#antha arc

[darkboysroadtrip]

Question for Antha, what was your daughters name?

Also, how did you die -bubble

Antha smiles sadly but she wants to answer your question.

She glides over to one of the large windows overlooking the back of the house, she puts her hand to the glass and it fogs over.

She writes 'Melody' on the window.

Then she looks past the window and points, her eyes glaze over and her brows knit as she stares at the circular, rotting, wooden hatch in the ground.

The children all go to look at it.

"What is that?" Patton asks.

They look up to her.

She writes 'well' on the glass.

"You died in a well?"

She see saws her hand in the motion for 'kind of'.

She puts her finger back to the glass, she makes a little drawing.

It's simple but it gets the point across.

The well, no longer covered up with the wood and overgrowth, a woman falling into it... No not falling - being pushed.

Everyone's eyes go wide, Patton's hands go to his mouth.

"That's terrible" Virgil whispers.

"Who did it?" Logan asks, her kitten ears are flattened to her head and she's stroking her tail.

Anthas eyes narrow, there's hatred behind them now - words appear on the window now without her scrawling them with her finger.

Someone I trusted.

[musicloverdani]

Every time I think about ACOTAR because someone on one of my timelines mentions it, I’m reminded of how much I liked it until we get to the Under the Mountain sequence. For me it went from a fun read to pure garbage very suddenly once we meet Ama*antha and Rhys& has more of a role in the story. It still makes me mad.

But at least I finished that one. Everyone hyped up the second book as better, but I was so bored, especially by Rhy*and. Who I really don’t understand the love for. From what I’ve read up to (cause I DNF’d ACOMAF at I want to say 75%. I just did not care about what was happening) not only is he badly written with no character arc, the romance between him and Fe*re reads so much like...Alina and the Darkling

Oh wait, I think I do get it. Cause lots of people still ship Alina and the Darkling. And in both cases they involve a century/centuries older man emotionally manipulating a powerful teenager into doing what he wanted.

Reading the Grisha trilogy now I see why antis say ACOMAF is basically fan fiction of the Grisha Trilogy only somehow more boring. But those who wanted Alina and the Darkling to be together and are forever unsatisfied that Leigh Bardugo doesn’t write the Darkling as if he’s a romantic but tortured dark hero, can get a worse version of it with Rhys/nd andF/yre.

I get it. It’s just not for me.

[aftselakhis-shaladin]

Ladies' Month Challenge

I'll cheat and do it in one post.

Fave lead: Edith Cushing (Crimson Peak)

Fave support: Haruka Tenou (Sailor Moon)

Used to hate but now love: none

Relate to: Shiori Takatsuki (Revolutionary Girl Utena)

Female fave from a male driven show: Nena Trinity (Gundam 00)

Fave female driven shows: Sailor Moon, Madoka, Symphogear, Steven Universe

Needs more screen time: Sincline girls (Voltron Legendary Defender), Diamonds (Steven Universe)

Fave in comedy: Haruhi Fujioka (Ouran High School Host Club)

Fave in drama: Kaoru Orihara (Brother Dear Brother)

Fave in scifi/supernatural: Cagalli Yuna Antha (Gundam Seed)

Fave in children's show: Pearl (Steven Universe)/ Allura (Voltron Legendary Defender)

Fave in a movie: Maleficent (Maleficent duh)

Fave in a book: Luna Lovegood (Harry Potter series)

Fave old lady: Tae Seragaki (Dramatical Murder)

Fave growth arc: everything in Revolutionary Girl Utena

Fave mother: Hana (Wolf Children)

Fave warrior: Oscar de Jarjeyes (Rose of Versailles)

Fave non-warrior: Anthy Himemiya ( Revolutionary Girl Utena)

Fave non-human: Pearl (Steven Universe)

Fave antagonist: Lucille Sharpe (Crimson Peak)

Screwed by canon: Tara Markov (Teen Titans)

Fave others hate: Shiori Takatsuki ( Revolutionary Girl Utena), Tara Markov (Teen Titans), Nena Trinity (Gundam 00)

Fave platonic relationship: Inner Senshi in Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon (life action)

Fave romance: Haruka Tenjou and Michiru Kaiou (90s Sailor Moon anime)

Fave familiar relationship: never paid much attention to this aspect

Fave female character from a story at least a century old: not fond of stories so old

A female character you have extensive personal canon for: no idea what is this supposted to mean

Fave writer: Hagio Moto

Fave female-centric fic: Persephone's Waltz by Sailor Ptah

Fave from a fantasy show: Azula (Avatar: The Last Airbender)

[darkboysroadtrip]

So kiddos what is this road trip about?

They started this trip as adults, when they were turned into children their memories became fuzzy about their adult lives.

Remus hums, "I think for fun?"

"That sounds about right for you" Roman snickers.

"Speaking of the road trip" Logan says then points to the car, "we should move that somewhere in case someone comes to check on the fire."

"I guess we can put it in the trees?" Remus suggests.

"How?"

Remus shrugs "idnno, you're the brainiac."

Antha raises her hands as a 'don't worry I've got this'.

She glides to the car, circles around it a few times then dives into it; the car starts on its own and drives itself into the trees, camouflaging as best it can.

Antha drifts out of the trees back to the group; she does a little bow when the children clap.

[darkboysroadtrip]

"You guys gotta get up here!" Remus says.

Roman crosses his arms, "how we sposed to do that?" he asks.

"Uh, I guess Antha can take you up?"

"Antha?" Patton tilts his head.

"Yeah the ghost lady! One sec I'll ask her!" and then he's gone.

The ghost lady -Antha- appears a few seconds later, she quietly hovers in front of them.

Now that she's close enough to see her facial features you notice that she has soft, kind eyes.

Her hair is swirling around her as if she were underwater it may have been black at some point but her ghostlyness makes it look a deep blue.

Her skin is translucent and deathly pale, there are shimmers across her face and shoulders like sparkled freckles.

Her clothing, despite looking like it's stuck to her seems like it's dripping and soaked, she's wearing an elegant evening gown and no shoes.

She holds out her arms to the boys, she doesn't say anything but they understand her as if she spoke out out.

They all walk towards her slowly, warily - and when they huddle into her embrace, it's cold but strangely comforting.

With a shiver running through all of them her mist envelopes them and they're gone.

Not even a second later they're in a different room - an attic space with no entry way in or out except the small square in the floor where Remus popped his head out from.

The space is littered with plants and flowers, half of the roof is skylight to let the sun pour in.

There's holes in the wooden parts of the roof where animals and little critters seemed to have been able to come through - there are birds nests, small rodents scurrying around and chittering.

It's beautiful in a overgrown decrepit sort of way.

"Where are we?" Virgil asks.

"Her sanctuary" Logan says from behind them.

They all whirl around and see Logan sitting at a table with Thomas, safe and sound.

"Logan! Thomas!" They shout happily then rush in to hug them; Patton starts crying again but this time from happiness.

Remus joins in on the pile by throwing himself at them.

Thomas giggles at the group hug and Logan's tail wraps around the group.

[asks and interaction is payment for more story! The best deal of the century folks! It can't be beat!]

[darkboysroadtrip]

As they walk Antha lifts into the sky every now and then to make sure they're still on their course.

They've been walking for around fifteen minutes now, the long grasses were hard to trudge in and Thomas got tired of trying to keep up and annoyed at how much he was tripping and being tangled, being four is hard when everything is big.

So Patton has him on his back now, Thomas dozing in and out of sleep every few seconds.

The long grass turns into a dirt pathway, it's not far now until the cemetery.

The sky gets darker with every minute that passes and with the last five or so minutes that have passed to get to their destination it's almost completely darkened.

They stand before a rickety metal gate with broken hinges and rusty fencing.

Antha blows the gate open and zooms off to look at the tombstones.

She's not exactly sure where Melody is buried but she knows it's here somewhere.

It doesn't take her long to find it though, she guides them to the worse for wear grave.

It reads:

Meoldy Hugo.

Beloved Daughter, from a loving mother.

Beloved Mother to a sweet little boy.

And Beloved Niece to a brave aunt.

Loved by the community sadly taken too soon.

1971 - 1993

Antha kneels at her daughters grave, her hand resting on the face of it.

Her own face is saddened to read of how young Melody was when she died.

Antha looks over to the grave next to Melody's, it's her own, her eyes narrow at the empty grave but then turns to fire when she notices the one next to hers.

The fire in her eyes turn quite literally when she destroys the already crumbling stone then turns her attention to the children.

Her eyes soften at them before she swirls herself around the group, surrounding them in a ghostly hug.

She then floats to the back of Melody's grave and hovers there.

Logan walks up first, she takes the locket out of her pocket.

The others walk up in front of the grave with Logan.

"I wish we could have known you more" Patton says.

"Yeah" Virgil agrees, "having a ghost friend around would be super cool."

"Imagine the pranks we could pull!" Remus adds.

"No one would see them coming" Dee says.

Antha laughs a silent little laugh at the children's thoughts.

Logan looks up at Antha, her brows knit together in confusion which is not something that happens often.

"I'm not sure what this feeling is but..." she trails off trying to think of her words, "I feel a kind of connection with you and I'm going to miss you."

Antha smiles down at Logan, she cups her cheek and kisses her forehead.

Logan smiles, for reasons unknown to herself soft tears start to fall and she tries to wipe them away but they won't go.

She kneels with the still falling tears and digs a hole deep enough so the locket wouldn't get dug up.

For once she doesn't care about how dirty she is, the mud on her hands and under her nails don't seem to bother her as of right now.

She looks up from her position on the ground to see softness in Antha's eyes.

"Bye" her voice comes out softer than expected, she places the locket in the hole and buries it.

Almost immediately Antha starts to glow, a bright brilliant silver with sparkles and streaks of elegant blues.

Her form twirls and swirls, she's practically dancing around them as her form changes from her ghostly aura to a more solid person.

The deathly paleness of her tanned skin leaves her, the shining spots on her face and arms stay shining however more freckle looking than before, her hair is now tamed from the water like movements it had.

Her dress is now cleaned and devoid of rips and the gash around her throat has vanished.

For the first time she's able to speak to them.

"Thank you, all of you" she glances to each one of them -tenderness solid in her words- "I would never be able to thank you enough, you seven have made my last moments as a spirit wonderful, not to mention the only ones to ever even try to help."

"Of course we would" Patton says, "we couldn't not."

Antha smiles "I hope you keep that kindness and tenderness in your hearts, the world needs more of it."

One last glance around, she ends on Logan.

She lands her hand on Logan's head petting her, "I must go now, I wish nothing but amazingness and joy for you - all of you."

And then in a brilliant flash, she's gone.

[darkboysroadtrip]

We love arson 🔥 -bubble

Seriously though. REMUS AND ROMAN ARE YOU KIDDING ME

Remus jumps up, his hands in the air he's very happy about today's turn of events.

"We set a house on fire!! We found a ghost! Can this day get any better!"

Logan shakes her head, "that was very dangerous and stupid" she chastises.

Roman jumps up with his brother - equally as joyful, "but we did it Logan!"

She raises her brows "did it? Yes the house is on fire and you're lucky no one got hurt!"

Antha lays her hand on Logan's head -right between her cat ears- and pats a little.

Logan sighs "I know you wouldn't have let us get hurt."

Patton looks up at Antha, "are you stuck on this property until we bury the locket?"

She shakes her head, Logan explains- "she's bound to the locket, wherever it goes she goes."

"Do you know where Melody is buried?" Patton asks.

Antha floats upwards a little and points in a direction.

"Is it far?" Logan asks.

Antha shakes her head no.

"Is it walkable?"

Antha nods.

"Alright, I guess that's where we'll be going now."

[darkboysroadtrip]

Remus is practically vibrating thinking about what they get to do now.

This has been a long time coming and finally they get to set something on fire.

He rushes into the dining room where they left the bottle of alcohol to grab it.

"Okay what do we do now?" He says, he's very ready for this.

"I suppose we can put fabric in it, light that and throw it in the house from a safe distance" Logan suggests.

"Safe distance doesn't sound as fun" Remus responds.

Logan's ears flatten with agitation "we don't need any more injuries."

Remus pouts, "but I wanna be close to the action."

"Yeah, the action of getting hurt" Virgil nudges Remus with his elbow.

Remus sticks his tongue out at Virgil - Virgil shoots it back at him.

"Would one bottle of alcohol even do much?" Dee asks.

"More explosives!" Remus shouts "yes yes more!"

"The wood is brittle and old enough to light up pretty well" Logan says, "I don't think we'll need more."

"On it!" Remus says, he takes the lighter from his pocket, stuffs a random piece of fabric in the bottle but with his injured hand he can't light it.

"On it?" Logan asks incredulously whirling on Remus, she sighs in relief when she notices that he can't light it.

Remus shoves the lighter to Roman and holds out the bottle, "here light it!"

Roman shrugs "yeah okay."

"No not okay!" Logan yells, but it's too late the fire has taken to the rag.

"Oh damn Remus I think you need to throw that!" Virgil says starting to panic.

Remus turns around to look for a place, "where?"

"Just throw it!" Virgil yells.

Remus tosses it not paying attention to where he does, the bottle shatters on the stairs railing, the liquid scatters the flames about and it catches quickly.

Patton yelps and scoops Thomas up to run for the door.

Logan and Roman follow close behind.

Remus stares at it wide eyed, the fire is everywhere but he can't seem to feel the heat of it.

Dee and Virgil grab each of Remus' hands to pull him out with the rest.

They all go stumbling out into the tall grass of the front yard, they don't stop until they get to the car.

Other than their panting and huffing it's no one makes a sound.

Then Remus starts to laugh.

His laughter is light and jubilant -it's contagious- the others start to laugh with him as they're staring at the flames.

The sense of danger from this whole experience seems to have fully dissipated and now a calm washes over the group.

[darkboysroadtrip]

Haha idiots you're stuck there! There's no way out! - 🧠

Antha narrows her eyes, she doesn't like you.

She waves off your idiocy and opens her arms to the group.

They all huddle into her presence, her mist swirls around them and they're transported to the front door.

"Hehehe who's the idiot now?" Remus taunts.

[darkboysroadtrip]

Can she show us what happened? 🎈

Anthas face scrunches with thought, then one small nod.

It's not a happy story, she scrawls on the window.

The children nod.

"I wouldn't think it would be" Logan says.

"Maybe if you can just shield it from Thomas?" Dee asks.

Very well she responds.

She glides back away from the window, she motions for the kids to stay where they are and when they don't move she stills.

Her eyes close, her face furrows in concentration, cold steam starts to pour from her being covering her, when the steam gets thick enough her hands move in a way a conductor would.

But instead of music she's leading it's pictures that start to form with her movements.

And more surprising, noise starts to fade in as the image gets clearer, it's echoey but not hard to hear.

Humming is heard, a light beautiful meoldy.

And then we see hands putting things into a small elegant hand bag as if we were the ones doing it.

The sound of a door closing, we turn to see a woman walking through it, it's not Antha.

"Oh sister dear! Look at you all ready to be going out tonight! You look marvelous!" The woman gushes at her.

"Thank you" the person who we're seeing out the eyes of says, her voice is soft.

"So, where is that niece of mine?" the woman asks.

"She's already gone to bed, it's late and I would like it if you wouldn't wake her."

The woman waves that away "pish posh Antha! She would love to see me and this gift I brought her!"

"Another gift sister? It's almost as if you're trying to buy her love" Antha laughs a little at her joke.

Her sisters face slackens like she didn't find it funny but she brightens it back up quickly.

"Oh ha ha, I just love her so much! You know that!" she puts the parcel down on the hall table and when she speaks again her voice has a sadness to it underlined with manipulation, "besides after my own little one didn't make it you can let me live vicariously through her."

Antha sighs and lets it go, we look up at the clock, Antha gasps "oh no I'll be late!" we rush to the door then look back "don't wake Melody, you can see her tomorrow."

Her sister waves her off "fine fine."

We leave the house.

The mist swirls and the scene changes, we're in the back yard now, rushing to the well.

A snap is heard and Antha falls to the ground, she curses, turns and yanks off her broken heels.

She gets back up to her feet sprinting to the well, her hair falls around her vision as she stares down into the blackness.

"Melody!" She screams "baby if you can hear me please hold on! Help is on the way!"

"Oh Antha, no one is coming."

We whirl to see her sister walking towards us.

"Wh-what do you mean? You said Melody"-

She's cut off by a sharp laugh "Melody is upstairs in her bed, not privvy to anything going on here."

"What?" Antha whispers, the confusion is very clear in her voice.

"I have decided on something dear sister"- she walks forwards -"and that decision involves you not being here anymore."

Anthas head shakes "what are you talking about?"

The next few seconds are fast but it feels like slow motion.

A flash of metal swings across her throat.

Her locket falls to the ground.

Her sister pushes her into the well.

The last thing she sees is Melody, in her bedroom window looking down at her mother being murdered by her aunt.

Then darkness and a splash.

The steam evaporates and we're back in the attic sunroom.

Anthas form is barely visible anymore, but you can see that her eyes are screwed shut and her jaw is clenched, she's slumped like her limbs were too heavy.

The gang all either have tears in their eyes or have them running down their faces.

"Oh goodness" Patton says, his voice small, he and Roman are sandwiching Logan in their arms.

Logan takes off her glasses to wipe her eyes.

Virgil is gripping tight to Remus' hand and Dee has his arms around one of Remus' arms.

"Not a happy story at all" Roman says blinking his own tears away.

Amid the gloomy atmosphere Thomas' voice rings out "here!"

They all look towards the youngest, he's standing right in front of Antha, he has flowers in his little hands he holds one out to her.

"You look sad! Flowers help!"

She glances down at him, a smile tugs her lips up, she reaches for the flower, despite her form not being fully solid the flower is held.

Thomas then runs up to the rest of them handing them each a flower.

"No sads" he declares.

[darkboysroadtrip]

The children are all still huddled together, happy to know that no one has been hurt.

Well, no one since Remus hurt his finger earlier.

Antha floats patiently watching their hug pile of a reunion.

Virgil speaks first, "hey yeah why did she take you?"

They untangle themselves to look curiously over at Antha.

But Logan answers the question for her, "she needs our help."

Understanding floods Virgil's eyes "oh" he says, "that makes sense ghosts usually do right?"

"She just wanted our attention" Patton says and starts to walk towards the ghost woman, "you didn't mean to scare us."

She shakes her head -no- there was never any danger here, she merely needed someone to help; there's apology written on her face.

"It's okay" Patton says, "we'll help you."

She takes Patton's hands in thanks, he shivers at her touch.

"What does she need us to do?" Asks Dee.

Logan holds up a locket, it's old silver, there are flowers carved into it; Logan opens it.

They all peer at the small photo of a smiling mother and child, she has dark hair and sun kissed skin, the little girl laughing in her arms is almost identical to her.

"What do we do with it?" Roman asks.

Again Logan answers, "she wants us to bury it at her daughters grave. She also has one other request."

"Wassat?" Remus asks.

"When we leave here, she wants us to destroy the house."

Remus' eyes go wide and a very excited smile forms, "oh hell yes."

[Antha can be asked questions until they put her to rest.]

[darkboysroadtrip]

Am I able to hug Antha? -bubble

You may not be able to physically hug her but she feels the warmth of your intent, it is comforting and she motions a 'thank you' in sign.