore, he had found someone else who had the same task as him; but unlike him, Kira did it quickly and cleanly, without having to go through lengthy battles to prove the deserved fate of a criminal.

What a god-like power, to punish without having to conform that twisted, sick society upheld by twisted, sick people.

Thinking back he was not quite sure which played a bigger part in his admiration; joy over the fact that he was not alone in seeking justice, or finding that what was happening in the world was objectively good.

Teru did not quite know if he regretted letting Kira change his life.

On the fourth day he thought over everything, again and again.

He had known from childhood that god was not real, and if he was, he was not kind.

The opposite, rather; at best god was indifferent, at worst god was just as sick as his creation.

Then why, Teru wondered, had he let Kira shake this firm belief? Why had he worshipped him as a god, as an infallible deity of justice?

There was no concrete, rational answer; Teru had to accept that he had perceived himself wrong. After all, there was only one explanation:

Teru had let his emotions disrupt the clockwork.

On the eighth day, Teru wondered if he might die soon; a part of him hoped for it, honestly. To be freed from this cell, for as of now he was not benefitting the society.

Teru regretted many things; his rules were not one of them.

But he did regret ever falling for an illusion of a God.

#fanfiction #death note #submission #teru mikami #karl-the-stingray #transbb #Near's Bday Finale 2k21

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sleepylixie · 4 years ago

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The Dreamwalker- Incubus! Hwang Hyunjin

Word Count: 1.3k

Genre: Fantasy

Beware of: Elements of mental imbalance(crazy behaviour), Elements of smut(only mentions, nothing specific at all.)

A/N: THIS FIC DOES NOT REFLECT THE CHARACTER OR LIKENESS OF THE REAL HWANG HYUNJIN IN ANY FORM OR MANNER. ONTO THE FIC!! I had a power struggle with this one, making the words sound the way I wanted them to ( @aliceu and @rebecca-noona welcome to the cult yet again. Today we’re serving Sex on the beach with a side of Fantasy Fries)

Requests are open for SKZ and BTS! || Masterlist

Ever wondered how wrong a dream could possibly go for it to become a nightmare? One that leaves you unmoving, still as a statue, even in the deepest of sleep? But what if the stillness wasn’t from terror but from.. from desire? Ask the Dreamwalker, he could show you.

Demons couldn’t create, they were ruled by their penchant for destruction- until the first succubus came along, with an entirely different kind of lust.

Lilith. She was a headstrong woman, the kind that was unshaken from her beliefs and gladly stood trial and punishment for them.

After being banished from Eden’s Garden, she lived amongst the mortals, reduced to a fraction of her full powers but still, more powerful than humans.

Lilith fell in love with a mortal man, a mortal king who commanded respect and power, the exact kind of person she’d dreamed of for herself.

She was shot down the second the king came to know of her true nature- a creature rejected by the heavens, the mother of everything unholy.

Her screams of pain ripped the sky apart as she flew to safety, bringing down thunder and lightning behind her.

Her blood rained down to the ground as she created the Demon plane, outside the bounds of everything holy where she could reign supreme without fear

Where drops of her blood fell, there sprang a new race of demons: the succubi and their male counterparts, the incubi.

They were the youngest and newest race of demons but the strongest in their destructive power- They wreaked havoc over the mortal plane with great glee,

their strength came from the darkest fantasies that humans kept locked securely within themselves, particularly of the sexual kind. When a mortal spent enough locked in an incubus’ spell, they lost their wits to the point of madness

At which point the incubi gladly fed off their life forces, reveling in the sweet tang that the newly-damned souls left on their tongues

All of them were devastatingly beautiful, almost angelic in appearance, with their soft skin, silky hair and shapely bodies

but none more beautiful than the youngest of them all

His name was Hwang Hyunjin.

The Nightmare, some called him, others knew him as the Dreamwalker

There was something about him even his kin couldn’t shake, much less the mortals he fed on

Maybe it was the shape of his face: angular yet soft at the cheeks, narrow hooded eyes with the darkness trapped in the pupils, lips that looked like they were sculpted by mother Lilith herself

Or maybe it was the way he was built: lean, tall and sharp where mortal bodies were sharp and soft as they were soft but still, carried the aura of something so distinctly otherworldly even without the black wings balanced on his back.

But it was definitely the way he could make even the most depraved, sex-crazed fantasies into an illusion of love and passion

There was not a single mortal Hyunjin hadn’t succeeded in feeding on because of this depraved skill of his

Like his looks weren’t enough, he also had to be one of the best incubi there ever walked the Earth.

Of course, with creatures that shined so bright in their depravity, disaster was sure to come knocking

and surely enough, it did.

Demons couldn’t love, they were ruled by their penchant for hate-under the first incubi came along, with an entirely different kind of chaos.

Incubi and Succubi felt love as Mother Lilith once felt love- not as a wholesome, fuzzy feeling of warmth as the mortals do

but as an ell-encompassing hellfire gone wrong, endless and destructive in it’s affection.

It was rare as it was devastating, for succubi often couldn’t control what they felt in their unholy souls for their significant others and often gave their existence away in pursuit of their lover

Hyunjin had seen enough of his older siblings go mad in the sham called love and decided that he would never want to walk down that road for himself.

He loved his life and his demonic status, he needed nothing more

Or so he thought, until he saw Amaretta.

Like her name, she was from a foreign land Hyunjin had never deigned to visit

but one look at her made him wish that he had,

for what an infallible beauty was sweet Amaretta, with the brightest skin and the clearest eyes, the sweetest smile and the softest hair.

She carried a scent of jasmine and hibiscus with her, under a deeper tang of an addicting mortal liqueur that always lingered around her.

Hyunjin had to have her, he decided. She was too beautiful, too pure, too...untouched for him to pass up the opportunity

She didn’t pose any difficulty to get to, it was almost like she was waiting for him to find her, the way her shadowed eyes gazed into him as he prowled closer

and oh, what a dreamland her mind was for a deviant like him

The most indecent desires and the most sinful fantasies that were symphony to his ears

And oh, how beautifully her body responded to his touch, the most lovely whimpers and the most musical moans that only he could coax out of her rosebud lips

Her aura just begging for him to come back to her every night like she was the flickering flame and he was the smitten firefly, he couldn’t have enough of the beauty that was Amaretta

Hyunjin was bewitched by her existence to the point where he even forgot about feeding on her at all- it became about her pleasure, the kind of toe-curling pleasure that he could give her, so easily

that it satisfied him even despite the lack of feeding

He didn’t realize it for what it was, that the charm that he had fallen under was the very same curse he had vowed to run from.

Mortals couldn’t withstand the seduction of an incubus for too long, but Amaretta held to her sanity for an entire month before the strings in her mind came undone.

Something broke inside Hyunjin to see his sweet Amaretta, who once shone like the sunlight at dawn, reduced to a mere shadow of her old self

Was it guilt?

He couldn’t bring himself to appear before her when the time came

Even when Amaretta began to see him everywhere that he wasn’t, even when she was shunned by her village and left in the wood to the wilderness

It was when a panther nearly attacked her that he tore the wild cat apart, then watched

as Amaretta threw herself at him, smiling a smile that was so vastly different from the one he was used to seeing from her

Her hair sticking out in the most ghastly way, her eyes sunken into her skull

She looked dead on her feet, a walking ghost

Hyunjin knew there was a soul left in her, one that was all his for the taking

But why didn’t he feel the victory he normally felt after a successful hunt?

What should’ve tasted like sweet lemonade on Hyunjin’s tongue now tasted like powdery ash

His honey-eyed, sweet-smiled Amaretta. Her soul was damned, now another lost soul trapped in the Demon plane

All because of him

So this was the insanity his siblings told him about

To be able to see the one you care about with all of your sinner’s soul and not be able to do anything when you’re the one that’s causing them all of the pain.

It did drive him crazy, so incredibly crazy that he lost the need to feed,

it was like all of the life forces he had ever consumed had set a fire inside him, chanting about the wicked harbringer of death that he would forever be.

He wandered the world as a ghost of his former glory, never again taking pleasure in the fantasies that had once riveted him

Feeding was a chore now, not an unholy cat-and-mouse game

Everybody knows about the youngest true incubus of Lilith who was once all blonde hair and dangerous beauty, a tale of caution for a broken heart, a reminder of how flying too close to the sun will always have end in a savage fall to the ground.

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bigskydreaming · 4 years ago

Note

The recent Truth & Justice story revealed Jason, since his return, sees Dick as someone infallible and perfect that he's constantly compared to, which is why Jason keeps his distance, and I wonder what you think of that kind of outlook of those two's post-resurrection relationship.

I mean, this is a complicated one for me, because on paper I can see the merits of that angle and where it comes from and what they’re going for with it, but I’m more than a little embittered and bored of it already, because fandom has kinda taken that take and run with it for years without any balance to it? Like, its very one-sided always, because the thing is Dick is so far from perfect and infallible that no one who really knows him honestly believes that, which kinda creates the trap that as long as Jason believes this, it can’t ever really be true that he actually knows his brother all that well, and I’m just tired of that, y’know?

We’ve HAD Jason and Dick at odds in fandom and in canon for eons and with hardly any variation, and I honestly am just bored of it. Its tired. I don’t think it says anything new. It just feeds into the same old “Jason is the unloved, misunderstood second son” thing that has kept these characters estranged in fandom’s eyes for like, ever, and lacks depth and nuance IMO because it fails to ever take into account the many times and ways in which Bruce and Dick have been at odds, and Dick has absolutely lacked feelings of security in his place in the family and partnership with Bruce. Not to mention it additionally fails to factor in the fact that Jason has been WITNESS to so many of Bruce and Dick’s fights, that he KNOWS that Dick is not this perfect son and untouchable figure who always is viewed as in the right.

And at the same time, like I said, I do know that there’s ways around all of that because its not like Jason has to be RATIONAL about this, and he very well can be more informed by his own feelings of insecurity than any actual real basis for feeling everyone’s always comparing him to Dick - its entirely possible for that to still be an issue for him even if its a thing that only actually exists in his own head and self-perception. But the problem I still have is the very fact that they take this angle with Jason makes me suspect we’re unlikely to ever get much of a narrative COUNTERING it, with Dick or someone else like establishing that much of this IS rooted in Jason’s own insecurities rather than actually existing in reality.....and WITHOUT that counter, the takeaway for most readers is to accept this on face value and just run with it as the fundamental nature of Dick and Jason’s dynamic.....which leads right back into the same thing that we’ve seen so much of in fandom for years and years. Like I said, there’s nothing new here. Not IMO. Its just....tired.

*Shrugs* This sort of take, to me, is all very paint by numbers. It feels more engineered to keep them eternally at odds and Jason eternally pigeon holed as the son who will never measure up, than any actual attempt to develop either of these characters or their relationship. And its made all the more annoying to me because of the fact that it very easily could be flipped on its axis so as to run with the idea that Dick is just as insecure comparing himself to Jason because he sees Jason as the son adopted first, the one Bruce chose after he’d already dismissed Dick from his life as far as Dick saw it, etc.

And even that much could be more interesting than what we have here because it makes it less of a one-sided thing and doesn’t position any particular one of them as the more disenfranchised but rather pits these brothers against each other for the exact same reason and miscommunication and mistaken impressions. Which still is at least a more nuanced back-and-forth and reasoning for a sibling cold war than just this shallow and superficial impression of a Golden Boy and his Bad Seed brother. But it’ll never happen because it requires actually puncturing the illusion of Dick as the golden boy and DC writers are too addicted to their superficial niches in writing family dynamics to actually go that route ever. Even if all their actual stories put the lie to it since Dick absolutely does not enjoy any kind of privileged relationship with their father or the rest of the family at large, except for Damian perhaps (and even there, people so frequently gloss over the fact that the reason Dick is so favored by Damian is because Dick put in the work to treat Damian as his own person and see the child he was when all anyone else bothered to see when they looked at him was the assassin).

Anyway, I saw that story too, and like, I acknowledge it exists and will doubtless spawn all kinds of stories that run with that take, but like, those stories have been being written and running with that take all along, so its kinda just business as usual IMO? *Shrugs* I’ll just be here still going with the take that Dick and Jason have fights and ideological differences and grudges even while being brothers who actually do love and respect each other, would die for each other, and actually have history no matter how many stories like to pretend that Jason was Robin for three whole years and Dick the guy who bleeds with his need and want for family spent the entire time just ignoring his existence except for one single interaction.

That to me is far more interesting than anything that can come from Jason being like “ugh I’ll never measure up to my brother and everybody else thinks that too,” while Dick is like “I can not fathom why Jason feels this way and no writer will ever let me show him evidence to the contrary because that would ruin the trope.” Blech. Tedious. Boring. Been there done that. Read that 20000 + times. Seen that episode on repeat ad nauseam. Its a hard pass from me.

LOL.

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dragalialore · 4 years ago

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MMMM OKAY LET’S TALK ABOUT ALL THAT JUICY GOODNESS IN CHAPTER 16

(spoilers. obviously)

In no real order:

Elisanne resolving her insecurities. The poor girl has been an absolute MESS ever since Harle purposely showed her the exact kind of information that would throw her off her feet. Remember, Elisanne is a Paladyn to the CORE--her entire world revolves around serving church and having the utmost faith in their teachings. The church is closely related to the royal family--recall how the Sacred Shards are said to be fragments of a sword gifted to Alberius, the founder of the kingdom, by Ilia herself. (Or, well, Meene. lol) I’m unsure if we’ve ever heard about any past Auspexes (Auspexi?), but Zethia being both from the royal bloodline and the Auspex of the Ilian church is possibly related. (Maybe their mother was the previous Auspex; it would explain why Zethia took up the mantle at such a young age.) ALL THAT means that Harle revealing to her that the church has been lying about her liege’s origins was a sure-fire way to throw her for a loop. Her faith in Euden was not wavering; her faith in the CHURCH was. This is why, at the end of Chapter 16, she chooses to step down as Grand Paladyn and serve Euden whole-heartedly. She recognizes that the Church’s teaching are not infallible, and that there is no shame in questioning the truths that she knows. This poor girl has been tormented by this anxiety since... what, post-Chapter 11? And she FINALLY found her answer. She doesn’t need the church to be part of her identity, and she doesn’t have to answer to them to have faith. This much is proved when the sheer potency of her prayer, filtered through Zena, purifies Poseidon in one shot.

Leonidas AND Chelle coming to Euden’s aid. FINALLY, the siblings are working together! With the glue that bound them previously, Morsayati, slurped up by their Hot Topic sibling, Leo and Chelle are FINALLY able to move more freely. The cracks in Leo’s armor that Alex found have been widening since Chapter 12; she has a fucking point there. Agreeing to be UNDER someone is the antithesis of Valkaheim’s, and by extension Leonidas’s, ideals. He’s the first-born fucking heir. He shouldn’t have to answer to ANYBODY. So why is he agreeing to be so subservient under a clear evil? The answer is a little clearer when you look at Chelle: the core of Chelle’s character is that she is always planning ahead. I have zero doubt that the second Morsayati offered his deal she was going to take him up on it, because Chelle is always playing every side. There’s no better place to keep an eye on the enemy than at the enemy’s side, and the proof that she was never with Morsayati in the first place is in both Chapter 11 and 12, where she intentionally sabotages the battle in ways favorable to Euden--Chapter 11 where she gives Emile control over androids that he DEFINITELY can’t handle, and 12 where she lets Euden walk right through her camp. There’s also the fact that while Morsayati was in power, they had their own city-states to worry about. Chelle and Leonidas have a responsibility to Chanzelia and Valkaheim respectively; while 16 shows that they’ve been mostly ignoring the rest of the territory, to abandon their own kingdoms would be unthinkable.

Leonidas’s seemingly heel-face turn. I’m not saying he HASN’T gotten character development; we all remember when Leo was introduced as the crazy maniacal first-born who experimented on his pact dragon and blew up his hired assassin without hesitation. I AM saying that Euden’s screaming match with him in the climax of Chapter 12 definitely got to him. Ever since Euden challenged his ideals, rescued him from certain death, and treated him without asking for anything in return, Leonidas has been significantly more subdued. He’s always thought of himself as the strongest and the best, and instead he got his ass handed to him by his youngest sibling that was using a dragon elementally inferior to his own. AND he got chided by his own ex-subject, WHO HE LITERALLY TRIED TO BLOW UP. Talk about a reality check! From then on, interludes do touch on how Leo is keeping track of Euden; probably through Chelle’s network. Despite it being clear that he knows Euden’s movements, he doesn’t really... do that much to stop him, even when Euden launches an attack on Sol Alberia. His sudden character 180-flip isn’t quite so sudden--it’s the culmination of four chapters of reflecting why his kid brother handed his ass to him. It wasn’t the power of friendship, or even his raw strength. Euden’s conviction is what’s let him smash through obstacle after obstacle, and as soon as Leonidas realizes that conviction is shaken, he doesn’t hesitate to help. Leonidas is, and always has been, about valuing strength--and this time, he recognized a different kind of strength in his little brother.

The acknowledgement of the state of New Alberia. Whatever the kingdom’s name is right now, it’s super fucky. New Alberia and Dyrenell’s clashes, along with Euden’s tunnel vision for Zethia’s rescue, have left the whole of southern Grastaea in shambles. Faith in the royal family is at an all-time low because they’ve all been squabbling amongst each other without much thought for the common people. Yes, Euden and his folks make it a point to shepherd people to the safety of New Alberia’s borders, along with making regular rounds to take out fiends, but his quest to defeat Dyrenell (read: save Zethia) is all that’s really on his mind. Laxi and Mascula are most definitely parallels to Euden and Zethia; Euden is apt to run into situations without a second thought, not hesitating to fight if it’s clear talking won’t work. Zena, on the other hand, has basically been Euden’s braincell for the last two chapters: Euden is ready to do something dumb, and then Zena says “hey Euden maybe don’t do that actually” and Euden immediately settles down. I’m pretty sure the primary reason she was included in the main cast was so she could act as Euden’s conscience, and the last two chapters have not proven me wrong.

Euden’s potential origins. SO I’ve seen theories floating around about Euden being a changeling or fairy child since the Chapter 12 interludes, and it looks like they’re confirmed in this chapter. Euden’s true nature seems to be the son of an important faerie, Finlorda. However, knowing what we do about faerie lore, it’s got everyone wondering if Euden’s wings were removed to preserve the illusion of him being human. I’m not super sure what to think--I mean, fae lore dictates that faeries reach a period in their adolescence when they get big, but for this whole ruse to work, it would mean that Euden’s been human-sized since the beginning. Does taking a faerie’s wings completely absolve them of their magic? (Note I have yet to read Meene’s story; my perspective may change.) Euden coming from the faerie kingdom casts questions on Notte, too--we know that Zethia found her in the garden after she tried to convince dragons that they were kin. Who is she, really, and why doesn’t she remember anything about the faerie kingdom? Something hinky is going on, and hopefully it’ll be explored in Chapter 18 when they reach the kingdom.

The assurance of Euden’s place in his family. This. THIS is why Euden had such a major freakout. The absolute, gut-wrenching TERROR that he’s been ignoring his country’s plight, his friend’s pleas, all of that for a girl that might not even consider him her brother. That all the mistakes and sacrifices he’s made have been pointless. And let’s also point out that Leonidas REFUSES to recognize Euden as his own brother in his introduction chapter! He literally calls Euden a grain of dust. And yet this chapter. THIS CHAPTER has Leonidas EXPLICITLY telling Euden that regardless of his origins, he considers Euden to be his brother. Those are the words that Euden needed to hear. That is the reassurance Euden was desperate to have. This is the first time anyone OTHER THAN Zethia/Zena has properly acknowledged Euden as family; Phares uses it in passing, Emile hates his guts and insults him, and Beren mocks him with it. His oldest brother and sister heartfeltedly telling him that he is their brother was what Euden needed, and I am so very glad that he got it.

Chelle joining the main party. The first mainworld royal party member! FUCK YEAH!!! I know a lot of people thought it would be Leonidas, with all that emphasis on him in the preview, but like, c’mon. Of course his little sister would steal the spotlight. Plus she has an entire moving ship, so no more camping in the woods for the main party! Woo!!!! It also gives us an opportunity to see how she runs things, and more specifically, how it’ll work in the main cast’s favor now that she’s finally not explicitly against them. I’m super excited. (And hey, Leo might be the next Gala along with Poseidon. Who knows?)

All in all, this was, perhaps, THE most emotionally satisfying chapter Dragalia Lost has put out. Fears were assuaged, families were reunited, problems were solved... someone please put the Stefon meme here. This chapter has everything: family love, guns, sexy new outfits, the characters you love finally being happy...

#dragalia lost #main campaign #chapter 16 #euden #leonidas #chelle #elisanne #god i haven't felt this good post-chapter in a loooong time

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nonamenotitles · 4 years ago

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HELLO, IN THIS ESSAY I WILL TALK ABOUT RIDDLER AND DO A COMPARISION WITH A POP CULTURE BRAZILIAN CHARACTER AS WELL.

RIDDLER is a fascinating character. He can be portrayed as silly, or menancing. A gentleman with finesse and complex schemes or a completely mess who doesn’t really know what to do, but hey here’s 10 dolars for solving my riddle! Also Spandex! And Question Marks!

My Favorite Edward is the one from @askarkham. There’s lot of thing I like about him, but the one that resonates with me the most is this:

Ronnie, how dare you give me feels!

Because I’ve been there, my anxiety sometimes fills my head with so many things it’s overwhelming.

I am a lot better know with therapy and stuff.

But before treatment I too, soo many times, cried the same phrase.

That really touched me

Sooo

That’s why I’d like to talk about my fave villain who is very similar of another beloved character here in Brazil, who shaped every childhood here. (And I do get a little pride at showing my people’s comics, they’re great!)

A lot of other characters reminds me of the riddler. Like Wheatley!

@canadian-riddler made an wonderful analysis of the two characters.

I’ll poorly describe them: Polite and condescending, friendly enough until he get’s high advanced technology. Then he wants to put you through puzzles and puzzles and if you keep getting it right he will try to murder you with one of them.

But the character that reminds me of Riddler the most is:

Jimmy Five (English) Cebolinha (little onion) Cebola (onion) from Monica’s Gang/ Turma da Mônica

His main traits is his ingenuity, his five pointed hair and his dysdalia (pronounces R as L)

@drdeath did na wonderful analysis of Riddler and he’s motivations, and both these characters personality and motives matches a lot.

Cebolinha is a kid who gets in lot of trouble. He’s a very smart and clever kid, always bragging about he’s superior intellect, and creating “infallible plans” (who always fail) to defeat Mônica and earn the title of “owner of the street”.

Cebolinha also messes with Mônica to get her attention and for fun, calling her names ( he has a little crush on her, and in Turma da Mônica Jovem they’re dating) and he has almost a compulsive desire to knot the ears of her rabbit plushie.

Mônica’s main way to deal with the boys name calling is hitting them with her blue rabbit plushie (though the also gives them advice and uses other ways) which hurts a lot because she has super strengh!

Even though he has been beated numeours times Ceblinha never gives up. Believing he deserves the title of Owner of the Street, yet a lot of he’s plans fail because he understimates Monica’s own cleverness.

Despite everything the two kid’s consider themselves friends, and don’t hesitate to protect each other. We have a movie about the group of kids helping cebolinha to find his dog, floquinho.

A lhasa apso that for some reason is GREEN.

Turma da Mônica Jovem.

These comics are about the characters as teenagers. Cebola grew to be na expert with comouters, games and technology, he went to a professional and now only speaks L intstead os R when his nervous.

Batman notices it (but it’s another comic for another time)

Now he wants to take over the world to make it a better place.

He’s cleverness and plans saves his friends through the many and dangerous adventures they get themselves in.

Yet he’s been called out on his manipulations.

One of the earlie sagas was about the ID Mosters, the physical manifestations of the group worst traits and impulses.

They manifested because it’s in the teenager years that kids start to get more emotional changes, and start to be aware of their impuses and control them better than when as kids by developing their emotional intelligence.

Cebola’s mosters is a Liar and master manipulator who uses his charms and skills to get whatever he wants. And the kid had to deal with his shame and realise he is and can be a better person than in he was in the past.

Maybe Arkham should try the “fight the physical manifestation of your Id” it seems to work.

Important scene in the Saga.

Here Red Monica is Monica’s ID monster disguised. Humilliating Cebola. Later the Real Monica confronts him, thinking he’s sending fake messages to make her look bad. So he feels he’s being gaslighted.

THEN HE BEGS HER TO BEAT HIM.

C: Mônica...No... I will do anything...I

Cellphone*Sending to all contacts*

RM: Tomorrow you will make another sign, and will do my homework too! Or else... I will send your other love notes so everyone will laugh at you.

C: I thought that we...

I thought that...

I thought that you liked me!

RM: And I Like! I like when you do what I SAY!

M: CEBOLA!

Speak now! What nonsense is this!

Why are you saying such things about me. Did you decide to go back to the old plans?

Why are you lying,Cebola?

C: BEAT ME UP!

Go on, Mônica! Beat me up already! It was better when you beat me up!

C: Because being beated up by you doesn’t hurt s much...

As what you’ve being doing...

NOW! Of course emotional manipulation hurts more than being punched.

And what was the blackmail: Humilliation

Tying it with the Riddler: Edward surely feels that being beaten up by Batman hurts much less than the humiliation of being defeated. That’s also why he goes on and on with puzzles and plans even though if he fails he will physically hurt.

Because he’s already hurt! He already feels humilliated! And that’s the worst pain he’s ever endured and is still going on.

Back To the comics.

Later in the comics, He and Mônica confessed his feeling to each other, but Cebola explained he can only date her after defeating her.

He does get called out on it in later editions.

C: Mônica...I...

M: Why illusions of grandeur, Cebola? Why do you believe you need to be superior than me?

C: Superior? I don’t want to be above you, Mônica!

I want to be equal! Sice childhood you’ve been strong... confident...the leader...

While I always was the changing-letters kid who got beaten up at the end.

Okay, Edward Nigma wants to be above Batman. But most of the feelings is the same.

Eddy sees Batman as strong, and confident and a leader. While he’s the one who’s humiliated and beaten up.

C: You don’t realize it, right? You have no idea how hard it is to stand at your side...

Without feeling small.

I think I’m giving a little fuel to batriddle shippers... oh well.

As you can see, like Riddler, Cebola feels that he needs to prove himself, needs to prove he’s worth, to the point of delaying everything else in his life until heachieves it.

So my analysis is complete. BEHOLD!

HEADCANONS

I found a fic that I still wanna read called “Dinner at Wayne Mansion”, I get Riddler made the highest bidding in Bruce Wayne at the Bachelor Auction.

It reminded me of that comic where Eddie tried to trick Batman into dining with him.

I think this universe riddler would totally do the auction thing just to talk all night long with Bruce Wayne, and his projects and stuff. All happy and giddy. “Oh Bruce, how are the kids doing?”

Edward lowkeys wants Bruce Wayne to adopt him.

Come on DC! Give us na alternative universe where after his first crime and Batman finding out about he’s abusive household, Bruce decides “Okay I’m gonna raise this young man”.

Stephanie LOVES her Big Brother Eddie! He beat up her abusive dad (Cluemaster) and humilliated him with trivia knowledge and stuff.

I think one thing that should be explores is Riddler as na expert magician, he is a master escapist because he loves houdini, and magic employs cleverness and illusion.

He’s a geek for magic tricks.

He shows them to Harley and Jervis who look bright eyed and “Oooooooh”

Firefly asks if he knows fire tricks

He does and promplity shows off his skill.

Then John has to clean out the entire hideout because Edward fell for it and now Garfield knows there are flammable chemicals here.

Final Thought.

Well, there’s ANOTHER brazilian character that he reminds me of.

Visconde de Sabugosa (Viscount of Corncob) from The Yellow Woodpecker Farm

Ginger like lots of adaptations

Soul patch

Green tux

He’s main trait is his intelligence

differences

HE IS A LIVING DOLL MADE OF CORNCOB!

@jonathan-cranes-mistress-of-fear

@weyoun

@askarkham

@drdeath

@frommylack

@praprikat

#riddler #batman #turma da monica #monica's gang #turma da mônica jovem #tmj #cebolinha #brazil #brazilian comics #the yellow woodpecker farm #visconde de sabugosa #edward nigma #edward nygma

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funkzpiel · 5 years ago

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How To Care For Your Witcher: Cat Eyes

Hello, dearest reader. If you have found this then you, like I, must be in the habit of sharing your Path with a witcher. It is my pleasure to share with you what findings I have made during my journeys with my own witcher. May the knowledge gleaned from my struggles spare you in the coming days from the sheer stupidity you are about to experience. Because witchers, as masterfully trained and clever as they are, utterly lack any capacity for self-interest. They were trained to hunt, to kill – to be a perfect solitary predator. However, their training has one very distinct hole…

And so, I wrote this book.

When it comes to caring for one’s witcher, it must be first and foremost noted with the utmost urgency that witchers, the bloody fools that they are, do not communicate. That means many a one-sided conversation is ahead of you, dear reader, but furthermore, it means simply this: do not trust your witcher to tell you he is hurting.

He won’t.

Jaskier was no stranger to the very wide, very strange collection of potions and decoctions that witchers carried on them at any given time. Things that helped them hold their breath underwater past human comprehension or limitations. Tonics that made their blood poisonous to creatures that might bite them. Potions that helped them heal quickly and others that gave them energy or made them immune to noxious gases. Witchers were nothing if not highly prepared for nearly any situation.

But that did not mean they were infallible. And it did not mean that their potions and decoctions came without a price. Jaskier just wished he had known that before Geralt had driven himself to such a sorry state.

It had started off benignly enough. Geralt had taken two of his famous potions – although, like usual, he did not precisely narrate to Jaskier which ones. Squinting in the shade of the cave’s mouth despite the kindness of its shelter from the sun, he told Jaskier to stay put and disappeared inside the earth’s yawning maw, slipping away into the darkness. He was hunting a poisonous toad, based off the stories from the villagers. A thing roughly two and half stories tall, going off their tales – which meant it was likely only one story tall. But one story was more than enough toad-mass to crush a man. It was a toxic thing. It breathed dangerous green fumes and made a bed in noxious plants that were constantly releasing a steady spew of poisonous fog into the creature’s den. Jaskier assumed that one of the potions had been to combat that, of course, though he was still unsure of the other.

It also meant that Jaskier – all too human and unable to safely consume a witcher’s potions – really had no choice but to wait. Geralt had originally insisted he stay at the inn. But where was the adventure, the story, in that? What if Geralt forgot something! No, best to be there while it was still fresh in case Geralt forgot. For the story, of course. No ulterior motives at all.

Jaskier had paced the cave idly for two or so hours. He’d take a few steps into the darker stretch of the cave, listening as hard as he could, before pulling back again. He babbled anxious nonsense to Daisy and Roach, both who merely snuffled at him appeasingly. Over and over, until finally his witcher emerged covered in goo and dragging an oozing toad head behind him. Jaskier nearly rushed to him before stumbling to a halt at a brusque gesture from the pale haired man.

“Still noxious,” he said bluntly, “Wait.” Before dragging the head off in the direction of the river, face screwed up into an unpleasant twist, as far as witcher expressions go.

Jaskier was grateful, he supposed. The man certainly smelled noxiously, covered in guts and who knew what else. It was another hour before Geralt returned to him and the horses looking impressively cleaner for a man who had once returned to a bar slathered in creature guts from head to toe. It was… unlike him. He carried the head in a burlap bag now, the thing trailing the occasional clump of dirt or herbs or muddied ooze now and then. Geralt had explained it made the head safe to travel with for Roach and Daisy. Which meant for Jaskier too, of course, the emotionally constipated stick in the mud. But Geralt could have just as easily insisted Jaskier simply find his own way home, the road too dangerous to travel with Geralt and his poisonous toad head, so Jaskier took that for the olive branch of compassion that it was, even if it went unsaid.

He hadn’t noticed the way Geralt still squinted so obviously despite the overcast day or the way he kept his gaze distinctly downward away from the bright blue of the sky or the glare of the sun. He missed how large his pupils were, how they didn’t contract as they should – too high off the possibility of a new story and Geralt’s safe return.

Jaskier had blathered on as they begun their journey back to the village alderman, of course. He asked questions about the creature, about Geralt’s fight. What had the cave looked like? Had it been damp and sickly? Dark like the deepest paths to hell? Did it smell of sulfur or rich, wet earthiness? Geralt never answered, but then again Geralt rarely humored his questioning for finer details. He had offered up the basics though – in as few words as possible – poisonous toad, slick floors and moss everywhere. No bites, no dramatic wounds. Toad’s dead, nothing more to it.

It wasn’t until they were nearly halfway back to the village that Geralt began to show any true symptoms worth noticing. He was sweating, for starters, and pale as a sheet – and yet the day itself was brisk and pleasant. He kept snorting softly, like a dog trying to clear a scent from its nose, and occasionally he’d sneeze dryly – which just made the witcher wince something unpleasant. That was finally enough to make Jaskier comment and look closer.

“Geralt, are you feeling alright?” Jaskier asked.

Geralt had grunted, but the sound was soft by comparison to normal. As if Geralt was loath to make much more sound than a gruff whisper. Jaskier drew his horse to a stop beside Roach, their flanks brushing, and offered a hand to Roach’s long neck to steady her to a stop beside him as well. The fact that Geralt let him without so much as a word was more than a little worrisome. The witcher just furrowed his brow, mouth a taut line as he kept his eyes down on Roach’s neck.

“Geralt,” Jaskier said plainly, dipping his face to try and catch Geralt’s stubbornly averted eyes. “We’ve talked about this. Use your words, where does it hurt?”

It was a barb. A somewhat mean one at that, but Jaskier was scared, and unfortunately his silver tongue had a terrible way of getting ahead of him when he was scared. Geralt bared his teeth at him, a flinch caught sharp and tight in the muscles around his eyes and in the taut stretch of his cheeks.

“Jaskier,” Geralt warned, but his hands were shaking. He wasn’t leaving, wasn’t forcing Jaskier away. Which meant only one thing for a witcher as deadest on never admitting his weaknesses as Geralt: he couldn’t leave.

“Geralt, I can’t help if you don’t—”

“—I don’t need your help, I need you to move,” Geralt snapped, each word as vibrant as the bared fangs of a snarling wolf, cornered and agitated. Geralt turned to glare at him then, more out of habit than anything, and that was when Jaskier finally noticed the explosive width of Geralt’s pupils, the way they didn’t quite land on his face, but rather slightly over his shoulder. They left the thinnest ring of amber around them, flooding the man’s eyes with light, making him squint – and no doubt unable to see much of anything. He had been trusting Roach to stay on the path, then. And he had been trusting Jaskier to redirect her instinctively if she strayed. What with the time the two of them had spent together, Roach and Daisy had bonded in that way working animals sometimes did – keen to follow one another if there was no lead from their rider. He realized now that Geralt’s hands were largely on his pommel, reins loose in the tangle of his trembling fingers. He had been struggling to stay in his seat, deferring their journey’s navigation to Jaskier all this time, and the bard hadn’t noticed.

Witchers don’t get sick – not easily. But they weren’t immune to everything, and their mutations certainly left them susceptible to quite a number of things. The genetic enhancements that gave Geralt his gift for tracking – his keen sense of sight, smell and sound – also left him vulnerable to overstimulation. It rarely became a problem, but even witchers had their limits; even if they would rather die than admit it.

“Geralt, this is important,” Jaskier said softly, voice lower, and felt the twist in his stomach ease when that removed some of the tension from Geralt’s face. Whatever was going on, it was definitely tied to his senses. “Was it the toad that did that to your eyes? Or was it you?”

Was it one of your blasted toxic potions?

The question went unsaid. Geralt knew well enough Jaskier’s opinion on those potions. Amazed by the feats witchers could perform with them and yet constantly wary of the repercussions he knew Geralt would suffer in secret.

Geralt licked his lips – dry and cracked, another side effect of some of his potions, Jaskier had noticed over time. The bard reached for his canteen as smoothly as he could without jarring the other man. He unscrewed the top slowly, quietly, but not entirely, and gently pressed it into Geralt’s hands. The witcher appeared as grateful for the bottle as he was for the fact that Jaskier had left the littlest bit of it left for him to unscrew on his own; the smallest illusion of self-control. Jaskier watched the way he drank from the skin of water and realized with a feeling akin to a stone dropping in his stomach that all this time Geralt had been thirsty and had not been able to see enough to find his own canteen in his pack. He had likely quenched the worst of it while cleaning himself in the river, but he had never asked for help after. Not once. And Jaskier had missed the significance of the few times the witcher’s hands had subtly fumbled around his saddle, searching for it.

Eventually Geralt handed it back – still half full – before Jaskier urged him to keep it in his grasp with a soft, “It’s not a long ride, go ahead and finish it. I can refill it when we’re back in town.”

“Jaskier,” Geralt croaked, frowning. Geralt didn’t like taking from Jaskier. Something about the fact that humans were fragile. Limited. Whether it was food or water, the bard had quickly picked up on the root of Geralt’s reluctance with resources. Jaskier didn’t let him argue.

“I can take yours if I need any, Geralt. It’s fine.”

There was a pointed statement between those words; I know you had looked for it and didn’t ask for help. One Geralt caught easily enough, eyes darting away again, mouth drawn tight. Caught. Frustrated. Bristly and edgy, and the slightest bit embarrassed.

“Toad or potion, Geralt?” Jaskier repeated.

Geralt held up two fingers, unwilling to speak; second option then, it was a potion. It was hard to tell how much of his discomfort was due to the situation that left him so mute or sound sensitivity. Jaskier assumed a bit of both. Geralt was acting not unlike a man hung over, after all, and the bard had no end of experience with that. Unwillingness to open his eyes, a desperate yearning to be somewhere dark and quiet. Jaskier had no doubt that the witcher might have stayed in the blessed darkness of that cave if not for the noxious clouds and the guts and the fact that his potions that granted him immunity to gas did not last forever. And they certainly carried a hefty price to ingest more. Namely blood poisoning.

“Can you take something to…” Jaskier gestured vaguely before he remembered Geralt couldn’t see before continuing softly, “Clear the effects of whatever caused this?”

Geralt rubbed his thumbs into his eyes and shook his head. He did have something for that though. Jaskier had seen him take it before, particularly on grueling hunts that required three or four potions at a given time. If Geralt hadn’t taken it, that meant something had happened in the cave. The beast must have hit him somehow – into a wall or even just a glancing blow – that had damaged his reserves. No wonder.

The story was beginning to come together now, pieces slowly falling into place. Geralt had taken a potion for the gas, this Jaskier knew, but one other as well. Dark as the cave was, even Geralt’s mutated eyes could not compete with complete darkness. It must have been a potion to further dilate his eyes and although them to capture more light than humanly possible. It was a powerful potion and a useful one at that – but Jaskier knew from experience that the times Geralt had taken potions like that, they had lasted the entirety of his time in the caves and had always needed another potion to clear the effects upon exiting. It was an advanced potion, after all; one Geralt had mastered to perfection. It could last hours, even longer. A good thing, if you didn’t know how long you’d be exploring the dark recesses of the earth.

Terrible if you had to return to the light of day before the effects had worked their way out of your system.

“Fuck, Geralt, why didn’t you say something?” Jaskier breathed, giving Roach and Daisy room between them so he might slide down onto his feet as quickly as he could manage and search through his pack attached to Daisy’s saddle. Thank god they had begun to explore other pastimes when sharing each other’s company intimately recently. He found the satiny texture of the thing he had been looking for and pulled from his pack a long strip of fabric – long enough to bind a man’s eyes with. It was black as pitch, enchanted to absorb light rather than simply deflect it. What fun was tying a witcher to his bed if the man could see through a standard threadbare blindfold, after all? When he had bought the blasted thing, he had never guessed that his kinky purchase would become such a practical item toward the care of one’s witcher.

He remounted Daisy so he could reach Geralt easily and at first reached for the witcher’s face without warning the man – making him flinch back from the sudden sensation of hands near his face, muscles moving tightly to prevent himself from falling at the last moment. Jaskier stuttered out a broken breath and said softly, “Sorry. I’m going to blindfold you. It should help.”

Geralt’s lip curled at that, exposing one pearly incisor.

“You already can’t see,” Jaskier frowned, “How is this any different?”

You were already trusting me to lead the way.

He watched Geralt clench his jaw, almost thought he could hear the man’s teeth grinding – but ultimately the witcher agreed with a tight, short little nod.

“Alright, good. I’m going to put it on now,” Jaskier said, more so that he wouldn’t surprise the man into another dangerous flinch again than anything else. Geralt sat atop his horse, stock still, his back ramrod straight, like a wolf scenting the air – certain something was about to go wrong but unable to tell how or why. But he allowed Jaskier to ease the fabric around his eyes and when the bard murmured softly, “Look away so I can tie it properly,” he dutifully exposed the back of his neck and head to him. Jaskier was careful not to twist any of the witcher’s fine white hair into the knot – taking his time with placing it, adjusting his hair so it fell comfortably around it.

“Snug? Too tight? Too loose?” He asked, not really thinking the witcher would truly answer but asking nonetheless.

“M’fine,” Geralt said, and that was about what Jaskier knew he’d say regardless. Geralt could have a spear in his gut and he’d say he was fine. The idiot. But before Jaskier’s very eyes some of the tension eased from Geralt’s face. His shoulders were hunched, uncomfortable with his total blindness now, and he still looked very much like a wolf with its ears perked – but much of the pain had washed away from his face. Geralt let out the faintest breath of relief and Jaskier felt something pleased bloom in his own chest.

This was, after all, no small feat. Who else could say Geralt of Rivia had trusted them enough to allow himself to be blindfolded and led? Geralt didn’t speak with words. In many ways he was Jaskier’s polar opposite. And there was a time Jaskier feared the two of them would never find common ground; that the witcher would never warm to him, never speak with him.

But in moments like these, the witcher spoke volumes. Jaskier just hadn’t been listening before.

The bard was a nervous talker. He yearned to speak, to blather – anything to fill the painful silence. But with every blessed moment of quiet, a little more tension left Geralt’s face, and while Jaskier normally had no qualms with ruining the witcher’s very limited idea of a peaceful journey – now he couldn’t bear to do it. Geralt needed silence. So Jaskier bit his tongue. It allowed Geralt to see with his ears rather than his eyes. It was also less strenuous by far.

And if Geralt occasionally reached for the bard to assure himself Jaskier was still there? Well, Jaskier didn’t mention it this time, though it did put a small, fond, surprised smile on his face. He shifted his thigh closer when Geralt’s fingers couldn’t quite find him. Even brought Daisy to a closer pace beside Roach so they might brush more often, more organically. And since, to a degree, Geralt did not seem to enjoy his total silence, Jaskier would occasionally do something to make noise. A deeper breath, a soft scratch to his hairline, hum a very gentle, short tune. Anything to assure Geralt he had not disappeared.

For a moment Geralt had blessed peace. The water, the darkness and the quiet had done wonders to ease the man’s sweating and return some of the color lost from his complexion. But the closer they got to town, the more of that progress they lost. They weren’t even in sight of the place before Jaskier noticed the change in the witcher – pale again, fingers trembling lightly, tense and scowling. Jaskier drew Daisy to a stop and Roach obediently compiled as well, head tossing, searching for Geralt’s guidance in the reins.

“What’s wrong?” Geralt croaked, his body transforming from tight but moderate peace to alert in an instant, ears no doubt straining for any sign of trouble.

“We can’t go back to the village like this,” Jaskier said softly, eyes on Geralt; watching him plainly. “You’re already reacting to the sound of that place from here.”

Geralt scowled at that, but added, “And the smell,” and suddenly Jaskier realized he had not bathed purely because the fumes may still be toxic. It appeared his sensitivity to light had also affected and overstimulated his other senses terribly. Jaskier gestured to him and said, “Precisely my point. We can’t go back.”

“The notice—"

“—Can wait. It’s not as though another hunter is about to beat you to the kill, you have the head in hand. We’ll go as soon as whatever you swallowed wears off. In the meantime…” Jaskier trailed off, twisting in his seat to look around them. There had been an abandoned bandit camp along the way. He remembered discussing it with Geralt on the way there – theorizing why the men had left their tents and gear behind. A monster? A rival group of thieves? Geralt had taken one look at the place and said, “I’ve been here before,” and that was all there was to it.

It hadn’t been far from here.

He reached over the reins toward the corner of Roach’s mouth and gently urged her to follow as he guided Daisy into a tight u-turn.

“Jaskier,” Geralt groused, stock still in his saddle.

“We’ll make camp in the woods,” Jaskier said simply – and surprisingly, Geralt did not argue.

A part of Jaskier still fretted whether or not he was making the wisest decision. They could go to town, buy whatever ingredients Geralt was lacking to recreate the potion that would remove the effects of the Cat’s Eye from his system – but that was a plan that hinged on the town having a herbalist, said herbalist having the ingredients in stock, and Geralt being able to see to make the blasted thing. He didn’t exactly carry around recipes, well, at least not his go-to ones; not when Geralt knew them by heart. There would be recipes in his pack for untested potions, sure, but that’d likely prove to be wildly unhelpful now. And Jaskier was not about to try and make one himself, lest he kill Geralt (or himself) by sheer accident.

Returning to town had its advantages though, advantages that weighed heavily on the bard’s shoulders as they rode away, deeper into the woods. In town he could at least urge Geralt to rest in a bed, even if he couldn’t control the sound or the smell of the place. They could rest in peace for however long they needed without having to worry about a bandit group or a creature happening upon them in the wood when Geralt was vulnerable. Not that villages didn’t get attacked – they did – but it was less likely.

But the sound and smell of the place would worsen Geralt’s ailment. And no doubt the village alderman would want to speak with him the moment he rode into town. They’d have to store the head, negotiate coin – because villagers almost always tried to walk back on their agreed-on price after the deed was done. It ran the risk of getting them run out of town if negotiations soured, even if Jaskier was confident he could outsmart a village alderman into giving them their deserved coin.

That would just land them right back in the woods, likely closer to dark. Better to set up now, somewhere Geralt could process the remnants of his Cat Eye’s potion in peace, than to worsen their situation hoping for reprieve in the village. They found the bandit camp easily enough, tucked away a stone’s throw from the road and nestled in the security and privacy of a nook of trees and underbrush.

“Is there any reason why we shouldn’t stay in that old bandit camp, Geralt?” Jaskier asked gently, stopping their horses on the road where he could just see it through the foliage. If Geralt had ‘been here before’, he likely had ‘killed here before’.

“Corpses should be long gone,” Geralt said disinterestedly. As if that were the same as saying ‘everything will likely be freshly laundered and clean’. Jaskier wrinkled his nose, but it would have to be enough. It helped to see that Geralt was obviously keen to the idea of staying somewhere he had been before, somewhere he was somewhat familiar with. He knew it was somewhat hidden amidst the forest. Close enough to the road to flee if needed and for beasts to mostly avoid it, tucked away enough to be passed over by the untrained eye.

“Then that’s where we’ll stay.”

He let Geralt get down on his own, lingered near enough to help if needed but knew that ailing witchers needed assistance (as much as they might deny it) just as dearly as they needed some measure of independence. A man simply didn’t survive on his own for decades and walk away from that with a healthy perspective on accepting help. Geralt had been doing this alone for longer than he even knew Jaskier. He had survived decades of traveling alone. Sometimes it helped for the bard to remind himself of that.

Other times, it hurt to think that surely in those days the witcher must have suffered. He didn’t know to know how many times Geralt might have almost died in the woods alone. He avoided lingering on the thought too long, afraid that thinking about it would invite that fate into his life somehow.

Jaskier did a cursory check of the little encampment, just as he might do if he were traveling alone and making use of abandoned lodgings. Geralt was right, the corpses had long been dragged off. There was a patch of bald ground still ruddier than the rest – blood – but otherwise the place was remarkably clean, considering. No scent of death or decomposition. It must have been some time since Geralt came through.

There were two tents, both threadbare from the elements, but still more than nothing – though Jaskier hoped they wouldn’t be camp-bound long enough to need them. The remnants of a fire pit sat empty and unused between them. One of the bandits must have dragged a log between the tents to sit on, because it was there – convenient and idle. Jaskier nearly thought fate was being kind to them for once.

It took everything in him not to ask Geralt how he felt, how long he thought he might need before they could leave. It would help to plan ahead, but it would also serve to remind Geralt that here and now, he was the weak link in the party. It would drive him deeper into his stoicism. That helped no one.

Jaskier settled the horses, set them up with their feed harnesses, and watched all the while as Geralt blindly picked out a spot to kneel in the camp. The witcher went down to his knees gracefully, curled either hand into a fist to rest upon his thighs, and tilted his chin up – as though facing the sky despite the trees that blocked it.

Then he stayed that way, deathly still and silent, swayed only by the minute rocking of his heartbeat. If Jaskier had not seen it before, it might have frightened him. Meditation. Witchers could pass enormous amounts of time through sheer meditation alone. There was something strangely beautiful about it; the straight curve of Geralt’s back, the pristine nature of his posture. It reminded Jaskier of the women he once met in a teahouse in his travels, framed in expensive silks and fabrics that swallowed them in stunning ways, always moving around through the slightest motion of their feet beneath their kneeled legs. It took extensive self-control to maintain posture like that for long periods of time, even more so to fall into meditation that was both wholly consuming and yet utterly aware of one’s surroundings.

Geralt was waiting out the worst of the Cat Eye’s potion in the way he knew best now that he was free to do so – no longer bound to the road or to returning to the village. Jaskier could see in the lines of the man’s body how much it helped to fall into such a practiced exercise. His shoulders fell not so tightly around his neck anymore, and the taut muscles of his face had smoothed out. This was the best way for him to self-mitigate what stimuli he couldn’t control, the best way to filter it.

And once again Jaskier was struck by the fact that Geralt trusted him enough to fall into such a state of mind in his presence. That he trusted Jaskier to handle the horses, to mind the camp and watch his back while he focused himself of controlling as much of his recovery as he could.

It meant more dreaded silence for Jaskier. But sometimes love meant being quiet so one could better listen to their partner, their needs. Jaskier settled himself atop the log and contented himself in watching Geralt at peace. That had been the goal, after all. Peace.

At some point Jaskier must have dozed off, because when he woke Geralt was beside him, leaning back against the log, his thigh flush with the bard’s – warm and steely. His blindfold was gone, his pupils thin slits again. Dusk approached., casting the woods in a muted half-light. Jaskier’s mouth felt tacky from his nap and silently, Geralt passed him a canteen – the witcher’s canteen. Jaskier drank from it gratefully, then wiped his mouth on the back of his hand and asked, “Better?”

Geralt nodded.

“How long were you waiting for me to wake?” Jaskier asked, feeling a bit abashed for having fallen asleep somewhere along the way. But the woods had been so peaceful to listen to. Between the birdsong around them, the hush of the wind in the leaves and the reassuring rhythm of Geralt’s breathing, he had just… slipped away. Would explain why he was leaning back against the log now instead of on it. Must have shifted down at some point. Better that than falling over like a graceless lout.

The pleasant day was waning. A chill was beginning to creep into the air, and yet with Geralt beside him, Jaskier found himself to be comfortably warm. The man was like a furnace. Jaskier couldn’t help but press in a little closer.

“Not long,” Geralt said.

Jaskier didn’t bother to ask how long it had taken for Geralt to recover. That wasn’t what mattered. What mattered was that Jaskier had been able to make the right decisions that led to this: Geralt, peaceful and without pain. And that Geralt had trusted him enough to let him try. More and more Jaskier felt as though he were no mere tag along or convenient company. More and more, he felt he earned his keep.

He had never used to worry about such things. His life had been devoted to the pursuit of art, the telling of stories and merrymaking. He went where the wind blew him, drank with however caught his attention, loved fast and moved on just as quickly. This was new. Strange, even. To have responsibilities and like it. Yet here he was, thigh to thigh with a witcher. For once, he found himself in a place he’d rather be more so than a tavern singing. It felt important to be there in that moment.

They enjoyed the silence – sleepy and soft as the light faded from the wood. Neither seemed eager to go. Reluctantly, after a time, Jaskier said, “We should probably head back before it gets too dark.”

Geralt grunted and said, “No… I think we should stay. There’s something I’d like to show you.”

That was witcher speak for gratefulness, Jaskier had learned. They cared not for coin or trinkets, their only utility to purchase them food or board or sex. Witchers therefore didn’t give physical gifts (other than weapons, occasionally) and rarely spoke their gratitude. Instead, witchers appeared to give gifts through experiences rather than items. Memories. Shared time.

That night Geralt showed Jaskier the stars in a way the bard had never been quite so bold as to experience alone in the woods. Took him out to a field not far from their camp where they could hide in the tall meadow reeds and make childish beds in the blanket of their cover. They laid flat on their backs like boys, thigh to thigh and shoulder to shoulder, and quietly Geralt pointed out the constellations that Vesemir had taught him as a lad – similar and yet so different from the way it had been explained to him in Oxenfurt. Witchers had different purposes for the stars and different stories to go with them – and yet Jaskier found his love for knowledge suspended instead by an even greater discovery: Geralt loved to talk of lore, of the things that had been trained into his very bones. He quiet witcher who rarely spoke was detailing each star almost animatedly, explaining the monsters that correlated with them, how the stories came to be. The moment Jaskier realized it, recognized that spark in the witcher’s eyes for what it was, he saw in hindsight all the times Geralt had been eager to share his knowledge of lore or monsters and Jaskier just had not understood the significance of the act. This was Geralt’s life, his everything – and he was sharing it with Jaskier.

Geralt’s smile as he recalled Vesemir’s teachings, his gestures, the fire in his eyes, all of it made the stars look pale by comparison. A ‘thank you’ that Jaskier would not soon forget.

#How To Care For Your Witcher #The Witcher #geralt of rivia #jaskier #gaskier #light sensitivity #sound sensitivity #migraines #fic #competent jaskier #hurt/comfort #witcher writing

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gongju-juice · 5 years ago

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7. Once Upon a Southern Night

Still Stuck in 1863

Warnings: Language, Mentions of a miscarriage, all of the usual

That night, you had the strangest, most desirable nightmare of your entire life.

You were barefoot, laying in a bed of flowers wearing a long black dress and white apron. By your side, he was there. But instead of his brilliant red eyes, they were the peaceful color of a bluish gray. On his stomach rested his top hat and he was dressed in the finest clothes; clothes no regular person should have been lounging around in.

“P-Preston?”

He turned on his side and looked up at you, his hand absentmindedly rubbing circles on your flat middle. Bending down, he pressed a kiss to your forehead.

“Yes, dear. I’m here.”

“I. . .” you looked around the clearing. It was early in the afternoon, the golden rays peeking through the oak trees above you. In the distance, rows of cotton stood out against the brown field. “Is this. . .a dream. . .or a memory?”

“Neither,” he murmured. “This is a vision. We are talking together in real-time while you are asleep. Everything around us is what home used to look like.”

“How. . .is this possible?”

He caressed your face with his other hand, gazing into your eyes like he was a moth drawn to a light.

“This is what life should’ve been like. Your mom and the aunties should have been making clothes for the baby, and I should’ve been preparing our home in Pensacola. Instead, I was dragged out to war for what would be the final time I’d ever see you.”

You shook your head, sitting up in the bed of dandelions. “Home? I would be a slave if that would’ve come to fruition. You would’ve married Abigail, and I’d be your negro mistress sleeping in the shack outside with our biracial children.”

He grimaced at his former fiance’s name. No matter what he said, the truth would always be the same. Your love was never equal, he owned you. His family owned you from the moment you were born. You were not his lover. You were his slave.

“I would’ve bought your freedom. Mother could not really force me to marry that woman. I wouldn’t have put up with it—not in a million years. I wanted to dress you in the finest clothes, drape you in jewels. At one time, you wouldn’t have hesitated to believe me.”

He gently pushed you back down to the earth and hovered over your middle before placing a series of kisses on your covered navel.

“We were going to name her Sarah,” he said with a sad note of laughter. “If she was a girl. And if he was a boy—”

“Clyde,” you whispered. “Oh, Preston—Preston, I remember it all. Everything!”

He took you in his heart, and you heard his wild heartbeat clear and strong. The flood of memories was overwhelming, and all you could do was sob in his chest. You remembered catching lightning bugs in the twilight, him secretly teaching you how to read under the stairs. You remembered making love in his bedroom—how the other slaves on the plantation resented his favoritism.

You remembered missing your periods three consecutive months in a row. You remembered his face as you told him, how he lifted you in his arms. You remembered when Major Whitlock arrived and took him away, how he left you with only a little picture of him in a tiny locket.

You remembered his furious mother, and how she incurred her wrath on you any chance she got. You remembered when she knocked you unconscious, blood spilling between your legs when she told you her plans. You remembered your mother’s cold hands and the pain—

How you cried. How you wished for him to come and take your pain away. And your vengeful mother. She spoke nonsense in your ear as you were dying on her straw mattress. She chanted in the candle dim light of your cabin, and the next thing you knew—

You were being tickled in your adopted mother’s arms.

“Do you know?” you choked. “Do you know what your mother did to me?”

His eyes lowered, hands falling to clasp your wrists. “I didn’t find out until twenty years later. . .when I could finally stand to be near a human without wanting to rip their throat out.”

“Did you know. . .that she killed our baby? That she wanted to send me up to Charleston so Abigail and her folks wouldn’t know?”

Tears threatened to spill from his eyes as he turned away. As he did, a butterfly rose from a lonesome bluebell.

“If I would have been there, I wouldn’t have let that happen,” he growled. “And it’s all Jasper Whitlock’s fault. If he wouldn’t have dragged me out to—��

“No,” you said, “you wanted to go to war. You wanted to bring honor to your family and keep slaves from being free so you could bathe in your money. Don’t act like the victim, Preston. Don’t act like I don’t remember how cruel you were when the abolitionists showed up in Mobile.”

He shook his head, whirling back around to face your tear-stained face. “It was a different time, Y/N, Why does that excuse work for Jasper and not for me? It was my right—”

“And you still think it is!” you snapped. “You think you’re entitled to me because of the past, because of a flawed love we used to share. Jasper has acknowledged things have changed, and he’s changed with time. But you—you’re still stuck in 1863.”

“No!” he shouted ferociously, and suddenly his eyes flickered from river blue to blazing red. “I lost the life I should’ve had! He stole that from me! He deserves to pay, to feel every ounce of suffering I felt all those years.”

“Has he not suffered as I have?” you cried. “He was a slave to Maria, just like I was a slave to you!”

His eyes closed, and he struggled to regain his composure. You saw through the illusion quickly. He must’ve enlisted the powers of a witch to fabricate this false reality. Your love for Preston was real, but your fear of him was even stronger. You gave yourself to him out of necessity. To refuse your master. . .it was not something a black woman did and got away to tell the story.

“It doesn’t matter how you feel,” he said after a while. “I will make you love me again as you did once before. You’ll see—once I destroy Jasper and all of his family, you will have nobody else but me.”

The dream evaporated and suddenly you were in the middle of the living room, your family and guests all standing over you as she gasped violently.

“Y/N!” Jasper called, holding you in your arms as you came to. Your mother was about to inject an IV needle into your vein while Carlisle tried to determine the cause of your sudden collapse.

“Mom? Jas? I—” you tried to sit up but you were promptly held in place.

“Just breathe, darlin’,” Jasper instructed. “I’ll move you in a minute. It’s okay, I got you.”

You attempted to weakly lift up your hand to his cold face. And that’s when you knew. Nothing or no one could ever separate you from him. Jasper was the only man you loved; the only man you needed. If he was the light, you were his shadow. If you were the night, he was the star that made it brighter.

“Y/N, this is really important,” your sister said, bending down on her knees to get closer to you. “What happened while you were gone?” Behind her Zacarias stood looking very concerned, his hand on her shoulder.

You shook your head, trying to find a way to say the words. “It was him, and we were. . .back in the past.”

Jasper’s jaw clenched and he looked towards the ceiling. If he were human, you could tell he would be crying by now.

“He’s got a witch on his side,” Zacarias confirmed, crossing his arms. “And whoever it is, they must be good. It’s hard to make telepathic communications for more than a few moments at a time, especially from such a far distance.”

“Then what can we do?” Peter asked, looking at the Cullens in desperation. “These witches. . .we’ve never faced anything like them before. And the newborn armies will still be coming on top of that.”

Ava massaged the palm of your hand comfortingly, slowly, your energy began to come back. But Jasper still would not let you move.

“Witches are not infallible. It looks like he’s only got one on his side—maybe two if he’s lucky. As long as they’re at a far enough distance, well protected by the armies, they can do much damage to any specific target. The concentration that’s needed for combat is ridiculously difficult, and they can only focus on a few people at once. But that’s why Zach and I are here. We can hold off their attacks while you guys take care of the armies.”

Jasper finally spoke up, shifting you so that you were held firmly in his embrace. “We’ve got just a week-and-a-half to get in tip-top shape and make things right. I don’t care what I have to do, Ava, I won’t let Y/N get hurt. I would die if it meant her freedom, and if it that’s what it takes to end this all, then don’t hesitate to sacrifice me for the greatest cause—”

“No!” you objected. “If you die, I’m dying with you! I don’t want to be in this world without you, Jasper. It wouldn’t even be a life anymore! Please don’t say that, please don’t leave me alone!”

Carlisle kindly ushered the guests to the door, and left the two of you alone in the house.

“Your happiness is my only priority. And if you want to be with him. . .then you should,” he whispered painfully. “I deserve to pay for the suffering and heart I’ve caused others. I could’ve sent Preston away with the others when we were leaving that fateful night. He didn’t have to die, as I did.”

“You didn’t die,” you insisted. “It was the first stage of your metamorphosis. He died that night. He could never get over what he’d lost then and even now. That’s not your fault. He could choose to be happy, but yet he only desires the suffering over others. He told me he didn’t care about my happiness but you—”

You didn’t have to finish your statement, the both of you knew in your hearts.

“I love you so much, baby!” you sobbed, clinging onto his shirt desperately. “I don’t want him, or any of the life we had before. You are my now, and you are my future.”

He buried his face into your shoulder, rocking you on the cold living room floor.

“And I love you too, darlin’. I love you so much.”

The truth is guys, I haven’t posted in a while because I’ve been so depressed lately. This world is so evil, and I just feel like how can I post when they are literally people protesting in the streets, people dying, and the world in chaos??

Anyway, fanfiction is an escape these days. It always had been, now moreso than ever. I know I’m just an amateur, but if I can make someone forget their worries for even five minutes, I’m honored.

Stay safe, mah bois.

Part Five Part Six Part Eight

#jasper hale #jasper hale imagines #jasper hale x reader #twilight x reader #twilight #twilight imagines #twilight scenarios #carlisle cullen #edward cullen #emmett cullen #esme cullen #alice cullen #rosalie cullen #stay safe

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unstoppableforcce · 5 years ago

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Oh can you do 👔🌟 for eccentricity? (I’m obsessed with readers’ fashion after her performance) 💙Freya:)

@slfreya

Clothing — that dazzling dress

The dress that gets Din so distracted in that first part is a floor length gown that goes from the bottom of your chin, to your hands and down over your boots. And, while in the regular light of the club, is almost a dull reflective color made up of individual sparkles, under the lights of your performance, sparkles with the light of a thousand planets.

Its a special design, perfectly made for you to seem ethereal when all the lights hit you, to get more people into the club to see you and to keep them coming back for more. It certainly has its intended effect too.

But it’s terribly uncomfortable.

It grabs you at all your edges, every single one of them and makes sitting down almost impossible without adjusting it. And at your neck, where it perfectly cuts you to give the illusion of razor sharp edges, it does practically cut you every time you move your head too fast. More like a collar than a gown you would pick for yourself.

It’s all by design though. It makes you look truly incredible for the cost of comfort... but what’s new?

(And, sneak peak of all that I haven’t written yet but plan to, once Din finds out? He wants you out of it. Well he wants you out of it anyways but he wants you out of it and into something you want to be in. And he will fly you to the galaxy’s edge until you figure out what you want that to be, what’s comfortable for you)

But after the performance? Out in the rain with a death stick between your fingers?

It’s a light shawl to protect your hair and shoulders even under the slight covering above, plain in comparison to the gown coating your body in dull sparkles. And the boots? Not typically worn during a performance unless you’re feeling extra insubordinate, but normally for whenever you went outside into the mud. They are the most worn thing you own, everything is perfectly designed to be perfect and new almost every time you show up on stage with it.

They’re good boots, you just wished you could wear them more.

A secret wish — touch starved din vs. adventure-starved reader

This was kind of the whole idea for the story and I really do want to get back around to writing the next part, maybe this weekend!

But initially, Din’s obsession is purely based on his attraction to you when he finds you on stage and the distraction that you are to him and his seemingly infallible focus. He’s never seen anything like you and he wants to know everything about you.

And you see him as the bounty hunter that he is and it thrills you to know what he does. To know that he travels from one end of the galaxy to another for jobs, stopping on planet after planet and getting to see life out there living. Meanwhile, the most life you ever see is the outside of the club and the rest of the small smuggling community based on Ramda.

You see people coming and going every single day and night who have lives outside of the club, who only use it as a minute long distraction before moving on. And that’s what you want. You want out.

Oh boy do I want to write more of this. I want to write more here but I feel like i can’t spoil too much of what I have in mind!

send me headcannons for fics!

#relliot headcannons #din djarin x reader #the mandalorian x reader #eccentricity

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spiltscribbles · 5 years ago

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Notes: One Reblog is worth a thousand stars <3.-

The grandiose brownstone on the upper west side is filled to the brim with guests that Ronan barely recognizes, platters of foods he doesn’t remember ordering, and rounds of drinks he thanks God, Jesus and the Holy Ghost above that never seem to run out.

“Lynch, old boy,” a faintly familiar, boyishly attractive brunette calls from where he’s standing with three other nondescript fucks that Ronan eventually realizes are all from his old preparatory days at Aglionby.

“Wentworth,” Ronan greets with as much welcome as he can muster— a negative four point two on the Gansey scale of charm, but hey, what’s a guy to do. “I presume you’re enjoying yourself?”

“Thoroughly,” he assures with a coquettish little wink that Ronan completely ignores.

“Let me know if that ever changes,” he directs the question to the group as a whole so that Wentworth doesn’t get any bright ideas.

“How’s Declan?” The shortest one asks, all plastered smiles and heaps of blonde hair.

“He’s enjoying DC, says that Matthew is getting on with all his courses.”

“Smart of him to get out of Henrietta,” another of the foursome interjects with a swig of his iced white. “With Greywaren here and all the trouble he’s stirring up.”

“Come now,” Wentworth chides with a dismissing wave of the hand. “Greywaren is who’s keeping us safe from the trouble and all these awful villains. “Wouldn’t you agree Lynch?”

Ronan feels the slightest uptick to his pulse, but doesn’t let anything show, just gives a placid smile and blasé shrug to his shoulder.

“I make it a point not to mingle with politics.”

“Smart chap,” the third one smirks. “Couldn’t tell you how many times the boys on the board told me to keep my trap shut on it.”

Queue round of polite chuckles that Ronan doesn’t partake in.

“You know what isn’t controversial? A donation to the arts.” Ronan tells him.

“A wily one too,” Wentworth laughs. “Well you’ve convinced us Lynch, we’d be happy to help whatever inner city project or museum renovation you’ve got going on.”

“I’ll send Blue over to take the checks,” he tips his glass to them before continuing on strolling through the throng of blank faces, exchanging pleasantries and volleying nods of recognition as if it’s an olympic sport.

Ronan hates every fucking minute of it.

“Poor sour patch,” Blue, five foot nothing and unappreciative of any sort of bullshit, mock croons at him once he finally reaches the foursome, clucking her tongue all the while.

Ronan bares his teeth at her, swats away the hand she’s using to pinch his cheek with a hiss of, “Hop off.”

Blue only laughs ebulliently.

“I fucking hate you.”

“No way to speak to your guests,” Henry toots on Blue’s behalf. “After all, you were just elected Henrietta’s most eligible bachelor, wouldn’t wanna ruin that image with your surly attitude.”

“What would you know Cheng? I sure as fuck don’t remember your name on the list.”

With a role of the eyes, Henry just shoos him away. “Never any bite, I swear.”

“He strolls off to take a call on his pretentious bluetooth, while Noah passes Ronan a fresh flute of the Prosecco.

“You don’t have to keep up the charade you know,” Gansey tells him, popping an appetizer with to many vowels and too little alcohol for Ronan to ever really bother remembering the name of into his mouth. “It’s not as if, ahem. People would ever be made privy to your particular gifts.”

He means the gifts Ronan had inherited from Niall, the ability to dream things and even people and occasionally places into existence. He means the fact that despite the way Ronan dawns a costume with a raven on the chest, he’s in all actuality a dreamer. He dreams his weapons, his vehicles, his everything to use against the bad guys and vigilantes that roam the streets of Henrietta, their city, their home. And some of the things he dreams Declan takes it upon himself to study, to replicate, to cell for the endless fortunes the Lynch name has always been known for. The millions upon millions that Ronan grew up unaware to how his father, a scoundrel and drunk most days, and absent the rest of them, had ever been able to earn.

No, but Ronan still loves him, adores the memory and the man. Niall gave everything to Ronan and he’s going to respect everything Niall planned out, everything he wrote in his will.

“It’s what my father would’ve wanted, complete secrecy,” says Ronan, doubtless.

“Even with the solitude,” asks Gansey, cutting to the heart of his worries with none of his usual attentiveness. Finally tired of beating around the bush like the Gansey way dictates.

Ronan’s about to snarl something back that he’s not proud of, something nasty and vicious and unnecessarily cruel. Maybe about Gansey’s pretentious upbringing, probably something about his tireless efforts to find out what’s caused this explosion of superheroes and super villains in the last half century, definitely also about his piece of shit haircut that makes him look like a douchebag congressman. But Blue must sense it because she interrupts him before Ronan could even part his lips.

“All we’re saying is that we know you’ve got your priorities, but you deserve someone to come home too.”

“It’s so cute that you care,” Ronan snorts, doesn’t mention how this place isn’t home, that it can never stack up to The Barns.

Ronan doesn’t want to build a life here.

“I only care because every group needs the weirdly brooding, emo friend,” Blue says causticly.

Ronan cuffs her on the back of the head and she kicks him in turn.

“Hey tall, dark, and handsome,” Henry calls, abruptly returning with a slight franticness to his gaze. “No time for the juvenile squabbling, there’s a robbery on Appleton and they’re in dyer need of a certain masked hero.”

Ronan remembers the sun kissed skies and tumbling grasslands that painted the landscape of The Barns, his childhood manner, his oasis away from the bustling folks and raucous traffic of the city that the Lynch’s spent a majority of their year trapped within. He remembers the iridescent rosebuds that scattered the front yard and the strawberry fields he’d run through, frolicking with a giggling Matthew and occasionally a surly Declan if Ronan had nudged him outdoors by stealing one of his books or hats or whatever proper, grown up thing he was insistent on mastering for that week.

Most of all, he remembers the way Niall would card an indulgent hand through Ronan’s dark mop of locks while they tread around the trails as he divulged to his middle son all the magical wonders and whimsical secrets of this world, a doting smile on his face while regaling to Ronan stories about brave Irish warriors and lands unexplored, and things unimagined. A dreamer father showing his dreamer child— his favorite child— all the possibilities in his grasp.

“There’s nothing outside your reach Ronan my boy,” Niall, dark haired and sharp jawed and everything Ronan idealized, had boomed in his deep baritone. “You could do anything as long as you can imagine it, dream it. Omnium rum principia parva sunt.”

“The beginnings of all things are small,” Ronan, pint sized and open faced and infallibly kind hearted, had beamed up to his father, pleased that the Latin courses Niall had insisted upon were sticking.

“Oy, attaboy,” Niall had crowed, swinging on his shoulder a laughing Ronan, a Ronan who believed in the untarnished truth of his father’s words.

But then Ronan hit sixteen, and Niall was murdered and the Barns were sanctioned from anyone visiting and everything had fallen apart in a matter of days.

The BMW hums beneath his grasp as Ronan sores through the streets of Henrietta, blanketed in darkness and buzzing with danger.

“It’s at the Sheffield’s lake house,” Gansey patches in through the minuscule communication device Henry had created for them to use. “They’re big supporters of mothers campaign.”

“Oh how darling,” Ronan says in a deadpan. “We should invite them over for high tea, less we look gauche.”

“I’ll ignore the sarcasm due to this being a stressful situation and all,” Gansey harrumphs from the other end. “Noah will be there taking pictures for the paper and Henry’s sending over the address right now. Stay safe.”

“always am.”

“Now we both know that isn’t true.”

Ronan screeches to a stop in front of one of the more posh houses the city has to offer— all high gates and wide partitions and a fountain of a baby angel spitting out water while balancing on one foot— greeted by a middle aged woman in pink chiffon raving to a fearful looking officer about hooligans and dirty thugs and irreplaceable diamonds handed down to her through generations. Though Ronan doesn’t bother to stop and listen to her sulking once he catches the barest trace of a yellow cape slinking into the shadows out of sight.

He pounces.

“Fifteen minutes and twenty-three seconds,” the dude in a yellow cape tsks (all the while sporting the world’s most infuriating half grin that Ronan can’t help but appreciate if only for the esthetic) once Ronan finally catches up to him on the edge of the woods skirting against the water. He’s smaller than Ronan, but not by much, and agile as all get out if those amateur parkour stunts weren’t just an illusion. “getting rusty are we? It’s been a while since Henrietta’s seen anything more than a chump vigilante I suppose?”

His voice is low but has got this almost musical cadence to it. Ronan would’ve sworn he was a local if the subtle drawl was anything to go by.

“And who, pray tell, the fuck are you,” Ronan snarls out, stepping closer with his most menacing glower.

The guy in yellow and red just snorts, unimpressed, while he leaps backwards onto a tree branch… But no, it’s like the tree branch was waiting for him. No not even that, like it reached out for him to hop on, like he was the sun and the tree was responding to his very presence.

“Unimportant, but I know who you are Greywaren.”

“NO fuck, everyone knows me,” Ronan spits.

“Not the real you,” he counters. “But that’s why I’m here.”

Ronan is over the small talk, even if the guy’s got an admittedly attractive voice, he taps on the heels of the shoes he had dreamt and begins to shoot upwards, but the messed up thing is that the guy seems to have been expecting it, and with just a flick of the wrist another branch swings out and smacks Ronan down like a pesky fly.

“What. The. Fuck.” Ronan manages out with labored breaths as he stands back up.

“Anyone ever tell you that you’re a real let down Mr Greywaren, because you sure are,” Yellow Cape says with a faux yawn, stretching out to his full six feet while still standing on the branch. He looks like the fucking Fairy Folk in the storybooks Matthew had once insisted Ronan read to him before bed. “Well I’d love to stay and chat but I better get out of your hair and get some bank for my buck.”

“I’ll show you where to shove your buck.”

“Scandalous,” yellow cape sniffs, bored sounding. “ oh and before I forget, Greenmantle sends their hellos.”

In an instance everything freezes.

That word.

Greenmantle.

Flashes of blood and darkness and Niall’s too pale face accented by a wretched slash to his forehead.

The name carved in blood.

Greenmantle.

Ronan’s veins turn to ice and his chest contracts, and by the time he comes to yellow cape is already gone and Ronan is awash with the sorts of memories he ordinarily keeps securely locked away.

“Greenmantle, are you sure he said that precise name?” Henry asks for the umpteenth time since Ronan came back empty handed and with a major life revelation the night of the Sheffield robbery.

“Yes Cheng,” Ronan seethes, tugs on the tie that feels like it’s choking him.

“You look insane,” Blue toots, goes on her tiptoes to adjust it once more. “Now let’s just take deep breaths, being in public and all.”

Ronan still isn’t sure just how Gansey had convinced them all to attend the Tribune’s annual fundraiser, only remembering a lot of “getting on the insides” and “copious amounts of alcohol,s” thrown around, and a couple, “you get to tease uppity know it alls who trash the Greywaren for a living,” sprinkled on top just for good measure.

But still, Ronan hates it.

“So he’s back then, finishing off what he started.” Noah surmises.

“Did we ever truly know what exactly he wanted? Erm, aside from the Lynch family’s demise.”

Ronan glares and Henry just winces, apologetic.

“Noah you think you can get anymore intel on Greenmantle possibly leaving Boston? That was last where we tracked him, right?” Blue asks, head cocked.

“I’m on it,” Noah says while literally pulling out his phone and wandering off to a discrete corner to do whatever it is that he does that gets invasively detailed reports on literally anyone with a social security number.

“Let’s cut the conversation there, Gansey’s coming with that delicious looking friend of his,” Henry warns, causing Blue and Ronan to turn around at the same time to catch on a beaming Gansey promenading towards them with decidedly less sunny company. Company with sea glass eyes and effortlessly ruffled hair that falls unevenly on the left side of his forehead and cheekbones that can literally cut timber.

“Ronan, you’re gonna catch flies,” blue goads, shit eating grin on her face and something like amusement etched into Gansey’s own all the way across the aisle, as if he knows exactly what she had said. Leave it to those freaks to create the world’s first telepathic connection out of the power of their gross as love.

“You’re fired from both my friendship and your job,” Is all Ronan tells her, tries to look distracted by anyone that isn’t the literal incarnation of Prince Philip walking ever nearer… Erm shut the fuck up, Ronan only knows that certain prince because of Matthew when he went through his Disney phase… And well, Arora really liked those sorts of cartoons when she was bringing up her boys.

Gansey dives down to kiss Blue just as soon as they came close enough, and Henry bugged off to go flirt up some poor soul on the catering staff, which leaves it so he and Adam have got some semblance of privacy… Which Ronan doesn’t care about at all.

“Lynch,” Adam says, mouth curled ever so slightly, giving him a thin lipped smile. “How’s it going.”

“My life is a fucking summer day,” Ronan replies with probably too much glaring.

“So that nasty looking bruise on your jaw?”

“For the esthetic.”

“Think you missed bad ass and landed on kid who gets too many nose bleeds during gym class.”

“Know that look from experience Parrish?”

He shrugs, unaffected.

“I was always captain, so can’t say so.”

“Cocky little fuck,” Ronan hisses, making it so Adam’s face finally brightens ten fold and he lets out a breathy— blink and you’ll miss it— laugh. He’s got these insane dimples that never fail to make Ronan’s stomach tie itself into knots, and makes it so his heart stutter with pleasure and always, always fuels him to try and make them pop out just one more time…. But erm, that means nothing. Whatever Blue or Gansey, or Noah— Especially Henry— Whatever they say whatever stupid little ticks his body goes through, it means nothing towards what he feels for Adam. Which for the record, at best, is irritated exasperation veiled with a thin layer of indifferent acquaintanceship, considering Gansey has regarded the bloke as a brother since their first night as roommates back in college.

“You wanna grab a drink or will it hurt too much with the injury and all?”

“Shut the fuck up or I’ll make it so your shitting teeth for the next month.”

“Kinky.”

“Jesus, Mary and Joseph, Ronan’s doomed.

“So far the pattern seems to be wealthy, careless and dumb,” Blue says from where she’s hanging upside-down on the couch in Ronan’s den that’s been commandeered for any Greywaren business.

“You just read that off of Parrish’s article in the Tribune this week,” Henry toots, flipping through the aforementioned news report about who’s been labeled as The Magician.

“He’s a smart cookie,” Blue relents, having always been partial to Parrish since first meeting him years ago at one of the ridiculous “family dinners,” Gansey holds every Friday evening, instead of doing something more par for the course for adults their age, namely getting blackout drunk and dancing at sleazy clubs. (

Gansey had just stepped into Monmouth , blasé as all get out with Adam only a few feet behind him, and had gestured his way with the introduction. “This’s Adam, he’s a genius reporter and a great man. Even’s got a photo of him and Lois Lane pinned to his desk at the Tribune.”

Adam in turn smiled self deprecatingly, his cheeks flushed prettily. “She spoke at a rally our freshman year, just got lucky I suppose.”

“Oh my God! I love her!” Blue had squawked, eyes bright. “She’s right between Wonder Woman and Angela Davis on my wall of inspirational women.”

“Some wall,” Adam said wryly.

“I thought that was a wall of ladies you wouldn’t mind pegging,” Ronan had interrupted just to be a shit.

“Lynch, I’m not afraid to kill in cold blood.”

If that interaction hadn’t scared Adam off, Ronan supposes he shouldn’t be surprised that nothing had, that now he’s as internal to this little ragtag crew of Henriettas saving graces as any of them, even if he doesn’t have the slightest clue of their night gigs.

“We could ask him about the Magician,” Gansey offers, lips pursed and hopeful glint to his big, caff like eyes. Ronan knows that he— that all of them— hate lying to Adam, to evade his questions and avoid his calls whenever things are particularly insane, but it’s better this way. If it was up to Ronan none of them would be stuck in this dangerous business. Gansey is here because he had been brought up with Ronan, quite literally brothers in everything but blood. He knew what Niall was, what Ronan is. He knows the importance of the Barns and the danger of Greenmantle, Ronan couldn’t have lied to him about this if he tried. Noah was already privy to the forces of good and evil warring it out in this seemingly inconsequential city right out of DC, had been the one to approach Ronan as Greywaren first, to cultivate a bond that soon transformed into a partnership and now friendship. Henry’s family worked to provide the pieces for the technology that the original dreamer wanted replicated, for Niall, and it only made sense that when Niall had ever so unceremoniously past the mantel off to Ronan, that Seondeok did the same for Henry.

To this day Ronan isn’t quite sure how Blue squirmed her way into everything, only that she’s the daughter of a well renowned psychic that they consulted with once on a case, and she had right then, chin tipped high and a deeply embedded resilience in her gaze, had informed them all that she’d be joining their efforts. A few years later, falling in love with Gansey and officially hired to lead all knew projects for Lynch Charity, in between, Ronan can’t imagine doing all this without her scrappy self.

But that’s all besides the point. Ronan never wants to be the cause of them hurting, them in danger. He’s seen what could happen to someone if they take one wrong move, saw it splayed out with Niall’s blood and matted hair and sickly pillar that still haunts Ronan’s nightmares most nights.

Ronan’s gonna prevent that from ever happening again to anyone he loves, even if that means he has to prevent any of the aforementioned teammates from joining his chases, or if it means he has to lie to Adam’s face. To pretend as if he doesn’t see the way Adam’s begun barricading himself from them bit by bit, well aware that there’s something dividing them all from him.

Ronan would rather see Adam furious at him, than never getting to see the particular shade of forget me not blue that colors his irises, ever again.

The choice is simple.

“No.” He tells Gansey, not leaving an ounce of room for rebuttal.

“He’s a Pulitzer Prize nominated Journalist Ronan, in layman’s terms that means he’s great at figuring things out,” Gansey says with the worn patience of someone who’s hashed out this argument a thousand times before. “It’s improbable that he hasn’t already begun suspecting the truth already.”

“It’s dangerous.”

“I’m sure he could handle himself.”

“No,” Ronan repeats, voice resounding.

“Okay, no time,” Noah cuts in shortly, fingers tapping an agitated staccato against the keyboard of his desktop. “There’s a robbery on Madison Avenue and people are saying it’s our little, yellow caped friend.”

“Stay safe,” Gansey says— like he always does— and Ronan says that he will, like he always does— and the tension between them breaks, for now at the very least, like it always does.

Ronan’s day job, as Declan had once oh so kindly put it, is to stay pretty and give a good face to the brand. “You’re a shit and I know that, but maybe if no one has to talk to you and just sees that you’ve got the same smile as Dad did, they won’t find out for themselves.” Declan had earned a swift right hook for that one, but was probably expecting it considering the dodge and the lecture on anger management he had suffered Ronan through for the next hour.

All this to say, Ronan doesn’t really have a day job. He occasionally visits The Barns— never crossing the threshold but just looking from afar at all he’s fighting to get back— Other times, if he’s not nursing a hangover or injury from the night before, Ronan would drive out to Dc and pull Matthew from classes to get lunch and maybe catch a movie. Though more often than not, Ronan ends up at one of the numerous Lynch owned real-estates, specifically the one where the entire top floor is rented out by the second largest paper in the fucking tri-state area. The fact that a majority of his friends happen to work there is pure coincidence and it would be slanderous to allude otherwise.

“You enjoy our company,” Noah taunts, camera dangling from his neck and face split with a bright smile.

“Fuck you.”

“You do though,” he beams, impervious.

“Noah I swear to fucking God.”

“Ah, so the prodigal son has returned,” Adam, looking like a fucking professional in his button down and tie, greets one particular Thursday afternoon when Ronan shows up for the first time that week. It’s been a difficult one for him, with the news that Greenmantle is most certainly not in Boston anymore, but also undetectable anywhere else on the continental United States, coupled with the series of robberies from more and more of the city’s wealthiest, surely by no other than that fucking yellow cape— The Magician— It’s just been really fucking exhausting.

Ronan will go to his grave before admitting that just catching sight of Adam here, now… It kind of makes him breathe a little easier, even if there’s a cut right under Adam’s chin and his stance is woven with a certain fatigue one can only recognize with experience.

He suddenly remembers talking to one of Adam’s old school friends, a petite blonde who looked at an oblivious Adam with hearts in her eyes. He members her telling him just how Adam had lost the hearing in his left ear, how it was merely a tipping point from a long building cycle of abuse. Ronan thinks of how gutted he feels looking at how haggard Adam looks right now, and can’t imagine knowing him back when fucking Robert Parrish was still apart of his life.

But he shakes that all off, offers Adam a snide half grin like he’’s probably expecting.

“Missed me sugar dumpling,” Ronan jeers in an overdone accent to mock Adam’s subtle one, vowels rounded and snatching away the g.

“It was quieter,” is all Adam says, and if Ronan doesn’t know better he would’ve taken that as a compliment teetering on flirtatious instead of one of Adam’s deadpan observations.

And oh, that’s interesting.

“I’ve always been known for my stimulating conversational skills,” Ronan nods sagely, leaning against Adam’s desk with his arms wrapped across his chest, enjoying it probably a little too much how Adam’s peering up at him with his bright eyes through his spider leg lashes.

Sometimes, just sometimes— just when Adam looks at him like Ronan could be the brightest part of his day— Ronan feels like he’s standing on the precipice of something with him, something that makes his chest stutter and stomach tumble itself into knots. Like Adam’s air and Ronan’s finally breathing. But also that’s a ridiculous notion because in all the years they’ve known each other Adam’s never made a move, not one that Ronan could discern at least, and he just needs to not fall into some ridiculous folly.

“Oh I’m sure,” he snorts.

“You wanna grab lunch? Leo’s having a half off if you buy two sale.”

“I don’t eat gluten.”

“I saw you scarf down a bowl of pasta at the mayor’s shitty dinner literally last weekend,” Ronan accuses, incredulous and only slightly affronted.

“Fine,” Adam breathes out. “Then I don’t eat gluten that’s meant to distract me from my work.”

“Fuck off.”

“Can’t do that either.”

Ronan seriously thinks he might hate Adam, if it wasn’t for the fact that he most certainly does not.

“You don’t have to like work yourself ragged just to prove a point you know, just because you’re the newest print journalist doesn’t mean you’re the least talented.” Ronan tells him, gruff sounding and avoiding his gaze at all costs. “That’s obviously Tad.”

Adam stays quiet for too long, so Ronan braces himself and turns around, not expecting Adam to be pinning Ronan with a one eyed squint, like he’s sizing him up. Like Ronan’s some sort of jigsaw puzzle he can never quite figure out.

“Kay, let’s go,” he says, slow and cautious as he shuts his laptop and slinks on his jacket. Ronan is only partially surprised that he actually listened, usually it takes a whole lot more cross looks and prodding at and about ten times more profanities for Adam to even consider stop working on some new story or the other that he’s particularly passionate about.

“Good,” Ronan huffs in as flat of a tone he can muster. “But I fucking hate subs so we’re not going to Leo’s.”

Adam sighs, long suffering. “You were born to be contrary Lynch.”

“’S what Declan says, but he doesn’t know shit.”

“As opposed to you? Oh great arbiter of all knowledge.” Adam retorts, making it so Ronan’s mouth dips into a small, reluctant smile.

“Precisely.”

Their eyes connect at that moment, ice blues boring into a twilight night sky sparkling with kisses of starlight. Ronan can hear his heart beat in his ears and his throat lodge with emotions he can’t place quite yet.

It’s Adam who breaks it, averting his gaze and clearing his throat, adjusting his papers on the desk just to make it as seemingly natural as possible.

“Mexican, Mexican’s never bad. And hey I get a chance to hear you fail at rolling your Rs.”

Ronan glowers.

“Piss off.”

So they go, Ronan orders a meat stuffed burrito and Adam orders the special and Ronan doesn’t talk about all the gluten Adam’s eating and they most definitely do not talk about what may or may not have past between them.

It’s fine. It’s normal. He’s good.

Ronan’s got a lot of other shit to be worrying about without this maybe something he’s been harboring for Adam since before they even really knew each other, and it shouldn’t change just because Adam seems to be finally joining him in this strange little dance, stumbling together around this tiny flame that may or may not have sparked to life.

It’s fine. it’s normal. He’s good.

“I’m figuring out who Greywaren is,” Adam answers Ronan’s inquiry on what story’s got him so on edge and everything freezes over.

It’s not fine. It’s not normal. And Ronan is sure as fuck not good.

“He’s swung onto Hamilton Boulevard,” Blue tells Ronan, almost frantic, through the headphone set.

Ronan finally gets the fucking Magician in eye sight, watching as he slips into the maze of downtown apartments.

“Good, no fucking trees,” Ronan hisses while swerving off the road and chasing after him by foot, eventually landing on a rooftop. It’s the sixth encounter they’ve had in as many weeks so Ronan thinks he’s finally starting to ware him down, or at least beginning to figure out his arsenal of techniques. He knows that the moment he lands on that roof The Magician will just leap to the next one and the one after that until he finally loses Ronan in the dust.

But this time the Magician doesn’t know about the little pouch of a Ronan Lynch original that’s clacking around on his belt.

“Isn’t there more important shit you should be chasing after?” The Magician growls out, leaping to the next roof in the row and rolling his landing— smooth fuck.

“Isn’t there better ways you can be earning money besides stealing it?” Ronan counters, right on his tale.

“Like those old farts would miss’m,” The Magician scoffs, thin lips pinched into an infuriatingly attractive pout. “There are kids starving in this city, you know that Greywaren?”

“So what? You some fucking reincarnation of Robin Hood?” Ronan spits out.

“He was a fictional character, so that’d be impossible,” The Magician pivots around so quickly that Ronan is caught off guard, especially when he pulls out a bow and arrow and shoots it with deadly precision, tearing Ronan’s cape right off and sticking it to the wall behind them.

“But the bow is a favorite of mine.”

Ronan clenches his teeth in frustration.

“Look I don’t give a fuck about you getting your jollies from stealing from old, rich fucks. Not really.”

“Then why the hell do you keep pursuing me?” The Magician charges, never flinching from his stance or losing his aim directed right at Ronan’s chest.

“Greenmantle,” he grits out, like broken glass ripping his throat to shreds and piercing his tongue and lips as it escapes in a fury of blood and guts and abandonment. “You said that name when we first met.”

“Yeah, and so what?”

“What do you mean so what!” Ronan bellows, hates how this vigilante fuck is so blasé about the one person that makes it feel like Ronan’s insides are burning up and dying right alongside everything else when Niall had past. With his mother and the Barns and the memories and the ease of just existing to exist instead of searching for some existential meaning behind it all. “How do you even know Greenmantle?”

The Magician just shrugs, for the first time in all the weeks he’s been clashing against Ronan his face betrays his typical impassivity and actually looks cautious, curious— unsure.

“Greenmantle’s the one who asked me to figure out who you are, paid me like a ridiculous sum of money for it.”

“And why do you think Greenmantle wants me so badly!”

“Fuck if I know, some blood feud between the wealthy and powerful. I don’t care, it’s not my business.”

“Fuck off,” Ronan steps closer, but the Magician remains stock-still, weapon poised to be wielded. “I know it was you who stopped that armed robbery last weekend at the bank, and you saved that bus collision with your creepy voodoo one with the trees, powers.”

This time the Magician’s lips curl into acute disapproval, he’s irritated by Ronan calling him out. Ronan thinks that it should be disconcerting that he could get so much from a simple reading of his mouth, but also it’s the only feature he can see on his face, so it isn’t that creepily invested.

“I don’t put people in danger, just steal from the oblivious and wealthy.”

“You’re not a bad guy,” Ronan surmises, has known that for a while now. “Don’t get mixed up in Greenmantle’s shit. They’re bad people, really bad.”

The magician sinks his teeth into his bottom lip, flickers his focus to something right above Ronan’s shoulder, like he was considering his words in a meaningful kind of way.

“How do I know that you’re not just lying to me. That Greenmantle isn’t justified for whatever slight you’ve done to them.”

“There’s a reason why you haven’t really tried figuring me out, you don’t want to help them.” Ronan needles.

“Don’t try to psychoanalyze me.”

“It’s true, you feel it. you know they aren’t safe.”

“Tell me why I should trust you,” is all the Magician says, waspish.

Ronan wants to shout, to pull out his hair and just scream. He wants to tell the Magician that he didn’t commit some sort of fucking obscene offense to’m, that Greenmantle just knows what he can do and wants to control it, control him. But Ronan’s suddenly too tired and too frustrated and too so many things that he can’t even fathom parsing out the right words to convince him. Instead, Ronan just picks out one of the seeds in his pouch and throws it into the Magician’s sandy hair, ducking when the first arrow is released.

“What the fuck was that?”

“Why can’t you fucking just listen to me!” Ronan says instead of answering. “Greenmantle is fucking evil.”

“You missed anyways douche,” the Magician snarls out, pulling another arrow from his sheath.

Ronan lets out a little, dark laugh at that, standing up to his full height. “Haven’t you ever heard that the beginnings of all things are small?”

The Magician’s face goes very flat, completely unimpressed.

“Now who’s speaking in shitty voodoo riddles?”

Fuck, Ronan hates how much he enjoys waging words with him.

“It’s not voodoo,” Ronan says in an admittedly cryptic voice.

“What the fuck!” The magician suddenly balks. Ronan reckons it’s because of the ropes knitting themselves around him over frustration about his comment.

“You won’t listen, so I’m turning you in.”

“Screw you!” he yells, face bright with feeling.

“Jail’s better than if you accidentally get on Greenmantle’s bad side,” Ronan informs him magnanimously, dark head tilted in an admittedly Declan way.

“You are such a piece of shit.”

“Could say the same to you sweetheart,” Ronan sniffs, is taken aback at the unexpected prickling to his side.

“What—“

He looks up to find the Magician tearing through the ropes that look like they’ve been completely unwound. He looks a bit closer to find the hundreds of small spikes prickling its circumference.

“Is that—“

“A pine,” Magician scoffs, lets out a new round to pierce into Ronan’s side with a mere snap of his finger.

“How the fuck can you even do that!”

The Magician doesn’t answer, just bolts over to Ronan with a swift kick to the opposite side from the needles, rendering him defenseless, and runs off just as soon as the sirens come within hearing distance. All Ronan could do is watch the night swallow him whole.

Ronan is bothered and disgruntled and pissed off— even more than usual. It’s why he’s sulking in a dark corner, peevish as all get out, while there’s like a hundred guests invading his family home in the city, here to celebrate Declan’s thirtieth and also probably just to make Ronan hate life that bit more.

He can’t believe he let the Magician go that easily, and now that he is actually mad at Ronan who knows what he’ll do now to actually figure him out, bring’m to Greenmantle just so they could finish the job and kill off all the Lynch dreamers.

“Fuck.”

“Language,” a far too familiar voice reproofs with no heat, making Ronan jolt back to watch as Adam strolls towards him.

“You’re here?” Ronan says, floundered as he stares at the way his shoulders move just right in that blazer. God he’s beautiful.

“You should really consider asking Gansey for a job, your observational skills are truly top notch,” Adam says in a decidedly sardonic tone.

“Asshole,” Ronan huffs, excepting the drink Adam offers him.

“You seemed in a funk all week, thought you’d need the moral support for a party literally meant to celebrate your brother.”

Ronan looks away, tries not to look so gleeful that Adam came here specifically— solely— to cheer up Ronan.

“You thought I’d want your company over any of these pricks,” Ronan says just to keep up pretenses— Admittedly a bit to afraid of the outcome if he starts to let them slide and just begins to babble out loud all the stupid thoughts clamoring in his mouth and chest and mind whenever around Adam. The way his chest blooms with something splendid and the blossoms taking shelter in his ribcage. Though Adam seems to be having completely contradictory thoughts, because all he does is shrug— almost defiant.

“I thought you’d like my company yes,” he says blithely, as if he were reading a weather forecast or some shit.

“Whatever,” Ronan says instead of telling him he’s right. But Adam takes it as is with a diffident little smile and stepping that much nearer, good ear tipped towards Ronan.

“You wanna get out of the crowd? Show me around this place?”

Ronan does not swallow down, not for any particular reason at least, like how maybe to the untrained ear that could’ve past as a come on.

That is not a thing that happens! He’s not some Bella Swan type swooning over a cute boy he’s pretty sure is the one. That’s not happening! Ronan is not doing that!

“Yeah, sure. Whatever.”

Adam’s answering smile is radiant. And Ronan fucking hates himself for even knowing that word.

“It’s huge…. Ah erm, your house I mean,” Adam coughs a little and Ronan’s absolutely ecstatic for the turning tables.

“Dad use to say that if we weren’t at our palace we still should live like kings, and my mom just indulged all his stupid whims,” Ronan explains, wistful.

“The Barns,” Adam says, slow and cautious, probably knowing that it’s a touchy subject but still curious. “That’s your palace, right?”

“Mmhmm,” Ronan nods, stops in front of a mantel underscoring a risibly large portrait of Niall and Arora, the pair of them juxtaposing completely but still both so etherial that it would be preposterous to ever imagine one without the other.

Beautiful and rugged. golden and dark. careless and careful.

Ronan feels a sudden, acute pang to his chest. Jesus Christ does he miss them.

“They’re beautiful,” Adam marvels, pinky touching the side of Ronan’s hand ever so tenderly from besides him. “You look exactly like your father.”

“Yeah… I’ve been told that.”

They stand there, in the silence, for a little longer— Ronan isn’t quite sure how much time past, a minute or hour, but it feels quiet. For the first time Ronan feels quiet and at peace when he looks at this portrait, and he isn’t sure if it’s a good sign that he’s finally starting to mend, or a bad one that says Greenmantle will soon cause him to join them on the other side.

Eventually, Ronan turns over— apologetic— To Adam, is surprised when he finds him staring with intense interest on the words carved into the frame.

“Omnium rum principia parva sunt,” Ronan reads out loud. “It means—“

“The beginnings of all things are small,” Adam says, mechanically, disbelievingly, confusedly.

“You know the quote then,” Ronan asks, is struck dumb when Adam’s ordinarily bright and methodical eyes flicker to him as if in a trance.

“No, not really. Just heard of it recently.”

Ronan nods, it being answer enough. “You wanna meet Chainsaw?”

“Chainsaw?” Adam repeats, finally appearing to come to his own again.

Ronan cocks his head, silently telling Adam to follow suit, and he does.

“It’s a bird…”

“She’s a raven,” Ronan huffs. “Now who’s got wicked observational skills?”

Adam’s face goes a bit pale, looking excruciatingly uncomfortable as he just nods along to Ronan, not even bothering to snipe back.

“Yeah sure, of course she is.”

He finishes feeding Chainsaw and leads Adam back to his nearby room, pretending his skin isn’t squirming with anticipation.

“Is this how you court all your dates?” Adam asks, teasing unassuming all at once, a masterpiece of contradictions Ronan could spend an eon trying to parse out and wouldn’t grow tired.

“Is that what this is?” Ronan asks, tentative while sitting down besides him on the bed.

“Dunno,” Adam shrugs. “’S what I wanted it to be, reckoned you weren’t gonna make a move for another five years.”

Ronan’s face goes blotchy, and Adam’s laugh is something musical.

“You’re enjoying this.” Ronan huffs.

“You’re precious,” Adam preens, cupping Ronan’s cheek in earnest and slanting his lips against Ronan’s own, and suddenly all the muted grays of this poor substitute of The barns transform to vivid, screaming color. It’s slow and cautious at first but melts into something more, something so much more. It feels like nights racing in the BMW, and days running around the Barns as a kid, wild and free. It feels like sun kissed skies and when his cold fingers begin to thaw at the fire place. It feels like remembering and discovering and just knowing.

“I’ve been wanting to do that for like a year,” Adam admits, bashful, once they finally part, hot tendrils of breath skirting against Ronan’s lips and soft hands caressing his cheeks.

“Try. Like. three of them.” Ronan counters, punctuating his words with a kiss to Adam’s collar bone, the hinge of his jaw, the tops of his cheekbones.

He can do this, Adam wants him to do this. This is a thing that they’re doing.

“Jesus Ronan,” Adam says in an almost wine, snaking his hands beneath Ronan’’s shirt and splaying out his fingers greedily. “That’s like since we met?”

“I know.”

Adam swoops down so that their lips are moving against each other once more, and everything feels golden.

But it all goes to an abrupt halt when he feels Adam’s long fingers skimming his still bruised side and he sucks in a breath.

“Still tender,” he winces.

Adam pulls back, as if he’s been scorched.

“I’m so sorry.”

“It’s fine,” Ronan assures, only a bit pissy that the kissing has stopped— he liked the kissing. “Just a little sore spot.” His shirt rises up enough to give Adam a clear view of the still healing spot, is confused when his face goes a sickly green and he pulls away even further.

“What’s up Parrish?” Ronan asks, sitting up right alongside him.

“That… That looks like a kick. A hard one.”

Ronan kinks up his brows, teasing.

“So I swung back to bad ass or still a nerd with nose bleeds?”

“That’s a kick,” is all Adam repeats, like he’s gone mad.

“Yeah Parrish, I got in a fight. Don’t sweat, it comes with the territory of buzz cuts and leather jackets. Wouldn’t expect you to know Mr All America.”

“A fight,” Adam says, slow and confounded. His lips moving around the words and his face still blanched, a decidedly unhealthy hue spreading across his soft features.

“Parrish you okay?”

“I gotta— I gotta go.” He says, scrambling off the bed and straightening his clothes. Ronan feels distinctly like being left high and dry.

“Now? You have to leave now?”

“Yes, now. Immediately.”

“Okay… Gimme a minute to find my keys, I’ll drive you back to yours.”

“I want to walk,” Adam declines, already racing out the door.

“Woah, did I do something wrong?”

“No, nothing,” Adam says, face being tugged into a whole array of emotions before landing on a dangerously blank expression that Ronan’s never been able to read for shit.

Adam goes and Ronan’s confused and the house is still filled with fucking annoying ass guests.

“You’re upset,” Blue says, blunt as ever.

“You’re annoying,” Ronan counters, snappish.

“It’s gotta due with Adam doesn’t it,” She charges, hands flying to her hips and looking more like Maura than Ronan could’ve ever expected.”’S why he’s called in sick to work for the past week and you’ve been more crass than usual.”

“Fuck off,” Ronan hisses, doesn’t look away from where they’re perched atop one of the higher buildings of Henrietta, perfect view to both its polished corners and seedy underbelly.

“I’m right, aren’t I,” Blue presses, but Ronan doesn’t bother to engage. “Just admit it!”

“So what if you are?”

“God, you both are such idiots.”

Ronan flips her the bird only just catching a flash of yellow ducking into an alleyway.

“Not the fuck today,” he hisses out morosely. “Call me on the bee,” he tells Blue before pouncing down and chasing after him.

He doesn’t hear her respond, doesn’t really hear anything. He only comes back to focus when the alleyway ends and he’s looking at The Magician standing rigid in front of St Agnes.

“You’re a dreamer,” He says with no fanfare, not accusing but not happy about it either.

“Wh—“

“”s why Greenmantle wants you.”

“Not exactly Nancy Drew,” Ronan mutters out, circling him cautiously.

“He killed your father, he’s the one who sent the hit on Niall.”

In an instance everything goes red, Ronan’s ears roaring with unadulterated fury.

Like a bullet, Ronan tackles into The Magician, hand wrapped around his neck and noses brushing against each other.

“how the fuck do you know that name,” he asks with heavy breaths.

“Greenmantle killed your father and he wants to kill you next because of some sort of vendetta against the Lynches.” Yellow cape manages out, barely breathing with Ronan’s hand still clasped tightly around his neck.

“Tell me how you know the name Niall?” He barks out, squeezing even harder. Though Ronan is confused when the magician doesn’t even try fighting back.

“I know you Ronan, it’s me.”

Everything stutters to a stop, and Ronan’s grasp begins to subside.

“You know my name? How do you know my name?”

“Because it’s me, It’s Adam.”

The world’s gone inside out, and flipped upside down and Ronan’s let go of the Magician— of Adam— and is across the yard once more, stunned silent as he watches as the Magician sheds off the yellow mask to reveal a familiar mop of sandy hair and night blue eyes and a tiny little dent over his top lip that Ronan’s never asked about but has always wondered if it had to do with the way he holds himself with caution strung into his stance. And absolutely nothing makes sense at all.

“Ad—Adam,” he balks.

“It’s a long story,” is all he says, completely glum.

“When did you— How did you—“

“Only the other night when we were in your room,” his cheeks go a fetching red at the memory and Ronan yearns to go back to that moment of tranquility before all of this. “I couldn’t believe it, but when I finally figured it out, it all made sense.”

“How— How did you.”

“Look Ronan— Or, erm … Greywaren, there’s no time to explain any of this right now.”

“Why the hell not,” Ronan snarls, tries to feel an appropriate amount of fear, but hates how he’ll probably always feel safe and secure when around fucking Adam Parrish, no matter who he’s dressed as.

“The Greenmantle you know, Colin, he’s dead.” Ronan balks, but Adam just steamrolls over it, continues on speaking with clipped words and a franticness Ronan doesn’t understand quite yet.”it’s his wife you need to worry about, Piper. She’s the one who hired me and has been looking for you, she wants to avenge him like some sort of Harley Quin esthetic.”

“I have no fucking idea what you’re saying.” Ronan informs him grimly.

“You don’t need to understand, just dream.” Adam tells him, thrusts out a manilla envelope to him and waits for Ronan to open it up and read its contents.

“Excuse me?”

“Read it. memorize it, Dream it.” Adam tells him.

“You want me to frame Greenmantle for some pretty heinous shit.”

“You want her taken out, don’t you,” Adam charges.

“How do you know I can even create this shit in my head?” Ronan asks, brows furrowed.

“I have faith,” Adam says with a seriousness etched into his features Ronan’s never seen. “And you’ve got fuel.”

“fuel?”

“Shit won’t be safe until she’s gone, if you ask me, I reckon that’s all your dad intended, for you and your brothers to be safe. I reckon that’s why he barred you guys from the Barns in the first place. Piper’s been there like a thousand times, the dream energy at The Barns is heavy, like a ley line all it’s own. But when the dangers gone, you can make it your palace again.”

“That’s detailed,” Ronan says slowly, still so totally confused.

“I’ve had a week to figure it all out, and this’s the only full proof plan I’ve got.” Adam tells him.

Ronan bores his eyes into Adam’s own, finds something he recognizes as quintessentially Adam Parrish in them, and feels that quiet again he did a week ago at Declan’s birthday party.

He feels sure.

“Okay, I’ll play along.”

“Good,” the ends of Adam’s lips curve up into a smile and Ronan feels like he’s finally gotten the answer right.

They’re back sitting side by side on Adam’s desk, a newspaper in Ronan’s grasp announcing the arrest of Piper Greenmantle.

“You’re preening,” Adam mildly notes.

“I feel…. Free,” Ronan says, far too vulnerable for such a open place.

“I’m glad,” Adam says, voice shimmering with sincerity as he stands up. “Promise me you’ll take care of yourself, that you’ll always feel that.”

Ronan eyes him, confused.

“Sounds like a goodbye to me,” Ronan accuses, and Adam just shrugs.

“I’ve made a mess of everything, you almost got hurt, seriously hurt.”

“You didn’t know,” Ronan contends.

“I was flippant,” Adam corrects. “But she’s gone now, and you’re going to be safe, so it feels like the right point for me to maybe start fresh too.”

“No,” Ronan says.

“Excuse me?”

“You’re a good guy Adam, and that’s more than most people. People either suck or are awful… You’re not, you’re good.”

Adam frowns.

“You’re wrong.”

“I’m not,” Ronan stands up, wraps a hand around one of Adam’s slender wrists. “You’re good and you’re bold and you’re a genius and if it weren’t for you I’d probably still be running around terrified that Greenmantle would come back to finish me off. Thank you for giving me the chance not to be afraid of that anymore… Thank you for that.”

“Of course Lynch,”

Ronan swallows down, trying his hardest not to avert his gaze.

“So stay Parrish. Stay and let’s start shit over together.”

Adam doesn’t answer in so many words, instead just inclines his head forwards and kisses Ronan within an inch of his life.

Ronan likes that answer a whole hell of a lot more.

#PYNCH #RONAN LYNCH #ADAM PARRISH #THE RAVEN CYCLE #Spilled Ink #I'm a hot mess #It's Gucci I Know #SPILT INK

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