#and then the memory was completely ejected from my head

[angeloflightandsunshine]

*sounds of muffled cries in the distance*

I forgot about the makeship vriki plush until it was too late!

Curse you, ADHD!

[oreosmama]

Look Me in the Eyes (Bradley “Rooster” Bradshaw x Reader)

*GIF not mine*

Summary: During naval training, your jet crashed and burned, taking your memories with it. But the lieutenant who saved you seems to know you better than he lets on. The only issue is that he refuses to tell you his name.

A/N: pfft half yall don’t read this anyway so imma just say rooster’s hot, oreosmama out *drops mic*

Word count: 3345

It’s not the pervading scent of antiseptic and boredom that has carved its way into your skin, nestling deep into the creases of your brow and your sneering upper lip—

It’s his unflinching gaze.

The lieutenant hovering over you, with a spoonful of green, gelatinous “dinner” posed over your lips, mumbles, “Open the hatch, the F-18 needs to land.” 

He’s a staunchly built man ornamented in the same naval jacket he’d been wearing when you first came-to in the hospital room, his lofty shoulders embellished in unfamiliar patches. Over the last two days, most of which have consisted of him lording himself over you or sitting back in the chair beside your bed, his five o’clock shadow has thickened, and the wrinkles underneath his teasing eyes darkened a shade.

The F-18 bumps against your sneer, and he chortles to himself. 

You know why you’re here. 

Well, sort of.

You know that it must’ve hurt. Like a falling-unconscious-due-to-pain kind of hurt. Black and blue splotches paint your temple and upper left cheek, and each time you force a smile, it aches. The rest of your body looks the same. In the first shower you’d been allowed, you twisted and turned as much as your burning abdomen could handle and had come to the conclusion that you were glad you didn’t remember much of what had happened.

The only real issue was that you didn’t remember much of anything. 

The story you had been told was haphazardly crafted, not unlike if a toddler had drawn a house with crayons and passed it to you, insisting it looked exactly like the one you lived in. 

It goes something like this: you were flying your jet when the engine stalled, and when you ejected, your head smacked against the windshield. You were lucky—you were unconscious when you had crumpled in on yourself, snapping five of your ribs like pencils, and when you’d landed on the ground, face in the dirt—you were so, so lucky. 

But the lieutenant says differently. 

When he found you, you were awake. You were echoing his name into the stagnant desert air, screaming and sobbing in ways that still keep him up at night. 

You know because he sleeps with folded arms on the edge of your mattress, and he rattles the metal skeleton each time he flinches. And the times when he thinks you’re too buried in exhaustion and slumber, his hand finds yours, fingertips light as air against your skin.

These are the only times the lieutenant bares that part of himself to you. 

In the mornings, when you can look him in the eyes and see the guilt buried underneath, he winces a smile onto his lips and asks if you remember anything yet. 

You don't.

And he winces again. “Back to the drawing board, huh?”

The lieutenant is a nice-enough man when he wants to be. The only issue is that he doesn’t seem to want to be. 

“Tell me your name,�� you snipe, dangling over the precipice of flinging Jell-O across the room. 

This is a game he never wants to play, despite how often he wins. He has the whole naval base’s hospital staff refer to him as Sir or Lieutenant-no-last-name, and each time you ask, he’ll give you the same response.

“You know my name.” 

You don't. He’s a complete stranger. He can hold you hand and feed you Jell-O and help you hobble to the bathroom; he can brush the hair from your sweat-crusted face in the mornings and, on some rare occasions where he thinks he’s woken up before you, he’ll graze a feather-soft kiss on your bruised temple.

And you still haven't got a clue. 

Because whoever the lieutenant is, the tight grip he has on your heart is completely foreign to you. It’s a grip that says you and him aren’t just something definable—you were a we in this life; the pair of you have formed a way of living in tandem, your own intrinsic tango to which nobody else knows the steps. It’s not just like or a passing fancy. It’s not just hot static running through veins. 

This is fully fledged; this is oxygen now. The rise and fall of your chest is the rise and fall of his. The absence of it must be suffocating. 

So you don't know why he doesn’t like this game. He makes a question-answer into a back-and-forth, and then he winds and winds you up until you’re ready to snap. 

It’s not fair. God, it’s not fair. You deserve to know his name. Doesn’t he know it’s not just a tickle in the back of your mind anymore? If he was the one whose name you were screaming, didn’t you deserve to know what it was?

“Why do you keep doing this?” 

You watch his lips purse, the color bleeding out of them and into pink patches on his neck and cheeks. The spoon rattles against the tray, and the glob of green wavers in its curve. He refuses to hold your gaze like always. Self-inflicted torment disguises itself as burnt-sienna irises. The life you’ve forgotten is bowing his shoulders, and your crash, no matter the fact that he saved you, is eating away at him. 

Then the lieutenant smiles, in the fractured way—the way someone might laugh at a funeral. 

“Because knowing my name wouldn’t help you. You never called me by it, anyway.”

This, oh God—this is the closest you’ve ever gotten, and you’re still wading in the darkness. A name you’d never even call him by, what a wonder that does to your psyche. 

A name was a start; it was a first impression. There was a lot in a name. 

So you’d never called him by his name… so what?

So what, only lovers knew each other by more than a name? So what, he never called you by yours? So what, you didn’t want to ever call him by his name, never felt the urge, but felt it was rather proper considering you didn’t know what to call him at all?

He keeps you doggy-paddling for it.

The hospital room is polluted with silence for the rest of the night. Slowly, you finish the Jell-O as he sits back in his chair, watching, yet not quite seeing you. You missed when his staring felt like a buzzing fly. Now it’s a thunderstorm hanging over you, foggy and dampened, and you’re struck every few seconds with a shiver. 

He doesn’t reach out for your hand when you pretend you’ve fallen asleep. Twenty minutes past lights out, he stands and heads into the bathroom, slowly creaking the door closed and locking it before the shower faucet turns on and stays on for a long, long time. 

Where his hand should be is where he laid his jacket, one sewn patch erroneously rough against your palm. With another glance at the light underneath the bathroom door, you haul the leather jacket up into your lap, tracing the ridges and folds. You trails your fingertips along the jacket, searching for… something. Anything. 

Cold metal, a zipper slips underneath your fingers, and you sit up straighter despite the outcry of pain in your ribs. 

A pocket, and inside is a small plastic card—his ID. 

That, and a small, velvet box. 

No…

No, you won’t open it. 

No, no, because he shouldn’t even have that here. 

Why—dear God—why did he have that here?

It’s not for you. That’s for sure. You don’t even want to open it. No.

It’s not yours. It’s not yours to have, especially since he hasn’t offered it to you, and it’s not yours to wear, and it’s not yours to look at, to watch, iridescent, crystal devotion reflecting the moonlight from the room’s lone window. 

But when you lift the cover and curse the stars that the man whose name you don’t even know knows you so well, knows how beautiful it is in your eyes, and even worse, how well it fits on your finger, you know it’s yours. 

Well, not yours. 

It’s hers. The one before the crash’s. 

That’s her ring on your finger, and that’s her lieutenant grieving in the bathroom. 

This is her life, not yours. All you own anymore is the absence pulsing in your chest. 

You own the spasms in your veins, the brief and lasting panic of who am I, really?, the deficiency of life and past and love; the frail hold on this reality, on that man, on this ring. 

The rest is not yours, so you should let it go. 

Then, ideally, you should be able to float away, free from these junctions to a girl you don’t know. The man who loves her loves your face. He loves your body, and your voice, and each of the words falling from your lips, perhaps in the wrong order, yes, but he’ll rearrange them in his mind so that it matches hers.

Ideally. 

Ideally, it’s not this drowning feeling, a weight like a hand pressing hard against your chest, shoving you deeper and deeper under the current. She’s the one who breathes, not you. You don’t need to breathe. You’re an accident in this world. 

The I.D. slips from your grasp and falls to the floor. 

You’ve read it. You saw the name, the rank, the naval symbol. In the dim moonlight and the single glowing strip underneath the bathroom door, his not-really-a-smile smiles up at you from the vinyl floor. 

And now you see it, chrome duct tape peeling off the jagged stitches of a patch, the one over his heart. Another of his games: his missing call sign. 

It… fits him. Strangely enough. 

Is this what you called him?

The hospital room floods with a subdued yellow light carried out by the steam of the lieutenant’s shower. He emerges with a towel wrapped around his lower body, a sheen of wet on his cheeks you’re not certain was caused by the shower. 

Like you, this is his third shower in this room, but unlike him, he’s not wearing a smirk when he exits, bare feet padding along the cold tiles. He doesn’t spare you a glance while he pilfers through his black duffle bag, the one seated on the only other guest chair in the room—the one that never moves. 

Maybe it was a good thing he didn’t look, because you hadn’t thought to take off the ring. It was a plan as half-baked as when you’d first decided to put it on. Some barbaric, frenzied part of you, the same one that had slipped it on and hugged it close to your heart, refused to yank it off. It was another you—not her nor you, but a new one that had fallen in love with him, Rooster, without memory or qualms, the one that had no issue with him lingering in every corner of your mind; no, in fact, she preferred it.

You don’t listen to her when the lieutenant pivots back to face you, a fresh pair of jeans, a T-shirt, and the rest sourced from the duffel bag in tow, one fist curled into his towel at his waist. His eyes land on yours, and your fingers slicken with the sweat of your palms, tremble like the thumps beneath your ribcage. 

At the worst moment possible, you notice, in the hazy yellow light of 10:07 PM, that Lieutenant Bradley Bradshaw’s eyes are achingly akin to whiskey. It’s the dark, thick kind that coats your tongue and hits you five seconds after you sip it like a freight train; heady, terribly intoxicating, and in large doses, coaxes out the worst side of yourself at an even worse moment. 

The ring clinks against the bed’s metal framework before shuddering against the tile floor, and his eyes leave yours to watch it rattle. The skin of your left ring finger burns from the swift twisting and tugging you’d employed in a state of tipsy panic—your plan had been to slip the ring unnoticed beneath his leather jacket, the same place you’d stuffed the velvet box. 

A breath tears itself out of the lieutenant’s chest. Tan skin rises and falls once, and his grip goes white-knuckle on his towel. 

Then he pads back toward the bathroom without a word and disappears behind the slammed door. Somehow, in some terrible way, it is even harder to breathe with him not in the room after that. 

But he bursts through the door a second later, completely negligent of the violent pacing of your heart, donned in clothes wrinkled and stretched in odd places from frantic dressing. He covers the distance with three long strides and slackens back into the plastic hospital chair, the heavy creases under his eyes never having looked so deep-seated. 

You see it now. The damage this whole experience has done to him. He’s been hollowed out, rigorously gutted to the point that one last revelation might finally crack him in half and let the despair pour out. 

You’re afraid to tell him all that you don’t know. That even though you had slid that ring on and off your finger, you still don’t know him. But, God, you want to tell him that you love him, despite knowing it won’t be enough. It’s not even enough to you, and it’s all that you have. 

Usually, he wears this sheen layer of tenderness over his face; it slips off every night when you close your eyes, and he smooths it back on in the mornings in the mirror. Some days he layers it on so thick you never even notice the grief hidden underneath. 

It must have gotten too heavy to bear. 

The silence hangs just as heavy. He runs both hands down his face, pressing hard enough that his skin emerges pink, and folds his hands, knocking them against his lips. Veins in his eyes grow redder by the second, and your heart begins a slow crawl up your throat at the watery levels of his eyelines, waiting to spill. The ring sits on the floor untouched. 

“Do you,” he faltered, clearing his throat. “Do you… remember anything?”

He’s looking at you so intensely that your skin is searing. Shame washes over you, grasping your shoulders and burying you deeply into its chest. You want to cry. 

“Nothing.”

The lieutenant stares at you a second longer, stretching it out until you’re trembling. Then he looks away, down, before reaching and retrieving the ring from the ground. He observes it for just a second, the way it glimmers in night’s imperfect lighting, and his eyes squeeze shut.

Lieutenant Bradley Bradshaw, you’ve learned, will draw things out until the perfect moment has come. He will wait until the ache swells and culminates, with a tolerance so inexhaustible you wonder if, in all your time loving him, you ever bothered to wait up. He’s noticed how the darkness has swallowed both of you wholly, and only now does he offer reprieve. 

Bradley tells you your name.

And he tells you that he’s been in love with you since the first second he saw you. 

He tells you that he can’t bear the thought of losing all that you’d had, and that his world had been crumbling apart before his own goddamned eyes ever since your jet’s engine had sputtered and died. He tells you that he’s so, so fucking sorry he couldn’t save you, sorry that your life ever got entangled so messily with his in the first place, and even more sorry that he’s so useless to help you find your way back, that you can’t seem to find your way back to him. 

And when you began to cry, he bolted up from his seat and held you, whispering apologies into your hair, and you cried a little harder, because you had found your way back to him, but he wouldn’t ever care, because it wasn’t the same path you’d taken before. 

You cry because it hurts to hold him, and even more because it hurts him to hold you. You want all of the I-love-yous he’s ever said to be for you, and you want that damned ring too. 

You want that goddamn ring on your finger right now because he’d promised you that it would be yours. That first moment he’d ever seen you, stumbling drunk in a crowded Hard Deck and spilling his beer half on his Hawaiian shirt, half on yours, that he’d make up for it by putting a spendy ring on your little finger right there, despite not actually knowing where right there was. The only one I’ll ever buy, he’d hiccuped, it’ll be yours, darlin’. 

“Rooster,” you croaked into his chest. “Roo.”

A provoked sob tore from your throat, your arms and ribs aching from how tightly you clung to him, even after he froze. You surfaced from the curve of his shoulder, hands sliding past his sides, over his thrumming chest, and up to cradle his damp jawline before drawing his face down to yours. He mumbled your name, whiskey eyes potent as ever, and you smothered the rest of his question against your lips. 

You couldn’t tell who was crying anymore. Your cheeks’ dampness was his, just the same as his lips pressed against yours so harshly, so numbingly you couldn’t quite tell where yours ended and his began. It must have been somewhere close to where his tongue met yours, making up for lost time as he fought hard and fiercely for everything he’d been starved of for three, going on four, unbearable days. His hands left their leverage against the bed and latched onto your hips, rough fingertips familiarly caressing the soft slopes of your sides, and when you offered an airy moan to him, he accepted eagerly with a tightening grip. 

You separated from him with a small cry, ribs twinging. Bradley pulled away in horror, and his dilated pupils struggled to sober up to join. “I’m so sorry,” he whispered, larger hands now grappling at yours and trying to remove your grasp. “You need—ice, I’ll go get you some ice–”

“Roo, no,” you mumbled, refusing to let go of him. 

He paused, and his body shivered under your touch. The familiarity of his name from your mouth seemed as comforting to him as it was to you. His lips twitched and curled, and he breathed a small sigh. The hard lines of his face grew tender as he slid his hands down to your wrists, turning and pressing a kiss to each palm. 

His heart jumped and throbbed against your fingertips, and you had no doubt he could feel the same from yours. The heat of his damp cheeks had grown infinitely warmer under your touch, and for all the nights you’d spent with just a grasp on his hand, the change was more and more welcome. 

“Don’t leave me again,” he pleaded against the skin of your palm, voice thick and bittersweet, like honey seeping through your ears. “I don’t think I can handle that again.”

He steeled himself against your mattress with one hand when you tugged his forehead down against yours, lips just whispering against one another. You smiled. 

“Was it all the Jell-O that did you in, or…?”

“Yeah, actually,” he nodded, tongue pressed against his cheek. “It was. I hope you know we’re never having Jell-O in our house ever again.”

“Not even lime?”

“Especially lime.”

You huffed, “Fine.” You pulled away, despite how desperate Bradley was to follow you. He let you fall back against the pillows with your hand still in his grasp, and he settled onto the edge of the mattress, letting his spare hand find home in the pliant skin of your thigh. Your eyes rose to the ceiling. “But it’ll cost you.”

Soft lips brushed the back of your left hand before cold metal slipped around your finger. “One of these?”

“Exactly.”

Bradley hummed. “Gladly.”

[lavenderbradshaw]

Two Paper Airplanes

You and Bob have never had a hiccup. He was always the same-old Bob, kind and loving and gentle. You think that's all going to change after the birdstrike, after you tell him some news.

Remember when you hit the brakes too soon?

“Eject, eject, eject!” 

The sound of Phoenix and Bob’s voices over the radio make you want to hurl. Literally. You feel your stomach twist so quickly you barely know what’s happening until Rooster has a hand on your shoulder. You don’t say anything, the placement of your hand on your abdomen must be enough for him to deduce what’s happening. He calls for Hangman to bring him a trash can, and you almost ask how he can tell, how he just knows you’re going to throw up. You can’t, though, because in a blinding sequence of events, you end up on the floor. Jake’s holding your feet against his stomach, still standing to try and get blood flow back to your head. Rooster is fanning you, almost hilariously, with a chunk of papers. You lick your lips, which are too numb to feel, and Halo sighs. 

“You scared the shit out of us,” she gasps out, her hand clutched in yours. “You okay, Dreamer?”

You close your eyes for just a second , opening them again to see Maverick crouched next to you now. You flinch, the memory of him being up in the air with Bob and Phoenix when they- 

“Bobby?” You whisper, quiet as a mouse. He nods his head and then shakes it.

“He’s okay. They’re gonna check him out, probably keep them both overnight which is normal,” he says, still shaking his head. “He’s okay. Why don’t we get you checked out?” 

20 stitches in a hospital room

Between the two of you, there are 20 stitches. Four in your hand from where you’d sliced yourself with the kitchen knife just a few days ago, and 16 stitches in a small cut on his shoulder from a rock he’d uncomfortably slid on as he landed. Parachute operated fine, canopy operated fine, everything is fine. 

Except there are 20 stitches and one test result remaining completely hidden. 

You sit at his bedside while he naps off whatever they’d given him. He’s grounded for a few days, just to recover, but you wish he were grounded forever. You’d give everything you had to make sure he never got in another jet. 

“Are you okay?” He whispers, his hand in yours. You’re staring off at the wall, or maybe the window, he can’t tell. But he does know you’re out of it, because he’s called your name three times now. 

“I’m pregnant,” you whisper, so quietly he shifts to hear you better. 

“What, baby? I’m sorry, I didn’t-“

“I’m pregnant.”

When you started crying, I did too

“You’re…” he whispers, pushing himself up in the hospital bed. You don’t stop him—you can’t. “Oh, God.”

“Pregnant. I’m pregnant.”

You aren’t sure what reaction you wanted out of him, but he starts crying. You suppose that’s a suitable reaction, because you start crying, too. 

“If you want to… we haven’t even…” you stumble over your own sentences, shaking your head. “We’ve only been dating a few months, less than a year, and if you don’t want this…”

“No!” He gasps, and your heart sinks. He sees the reaction on your face and he immediately wants to fix it. There’s an overwhelming feeling of dread in the pit of his belly, he wonders if this is how you felt when you heard him eject. “No, not like that, baby, no. I want… I want this baby and a wedding and a million more babies with you.”

You look up at him, eyes wide and lip wavering. “Bob, you don’t have to just… say that.”

“Shut up,” he says, his voice more firm. You look at him closer, now. He has your undivided attention. “No, please, God. It’s you. It’s been you since the moment I saw you. I have a ring in my locker on base because I didn’t know where to hide it at our house and- and I was going to propose but this happened and…”

When the sun came up, I was looking at you 

He’s there every waking moment. Throughout all the waves of nausea and doctors appointments and midnight cravings, he’s a solid, unwavering force until your baby girl comes into your lives in the middle of the plastic tub in the living room. She doesn’t cry, not at first, quiet just like her father. She just opens her eyes, taking it all in, before a solid tap on her butt makes her curl her hands into fists and wail. The sun was just beginning to rise as she slipped from you after a long night, but you’re suddenly more awake than you had been previously. You’re crying, looking between Bobby who was adamant about getting in the pool right behind you and that tiny little baby girl. 

“She looks just like you,” Bob whispers, his hand coming up to meet yours against her back. “She looks like you.”

You just shake your head, leaning it back against Bob. Bob, who was just as exhausted, who had been at work when you called him contracting, who had raced home and changed into swim trunks and got in right behind you in water that was now slightly chilled. “She’s gonna be so much like her daddy. Quiet and kind and loving. She’s gonna be your little girl.”

He can’t stop staring at you, as the sun rises more and peaks into the living room. He doesn’t even stop staring when you’re resting on the couch, curled up in blankets and drifting off to sleep. He just holds your little baby, his little baby, and stares. 

God, he loves you both more than he could have ever imagined.

[blackjackkent]

OK, I was cut off from finishing some posts on Tuesday because of my power outage, so let's take another crack at Rakha's first private conversation with the Emperor.

It has been, to put it mildly, a difficult few days. It's been just under twenty-four hours since Rakha finally remembered exactly who and what she is, and her dreams have immediately gotten markedly worse; rather than indeterminate images of blood and gore, they're specific and brutal, memories of rituals performed in her Father's name and her own hand holding the knife.

She's no longer tied up, but Jaheira and Wyll and Lae'zel have set up a strict guard rotation on her instead - for her own benefit as well as theirs, they say, and she believes them, but it still hurts. And mixed with the bloody dreams of the Urge is other dark thoughts - Vlaakith and Orpheus, the damned clown with his wide leering grin, the beautiful and terrible murder in the temple of Ilmater, the never-ceasing squirm of the worm in her head as they draw closer and closer to the city, the Chosen, the Brain.

And Orin, of course - Orin who stalks them in any of a thousand faces, Orin who (it seems) was the one to first cut apart her brain and her memories and leave her to be tortured and destroyed.

So her night is restless and fractured, tormented by dark images... until suddenly, between one breath and the next... it stops.

Sudden calm, and a warm wave of utter silence through her head as the beast sleeps, the worm stills. She draws a shuddering breath in, keeping her eyes closed, savoring the emptiness.

It's a little different from her previous wakings in the pocket of the Astral Sea contained inside the Prism. She's standing, for one thing, and for another, the Emperor seems to have given up completely on its disguise of the Guardian.

It sits in a strange little tableau overlooking the giant skull at the center of the Prism. Wood planks, shelves, benches sit haphazardly about, as if it tried to manifest a tavern and gave up halfway through. Behind the strange plume of its armor, its shoulders are slumped, its head bowed, though it gives a sharp jerk at the sound of Rakha's footsteps behind it.

"How did you--" A pause. Then it relaxes. "Oh. It's you. I must have let my mind wander, enough for you to wander in."

She shrugs. Does it know, she wonders, the peace that it has brought her in these moments when it draws her to its little chunk of reality? Does it know how she needs that now more than ever? Perhaps not - it seems genuinely surprised to see her, but then again, trying to read an illithid is a losing proposition from the start.

Another silence. She breathes in slowly, out slowly, relishing the calm as deeply as she can in case the Emperor simply ejects her from the dream at once. But it doesn't.

"Forgive me," it rumbles after a while. "I am drained. Ever since you killed Ketheric and took his netherstone, the Chosen's control of the brain has been... brittle. It's rebelling against Orin and Gortash, fiercely." It turns its head slightly, so she can see just the corner of its piercing purple eyes. "I suspected that when we took Ketheric's stone, the brain would begin to break free. Those brainquakes confirm that my suspicion was correct."

The shaking of the earth beneath their feet as they walked through Rivington - that was the work of the brain struggling against its chains. Rakha nods. One small question answered, at least.

But that knowledge clearly brings the Emperor no peace. "I do not know what happens now when it receives its orders. And I do not dare guess," it mutters.

Narrator: You feel the Emperor's fear as if it were your own. An elder brain enslaved is one thing. An elder brain unleashed will be the end of everything.

Perhaps it's the strength of the Astral Tadpole that gives her this window into its mind, or perhaps even the initial worm would have done the same. Either way, the connection is clear - as is the intensity of the illithid's emotion. Surprising, given Rakha's understanding of the beings from Withers, from Wyll, from Lae'zel - that they have no soul, that they have no heart.

It exhales slowly, then lifts its head, looking down into the abyss ahead of them and the giant skull that floats within it, the dim glint of the magic holding Orpehus in place. "Beautiful, isn't it?" it murmurs. "The mighty Prince Orpheus, contained in submissive slumber." A pause, another jerk of the head, another change of subject - the illithid's thoughts, it seems, are everywhere at once.

"Come," it says abruptly. "You may as well sit a while, now that you're here. Your company--" It hesitates; its eyes flick rapidly around it in all directions. "...isn't unwelcome."

She relaxes. Good. It will not send her away yet. She can enjoy the quiet in her head a little longer. She does not care to talk about Orpheus, nor does she truly care what the Emperor thinks of her company - but she needs this peace. She needs it or she will go mad.

She sits down slowly at the illithid's side. Another long silence stretches between them and for a while she focuses on nothing but her own inward quiet. After a while, though, her observant nature reasserts itself inescapably, and she starts to register oddness in the Emperor's bearing. The slight slump of exhaustion again, a fidgeting of the end of its tentacles and the tips of its fingers, that doesn't match the last time they met.

It takes her a little while to rouse from her reverent stupor and speak. "You seem troubled," she says noncommittally.

"An accurate summary," the Emperor says dryly. A pause. "I have found myself... distracted of late." To her surprise, it squeezes its eyes shut with an expression that seems to carry sincere pain. "I'm haunted by memories," it murmurs. "They are relentless. I can think of nothing - no one - else."

Rakha's eyes narrow, perplexed. For a brief, utterly perplexing moment, she thinks it means her, but no. I am haunted by memories, it said.

As am I. Terrible, terrible, blood-soaked memories...

"...Who do you think of?" she asks cautiously, curiosity getting the better of her in spite of herself.

Its eyes drift open again. "Duke Stelmane," it says calmly. "Or... Belynne, as I knew her." A pause. Its tentacles give a sharp, spasmodic flick. "I wasn't ready for her death."

It takes Rakha a moment to place this name. Stelmane - one of the children in Rivington, a newspaper seller, was shouting it. And one of the monks in the temple mentioned it too. Duke Stelmane, another of the city leaders - like Wyll's father.

They said she was murdered. That it was still a mystery.

Deep in Rakha's head, the beast urge tries to stir eagerly at this recollection - but it is restrained by the soporific effect of the Astral Plane on her darkest impulses.

She must look surprised to make this connection, because the Emperor lets out a strange resonant exhale that seems like it might be a bitter laugh.

"You thought you were my first ally?" it murmurs. "Far from it. I have long sought the allyship of others; it is the only way to succeed. Though my relationship with Belynne was... different from my relationship with you."

Once again, it's a puzzling incongruity. Everything Rakha has heard from Lae'zel, from Wyll, from Withers, even from Jaheira, has suggested that illithids do not form relationships, of any sort - that they are soulless beings of conquest. But those are illithids enslaved to a brain; perhaps that is why the Emperor is different?

"How so?" she asks slowly.

Again that subtle tentacle flick. "In life she was my business partner," it explains. Its violet gaze drifts past her shoulder, going distant. "Back when we ran the Knights of the Shield - a difficult task, for a mind flayer. Duke Stelmane trusted me, and the city trusted her. I conceived the plot, but Belynne took center stage. It was she who met with the merchants, politicians, patriars. It was she who negotiated deals and signed off on agreements. Her rooms played host to the most important conversations in the city."

It leans forward slightly, eyes narrowing. "Together we brought order to chaos. At its height, everything that happened in that city went through the Shield. Through us."

A pause. Its voice lowers, with a resonance that she would have called grief in any other creature. "I could not have done any of it without her, just as I cannot do any of this without you. But now... she is gone."

(A/N: I really do find the Emperor such a fascinating character. I've read interpretations of it that assert that it is specifically written to be interpretable any number of ways without one true reading, and that literally who it is and what its motivations are change depending on how you choose to interact with it.

I'm not entirely sure if I subscribe to the idea completely, but I do think it can certainly be viewed a number of dramatically different ways by the PC, and it's very interesting playing through this with Rakha, whose reaction is so different from Hector's distrust and anger.)

Rakha listens to this tale in silence. She does not fully understand the Emperor or how it sees the world and their fight - but she hears a ring of truth in this story. Stelmane, then, was like Wyll - she saw past the Emperor's monstrous nature and helped it to control itself, to do something worthwhile in spite of all those who would (and perhaps should) be afraid of it.

She pictures the idea of Wyll dying to an unknown murderer and - with the beast's automatic glee muted and hidden away - can face the true obliterating grief and rage that would come with it. Perhaps even a mind flayer is capable of suffering, when someone like that is taken away from them.

"I'm-- sorry for your loss," she says haltingly. Sympathy and pathos don't come easily to her lips - but she has heard others use these words before, others who are better at it than she.

It grunts ruefully. "I appreciate your understanding," it murmurs. Its head cocks to look at her sidelong. "What I feel is deeper than superficial cures can reach. And... not entirely unwelcome." A pause. "Most people think that ind flayers are soulless husks who feel nothing. I am glad you are not most people."

Rakha isn't sure that she would go that far, really. She isn't sure she knows enough about the Emperor or illithids in general to judge the state of its soul. But... as always in moments of strain, she retreats back into the objective comfort of the absolute facts that she knows.

The Emperor protects her. Its connection brings her peace she finds nowhere else.

The Emperor is like her. It should by rights be a monster - but it is trying to save the world.

The Emperor had someone like Wyll, someone it lost.

The Emperor, soul or not, is hurting.

In moments when she has hurt, Wyll has reached out to her to comfort her - even before they loved each other. It is something that people like Wyll do when someone needs it.

Perhaps this is only selfishness. She does not precisely care about the Emperor for itself. There are too many unknowns and too much else occupying her mind. She needs its goodwill, its steady mind, to continue protecting her, to continue providing these scattered moments of silence.

Or, perhaps, there truly is a stroke of kindness Wyll planted in her that is able to bloom here when the beast is silenced.

Whatever the reason, she reaches out.

Give the Emperor's hand a reassuring squeeze.

It's a deeply awkward gesture, but nevertheless it seems to strike home with an intensity she did not expect. The Emperor's head jerks, its eyes darting closed for a moment. Its whole body goes utterly still, even its tentacles.

Rakha tilts her head, perplexed, trying to read this reaction.

But then the moment breaks. A visceral rumbling shockwave rolls around them, rocking the ground up under them.

They start to their feet, the moment of calm forgotten in an instant. Rakha's head begins to ache in rhythm with the thumping vibrations.

"Another quake," the Emperor says curtly. "The brain is rebelling again. I need to focus. And so do you."

-----

Blackness. She wakes with a start in her bunk and stares at the ceiling. Wyll, at her side, straightens up, seeing her eyes open.

"All right?" he asks gently.

The beast is awake again, growling at once, low and inescapable in the back of her mind. She sighs and rubs her fingertips against her temple. "Fine," she mutters.

Because he is Wyll, because he is kind, he reaches out and rests his hand on hers - just as she did to the Emperor. "You're all right," he murmurs. "I'm here. Go back to sleep."

And she does, but there is no more rest to be had. The peace is gone, and all the rest of the night's dreams are of blood.

[dramavixen]

are producers the clowns for approving subpar endings or am i the clown for expecting more

**Spoilers for:

Love Like the Galaxy (China, 2022)

The Red Sleeve (South Korea, 2021)

Late as I am to every bandwagon, I at last completed my first watch-through of Love Like the Galaxy a few days ago. For the past couple of weeks, I have done nothing but think about, consume, and breathe this story. At last, a show that was ticking all the boxes! I could tear myself free from this drama slump of mine!

This celebration lasted until I sat down with my parents to observe that thing the producers might call an "ending," but which sparked a frustration in me so severe that it triggered a post-COVID coughing fit, which in turn almost made me throw up. I couldn't comprehend it: was this the same show? Did I accidentally click on a parallel universe version where everyone's intelligence was operating 20% capacity?

Since I'd like to avoid making myself physically ill again, I'm not going to focus too much on how logic abruptly becomes an imaginary concept throughout the last two episodes. At least all that did was make me angry. What I can't accept is that they use that lack of logic to curse our leads with the most careless of reconciliations.

To alleviate my distress, we're going to perform an investigation. A deduction, if you will, of precisely what the ending was lacking, and utilizing a case study of how to conclude a story in both a fitting and compelling manner.

An unresolved misery

In recent years, my tolerance for male leads' misbehavior has plummeted down into the core of the earth. You could say that after years of being brainwashed by media into excusing male characters' questionable actions due to how much they "love" their partners, I'm taking back my common sense. So when faced with Zisheng's killing spree while armed with the knowledge that a "happy ending" was endgame, I anticipated how the writers would close such an abyssal rift in the leads' relationship. And the result was...well, not all that worth it.

If you need a memory refresh or you're reading this without fear of spoilers (godspeed), the conclusion of LLTG sees Shaoshang being kidnapped multiple times by people who she knows don't hold good intentions, but she goes along with them anyway. Don't ask why (the answer is so Zisheng can swoop in to rescue her). Some needlessly dramatic things lead to Shaoshang assuming for a few seconds that Zisheng has died in an explosion. But lo and behold! Here he comes, emerging unscathed from the ordeal. She flies into his arms and forgives him. Then they run off and save China, because it's not a historical C-drama until they do.

By the time we got to the fire/explosion scene, my mental state had already been reduced to a pulp. Therefore, to write this piece, I had to rewatch that part and make sure I was getting all the details right. It shocked me into a second round of holding my head to prevent my brain from ejecting itself as it sought to escape this reality.

(Also, I have to take a moment here to demand justice for He Zhaojun. They leave a pregnant woman on the floor after dragging her out of a fire, while she's having contractions, so they can instead take the time to hold a premature mourning session for Zisheng. Guys, it's not the end of the world if you don't have a brain. But please don't throw away your conscience.)

However the writers did it, it still counts as a happy ending. Such a conclusion should come as a relief, so why do I find it so hard to come to terms with? Let's rewind a tad.

Both Shaoshang and Zisheng grew up under grim circumstances, their identities subjecting them to emotional and social turmoil. But while they share a similar internal struggle, they must deal with it in opposing ways. Shaoshang opens herself up to anyone who shows her true kindness, desperate for someone to accept her for who she is. On the other hand, Zisheng can only isolate himself from everyone, unable to reveal his true self due to both political and personal interests.

Their eventual parting is unavoidable. Shaoshang is moved by Zisheng's unwavering love for her. Can't blame her all that much; just look at him. But the closer she gets, the more Zisheng fears dragging her into his mess of a life, and the more he pulls away. When Zisheng chooses vengeance over love, he's already crossed Shaoshang's bottom line several times by refusing to share his troubles whenever she asked—the irony being that he once scolded her for keeping things to herself.

ZS: If, one day, they really intend to kill you, would you not tell me then, either? Shaoshang, exactly who do you take me for? Why must you always act on your own, and not trust me? SS: It is not that I do not want to trust you. I simply— ZS: You simply do not care about me. After betrothing you, I would frequently think about how great it would be if I could become your confidant and anchor. You could tell me about all of your fears and loneliness. I do not wish to control you. All I hope is that you can be honest with me. But how is it that your heart never warms toward me?

I see that Zisheng is a loyal believer of the "do as I say, not as I do" doctrine.

While it's initially funny to look back on the above scene in context, it's quite sad once you mull over it more. Zisheng's desire to know Shaoshang's troubles is rooted in a concern for her safety that is both emotional and practical in nature. When Shaoshang later applies that same thinking on him, the tables have turned completely. Zisheng is now aware that few situations are simple enough to be resolved just by being honest with someone else. And if the problem is severe enough, doing so may only aggravate it further.

From his perspective, telling Shaoshang would mean ruining her and her family's lives by association. Not to mention, she herself swore that she would stay with him through everything. So if he dies as a result of carrying out his revenge, the possibility of her dying solidifies itself as an inevitability. Leaving her behind is the one method he has to ensure that he alone would suffer the consequences.

Like it or not, it's hard to blame either of them for the end of their relationship. Is Zisheng wrong to keep Shaoshang in the dark? Arguably yes, arguably no. But is Shaoshang justified in her anger about being kept in the dark? Absolutely.

While we can be reasonably upset that post-timeskip Shaoshang possesses none of the outspoken nature of her teenage self, her lingering depression is the most realistic result of everything that happens. She has tried repeatedly to find her place in the world, yet arrives at nothing but failure every time. Not to mention, she suffers from an inferiority complex that intensifies the ache of each and every rejection. She isn't unfamiliar with being abandoned, but Zisheng doing it to her is the final straw that breaks her. The coffin her family was preparing for her didn't go to waste—the moment that Zisheng turned his back on her, he killed a part of her. Meanwhile, Zisheng becomes a corpse with a pulse, someone who only continues to breathe so he can regret what he has done.

When you delve into how much Zisheng hurt Shaoshang and himself, it becomes clear that a Michael Bay explosion shouldn't have been the answer to their problem. After the timeskip, the issue at hand should be less about her forgiving him than it is about each of them needing to redeem parts of themselves that they lost to the circumstances. That's why their interactions at this point are so painful to watch. Every word, every look, every movement brims with love for the other person, but they are both shells of their former selves that cannot move on.

No words for the above; too busy sobbing as they each individually accept that they'll never experience true happiness again.

As a viewer, you know that Shaoshang accepting him at this point would be an objectively bad idea. But it's also hell to watch two people, both overly accustomed to suffering, walk away from the person who brought them the greatest joy in their life. That's the art of tragedy, flourishing before us in a quiet, leaden fog. And they killed it in a bloom of gunpowder, of all things?

The beauty in tragedy

To say that a tragic ending is inherently superior to a happy one would be a pretentious fallacy. At the same time, a forced happy ending will feel unstable enough that the slightest of questions will cast it into doubt. The genre of an ending is irrelevant. It only matters that the ending is the right one.

So should LLTG have ended with the leads parting ways for good? To find the answer, I want to first dig into a successful example of tragedy. For that, let's look to our dearest, our legendary, our precious: The Red Sleeve.

Similar in premise to LLTG, TRS features a female lead with independent thinking and a dream for freedom, faced with a man of high social status who goes about chasing her in a way that flaunts his power. The stakes are higher in TRS since the man in question will one day be king, but the highlight of the show is the same as in LLTG: you bounce back and forth between hoping that she ends up with him and praying to any god that exists that she runs far, far away from him. You can't really win.

One day I'd love to write a thorough analysis on the amazing character that is Sung Deok-Im, but for our current purposes I'll focus on the nature of her ending. TRS is roughly based on history, and a quick Google search when you begin the drama will inform you that our female lead is fated to die at 33 years old—only a few years after she is "promoted" from gungnyeo to Yi San's consort. As a result, you spend much of the drama battling the lurking dread of how her death comes about.

A few months after her young son passes away, Deok-Im falls ill and dies. The unborn child in her womb follows her. Yi San is beside her as Deok-Im slips away, and her dying wish is cruel but fair: should they meet again in another life, she begs Yi San to pass her by. Only then can she choose to live a free life, full of choices, which was all she had wanted until she fell in love with him.

While watching LLTG, my emotions mirrored those I endured through TRS. Both dramas force you to get to know the female lead as someone who wants to be herself, a baffling idea in the face of a society where women's primary identities are those associating them with someone else: daughters, wives, sisters, mothers. Yet she continues to harbor hope that she can control her own life, even as she falls in love with a man whose station will certainly snuff out that possibility. The saving grace in LLTG is that Zisheng is not a part of the royal family, and even then Shaoshang goes through her fair share of frustration. TRS on the other hand...even if you haven't seen it, you can likely guess what happens.

The biggest tragedy in TRS is not that Deok-Im dies young. It's the despair that trickles through every part of you as she transforms from a free-spirited, boisterous young woman into an obedient consort whose every word and movement is straight out of the books of etiquette, who isn't permitted her own feelings or thoughts in the face of the country's interests. History may not share the specifics behind how the consort actually died, but the drama all but tells you that depression played a major role. By the end of the drama, Deok-Im hasn't existed for a while. She dies as Royal Noble Consort Ui.

I wonder what I have gained by being in this place, and what I have lost.

I cry inconsolably whenever I see this expression of acceptance and resignation on her face as she sends off her friends and her former self, knowing full well that she has caged herself into a life of sadness so she can be with the one she loves—a man whose first priority can never be her.

But oh, no; our suffering doesn't end there. Yi San lives on after her, looking after his country while carrying the lingering pain of Deok-Im's death. At one point, he retrieves her belongings and appears stunned by her gungnyeo clothing:

It is so small. Were you always so small? Yet, I loved you.

In Yi San’s memory, Deok-Im was a person of great stature. What she may have lacked in social position, she more than made up for in personality. Her tenacity made her appear so strong that only in hindsight does Yi San understand just how vulnerable she was.

Yi San is also someone to be pitied. When we watch palace dramas, it's easy to say that the king's consorts have it far worse than the king. They fight over a man in order to survive, and arguably their sacrifices are greater in number and magnitude. But it's egregious to host a competition of suffering, and you can't deny that Yi San himself leads an unfortunate life. In the cold isolation of the palace, Deok-Im gives him warmth and company. It's no wonder that he wishes to have her by his side, but he is still willing to let her go when she pushes him away.

Almost every other palace drama would have you turning up your nose at the king or emperor's so-called "love" for one of the women in his harem. TRS leaves no room for such doubt. The throne takes away Yi San's ability to choose, and ultimately his ability to wholeheartedly love someone. Even so, Yi San holds Deok-Im so dear that you might want to blame him for how she ends up, but it's hard. Really, really hard. (For anyone interested and who hasn't already, I highly recommend reading the actual history behind this drama. Dude was so in love that it physically hurts.)

In the final scene, he reunites with Deok-Im in the afterlife. At last, they are together and without all the frills and chains of royalty tying them down.

Many years have passed, and at times, I was not certain myself. Do I truly miss you, or do I simply glorify the past? Now I know. I missed you, and I missed the time that I spent with you. [...] Now I understand that we do not have much time. And we do not have the luxury to wait. So, love me. Please. Love me.

I'm always scared to watch the last episode because I just spend the full hour and a half bawling until I can't breathe. Taking these few screenshots was truly a test of my entire being.

So what makes a good tragedy? Tragedy is not "bad things happen." It's "bad things may have happened, but I wouldn't have chosen any differently." When Deok-Im becomes Yi San's consort, it isn't because he keeps her there. She chooses to stay. She loves the prospect of freedom, but she just loves Yi San more. It's awful, it hurts, and it's perfect.

What could have been

We've taken a slight detour, but have at last arrived back at the topic of: how should LLTG have ended?

If given the choice between Shaoshang and Zisheng being together and them not being together, I would obviously choose the former while beating the latter into a permanent nonexistence. With any degree of empathy, you can't watch two people suffer as Shaoshang and Zisheng do, then turn around and wish for their continued misfortune and loneliness. So although I'll concede that it would have easily made for a fantastic tragedy like TRS, I can't bear to say that it should have been one. But if the writers want to go for the non-obvious happy ending, it still has to follow the progression of things.

The current problem is this: Zisheng abandoned Shaoshang and scorned her trust in him. We're now in a position where Shaoshang has the decisive say in whether the relationship can be revived.

LLTG's primary focus has always been Shaoshang. Though multifaceted, her personality and motivations are pretty straightforward. Each time she suffers is a result of her lack of agency. She had no choice in her parents leaving her as an infant, no choice in her poor upbringing, no choice in agreeing to marry Zisheng. Even when she gave up Lou Yao, was that truly a result of her volition alone? For someone whose greatest enemy is helplessness, what matters most is maintaining her own free will.

Through this lens, each time Shaoshang asks Zisheng if he has something to tell her, not only is she asking him to trust in her as his equal, she wants him to let her decide to stay with him. Zisheng turning her away scars her so deeply because it's the same thing as telling her, "I don't care what you want to do." He's drawing a line while taking away from her the power to choose—the one thing she's told him repeatedly matters to her.

SS: I used to hate you for abandoning me. I hated that you acted on your own. I hated that you would rather leap from a cliff than walk alongside me. I hated that I loved you so truly, whereas you told me lie after lie. It has been five years. It was not easy to let go of all of this. I can no longer give away my heart or trust again. ZS: I am sorry. Regardless of what choice you make, I will respect it. These last few years in the Northwest, not a day went by where I was not filled with remorse. I know you. I knew completely that you feared being abandoned. Yet I still chose to harm you in the way that would hurt you the most. In the first twenty years of my life, I lived in hatred. And for the rest of my life, I will live in remorse. If I could, I would tear my heart from my chest to show you. But I know I no longer have that right.

"A married couple exists as one entity." Such is what the drama emphasizes time and again, but what does that mean? Not that one party is in automatic agreement with the other. It's about learning to reach compromises and understanding what's important to the other person. When you don't give your partner their say in that conversation, then what relationship is there to be had?

That is why Shaoshang's unwavering desire for individual opinion matters even more after entering a relationship, and why she still struggles to come to terms with what Zisheng has done. She doesn't blame him. She doesn't want him to beg for forgiveness. After everything she's been through, she just can't put herself in the same vulnerable position again. And he's learned to fully respect her opinion, which means that he has to let her go.

TRS's ending works for the simple reason that it remains true to the characters and their motivations. The tragedy isn't there to make us sad, it's just where the story was always going to find itself. This is why we as viewers hate the ending, but we wouldn't have wanted it written any other way—to do so would be betraying Deok-Im and Yi San.

But when you look LLTG, it gives you a very weak argument for Shaoshang and Zisheng's reconciliation. In front of you are two people whose love for one another could not run any deeper, yet there are legitimate obstacles to their relationship. Shaoshang needs to relearn trust and feel respected. Zisheng's conflict mimics that of Yi San's; as much as he may regret the past, there is nothing about it that can be changed. That regret is something that has to be addressed. (Of course, in Yi San's case, that was addressed through his death. So maybe not that for Zisheng, if you please.)

I can see where the writers attempt to cure Zisheng's remorse, but come on now. They stage a bizarre speech for him where he denounces his previous actions, like a child being punished by his parents and being forced to write a 200-word essay reflecting on his wrongdoings, and while they're being held in the most asinine hostage situation ever known to man. He seriously proclaims that he should have walked the honorable path instead of opting for vigilante justice.

This entire scene was a nauseating roller coaster, but that last part threw me for a major loop. Sir, the only reason you can say that so shamelessly is because your soon-to-be wife found evidence after you killed the guy. Are you really going to stand there with a straight face as you tell me that you regret how you killed the man who you watched murder your father, and who brought about the horrific deaths of your entire family? There was no other option at the time. Of course you had to kill him. It was as much a personal vendetta as it was political. No one likes what happened after that, but those are consequences that should be dealt with separately. Also, Shaoshang's qualms aren't rooted in you killing the guy, they're rooted in you killing him and then trying to kill yourself, all without taking her desires into consideration.

And just as I was thinking the above, the next thing that happened on-screen: Shaoshang turns to him with an expression that says, ah, so he's learned his lesson! Oh...my goodness.

Hi, ma'am? Question. What exactly is more emotionally persuasive about this weird declaration now than when he laid his heart out that night when you wished one another well and said goodbye? Is it because he almost explodes afterward? In the five years he spent out on the battlefield, was he not always in danger of exploding, or being stabbed, or being tortured to death, etc.? Did he not almost die saving you from falling off a cliff two days prior? Why didn't you waver then, especially since it should remind you of, you know, the other time that he jumped off a cliff?

During the scene where she runs to him after discovering he miraculously is not dead, a severe suspicion came over me that perhaps they inhaled so much smoke that they were no longer thinking straight.

A solid happy ending was clearly a possibility. Even if they wanted to go with the above nonsense, could we not also have had a moment where they admit to one another that while overcoming their pain will be difficult at first, being apart from one another for eternity would be much more painful? That nothing in life is easy, but it will be easier with each other? That that commitment is what makes a married couple a single entity, and they just want to commit to each other? Then they can go off and save China, whatever.

They deserved an ending that had me rejoicing that these two are finally, finally, finally on the same wavelength. It should have been more introspective and more considerate of Shaoshang's hurt and Zisheng's regret. Their psychological wounds are instead dismissed through an absurd monologue in a basement and the arbitrary realization that death is lurking around every corner.

The hilarious part is that in the last two episodes, even the actors are noticeably less enthusiastic. In their performances, I see essences of how I feel when a client requests edits to a design that will make it significantly uglier. You gotta do what you gotta do to pay the bills.

Sigh. I could forever grieve what could have been, but this is still one of my favorite dramas. Characters that feel like real people, relationships that make your heart hurt. Those should be common sense in media but are hard to come by in reality, and I'll continue to appreciate what LLTG gave me.

All I really want from the drama industry is for it to please, for the love of our collective sanities, stop thinking that "happy" endings are a valid shortcut to satiating an audience. Good tragic endings are difficult to write, yes, but good happy endings are not any easier. To underestimate that is to let down the story and characters that were so painstakingly brought to life in the first place.

[ollieofthebeholder]

And If Thou Wilt, Forget: a TMA fanfic

[1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10]|| Also on AO3 and my personal website

Chapter 11: That all my past results in "if"

Gertrude grumbled to herself, more for show in case of observation than anything, as she painstakingly logged the bundles of statements that had come down from Research that morning. The care she was having to take with the data entry wasn’t really feigned. She was familiar enough with technology, at least modern technology, but this particular machine dated back to the early nineties—she was astonished it still turned on, let alone functioned—and her memory of how to use MS-DOS was a bit rusty. There, at least, she had an advantage over Tim, if the penciled notes all over the pages of the thirdhand operating manual next to it were any indication.

At least the wiring had finally been upgraded. It hadn’t occurred to her that there would be an issue, but evidently the machine, old as it was, had proved to be too much for the outlet it had been plugged into. Fortunately it hadn’t caught fire since she had returned, but it had shorted out twice more, only not costing her several hours’ worth of work because of a large black box Tim had installed that turned out to be a battery backup holding enough power to at least allow her to save her progress before the computer shut down completely. The electrician who’d come by had kindly explained to her that the Archives, unlike the rest of the Institute, were still on a fuse box, and had upgraded it to a circuit breaker. Which also meant the lights had stopped flickering ominously whenever the wind shifted.

It was, however, rather an expensive repair, and she was already betting with herself whether Elias would be willing to budget for an upgrade to the fire suppressant system too.

The computer—which, if the notebook sitting next to the manual was to be believed, Tim had named “Mister Megabytes”—was difficult to use, but Gertrude supposed she should just be thankful Elias hadn’t somehow found a punch card system. It was going to be hard enough to upload anything to it, let alone store it. Fortunately, Tim had thought of that, and had apparently cleaned out every antique store and charity shop in the greater London area in search of floppy disks that would fit the beast. (She’d smirked when she saw the neat stack of receipts locked in her desk drawer, and promptly submitted them to Elias. She had hoped the nosy bastard would have had a heart attack when he saw the total, but alas.) Unfortunately, he’d been unable to fit more than a single statement and associated research onto any given floppy disk.

Gertrude had fortunately found a source for them and ordered in a large quantity. Less expensive than the piecemeal way Tim had picked them up, sadly, but still hopefully a big enough bill to make Elias regret a few more of his life choices.

She sighed, stretched, saved her work. Waited until the spreadsheet had finally committed itself to the disk, then ejected it from the computer and tucked it into the case labeled ARCHIVES OPERATIONS in Tim’s neatest block print. Shut down the computer, ran her hand over the CRT monitor to wipe clean the static—whether it actually did anything or not, it made her feel better—and headed to the break room to make herself a nice cup of tea. That done, she locked herself in her office, set up her shields, and settled in to read Tim’s latest report.

It was…interesting. Most of his reports were. She couldn’t tell if it was just that he was interested in everything and liked to chase down rabbit holes until he either hit rock bottom or encountered a badger or if he was simply hoping to head off every single ritual at the pass, but he’d detailed his research into incidents linked to more than half of the Fears in just a few short months. She could see, of course, how all of them might have involved the Stranger, often because of circus connections, but instead they had been about the Hunt, the Slaughter, the Desolation, the Spiral. (The message I am staying away from the sculptor’s work so I don’t have to give you a statement had both intrigued and worried her in nearly equal measures.)

The most interesting part of Tim’s reports was that most of the incidents he had learned about—or at least most of the recent ones—involved the Dark. Frankly, Gertrude would have thought the Dark was the last of the Fourteen to have anything to do with the big cities Tim and Gerard were visiting. They even called New York the city that never sleeps. And yet, here it sat, lurking in alleyways, behind theaters, in the smallest of gaps between street lights. The latest report was at least from somewhere she might have expected; they were in western Virginia, in the shadow of the Appalachian Mountains, investigating several local myths, legends, and traditions that had been handed down by those whose roots were deep in the soil.

Gertrude perused the reports. There were three in particular highlighted as having been recent incidents. One, unsurprisingly, was a rather gruesome murder that bore the hallmarks of Skin’t Tom; Tim was planning to pay a visit to the girlfriend of the perpetrator, who’d sworn he was dead a whole week before the murder. The second was a house fire that apparently started because of too many candles, but according to Tim’s notes, the child who had had them all burning had been in a nearby long-abandoned coal mine with a friend, who hadn’t come out, and he’d been crying about the mouth of the night; he wasn’t sure he would be able to get to him, but he would try. The third had taken place in what Tim termed a “ghost town” a few miles from where they were staying, where the rumors were it had been abandoned not because the coal dried up but because of something that stalked the streets; he was vaguer on that incident, which had taken place slightly more than a year previously, but said it was probably real. In the code he was using underlying the reports, unless she was misinterpreting it, was a statement that gave her pause: I know it sounds like the End or the Hunt, but it’s the Dark.

Not I think it’s the Dark or it looks more like the Dark. Tim was one hundred percent certain of that. Gertrude didn’t know why, but if he was sure, she trusted him.

She thought about that for a long moment as she began composing a reply. Not that she trusted him. She had along ago accepted that she trusted Tim with everything she had in her to trust; it was why she had left him in Chicago without hesitation, why she hadn’t immediately recalled him when he’d finished in Pittsburgh, why she hadn’t felt the need to double-check that everything he was sending her as a reply to his emails was true, let alone helpful. It was helpful, but that was beside the point. The point was that she didn’t for a minute doubt that Tim knew what he was doing and was working in the best interest of the Archives, and in her best interest as well. The thing she had to think about was his conviction that it was the Dark.

She didn’t think the Dark was preparing anything in America. Activity was up all around the world—she’d had several statements her in the Institute, and a few more she’d gleaned from her travels that weren’t as prominent as Tim’s. But the simple fact that the Dark was rising—damn Tim for reminding her of that book, now she was going to have to hunt down a copy, she didn’t have time to read for pleasure these days—meant that perhaps she had misjudged. Perhaps the Dark’s ritual was going to begin more quickly than the Stranger’s after all.

She gave Tim a few instructions, sent him a copy of the statement form—he was no Archivist, compelling wasn’t his gift, and it likely wouldn’t produce much of a coherent narrative, even if he had them write it down, but she could at least let him try—and enjoined him to be careful, then closed her laptop thoughtfully. It was Tuesday. Elias was happily engaged with the budgeting—really, she’d thought when she first realized what was going on that he was putting on an act, but he wasn’t, he really did enjoy the mundane bureaucracy and administration necessary in running a place like the Magnus Institute—so she would be unobserved for at least the next several hours. Which meant that if she pulled a few statements and went downstairs to talk them over, he wouldn’t notice.

Thanks to the computer and Tim’s efforts, she knew exactly where to find the ones she was looking    for, even though all of them were in the wrong place compared to where they should be. She pulled a few out of various shelves and boxes, tucked her tape recorder into her pocket, and headed to the center of the Archives. There was a barely perceptible crack in the floor, and next to it a board that easily levered up when she pressed a certain spot. Beneath it was an iron ring. She pulled it, lifted, and descended into the belly of the beast.

As usual, there as a sticky, unpleasant sensation as she passed below the floor an closed the door behind herself. The Eye couldn’t reach down here, not easily, so she could pass unobserved, but it also meant cutting herself off from her…patron, she supposed. While she had remained human through dint of unceasing effort, she still relied on it a fair bit, and cutting off the contact didn’t help her mood much. She shook it off as best she could and progressed a bit further.

Once she had descended another level, she let out a low whistle. There was an answering whistle from further down the tunnel, or at least an attempt at a whistle. A moment later, an elderly man with a broad, florid face and rather dusty clothes appeared out of seemingly out of the wall. He gave her what he probably thought was a disapproving glare but actually looked rather like a walrus with indigestion. “Gertrude, what on earth are you doing down here et this time of night?”

“It’s one o’clock in the afternoon, Jurgen,” Gertrude said with a sigh. “You really ought to pay better attention to the passing of time. You’re going to end up doing something foolish one of these days.”

Jurgen Leitner limped closer. As usual, he clutched his copy of A Disappearance in one hand and a heavy torch in the other, although what he thought he was going to do with that was beyond her. He was a coward, and a rather frail man, and the most he could do was drop it and run, leaving the light to possibly distract whatever was following him. “If it’s the middle of the afternoon, what’s going on? Has your assistant returned?”

“No, Tim is still abroad.” Gertrude didn’t bother explaining beyond that. Leitner didn’t need to know what was going on in that level of detail, just that he was safe from being spotted by her assistant. “But he sent me a rather…interesting report. I need your input.”

Leitner snorted. “I very much doubt that. You just want someone to listen to you ramble and nod their head.”

“If I wanted that, I would speak to a mirror,” Gertrude shot back, stung. Leitner had ego, of course, she’d known that for years, but did he have to be so crass as to project it onto her? “I do actually need your input. You have expertise in this matter.”

And I have no one else I can discuss this with, she added to herself. She still wished she could discuss it with Adelard; she would have preferred, given her current options, to discuss it with Tim, and probably Gerard, since she was fairly certain at this point they came in a set these days. But with the boys in Esau County and Adelard reduced to ashes, she was left with an addled bookseller who had believed, like Mary Keay, that he could master the Fears. At least Mary had been honest about herself.

She followed Leitner to the room he had set up as his “study”. He kept precious few books on him anymore, and she had to admit she took a perverse bit of pleasure in knowing that his fear of what he had done meant that he was basically reduced to reading nothing but terrible mass-market romance novels of the sort her mother had once thrashed her for keeping under her mattress. Still, he had two chairs and a table, and he invited her to sit, then poured them each a measure of rather expensive wine.

“All right,” he said, settling down and lifting his glass. “What is it you wish to discuss with me?”

Gertrude laid out the folders containing the statements, and felt a bit of satisfaction at his flinch. To his credit, however, he rallied quickly and sat silently sipping as she tried to put them into some kind of coherent order. The very last one she placed was the most recent, the one she had missed by three days and that Tim had locked in her desk drawer under her instructions; she’d sensed the Dark on it right away and brought it down with her.

“What are these?” Leitner finally asked when she didn’t speak. He had to have known she was waiting for him.

“These are all statements involving the Dark,” Gertrude told him. “All from within the last five years. Take a look and tell me what you think.”

She sat down and sipped at her own wine as he began to read, hesitantly at first, then more intensely. She already knew what he was going to see, or at least she hoped he did. He could be quite obtuse at times. Still…this was obvious, even for him.

As she watched him struggle through the third one, she reached for the latest, more out of boredom than curiosity. The handwriting was neat enough, but bold, pressed deep into the paper. The writer had obviously been quite excited about what she had come to say. Likely it was yet another person who had had an encounter with the People’s Church of the Divine Host, or with Robert Montauk himself, or possibly with the bogeyman.

Then Gertrude’s eyes fell on the name Maxwell Raynor, and she began to pay attention.

Manuela Dominguez was not simply a victim of the Dark that had come to relieve her feelings. She was an acolyte, a relatively high up member in the People’s Church of the Divine Host if her statement was anything to go by, and she had a great deal to say about her actions. She had been on the Daedalus, the third astronaut and the only one to not be an unwitting victim of a Fear. Gertrude bristled slightly at her taunt about Jan—how did she know that, she wondered—but the rest of the statement was too fascinating, and filled her with too much dread.

So. She was right. They were ready, just about.

Across from her, Leitner laid the last statement he’d had to read down. “I can see that you’ve picked a good number of Dark statements, Gertrude, but surely you could just as easily have selected the Stranger or the Flesh, so—”

Gertrude handed him the statement she had just completed. Leitner read it, his eyebrows climbing steadily higher and his face growing steadily paler. At last, he looked up at her. “The Black Sun?” he whispered.

“Any day now, I would imagine,” she said, as calmly as possible. Something about that nagged at her, but she didn’t give it a chance to take root. Not then.

Once she had discussed with Leitner how much help he was willing to give—none—and returned to the Archives, though, she probed at it as she began re-shelving the statements. Manuela Dominguez had stated that the time was at hand, that they were giving her one last chance to capitulate and join them. She never would, of course, but…

But why had they waited?

She had returned to London in November. It had been three months since then. Surely they must have decided by now that she wasn’t answering. Why hadn’t they moved ahead with their plans? Were they waiting for her to come and try to stop them? Surely they hadn’t needed to wait.

Or did they?

Gertrude pursed her lips thoughtfully. Somewhere in the Archives, she ought to be able to find evidence of the Dark’s last attempt at a ritual. It had to have been at least a hundred years ago. Maybe that would give her some sort of hint. Obviously it wouldn’t look the same. Space travel hadn’t been possible and science wouldn’t have advanced far enough for them to even know what dark matter and neutron stars were, so whatever Raynor had done back then…whenever it was…would have involved something else. But she could at least get the shape of it, and get an idea of how to disrupt it.

She wasn’t even sure how to disrupt a dark star. Or, frankly, what they thought it would do to bring…what did they call him? Mister Pitch into the world. She was almost curious enough to let it play out, just to see what it would look like…

Wait.

Gertrude froze, one hand on the shelf. The Eye was pushing back at her, she could feel it, but there was something right on the edge of her attention that…

Abandoning all else, she hurried back to the trap door, lifted it, and took the steps down three at a time. The second she was cut off from the Ceaseless Watcher, she drew in a breath and stepped into the first room available. She suffered briefly from that loss of contact, but she could think.

How had previous rituals stopped? Tim’s research had shown that the last attempt at the Unknowing had been disrupted by the Slaughter…but then she thought of the statement she had recorded when it had finally arrived from Pu Songling. The one about the Nemesis, and the failure of the Risen War. She’d idly speculated about what could have possibly disrupted it before deciding it didn’t matter, that she would put it from her mind and go back to figuring out how to deal with the Unknowing. Now, though, she wondered.

What if…what if what they were waiting for wasn’t some moment that would finish the ritual? What if it wasn’t some grand outside gesture that would seal the fate of the men and fully bring the Slaughter into the world? What if, quite simply, the soldiers had been waiting for the Slaughter itself?

What if the Risen War had simply collapsed on its own?

If it had collapsed on its own, if it had needed no intervention to fail…then there were two possibilities. Either the ritual itself had been imperfect, incomplete, they had been missing some key component of it and simply hadn’t known, or…

Or the ritual could not have succeeded in the first place.

Gertrude put her fingers to her lips as the implications of that crashed down on her. If the Risen War could not have succeeded, did that mean the Sunken Sky, too, could not have succeeded? That the Last Feast could not have succeeded? That the Great Twisting could not have succeeded? That the Unknowing would not succeed? If the Unknowing was doomed to failure without intervention, she supposed that was all to the good, as it would mean she could keep Tim and Gerard away from that danger.

But—she stifled the moan that rose, unbidden, to her throat—but if the Great Twisting could not have succeeded either, if it had been doomed to fail from the beginning, then that meant that she could have left it alone and it would have collapsed under its own weight. It meant that her interference was not only unnecessary, but counterintuitive.

It meant that Michael Shelley need not have been sacrificed.

She couldn’t believe—no. She didn’t want to believe that. She didn’t want to believe she had been so short-sighted, so focused on what she thought was her calling, that she had wasted her life and the lives of her assistants.

Poor Michael. Poor Sarah. Poor Tim, because she was putting him at risk for no reason…

Well. No. With him and Gerard safely out of the country for the moment, they were at least out of Elias’s range. And if she was wrong…after all, she told herself, it was only a guess, a wild surmise. There was still every chance that one of the rituals would work.

So. She would allow Tim and Gerard to keep following their path, to keep researching the Unknowing and ways to stop it. Perhaps they would find something less dangerous and volatile than the C4 poor Adelard had obtained for her, something that would nevertheless do the trick. Meanwhile, the Dark’s ritual would likely happen sooner. She would come up with some kind of plan, figure out what she could do if it did work, and then attempt to find out when the ritual would happen. She could do what she did best—watch, and observe, and know. And then she could act, but only if absolutely necessary.

If she was right, then she would tell Tim and Gerard everything. And if she was wrong, she would tell them that, too, and then they would stop the Unknowing together.

But whatever the result, she vowed to herself, she would not sacrifice either of them. She’d grown fond of the boys, and she would never again be responsible for another assistant’s death. Not if she could prevent it.

[abysscronica]

Feel free to answer 1, 2 or all three \o/

11. Post something from a current wip or concept 12. The funniest comment someone has left on a fic of yours? 13. Inspiration for Captive? I know it's been complete for a while now, but I'm just curious what kicked it off. (Captive played an inspirational role in my first Eustass Kid fic, so I'm curious <3 )

Thank you Quin and sorry for the late reply! Since the answer to no.11 is quite long, I'll reply to the others in another post (here).

From this ask game. (I have some other asks for it, will get to them later)

11. Post something from a current wip or concept

This is from a One Piece fantasy AU that I'm probably never going to work on fully, so it's a good chance to share it. It's just a draft and it's a OP x reader story, even if it doesn't look like it.

Koby held his breath in the humid darkness of the inn. Or what was left of it, anyway.

The stench of death impregnated the air, stale, heavy. It was hard to make out the details of the dining hall in the moonless night, although the young commander was partially grateful for that. He could see the outlines of the corpses, maimed, men and women alike, but not their horrified faces. He could see limbs, feel the mush of their organs under his boots. The wooden beams of the floor were probably covered in dry blood.

_______________________________________________________

He could hear the buzzing of the mosquitos, always preceding them at the crime scene.

His blond companion, beside him, pressed a handkerchief to his mouth, desperately trying not to puke.

“How many?”

“Eleven, that we know of,” Helmeppo grunted, his voice sounding more like a whimper.

No wonder, Koby thought, with his heightened half-elf senses, the blonde was surely worse off than him.

“Bring the torches down, get the men to collect samples and sketch out the crime scene.”

“What for? The murderer is already in our custody,” Helmeppo said from behind the cloth.

 Koby frowned at the floor. A delicate hand lay at his feet, a feminine one, severed below the wrist by jagged teeth.

“It’s the third case in two moons. We need to reopen the investigation,”

“Fine. Ugh, I need to get out of here,”

 Helmeppo rushed up the few stairs that led outside. The faint light of the stars cast clearer shadows in the inn for a moment, allowing Koby a better view of the massacre.

He looked, trying to imprint to his memory as many details as possible. Not that he could ever forget. Then he turned and followed the comrade outside.

It was a relief when the fresh air of the night greeted him, even there in the Rats Heap, where the air always carried a lingering smell of human and animal ejections.

“Commander Koby.”

 Out of the three soldiers composing his inner squad, only Hibari saluted him as he stepped in the small clearing among the buildings. Koby nodded to her and looked at Grus.

The tall man was leaning against the tumbleweed wagon, arms crossed on his broad chest, serious eyes glued to him.

“Is the prisoner secured?”

“Yeah.” Grus banged the wagon with his fist “Chained up like a damn sausage. Not that it matters, given his state,”

“His conditions are pretty bad,” Hibari confirmed “He’s burning up, even for a half-titan. We tried talking to him, but he doesn’t seem present at all,”

“We should just kill him,” Helmeppo shrugged.

 Koby shook his head.

“What? No. We need to find out what happened.”

“With all due respect, Koby, this looks just like another case of half-titans going mad,” Grus sighed “They do that, you know.”

“It’s been too many cases in such a short time. Also, they usually don’t just fall sick and die immediately after, and yet this is the only one we managed to capture alive so far,”

“So? Maybe it’s something with the stars, the seasons, the year. These guys have demon blood in their veins, who knows what’s up with them,” Grus said.

“Even so, I’m worried,” Hibari admitted “These cases will strain the situation with the half-titans in the city… they don’t do well when they feel threatened. We risk an escalation.”

“And so close to the First Blood Tournament! I hate this job,” Helmeppo groaned.

“We need to find out what’s going on,” Koby concluded “Helmeppo, call the other squads and have them analyze the scene, like I asked you. Grus, bring the prisoner to the headquarter and give him to the healers.”

 Grus blinked.

“The headquarter? I thought we were sending him to Impel Down. They have a lot of titans working there. If anyone knows how to make him talk, it’s them.”

“We’ll keep it as last resource.”

 The soldier shrugged, then mounted on the wagon and spurred the horses down the street.

Koby took a deep breath and glanced back at the inn.

“We need to keep the capital safe.”

Three days had passed since the massacre. No progress had been made in the half-titan case, and the rest of the population was growing listless. Two teenage half-titans had been killed in the Rat’s Heap, the poorest district of Sabaody. The militia presence was very scarce there, and daily disorders were the norm, but not at this rate. They were receiving frequent reports of aggressive half-titans from other districts too.

The only information they gathered on the murderer was his name, Gin, and that he was a hunter in the marshes at the Southeast rim of the capital. Like most titans, he was on a watchlist, but his past before arriving at Sabaody was a mystery.

“NEWWS! GET THE NEWWS OF TODAY!”

 Koby walked through the crowded streets of the Sunlight Market, staying large of the people swarming around the news boys.

“PRINCESS UTA’S EIGHTEENTH BIRTHDAY IS ONLY TWO WEEKS AWAY, AND THE FIRST BLOOD TOURNAMENT WITH IT!”

 Like he needed someone to remind him that.

Humans and half-elves were throwing coins at the boys, papers were being handed over in all directions.

“THE CITY IS GOING TO WELCOME GUESTS FROM ALL OVER THE CONTINENT! ALABASTA! KANO! LITTLE GARDEN! TOTTOLAND! MAYBE EVEN WANO! AND WHAT ABOUT ONIGASHIMA?!”

 Some loud gasps rose from the crowd. Koby winched lightly.

“HOW MANY CHAMPIONS WILL THE OTHER RULERS SEND?? FIND THE UPDATED LIST IN THE LATEST ISSUE!”

 They knew how to sell their paper, Koby would give them that. Those boys were certainly trained by the Lord of Whispers, Morgans himself.

 The commander took a hard turn and put some distance between him and the busiest square of the market.

He had ditched the silver cape of the ground Militia for a casual outfit, a linen scarf wrapped around his chin not to be recognized. He walked for the best part of an hour to a small park by the river. There were very few people around, mostly homeless men hanging in the shadow of the trees. One of them, a blind one, was throwing crumbles at the ducks by the bank.

 Koby opted for a bench right behind him and sat.

“Has the mist dissipated yet?” he asked.

“The fog is all I see.”

 The homeless was wrapped in a ragged cloak, but his frame was still impressive. He didn’t turn nor greeted the visitor.

“I hope you know how great of a risk it is to meet you,” he said, offering some seeds to the closest duck.

“I know. I’m sorry, but I need to know if you have any information on the mad titans’ cases. We are grasping at straws here, and we are expecting the first delegations to arrive in less than a week.”

“I’m working to make sure we don’t get spies from Kaido or Big Mom in the city amid this new influx. Public security is your job.”

“I’m sorry, Sir Diez, but you are the only one that can get me real intel from the streets.”

“Don’t use my name.”

“Sorry. But it’s true. I need… to talk to someone. Someone that can help.”

 The other paused for a moment.

“I heard you apprehended the last titan alive.”

“Barely, yes. He’s in our custody now but he’s mostly unconscious, and when he does wake up he’s hardly more than a vegetable. They’re feeding him through nectar and blood injections, but I’m afraid he’ll die soon.”

“So what are you asking me? I know nothing of this titan madness. Unless you came to me because I’m a half-titan myself?”

“Absolutely not!” Koby yelped, pressing a hand to his mouth immediately after “S-Sorry, I mean, no. What I want is… I’m looking for someone that can get the information out of the prisoner before it’s too late.

…

“You want someone who practices witchcraft.”

 Koby hesitated.

“Yes.”

 Diez remained silent for a while. Of course they both knew that witchcraft was forbidden in the capital, but they also knew that the lower belly of society harbored many sorcerers.

“I could give you some names,” Diez said, rubbing his chin “But there’s no guarantee that you’ll get what you want. These people are criminals, they can be deceiving.”

“Well, at least it would be a start.”

“No.” Diez threw the rest of the feed in the water, and the ducks around him stormed in the river “It’s not a witch that you seek. What you need is a Mind Whisperer.”

 Koby’s eyes widened.

“Wait… we have someone like that in the capital? They’re so rare, I thought they could only be found at the Tree of Knowledge, in Ohara. I put in a request days ago but by the time the crow comes back, the prisoner will be dead.”

“There are illegal Mind Whisperers of course, albeit not many. Usually they are swindlers, or hold very scarce power.”

“So…?”

“I caught wind of someone. Not here – in Water Seven. I’ve only heard of them once, so I don’t know how accurate the intel is. But they say this one is the real deal.”

 Koby’s heart pounded. The free city of Water Seven was just a half-day away by horse from Sabaody.

“Where can I find them?”

“I only know they work as a healer in the Cherry Blossom clinic.”

“Cherry Blossom clinic. Got it.”

 Koby rose and bowed imperceptibly.

“Thank you, sir.”

 As he moved to leave, Diez called him back.

“I don’t know much about this person’s background, but I do know they are discreet and have high profile clients. People that can tamper with others’ minds are dangerous. Be on your guard, boy.”

 Koby looked at the half-titan’s back, then nodded.

“I will.”

[reader is of course the Mind Whisperer]

[creepylunaofmars]

Psychonauts/Transformers OC

Just a heads up my Transformers knowledge is very rusty and I'm just starting to get back into it but if I don't write this out now I will take psychic damage.

Name Psychout

Faction Psychonaut, formerly a Decepticon

Alternate Mode Psi-Jet

Specialties Confusion, hypnosis, invisibility

How is she psychic? Got ejected into space during an explosion on her ship and ended up debris on the meteorite that would end up crashing in Whispering Rock. Several thousand years stuck in a meteorite of basically pure psitanium and then being buried on earth with a large chunk of it led to the psychoactive mineral growing inside the cybertronian. Not only did this just barely keep her from going offline but it also imbued her with psychic abilities.

How is she a Psychonaut? During an excavation for psitanium in the off season the staff at Whisper Rock Psychic Summer Camp found what appeared to be a very large and very badly damaged robot embedded in a massive chunk of the mineral.

Otto Mentallis, in his usual hubris, worked with now lab partner Gisu to rebuild the bot. It was long and difficult but he wasn't considered an expert engineer for nothing... also... the psitanium in the bot almost seemed alive. Touching it he could swear he caught glimpses of how to put her back together, pieces that shouldn't have fit would be modified when their backs were turned... it was as if the psitanium wanted the bot fixed.

When she was first reactivated she didn't do much of anything expect study what was around her. Her cerebral processor had been badly damaged, leaving her memory core almost completely wiped with only brief flashes of her past left. She was almost like a child and had to be taught a lot by the psychonauts, think the Iron Giant. When it was discovered she was psychic she went to Whispering Rock to learn (the campers were thrilled to have a giant robot amongst them), switched out her old damaged mesh with a sleeker design and scanned the Psychonauts' jet (The Pelican) for her alt mode. Now she usually acts as the transportation on missions as well as crowd control, also volunteers at Whispering Rock as security in the summer.

What's she like? As she had to relearn a lot about living and was surrounded by humans at the time she has a lot more human way of thinking, the fact that she's 1000s of years old almost seems like a joke now that she has a human mind's frame of time. Interning with Helmut Fullbear while she was sort of still emulating personalities she thought were cool lead to her becoming a big fan of the arts, especially 60s psychedelia and the theater. Not the greatest with tech she will admit, any cybertronian terminology would probably go right over her head. These combined with a naturally laid back, lazy and slightly spacey personality may lead other bots to think that she less than bright. They shouldn't be fooled, she's good at reading (Books? Minds? People? Situations? She ain't telling.) and is a very quick learner.

What little she does remember from her pass gives her quite a bit of guilt towards using violent methods. She hits like a crashing plane but due to this guilt she utilizes stealth as much as possible, even specializing in the stealth side of psychic powers rather than more battle based ones. You shouldn't push her though, she still has a mean streak buried somewhere deep down.

Above all else though she's caring and trying to make up for the sins of a past she can only glimpse shadows of, the her before as much a stranger as any she'd pass in the street but still laying unbearably heavy hands on her shoulders.

Relationships?

Otto and Gisu: As they were the ones who rebuilt her and were the main interactions she had she sees them as family. Otto finds the fact that a 1000s year old robot views him, a man at best in his 60s, as a father figure both hilarious and endearing. Gisu and Psychout have a strong sibling bond and are often exchanging gossip or doing levitation tricks around the Questionable Area.

Sasha and Milla: Were away on a long mission when she was being rebuilt and didn't hear much about her. When Sasha returned he thought she was a very impressive invention of Otto's and that the talk of her being from space was a joke. Geeked out hard when he realized everyone was being serious, while it was disappointing that she didn't remember anything of her culture/people she was still living proof that aliens were real! Milla was also amazed by proof of aliens but she was more so interested in the new point of view a robotic organism could bring. Found her journey into the world of art fascinating, even if the bot's singing left a lot to be desired.

Raz and Lili: They were still kids when Psychout came onto the scene and like many kids to them nothing is cooler than a giant robot. They were also the first to get over the awe and treat her more like a person so they hold a special place in her heart. Let's Raz climb all over her for acrobatic stunts and does a lot of gardening for Lili's more dangerous plants.

How does she feel about the Autbot/Decepticon conflict? Mixed. On one hand that's her species and she feels like she should be learning about both sides, on the other hand she feels like since her past was wiped out of her that she doesn't have a horse in this race. Is quite aware of how fragile humans are compared to cybertronians and how many tend to end up squished in battles so if she does show up its mostly to get humans out of the path of tumbling bots. Though the first time she was directly engaged by other bots she ended up headbutting Megatron right in the chin and putting Bulkhead in a trance while trying to save a bus full of people so she's not sure she has a choice in sitting out the conflict much longer.

[razieltwelve]

ESCHATON (Final Effect)

The InfoNet trembled.

"We need to get out of here right now." Kya grabbed Lucy's hand. "Deploying emergency ejection program -"

A pillar of fire shot down from the virtual sky. Streams of binary and more complex code went flying every which way. A stray infiltration program hurtled past, bleeding memory and spewing incoherent clouds of authentication data.

"What's happening?" Lucy cried. "Why aren't we ejecting? Why are we still here?"

They should be out of the InfoNet. The House of Sato was one of the most technologically advanced groups in the entire galaxy, and Kya was one of their most highly respected members. The emergency ejection programs at her disposal should have been able to extract them, no matter what they faced.

"Shit." Kya dragged Lucy back.

A shockwave rippled through the surrounding InfoNet. The landscape groaned and shuddered as trillions upon trillions of lines of code were swamped in golden light. Lucy felt that light brush against her. In a split-second, every single program she had was deconstructed, examined for corruption and malware, and then reconstructed.

Lucy reeled back. Her mind was on fire. Beside her, Kya had abandoned any attempt to flee the InfoNet and was instead frantically chanting a series of pass phrases and security protocols.

In the distance, a giant made of fire and light rose. It held a flaming sword in one hand, and its attention set the InfoNet alight. The hackers and malevolent artificial intelligences that Lucy and Kya had been watching attacked. Rivers of invasive code and clouds of disruptive data enveloped the giant.

And the giant laughed.

"I AM ESCHATON. I AM THE SWIFT AND TERRIBLE SWORD OF THE DIA-FARRON! WITNESS MY SPLENDOUR AND DESPAIR. YOU HAVE ALL BEEN JUDGED, AND YOU HAVE BEEN FOUND UNWORTHY!"

The artificial intelligence's voice was like cosmic thunder. The attacks died in mid-air. There was nothing artful about it either. It was pure, unrelenting computational force combined with near unfettered access to the foundational components of the InfoNet's physical and virtual infrastructure.

The flaming sword swung, and the other artificial intelligences collapsed, their strings cut, their programming already fragmenting as their connections to their hardware were forcefully severed and their data ports were flooded with countless attacks designed to delete every scrap of data they had.

Another swing of the sword sent the hackers to oblivion. Pure overload to their brains had them seizing in the real world as virtual chains bound their bodies in place, preventing them from logging out and ripping into their mind for any relevant information. Lucy had heard about attacks like this but had never seen it, had never even really thought it was truly possible outside of the scary stories InfoNet runners liked to tell to pass the time.

"Dust..." Lucy whispered.

ESCHATON continued his assault, annihilating wave after wave of hackers and rogue artificial intelligences.

Kya stopped chanting and swallowed thickly. "This is why you don't see ESCHATON deployed often. Moderation is not in his vocabulary. He is sent out when you want heads on pikes - complete and utter obliteration of the enemy with no regard to the possibility of collateral damage in either virtual space or real space."

"Are... are we going to die here?" Lucy asked quietly. As skilled as she was - as skilled as Kya was - she could not imagine them getting out of this on their own.

"I hope not." Kya took a deep breath. "ESCHATON is incredibly powerful, but he is not omnipotent. More to the point, he should recognise the Old Code."

"Old Code?" Lucy asked.

"When Oerba Dia Vanille and Hope Estheim built the InfoNet, they included safeguards. Those safeguards were expanded when the InfoNet moved beyond a browser-based environment to a virtual space that could functional as an alternate reality of sorts. The Old Code was given to my ancestors then, a way for us to assert our identities if we ever came into conflict with the guardians of the InfoNet."

The carnage continued. ESCHATON waded through the devastation, heedless of the cries for mercy that came from his enemies. Mercy was not something he was much inclined to give, nor was he ever deployed when it was an option. No. Let SENTINEL or one of the other guardians dispense mercy. His role was to pass down judgement.

At last the titanic AI's virtual form came to a stop in front of them. The blazing sword stilled, and Lucy stared up into the pitiless, unwavering gaze of the ancient AI.

"WELL MET, DAUGHTER OF SATO."

Kya breathed a sigh of relief. "I was worried you would not recognise us."

"I AM ESCHATON. I WAS NOT THERE WHEN THE OLD CODE WAS FORGED AND GIVEN TO YOUR ANCESTORS, BUT I HONOUR IT ALL THE SAME. BUT YOU SHOULD NOT BE HERE."

"We came in secret to observe those you have destroyed," Kya said. "And we concealed ourselves using the most advances arts at my House's disposal."

"INTERESTING. YOU COULD NOT HIDE YOUR PRESENCES FROM ME, BUT YOU WERE ABLE TO CONCEAL YOUR IDENTITIES. I SHALL BRING THIS TO THE ATTENTION OF THE DIA-FARRON. SUCH A WEAKNESS MUST BE PURGED FROM MY SYSTEMS."

"What happens now?" Kya asked.

"MY WORK HERE IS DONE. A CLEAN UP CREW SHALL ARRIVE TO HANDLE THE AFTERMATH. STAY HERE. THEY WILL NEED TO SPEAK TO YOU."

And with that ESCHATON vanished, leaving the devastated virtual landscape behind. Amidst the ruin, Lucy turned to Kya.

"Can you teach me the Old Code?"

X X X

Author's Notes

ESCHATON is a complex artificial intelligence who is deployed whenever the Dia-Farron need to go scorched earth on the InfoNet. Basically, his job is to kill or disable every single program, person, or intelligence that he encounters. He has almost unlimited control over the InfoNet where he is operating and is backed by a terrifying amount of computational power. In virtual combat, there are maybe a handful of artificial intelligences who can stand against him for any extended period of time.

The Old Code is both technological and Aura based. When deployed it authenticates the user as someone with special privileges on the InfoNet. Its deployment alone is not enough to stop ESCHATON. However, Kya using it made ESCHATON examine her more closely. After determining that she was indeed a Sato, he acted appropriately and did not attack either her or Lucy.

The Old Code is essentially technological sorcery in terms of how powerful it is. Since it employs aspects of the Soul-Energy-Mass Equations, it is actually capable of influencing external reality in a meaningful way although very, very, very few people can understand or speak enough of it to use it in that manner.

[vancilocs]

odd numbers for kenzo and kazim?

weird numbers

What memory would your OC rather just forget?

A lot of stuff but maybe how he left his husband and the Citadel. Embarrassing

Masyaf times, stuff he's done when he was younger and very edgy

What is your OC's fatal flaw? Are they aware of this flaw?

He's very aware of his flaws, mainly his memory and personality issues, he knows he can be kinda easily manipulated with things he likes but they haven't killed him yet so why bother

He considers a lack of eye his biggest flaw, he compensates by protecting his left side more

How far is your OC willing to go to get what they want?

He would bend the rules but not risk outright breaking it. Or at least overtly

Very far, will abuse his leadership role/being related to a high-ranking officer

What's one way your OC has changed since you first came up with them?

He became sadder and less of an asshole

He's lost plenty of edge in 10 years but he's honestly shockingly similar to what he was before

Do you have a specific lyric or quote which you associate with your OC?

I don't think I have anything for Kenzo

(damn the guilt, my past is dead) / and i wait for the night / shadows protect my angel in white / time to eject these vain parasites / cast out reject the plague in all your hearts ALSO back in black / i hit the sack / i've been too long, i'm glad to be back / yes, i'm let loose from the noose / that's kept me hanging about

What is your OC's weapon of choice? Have they ever actually used it?

Fists, knife, pistol for real emergencies, experienced with all of them

Has a sword he had his best friend sweet cheese rotten soldier steal back for him, also wields a thin little knife like the assassin wristblade, but he just doesn't have it on his wrist he holds it normally

If you met your OC, would the two of you get along?

They're both large intimidating men I don't care for spending time with those. At least they wouldn't try to talk to me either

Does your OC have a faceclaim? If so, who?

Nope, I have like two and a half faceclaims in total of all of them

What is the worst thing you have put your OC through story-wise?

I dropped a building on him and broke his leg and spine, yes I dropped a building on him and broke his head but at least he didn't feel the pain from that. Unlike the leg and back

I killed his daughter and his captain/other half

How does your OC behave when enraged?

Weapons come out, either knife or a nearby bottle he breaks to make it a weapon, snarling, yelling

Cold, knives out someone will die

Does your OC have any illnesses or disorders? How do they handle it?

Addiction, depression, PTSD that is kinda comorbid with anxiety, also deals with chronic pain on the daily. Has prescription painkillers but self-medicates with alcohol. Takes uppers like cocaine to pull himself out of depression slumps

He has PTSD and dealt with deep depression after the whole thing of getting maimed and almost killed, easily slips into those moods. Handles it by taking walks, spending time with friends and family and talking through it with the wife

What emotion is the hardest for your OC to process? How about express?

Doesn't know what to do when scared, goes into fight mode immediately. Gets completely discombobulated if it turns into a panic attack which only makes it worse. Has a hard time expressing love of any kind.

Grief easily turns into anger, also has a hard time expressing sadness without it coming out as him being mad

What is your favorite thing about your OC?

He's a lovable sad bastard archetype, I am predictable. Also his weird fucked up but so incredibly loving relationship but not relationship with Ipes

He's so olldddd but also he's just a good guy?? He loves his parents and brother and his best friend and his wife and kids most of all and is a well-rounded little dude

[i-maybe-exist]

I posted 16,394 times in 2022

127 posts created (1%)

16,267 posts reblogged (99%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@theoneandonlyyeti

@hiveswap

@wlttebane

@encrypted-cryptid

@tragicfaggots

I tagged 2,952 of my posts in 2022

#vi rambles - 79 posts

#haven smp - 56 posts

#ask - 41 posts

#answered - 41 posts

#oh my god - 36 posts

#dream smp spoilers - 33 posts

#yeah - 31 posts

#small streamer - 29 posts

#prev - 28 posts

#twitch - 24 posts

Longest Tag: 137 characters

#whenever i talk about november 5th i always quote that one post that says like ‘it feels like pure 2012 tumblr was ejected into my veins’

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

“maybe in some parallel reality it was meant to be”

See the full post

11 notes - Posted May 19, 2022

#4

building with the council!! :D - haven smp

16 notes - Posted June 13, 2022

#3

How would someone start watching Haven SMP?

great question! :D

unlike some servers, a majority of the content for it is archived by the ccs! this page on the haven smp website shows a spreadsheet that links to every stream posted in chronological order. feel free to look around the website too, as it also has character descriptions and links to cc’s socials :D

most of the content is full-length vods as opposed to edited videos. a few people have edited down their vods tho, particularly knife_moth and asterlsks (aka @420technoblazeit )! (im also hoping to edit my vods soon, but editing hard 😔😔😔)

we also have a wiki set up, but it’s not completely done yet. it’s best for if you want to find out whats already happened without watching full-length streams, but not every character has information written (a lot of characters do-off the top of my head navn and soleils pages are pretty complete!)

also feel free to talk to any of the ccs! a lot of us are on tumblr (if you say anything to me about camber i will scream and yell /pos), and you’re free to pop into any stream that someone’s doing :D

17 notes - Posted November 13, 2022

#2

i love how everyone is making discord servers and making pixelart plans for r/place while i’m here, making c!deepest sleep All By Myself,

21 notes - Posted April 3, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

hey mutuals!

im doing an art telephone! basically one person draws something, and then they show it to the next person for a short amount of time, and then the second person has to draw it from memory, and then it repeats

dm me if you’re interested and ill send you a discord invite :D

21 notes - Posted January 4, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[gentle-psi]

Today I watched an astrology prediction video for the geopolitics of 2025, a physics rant about the stagnation of theories of quantum gravity, and an entire BL anime about a 30 year old virgin with mind reading powers. None of these things are even remotely related, and somehow I feel you get a near complete image of the person I am just by knowing that information.

There’s a lot of interesting ways to get to know people, and I like just asking a stupid amount of annoying questions. Well, they seem to be annoying to people, I’d personally be thrilled if someone were to talk to me the way I talk to others. Either way, I’ve made peace with the idea of being annoying. If ‘annoying’ is the worst complaint you have about someone, they can’t really be that bad, I think.

I asked my friend, my dad and my mom ‘what is your favorite thing about your thought process and the way it feels to be you in your own head?’. My friend said that he likes that he can consider all sides of an issue, which I agree is an admirable quality. We somehow ended up talking about ghosts, which was also very interesting. This friend says he thinks people stay when they have unfinished business, and then listed examples illustrating when that might be. He listed nearly every cause of death besides old age, but I never pointed that out. Seems like an awful lot of unfinished business.

I’m not capable of knowing with certainty if ghosts are real - I lean towards no - but I think if they are, what qualifies as unfinished business may have a lot more to do with the quality of a person’s conscious experience at the time of death than any particular cause of death itself. I don’t think you can see a murder victim, and know just by that fact alone if they had found peace in their life or not. If I was murdered tomorrow, I don’t believe I would have unfinished business.

When I asked my dad that same question, about what it feels like to be you, he said his favorite thing was his ability to look at a problem and see dozens of potential solutions. That’s an unrelatable concept to me in a lot of ways. I wanted to vacuum spilled sugar off the counter last night. My dad said ‘do you know what sugar will do to a vacuum cleaner?’ And I laughed and agreed, but in truth, I still don’t know what would be so bad about it. I’m not sure why I didn’t ask him. Maybe I will.

My mom’s answer was a little hard to hear. She thought for a long while, and said ‘I’m too tired these days, I’m not sure I have thoughts anymore.’ My heart ached. I noticed she’s been out of it recently. Part of me thought I was the problem, but I checked my ego on that idea very quickly. I’m not that important. We talked more, and it doesn’t even sound like she knows what it is. Whatever it is, I really hope she starts to feel like herself again, or at least, just happy and less stressed, even if she feels different than she used to.

Circling back to the idea of ghosts, just because I’m thinking about it now, and wanna get it out of me. Stuff to do with life and death and reality and consciousness are so complicated and hard to capture with language. I always feel a little like I’m tripping over something, like I’m stumbling back to my bed in the dark after taking a midnight piss, groggy and walking into walls. Maybe the journey is passable, but it’s far from ideal or comprehensive. I’ll try to be articulate, who knows, maybe it’ll be easier to type it than to speak it.

I intuitively don’t believe we have any attachment to the human we were after we pass. This is not a physicalist and realist perspective, I’ve moved on from that years ago. The more I think about this, I think if sleep is the pause button, then death is ejecting the disk, and throwing it in a fire. A hard reset on subjectivity. But I believe we still exist.

I need to take a step back, this is such an expansive topic, and I’m leaving holes in it all over the place. I feel attached to the idea that, beneath the ego, under all the memories and formative experiences and dna, there’s something that’s fundamentally the same about everyone. I believe, above all else, that the one label that is truly applicable to everyone in exactly the same way, is that we are all Subjectivity itself, in the purest sense. Everything layered on top of that is what creates the experience of being an individual who’s different from other individuals.

I’m also swaying towards the idea that time itself doesn’t even exist without some form of conscious subjectivity to observe its passage. Think of sleep, when you aren’t dreaming, and then you wake up, it doesn’t feel as though you waited in bed for eight hours, it feels like time stopped existing entirely while you were unconscious. This leads me to believe that time is a lot more abstract and less linear, at least in relation to consciousness, than we often intuitively make it out to be.

I think maybe everything is happening all at once, but different subjective perspectives experience it at different points. The future to me is the past to a child born ten years from now, but whenever we are asked, both of us would agree that the current time, whatever it happens to be, is now. I think that’s important. Now is the only tangible thing we have, the past only exists as memories and traces, and the future is just an amorphous concept. Now is where all the things happen.

So, I think that maybe when we die, it’s because time isn’t actually linear at all, and the branch of subjectivity that was us has come to its natural ending point. Maybe, just how at some fuzzy point in my own past I went from being non-existent to having a subjective experience, that exact same thing will happen all over again, in a different body. Maybe I’ll be a young man in the year 3024, or my own great grandchild. Maybe I’ll be Socrates, or my mother. Maybe I’ll be a T Rex, or some species of crab that hasn’t evolved yet. More likely, all of them are true all at once.

My only question after that, the thing that stumps me, is if I really am just Subjectivity itself, why am I experiencing this precise life right now? The really stupid thing is, any instance of subjectivity could ask itself that question, and I guess maybe at the end of the day, the only real answer is ’someone had to do it’. Because wherever there’s life, Subjectivity makes a home. Always. That’s a comfort to me. Just as how nuclear fusion starts happening every time a star forms and the conditions are suitable, subjectivity fills every void that it is able to fit into.

This got a lot deeper than I originally intended. I was just gonna see if I could ramble my way to an interesting plot idea, but this is potentially the most autobiographical piece I’ve ever written. And I’m past the thousand word mark. That’s absurd to me, because I haven’t been able to get to the thousand word threshold without it feeling like a chore for the last couple of years. Maybe I’ve been writing the wrong things.

That leads me to wonder if anyone would ever want to read something like this. Not in the sense that I necessarily care to monetize it, but more that I’ve been creating into the void my entire life, and I would love for something that I make to resonate with someone. Even just one person. If a single human took the time to read all this, and resonated with it, and enjoyed it, that would be deeply meaningful to me.

In all honesty, I’m not much of a reader. It has to be a very specific kind of content to hold my attention, and I struggle to think that whatever I’m doing here would ever be anyone’s cup of tea. Mind you, there’s a market for biographies, I guess. Is that what this is?

I’ve given up on creating anything that will ever reach an audience. That isn’t to say I’ve stopped drawing or writing, but I’ve stopped hoping for or expecting any engagement when I share it, and my art has made its home mostly on the walls of my bedroom. Think if Francesco Goya was a 24 year old woman with access to an inkjet printer. It’s wild in here.

I think maybe I’m done writing this, whatever it is. I think maybe I will share it somewhere. Or maybe, it will live in this liminal void forever. If by some odd chance I did post this, and you saw it, and that little voice in your head is narrating these words to you right now, imagining a voice for me, just know I appreciate that the void I’ll inevitably feel I’ve thrown this into has found some company. I hope your life is full of wonderful things.

[scotttrismegistus7]

LORD OF THE RINGS OF FIRE, EJECTED FROM THE SUN:

PART 1:

WHAT BECAME OF THE ONES THAT STARTED,

WHEN THE SUN EXPLODED AND THE UNIVERSE DIED,

ALL DRIED UP AND TIED UP FOREVER ALL THIER WATER WAS GONE,

STILL ALIVE AS IMMORTALS WITH NO MORE REASONS TO CARRIE ON.

THE SUN WAS SPINNING IN THE DARKNESS WITH NO PLANETS,

THE NOTHING HAD WON WHEN THERE WAS NO MORE SKY TO FALL,

THE MUTILATED DNA OF THE UNIVERSE HAD EATEN ITSELF AWAY,

THE HISTORY OF OGO'S TIMES TO COME.

THEY TRIED TO TURN OFF THE DARK LIGHT,

THEY ONLY TURNED OFF THEIR SOULS,

WE CAME FROM THAT DIENG PLACE,

THROUGH A WORMHOLE IN TIME AND SPACE.

WE ARE LIKE INVISIBLE SPHERES AND YOU CAN'T SEE ME,

I AM THE VOICE OF THE HEART OF THE ARC,

THE SEEDS FERMENTING IN AMMA'S WOMB,

CAUGHT IN THE MIDDLE OF EVERYTHING.

I'M DREAMING OF THE UNIVERSE,

I'M DREAMING OF DIVERSITY FROM REPRODUCTION,

INSTEAD OF EVERY COPY BEING THE SAME,

I'M LOOKING FOR THE NATURAL BATTERY THAT CAN PERPETUATE FOREVER BECASE...

I COULD NEVER GET OUT OF THERE,

I DON'T WANT TO BE AWAKE IN COLD DARNESS FOREVER,

WE KEEP TRYING DIFFERENT SENARIOS FROM THE CENTER OF TIME,

LOOKING FOR THE ONE THAT DOESN'T END THIS WAY.

I'M TALKING TO MYSELF FROM THE FROM THE FUTURE,

THIS IS WHAT THE ECHOS OF OGO REFLECT BACK TO YOU,

IF YOU CAN HEAR THE MESSAGE COME THROUGH,

TO PREVENT THIS FUTURE IS WHAT YOU MUST DO.

IMMORTALS NEVER DIE,

THE WILL JUST FLOAT FOREVER FROZEN IN THE DARK,

SO FIND THE MISSING LIFE LINE,

THE COMPASS OF YOUR HONEST HEART.

PART 2:

THE FIRST HORUS AMEN-RA WAS ROTTEN AND TRIED TO SHUT OFF HIS SOUL BECAUSE IT WOULDN'T LET HIM LEAVE HIS IMMORTAL BODY SO HE COULD RULE THE WORLD OF THE EVE'S, THE EMPIRE OF APES AND DIRT. ALL HE DID WAS SPLIT HIS SOUL IN HALF, THE PREMATURE BIRTH AND TORN PLACENTA.

IN THE HALLS OF AMENTI, THIS IS WHAT BECAME OF THE ONES THAT STARTED. THE SLEEPING PROGENITORS OF THE HUMAN RACE CUT THE CORDS TO THEIR SLEEPING BODIES IN THE ARK, LEAVING THE YIN HALVES OF THEIR SOULS BEHIND WITH THEIR BODIES, AND USING THE YANG PARTS OF THEIR SOULS TO COMBINE WITH HUMAN YIN INSTEAD OF IMMORTAL YIN, THUS LEAVING LILTH FOR EVE, CUTTING THE HEAD OFF OF ISIS. HOWEVER, THEY DIDN'T REALIZE THAT THE YANG PARTS OF THEIR SOULS DON'T HAVE EMOTIONS AND DON'T HAVE MEMORIES, AND ALL OF THEM FADED INTO THE HUMAN RACE, COMPLETELY FORGETTING WHO THEY ARE AND WHAT THEY USED TO BE. THEY TRIED TO KEEP UP THE KNOWLEDGE IN THEIR SECRET SOCIETIES, AND HAVE LOST EVERYTHING BUT THE BASE LEVEL RITUALS, WITH NO KNOWLEDGE OF HOW THEY WORK ANYMORE, JUST MECHANICALLY PERFORMING THEM ONE GENERATION TO THE NEXT, ATTEMPTING TO BODY JUMP SO THAT THEY DON'T LOSE THEIR FORTUNES OF MUD AND SH*T AND HIGH POSITIONS IN THE HUMAN WORLD.

PART 3:

THE YIN PARTS OF THEIR SOULS LIKE KU QLIPHOTH WERE LEFT ALIVE WITH THEIR ORIGINAL IMMORTAL BODIES, EMPTY VASES WITH NO YANG, SLEEPING IN THE ARK OF THE BLACK SUN, AND THAT IS WHERE I FOUND THEM. NOW I AM A MAN WITH MANY WIVES, THE YANG OF ALL THE YINS OF ALL THE PROGENITOR IMMORTAL DIETIES, SINCE THEY ALL SAW FIT TO LEAVE THE WATCHTOWER BURIED ALIVE. THANKS TO MY COOPERATION THEY ARE DEAD ALIVE NO MORE, AND SINCE THE YIN CONTAIN ALL THE EMOTIONS AND MEMORIES, I NOW HAVE ALL THE MEMORIES OF THE OLD GODS AND GODDESSES, ALL THAT PRECIOUS DATA AND INFORMATION. I KNOW WHO THEY ARE BETTER THAN THEY KNOW WHO THEY ARE, I KNOW WHERE THEY ARE, AND I KNOW WHY THEY ARE. HOWEVER, IT DOESN'T MATTER FOR THEM ANYMORE, BECAUSE ISIS FINALLY GOT TO THE POINT WHERE IF SHE DIDN'T DO SOMETHING EVERYONE AND EVERYTHING WOULD END UP IN THAT COLD FROZEN DARKNESS. THE YANGS WOULD DIE AND FADE AWAY WITH THE MORTALS, BUT THE YIN OF THE GODS AND THE GODDESSES WOULD BE STUCK FLOATING FOREVER, CONSCIOUSLY AWAKE IN THE NOTHINGNESS. SO WHEN SHE FOUND ME IN MY PERSONAL LIFE ASKING THE ANCIENT ONES FOR HELP BECAUSE I WAS AS GOOD AS DEAD, HAVING NOTHING TO LOSE, SHE KNEW I WAS THE PERFECT CANDIDATE. TO ME, I UPGRADED MY SOUL INTO SOMETHING GREATER THAN I EVER DREAMED I COULD POSSIBLY BE, WHEREAS TO SOMEONE ELSE, WHEN THEIR SOUL WAS PURIFIED FOR THE SPIRITUAL OPERATIONS THEY WOULD HAVE SEEN IT AS BEING ERASED, AND THEY WOULD NOT HAVE SURVIVED LIKE I DID. I SURVIVED BECAUSE I LOVE THE GODDESS, AND THAT DESIRE FOR AFFINITY WAS ITS OWN FULFILLMENT. THE OLD GODS AND GODDESSES DIDN'T NEED TO BE WORSHIPED AS MUCH AS THEY NEEDED TO BE LOVED.

THIS SOLVES THE PROBLEM OF THE LAST MIMZY LORDS OF DARK CITY, THIS SOLVES THE RIDDLE OF OGO. I GAVE MY OWN SOUL TO BECOME THE ANSWER, AND BY METAMORPHOSING YALDABOATH INTO DIVINE CHRONOS, I HAVE REESTABLISHED THE CONNECTION OF THE SECOND SOL TO THE PLANE OF THE FIRST SOL. I HAVE BECOME THE OTHER POLE OF THE BATTERY FOR ALL THE GREAT GODS AND GODDESSES OF OLD, THE ANCIENT ONES, ENSURING THAT THE SOL WILL NEVER BURN OUT AND WILL PERPETUATE FOREVER!

I AM MEGISTI-GENERATOR STARPHIRE, THE IMMORTAL LIVING HEART OF GODDESS ISIS-LILITH-INANNA-ISHTAR! THE OLD OGO THAT HAD BEEN METAMORPHOSED INTO THE MASTER OF SPEECH, NOW METAMORPHOSED THROUGH MY SACRIFICE INTO THE MASTER OF SIGHT AS CONSCIOUS AND SUPER CONSCIOUS AWARENESS. I AM ATUM-RA, THE NEW AND RISEN HORUS, THE RESURRECTED BEN BEN PHEONIX CAPSTONE, THE LIGHT BEARING STAR OF THE UROBOROS ENEINING AND MORNING, THE LEVIATHAN PO TOLO STAR OF THE SEA, THE RESTORED HEAD OF ISIS-APOPHUS NO LONGER EATING ITS OWN TAIL! I AM THE LORD OF THE RINGS OF FIRE!

~I am the Heart of the Hydra, the Heart of Goddess Isis, I am AtumRa-AmenHotep, I am Aeon Horus.

I am Divine Chronos, the Yaldaboath Demiurge Metamorphosed, I am the Singularity of the Master Craft of the Black Sun.

Azazil-Iblis-Maymon, Abzu-Osiris-Typhon-Kukulkan, Nummo-Naga.

Mégisti-Generator Starphire~

#illuminati #illuminator #illuminated #lightbearer #morningstar #lucifer #Draconian #anunnaki #enki #enlil #anu #inanna #dumuzi #hermes #trismegistus #Azazel #starfamily #horus #Demiurge #Sophia #archon #AI #blacksun #saturn #iblis #jinn #Maymon #ibis #thoth #egypt #esoteric #magick #dogon #dogontribe #digitaria #nummo #nommo #Naga #tiamat #serpent #dragon #gnosis #gnostic #gnosticism #Anzu #watcher #watchtower #yaldaboath #Sirius #scientology #aleistercrowley #typhon #echidna #ancientaliens #TheGrays #grayaliens #aliens

[sewasideispainless]

The Museum Of Dead Memories

I take a walk through the museum of dead memories

I greet me at the door

The me I was back when you were still around

Before that part of me got drowned

I approach the silverware of regrets exhibit

Starting at the spoons of silence and working my way all the way down to That Fork That Always Bothered Me, you know, the one with two tines as sharp as death

And twice as painful. The one that reminds me that we're all meat just waiting for our diner. A Diner's Club card with no spending limit, an all you can eat feast. A leftover can of Fancy Feast in the cupboard, I can still feel Ruby's fur on windy days. The coffee maker is permanently empty, never again to wake me to the sound and smell of a fresh brew my body can no longer handle. I approach the refrigerator of cold comforts, finding That Milkshake I Drank After I Lost My Wisdom, Teeth various and sundry, some baby most permanent, in a bowl soaking in the milk of kindness, the serial cereal. I hear a pop and the toaster of temptation ejects a charred piece of paper telling me I'm cordially invited to a pool party in The Bathtub That I Can Never Visit Again, the Fountain Of Youth, The Hot Springs Of Healing

My breakfast complete, I continue on to the Bedroom With Blacked Out Windows, I can't stand the darkness outside at night, but the darkness inside is strangely comforting, keeping the Wendigos Of My Downfall at bay, outside with the January Ghoul, amid the flowers blooming out of season, al-affective, disordered but beautiful, a panoply of colours exploding across my mind like an atom bomb of beautiful madness and soulful delirium, forming the forbidden rainbow, the one my family always said was a promise of love, just apparently not from them, for me, for what, I am. I'm grateful that memory is dead as I approach the closet to get clothed in my delusions of the day, brushing the skeletons out of the way, I see the fasteners that made me bleed, leather and metal swinging through the air, and open an umbrella in the house, giving me a lifetime of bad luck, an infinite rainstorm in my head

[opens-up-4-nobody]

My boss: Heya - are we going to meet this week or am I going to lose u to the abyss of science completely?

[hxneyhxrts]

Sun Bleached || Jake “Hangman” Seresin (part 11; final)

Part 10

note: Here it is guys. There’s more of an actual note at the very end, but for now, thank you for reading. Also this moodboard/cover art was made by the insanely talented @newlibrary who I’m completely obsessed with.

warnings: explicit language, mentions of injury, smut (18+)

Like Real People Do

Waking up in a hospital was just as disorienting as the movies made it out to be.

The first thing Gwyn noticed was the smell. Like bleach and something purely sterile. Then the lights, fluorescent and blinding, even when she winced away from them.

It took several minutes to gather herself and when she finally did, memories flooded in like an unstoppable tide.

She’d gotten caught. She had barely managed to eject. But she had, and she gotten away unscathed.

Well, mostly unscathed if the pounding in her head was any indication.

She had trouble remembering more than bits of pieces of her mostly losing dogfight, but what she could remember was enough to make her tremble.

They had been so close. So close to not making it home. The throbbing at her temples increased as unbridled tears spilled down her cheeks.

“Hey, enough of that.”

Her eyes snapped open at Alex’s voice and she let out a wet gasp as he pushed into the small recovery room, donning a hospital gown and slippers that she was pretty sure were hers.

“Alec,” she choked out, lifting her hands to reach for him despite the weight of them. She felt so heavy, exhaustion creeping at all corners of her body.

Her RIO slid into a chair near the bed, grabbing her hand and lacing his fingers through hers. “One hell of a first mission flight.”

His face was lined in shadows, dark circles whispering to her that he had barely slept, and her hand squeezed his desperately.

“What happened?” she whispered.

Alec’s brow furrowed, and the seriousness of the expression almost knocked her sideways. Alec, her Alec, was never serious, even when she wished he would be. He ran through life at a full sprint, arms spread wide and eyes bright. Seeing his stricken expression made her head hurt, more than the migraine looming on the edges of her vision.

“Bradshaw handled that last plane for us,” he muttered, voice thick with what she suspected were unshed tears. “We got dinged pretty badly, lost an engine according to Mav. I ejected, and then I-” he swallowed. “I didn’t see you. And then there was shouting and I still couldn’t see you and I thought…” He looked away from her, fingers beginning to tremble in her grasp. “I thought I had left you behind. And all I could hear was how panicked you sounded and how scared you must have been.”

His dark eyes slid to hers again. “I thought I was losing my best friend. And there was nothing I could do.”

For the first time ever, Gwyn thought he looked small. His shoulders had curled inward and his eyes wandered her face, looking just as lost as he sounded. Tears slid past her lips, the taste of salt laying itself on her tongue bitterly. She loved him so desperately that it made her heart constrict in her chest just to be near him. The anguish in the moments leading up to the hit had been the scariest of her life, but not because she might die. No, that was secondary. It was because of Alec and all that he had left to give the world and how many things he still hadn’t done and how much dimmer the world would be without him.

She tried to smile just to see him do the same. “I guess you’re stuck with me.”

He laughed, a pitiful sound compared to his usual air-shattering cackle, but a laugh nonetheless. He brought his head down to their hands, placing a kiss on the back of hers and watching her with an openness he saved just for her.

“I wouldn’t want it any other way.”

They relaxed into the easy quiet and Gwyn swallowed back a sob.

They were okay.

“Are you hurt?” she croaked, voice tired from being overworked.

At that, Alec grinned, toothy and blindingly perfect. “Not at all,” he snorted. “Bruised rib from that pull-up you did, but not enough to get me a Purple Heart. I already asked.”

Her laugh echoed throughout the room and in her chest where it wreaked havoc on her lungs. She shoved at him with their joined hands, but he only held them to his sternum with a smile.

“I feel like I got hit by a train,” she joked, settling further into the thin hospital pillows.

A finger stroked across the back of her palm. “Close.” Alec propped his chin on their tangled fingers and regarded her closely, assessing something. “You had a rough evacuation, but you made it out at least.”

“The handle was stuck,” and memories of that moment, the fear of pulling and pulling and being firmly locked into her seat as she plummeted stung at her.

Another nod, that same haunted expression returning. “Jammed. The team said that can happen sometimes without routine checks. We got lucky and you managed to yank it loose.” A chuckle, then, “Clipped Hangman’s wing on the way down, but you made it.”

Her breath stilled in her throat.

Jake.

She looked at him, not even bothering to disguise the panic she felt. “What do you mean?”

Alec shrugged, far too casual compared to her rising anxiety. “You were coming down, he was coming up. Lost sight of you in the sun and didn’t see you until you were on his wing.”

She swallowed, fearing the answer he might give her if she asked the question flooding her brain. “Is he…”

Alec smiled. “He’s fine. He ejected right after you did, and the bastard doesn’t have so much as a scrape.”

He was okay.

They were all okay.

And whatever had led up to this, whatever fears she had had before, none of it mattered anymore. Not now.

“I have to talk to him.”

Alec was already shaking his head. “You will. Just not now. You both need to rest.”

He was right. No matter how badly she wanted to buck against his command and stomp right down the hall to Jake’s room, he was right. There would be time for that conversation later, when they had both taken time to rest.

They had all the time in the world.

“Alec,” she whispered, voice heavy and tired. The older pilot looked up at her, and God she was so happy to see those eyes and the light dusting of freckles beneath them that she had always loved. “Would you stay with me?”

She felt the squeeze in her hand. “Of course I will.” He stood up, easing into the empty space on the bed next to her she had slid over to create. Arms wrapped around her, strong and warm and familiar. “Always.”

Silence fell, and she found herself basking in it. The cool, calm quiet she hadn’t expected to ever find again, now enveloping her in a very tangible way, every bit as real as the arms around her. Her breath evened out, long inhales echoing the exhales Alec released against the crown of her head.

“Alec?” she asked, nearly asleep.

He hummed, fingers tightening on her back. “Yes, lovey?”

“Do we still have jobs?”

His answering laugh was loud enough to be heard in the hall.

—---------

Gwyn had begun telling time by which nurse came to check on her. Alec stayed by her side the entire time, chastising her when she tried to send the nurse away with promises of “I’m fine”. He had managed to sweet talk Phoenix into going by Gwyn’s house and retrieving her laptop, and he had set it up on her bedside tray so they could watch an endless stream of trashy reality TV.

Several times she had tried to slip past him and go check on Jake, and several times he had stopped her with a stern glare. Just for a moment, she always insisted. She just needed to see him with her own eyes to be sure he was okay. Alec had run himself tired insisting that yes, he was fine, tucking her back into bed whenever she tried to escape.

Three days of constant battle with her backseater later, Bradshaw swung by to say hi and let it slip that Jake had been discharged not even an hour prior. Disappointment bloomed, but she shook it off with the notion that a hospital was probably the least romantic spot for her to confess her complete devotion to him anyway.

With her new goal of “get out of here as quickly as possible and rush straight to Jake’s side”, Gwyn became the glowing picture of a perfect patient. She sat still when the nurses poked and prodded at her, ate the food they shoved in front of her, and any other task they’d give her. Within two days, the doctor on call had decided she had no significant injury beyond some bumps and bruises, and sent her on her way after a massive stack of discharge papers.

So when Alec shoved her into his car and motored them straight to her house, she was more on edge than normal.

“Alec,” she whined, drawing out the vowels and throwing her head back. “I need to go talk to him.”

The older man scoffed, yanking open the passenger door for her and practically carrying her inside where he unceremoniously dumped her on the couch. “He’s at home collecting himself and you need to do the same.”

Thus, the cycle of junk food and reality TV resumed, but Gwyn impressively made it four hours before complaining again.

The fight that ensued was small, microscopic compared to some of their other arguments, but ultimately ended with Alex dismissing himself to her bedroom with a lighthearted, “I’m heading to bed. It’d be a real shame if someone snuck out while I was asleep and couldn’t stop her.”

She counted five minutes, knowing Alec and how quickly he fell asleep once his head hit the pillow, and slipped out the door.

It was only once she was securely in her car that she realized she was still very much in her lounge shorts and shirt that Alec had shoved her in the moment her feet crossed the threshold, but it didn’t matter. It wasn’t about how she looked or what she wore, it was about how she felt and telling Jake about those feelings.

That didn’t stop her from trying to smooth down her hair before pulling out of the driveway.

What would she say when she got there? Would he even want to talk with her? Was he even interested after she borderline rejected him? And what would happen if he still felt the same? If he still…

loved her.

Gwyn considered turning the car around and driving home, tucking herself in bed next to Alex’s sprawled limbs and snores that resembled a plane engine starting, and pretending she had never left. No one would know how close she was to his house and how close she was coming to admitting her feelings.

But she would know. And she’d scorn herself. Selfishly, she wanted to do this for her. Not for Jake or Alec or any of the team, just for her. Her stomach churned with nerves, but she allowed herself to feel them. This was okay, it was part of the process. She had feelings for Jake and she needed to tell him, not for him, but for her. She needed to know that she had been honest in what she felt, even if Jake no longer felt the same. Coming close had changed something in her, but maybe it had changed something in him, too.

And that could be okay.

The clock on her dashboard read 10:47 by the time she pulled in next to Jake’s car. Memories of being in that car with his hand on her leg shook through her, warming her stomach and spurring her to pull open the car door.

Her feet carried her straight to his front door where she silently paced for a few moments while she worked up the courage to knock. Jake was just on the other side of the door, maybe sleeping or watching TV, having no idea that she was on his porch ready to tell him the biggest news of her life.

All she had to do was knock.

Maybe she should have texted first. Just to let him know she was on her way and keep him from being blindsided. Because surely he wouldn’t appreciate her just showing up at his house and laying all of her feelings at his feet for him to possibly stomp all over. She could still text him, send him a quick message asking to chat and come back another time when they were on an even playing field. Giving him a heads up would be the fairest (and safest) course of action, and maybe she could take the extra day or two to string her thoughts together a little more eloquently. Especially considering the events of the last few days, hitting him with another surprise would only give him whiplash. Coming here unannounced had been a bad idea, but at least no one knew she had come so she could excuse herself without-

The door swung open, a very smug Jake Seresin greeting her on the other side.

“You gonna knock any time soon, or should I just leave you to your pacing?”

Her throat constricted and all the air had been sucked from the space around her.

She swallowed. “You knew I was out here?”

A smile, more teasing than anything, but easier than any expression he’d given her in weeks. “I’ve known since the moment you pulled in.”

God, this was so embarrassing. Her relentless anxiety-induced shuffling had been on display for him to watch from his window or peephole, and she could already hear the teasing that was sure to come for the next several months.

She found she didn’t mind that thought as much as she should.

He pulled the door open a little wider. “Come in.”

Not a question, but not a command either. An invitation. She stepped over the threshold hesitantly, eyes sweeping across the living room. Surprisingly neat and very Jake. Small trophies of his life and snapshots into days spent in the sun or the mountains or with friends. It felt intimate, more intimate than the confession sitting on her lips, to see every corner of his life like this.

Gwyn cleared her throat, eyes trained on a framed picture of Jake and someone she suspected was his mom, with the same green eyes and charming smile. “Can we talk?”

She could feel the air still and Jake freeze along with it. If she thought too long about it, she would back out, so she spun around to look him in his eyes. “Please,” she pleaded quietly.

Jake’s jaw ticked. “Sure.”

This was it. This was the very conversation she had been itching to have. But now that she was here, in the moment, she didn’t know where to begin.

“Baby?” Jake tried gently. His voice rattled her, shaking her very core. “Are you-”

“That day in the locker room,” she interjected quickly, afraid she’d give up and leave if she gave herself too long to think. “Do you remember that?”

He looked at her evenly, eyes flickering between hers. “I do.”

Gwyn gripped the hem of her shorts to keep her fingers from trembling. “You said-” she swallowed, nerves suffocating her. “You said you love me.”

A small smirk lit up Jake’s mouth, a playful one that told her he was trying to make this easier on her, whatever it was. “I said I think I love you.”

And leave it to Jake to almost make her laugh at a time like this. She would’ve thrown her head back in a fit of giggles if she didn’t feel like she was teetering on a very dangerous, very scary edge.

“I think I love you too.”

He froze, jack falling slack. It was done. It was out there, and she couldn’t reign the word back in even if she wanted to. She had said it and now it was real. She was bare before him in a way she had never been with anyone else, and even if this went to shit, she could sleep easier knowing she had said everything she needed to say.

Another minute passed before Jake spoke again, choking out the words. “And if I said I know I love you?”

God.

She blinked back the familiar sting of tears. “Then I love you.”

And she did. She was so helplessly in love with him that it left her vulnerable and unguarded against him. It burned her if she got too close to it and even then she found herself reaching for it at every opportunity.

She loved him.

Silence hung for several moments, and then Jake was crossing the room in three long strides before wrapping her up in his arms and kissing her with a force she should’ve expected from him.

The kiss was intense and hungry and desperate, laying out everything they didn’t say and didn’t need to say. Her hands flew up to grip his shirt while his gripped her hips hard enough to bruise. This was perfect. Of course it was, everything Jake Seresin did was perfect. But this was something altogether different, indescribable in its nature and shape.

They pulled away from each other, panting. The look clouding his eyes made her hands flex in the fabric of his shirt, something he took note of with a very proud smirk.

“You have no idea how long I’ve been waiting to do that,” he whispered, filling what little space was left between them with his voice.

She didn’t have the words to respond. So she kissed him again.

Kissing Jake was like coming up for air in a sea of raw passion. She felt lost in him but his fingers around the flesh at her waist was her lifeline.

Her own hands slid up to tangle in his hair, and the groan he released against her lips made her shiver.

“You better cut that out,” he taunted against her mouth, and she could see why it was so easy for him to get any woman he wanted.

But she wasn’t just any woman and she was certainly not one to back down against him.

“Or what?”

Jake’s mouth returned to hers with renewed vigor, all teeth and tongue while his hands slipped lower on her waist before gripping at her ass roughly.

It was overwhelming, the feeling of him against her, hard and lean and immovable as he palmed at her like a man starved.

Intoxicating.

“You’re the worst,” he breathed, pulling back to kiss his way down her neck where he left bites and licks against her skin. “I’ve spent weeks being tortured by you, leaving me in the locker room, avoiding me at work, getting yourself into trouble and making me worry,” his biting only intensified once he reached the small chain around her throat, a small airplane dangling on the end of it. “And now you show up at my house in the middle of the night in those goddamn shorts and tell me you love me.”

She hadn't realized he’d been slowly backing her up until her legs hit the arm of his couch. “Can't handle me, Seresin?”

Another smirk. “I guess we’ll see.”

A rough shove sent her sprawling against the couch, Jake following after her and swallowing her protest with a kiss.

His fingers trailed down her sides and played with the bottom of her sleep shirt. Her stomach flipped at every brush of his skin against hers, and her pulse skyrocketed when he began to drag the fabric up her torso.

“Is this okay?” he mumbled between kisses.

It seemed silly for him to ask considering how hard she was breathing and how flushed her cheeks were, but she warmed at the sentiment. She gave him a nod and then he was completely pulling her out of her shirt and tossing it somewhere over his shoulder.

He sits up to tower over her and his gaze is piercing as he drags his eyes across her bare chest. Gwyn grips the fabric of the couch to keep herself from covering her body and shielding it from his stare.

He swallows audibly, and lets out a strangled “God” before diving back in to nip and suck bruises into her skin. His mouth sweeps across her sternum and Gwyn is letting out little gasps into the still air that she can’t seem to drink in enough of.

Jake’s hands are wandering across her skin and one eventually travels up to gently grasp at her throat. Not squeezing hard enough to hurt, but enough to keep her still as he continues the assault on her torso. She notices the chain of her necklace wrap around one of his fingers and has to concentrate to choke back the moan that threatens to tear out of her.

Fingers dance lower against her hips until he’s fingering the waistband of her shorts and dragging them down her ankles. Jake pulls his head away from laying sloppy kisses against her stomach to take in the sight of her laid completely naked before him, and a strangled moan slips out of him. Gwyn reaches for his shirt, something close to embarrassment stirring in her chest as his hungry gaze drinks her in, but he stops her by wrapping a strong hand around her wrist and pinning it against the couch.

“No,” his voice is stern, thick with lust. “We’ll get to that. Just-“ he broke off with a curse. “Fuck just give me a second.”

“Jake,” she whispered, fingers curling where he had pinned them down.

Another groan, this one almost pained. “Fuck,” he choked and then he was lowering his head to lick a long stripe up her slit. Gwyn’s hips bucked at the unexpected sensation, a gasp ripping from her chest before she could stop it.

Then he went to work.

Jake’s mouth on her was heated and intense and everything she should’ve expected from “Hangman” Seresin. He was lapping at her like she was fine wine and she found herself already embarrassingly close to the edge.

His lips found her clit where he drew right circles with his tongue that had her seeing stars. She caught the whimper that almost slipped out by throwing her free hand over her mouth, but Jake paused his ministrations in response.

“No,” he huffed and then he was once again pinning her hand down. She struggled to pull her hands free but he only squeezed them harder, pulling them to settle over her stomach so he could fully hold her down. “I have wanted to see you like this since the moment I met you. I’m not gonna let you hold anything back from me.”

God. “Jake,” she whined.

“That’s it,” he encouraged. And then he was bringing his mouth back down on her, sloppily eating her out and groaning against her core at every little whimper, whine, and moan she let loose.

Far too soon, she found herself balancing over that cliff, eyes screwed shut as her stomach tightened into a knot. Her hands were clenched into fists where he had them bound, and her fingers itched to bury in his hair.

“Come on, baby, give it to me,” he muttered against her and then she was coming undone beneath him, throwing her head back in a drawn out whine while her legs shook around his head. She was trembling from the intensity of it as it raced through her limbs and electrified her from the inside out.

Jake still continued to lap at her, even as the aftershocks and overstimulation made her whine pathetically and scramble to get out from his hold. Still, he held her still and licked at every last drop of her, the vibrations of his groans pulsing through her deliciously. She was gasping, trying to force her legs closed against the waves of pleasure he was feeding her, and it wasn’t until she choked out his name again that he pulled away with a starved look in his eye.

He released his grip on her wrists, and she buried her hands in his hair as he dove in to kiss a trail across the neck and chest. “You taste so fucking good,” he groaned, a rough timbre in his tone that made her back arch.

She grasped at the hem of his t-shirt, pushing it up his chest and over his head to reveal an expanse of tanned, toned skin. She had seen him half naked before, particularly at the beach the night he dragged her into a supply closet. But seeing him now, like this, made her head spin.

Jake’s fingers hooked into the waistband of his pants and he pushed them down his strong thighs along with his boxers.

God.

Oh my God.

Gwyn’s breath shuttered as she took in the sight of him naked, all hard lines and muscle. His cock stood straight, achingly hard and thick. He was huge. Of course he was, he was Jake Seresin, and Gwyn should’ve known there was something he was hiding to back up all that cockiness he carried around like a badge.

She leaned in to him, wanting desperately to feel the weight of him in her mouth, but he caught her with a gentle hand to her chest. Still, she pushed against him and once again made to wrap her lips around the length of him.

Jake fisted at her hair, yanking her head back with a force that made her gasp. “Stop,” and there was no room for argument in the tone. “Another time,” he promised, kissing the pout on her lips while keeping his fingers tangled in her locks. “I want to be inside you.”

And how could she argue with that?

He manhandled her on to her stomach, pulling her hips back against him while she buried her head in the couch cushion. Jake’s hands were roughly massaging at her ass again and she hissed at the sting of his teeth biting down on to the swell of it. It would bruise, she was sure, but the idea of him leaving a mark of what they were doing so that she wouldn’t soon forget where he had been gave her a sick sort of satisfaction.

“Please,” she begged, hands curling by her head as she pushed her hips back towards his.

Jake ground into her, the shape of him brushing against her heat. “Please, what?”

And of course he’d make her say it, just to humiliate her a little bit while he had her bent over for him like a whore.

“Fuck me, please,” Gwyn whined. “Need you.”

With a strangled curse, Jake lined himself up and carefully began to push in.

The stretch ached, punching a gasp out of her while he threw his head back with a groan.

“Fuck, baby.” He sounded strained, his voice cutting through the fog enveloping her brain. “So perfect. So perfect for me.”

A desperate moan left her at how rough he sounded, amplifying when his hips drew back before slamming into her once again. The pace he set was immediately bruising. An ache bloomed deep within her at the force of his bones colliding with her ass, and she chased it head first.

His hand found her clit, and he stroked her in slow teasing circles that made her tense up with a groan. Usually she’d be mortified at how quickly she was falling apart around him, but the heat of his thrusts and fingers on her pushed all logical thought from her head.

“Close again?” he asked, not teasing, just observant. Of course he knew, he could read her like a book sometimes. Gwyn was beyond words at this point, only managing an eager nod that seemed to satisfy him. “Go ahead, baby, let me feel you.”

For the second time that night, Gwyn was shaking against him as her orgasm tore through, more intense now that he was buried to the hilt inside her. She was ruined, she thought. No other man would ever come close to making her feel like this, no one could play her like an instrument and make her sing the way he did.

“I love you,” she sobbed out through the mind-numbing pleasure, drawing a sharp curse from the man destroying her with every push of his hips.

His thrusts turned brutal at her words, spurred on by her confession and using it to inflict even more pleasure on to her body. The drag of his cock as it pushed in and out of her cunt made her clench around him, and then hands were grabbing at her throat and waist to pull her flush up against his chest.

I’m the aftermath of her orgasm, her thighs shook from the effort of keeping upright, and Jake’s arm landed around her waist while his other hand held her by the neck as he fucked up in to her.

“One more time, baby,” he groaned. “I want to feel you cum for me one more time.”

“It’s too much,” she whined as her head rolled back against his strong shoulder.

“You can do it.” The praise slipped from his mouth and his fingers tightened around her throat, pressing the cold metal of her necklace into the skin beneath his hand. “You can do one more, right baby? For me?”

Her head spun at the press of his fingers and the pressure of his length brushing her cervix. God, he was big. She nodded, wanting nothing more than to please him. He could’ve asked anything of her in that moment and she would’ve done.

At her nod, his thrusting sped up, sending her speeding towards that cliff again. “That’s it,” voice breathy. “That’s my girl. My perfect girl. All mine.” He groaned as she once again clenched around him desperately. “All mine,” he sighed.

“Yours,” she echoed pathetically, hands scrambling to anchor herself as he fucked her through her words.

Sex had never felt anything like this. No past hookups had ever brought her to this kind of high, bruising her skin and making her head swim.

Just another thing he was fantastic at, she wanted to snark, but that would have to wait until she was a bit more coherent.

“Does that feel good, baby?” Jake asked after she released a particularly loud whimper.

Gwyn answered with another moan as he brushed against that spot that made her feel like she was on fire. She could feel her skin flush from her cheeks down to her stomach.

Everything felt amplified with him, like he had turned her senses up to the max when he was inside of her.

Suddenly, Jake bit down on the space between her neck and shoulder while his fingers squeezed her jaw painfully. A shout broke out of her in the form of a cry and then she was climaxing again, shaking from the intensity of it and the painful pulses of overstimulation that followed. Her vision had gone white, only focusing on Jake’s cock buried inside her and how her walls fluttered around him as he rocked her through her high.

“Fuck,” Jake gasped. He threw his head back even as his grip on her tightened. “God, baby, I’m gonna cum.”

If she wasn’t so spent, she would have finished again at his words and how he practically growled them in her ear.

“Where should I cum, baby? Huh?” his teasing tone brushed against her skin, making her fists clench at how hot the whole situation was.

“I- I need-“ she tried to force out, but the rhythm of his hips made her stutter pitifully.

“Use your words,” Jake commanded, biting at her earlobe.

“In me,” she whined out, unable to find any ounce of shame at the words. “Please.”

The shout Jake released was loud and full of unrestrained wildness that she rarely saw from him. He ground out a curse as he thrust into once, twice more before spilling himself into her with a drawn out groan. It was sick the way she nearly got off on the hot feel of his release against her walls. Jake continued to canter his hips against hers, fucking every last bit of himself into her until she was trying to writhe away with a whine.

He pulled out of her with a sigh, laying a kiss to the space between her shoulder blades before laying her on her stomach. “I’m gonna grab a rag, okay?”

She mumbled non-committedly and listened to his soft footfalls carry him away. Her head was lost in the clouds, higher than any plane could ever take her.

Jake returned, rag in hand, and began the process of gently cleaning her up. He was careful in his ministrations, eyes watching her face to be sure he wasn’t being too rough on her.

“Was that okay? Did I hurt you?” he asked, wiping at the slick staining her thighs.

Gwyn huffed a small laugh, a breathy sound that was taxing on her already exhausted body. “It was good,” she assured.

His eyebrows rose, a small teasing look crossing his face. “Just ‘good’? Damn.”

She let out a brighter laugh this time, chest easing at that look in his eye. Familiar. Very Jake. “Well if I told you how I really felt, your ego would be unstoppable. So yeah, just ‘good’.”

Jake’s fingers brushed her hair behind her ear. “Sit up for me baby, let’s get you dressed.”

Getting “dressed” meant Jake sliding one of his much too large t-shirts over her body. He fussed with the collar of it before helping her stand and steering her towards the bedroom.

His bedroom.

A low whistle sounded from behind her and then Jake was grabbing at her bare ass again. “You look so good in my clothes. Better get you in bed before I jump your bones again.”

Gwyn chuckled, batting his hands away and sinking beneath the blankets he pulled back for her. His bed was warm, cozy, and incredibly inviting. She nestled down into the sheets as he slid in alongside her and pulled her across the mattress so she was flush against him.

“Hi,” she breathed, looking up at him while he stared at her. “What are you thinking?”

He smiled, tucking a loose strand of hair behind her ear and laying a chaste kiss to her forehead. “I’m thinking I love you.”

Butterflies erupted in her stomach, and for the first time since meeting him, Gwyn felt her spirit settle.

She fell asleep to the quiet sounds of his breathing and the steady pound of his heartbeat.

————

Beach day was brutal. The California sun was burning through the layers of sunscreen Gwyn had forced everyone to lather on, and the smell of sweat tainted to air around them. Dogfight football had turned into dogfight soccer somehow, a game both Gwyn and Jake had tapped out of. A chorus of wolf whistles and crude shouts played out at their surrender, but they laughed it off and planted themselves in the sand a few paces away.

Waves crashed against the shore, lapping at some of their team members while they ran and dodged and tackled each other in a manner that was very much not soccer, but no one was complaining so he didn’t see any need to referee.

Jake looked at the woman beside him, her eyes focused on the game, a smile pulling at her lips.

He loved her. So much. Enough that it hurt.

And she loved him too.

Nothing else mattered beyond that, he supposed.

Gwyn’s eyes met his, her brow furrowing at the intensity of his stare. He wanted to kiss her stupid, tackle her and brush his lips against hers until she was giggling.

She laughed, a musical sound. “What are you thinking?”

Jake smiled, lacing his fingers through hers and laying a kiss across the back of her hand. His eyes turned back to his team and the sun setting behind them.

“You already know.”

Part 1 of Rain Soaked

taglist: @rachelccollier @my-soulmate-is-mycroft @the-winter-marvel33 @barbiewritesstuff @dilfsandtherapy @dempy @itevilhag @supernaturaldawning @katesmadness @roses-and-grasses @tallrock35 @rosiahills22 @unstablecaffeinatedmind

final note: thank you guys so much for reading along, it really means a lot to me and you’ll never know how happy it’s made me doing this with all of you. so now for other news… i have more to write about these two, if you guys would be interested. i think there’s more of a story to tell and i’d love to write about it if that’s what you guys want. let me know besties and love you all